Chapter 7

Guilt is a cognitive or an emotional experience that occurs when a person realizes or believes—accurately or not—that he or she has violated a moral standard, and bears significant responsibility for that violation. It is closely related to the concept of remorse.

I awake to a throbbing pain in my head. I try to open my eyes but the pain forces me to keep them closed. Bringing my fingers up to massage mytemples it takes nearly five minutes of applying pressure as I move my fingers in circles, for the pain to ease just enough for me to come around.

The events of last night are not lost on me even with this debilitating headache. Maybe that’s because my head is not the only part of my body that hurts. I hurt everywhere.... my arms, my legs, my shoulder, my neck, my... well you get the idea.
Last night it felt so wonderful, so why do I now feel like I’ve gone ten rounds with Mike Tyson not Mike Jackson?

Wincing with pain I force myself to slowly sit up. I’m still naked from our little escapade last night and I’m a little bit sad to see that I’m alone. I guess the romantic side of me thought that I’d awake to find myself lying in his arms or at least lying beside him.

Now I just feel, well, cheap. That’s the only word to describe the emotions that are stirring within and the insecurities start to flood my brain. I worry that last night was just a lay for him and like many times before, once again Ava Phillips has been used. Used and tossed out with the garbage. Only good for one night, only good for one thing.

I want to cry. I look at my wrists that are covered in faint purple bruises. I finger my left wrist with my other hand and I feel sick.

The nausea takes hold and as I feel the rush of liquid seep into my mouth, it takes all of my strength to jump out of bed and dart into the bathroom making it just in time to throw up.

The remnants of last night’s wine and pizza are forced from my body as I heave into the toilet. It takes me a while to stop vomiting and when I eventually stand back up I catch a glimpse of my reflection in the bathroom mirror above the sink.

I look a mess. No wonder he didn’t want to wake up with me. My hair is frizzy as hell and clumps of it have clung to my forehead. My hair has never been good around moisture and I guess all that sweating we did last night played havoc with my roots.
I wrap a nearby towel around my aching body before I take a comb from the side cabinet and begin to untangle the bird’s nest that is my hair.
I find an unopened toothbrush and scrub my teeth and tongue until the taste of vomit has vanished all together.
Splashing some cold water onto my face I realize that I really need some pain relief.

I begin to rummage around in the side cabinet looking for some Tylenol or something similar when I see a black toiletry bag stuffed inside. I open it up and I’m... shocked.

The bag is filled to the brim with little yellow medicine bottles. The medication has been prescribed, I can tell that by the doctor’s squiggle on the white labels. But the reason I am shocked is because each bottle contains a different type of drug.

Picking the bottles up one by one I read the labels: Vicodin, Fentanyl, Oxycontin, Demerol, Valium, Xanax, Midazolam, Diazepam, Versed, Lorazepam, Alprazolam, Lidocaine, Ritalin, Dexedrine, Ambien.... hell I haven’t even heard of half of these names.

Even more shocking though is that none of the bottles have been prescribed to the same person. Each bottle has a different name: Frank Tyson, Chris Carter, Jack London, Arnold Omar, Paul Farance, Michael Amir Williams Muhammad....

“What the hell?” I hear him say as I jump nearly twenty feet into the air.

I drop the bottles that I’ve been studying from my hands and they fall to the floor. I look up to see Michael stood in the doorway with an angry look on his face.

“M, M, Mi-ch-ael...” I stutter with nervousness. I feel like a kid whose just been caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

“Ava what are you doing with my bag?” He says calmer now as he takes in my appearance.

My bag... For some reason my brain focuses on these two insignificant words, only as the penny drops I recognize they’re not insignificant at all. He’s admitted right to my face that these drugs are in fact his.

“Michael, why do you have all of these?” I say. Before I can stop myself from finishing this question the words roll off of my tongue in astonishment.

He looks at me with a pained expression. I can see he’s searching my eyes for something. Understanding maybe?

“Please get dressed” he eventually says and begins to turn away from the door as he walks back into the bedroom.

Now feeling the anger inside me start to boil, I tighten the towel around my body and trail after him quickly.

“Did I offend you?” I ask with as much emotion as I can muster. Right now I actually wanna scream at him, yell obscenities until I’m blue in the face, but I don’t. I need to show him I care. Why? Simply because I do. It maybe one sided on my part, but I feel as though I’ve found the other half of my soul in this man. This funny, wonderful, beautiful, gorgeous, sexy, frustrating man.

“Ava” he sighs “I can’t do this right now. I have a plane to catch back to L.A. this evening and I just, well, I just can’t talk to you right now. Please understand.” 

Understand? Under-f**king-stand? Is he kidding me right now?

Every day for a solid month he’s done nothing BUT talk to me. Last night I let him abuse me in ways I’ve never let any man do to me before and then I let him make love to me over and over. But now he can’t even have the decency to answer my simple question?
To say I’m furious is understatement of the year. I know that if I open my mouth to speak, I will surely begin to cry. That is how mad I am.

I push my way past him to get to the living room where my clothes are still strewn all over the floor. In thirty seconds flat I am redressed, have grabbed my bag and I’m heading towards the exit.

He’s been watching me in silence. He’s said nothing to stop me. In fact I know he wants me to leave and with this realization I begin to feel the vomit trying to force its way out of my mouth once again.

As I turn the handle forcing myself to look at the door in front of me, I take a deep breath as I nervously whisper “Thank you for saving me that night at the club Mike” a single tear drops onto my cheek, as I continue “I guess... I guess last night makes us even now.”

I walk out of the suite and literally run to the elevator. As the doors close behind me and I descend the thirty-three floors to the lobby, I now feel myself shake as I literally fall apart.