Mike was slumped over in a crummy plastic chair.  He felt like he was suffocating.  The room they were all in was way too small.  All of the chairs were lined up close together, against the walls.  He tried to keep his glassy, tired eyes focused on the counselor in front of the dry eraser board.  But he kept nodding in and out of sleep.

It was his third day in here.  The wound on his thigh from the abscess was finally starting to heal up.  But the drug withdrawal was torture.  This particular ward was very chinsey when it came to giving out controlled substances.  He remembered when he asked about methadone the other day, one of the addicts near him started cackling and told him "good luck".

All they gave him were gastrointestinal medications.  For the muscle twitches and kicks, they gave him robaxin.  Which irritated Mike—robaxin was a very lame muscle relaxer.  It helped, yes, but the drowsiness that accompanied the side effects of it made it almost impossible for him to function.  He wished they would just give him Librium for it, since they refused to put him on a methadone treatment.

At least it's better than halfway houses, he thought to himself as he forced his eyes back open. 

Halfway houses were the worst places to get off and STAY OFF drugs—at least from his own personal experience.  Most of them were very run down due to the fact that they were relatively cheap for addicts to pay for.  The majority of the people who came to halfway houses had already hit rock bottom.  Most of them were coming off the streets.

He remembered the only withdrawal "medications" they would give him at those places were naproxen and Imodium.  Due to this, the first week was always hell.  He had been to two, only because he was broke at the time and his family guilt tripped him into going.

"Why the fuck am I even here," mike blurted aloud.

Those chocolate eyes widened when he noticed everyone glancing over at him.  He turned to see that the counselor had stopped talking.  She was gaping at him, too.

"Are you okay, Mike...?" The counselor asked.

He was shocked that she paused from doing her lecture to ask him that.  Still, he just shrugged.

"You look really sick, sweetie," she went on.  Her red brow curled in concern.  "You should go to the nurse's station and see if they could treat you..."

A sigh escaped his chapped lips.  Instead of responding, he slowly got himself up from his chair and limped out.  He held onto the wall as he slowly made his way over to the nurse's unit.  He had to or he would fall—he was getting extremely dizzy.  He hadn't ate much since he'd been here.  Plus the third day of opiate withdrawal was always the worst.

"You should sit down," a voice sounded from behind him.  Before he could glance over to see who was talking to him, he felt an arm wrap around his shoulders and help him over to one of the couches in the lounge area.  It was Briana.

He chewed on his lip for a moment, not daring to make eye contact with her.

She sighed, resting her head on the palm of her hand.  "You're still mad at us," she pointed out.

Mike raised a brow.  He still wouldn't look at her.  Instead, he scratched an itch at his temple and focused his eyes to the television set in front of him.

"The psychiatrist decided to prescribe you neurontin for the pain," Briana told him, her voice ringing with hope.  She was trying to keep him focused on the positive.

"Neurontin fucking sucks," mike spat.  His face burnt red with irritation as his scrawny body leaned back into the cushion of the couch.  A grimace elongated his pale face when his stomach cramped up again.  "That shit is for nerve damage and even people with fibromyalgia complain about it."

"Well, it's better than naproxen," Briana pointed out.

The brunette shot her a look.  He wanted to chew her out.  Every time she was working on the ward, she seemed to always bother him.  He didn't understand why.  She didn't have to pretend to like him now that Layne wasn't around.

"Why are you acting like you care about me?" Mike finally decided to ask.  His voice was cracked, eyes now soft.  The emotions were starting to get to him.  "The both of us know that you wanted to boot me out the second Layne told you I've been hiding this from you."

She shook her head at him.  "I didn't want to kick you out," she tried to reassure him.  She let out another breath of sadness when Mike's face twisted in doubt.  "I had threatened to when I first decided to let you stay with us, yes.  But, believe it or not, I actually do like you."

Mike forced a bitter laugh.  "Yeah.  Okay.  Whatever you say."

Those green eyes saddened.  "I know we had a rough start when we first met each other...  and, yeah, I was really hesitant about you.  But since I've gotten to know you better, I view you as a friend."  She shrugged her small shoulders.  "You kind of remind me of my old self..."

"Yeah, your junky self," mike bore on.  His heart sunk in his chest.  "I wish the paramedics never fucking made it to my apartment in time," he blurted out about his suicide attempt.  He didn't care to keep his thoughts to himself anymore.  The sickness was unbearable.

Briana handed him a Kleenex box when she noticed tears starting to roll down his cheeks.  "Well, I'm glad that they did."

He rolled his eyes.  "Could you quit being so fucking fake?" He snapped.  "You don't care about me.  No one does.  Aside from Layne..." he sniffled.  Eventually he had to tug a napkin out from the box to wipe his face.  "And I'm hurting him.  Just like I've hurt everyone else.  It's the same old shit.  For years.  I want to fucking die already."

Briana tried to speak, but mike demanded her to leave him alone.  Instead of being stubborn and trying to talk him down, she tapped over to the medication unit to get his neurontin.  When she came back to give him it, she was shocked that he took it.

He looked like he wanted nothing to do with her.  But he did.

She's like a sister to him.  He hated admitting that to himself, but it was the truth.  She was a great woman.

And he was shocked that she still was sticking by him, trying to help him....