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🔴 TRIGGER WARNING - DRUG USE & PHOTOS 🔴
I dropped off Ty at the casino and Jessica and I were headed back to Michael's house. What Ty had told me still sat heavy on my heart. I was scared to go to jail because I would miss out on my children growing up. I was scared to die for the same reason.
Jessica was in the front seat fidgeting with her bracelet. She looked upset while she kept flipping it and moving it around, trying to get it just right, but never exactly how she wanted it.
I glanced over at her, "can I ask you something?"
She jumped, startled at my question. "Oh, yeah girl, go ahead."
"Ty said something while you were inside the gas station. He said that the only way out of this shit is jail or death. Do you think that's true?"
She looked out the window, her expression turning from frustration to sadness. " Uh, he's not really wrong. I've been using everything I could get my hands on since I was 14. I know that I haven't been able to stop since I started," she said as her voice trailed off.
"Have you gone to jail before?"
"No, I haven't, but my mom and dad have. My dad has 40 years in the pen for cooking. He's served 23 so far. I don't know if he will make it back out alive. He's in his late 50's now. My mom went for distribution. She got out a few years ago, but I haven't heard from her. She was there for 6 years. I keep checking the inmate listings once a week to see if she got picked up again, but she never shows up. I don't know if she's okay. For all I know she could be dead."
"Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to bring up something that bothered you."
"It's fine doll, you didn't know. It's just the way this shit goes. There are people that get clean. They make it out with the help of God or something, but I've never met anyone who got out alive. I don't believe in God anyways, so I guess I'm just fucked all around," she said with a laugh.
"I've only been doing this for a few weeks, but I feel like I'm already to far gone, you know?"
She looked at me with pity in her eyes. "One time is all it takes. She never lets you go."
"That's what I was afraid of."
"You've got kids or anything?"
"Yeah, I've got two boys. My grandma watches them for me. I don't think she knows what I'm doing. She's used to watching them anyways. I got pregnant at 16 and didn't really have a chance to be a kid, so she tries to help so I can go out and live my life. I mean, I'm 23, I'm not really a kid anymore I guess. But anyways, I love them with all I've got. They are my world."
"They won't be your world for much longer. If you keep doing this shit like you are, you're only going to care about one thing and one thing only. That's crystal fucking meth. You know, I have a little boy too. My grandparents take care of him. They are the only drug free family I've got. I know he's being taken care of, but... but I haven't seen in him 3 years. I miss him. It kills me to think about him. He's my baby, you know? Now all I care about is my next high. I'm too far gone to get my life straight. That's why I'm using now. Makes me forget how horrible of a person I am. I started using to mentally escape the abuse at home. The more shit I go through, the more I wan to run away from it."
She looked down at her bracelet again. I could tell she was upset. I wanted to console her or say something, but what do you say to that? There's nothing you can say to just make it all go away. There's no way to make it disappear.
"Hey, I'm sorry if I got you upset. I just don't know much about this lifestyle. To be honest, I'm scared."
"It's okay. I'm scared too," she said. "Go to the parking garage downtown if you want. We can smoke some before we go back. I've got a pipe with me. I think we both need it right now."
"Sure, I got you," I said as we drove past Michael's house. We were almost back, but the parking garage was just a half mile away, so I went ahead and drove up there.
The parking garage scared the hell out of me. I was terrified of it. I always envisioned the whole thing collapsing while I was inside. It was mostly empty since it was so late, so I drove as fast as I could to get to the top.
I pulled into a spot overseeing the entire downtown area. I got out and walked over to the edge. I looked down at all the people walking down the street. All the street lights were giving off a pink glow to the cars and people below. I longed to be one of them again. To be normal. To feel normal.
"Hey, what are you doing?" Jessica was standing by the car. I turned around and started walking back.
"Sorry, I just like the view from up here."
"Well we can't smoke outside. Not here anyways."
"Yeah, I know."
We both got back in the car and rolled the windows up. I handed her the bag I got from Ty. She took the largest shard and dropped it down the pipe As she held the lighter underneath to melt it down, I realized something. I haven't done this on my own yet. Matt had always done it for me, and I felt ashamed to ask her for help.
"You want to hit it first since you bought it?" she asked.
"I'm fine, you go first," I said in hopes that I could watch her and hopefully manage to hit it by myself.
