A Glass of Crazy

I bolted up. A plastic mask smashed itself against my face. I grabbed for the mask, but my hands were stuck. Not stuck, shackled. My hands were shackled to a rail on each side of the bed like a crazy person or a prisoner. Tubes projected from my arms and connected to an I.V. drip bag. I was in a hospital.

  I almost died. I left my body and went to the ceiling. I was pretty sure that qualified for almost dying. I needed to stay awake. Falling asleep could equal death. I would force myself to stay awake, no matter what-keep my eyes open, concentrate.

  I shivered in the cold. The room was gray. I didn't notice that until a light peeked in. Someone pushed the door ever-so-slowly. It felt eerie and I wished they'd hurry up and come on in. I didn't see how things could possibly get any worse, unless the person sneaking in the door was a serial killer. I blinked slowly, waiting. It was Rafa.

  "Help me get these things off." I rattled the handcuffs on the metal side rails.

  Rafa's eyes grew wide like I was a ghost or something. "You're awake," he said.

  "There has to be a key around here." My voice cracked. "Turn on the lights and find it."

  Rafa ran out of the room, screaming, "She's awake, she's awake!"

  Ohmygod. Was I the only sane person left on the planet? My eyes scoured the room for a key, but every tabletop looked like sterilized gray Formica, untouched by human fingerprints, and then my eyes stopped and zeroed in on Rafa's duffle bag that was draped over my suitcase in the corner of the room. Before I had time to finish saying WTF, the lights came on and three medical people in scrubs surrounded me. One shone a flashlight in my eye.

  I squirmed. "If you're looking for me, I'm right here!"

  Without a word, he looked inside my other eye. When he finished, he said, "Follow my pen with your eyes."

  It's not like I had anything else to do. My eyes wandered around in my head, following the stupid pen wherever it went.

  "Can you hear me?" another one asked. And then he said it loud and slow. "Can. You. Hear. Me?"

  The man was living proof that I was the only sane person left on the planet. "If I couldn't hear you," I said patiently, "I wouldn't have been following the pen with my eyes." But the mask had muffled my voice, which explained why they were ignoring me and talking to each other.

  A wave of dizziness washed over me and I closed my eyes. My mind melted into the pillow and my breathing slowed. I was drifting back to sleep and I couldn't make myself stop.

  The memory of looking down at my body floated into my head. My eyes thrashed open. Rafa stood next to me and the medical people were gone. I forced my eyelids open as far as possible and refused to even blink. "Stay awake," I said inside the oxygen mask, "I'm awake."

  Rafa took my hand. His puffy eyes gazed down at me. Thin lines of tears glistened on his cheeks. I squeezed his hand tight, afraid to let go.

  With my other hand, I pointed to the mask. "Take it off, please."

  Rafa lifted the mask enough for me to ask, "Why am I pinned down like a wild animal?"

  He gently put the mask back into place. "They said you are under arrest for many things. Your mom, she is almost here. I promised I would stay with you."

  "Arrested for what?" I shouted. "Get this mask off!"

  "I can't," he said. "You need it to breathe. Just listen and I will tell you."

  I squished my eyes to hold in the tears that were coming. Whatever it was, it was bad. I'm not the kind of person who gets arrested. Maybe I was in a car accident. But why would I get arrested for that?

  "The police, they will not tell me everything." Rafa stroked my hand softly. "They will only tell your parents. I told them your dad, he lives in Mexico." His voice was weary. "They, they called your mom. She can tell you more. All I know is they said multiple charges. This is all they would say to me. There is a police lady sitting outside the door."

  Warm tears slid down both sides of my head and creeped into my ears. Because I was being held captive, I couldn't wipe them. I couldn't even ask for a tissue because of the stupid mask on my face. Maybe it was some kind of weird water-in-the ears torture system they used to get people to confess. But how could I confess? Wait, how could I deny everything? I had no idea what I'd done.

  Rafa hunched over me and wiped my tears. "You almost died."

  That was true. It was the only part I remembered.

  "How?" I muffled weakly underneath the mask.

  "They said you have alcohol poison."

