Hugh kept trying to work around Ezra’s timing, but it was becoming slower then faster. Lily, Hugh, and Sandra exchanged looks.
“I’m going to break for a moment,” said Ezra, coming to an abrupt stop. “Beer anyone?” All three of them sighed and exchanged glances. Tonight was only going to get worse and they knew it. While Ezra opened doors for them, got them into parties and after-parties, he didn’t know how to stop with the drugs. Always flush with cash from his dad, Ezra couldn’t resist getting the best weed and heroin he could buy. And there was never any problem finding drugs on the Strip.
“Sure,” said Lily, her voice falling as she tried to figure how wasted he was.
After he walked toward the main house, the trio looked at each other.
“I think you should say something to him,” said Lily to Hugh.
“Do you think he’s shooting up in the bathroom?” Rick was loading film.
“Who knows. He only listens to Sandra.” Hugh kept working through some fingerpicking he was thinking about for a new song. “What do you think of this, Sandra?”
But Sandra couldn’t focus on Hugh. In the distance, she heard something hit the ground—a beer bottle perhaps, then two. She saw what looked like a figure, which became Ezra as he became illuminated under the porch light staggering out of the back door and collapsing in the yard near Hugh’s tepee. On instinct, Sandra bolted from the room and into the yard.
“Ezra.” Dropping to her knees, slapping him lightly on the face. Sandra could see he wasn’t breathing. She checked Ezra’s pulse, which was weak.
Hugh and Lily were at her side.
“Call an ambulance.” Her voice was sharp.
“He’s turning blue,” said Hugh.
“I know,” said Sandra. “Call a fucking ambulance. Tell them he OD’d.”
Looking up at the trees and the remaining light that was shining down, Sandra wondered if an ambulance would ever find them so deep up in the Canyon with the unmarked roads and hidden driveways.
Sandra touched Ezra’s chest and she could feel—not really feel, but see—that his heart was slowing. The drugs were relaxing his lungs to the point he was unable to make himself breathe. As she touched him, she felt a buzzing in her fingertips. She pulled them back as if she’d touched a hot stove and looked at them, wondering if it was the weed she’d had earlier. It had to be a bad trip, some weed laced with some other shit that Kim must have gotten. But there was an overwhelming sense that she felt could pull the heroin out of his bloodstream through the pads of her fingers like she was draining a snakebite. This was some fucking weird trip.
“What the fuck.” It was Rick beside her.
Ezra had begun to foam at the mouth and it seemed he was attempting to vomit. Sandra turned him on his side, but he was making noises.
“He’s choking.” Rick came around and helped her sit him up, but Ezra’s body was limp.
Sandra met Rick’s eyes.
It was then that a smell began emit from Ezra. From experience, Sandra knew that she was the only one who smelled it. Since she had been a little girl, Sandra could sense death via smell. The first time it happened, there was this kid in school who’d come down with a fever. As she sat next to him on the school bus that Friday, Sandra smelled something sweet yet foul on him. He was admitted to the hospital with bacterial meningitis and was dead by Monday. She’d smelled this same rotting sweet scent again after her grandmother’s heart attack. As the woman lay in her hospital bed, Sandra remembered her doctor patting the woman on the shoulder and declaring her “lucky,” except that Sandra knew better. When she kissed her goodbye, she almost choked on the sweet and rotten fragrance ebbing from the woman’s pores. An hour after they’d left for the afternoon, her grandmother died in her chair in front of a cheap hospital gift shop Chinese checkers board.
And she smelled it now on Ezra. Her hands began to tingle, as if they were coming alive. She placed them on him and a sharp burning sensation shot through her. It was an odd sensation, but she could see that Ezra’s chest moved as long as she touched him and stopped when she pulled her hand away.
“What are you doing?” Rick stared down at her.
“I don’t know,” said Sandra. “When I touch him, he seems to respond.”
“So touch him then.”
Sandra placed her hands firmly on Ezra’s chest, and it began to rise. Sandra’s arms began to shake from the pain, but both Rick and Sandra could see him getting more lucid.
“Are you okay?”
She nodded to Rick and held her hands firmly on Ezra until he began to vomit violently. Rick held Ezra upright, slapping him on the back. When she couldn’t bear it any longer, she pulled her hands away, expecting them to be blistered, but they were still pale and pink.
It was then that Ezra opened his eyes and inhaled a raspy breath. “What the fuck.” He sat up and wiped his mouth.
“Sandra saved your life, asshole.” Rick stood up. “What the fuck are you on?”
“Nothing, man.” Ezra shook his head. “I’m clean, I swear.”
Ezra looked up at Sandra and something unspoken occurred between them. He knew what she had done.
Somewhere in the distance, Sandra heard the sirens getting closer—the ambulance on its way up Laurel Canyon Boulevard. They wouldn’t find anything in Ezra’s body, of that Sandra was sure. And with the same certainty, Sandra knew that she could still smell death lingering on Ezra. She had only saved him for tonight. There would be another night.
After Ezra’s collapse, practice was done for the night. The paramedics couldn’t find anything wrong with Ezra. He lied and said he often had seizures, and the team packed up their gear and headed back down the Canyon.
The group broke for the night, unsettled by what had happened. Hugh and Lily headed to the Forum. Ezra said he was headed home. Sandra decided to go down to the Shack to see about getting the band a gig for Thursday night. She needed to be alone for a while. As she was heading to her car, she heard a voice behind her. It was Rick.
“Hey, I wanted to see if you were okay?” He was juggling two camera bags, and Sandra could see he was headed to his Jeep. “He was lucky you were here tonight.”
“It was nothing.” Sandra shifted her weight. Why was she so nervous talking to this man?
“I was there, Sandra.” said Rick. “It was something.” He reached out and touched her arm lightly. It was an innocent, protective gesture, but Sandra felt her stomach flutter.
“Are you headed to the Forum?”
She shook her head. “I’m going to try and get us a Thursday night gig at the Shack.”
“Do you want me to call Milo for you?”
Milo—for he had no last name, at least not one that Sandra knew of—was the owner of the Shack, one of the oldest clubs on the Strip.
“Sure,” said Sandra. “If you don’t mind.”
“I don’t mind,” said Rick.
They stood there at his Jeep for a moment.
“I should go,” said Sandra.
“I’ll run up to the house and call him,” offered Rick.
Rick had always had enough sway in LA to get the owner of the Shack to give them a slot. He had that kind of power. So why was he doing this now? His brother-in-law was a member of the band as well, so he could have offered this favor up at any point. It seemed like it was a grand gesture for her for what he’d seen tonight. While she was downplaying it to Rick, she had to admit, what she’d done had been extraordinary. She had no idea how she’d done it.