I watched as she inhaled the smoke. It was swirling around the base like a magic crystal ball. She passed it to me as she exhaled. I looked down and watched it harden into a beautiful pattern along the glass. How could something so beautiful be so deadly?
I took a deep breath in and slowly started breathing out, just like Matt had told me. I lifted the pipe in front of me and held the lighter just underneath. I watched the heat melt it down and slowly started rolling it side to side between my fingers. The smoke started to swirl around. I nervously put it to my lips and took a long, slow breath in. I put the lighter down and took in all the smoke until there was none left. I looked down at the pipe as I held my breath. I did it. I did it all on my own. I was overcome with happiness. I let go of my breath and the car filled with smoke.
"I did it!" I said to Jessica.
"Yeah? Yeah you did," she said confused.
"So, I've never actually smoked by myself. Like, I never lit my own pipe before. Michael's friend has done it for me every time."
"Are you fucking kidding me? Well you did great! Why did they always light it for you?"
"Man, I don't know. But I did it! I'm so excited!"
We laughed together over my small victory and finished what she had in the pipe. I felt great. I wasn't sad, worried, depressed or thinking about what Ty said. At this moment, I didn't care that I would go to jail or die. It didn't matter to me. I was having the time of my life, and this moment was all I cared about.
I drove back down the parking garage with no fear or anxiety. I imagined racing out of a collapsing building like I was in a movie and the thought of dying didn't scare me for once.
During the short drive back to Michael's house, I noticed that Jessica has now moved form fidgeting with her bracelet to scratching at a small black mark on her dress. She scratched it compulsively until I saw her finger start to bleed. She had rubbed it so hard that the skin was coming off of her finger tip.
I avoided saying anything since she didn't stop. Blood was seeping into her dress, but she kept scratching the black spot, not seeming to notice the blood.
"God damn bug" she murmured under her breath.
I was a little concerned for her at this point, but I couldn't get myself to say anything.
I pulled in front of Michael's apartment and turned off the car. Jessica was still going at it with her dress.
"Hey, um, we're here," I said.
"What!" she yelled. "Fuck, you scared me. Oh my god what happened?"
"What?"
"My finger! This god damn bug bit my finger! Look!"
She showed me her finger with the skin had been rubbed off and blistered.
"You were scratching that black mark on your dress. That's what happened to your finger."
"Oh, oh no. Oh, I'm so sorry, Emily. When I'm on one I zone out really bad sometimes and I forget everything. Please don't tell Michael what really happened. Just tell him I burnt it on the pipe."
"Sure, whatever works for you."
She looked down at her dress in disbelief. "I really thought there was this beetle or something there. It kept moving through the fabric. I know I saw it."
"It's okay, I wig out too sometimes. You'll be alright."
"No," she whispered. "I won't be. I do this every fucking day. Every day for so many years. I do something fucked up when I'm high and end up hurting myself. I never remember doing it."
I didn't know what to say. I looked out of my window and grabbed my purse.
"You ready to go in?" I asked.
"Yeah, I'm sure Michael has some hipster organic shit in there to fix me up," she said with a laugh.
We headed up his stairs and walked in his apartment. He was laying down on his bed, snoring loud enough that I couldn't even hear his TV.
"Don't move," I told Jessica.
I sat my purse down, backed up a bit, and ran full force onto his bed.
"Wake up mother fucker!" I yelled as I jumped next to him.
Michael jumped up and almost fell out of his bed. Jessica and I laughed as he angrily tried to figure out what had happened.
"Jesus fucking Christ, Toast. You're going to give me a heart attack one of these days. Is that what you want?"
"Maybe," I said with a smile.
"Look at me," he said as he grabbed my face and pulled it close to his. He rolled his eyes and he pushed me away. "You're already high?"
"Like a G6!"
"This wasn't what I had planned at all," he said. He looked over at Jessica and saw the blood on her hands. "Oh my God, are you okay? What the hell did you two go do?"
"Oh, yeah, I just... I just held the pipe wrong. Burned my finger. We just went to smoke. Nothing else."
I nodded in agreement.
"I'm not leaving you two alone again," he said as he stomped into his bathroom and came back with his first aid kit.
I sat on the couch and watched as he put a bandage on her finger. As I was watching him, I noticed her jaw going up,down back and forth. It looked like she was having some kind of episode. The longer I looked, the more I noticed about her.
