I'd come home Friday evening and there she'd be, nursing a joint, dressed in a black lace corset and thread-thin stilettos, dancing around to a Pink Floyd album while she set the table. Since the third grade, I'd been madly in love with Annie, and finally succeeded in winning her heart freshman year at community college by some random act of God. We became inseparable, like two halves of a whole. Our weekends were often spent getting high, indulging in her impeccable cooking, then drinking whiskey from the bottle and fucking until we passed out. Monday morning would arrive and off she'd go to sell insurance policies to cookie cutter suburbanites as I waited for them to return to their own desk jobs where they'd call me in IT to advise them, "turn it off and on again." We lived as rockstars on our free time and become respectable citizens at the command of an alarm clock. If millennial relationships were an Olympic sport, we'd bring home the gold. I knew how lucky I was to have Annie. Everything you've ever wished your significant other would be, she was that and more. Always down for an adventure, drop dead gorgeous, and financially successful at only 26; I did my damnedest to keep that girl in love. Two months ago, Annie seemed tired and irritable, very unlike her usual easygoing self. Our two year anniversary was coming up and I had to make it incredible, get that spark back. I took off that Friday and ran around town gathering her favorite records, chocolates, and flowers. I even cleared out the liquor stores of Viniq, something we both found too sweet but loved when we were on shrooms. She said it felt like we were drinking in the universe. My last stop was at a cocktail bar my high school best friend, turned drug dealer, frequented. Sean had always been a quiet, reserved guy, and I was confused when I saw him waving me over to his table excitedly, grinning. "You requested something special and, man, I've got you covered. Annie is going to worship you forever after this." I frowned and shook my head, "what is it? Bath salts? People are eating faces on that gear. I'll just take the usual, shrooms and few of those acid sour patch kids." I'd known Sean for years, prone to dipping into his own honey pot too often left him a little out of touch. "No, not bath salts! Come on, I'd never do that to you. No, man, this is better. This is brand new." He said, opening his wallet and retrieving a thimble sized glass vial containing an syringe and a shimmering pinkish liquid. "It's called Delerium. Trip like LSD on steroids, without the paranoid, and an ecstasy that shames Ecstasy. This is government shit, experimental, fresh out of the underground shit." There it was; why are drugs prone to making conspiracy theorists out of junkies? "Well, like I said, sticking with what I know." "I sound crazy, hear me out. This shit runs two hundred, but I'll give it to you for one fifty." He spoke over my burst of laughter. "If you and Annie take this together, she'll be indebted to you, the man who gifted her with an other worldly high. One hundred percent satisfaction guaranteed, or your money back." He was obviously fried, but he wasn't a con. I thought of Annie and her early nights, brushing me away when I tried to touch her, and handed over the cash before I could change my mind. I took the vial and turned to leave, "lay off the hard stuff, okay?" Sean stopped me when a firm grasp on my shoulder. He leaned in close and whispered, "I've got to warn you though, it's the right thing to do. My supplier says this shit was engineered for population control. All you need is one drop on the back of your neck, but for every drop you lose nine days of your life. There's a little over 40 or so drops in there, less than a year for each of you, and that's not much really." "Is it heroine? Are you back on heroine?" I pushed him away from me lightly. "Please, ease up. You're fucking losing it. 9 days to a drop? Government experiments?" I'd grown tired of humoring him. "I was just being straight with you, maybe you want all your years." He called as I walked out.
Annie didn't even question what the stuff was, just took punched my arm, and told me to stop being such a pussy. The excited looks in her eyes was all I needed to convince me.
The ridiculous description Sean gave Delirium was nothing compared to what it really offered.
We couldn't keep our hands off of each other and we actually tore the clothes from our bodies. It was excruciating to be apart from her, and so pleasurable on contact that I couldn't stop shaking. Colors took on new shades of unimaginable vibrancy, turning ordinary objects into radiant treasures. Every sound was entirely alien, taking on an ethereal magnificence that left us with our ears pressed against the refrigerator door each time the ice maker would switch on. We were giddy, pleasure overloaded, wild creatures. Annie said she loved me over and over again until it was a chant she could not keep from repeating. By Monday, we'd finished the entire bottle between us. Her screams woke me. Blood soaked the bed sheets through her pajamas. I tried not to panic as she sobbed, sweat pouring from her forehead from a fever I could feel without touching her. I lifted her into my arms and took her to the kitchen where I soaked washcloths in cold water and layer them over her. She writhed in agony on the linoleum floor as I dialed 911. On the rise in the ambulance I thought of Sean, the bastard. He'd probably gotten fucked up and mixed together some concoction of whatever was under his sink, delusions of government experiments replacing realty. I'd kill him. The nurses kept me confined to the waiting room for hours while the doctors worked to stabilize Annie. I'd left Sean dozens of threatening voicemails and texts by the time an white haired man in dark green scrubs approached me. "Mr. Harris, your girlfriend seems to have suffered an infection caused by intrauterine death. Why did you not bring her in sooner? This could have been prevented." He glared at me, tight lines pulling at his mouth. I shook my head. "A what? What are you talking about." "Ms. Parker was pregnant, probably about 18 weeks along. But the fetus died in her womb, still it would've over two taken weeks after to develop this kind of infection." He sighed. "She had to have been gravely ill. Vomiting, bleeding, fever, excruciating stomach pains. Why the hell did you wait so long?" "I didn't know." I said. "She would've told me, she wouldn't keep it from me." The doctor went on, but my mind was racing. Sean, Delirium, a baby, my baby, my Annie.
40 drops, at 9 days each. 20 drops for her, 20 for me. 180 days a piece. 25 weeks. 25 weeks in two days. All that partying, she wouldn't have even shown. "She didn't know," I whispered, "she wasn't hiding it. This is my fault, this is my fucking fault. Please let me see her, please let me see Annie." I grabbed his shoulders and shook him. "Mr. Harris, I'm sorry," he managed to answer, trying to loosen my grip as my weight slumped against him. "The infection had already taken hold, she didn't make it." He freed himself and left me on the ground, the blame he placed on me more deserving than he could realize. I lost her.
That morning I searched for Sean, but no one has seen him since we'd last met. I looked for months and never found him. Maybe I'm supposed to wrap this up with some kind of big finish, but I don't have one. I lost the love of my life to something unknown. I didn't know who else to tell. I'm sorry. Just, be careful, I guess.
Submitted August 31, 2016 at 05:45PM by Astrangerspeculation http://ift.tt/2bVdud2 nosleep
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