  "Huh?" With the mask muffling my voice, I said, "Maybe the policewoman outside the door can tell me what happened."

  Rafa lifted the mask and I said it again.

  He nodded. "I'll get her."

  When Rafa opened the door, Queen Doreen's voice came bellowing in from the hallway. "Your daughter needs a lawyer!" she was screaming in the phone as she blew in the room.

  My stomach twisted. My eyes followed the clear plastic tubing from my arm up to the IV bag. If I could get an IV bag of vodka, one drop at a time, that would be perfect because then I wouldn't over drink.

  "Thank God you're all right." Mom tossed everything in a chair and wiped my tears, which I'd completely forgotten about. She lifted the mask and placed it on my forehead. "How did this happen?"

  She was definitely asking the wrong person. I looked away. "I was hoping someone could tell me."

  "She does not know anything," Rafa said. "I do not know anything. I was not there." Rafa said it like he felt guilty. Hurting myself didn't bother me nearly as much as hurting Rafa. He was so sweet, unlike me. "Do you want me to leave now?" Rafa asked Mom.

  Mom's eyes examined both of us, sizing us up on her bull crap meter.

  "No honey, sit down. I told them you were her brother so they'd let you stay in the room until I got here." Mom clenched her jaw. "I still can't believe Gwen Applegate left you here like this."

  "She was poisoned with alcohol," Rafa said. "That is all I know."

  "Someone poisoned me?" I asked.

  "No one poisoned you," Mom said calmly. "You overdosed on alcohol. That's called alcohol poisoning. They weren't sure you were going to make it." Mom's voice was shaking.

  Who knew you could overdose on alcohol? I thought that only happened to druggies. I closed my eyes. The beer bong boys. Tequila. It must have been the combination of beer and tequila. I might have had some vodka that day, too.

  I heard my ringtone. Rafa pulled my phone out of his pocket. He read the screen and silenced the phone. With eyes squinted, he snarled at the phone and said something in Spanish.

  "Who is it?" Mom said. "Give me that."

  "Excuse me, but it's MY phone." I turned my palm up and raised my hand the maximum six inches allowable by law.

  "You are no longer in charge of your life." Mom took the phone and read the screen. "Who is Daniel?"

  Daniel. I closed my eyes and smiled. Whenever I closed my eyes, waves of blurriness washed through my brain and made me sleepy. I kept my eyes closed anyway. I wanted Mom and Rafa to go away.

  I don't know how long I slept, but when I awoke, they were still there. My mouth was dry and gritty like beach sand. I needed water. Rafa and Mom weren't looking at me, which was good because I needed a break from them more than I needed water. The last thing I remembered was sitting on the beach with the Beer Bong Boys. More than anything, I wanted to talk to Daniel. He wanted to talk to me, too.

  Without moving my head to tip off my captors that I was awake, I slid my eyes around the room, searching for my phone. The Queen of Control probably had it in her purse. With my hands cuffed, I had zero chance of getting the phone. The handcuffs definitely had to go and if anyone could get them off, it was Queen Doreen.

  "I need water," I said in a raspy voice that was totally real.

  Mom jumped up. "Of course you do." She poured water from a Styrofoam pitcher into a plastic cup. "The doctors said you're dehydrated from all that alcohol." She tipped the cup to my lips and my tongue absorbed the water, like dry sand absorbing a cold ocean wave.

  "More,"
I said. My tongue had hogged all the water and there was nothing left to swallow. Mom tilted the cup again. This time, cold water passed through my raw throat. I took several swallows. What I really needed was Daniel's beer bong to get the whole pitcher of cool water into my stomach.

  "Slow down, honey."

  She pulled the cup away and I wanted to say something totally smartass, but my body let out a huge sigh of relief instead. I needed to know why I was under arrest, but I really didn't want Mom to be the one explaining it to me. I rubbed my eyes and that's when I noticed my hands were free.

  Maybe it was all a bad dream-the mean prison guard, dying and going to the ceiling, the handcuffs. I lifted my hands to check for any marks on my wrists. The red marks were real, but what bothered me more was the fact that my hands were trembling like I had some kind of weird neurological disorder.

