Post-Rent

Chapter 5

Nothing special had happened that month. Just waiting. Roger hated waiting. Once he got the call from the Rehab that Mimi was drug free and he could come and sign her out, he jumped for joy and ran out the door. He had reach the Rehabilitation Center in less than an hour and was in the waiting room when he saw Mimi walking tall and strong. She saw him and ran toward him, arms outstretched.

"ROGER!" She squealed as she flew into his arms. She was embraced by a man who loved her and she knew that she was going to be safer now than she had been in Rehab. Both Roger and Mimi were smiling and laughing as they walked home. As they neared Avenue B, Roger asked why Mimi hadn't accepted the heroin from The Man. She looked down as she answered, as if she thought he was still angry with her from being stuck there for another month.

" I didn't want to stay there, Roger. I wanted to come home to you. I wanted you to be proud of me..." She looked at him. He stopped walking. He took her face in his hands...one of which was bandaged from his earlier explosion.

"You know I'm proud of you. What you did was great, and I love you even more for it. You know I'll always love you." He looked into her eyes and kissed her passionately. They stood there kissing for what seemed like hours, until Roger broke away to look at his watch.

"Holy shit! It's 6:30!. I promised Collins, Mark, Joanne, and Maureen that we'd meet at The Life Café at 6:00! Dammit, I hate it when I do this. Come on, lets go." They hurried off to drop Mimi's stuff in the loft, then to the Life Café.

At around 7:00, Roger and Mimi walked into the cozy restaurant. They spotted Collins sitting at a table in the back. He waved to Mark, and they walked over to the group.

"Where the hell were you two? We've been waiting here for an hour." Mark said impatiently, as the two took off their coats.

"We, ummm, got caught up in a little romance..." Mimi said.

"Like...half an hour of making out on Avenue A..." Roger completed, shyly. The group broke out in laughter at Roger and Mimi's way of saying they missed each other.

"Hey, guys, no hard feelings, but can't you two wait for the couch?" Maureen said. They roared with laughter. Soon, their food came and they began discussing Mimi's time in Rehab.

"Well, it was lonely. There were only like 5 other people int the program, so I didn't converse with them much. But Roger came to visit me a lot, so he was about the only person that I talked to, besides the nurses and specialists."

"Sounds to me like it was pretty rough in there." said Joanne. She looked at Mimi, who smiled as Roger rubbed her back. She then turned to Maureen, who was chugging her third wine.

"The withdrawal was pretty tough, but Roger was there everyday to coach me through it. He went through it to, right?"

"Uhhhh, not exactly..." The group stopped talking and stared at him.

"What do you mean 'not exactly'? I was living with you when you were with April." Mark looked at the faces surrounding him. They were all staring at Roger, waiting for an explanation.

"Well, ya see...I only did it once...and I hated it. April became a heavy heroin user, like you were.." He gestured to Mimi. "..But I stayed away after that...the worst thing I every did was get drunk..3 times the legal limit...but I never went through withdrawal." The group was silent, they all stared at each other. Mimi looked away in disbelief, trying to accept that all Roger hadn't actually been through what she had, trying to accept that her boyfriend had told her he had done it before and became addicted, trying to accept that her boyfriend had lied to her. Then the murmuring started and it turned into a louder, non-threatening talk, and then Mimi lost it and had to be taken outside. To Roger, who ran after Mimi when she got angry and stormed out of the restaurant, it was a repeat of what happened about a month ago.

"What's your problem? It was just a lie. Your getting upset because I lied about going through withdrawal?"

"Yes! How could you do that? I was in so much pain and I believed that you had gone through it too, and now, I find out it was just a lie? I..."

"You can't accept that I didn't become addicted to heroin like yourself? Is that it? I didn't like it, I knew it was bad. But you, you went to Rehab before, while I was in Santa Fe, and you dropped out and started using again. You promised me you wouldn't do it again..."

"I started using again because I was lonely without you. I didn't know what to do with my life.."

"Besides shoot up everyday? Mimi, do you know why I put you back in Rehab?"

"No, why? To satisfy yourself? To tell yourself that I would be safe there?"

"No, I put you there because I knew that it was harming you, because it was killing you, and killing me. I put you there because I love you." Roger looked at her, hoping that he had broken through the barrier she had set up against him. She looked back, straight into his eyes and saw that he meant what he said and was on the verge of tears.