A Poptart As My Only Witness

I vape. 

I’m not proud of it. 

Whatever.

I fucking love it.

People have told me to quit, and I’ve listened politely while mentally daring them to try.

You can pry my vape from my cold, dead, trembling, sticky hands.

So when someone handed me a vape—slimmer than mine, a little off—I didn’t ask questions.

I’m not one to judge other people’s nicotine delivery systems.

I took a large hit. It tasted good. 

Creepy, but good.

So I took another.

Now, for context:

my vape has two modes—Pulse Mode (aka Pussy Mode), and Full Mode, which is just a full-throttle inhalation death wish.

I’m a Full Mode bitch. 

I hit like it owes me money.

But something happened.

My throat lit on fire.

Like, actual fire.

Not irritation—holy fire.

Divine wrath in the trachea.

Everyone just looked at each other like, “Hmm.”

I was on the floor, doing a sticker project at the time—something innocent, childlike.

I had been deeply emotionally invested in little shiny pieces of paper.

Especially the three-dimensional ones.

Then I stood.

And I laughed.

I laughed about stickers.

About life.

About being a grown woman with a dog and trauma and a sticker habit.

And then—I said, “Heehee.”

That was the last thing I uttered.

The last known word before full neurological collapse.

⸻

I don’t remember going up the stairs,

but I’ve been told I ascended using all fours—

like a wounded animal dragging its soul behind it.

Next thing I know,

I was curled into a ball on the bathroom floor, groaning.

I wasn’t crying. 

I wasn’t thinking.

I was just—becoming something else.

This is my life now, I thought.

This is who I am now.

How will I eat again?

How will I piss?

How will I pull my pants down to piss?

How will I get into bed?

How will I feed my dog?

I knew things would never return to how they were before.

⸻

At some point, three men—yes, three—hoisted me into bed.

Even with three full-grown males, they still failed to get my whole body on the mattress.

One of my legs dangled limply, forgotten. 

Like a tragic curtain.

And they placed me face-down, head at the foot of the bed,

ass up like a cursed Renaissance painting.

They turned on the ceiling fan—because I was sweating profusely—

and then they left.

They all just left.

Apparently, I looked asleep.

I was not asleep.

I was very much awake.

My eyes were closed.

My dignity was closed.

But I was awake.

Time passed in a way only the dead understand.

Eventually, I used all my remaining strength to turn myself around.

Head where a head should be.

But now I was freezing.

Fan still blowing.

Sweat dried.

Nothing left but shame and chills.

Blankets meant warmth.

But my brain couldn’t track the sequence.

Get under blanket = warm

felt like solving algebra in Morse code.”

So I did what I could.

I reached for my large stuffed Pop-Tart—Helen Judith Fox.

I pulled her across my body like a shield.

She stayed on me, sort of.

Mostly, she judged me.

Soft but stern.

She offered the emotional warmth of a tax auditor.

The physical warmth of disappointment.

She stayed on top of me for hours.

Slouching.

Sliding.

Half-committed.

Like a man.

⸻

In the morning, the world was blurry and cruel.

I asked:

“What the fuck happened?”

They said:

“You greened out, bro.”

I didn’t know what that meant.

I Googled it.

Turns out:

this was not a normal vape.

It was a very special vape.

A cursed vape.

A vape I will never fuck with again.

A vape that almost ended me.

A vape that left me face-down, ass up,

and judged by a Pop-Tart.