bottles.
Melanie struts in like Cleopatra, laughing as she pushes a potato-faced kid with a bull ring out of the way to clear a spot on the sofa. A small pile of heroin sits on the coffee table. Suddenly, Mel goes silent. I watch, intrigued by this new side of her, precise, focused, and serious.
Just as I lean in to do a line, the door slams open and a squatty woman with hair shooting out in all directions is silhouetted in the doorway.
“Hi honey, I’m Linda.”
“Mia,” I say, waiting for her to comment on the small mountain of dope.
“Nice meetin’ you, sweetie.” Her smile vanishes. “Derek, did you take my cigarettes?”
This place is nuts, awesome, but nuts. I lean back in and cut out two lines. The high hits me totally unexpectedly. It’s not that instant rush you get from coke, it sort of melts over you slowly until it feels normal to be weightless and floating, like life has always been slow and beautiful. My body comes and goes, tingly and prickly one minute, normal the next. I sit zoned out like that for hours before I realize I have to puke.
Derek gives me a ride home, Melanie being “occupied” with Trevor. I pass Linda curled up on the sofa, dazed and drooling.
“Is she sick?” I whisper.
“No,” Derek answers. “Not sick…just weak.”
I spend time in Mia’s room each day, exploring her old books and toys, her collection of handmade boxes, her photos. It soothes the ache in a part of me I wasn’t aware of yet, the way your sternum or spleen doesn’t exist until it hurts. I have a new organ now in the shape of my daughter’s absence. I’m learning the anatomy of new life.
Late one Saturday night, I find a pretty wallet that she never used. Or so I thought. I notice a seam has been opened to make a secret place. I dig inside and find a folded white 3 × 5 card. I unfold it to see, written in blood traced with a fingertip: ROTTEN.
“Hey, Mia, I’m gonna mix you up something special, ’kay? It’s better than straight H. Speedballs are seriously like communing with God.”
“Sure,” I mumble, half stoned, half drunk.
Derek comes over with a needle and a belt.
“Here, tighten this around your arm,” he says. “Make sure it’s really tight.”
The needle comes toward me, slow and weaving, like the circles my mom used to make with a spoon when I was little to get me to eat. It finally makes contact with the vein and plunges in.
It’s the most mind blowing pleasure, the rush of coke minus the agitation. And when the coke wears off it leaves just enough of an edge to enjoy the heroin, which is ten times more potent than snorting.
There’s nothing like personal calamity to find out just how small your town is. Somehow, everyone knows what’s happened to our family, friends, colleagues, school moms. I run into them everywhere, in library stacks, at the Writers Guild Theatre, at the Farmer’s Market herb stand. I’ve become a human car wreck that people can’t help rubbernecking.
They’re all kind, concerned, but sometimes I need to not be who I am. I’ve ducked out a restaurant kitchen, slipped through an employee lounge, hidden behind display racks. I’ve escaped through the produce doors at Whole Foods twice.
I know they all care, many of them deeply, and I’m grateful. It’s the pity in their eyes I can’t stand. How careful they are. It’s such a thin line between I’m sorry it’s you and I’m glad it’s not me.
We go to the Wilkinsons so often now it’s become routine. Time’s hard to distinguish there, nights blur with days, this week with last week with last month. It’s like a continuum, you know whenever you go back you’ll pick up right where you left off, snorting, smoking, shooting. It’s its own world, that house.
Derek’s become like a big brother. Sometimes he takes me on drives and shows me stuff, the best cliff jumping spots, places where deer gather, secret caves. We talk about things, his mom, my old dad. He lived
Melanie struts in like Cleopatra, laughing as she pushes a potato-faced kid with a bull ring out of the way to clear a spot on the sofa. A small pile of heroin sits on the coffee table. Suddenly, Mel goes silent. I watch, intrigued by this new side of her, precise, focused, and serious.
Just as I lean in to do a line, the door slams open and a squatty woman with hair shooting out in all directions is silhouetted in the doorway.
“Hi honey, I’m Linda.”
“Mia,” I say, waiting for her to comment on the small mountain of dope.
“Nice meetin’ you, sweetie.” Her smile vanishes. “Derek, did you take my cigarettes?”
This place is nuts, awesome, but nuts. I lean back in and cut out two lines. The high hits me totally unexpectedly. It’s not that instant rush you get from coke, it sort of melts over you slowly until it feels normal to be weightless and floating, like life has always been slow and beautiful. My body comes and goes, tingly and prickly one minute, normal the next. I sit zoned out like that for hours before I realize I have to puke.
Derek gives me a ride home, Melanie being “occupied” with Trevor. I pass Linda curled up on the sofa, dazed and drooling.
“Is she sick?” I whisper.
“No,” Derek answers. “Not sick…just weak.”
I spend time in Mia’s room each day, exploring her old books and toys, her collection of handmade boxes, her photos. It soothes the ache in a part of me I wasn’t aware of yet, the way your sternum or spleen doesn’t exist until it hurts. I have a new organ now in the shape of my daughter’s absence. I’m learning the anatomy of new life.
Late one Saturday night, I find a pretty wallet that she never used. Or so I thought. I notice a seam has been opened to make a secret place. I dig inside and find a folded white 3 × 5 card. I unfold it to see, written in blood traced with a fingertip: ROTTEN.
“Hey, Mia, I’m gonna mix you up something special, ’kay? It’s better than straight H. Speedballs are seriously like communing with God.”
“Sure,” I mumble, half stoned, half drunk.
Derek comes over with a needle and a belt.
“Here, tighten this around your arm,” he says. “Make sure it’s really tight.”
The needle comes toward me, slow and weaving, like the circles my mom used to make with a spoon when I was little to get me to eat. It finally makes contact with the vein and plunges in.
It’s the most mind blowing pleasure, the rush of coke minus the agitation. And when the coke wears off it leaves just enough of an edge to enjoy the heroin, which is ten times more potent than snorting.
There’s nothing like personal calamity to find out just how small your town is. Somehow, everyone knows what’s happened to our family, friends, colleagues, school moms. I run into them everywhere, in library stacks, at the Writers Guild Theatre, at the Farmer’s Market herb stand. I’ve become a human car wreck that people can’t help rubbernecking.
They’re all kind, concerned, but sometimes I need to not be who I am. I’ve ducked out a restaurant kitchen, slipped through an employee lounge, hidden behind display racks. I’ve escaped through the produce doors at Whole Foods twice.
I know they all care, many of them deeply, and I’m grateful. It’s the pity in their eyes I can’t stand. How careful they are. It’s such a thin line between I’m sorry it’s you and I’m glad it’s not me.
We go to the Wilkinsons so often now it’s become routine. Time’s hard to distinguish there, nights blur with days, this week with last week with last month. It’s like a continuum, you know whenever you go back you’ll pick up right where you left off, snorting, smoking, shooting. It’s its own world, that house.
Derek’s become like a big brother. Sometimes he takes me on drives and shows me stuff, the best cliff jumping spots, places where deer gather, secret caves. We talk about things, his mom, my old dad. He lived
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