An hour after she hung up the phone, there was a knock on her door. Olivia opened it to reveal Melinda holding a duffle bag full of medical supplies.
"Thank you so much for coming Melinda. I didn't know what else to do." She stepped aside, gesturing for her to come in.
Melinda looked at the blonde detective, shivering under several blankets. Her light skin much paler than usual, leaving dark circles around her eyes. "You were right to call me Liv. Withdrawal is difficult no matter the setting." She said glancing back at Amanda. "She's in bad shape."
"I know." Olivia whispered, watching Melinda make her way to the ailing detective.
"Amanda?" she sat herself on the edge of the couch next to Amanda, who was shivering uncontrollably, her eyes weak and her teeth chattering loudly. "Hey there honey. I'm going to start you on an IV drip alright? We don't want you getting too dehydrated." She smiled at the small woman before directing her questions to Olivia. "Do you know how long it's been since she used?"
"I'm not sure exactly. She told me it was this morning."
"Okay, so she's probably in the beginning stages of withdrawal. Has she been throwing up at all?" she asked pulling what she needed from her bag to start the IV.
"Not since she's been here. So not in the last hour and a half at least." Olivia said walking over to the two women, she smiled sadly down at Amanda who was staring up at her with glazed eyes.
"Well, chances are she will be. Sooner rather than later I'm sure. You might want to bring a waste basket in here if she's going to stay on the couch." She looked up at Olivia. "Unless you're fond of cleaning up vomit."
"No not really." Olivia said, suddenly horrified at the thought and retrieving a plastic bin from her closet, lining it with a plastic bag from the kitchen.
By then Melinda had the IV set up and going and began checking Amanda's vital signs. She quietly noted her findings; when she was finished she gestured Olivia out of ear shot of Amanda.
"Her heart beat is quick but I don't hear a murmur, so that's a good sign right now. Allot of people develop one at some point when they start using as heavily as I'm assuming she has been. Her blood pressure is elevated but not enough for me to worry too much about, that's pretty normal in this case, and her lungs sound clear. Her fever is high, 102.8, keep an eye on that. If it gets closer to 104 get her in a lukewarm shower to cool her down." She put a hand on Olivia's arm and smiled at her warmly. "I'll come back by tomorrow afternoon to check on her. She will probably get worse before she gets better. If you need anything between now and then, don't hesitate to pick up the phone. And maybe do something to distract her from the symptoms."
"Thank you Melinda, really. I can't tell you how much I appreciate you coming over here at this hour." They hugged each other for a moment before Melinda left the apartment. After it was just she and Amanda in the apartment, she turned to look at the younger woman. She had been in her apartment, on her couch for just over two hours and she only seemed to be feeling worse. 'itll get worse before it gets better' she reminded herself. She turned on the television to some romantic comedy playing hoping the noise might serve as a distraction for Amanda. She busied herself with gathering the blondes discarded clothing and making her more comfortable. She sat in the chair next to the couch and took in the scene in front of her. The woman curled up on her couch had chosen to come to HER when she could've gone to someone she actually liked and she couldn't understand why. She and Amanda hadn't gotten along well since the blonde came to New York. They had argued more often then they had had civil conversations. Yet, here she was, taking care of her colleague who was going through hellish withdrawals. She lay whimpering on the couch under several blankets, curled on her side, clutching her stomach.
"Liv?" she said quietly.
"I'm right here sweetie, what do you need? Water? Another blanket?" Olivia said, desperately wanting to help this woman through the pain.
"I ju- just wanted to, to thank you. I'm so- sorry for doing this." Amanda replied through chattering teeth and near violent shivers.
"Don't worry about that now. Just rest, we can talk in the morning, it's late, you need to sleep." Amanda nodded her answer, to weak to actually speak too much more. She felt terrible for putting Olivia through this, but she was the first person she thought of. She wanted her to see she was trying, really trying. Hell, if she was putting herself through the pain of withdrawals she had to be trying.
Olivia dozed off in the chair after Amanda's breathing started to evening out as her tremors lessened. Suddenly she was thrown from a dreamless, restless sleep to the sound of Amanda retching into the plastic bin next to the couch. She ran her fingers through her dark brown hair, Melinda was right, it was only a matter of time.
She tired the blonde hair up in a pony tail and set to wiping the young woman's face and mouth with the wet rag she had gotten earlier. Glancing at her watch, she saw it was 3 a.m.. She sighed, it had already been a long night, and it was going to be a long day, not that she minded really. She was proud of Amanda. Withdrawal wasn't an easy thing to go through, when she was young she watched her mother go through it several times in an attempt to get clean. Her mother had gotten mean sometimes when the pain had gotten to a certain point, telling her she should've been aborted, that she was a reminder the worst night of her life. She wondered what rude comments might find their way into Amanda's mind when the pain got worse, fearing what she might hear.
She checked her temperature and silently thanked whoever was watching that it had gone down slightly. "Amanda, look at me." She said lightly, sitting on the coffee table, brushing stay hair from the young woman's face. Amanda opened her eyes full of unshed tears and took a shuddered breath. "How long has it been this bad?" she asked her.
"It's been bad for two months, but I swear Liv, I didn't even realize until it was too late to stop easily. I tried so many times." She cried hard. "I tried so fucking hard."
Olivia's heart broke at the amount of emotion the blonde was showing. She was always so strong, never allowing anyone to see her cry or break down and here she was leaving a puddle of tears on her bosses couch. "Well, you're not doing it alone anymore. You've got me okay? You could've come to me with this a long time again and I would've helped you, I know you know that, and I know we don't usually see eye to eye but that doesn't mean I don't want you to be okay."
" You're a good friend Liv." she weakly smiled up at her boss, wiping away stay tears.
"Now were friends? I'm not some raging bitch trying to run your life anymore?" Olivia joked, squeezing her hand.
"I never said you were a bitch."
"But you thought it every day, didn't you?" she smiled at the defensive look on Amanda's face.
"Yeah okay, you're right." They both laughed at that. Glad to finally not be fighting tooth and nail with each other.
