“Out of our hair?” Julien asked. “Luis, we’ve been so worried about you. There’s no rush to leave. Brennan–the doctor that saw you last night–recommended plenty of liquids and bed rest today.”
Luis searched his memory, but had no recollection of any doctor. “There was a doctor?”
He could feel Julien’s frown. “Yes, he’s a friend. We had him come over since you were… quite opposed to going to the hospital.”
That brought a new wave of shame. Luis remembered the scene he’d made in the car, crying and begging them not to take him to the hospital.
“I’m sorry, fuck,” Luis rubbed a hand over his face. “I–I have some bad experiences with hospitals. I’m sorry, you could’ve taken me, it would’ve been fine.” He forced himself to move his hand and turn back to Julien to assess his expression.
Julien looked dubious, his lips pursed in tight disbelief. “It was no trouble to have him come over. And I daresay he gave a better assessment of your condition than human doctors would’ve.”
Luis didn’t miss the ‘human doctors’ bit, but couldn’t touch that right now. “What was my condition?” He asked instead.
“That you weren’t in danger of overdose, you threw up most of it,” Julien said. “But the drug contained a sedative agent which is why you’re so tired. With rest and food and water, your body will process it and you’d be okay. How’re you feeling now?”
Shaky. Uncertain. He wanted to ask if the doctor had mentioned anything about hiscondition, but also didn’t want to ask in case he hadn’t. “Better.”
Julien nodded, pleased. “Do you think you could eat?”
But Luis was already shaking his head. Taking up more of their time wasn’t going to make him feel better. He needed to get home and then he could lick his wounds where no one had to see him. Lay in bed with a bag of chips and feel sorry for himself.
“I think I’ll just get ready and go home–”
Luis tried to stand again, but his knees quivered and he dropped back down on the bed hard. Julien’s arm tightened on him once more, a warm band of skin against his bare back.
“Luis, you’ve been asleep for almost twenty-four hours, you need to take it slow. It’s no problem for you to stay here, Karim can…”
Luis stopped listening. He’d been asleep fortwenty-four hours?
If Luis had given himself a minute to think on it, he would’ve realized some time had slipped him by. Behind the nausea was a kind of cavernous hunger that came only when he’d gone without eating for a long time. And it couldn’t be the morning after the bar either, because Julien was sitting beside him.
Vampires slept during the day.
So, it wasn’t daytime. He tacked on another twelve hours. It had to be Saturday night.
Saturday night.
“Fuck,” Luis said, panic swelling. He’d been overdue for his treatment before he’d left for the bar on Friday night. Now he was another twenty-four hours later.
His hot, itchy skin, his shakiness, it all seemed a lot more ominous suddenly. What if it wasn’t the drug hangover making him feel this bad? He quickly ran through the list of symptoms: headache, itchiness, fatigue, shortness of breath. His vision seemed fine, but when he looked at his hands, they looked redder than usual. Were they?
Luis had struggled before his doctors had gotten his meds and treatment schedule right. He tried to think back, to compare those times to how he felt now. Had it been like this? He knew it could progress to dangerous levels in the span of a day. It could go from something he really should take care of to something that was threatening his life.
He’d been so stupid to silence the reminder day after day this week. He should’ve just taken care of it, reset the clock.
What had he been thinking?
But the answer was the same as it always was–he’d been thinking about how much it sucked. About how much he hated the treatment. He’d been thinking about how it was alater himproblem.
Well later him was now fucked.
What were his levels right now? Luis didn’t have his tester, had no way of knowing. Was he at risk of having a stroke any second?
“I have to go,” he said, interrupting Julien’s worried inquiry. “Really. I’m sorry. I’ll just order a—”
He reached for his phone on the nightstand as a fresh wave of nausea washed over him. He clutched the phone to his body gasping, trying not to throw up. He needed to calm down, raising his blood pressure would only make it worse.
“You have to go right now?” Julien asked, confused. “Luis, what’s going on?”
