Needle Too: Junkies In Paradise Part 5

"Why? Is she a baker?"

"She said it actually smells more like beer."

"She was probably drunk."

"Nope. Grandma only smokes weed. She stopped drinking right after she took the backhoe to the American Legion. And besides, she was right. After she gave me some antifungal ointment it was gone the next day and hasn't come back since."

"Maybe you should rub some of that s.h.i.t on your heart."

"You mean the oink-ment?"

A birthday party of 15 toddlers bearing baggies of breakfast cereal had suddenly stormed into the restaurant and there was little doubt my services would be required, so I hastily grabbed the broom and disengaged with Perry. But a few days later Perry would pick up the phone and call the restaurant once more-only this time I wouldn't be there to answerbut somebody else was.

10.

"Hey man, I'm really upset," Randy said to me as I walked into the restaurant for the start of my shift. "Apparently, we have a bit of medical emergency to deal with."

"Why, what happened? Did Jack cut himself shaving?"

"Perry called the restaurant this morning and told me to fire you for being such an incorrigible junky."

"Are you f.u.c.king kidding me?" I said after thinking about it for a moment.

"Why are you so surprised? He's your f.u.c.king friend. You didn't think he knew what you were up to?"

"No. I didn't think he knew what incorrigible meant."

"Well he does, and I'm afraid we're gonna have to do something about this."

"Don't worry, Randy-everything's fine. I had a momentary slip-up a few weeks ago but it's behind me now," I told him, a.s.suming he was already aware of the impromptu bit of bathing in Bridgeport.

"Yeah, I heard about that from Megan right after it happened and decided to keep my mouth shut. But listen, right now you've got an opportunity in Florida and I think you should take it. If you still want this s.h.i.tty job afterwards it's yours, but for now just go down south, stay with Perry for a while and try to get your s.h.i.t together. And enjoy yourself a little. He's near Fort Myers and it's almost winter! Hang out on the f.u.c.king beach for a bit! Bang a few babes-non-stripper types. I think it'll be good for you to get out of the area for a while. Listen, if we were talking about going down to Miami or South Beach I'd have some serious reservations, but Perry seems pretty convinced of the fact that there's no dope to be found in Lehigh Acres."

"Oh, by this point I'm sure he's looked under every f.u.c.king rock!"

"Here-take this," he said as he handed me an envelope with a bus ticket to Florida and a check for $500.

"I'm not sure I'm down with any of this," I thought to myself out loud.

"I think at this point you may be out of options."

He was right. With less than a bundle of some pretty potent dope, about $75 and a closet full of ten-year-old clothes I was just about out of everything including a job. But still, I wasn't entirely convinced of the merits of fleeing to Florida, because at the same time I knew it would be a lot easier to stroll into the bathroom, get loaded and decide to be the maligned and misunderstood victim. Tapping into a vein and activating that junky survival mechanism was always the easiest option and that was, of course, my first instinct because I'd been doing it for years. In fact, aside from a few isolated, cowardly and disingenuous moments spent on the brink of dopesickness and at the edge of a toilet, I'd never entertained a serious notion about getting clean. But things were decidedly different now. Before-despite the obscene drug consumption and horrific living conditions-I'd always remained absurdly confident, steadfast in my ambitions and forever focused on that pot of gold at the other end of the musical rainbow, while the heroin only seemed to propel my flight of fancy. Now, however, the heroin was no longer fuel for a grand journey but just a comforting distraction aboard a flawed flying machine grounded in abject failure and chemical complacency. Of course, I knew I'd be unable to continue on like this indefinitely, and though I'd occasionally address the fact it was really just a toothless brand of self-serving lip service as I'd periodically hold the problem against the light just to prove I knew it existed, before kicking the can down the road because I could always start my diet tomorrow. And although a HUGE part of me was still fiercely resisting the notion of Florida, during one of those rare and remarkably fleeting moments of clarity I realized I didn't have a choice. Indeed, I was now like a species threatened with extinction and forced to adapt in order to ensure its very survival.

"Who's Ethel Ward?" I asked Randy as I noticed the name scrawled upon the check.

