Empty

Spending time with the orange-haired boy. I guess I have a boyfriend. He is nice to me, too nice. Stroking my hair, worried he's said the wrong thing. Worried I don't love him enough. I unhook his arms and roll away, uncomfortable in my skin, anxious. What are you thinking? he asks. I'm thinking of filling my veins, so I just sigh. My mind is sticky with the thought.

I keep trying to remind myself of something I read in a brochure at the clinic. Cravings are like stray cats. The more you feed them, the more they'll come around.

Mistaking

I wanted all the goodness. Not the moments in his grubby fluorescent-lit bathroom, waking up with a needle in a shitty vein. Stumbling, not walking. Losing things, finding things. Nodding in the cab, seeing the driver's eyes cold on me in the mirror. Burbled one-sided conversations. And then through the bathroom door and puking up my ginger ale/ wine/ peppermint tea. The bruises spreading across my throat.

And so I went back for more.

But even the second time, the shots much smaller now, sensibly-sized, my high was not the happiness of before. Nausea still, too blue eyes, avoiding my friends they asked me what was wrong. Something had changed. My voice perhaps. It's because I'm sick, I reasoned, irritably waving at the wait girl to bring honey for my tea.

But if IT'S different now, then who am I?

I was counting on it. A safety barrier, of sorts. Just knowing it's there makes life okay. Knowing the cure. The code. The goodbye-reality. Now, I know I should be happy... relieved. But truthfully, softly rubbing Arnica cream across my wrists, my throat, I'm just very, very scared.

H is for happiness, and hell

My therapist adjusted her glasses, and asked me watery-eyed, the last time I wasn't doing any drugs, or drinking and remember being happy. I thought and thought, but finally, my lip between my teeth, I had to shake my head.

Drawings of pills cover pages and pages of my old journels. The messy handwritten words say things I don't want to hear. And sometimes, depending on how wasted I was, things I can't even read. I thought I missed myself before heroin. It turns out I've always missed myself. Always.

What if heroin users just know a secret that no one else does? We may wish we didn't know it, but we always will.

Why spend money on that boob job, those overpriced heels, why buy a plasma TV, an anything? They won't make you as happy as...

If you knew the secret you'd be fucked too.