10. Blew

"I woke up in the hospital and had that weird conversation with you, slept some more and dipped out again." I spread my arms a little. "And here I am."

"Wow. Are you okay? Like, do you feel alright?" Ana swirled the marshmallows around in her mug as she looked me over carefully."

"When it happened... when I was actually dead, I felt peaceful. I took a look at my life and it kind of sucked, but I didn't care at all. Coming back was like being ripped into a million pieces."

"Does it still feel like that?"

"No. This sounds weird and I'm not even sure how to describe it, but I feel different. I feel strong. It's like I came back connected to something bigger than me."

She smiled. "You're right, that does sound weird."

I took a mini marshmallow onto the tip of my finger and placed it gently onto the tip of her nose. "Who's the weirdo now?!"

She tried to lick it off and her tongue wouldn't reach, so I licked it off for her. "Still you, nose licker."

"I lick noses, but Ana sucks dicks," I sang.

She laughed. "Only one dick now!"

I put my feet on the floor and started spinning my chair around. "How long do you think the guys will be gone?"

"You know Seth isn't going to stay away long."

I sighed and spun once more to face her. "I have to show you something."

She followed me to my room and leaned against the dresser. "What is all of this?" she motioned towards the boxes in my floor.

"Mom over-nighted them to me. Just..." I started picking through the boxes. "Random shit I got on tour." I pulled some shirts out of one box and found an assortment of books underneath, some of them published and some of them handwritten notebooks that fans had given me.

She gasped as she picked up one of the t-shirts. "You saw 3QD again?!"

"YES and it was awesome," I gloated. "We drank a bunch of moonshine. You can have that if you want it," I pointed at the shirt.

"Cut it up for me?" she asked sweetly.

I winked at her before turning to my stash box. "Look at all of these beauties," I said as I unwrapped a gallon sized freezer bag full of potent mushrooms.

"Ooooh," she said, eyes wide. "We should eat some!"

I eyed the bag harshly. "I don't know..." What if I had a really horrible trip? I felt fine but I wasn't sure exploring my psyche was a good call so soon after a traumatic experience.

"Are you scared?"

"Kind of. On the other hand... " I raised my eyebrows at the bag, willing it to give me anything but an experience that broke me. "Chocolate bars, tea, or just chew these fucking things up and down them?"

"We're short on time. Let's eat these bitches raw."

The come up was quick and it felt good. We played our music loud, danced, laughed, rolled around like weirdos. We were riding this wave of amazing that was all shapes and colors and love. We were in the house the whole time but we were being taken to places far beyond our physical location.

We were sitting in the floor in my room flipping through a few of the books that were stacked in my boxes. "Look at this," she said, holding a notebook out to me.

The writing was hard to decipher; many pages were written in cross-hatch, frontwards backwards, sideways, different colored inks... it looked kind of like a jumbled mess. There were a ton of pentagrams going on and what I actually could read was in Latin. "Weird," I finally said, closing the book. "Hey, you know what we should do? We should build a fire in the backyard."

"How? It's too wet."

"We can go buy some wood," I suggested, though I really didn't want to leave.

"I have a better idea."

She drove us the ten minutes or so to her and Josh's house, both of us bopping around in out seats while we jammed Gorillaz. I had a moment where I thought about what would happen if we got pulled over which resulted in a little bit of cop rage, and then I was right back to feeling great.

"Wow," I said when we got into the house. "Nice." Josh had been spending what time he had renovating their already nice home. The kitchen sparkled with brand new floor tiles and marble countertops, along with brand new cherry-wood cabinets.

"He's still working on the living room, but it shouldn't be too much longer."

"Dude, I'm totally coming over and getting in your hot tub before it gets all jizzed up."

"Good luck!" she laughed. She led me over to the remnants of a wood stove that was being replaced and beside of it, a nice pile of dry wood that we could burn. "Jackpot."

"He won't care if we steal this?"

"I'll replace it. He'll be glad I chose this over going to the store with UFO eyes."

When we got back to the house, we grabbed some things from the house and then headed out back to build a fire. While Ana got the gasoline from my crawl space, I went back in and grabbed the notebook I'd been studying earlier. I threw our shitty patio chairs down from the deck before going back downstairs and dragging them closer to the soon to be fire.

Ana poured some gas on the logs and backed away while I struck the match. It took me a moment to actually throw it onto the logs... it was mesmerizing to me.

The fire roared to life and we settled into our chairs. "You still looking at that?" Ana asked, pointing at the book I held.

"I thing I'm going to need another notebook just to decipher this one."

"Hold on, I'll get you one," she said. I thanked her as she walked away.

I turned my attention back to the licking flames once she was gone. Just looking at it was making me feel strange and fluttery inside and I wanted so badly to touch it... so I did. Rising from my chair, my hands were actually shaking. I held my right hand over the fire, high at first and then dangerously low.

It didn't burn.

I rolled my sleeve back and held my whole arm over the fire, and still it did not burn me. I jerked my arm back and examined the skin - I had no visible injury. The only sign the fire had left behind was it's warmth on my flesh. I plunged my hand right into the heart of the fire and felt no pain.

