Drugs, for all their calming agents, were just--not good.
And it wasn’t because she suffered from an addiction or that her health was put in danger. In reality, they had helped settle her when the anxiety would spike back in Those Days, or after He had finished with her for the night and she was left alone once again. They were one of her few friends--the moon was another, and the wind one more.
But she would see things, things she knew weren’t there. Mostly Ellie, if not always. Her little body skipping around holding the toys she’d bought her when out with their nanny, her blonde braid swinging about. She was healthy--that was the first sign that it couldn’t be real--and she was smiling, and she was alive. And she knew deep down that it couldn’t be true, but in those moments--
Her hands would reach out and she would feel her vision blur, but her smile would be wide and her heart would thump wildly. She would be ecstatic.
Soon enough the affects would wear, and she would refocus on the reality before her. No smiles, no braids, no Ellie.
It was why she quit; she had lost her enough times to want to continue.
