PHARMACY
VILE SELF PORTRAITS, CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Winter stained Roxbury blue.
After three months of shooting fentanyl-laced heroin, I was a goddamn catastrophe, late on my rent and bills, unemployable, living in a shithole apartment with a rampant alcoholic ironically named Bill. A mephitic smog discharged from his bedroom—swill vodka, canola oil, MSG, and sheer misery. We overtly hated each other. Besides passing groans of acknowledgment, our conversations were limited to him asking for the rent, me crafting daft excuses, and him cursing my existence.
The apartment had no furniture. I slept on an inflatable mattress held together with duct tape. The door to my room had a fist-sized hole in the center. Terror scattered the floors, swept nightly by packs of rats.
Bill’s drunken snores shook the walls.
It had been over twelve hours since my last puny shot. The sickness had settled, shackled itself to my skeleton, and was actively consuming my marrow. My limbs ached in impossible ways. Writhing on the half-deflated mattress, clutching a soiled blanket, sweat pouring, legs flailing, I frantically searched Reddit for home remedies for dopesickness. The general consensus was to take Suboxone, methadone, or more heroin, none of which were options. About to give up and tie a noose, I discovered a post about loperamide, an opioid-based anti-diarrheal sold at pharmacies. It wouldn’t get me high, but it would allow me to sleep.
The nearest Walgreens was a thirty-minute walk. I layered myself in clothing—three pairs of socks, two pairs of pants, two long-sleeve shirts, two sweatshirts, and a puffy winter jacket. Every movement I made birthed a shockwave of pain, a millennium of torture that forced its way into each and every cell composing my faulty flesh suit. I had arrived at that special place where death seemed trivial. Dope had consumed my soul. Sobriety was inconceivable. Hope was illogical. I had nothing, not even a goddamn cigarette. Nobody to call, no junky "friend" who would bail me out of the horrors of withdrawal. No credit left with the dealer. Not an ounce of fat on my body to sustain another week of starvation. My only purpose was to rinse the spike, dump powder into a cap, mix it with water, drop a cotton in, watch it expand, suck up the mélange, stab myself until I saw blood, and waste away in a nod.
Bill’s door was ajar, his leather wallet illuminated by the soft glow of a bedside lamp. His snores intensified as I tiptoed in, flipped open the billfold, and filched a five.
Five isn’t enough, I thought. It’ll be at least ten.
I had combed every crevice in the apartment.
There was nothing left.
I’ll have to steal it, I thought.
I’m going to steal it.
It was a wretched night. I kept a brisk pace and glared at the ground trying to forget I was alive. My cheeks went numb. A car passed and I considered hurling myself into its headlights, traumatizing some innocent fool.
But that’s a rare kind of courage I’ve yet to possess.
The "W" in the Walgreens sign was burnt out. A vague figure, tall and gaunt, stood in the shadows of the building with invisible hands.
"Ya gutta dolla, white boy?" he said as I shambled past him toward the entrance.
"No, sorry," I whimpered, hastening my stride.
He jumped into my path and brandished a blade.
"Run ya pockets! Now muthafucka!"
"I don’t have anything!"
"Yeah-fuckin’-right!"
He pressed the knife to my abdomen while his free hand rifled through my pockets. His face was anonymous like the night sky, riddled with calloused planes and winking chasms.
"What’s dis, whitey? Ya fuckin’ lied ta me!" He took the crumpled five. "Nice phone, too. Unlock it, now!" I did, and he disappeared into the night hollering, "Bitch ass muthafucka!"
Interminable horror, I thought. Blunder after blunder. Born to lose, to be robbed and abused. I deserve this. All of it. I’m human scum. I want a hot shot. Fuck getting high, I want to meet God. Tell Him what I really think. I want to explode. Splatter this sidewalk with my innards. A Pollock in guts instead of puke. Scarlet Mist. Red slush over black ice. I want to rip my face off and let my brain breathe. Lie down right here and freeze. Just fucking give up. People would step over me in the morning on their way to work. Go on, God, you sadistic cunt, bring on another car and I’ll do it this time, I swear, I’ll hurl myself into the headlights and destroy another innocent life. This is what You created me for. To kill. Take. Hate. Suffer.
Die.
I entered Walgreens and went straight for the diarrhea medications, spotting a lone employee stocking shelves. My original plan was to buy something small—a drink or a candy bar—to mask the scent of larceny. Without the five I was back to zero.
Worthless.
I settled on Loperamide Hydrochloride Caplets, USP, 2 mg, 90 ct., knowing I’d need a high dose to quell withdrawals. The caplets clunked as I crammed the bottle into my jacket. The employee had moved to the register and was dead on her phone. Just fucking go! I thought, bolting toward the automatic doors. They split apart and I flew through.
"Excuse me!" I heard as a rimy sweat settled about my body.
I never turned around. I couldn’t face the disgrace I had become. I did what every junky does when confronted.
I ran.
◆◆◆
After a paranoid sprint through dystopia, I shed my cocoon, opened the bottle of loperamide, and dumped a handful of lime green caplets into my palm, downing around twenty. Half an hour later I took another twenty, then another. To my astonishment, the sickness subsided. It was still in the background warping my thoughts, just to a slightly lesser extent. My stomach tingled as it dissolved the sixty caplets into a sizzling gloop. Sour sedation sank me onto the squishy air mattress. My chest tightened with fragility. Breathing became difficult. Entire worlds weighed down my eyelids. As they collapsed, the universe whispered sobering judgements and I fell into nothingness. Blackness. Formless. I saw myself in another reality sitting at a tidy desk wearing a sharkskin suit. Not a whispy hair or blemish. My face: stoic, blank, gagging on ennui. I opened the desk drawer, gripped a pistol, pressed it against my right temple, and pulled the trigger, sending a thick, chunky splatter against the walls. My face: stoic, blank.
Free.
Twelve hours later I woke up on the floor in a puddle of sweat and vomit. The air mattress had completely deflated. I heard Bill closing the fridge, pouring himself a vodka. The capless bottle of loperamide was overturned on the floor. I picked it up—empty.
I didn’t shit for a week.
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THE BARMAN© AS AN ALTERNATIVE TO WET BRAIN
VILE SELF PORTRAITS© AS AN ALTERNATIVE TO TRIGGER WARNINGS
Completely immersed until the last word. This convinced me to go back and catch up on all the chapters I missed!
Saving this chapter for after work, will report back 💛