Filling in the Blanks

As promised.

I've not heard from Kyd. From what I can piece together he is living a few towns away with a young guy that he parties with. And when I say party, I mean Raves. They're back in vogue it seems, pacifiers and all.

The truth is, and this is where it gets scary in my head, I'd rather he was at a Rave than a basement drinking party. But it's the lesser of evils and I hate that my thinking looks like this. Because I'm more than aware about Ecstacy -- the HAPPY choice drug of Ravers -- and the devastation it can have on a healthy mind, never mind the quick mess it can make of a mind already teetering on the bleeding edge of chemical imbalance.  And we won't even mention the risk of sudden death.

So I make a choice every day. The choice to not think about what Kyd is up to too hard. I do this so I can come back from my own dangerous edge. I do this in hopes that I can salvage the tiny slice of what's left with my time with Lexi and push her out of a reasonably stable nest.

Jeezus, I'm living a warped version of Sophie's Choice.

I got a call the other day from his probation (for a drinking related incident) and I had to relay the message to him. He was short on the phone and clearly not interested in checking in or casual chatting. His responses were short and tight. 

When I hear that, when I think about how far away he is from me and from sobriety, my stomach shreds and dissolves and drips down into my feet and I just want to lie down in the middle of the road.  Anything to stop the ache and the worry and the helplessness.

So I throw my head into a box and unpack something, I make lists and check items off, I laugh about something with Lexi while I cook her a healthy dinner. I push away the black swarm of worry-wasps, push them back into a closet in the back of my skull and stuff towels into the cracks and hope they'll just suffocate in there.

But they won't, and so now that I'm unpacked well enough for satisfaction I need to go to a meeting. Stat.