When I first saw Jessica, she looked like some beautiful, normal woman. Now I noticed the balding spot on the side of her head where she's been pulling her hair out. The bruises on her legs and arms, her sunken in eyes and dark circles, and the series of track marks down her arms.
I thought of my future when I looked at her. I saw myself in the same position in a few years time. I've seen the pictures of people who have gotten addicted to meth, and now I see her in person.
This was my future. I too was going to turn out like Jessica if I kept on going this way.
I closed my eyes and saw myself sitting on the sidewalk, begging for money, losing my hair, and dressed in dirty clothes.
I took a deep breath in and opened my eyes. The feelings of fear went away as quickly as they came, and the wonderful feeling of being high came back. Happiness took over once again. Although I knew where I was headed, meth took my hand and told me that I was going to be just fine. Just enjoy the ride. What happens, happens. I've already gone too far anyways, right? Might as well enjoy the journey.
To be continued...
NOTES ABOUT CHAPTER 11
It's sad to say that for "Jessica", I don't know if she ever got clean. For most of the people I knew, I can tell you if they either died, ended up in jail, or got their life together. Unfortunately, I don't know about her. I saw her just a handful of times after this night, and she had only gotten worse.
I will try better explain what it feels like to be sad/upset on meth, at least in my experience. It goes two ways. You are either too high to feel the negative emotions, or you succumb to them in the worst possible way. There is no in between. You are happy and careless, or in an unimaginable rage or depression. I have stories on those experiences and I will get into that later on once I introduce the other main people in the story.
My journey through this lasted 6 months. I don't know how many chapters this will end up being, but It's likely going to be A LOT. If there's ever anything in a chapter you don't understand or would just like some more information on, please feel free to message my Facebook page or email me anytime! I'll be more than happy to talk about it.
For everyone who's never seen meth in real life, here's some pictures below to help you understand what I talk about in my blog.
TRIGGER WARNING: PHOTOS OF METH BELOW! PLEASE PROCEED WITH CAUTION, AS THESE WERE VERY TRIGGERING TO ME EVEN AFTER 4 YEARS.
I only post this so you know what it is, what it looks like, and how to ever spot it if (god forbid) your children or loved ones ever get a hold of it. I never knew what it looked like because no one told me and I never took any interest in looking it up. This is also to give a better visual in my story, because if you have no idea what any of it looks like, it can be confusing.
When I talk about it swirling around, this is what it looks like. It's a GIF, so hopefully it shows up right.
When it solidifies again, it's called crackback. These pictures were very triggering for me, but it's my goal to educate as well as tell my story. I want you all to know what it looks like in all it's forms, because I didn't know until it was too late.
And of course, this is what the typical pipe looks like. Some are more elaborate, but this is what you will usually see. TBH, I smoked out of a pipe connected to a 2 liter filled with koolaid. It was pretty cool, not going to lie. I'll tell that story later on.
If you all are ever interested in the life of a tweaker that's going through it now, like right now, I suggest going to Tumblr and searching "Tweaker Nation" or "Tweaker Family". Yes. They are dedicated and proud to be junkies. Thank god I didn't know about that when I was using.
Side story! When I was getting clean (just a few months in), I made a Tumblr account specifically for when I relapsed. I planned it out. I had found the "Tweaker Nation" hashtag a while before, I don't remember how, but I was going to relapse, and that was my truth. I was going to find people that I could meet up with and get high and fuck my life up again. I had the account for maybe 3 weeks, then I deleted it. I made another one to search the hashtags and what I did was watch people get high. People actually record themselves shooting up or smoking and post it there. It was oddly helpful being able to watch others smoke, or shoot up and watch their physical reaction when they got the rush. It was like virtual reality in a way. But I never did meet or even talk to anyone. Truth be told I was scared to relapse. No matter how badly I wanted it then, I just couldn't get myself to do it.
I DON'T recommend any other recovering addict to do that though, because that could be the tipping point for a relapse. Truth be told, when I was writing this chapter and gathering the pictures and stuff, I watched people shooting up again. It almost broke me. I stayed up late fighting the thoughts and urges that were coming back to me after all these years. It was hard. Writing this blog is hard, but it's so worth it to reach out to others and educate those who want to know what it's really like.
Oh, this is a little random, but I also HIGHLY recommend Tweak and We All Fall Down by Nic Sheff, another recovering addict. My two favorite books & favorite Author. You can also watch the movie Beautiful Boy, which is based off the book his dad wrote through his perspective!