Free Enigma by Leslie Drennan

of utter stupidity. Realizing it wasn’t going to go away no matter how much soap or shampoo I used, I decided it was time to get out since the water had started turning cold.
    After crawling out of the shower and putting my flannel pajamas on, I managed to make it into the bedroom, where Lena had turned my bed back for me and put my cell phone on the charger. Pulling up onto the bed took everything I had left in me as I slid underneath the covers, barely having the energy left to breathe. Lena walked back to the bathroom, and I heard her turn the shower off, gather my filthy clothing, and shut the bathroom door again when she came out.
    She had a glass of 7Up on the nightstand, alongside some saltine crackers and the remote to my fifty-two inch, plasma TV, which was mounted on the wall opposite of my bed. I couldn’t even think about nibbling on a cracker without feeling sick again, and TV held no appeal. Before leaving me to drift off to sleep, Lena put her hand on my forehead and checked to see if I had any fever. She offered to bring a heating pad to ease the muscles I’d pulled from being sick all night, but I told her not to worry about it. Then she said something about how I wasn’t going to die of alcohol poisoning and this wouldn’t be the first time I would find myself in this condition as my eyes closed and I was officially out like a light.

CHAPTER 4
    How I even managed to get up and get dressed this morning was beyond my comprehension. I guess my internal alarm clock was responsible. Every muscle in my body, including those that I didn’t know existed, made it painfully clear that they had been abused by the tremendous amount of strain that had been required of them the night before last, when I had foolishly tried to walk on the wild side, causing me to be sicker than I had ever been in my life. With every movement I felt the burning ache of the severely pulled muscles in my body. Today they hurt three times worse than they had yesterday, making me regret even more the decision to give in and drink for the first time.
    I felt as if I had walked out in front of a speeding bus and been hit by it, along with being plowed by all the traffic behind the bus before rolling off into a gutter. I felt so achy that I didn’t care one bit about my appearance. I grabbed a t-shirt and a pair of comfortable jeans, my tennis shoes, a worn gray sweatshirt that was slightly over sized, pulled my hair back into a ponytail without applying one drop of makeup, and grabbed my cell phone and keys. I was glad I had left my bag and laptop in my car on Friday when I got home from school, because carrying it down two flights of stairs would not at all have been pleasant. Just with my body weight alone, my muscles screamed in pain with every step I took.
    I headed for the kitchen where Lorenzo, our personal chef, was already busy making breakfast. It smelled terrific, but I was still too scared to eat anything solid. Knowing how sick I’d been, Lorenzo nodded his head and waved at me with a spatula rather than starting up a conversation like he usually did every morning. Though he knew I was sick from a hangover, he was keeping his distance as though I was contagious though it was clear the only thing I suffered from was chronic stupidity, so that was my first clue that he was more than upset with me. I really wanted to tell him that my stupidity wasn’t contagious, but I just kept my mouth shut and went about my business.
    I pulled into a parking space in front of Spirits, killed the engine, and grabbed my laptop, thinking through what I planned to say in my paper about not being a classroom disturbance. This assignment just made me mad. It was completely pointless. Just because it made her happy to make me miserable, I would play her little game. I wondered what the chances were of us having a substitute or Ms. Greer forgetting she had assigned me the paper. Neither one seemed to offer odds in my favor, so I opened my laptop and