"Perry's grandmother."

"Well don't make it out to her! She's just gonna blow it on weed!"

"As long as it isn't dope I'll consider the money well spent."

With more fear and trepidation than I can convey, on the following Sat.u.r.day morning I prepared for the journey to Florida which I would embark upon a little later that day. Then, at around 10 a.m., I grabbed a backpack and my old dilapidated duffle bag, stuffed it with some old clothes and fled Glenbrook Road without looking back or even leaving a note for my mother, but I'd be lying to suggest I wasn't at all curious about how long it would take her to realize I was missing. Before heading down south, however, I decided to bid farewell to the strippers of Stamford and even more importantly, the methadone dealers of Manhattan.

After I said my goodbyes to the girls and everyone else at the cafe, I took an express train into the city and arrived at the Harlem train station at around 12:30. I then descended the staircase and of course-since it was Sat.u.r.day-the methadone was flowing like an orange river down 125th Street. Without breaking stride I spent $50 on two 80-milligram bottles and then immediately turned around and headed back to the Stamford-bound side of the platform without even THINKING about scoring dope as if that was something to be proud of which, of course, it wasn't because I still had four bags in my pocket. And incidentally, although I was embarking on a journey to sobriety, I wasn't the flush-it-down-the-toilet type-so as soon as I made it to the bus station in Stamford I darted into the men's room, filled a bottle cap with water and a couple of bags of that potent dope and got loaded. I then exited the bathroom, but not before making sure the methadone was securely in my backpack. I wouldn't even want to consider the nightmare of making it all the way to Florida and then discovering that the meth was lost somewhere along the way.

A double-dose of this dope was too much to still maintain any semblance of sobriety, but I was unconcerned about appearances. This was apparently my farewell tour, my final hurrah, my grand finale, my very last walk on the wild side and I wanted it to count for something. Besides, I was looking at about a day-and-a-half of riding on a Greyhound bus and wanted to nod as much of it away as possible.

I immediately made my way to the southbound bus where pa.s.senger baggage was being stowed away beneath it, and as my own was placed among the many colorful cases it stood out because it looked like it belonged to a f.u.c.king junky. I then boarded the bus, took a seat, closed my eyes and as the vehicle departed the station the heroin overwhelmed me and I thought of nothing other than the hum of transportation. Of course, I certainly wasn't thinking about the hum itself, its origin, or what mechanisms were in play and contributing to that steady, warm, sound. It's simply all that I was bothering to be conscious of. It was all that I wanted to be aware of. It was all that I needed to know or didn't need to know at that particular time A gaseous release, a deflation of sorts and a thudding stop-and then some stirring.

"White Plains," suddenly says a voice from somewhere on some sort of a system as the half-hour jaunt to Westchester County took but a minute.

Without opening my eyes I try to pull myself up just a little from my nod-just a degree or two-but I can't, and instead descend further within it.

Then a moment later about an hour has elapsed: "New York City, Port Authority Bus Terminal," says the same voice on the same system as the bus seems to be going up a slope until it makes a stop, a few turns, continues on for a bit longer and then slows to a halt.

"Please exit the bus for any additional transfers, and thanks for riding with Greyhound."

I have about an hour-and-a-half before embarking on the next leg of my journey, so I exit the bus, find a desolate little corner of the enormous terminal and then suddenly another sixty minutes have pa.s.sed me by. I squint up at the clock and realize my transfer is now departing in twenty minutes, so I'm careful to jump into my time machine for just a second or two and then open my eyes as familiar-looking pa.s.sengers are getting ready to board the next bus.

I grab my backpack, walk through the doors of the terminal and the smell of carbon monoxide a.s.saults my nose and pokes at my brain. I then show my ticket to someone and am permitted aboard the shiny silver bus as I once again take a seat toward the back, but this time far enough away from the comfort station to miss the whiff each time the door opens.

"Newark, New Jersey," the bus operator suddenly says as I open my paper cuts to confirm the fact-though I could just as easily be on Mars.

"Chesapeake House."

