Crystal Lies - Melody Carlson [57]
For the next week, Jacob seemed to stay home more, and I felt like maybe, just maybe, we were finally getting somewhere. I thought that perhaps he had finally realized that all those late nights jamming with Daniel hadn’t been such a great idea after all.
It was late October, just before Halloween, when I decided to flip the mattress pad on Jacobs futon. He’d been complaining about a backache, and I’d grown concerned that this inexpensive bed might not be very good for his back. I thought I’d try turning it over, just to even out the lumps until we figured out a new sort of bed. But as I lifted the heavy pad, a flash of bright orange caught my eye. With the mattress resting on my head, I knelt down and peered at the now exposed wooden futon frame to see several neat little rows of hypodermic needles lined up on the wooden slats. With a rush of adrenaline, I heaved the heavy mattress pad over and onto the floor, then clasped my hand across my mouth as I stared at maybe a dozen obviously used syringes. I don’t know how long I stood there, shock waves jolting through me like bolts of electricity. I knew I needed to do something. But what? I couldn’t think straight. I felt angry, betrayed, worried, fearful, hopeless—every negative feeling imaginable coursed through me just then.
I started to leave Jacob’s room, then froze in the doorway and stood there. I couldn’t leave those nasty things just lying there out in the open and exposed for the entire world to see. As if anyone ever came to visit me in the apartment. Just the same, I couldn’t bear to handle those horrid objects. And yet I definitely wanted them gone. I walked back and forth, shaking my head and waving my arms like a crazy woman or perhaps an unfortunate chicken with her head cut off.
Finally I ran to the kitchen to get something to put the syringes in. I opened every cupboard in search of the perfect container. A glass mixing bowl, no. Saucepan with lid, not quite. Tupperware, no, but closer. Finally I reached under the sink and grabbed a recycled paper grocery sack (another money-saving trick I’d learned), then I dashed back to Jacob’s bedroom where I used a ballpoint pen to push these detestable objects into my brown paper bag. Then I rolled down the top of the bag, creasing it several times, as if by sealing these things I might forget that picture. But even as I set the sack on the kitchen counter, I could still see all those plastic hypodermic syringes lined up on the wooden futon frame like angry orange soldiers intent upon annihilating my only son. I wanted to throw up.
Instead, I took a deep breath and called Dr. Abrams. After explaining to her thickheaded assistant that it really was an emergency, I was connected to the good doctor.
“I don’t know what to do.” I gasped out the words as if I’d just finished a marathon.
“Take a deep breath,” she told me.
I did as she said.
“And now,” she continued,“slowly explain what is wrong.”
“I found…I found needles” I said. “Beneath my son’s bed.”
“Needles?” Her voice sounded unimpressed.
I hadn’t told Dr. Abrams about the severity of my son’s drug problems yet, and I immediately imagined her envisioning sewing needles or perhaps knitting needles as if Jacob had suddenly become domestic. “Hypodermic needles,” I explained. “At least a dozen of them—all used.”
“I see.” Long pause.
“I don’t know what to do, Dr. Abrams. I mean I feel like I can’t even breathe, like I’m going to be sick or just give up completely. I’ve never felt so desperate before. It’s as if my husband was right all along; I am only making things worse.”
“Do you think it’s your fault that your son has hypodermic needles under his bed?”
“No, not like that. But it feels as if I’m just messing everything up. I can’t even think anymore.” And then I began to sob.
“Glennis,” she said in her soothing voice,“listen to me. The only thing you can do about your son’s problem is to encourage him to get help. Do you understand? But it’s his choice whether he’ll do that or not.” And then she gave me the phone number of a rehab center in town.