"Jesus, my head is killing me," said Brian, rolling overin his empty bed. His head hurt like a bitch, AND Leighanne wasn't there... his day was starting out perfectly. He was reminded, by his jackhammer brain, that he had a concert that night in his (now) hometown of Atlanta, and that he needed to be at the venue at 11am. It was already 9:30, and he hadn't showered or eaten or... gotten up. I know Leigh's got some pills for this kind of thing, but where the Hell did I see her put 'em? he wondered as he planted his feet on the floor. He searched through her closet, finally discovering thembehind the flap of a small cardboard box on the top shelf. "Why are these hidden like this?" he asked nobody in particular, seeing as nobody was there, and looked at the bottle. "Fioricet," he read aloud, "take 1 every 4-6 hours for pain; may cause drowsiness, do not take with alcohol." Brian popped two of the half-blue-half-white pills into his hand. "One is just NOT enough for this fuckin' headache," he yawned, tossing the bottle back where it came from and headed into the bathroom.
He grabbed his cup and filled it up with water. I'll drink some extra water, just in case, he figured in his mind, throwing back the pills and chugging the water. Just the fact that he'd even taken the medication made him feel a little better. Now a nice, long shower should just about do the rest of the work, thought Brian, grabbing a towel from under the sink and sliding open the glass door.
About three minutes later, Brian began to feel the first effects of the medication. His legs went weak and he started to fall, but caught himself. "Whoa, maybe it's a little stronger than I thought," he chuckled, standing back up and rinsing his hair out. Five minutes later, though, was when he knew he was in trouble. His vision began to blur, and he felt extremely tired and drunk. "What's happeining to me?" he wailed, tears of frustration forming at the corners of his eyes as he stumbled along the wall to his room. He barely made it from the shower to his bed before he collapsed in a heap. "I gotta... call-" he said slowly, his limbs not functioning properly in response to his brain, so he was telling them what to do. He managed to dial 9-1-1 into his cordless phone before passing out.
A week later, Brian awoke from his coma. The doctors said it was a miracle he wasn't dead after his ordeal. One pill, by his height and weight, would have knocked him out for a few hours, and made him feel a little weak, but TWO pills... it was like taking a horse tranquilizer. When they'd analyzed his blood and found the drug, Leighanne went home and burned the bottle of pills in her gas-log fireplace, watching as the plastic melted into the logs.
The drug, which helps to open blood vessels in the brain, like a neuro-muscle relaxer, ruptured a small cluster of cappilaries in Brian's brain. If the damage had been done to the temporal lobes, he would've been fine, maybe moody, but that was not the case. In fact, the place of rupture was the part of the brain that controls speaking. Yes, Brian now had to re-learn to speak. He could not sing, probably ever again. And all because of one...little...pill.