Heroes...And The Rest Of Us.

Adam has been home for about two weeks now. The day he got home he came to my place and slept for three days straight. When he finally woke up he said that the road took alot out of him. No shit.

Today Mike and I are babysitting Kya. Right now were watching The Lion King, Kya fell asleep thirty minutes into the movie but Mike and I are still watching it. We both look up when we hear a knock on the door. We do rock, paper, scissors to see who should answer. He throws paper, I throw scissors.

"Ha ha" I say. He gets up and walks to the door. I lay down on the couch, leaving him no room to sit down when he comes back. Adam walks in to the living room and lays down on top of me.

"Hey! what are you doing here?" I say

"Um, hello! We have a child and a dog present, wanna get a room?!" Mike says before Adam can answer me. Adam glances at Kya, who's cashed out on the floor next to Charlie.

"Come on, lets go to your room to finish this before Uncle Fuddy-Duddy has a tantrum" He says to me.

We get up and I lead him to my room. Adam flips Mike off on our way and Mike returns the gesture laughing. When we get to the room he pushes me down on my bed.

"I want to ask you something" He says

"OK"

"I went to an NA meeting today, the first one I've been to in like, nine months"

"Wow, how'd it go?"

"Fine, I guess, My sponsor wants me to start going regularly"

"I see. You don't want to?"

"Not really" He reaches over to me and traces my collarbone with his finger.

"So what did you want to ask me?"

"Well, when I was there my sponsor told me that he wanted me to bring someone that I am close to, who I feel is essential to me staying clean, to a meeting. Kind of like a family day or whatever."

"And you think that I'm your essential person?" I say smiling, He laughs.

"Yes, but I don't want you to come if you're uncomfortable with it. I can ask Tobin or Barry."

"Why wouldn't you ask one of your brothers or your sister?"

"They don't know that I relapsed and I don't plan on telling them"

"Oh"

"So what do you think?"

"Yeah, I'll come. When and Where?"

"Wednesday afternoon. At the treatment center in Chicago" He says

"OK, Wednesday that's-"

"The day after tomorrow" He finishes.

"What should I wear?"

"I don't care, you're going to be in a room full of drug addicts and alcoholics. Do you really think it matters what you look like?"

"Well I don't want to overdress or something."

"Babe, you could wear a brown sack and you'd be overdressed... Still the best looking person in the room, but overdressed." I laugh.

"I would jump your bones right now but my niece is in the next room."

"You are such a bad person" He says.

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Wednesday morning, I'm getting ready for this meeting with Adam. I'm wearing dark colored jeans, and red and black fitted flannel shirt, and black knee high leather boots. Ive tucked my jeans into the boots for a little bit more of a polished look. I flat iron my hair and when I'm putting my eyeliner on, I see Billie's face appear in my mirror.

"Hey" I say turning around to give her a hug.

"Hey baby" She says "I just thought I'd stop by and see what my kiddies were doing this morning. I tell her about Adam and Chicago and going to the meeting.

"You're stronger than I am baby girl" She says when I'm finished.

"No I'm not."

"You are. I don't know if I could take watching someone like that"

"You were with Mike"

"That was different. That was one of my kids, if it were a man that I didn't know very well, but I thought that I loved..." She pauses "I don't think I could do it"

"Yes you could. Seeing him like that brought out every ounce of you that I have in me."

"You're sweet. So what's Mike doing?"

"Sleeping, he's off of work today."

"Awesome, maybe I can get him to take me out to lunch or something" I raise my eyebrows at her.

"What? Is it so wrong for me to want my kid to take me out once in a while?"

"No, not at all" I say turning back to the mirror. I hear Adam in the other room.

"Hello" He yells.

"In here" I yell back. He walks to the bathroom and leans on the door frame.

"Hey Billie, nice to see you again" He says.

"You too"

I turn around and give him a quick kiss, "How much time do we have?" I ask.

"About an hour driving time" He looks at his watch "Right now were late"

"Well, I'll go wake Mike up and let you two get going" Billie says.

"OK, love you" I tell her.

"Love you too. Bye Adam"

I turn and walk out of the bathroom, to the living room, Adam follows me.

"You look good" He tells me.

"Thanks, you do too" He's wearing a green army jacket over a white shirt and jeans with a ball cap style hat on his head.

"Shall we go?" He asks.

