Leave You Low

Twiggy was on the floor, his knees pulled up to his chest, a terrified look in his dark brown eyes. He was slowly rocking, like a child in time out.
“I didn’t know what to do,” Ginger told me calmly. “Pogo brought him to my room and just left him there. I tried bringing him back here, but he’s acting like he’s insane. It’s the drugs, I think.”
I knelt down beside my friend. “What did you take?”
“Unicorns are dancing on the moon,” the bassist told me tiredly, scratching at his messy dreadlocked hair.
“See? Insane gibberish,” Ginger sighed.
I sat down beside Twiggy. “Come on, man. What did you take? How many?”
“I can fly!” Suddenly, he darted up, racing toward the hotel room balcony.
I shot off after him, firmly grabbing his small waist and dragging him, while he struggled in my arms, to one of the beds in our hotel room. I pushed him down, and went back to lock the window. I didn’t want my bassist leaping to his death because of a bad trip.
“I know he had LSD with Pogo earlier. He had a bag of little white pills, but I don’t know what they were or how many he took.”
“It’s probably mixing them that’s got him so wild. The LSD always makes him a little crazy.”
Behind me and the drummer, the bassist was up on his feet, charging for the window again.
As I’d done the time before, I grabbed ahold of him, dragged him back to the bed, and this time, took out the handcuffs I always carried with me on tour. They had so many uses, and restraining one of us when we were on a bad trip was one of them. I locked one cuff to the headboard, and the other around Twiggy’s small wrist.
Howling in frustration, he frantically tried to slip his hand out of the cuff. “They’re going to leave me! Don’t let them leave me!”
I talked quietly to Ginger, trying to figure out what exactly Twiggy had taken, and if he’d been drinking. I silently cursed myself for having gone to that stupid after party. No hook up was worth coming back to this.
In less than five minutes, Twiggy had struggled so hard with the handcuff that he’d rubbed the skin nearly down to the bone. His wrist was bloody and torn open. I had no choice but to let him out of the restraints, if only to address his wound and find another way to keep him still.
Ginger went on a search for food. I knew that none of us had eaten much that day, and putting something besides drugs and alcohol into his stomach might be what he needed.
As soon as he was out of the handcuffs, he was fighting me to get up again.
“Stop it, damn it!” I yelled at him. “What’s wrong with you?”
“I have to go pee-pee,” he whined.
“What are you, three?”
“Mar-i-lyn, I have to go!”
“You’re not going anywhere. Now calm down. You’re perfectly fine. You’re just having a bad high.”
“But-”
I shook my head no. I needed to clean up his wrist, but I couldn’t leave him long enough to get supplies.
After struggling for a minute or so longer, Twiggy finally settled down, trapped beneath my arms.
“You’re going to eat whatever Ginger brings you, and then you’re going to bed. I’m sleeping with you so that I know you’re safe. You’re not to get up at all unless I say so. Do you understand me?”
“Yes,” he said quietly.
I could feel something warm against my thigh. It felt damp. Well, maybe he really had needed to use the bathroom. “Twiggs, did you pee on the bed?”
“I told you I needed to go.”
I sighed. I was wondering if this night could possibly get any worse. Now, I’d have to sleep in a wet bed. Or, put him in my bed and have to worry about being closer to the window.
Ginger came back. “All I could find was this,” he held out a paper plate with something that looked like smashed up road kill on it.
“What is it?”
He shrugged.
“There’s nothing else?”
“An orange.” He pulled it out of his pocket.
“An orange it is. Would you please peel it? And keep an eye on him?”
Ginger nodded.
Twiggy was sitting up, watching the drummer peel the orange with interest. “Ginge? Why is it an orange when it’s blue?”
“It’s not blue,” he said patiently. He noticed that the front of the bassist’s dress was wet. “What happened while I was gone? Why are you wet?”
“Because he pissed himself,” I said from the bathroom, where I’d washed my hands and taken the antiseptic, bandages, and gauze from my toiletries bag.
“Because someone wouldn’t let me use the bathroom.”
“Maybe if you weren’t trying to jump out of the window-” I stopped myself from going on. There was no point. I’d done things just as crazy when I’d had bad trips. He always took care of me in those times, so there was no reason I shouldn’t return the favor.
Ginger handed Twiggy a section of orange. “Here. Try this.”
Hesitantly, he popped it into his mouth and chewed. “I’m allergic to green,” he murmured while I worked on his torn up wrist.
Ginger patiently fed him the orange while I dressed his wound. He continued to speak gibberish, but at least he wasn’t struggling anymore.
Thinking that he was probably on the road to normalcy, I found him a clean pair of pajamas and helped him out of the wet clothes he was wearing and into the soft, dry jammies. I put him in my bed, tucked him in, and crawled in beside him. As Ginger left for the night, I had him check to make certain that the window was locked, and that there were no drugs or alcohol hidden in the room.
Twiggy fell asleep rather quickly, stretched out on his stomach.
I was tired, but I was too worried about my friend to allow myself to fall asleep. It would be on me if something happened to him tonight.
Around an hour later, Twiggy opened his eyes and looked at me.
“What’s wrong?”
“I feel kind of funny. Why are you in bed with me?”
“You were having a bad trip.”
“I was?”
“You were saying all kinds of crazy things. You tried to jump out the window. I think you nearly gave Ginger a stroke.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What did you take?”
“LSD, some speed, and these weird white pills that some chick gave me.”
“You should never take drugs you don’t know what they are.”
“Yes, mother.”
“I’m not kidding, Twiggy. I love you like my brother. I don’t want you dying on me. What would I do without my bassist?”
He laughed softly, turning onto his side. “I think I’m okay now. Want me to sleep in my bed?”
“No. We’ll have to wait until the maid changes the bedding.”
He wrinkled his nose, but didn’t ask. It wasn’t the first time he’d peed on the bed, and I was sure it wouldn’t be the last.
“You’re fine right here, with me.”
“Okay. Goodnight, then.”
“Goodnight, Twiggs.”
I kept an eye on him until he was asleep again. He looked so fragile and innocent when he was asleep. Nothing at all like the crazy lunatic he’d been a few hours ago. I knew that I should’ve protected him more, kept him from doing so many drugs and drinking so much. But he was an adult. He was capable of making his own decisions.
“Marilyn?”
I opened my eyes again. “I’m sorry. You deserve better.”
“It’s okay, Twiggy. Just get some sleep.”
“I want to go to rehab. Will you take me to rehab? Tomorrow?”
I lay there for a moment, contemplating telling him no. What was I going to do for the rest of the tour if my bassist took a leave to go to rehab? What would the label or the fans think? This could be bad. Very bad. Yet, denying him help was worse in every single way. He knew that he had a problem, and he was ready and willing to get the help he needed. I couldn’t deny him that.
“Marilyn?”
“Yes. Yes, I’ll take you to rehab. We’ll find you the best place, with the highest success rate, and we’ll get you checked in. I don’t care what it costs. We’ll get you through this.”
He smiled. “Thanks.”
I nodded, drifting back to sleep. All we had to do was make it through the night, and then, everything would be okay.