By this point I'm buried so deep within my nod that I'm having trouble climbing out even for just a second to pull my head forward, look out the window and get some idea of what the f.u.c.k Chesapeake House is. But I just can't do it. I can't seem to keep my neck straight and my head upright. Thankfully, an old man is sitting next to me.

"Excuse me, sir," I try to say through a dry mouth as I lean a little to my right. "Where are we?"

"Florida!" he snaps at me like someone who frowns upon sloppy dope fiends. It's either that or he's just a really nasty a.s.shole, and though I don't typically put up with really nasty a.s.sholes when in the midst of being a really nasty junky, I'm WAY too mangled to respond appropriately. And though I have no idea where we are, I know we're not in f.u.c.king Florida. After all, I may be more doped-up than the average commuter as I deliberately push myself to the brink of an overdose-but I'm not stupid, you know.

The old man is so disgusted with me that he decides to take another seat in another row and my feelings are hurt, but I suck it up and decide to shelve my curiosity and go back to where I was before curiosity kills the f.u.c.king cat.

11.

"Richmond-Richmond, VirginiaPlease transfer in Richmond and thanks for choosing Greyhound."

The bus arrives in Richmond at 12:30 a.m., and by this point my head has cleared a bit and for just a moment I exploit the open window of opportunity and sobriety by reflecting on the old, drug smuggling janitor-just before slamming the f.u.c.ker shut and booting the second half of my last gasp in the bathroom he never cleaned.

I am as f.u.c.ked-up as ever and still conscious enough to tell the talesort ofnot really, but I know I need to get seated quickly because in about 30 seconds my limbs will no longer work properly. As a matter of fact, at any moment my steps will resemble the belabored gait of an elderly invalid by the very thing that makes me feel good about myself. A few laborious paces further and I fall into a seat andthe clock suddenly strikes 4 a.m. as the nasty old man whacks me in the shoulder with his cane while he waddles by with his own debilitating affliction.

It's apparently time to hit the road again and I'm still gravely affected by the dope, but can somehow fake semi-normalcy (I think) and make it over to the Greyhound ticket-checkers without them feeling compelled to alert emergency personnel. I board a new bus with a new driver and for a moment I'm a little concerned that during the transfer my duffle bag luggage might have been mistaken for duffle bag garbage-but just a little. After all, the medication is in my backpack and with the very last vestiges of my stash now surging through my system-a bottle of green tea filled with orange meth is clearly my most cherished possession.

I'm deep in it now for the last timeI think. And I'm way the f.u.c.k down there-even further down than before because this second ma.s.sive blast is piggy-backing what was still lingering around from the first ma.s.sive blast.

Somebody sits next to me. I think I smell cologne, so it's probably a man. I don't trust men who wear cologne. I think they're hiding somethinglike a dirty a.s.s. And I never know what a man who wears cologne is thinking. In fact, I think men who wear cologne are suspicious, but I am ambivalent about women who wear perfume. But I don't like perfume that smells like flowers, I like perfume that smells like candy-and I will never shake a man's hand with flowers, especially if I'm eating candy at the zoo because that only makes the otters angry.

"And look: Now I've got a man with a marble because I'm taking names and making numbers so the chickens don't sleep through the fire drill."

"What'd you say?" I'm asked by someone somewhere.

I think I may be talking s.h.i.t.

"Oh, nothing," I tell the person seated beside me, and without opening my eyes I pretend to be dreaming as I will now make a concerted effort to keep my f.u.c.king mouth shut. "Because I don't wanna wake up the hookers before the horse race."

12.

Is it really black, or just a dark shade of blue? I can't tell, but I know there's no disguising this damage. Broken in two places there's no question I'll be humiliated at camp tomorrow because of course, Elmer's Glue can't fix everything. But s.h.i.t, I would rather her punch me square in the face because although that damage would have also been pretty obvious, I wouldn't feel as self-conscious about it. I'd just have to come up with a less humiliating lie to tell my teammates and counselor-like I'd gotten beaten up by a girl-and aside from a little ribbing that would pretty much be the end of it. But I'm gonna be completely embarra.s.sed tomorrow, and I know we would've DESTROYED them because we're the G.o.dd.a.m.ned YANKEES! Well of course-they're still gonna destroy them, but there's no way I'm gonna be able to play with it in this condition.