  "Lovely," I said. "Let's add Parkinson's to the list of reason I'm having the worst day ever."

  "You don't have Parkinson's," Mom said.

  Again, the big door opened slowly and I was tired of guessing who was going to come in next. It had to be a doctor or a nurse since Rafa and Mom were here.

  "Hey, sugar dumpling."

  "Ohmygod, Dad!"

  Mom rolled her eyes and stood up. Dad nearly knocked Mom over making a beeline for me. Mom hastily gathered her things and headed for the door. Rafa stayed put for the drama that was about to unfold with the arrival of Dad. It was the diva in him.

  Mom turned back. "Don't expect any father-of-the-year awards, John. If you had supervised your child in Mexico, she wouldn't be here."

  Sometimes Mom was a real witch. Clearly, she was having a relapse from that nice, new personality they'd given her at the treatment center back in November.

  Dad lowered the jail bar that I had been shackled to earlier and sat on the edge of the bed. He squeezed my trembling hands and then pulled me into his arms. "You don't have to do this alone, sweet baby. We're gonna do this together."

  I had no idea what he was talking about. "Are you my lawyer?" I guessed. "Do I need one?"

  "Yes and yes," Dad said. "I've already talked to the police and we're working on a deal."

  "Will someone please tell me what's going on!" I screamed.

  "Calm down, baby. I'm fixin' to tell you everything I know."

  Rafa moved to the other side of the bed and lowered the railing, too. He pulled a chair up close.

  "What do mean, 'a deal?' Are they trying to give me the death sentence?"

  Dad looked sad as he gazed down at me. It was eerie because I knew how he felt. I'd felt the same way when I was at the ceiling looking down at myself.

  "Metaphorically speaking, you do have a death sentence to deal with. But that doesn't have anything to do with the police."

  "Now I'm totally confused."

  "Let's take one thing at a time," Dad said. "They have four charges against you."

  I held my breath.

  "Public intoxication. That's number one." Dad had that professional lawyer tone. It was the tone he used to explain super emotional things in a matter-of-fact way. It put me at ease because I was getting sick of my feelings.

  "Now, we can't argue with that," he said. "Your blood alcohol level was point three nine. A point zero eight is legally drunk."

  It took a minute to process the numbers in my brain. Meanwhile, Dad's eyes welled up and his tone changed. "Baby, a point four o is legally dead. I almost lost you."

  Rafa sniffled.

  No, no, no, it was not time to cry. I wanted answers. I needed Dad to get back into legal mode and stay there.

  "I have no intention of arguing with the fact that I was drunk," I said. "What else?"

  Dad cleared his throat. "Number two, vandalizing state property."

  "What!" I bolted up.

  Rafa's eyes got big, like he was watching a horror movie.

  "They have photos of the signs you allegedly painted. Badass on the beach." Dad raised his eyebrows like he was trying to keep a straight face.

  Something clicked in my brain. "I remember talking about painting the signs, but not actually doing it. How do they know I did it?"

  Dad stayed in professional lawyer mode and said, "There's a video of you on You Tube, sitting on a boy's shoulders painting the sign."

  "I do not remember that," I said.

  Dad shrugged. "Doesn't matter. They have the video. The boy was arrested, too."

  "Daniel? Was it Daniel?"

  Dad scratched his head. "I think that was his name."

  "Well, it could have been Bobby or Brad," I said.

  Rafa cleared his throat.

  "What were you doing drinking with a bunch of boys?" He was clearly in dad mode now. Rafa bristled while Dad unfolded a piece of paper. Completely exasperated, I opened my mouth to speak when Dad said, "Daniel."

  I let out a guilty sigh. The whole thing was my idea and Daniel had been arrested, too. Now I was the one getting teary. No. Stop. "Let's finish this," I said. "What else?"

  Dad took a deep breath. "Resisting arrest and assaulting a police officer."

  "What?" I shrieked. "I do not remember that!"

  Dad and Rafa got quiet. I got quiet, too. Obviously, the police had made a huge mistake. I'm not the kind of person who goes to jail.

  - 34 -