Disclaimer: I don't own them.
A/N: It's short, so I figured I'd give you two in one day. I'm trying to make up for the shortage of postings, lately. :) Enjoy!
Oh, and let me know what you think. This one makes me sad. :(
Chapter 11: Manhattan Express
I couldn't believe that I had never talked to Amber about drugs.
How could I have been so careless… so foolish? Hadn't I read somewhere, years ago, that the average age of first marijuana use was fourteen? Or was it thirteen? And that alcohol use often started before the age of twelve. Certainly, at the age of ten, she had been old enough to be given that talk.
I mutely seated myself, the shoulder-restraints coming down and locking me in place. I passed the attendant a bill, and proceeded to ride the empty roller coaster until it closed. It had been a long time since I'd done a roller-coaster marathon, but I needed it tonight. I hardly felt like I was on a roller coaster at all—it was with a distant and uncaring awareness that I took in the flips and turns and drops.
We'd found a teenager, somewhere around Amber's age, out in the desert… in Red Rock Canyon. Just being out there gave me an ominous feeling of foreboding, and I should have realized then exactly what the case would put me through. They were just kids—it was the first time they'd ever done a drug… only chosen to do it because the punk-ass little shit who sold it to them assured them it was safe.
And even if the drug didn't kill the boy, it did something worse… it caused his friend to kill him, suffocate him, while in the midst of terrifying auditory hallucinations. He had covered his friend's mouth, trying to make the sounds that weren't real go away, and…
I hand the man another bill to keep going around, confused but somewhat grateful at how empty the coaster is today. You have to ride a lot longer to get over things when there's people around you… they distract and detract and complicate. You sit in the midst of strangers with the full awareness that they live each day believing in a just society, if not a just world, not knowing that death and despair linger on every doorstep, and that there are people in this world that truly are nightmare-worthy.
They don't know that the world isn't a safe place.
And my baby is out there, surrounded by drugs and cigarettes, alcohol and boys pressuring her for sex, and a mother who certainly couldn't be stable if she had exposed her to a man like Jack Murphy in the first place.
…At which point it hits me—I don't know how I didn't consider this before—but what would Laura have been able to give witness to? Sure she'd dated the guy but… would a pro like him let his girlfriend know the details of his drug trafficking if she wasn't into it too? If she wasn't using, if not helping?
My head swims with statistics, trying to remember if she'd ever seemed out of it on the phone, or if Amber had ever said anything revealing, to indicate drug-use on Laura's part, trying to recall exactly how much more likely children whose parents abused drugs were to use and abuse drugs themselves. What if my golden little angel was already a drug addict… doing god-knows what for god-knows who for a hit…
Heroin, cocaine, meth…
I felt sick at the thought, but the idea of leaving the roller coaster now was unbearable. My stomach churned and sweat broke out across my body as I struggled to think through the pain in my head. Surely I had no proof of something like that. Surely I had no indication that Laura would ever even try drugs.
And she'd gotten away from the guy—this much I did know. She wouldn't let herself fall back into something like that, would she?
I pass the man another bill wordlessly, and he shakes his head—probably at my physical state of being. I feel haggard—when I think about my face I feel as though it must reflect at least a portion of my pain, because I don't know how it could not. I feel like I can't breathe deeply. I feel cold. But I pass him bills when necessary, and the attendant lets me ride until midnight, when they shut down, and I rise out of the car on shaky feet.
For the first time, hours on a roller coaster haven't helped me gain perspective… put a case behind me… feel better from the emotion strain of the job. …Because it isn't just the job, it's my whole world crashing down around me, and I don't have the effort to even think about stopping it.
I retreat to my empty townhome—and my empty life, as Catherine would have me know—and I curl into a bed much too big for myself, remembering the high hopes I'd had of sharing it with Sara… or of when I purchased the place… how I'd wanted a room so Laura and Amber could visit. How I'd dreamed of that.
They never had, and they never would, and I didn't even know if Amber was alive and okay.
She needs a daddy in this world of horrors too vivid to comprehend or explain or endure… And I need my baby.
