Marco turned around at the commotion and finally saw me. But my heart dropped at the blank look on his face. He didn’t know who I was.
“Marco, it’s me, Aubrey!” I called out.
“You need to leave now, you’re not getting in here,” Randy growled, yanking me hard by the arm. Ouch, that would leave a mark.
“Hold on, man. I think I know this chick,” Marco said.
“Dude, you know a lot of chicks,” Randy stated, and not at all nicely.
“Seriously, hang on a second.” Marco looked at me closely.
“I’m Maxx’s girlfriend,” I explained and was relieved to see understanding dawn on his metal-studded face.
“Right! I knew you looked familiar. Let her go, Randy. She’s X’s girl,” Marco said, grabbing my other hand and putting a stamp on the back.
I should have thought to use his other name. But I didn’t know X. I didn’t think I ever would.
Randy loosened his hand around my upper arm, and my fingers started to tingle as blood rushed back. “Sorry, I didn’t know,” Randy mumbled, giving me a small push forward.
I rubbed my arm where he had grabbed me, wincing at the pain there.
“I had no idea you were coming tonight. Maxx didn’t say anything,” Marco said, leaving his post and walking me through the door.
Marco grinned, his lips stretching and exposing a tongue ring I hadn’t noticed the last time I had seen him. “And just so you know, nobody around here calls him Maxx. That’s why Randy didn’t know who you were talking about,” Marco explained.
“Do you know where he is?” I asked Marco, my teeth already rattling from the music that blasted just behind the door.
Marco shook his head. “I’ve been out here all night. I don’t usually see him until just before closing.”
Crap.
“Thanks, Marco. I appreciate your help back there,” I said sincerely. Maybe Marco wasn’t such a bad guy, even if he did look like a tattoo experiment gone wrong.
“Sure thing, Aubrey,” Marco said, clasping my shoulder before returning to the entryway.
I took a deep breath and walked inside the club. It looked like chaos. Normally I found the craziness appealing.
Not tonight.
Tonight, I hated it. I saw it as ugly and sordid, its darkness hiding secrets and ruin. I wanted to leave.
But not without Maxx.
I started to push through the throngs of people dancing to the frenetic beat, straining up on my tiptoes in my search for Maxx.
No, not Maxx. Here, in this world, he was X.
I was pushed and jostled as the music reached its pinnacle. A mosh pit had started, and if I didn’t get away from it, I was certain I would lose a tooth or two.
I could see the bar against the back wall, and that’s where I headed. I recognized the bartender Maxx had called Eric.
I waved him down, and I knew instantly that he recognized me from when I was here before with Maxx. When he came to my end of the bar, I asked him if he knew where X was. It felt weird to call him that. It rolled oddly off my tongue, a stranger’s name. But I knew that I was looking for a person I didn’t know at all.
“I saw him over there a while ago. But I’m sure he’s around. He never goes far, so just hang around and he’ll find you.” Eric grinned, winking at me.
I headed in the direction Eric had indicated. A door on the far side of the room led to a narrow hallway that held the bathrooms. If anyone was down there, I couldn’t tell. It was too dark.
“Maxx, where are you?” I murmured to myself. The door to the men’s bathroom opened and shut behind me, and I heard a couple of guys laughing as they walked by.
“Fucking junkies,” one was saying.
Instinct took over, and I just knew.
I hurried into the men’s bathroom. It was a row of four stalls, all of them shut. But the last one was propped open by a figure I would recognize anywhere.
“Maxx!” I yelled, running to him. I fell to my knees beside him, not caring about the piss and the filth on the floor. The bathroom smelled rank, making me gag. But it was nothing compared to the nausea I felt when I got a good look at Maxx, sagged over on the tiles.
He was on his side, his face pressed into the floor. His left arm was bare and stretched out beside him with a thin white strip of plastic tied tightly, just above the elbow, causing the vein to be exposed.
I knew exactly what Maxx had been doing. Anyone who had ever watched HBO or a bad health video in high school would be able to figure it out. I patted around on the ground next to Maxx’s limp body until I found the empty syringe.
I sprang into action. I immediately loosened the plastic around his arm and threw it on the floor. Then I leaned in close to make sure he was still breathing. His breaths were slow and shallow, and when I felt his pulse it was thready. I wasn’t sure how much he had taken.
I knew that a heroin overdose could involve depressed respiratory functioning. If a person took enough, eventually their lungs stopped working, and they’d suffocate.
“What the hell, Maxx?” I asked, knowing he was way past answering. I tried lifting him up, but he was too heavy to move. I rolled him over so he lay flat on his back.
He didn’t make a sound. I laid my ear against his chest, listening to the strained beat of his heart. My tears soaked his shirt, and I turned and buried my face in the fabric, screaming to a man who couldn’t hear me.
The door of the bathroom swung open, and a few guys came in. They noticed me on the floor with Maxx and chuckled.
“Sorry to interrupt,” they said, turning to the urinals and taking a piss, unconcerned. They didn’t see what was really going on. The sight was most likely not unusual at a place like Compulsion.
When the men left, I tried to get Maxx to wake up. I yelled in his ear. I smacked his face. I shook him hard enough to bang his head against the floor. Nothing worked. He wouldn’t wake up. And when his breath started to rattle in his chest and his lips began to tinge blue, I knew I needed to get him to a hospital.
I hurried to the door of the restroom and locked it, not wanting anyone to come in. I got out my phone and dialed 911.
And then I watched Maxx’s breathing slow down until his chest wasn’t moving at all.
Chapter thirty
aubrey
i had given Maxx CPR while I waited for the paramedics. His skin had grown cold as I pounded away at his chest. I breathed into his mouth, wishing he would start breathing on his own.
He would for a little while, then he would stop, and I’d start CPR all over again.