"Yeah" I say and take his hand in mine.

We walk out to the car and get in. I'm not really looking forward to the drive. I hate driving long distances. When we arrive at the rehab facility, Adam takes my hand in the car.

"We can go home, we don't have to do this" He says.

"Yes we do, we came all this way"

"Are you sure?"

"Yes"

OK" He exhales deeply "Lets go" He says.

Once were inside I remember doing all of this shit with Mike so many years ago. I'm very nervous all of a sudden. Adam leads me to a waiting room where I see lots of families sitting, waiting to go in to the meeting with their loved ones. We sit down is silence and wait for about five minutes or so when the counselor or whatever comes in and says that we can come in. It's a big room, like a school auditorium or something. There is a large group of chairs sitting in a circle in the middle of the room. Some people are already sitting in the chairs. The counselor sits in a chair next to two other people, who have clipboards in their hands.

Adam pulls out one of the chairs and motions for me to sit, I do and he sits next to me. We watch all the patients hug their family members, some people are crying. It's all very emotional and I feel a little out of place, like I'm intruding on these peoples reunion with their families. The counselor or therapist or whatever finally speaks up.

"Alright, if everyone is here we can begin" He says.

All the chairs are filled, so I assume that everyone is here.

"OK, here's how were going to do this. Were going to go around the circle clockwise, I'm going to have you stand up, introduce yourself, tell us about your addiction, then introduce your family member or spouse or whoever came with you, and you'll tell us about how this person has helped you in your recovery. Then, I'll go around and ask everyone some questions" Everyone nods.

"OK, let's get started" I notice that Adam and I are third in the circle. A guy stands up and tells the group about his year long addiction to meth. His mother cries the whole time. Adam grips my hand very tight.

"We shouldn't have come here" He whispers to me. I shake my head.

When it's our turn, Adam exhales and stands up.

"My name is Adam, I am addicted to heroin and Oxycontin. I've been clean for about two months, before that I was clean for almost a year. This is my...um"

"Girlfriend" I say quietly.

"Girlfriend, Sophie" He finishes.

"Welcome Adam" The counselor says, Adam nods and sits down while the guy asks him some questions.

"I was on heroin mostly, for five years. Recently my band went on tour for the first time since I was clean and I relapsed almost as soon as we got on the road" He says.

"What happened?"

"I started to take Oxy. A little at first and in a couple weeks time it progressed to handfuls at a time. My band mate called Sophie, who I hadn't even talked to since I left and she came out and helped get me off of it"

"Sophie, how long have you known Adam?"

"Almost a year now" I say. I'm trying very hard not to cry right now. It's one thing to live this stuff, but to hear about everyone and their gory stories is really taking it's toll on me.

"Have you always known about Adam's addiction?"

"No, he told me about it four or five months ago. We were at a bar and he was afraid of relapsing"

"What did you do?"

"I listened to him. And I got him out of there because it was pretty obvious that he wasn't going to leave on his own"

"Alright, getting back to Adam. What do think has lead to you taking drugs?"

"I don't really know. I mean, I have all kinds of things I could blame it on. I have a bad relationship with my parents, but I didn't start doing drugs to defy them or anything. Lack of respect for myself probably kept me on drugs" He says.

"Have you forgiven yourself for everything that you have done while you on drugs"

"No. Absolutely not" He says.

"How about your family? What about Sophie? Have you forgiven Adam, Sophie?"

"I don't really need to forgive him for anything. I understand what drugs do to people, I'm just there for him where he needs me, At least I try to be"

"Have you received lots of family support"

"Fair, I will always feel horrible about things I've done, to my family, to Sophie, to my friends"

The counselor nods, "That is understandable. Everyone here feels that way to a certain degree. Thank you for sharing your story with us, Adam"

When the meeting is over, we walk quickly to the parking lot. We don't say a word until we get to the car.

"That fucking sucked" Adam says.

"Yeah" I say, wiping a tear from my eye.

"I'm sorry babe"

"Don't be. I wanted to come here, it just hit me a lot harder than I thought it would"

"I hate those meetings, always have. I've always felt like they keep everything fresh on my mind and I don't want to keep over thinking everything"

"I know. Let's go home"

"Please" He leans over to me and kisses me. He looks up and wipes my tears away.

"You make me feel like I can do anything" He says.

"Let's go home, babe"