Loser || WlW

Two

I wake up to a light beep, beep, beep.

Christ, the wings are going to burn if someone doesn't get them out of the fryer and Andrew will have my ass fired. Do I have to do everything around here? He was right, the new kid is useless.

I blink a few times. Everything is a blurry white glow. My eyes burn, pain pounds in my skull. The smell of disinfectant and hand sanitizer assaults my nostrils.

This can't be the pizza shop. Andrew hasn't cleaned since I started working there.

"Shit." My voice is hoarse as I shrink away from the blinding light.

"She's awake." There are two uniformed officers against the wall, one young, only a few years older than me. The other is an older man with a beer belly and a thick gray mustache.

"Maybe we can finally make some progress on this case." The other officer rolls his eyes. I can't help but notice how familiar those beady little eyes look. Where do I know him from?

"Not until the doctor looks at her." The last one is my dad.

"Sweetie?" A rough hand grips mine, as he moves into view, his orange eyebrows pulling together with concern. Deep bags have replaced his wrinkles.

"Dad." My voice cracks as I glance from him to the officers.

A searing pain pierces the back of my head as I lean forward to hug him. I wince, and my dad pushes on my shoulders, ordering me to lie back down.

"My head." I move my fingers to the area where the pain is focused and find a scratchy gauze wrap. "Dad, everything hurts." The words have hardly left my lips when I gag.

He scrambles to hold a pink, U-shaped dish under my chin as I heave.

The officers shuffle from the room. The younger white guy covers his mouth to suppress a gag.

"You really cleared the room, Jo Jo." My dad wipes my mouth with a napkin and scratches his five-o'clock shadow.

"Dad, what's going on?"

He sighs and folds himself into the stiff chair next to the bed. "I'm not supposed to say anything until the police talk to you." He covers a yawn and rubs his eyes. The clock on the side table is flashing 6:00 am. He works nights at the warehouse. I haven't seen him up at this hour since I was a kid. He probably hasn't slept in over two days. "I've got some news." By the way he says it, I know it isn't good news.

"It's Zachary," he says.

"Dad," I whine. "No, really?"

He nods.

"He got kicked out of rehab again?" Any fraction of hope that I was hanging onto this time is crushed.

"He chose to leave." He rolls his eyes. "Says the place was... Bringing him down." He puts air quotes around the last part. I swear the stress is starting to get to him. He looks a year older every day with new wrinkles around his eyes or mouth and all of the fiery orange faded from his hair. He grabs my hand and squeezes. "Look, sweetie. I know this must be difficult. You put your entire savings into this facility and-"

"It's fine, dad." It's all I can say to keep him from talking and me from crying.

His mouth is still open like he's debating whether or not he should continue but he knows me. He knows that I'll open up about it later if I need to. We sit in silence until the doctor's heels click down the hallway.

She enters the room without making eye contact. Her face is buried in her clipboard.

She extends a hand to me, shakes mine, moves on. "Hi, Jordan. I'm Doctor Miller. How are you feeling?" She says all of this while scribbling something down on a clipboard, not wasting a second.

"Um."

She clicks her pen, sets the clipboard down, and shines a light in one of my eyes and then the other. "Hm." Her brows furrow as she continues writing with one hand. "Follow my finger." She moves her pointer finger from the left to the right and back.

"She threw up," my dad says.

"Mm." She writes again, tapping her foot against the ground.

"Doctor Miller?" A middle-aged woman in cotton-candy colored scrubs steps into the doorway and motions for the doctor to follow her. She's only gone a moment. "I've received some sensitive information. Would you like your father to exit the room before I discuss it with you?" she asks.

"No, it's okay," I tell her.

She nods. "Your tox report came back. We found high levels of Flunitrazepam."

My dad's knuckles go white as he steadies himself with the bedside railing.

"I don't..." I look between them, waiting for an explanation.

"The slang term is roofie," the doctor explains. "It appears that you were drugged last night." She waits a moment.

I try to shake my head but the muscles in my neck are strained. None of this makes sense. I was at work.

"I know this is an incredibly difficult situation to process," she explains. "We can do a sexual assault forensic exam free of charge." She continues writing. "You'll get the results back in a week or two."

"My baby." My dad's voice is choked as his eyes fill with tears. I've never seen him cry and I'm not ready to see it now.

"That's fine," I say. "Is there anything else?"

Doctor Miller flips through the sheets on her clipboard and shakes her head. "That's all for now. We'll continue screening the concussion and you should be good to go in a few hours." She clicks the pen and smiles at me. "Any questions?"

"Is she well enough to talk to the police?" My dad sniffles.

"I don't see why not. Call me if you have any concerns." Her words are pushed together as she leaves the room.

The officers return, their hands resting on their belts fitted with an array of weapons they can use to apprehend me in case I feel the urge to run.

"Jordan, my name is officer Hemmett." Hemmett? Where is this guy from? "We're going to ask you a few questions." The officer is short, clearly making up for his tiny build with puffy muscles that threaten to tear a seam in his sleeves.

The older officer takes out a notepad.

"You fainted at your place of employment last night, correct?" the younger one asks.

I swallow hard. My throat is sandpaper.

The older officer pushes a small cup of water toward me.

"Yeah, I did."

"Do you know what happened after that?" He asks.

I begin to shake my head but stop as the pain throbs through my skull. "Not really."

"Witnesses claim someone in the restaurant offered to drive you home. Do you know who that was?" Officer Hemmett grips the end of the bed and leans his weight forward.

"Claire," I whisper.

Officer Hemmett raises his eyebrows. "Then what happened?"

I open my mouth but nothing comes out. "I don't know." I pause, replaying the night in my head. "I don't remember."

The officer sighs and looks at his colleague. "But you do remember waking up in the middle of your Psychology class saying 'Claire Davis is going to die'?"

My heart clenches in my chest.

The machine to my right beeps faster.

I swallow. "Can someone tell me what's going on?" I look from the officers to my dad but he's staring at the ground.

"An Uber driver brought you to the hospital when you passed out in his backseat and couldn't be woken up." The older officer explains. "You were covered in blood. Yours and Claire's."

Bile rises in my throat.

"Claire hasn't been seen since she left the restaurant with you," Officer Hemmett says through clenched teeth. "And we have reason to believe that..." He pauses and shakes his head. "We think Claire Davis is dead."