"Gooooooooood morning everybody! In a moment we'll be pulling into Fayetteville. We've got about an hour to kill before we hit the road again, so if you're hungry or just wanna step off the bus and walk around and stretch out you're more than welcome to, or of course you can just stay right where you are and relax. But if you do leave, please be back by 10:15. And thanks for riding with Greyhound."

I opted for Option 2 as I realized I wasn't even halfway to Florida yet and was completely out of dope. But I was still high. Not time-travelling high, mind you-but high enough. High enough to completely retreat inward. High enough, in fact, to not even really notice the well-dressed gentleman sitting next to me.

"Good morning," he said to me at some point.

"How's it going?" I responded in a purely perfunctory way and emerged a little, not at all thrilled with the prospect of wasting what was left of my final nod on a stranger in a suit.

"How's it going with you? You know, you had me worried there for a little while."

"Why's that?"

"You weren't making a whole lot of sense earlier."

"Oh, yeah-that's right," I said as the stranger jogged my memory. "Sorry about thatoccupational hazard."

"Oh, really? What do you do?"

"Whaddaya got?"

"Whaddaya mean?"

I was suddenly faced with a decision.

"I'm adrug addict," I decided to admit. "So what do you do?"

"Cocaine, mostly, and a little Const.i.tutional law on the side but I swear it's only recreational."

After fully disclosing our respective dysfunctions and a little bit about our backgrounds, I would learn that Marlon Schumacher was the 30-year-old editor of a law review for a prestigious university in the District of Columbia-in addition to being an unrelenting cocaine addict who'd suffered several relapses over the past several years. He'd had a privileged upbringing and was raised in Miami with his mother and brother but partially without a father who'd pa.s.sed away when he was in junior high school.

"I'm gonna visit an old girlfriend in Sarasota first," he said. "But then I'm heading back home for a while to be with family so I can get away from all the drugs in D.C. before I f.u.c.k everything up again," he said.

"Good idea-they don't have any cocaine in Miami."

"It doesn't matter what they have in Miami. I've never done drugs in Florida. Drugs for me have always been a D.C. thing and besides, my mother's down there and that's the most important thing. Where's home for you?"

"New York."

"So why are you headed south?"

"Because I've never done drugs in Florida either and besides, my mother's not down there and that's the most important thing."

"Oh, come on now!" Marlon scolded me. "During times like this your family's where it's at, man, I'm telling you. When everyone else has given up on you and turned you away, family is who you need to be with. That's what they're there for. Anything less and you're just asking for trouble. Trust me."

"Do you have a big family?"

"Huge," he said. "But right now I think I need my mother most of all. Sounds sort of ridiculous, doesn't it?"

"It sounds f.u.c.king insane."

"Listen, I loved my father. I still do. Just like yours he was an amazing, brilliant man. He was a tremendous provider and protector-the kinda guy that would f.u.c.k anyone up for even looking crooked at his kids-but sometimes it seemed like it was more a matter of course with him, like it was his duty or some obligation or expectation or something. But with my mother it's always been different, you know? She's always been so plugged into her kids in such a completely different way. And what's weird is that I always felt so much safer, stronger, and more confident around her. It's crazy. I still feel that way, and I never really felt that way around my dad. Trust me-there is no love like a mother's love. It's unshakeable and indestructible. No matter how badly you f.u.c.k up your life-you can always go back home to mom."

"f.u.c.k you and your mother."

"Whaddaya mean?!"

"I can't relate-I never had that sort of relationship with my mother," I said as for some reason I suddenly felt able to speak plainly. "Sometimes I really can't even stand the thought of her."

"WHAT??? That's doesn't sound too cool, man," he said. "Look, your dad died when you were five and your mother raised you and your little sister all alone. You have to recognize that and appreciate it for what it is. You grew up in a big fancy building, she sent you to college and then you got yourself all f.u.c.ked-up. It's got nothing to do with her and it's not her fault."

"I never said it was."

"I think you just have to reflect a little on the really important things mothers do-the motherly things," he said.

"Like what?"