Another bone-deep stab. “Yeah.”

Venus rummaged in her purse for the prescription she’d picked up for Lex. “Ever taken Vicodin before?”

“No.”

“It might give you constipation.”

“Is that all? Okay.”

“Venus, I’m going to be sick.” Lex twisted over the edge of the bed and stared at the floor.

“Wait!” Venus rushed – well, inched, past the boxes to her side with a plastic bag.

“Sorry.” Lex grabbed the side of the bed to try to make the room stop whirling and dipping.

“Here.” Venus thrust the bag into her hands, just in time for another wave of nausea.

Lex started crying. “I feel so sick.”

“Shut up and concentrate on not throwing up.”

“I can’t.”

“And why not?” Venus thrust a paper towel into Lex’s plastic bag.

“Because I have to go.”

Venus’s eyes crackled with sparks. “Again? ”

Lex’s sobs renewed. “I’m sorry.”

“Stop crying.”

“I can’t. Nausea makes me weepy.” She burst into fresh tears.

Venus’s sighing breath tangled in Lex’s hair. “Come on.” She unhooked the ice machine, turned off the CPM, and stuck her arm under Lex’s ribs.

Upright was way worse than lying prone. Lex kept the plastic bag close to her face as her stomach clenched tight. Venus helped her stagger through the boxes and onto the toilet.

She couldn’t even sit up. Hot tears ran down her face as she sagged over, clamping her mouth shut to the tidal waves of nausea ebbing and flowing in her stomach. Venus leaned against the wall, sweating and panting from carrying her.

Back in bed, Lex turned her face to the wall while Venus re-hooked her ice machine. “I just want to die.”

“There is no way you’re going to die after putting me through all that.” Venus’s razor-sharp tone would have stopped Mel Gibson from dying in Braveheart.

“Why am I feeling so sick?”

“Have you ever taken any narcotic before? Codeine?”

“No.”

“How about your family?”

“Oh. Dad reacted badly to codeine when he got a bad cough, and the doctor prescribed him this strong syrup.”

Venus squeezed her forehead hard with her hand. “You’re kidding.”

“What?”

“Vicodin is related to codeine. If your dad reacts badly to codeine, you’ll most likely react the same way to Vicodin.”

Lex closed her eyes. “Oh.” She wished she’d known this sooner.

“I just want to diiiiiie.”

“I’m calling your surgeon.”

“It’s Saturday.”

Venus grabbed her cell phone. “He has a pager.”

Lex listened carefully, but Venus remained polite while on the phone. She snapped it shut. “There’s nothing else you can take that won’t make you sick.”

“Nothing?”

“There’s other stuff not related to codeine, but if you’re supersensitive like this, the other medications might also make you dizzy.

The doctor said you can take Tylenol.”

“That’s it? ”

“Well, you’re already taking ibuprofen. It’ll work in tandem. He said it might be enough. Or you can continue to take the Vicodin.”

Rock and a hard place. Wonderful. “I’d rather be in pain than puking.”

Venus shrugged. “Your call.”

Lex stared at the wall clock for the next few hours while Venus read her bits from People magazine. After a while, she started to notice what felt like fiery-hot pins across the surface of her knee.

“Venus, something’s wrong.”

“In a lot of pain?”

“Not the same kind. It feels like… sunburn. With jeans on.”

Venus winced. So did Lex.

She felt it when she got up to use the restroom again. The room had stopped spinning, but as soon as she swung her leg off the CPM machine, fire ants crawled up her shin and bit her kneecap with relish.

“Ow ow ow!” Lex pressed a hand against the thick bandage.

“Do you want the Vicodin?”

“No.” Lex waited for the burning to subside. “It’s weird. It feels like really bad sunburn.”

“Well, your doctor’s appointment is Monday. You’ll have to last until then.”

Monday couldn’t come soon enough.

The bone-deep ache returned after the Vicodin wore off completely. It hadn’t been a good weekend.

Monday morning, Venus drove her to the doctor’s office. Lex eased down into the waiting room seat.

The woman sitting next to her had a horrified look as she stared at Lex’s face. After two days of biting her sheets and sweating into her pillow while her knee throbbed with each motion of the CPM machine, Lex knew she looked like death warmed up in the microwave.

“Lex Sakai? Come on in.”

She hobbled into an exam room. Another patient passed her – the young redhead who had been on her third knee surgery. She walked without bandages or crutches, just her leg brace. Her surgery knee looked a little pink, but swelled only slightly more than her good side, with three small round Band-Aids. She smiled and waved at Lex.

Lex felt too weak to do more than growl at her.

She got up onto the exam table with Venus’s help. The doctor came in and shook hands with both of them. “How does it feel?”

“It’s burning, like a sunburn. I had to stop using the CPM machine.”

“Hmm, not good. You need to keep using the CPM machine so your knee doesn’t freeze up. Let’s take the bandages off and see how it looks.”

He took off the outer Ace bandage to reveal the flat, water-filled plastic pad that had attached to the ice machine. Oh, so that’s what it looked like. Lex had only felt the coldness.

Then he took off the gauze and pads underneath.

Whoa, momma. Blisters covered her entire kneecap. The swelling hadn’t gone down at all, unlike the redheaded girl’s knee.

“Your body didn’t shunt the fluid away, so it formed subdermal blisters.”

Whatever that meant.

“I’m going to drain the fluid.”

Lex didn’t quite get what he intended to do until he whipped out several humongous needles, and then drew up some clear liquid with another one. “I’ll numb the area a little.” He injected the fluid a little above her knee. It pinched but didn’t seem to reduce sensation.

Then the doctor grabbed the big needle.

Suddenly, all she could feel was white-hot pain pain pain pain pain… She grabbed the table, but her fingers scraped over the paper covering and the smooth vinyl. Whoa, Momma!

The doctor moved the tip of the needle to another blister. Lex’s teeth scraped against each other. The cuss words started flaming through her head sharp and fast.

Let no unwholesome words come from your mouth -

Oh, shut up. God has it in for me or something.

God didn’t answer, not with comfort or a lightning bolt. Lex felt completely alone.

TWENTY-FIVE

Let’s ask Mimi for help.”

“What?” Lying in her bed, Lex paused as she adjusted the pillows behind her aching back. “You’re kidding me, right?”

Venus pulled out her cell phone. “She doesn’t have any scars from that auto accident a few years ago, and it burned her pretty badly. She might know how to help your blistering.”

Lex had last seen her cousin when she stole her slimeball date George at Crustaceans Restaurant. “But Mimi? She’s not your favorite person either.”

“Do you have any other ideas?”

Lex started up the CPM machine again and winced at the rippling pain from the blisters that gradually dulled. “I guess not.”

Venus made the call, which, after some initial snarling, went well. “Mimi said she’ll be right over.”

“She’s probably coming to gloat over how terrible I look. I’m not holding out hope, Venus.”

“Let me warm up some soup for you. You haven’t eaten in three days.”

Lex shifted her back against the pillows. The CPM machine -moving only her right leg and not her left – had caused her lower spine injury to worsen.