"What are you doing?" Ana yelled from far behind me.

"Just stoking it," I responded as I pulled my hand out and looked it over once again. Either something very fucking weird was happening, or these mushrooms were out of this damn world.

She handed me a brand new notebook and a pen, and I settled back into my chair, sitting awkwardly to prop both books up. I started trying to pick the lines that went together and write them down, but it wasn't proving easy at all.

"Look," Ana said, pointing high into the sky. Against the background of the nearly setting sun, you could plainly make out the alignment of planets on the horizon; Jupiter in the southwestern sky, Mars due south, Saturn climbing in the southeast, Venus to it's lower left, and lastly Mercury hanging low in the twilight.

"What the fucking hell?" I said. As soon as I studied the sky, I remembered what this phenomena was called and in the same moment realized that I had just read it in the first page of this odd book. "Harmonica concursum," I breathed aloud. "Harmonic convergence."

"Ah, we picked the perfect night for tripping and didn't even realize it."

I picked my phone up and started translating lines of Latin to English. I'd taken it back in high school but I still couldn't read half of this. "Listen to this shit. 'First she will command the serpents, then the fire, water, air. She will pierce the skies with her call, she will open Hell when the fury overtakes her'." I slammed the book shut because it was freaking me out.

"You've got some pretty imaginative fans, Liz." Ana picked up one of the guitars we'd brought and started strumming, so I joined in.

We rode the rest of our trip out like that, playing music and singing or dancing around the fire until the last ember died. We were packing up our little party when Seth and Josh finally arrived home. They helped us carry everything back to it's rightful place, and then the couples parted ways.

If I had considered how the rest of my night would go, the transcript would have been pretty normal; hang out with Seth, probably have sex deep into the night, pass out until morning. I didn't expect it when our quiet evening took a turn.

Seth was sitting outside with me while I stared off and contemplated space when his phone rang. I glanced over and saw 'Charlie' on the screen and before I could hear a word from either side, I knew there was trouble brewing.

The conversation took a nose dive pretty quickly. "She literally got home last night," Seth was saying into the phone. "She hasn't done anything wrong. Charlie, I swear to you, if you cross the line and start harassing her I will go to the state police about it."

I snatched his phone away from his hand. "You want me, Charlie Swan? Come and fucking get me." I hit the end button and started back towards the house.

"Liz!" Seth yelled angrily. "What are you thinking?!"

I darted down the hall and banged on the wall. "Dope sweep!" I called to Ana. She emerged with a box designed to look like a novel by Kurt Vonnegut, Hocus Pocus. I had made this for her years and years ago. "This it?"

"Yeah. What's going on?"

She started towards my room with me. "I poked the bear," I explained. "He's going to learn not to fuck with me, and the lesson begins today. SETH! JOSH!" I piled our boxes and various bongs I had into a large garbage bag. "I'd do this myself but I have a feeling you guys dig a pretty bitching hole a lot faster than I can. Go far, go deep, and do not forget where you bury it."

They were already gone when Ana said, "Oh, shit," and pulled about a half of a joint out of her pocket.

"Smoke it or eat it, quick. Are you sure you don't have anything else?" I'd take another possession charge if I had to, but I wouldn't like it.

We puffed it down until it was empty paper which we discarded in our ashtray outside. We sprayed the house down like crazy with Febreze, and then we waited for the knock to come.

"Chief," I greeted.

"Collins," he said with a nod. "Where's your stash?"

"I invited you over. How dumb do you think I am?" I shook my head at him - this was a fun game.

"Dumb enough to smoke pot pretty recently, by the smell of things."

"There's no dope in this house."

"Mind if I look around a bit?" he asked, already on his way to do just that. He hit my room first; it was closest to the front door. I was still in the living room, giggling with Ana as he rummaged through my things and then he yelled, "Is this a bong?!"

We exchanged that "oh shit" look - had I really forgotten a whole fucking bong in my room? There was no way... I walked to the doorway of my room, and it was in that moment that I witnessed Charlie Swan, chief of police and all-around hard ass, standing there holding my blue vibrating dildo.

I started to howl with laughter, pulled out my phone and snapped a picture of him. I took a moment to gather myself and then crossed the room. I reached my hand to the bottom of Mr. Blue and flicked the switch, and it started to buzz wildly in his hand. Recognition and then disgusted terror lit his features.

"Gaaaahhhh!" he screamed as he flung my vibrator to the floor. It laid there pulsing as he pushed past me and ran - literally ran - out of my home.

"Aw, come on Charlie! Mr. Blue's not so scary!" I yelled after him, but he was in his car and speeding away already.

Ana and I were dying laughing. I couldn't remember the last time I'd felt quite so light with humor. She high-fived me after a bit and sat down in the floor, holding her sides. "Should we have them bring our stuff back now?"

"Not yet," I told her as I looked at the picture on my phone. "He may come back, or get someone else to. Wait until he finds out that I have this, and then I doubt he'll mess with me anymore."

"You're like an evil genius," she complimented.

I winked at her. "Thanks."