This Cruel Love

“He’s not going to get near me.” I hugged him back, standing on my tiptoes and burying my face into the crook of his neck. It was my favourite place to be. “I don’t want him anywhere near me. Only you.”

He pulled back and held my face in both of his hands as he kissed me with such warmth and delicacy that I felt like my heart would break.

“I won’t be gone for long, princess, I swear. I just need to get out, okay?”

He searched my eyes with his, looking for some kind of approval. I nodded back, trying to look like I was okay and on board with him constantly bailing on me since I’d come back to town.

“Don’t be too long. I get lonely without you. And Justin? Please don’t do anything stupid.”

I hated being on my own at the best of times, but in Justin’s apartment it was a million times worse, because everywhere I looked there were reminders of him. Damn, the whole place smelt like him, and it made me pine for him when he was gone. It was ridiculous to think that any man could come between us, especially one as cold and heartless as Jackson Caine. I would never let that happen, never in a million years.

An hour turned into a few hours, then before I knew it the sky was pitch black and my eyes were growing heavy. I’d waited up long enough for him, and now I couldn’t fight the tiredness anymore. So, I fell into bed, alone and slightly pissed off that he hadn’t even responded to my texts or calls to let me know he was alright. Since when had Justin become so inconsiderate?

I drifted in and out of a hazy sleep, and when I heard distant, muffled sounds, at first I thought they weren’t real, just extensions of my dreaming mind. Then suddenly, a crashing sound made me shoot up into a sitting position in bed. My heart was hammering out of my chest, and the adrenaline shooting through my system made my stomach churn. Was this Caine’s men, back again to take what they thought we owed them?

I threw the covers off, and grabbed the baseball bat that Justin kept in the corner of the bedroom, to give me some element of self-protection. What good it’d be was debateable. I wasn’t the best sports person. I’d probably have more luck making an intruder laugh to death with my weak-ass swing than successfully whacking them. But it helped make me feel slightly less vulnerable. I followed the noise to the bathroom, and when I slammed open the door to surprise the trespasser, my heart sank at the image in front of me. An image that’d be ingrained in my mind for as long as I lived.

Justin was part lying, part sitting up against the bathtub. His shirt was off and his arm was wrapped above the elbow with some kind of tourniquet. A needle hung out of his arm, but that wasn’t the worst part. It was the vacant, lifeless stare in his eyes. Pupils fixed, dilated and looking into nowhere. That was what filled my heart with dread and made me cry out. The way his limbs were slumped into an uncomfortable position made him look like he’d been dumped there, but I knew he’d done this to himself. This was all on him. No one else had wrapped his arm up or stuck that needle into him.

I screamed his name over and over again, but he didn’t respond. He didn’t even flinch at my ranting, and his blue lips remained slack and unresponsive. I was in full on panic mode, and even though I was screaming, shouting, trying to get through to him, I couldn’t touch him. I couldn’t bear to look at the needle that hung out of him. Was he dead? Was this how he was going to leave me; heartbroken and alone, with this as my final image of him?

I couldn’t stop shaking, but my automatic pilot gear eventually kicked in. I raced to get my mobile and rang for an ambulance.

“Is he still breathing?” the operator asked me, but I was all over the place and I hadn’t even checked.

“I don’t know,” I cried, desperate and out of my mind with fear.

I reluctantly reached out to touch his arm, the one with the offending needle, and I held his wrist to see if I could feel for a pulse. It was there; weak, but still pulsing, thank God.

“He’s still alive… just… please hurry. I don’t know how long he’s got left.”

I felt totally out of my depth. I had no idea what to do for the best, but I knew I couldn’t handle this on my own. If by some miracle he managed to survive this night, then we needed help. Justin had to get professional help. We wouldn’t survive if it was left up to me to get him out of this. Love wasn’t strong enough when faced with these kinds of demons.

It felt like hours to my panicked state of mind, but minutes later I heard the doorbell. I ran to let the paramedics into the apartment and guided them through to the bathroom, where Justin lay hanging on by a thread. I knelt down beside him, holding his hand and willing him to come round as they did their vital checks. They asked me questions about what he’d taken, when and how much, but I could barely string a sentence together. Obviously, I had no clue. I wasn’t with him when he’d done this to himself. I felt totally and utterly helpless.

They administered some drug, which they informed me was widely used to reverse the effects of an opioid overdose. Then they cleaned Justin up, moving him into the bedroom and dropping him onto the bed without the care I would’ve expected from medical professionals such as they were.

“Is he going to be okay? Don’t you need to take him into hospital for further checks?” I asked, praying they’d tell me he’d be checked in for observation and some one-to-one professional medical care that I believed he desperately needed.

“Your man here will be fine once it all wears off. Well, as okay as a drug addict like him can be,” the older of the two men informed me. “He’s got a serious addiction. That’s painfully clear, love.”

He smiled kindly at me then, and I fought the urge to go to him for a hug.

“I’m guessing this is all new for you? You’ve never seen him like this before?”

I shook my head and let silent tears fall down my already dampened cheeks.

“You look about the same age as my daughter. Early twenties? Am I about right?”

I nodded, waiting for him to impart some gem of knowledge in how to deal with Justin and his drug addiction that he was ready to gift to me.

“If you were my daughter, I’d tell you to run. Get as far away from this junkie as you can.”

My heart sank again and I gasped, totally taken aback by his candid admission.

“You can’t help him, sweetheart. He’ll only drag you down with him. He needs to want the help, and his brand of addiction needs some heavy duty professional

counselling. It wouldn’t be an easy road.”