wasted means hasted

A blur of work, hours gobbled by sonething inexplicable. Five minutes now is 5 hours. Just sitting down, wheeling chair deskward, a sip of water, pretending it will make a difference to the drought in my mouth and throat. I feel productive. If only that made a difference. Always doted on by my bosses and colleagues, handled with care, as if a lapcat, needing strokes and tail scratches, I blipped last week. Felt the first frowns ever,workwise.

I thought of apologizing, but it's not good to admit a thing like I did. It's less of an issue, flickering out in a shroud of unknown variables. A personal something-or-other, maybe completely understandable.

So this was it, two radios to write, 3 days. Easy. The first day, I researched, had the ideas, but fuck, every time I started to write, the words dripped out of my finger like a clogged syringe. So, I'd leap to my feet, go bathroomward, the end stall, coughing and scriiping my heels on the tiled floor when the main door swung open. The stall doors have oddly loose locks, and three times someone has opened the door on me, my arm whipping up, in record time, to slam it in their face. But even record time can be just enough to see me with my purse strap twisted, held in my mouth, bloodied arms, a needle poised, or half in.

By the time I get the fucking vein, sometimes 45 minutes can pass, one night four, uh-huh, four, hours had passed. And that was the first radio-writing(non-writing really) night at work. Four thirty am, I depressed the plunger, the liquid so bloodied and thick, despite countless emties and clot-removal. Switch to new syringe, add a bit of water to anti-opaque it. Maybe the coke had clung to the clots I'd killed, because it was weak as fuck.

By that time, I was alone in the office, daylight waiting in the wings, 4.30am. Too late to go home and sleep, three hours in my own bed could only be a cruel tease, I worked(I guess, no actual words materialized on my radio template) until 6.30am, when the dealer turns his phone on.

The day was like a marathon drug-scoring, over and over not predicting the right amount of drugs to get, yo-yoing between the money-machine, my dealer's car, the bathroom, oh yes, and my radio scripts.

That evening, falling asleep in my cab home, I had had had to finish the radios, for a meeting at 9am the next morning. I tried, a valiant effort, I presume, but all I know with clarity is that moment I burst awake. The clock flashing 9am, computer still open on my chest, radio templates still empty, the meeting starting.

That felt really bad.