by Rowan Massey
“Not really. It was, um…” I looked around for a place to rest, and where I was standing was as good as anything else, so I sat in the dust and carefully leaned forward. My back hurt, and my right hand and wrist were messed up. Bloodied and bruised.
A weird little laugh came out of me. “It was Veronica and two guys. Can you believe it? She was…withdrawal. I don’t know if she’s going to make it. I wanted to help her out, but those guys took the money, and I had to come back here. We need to start looking for trash we can sell right away. I’m sorry I should have been looking on the way back, but that’s what I was trying to do…maybe we can go back and find her.”
I stopped talking when I realized what my voice was doing. Up and up. I sounded like Veronica had sounded. When I looked at my friends, they were both shaking. They’d been shaking ever since I showed up. I had taken that long to pay attention.
“I think we should forget the trash,” Spitz said.
“We have to go to Nando’s or—the doc’s. Whichever is closer,” Fiona said. She crouched down and patted my shoulder. “We’ve been waiting for you. W—we figured you were the same, and we couldn’t go until you came back. Weren’t sure—Wally—exactly which way you went.”
Oh fuck, god. I hated hearing her voice do that.
“Fuck Veronica, seriously,” she said, suddenly angry, but her voice went soft just as fast. “Poor Veronica!”
Spitz’s face twisted, watching Fiona. She’d only been a fielder for a day, and already she had to deal with one of these scares. But this wasn’t like other scares we’d had because our dealers weren’t where we could find them. Our supply was gone. And we had no idea why this was happening so soon.
“This is the doc’s fault,” I said. My voice couldn’t be controlled, and I hated how shaky and insane I sounded. “We should be fine for hours—hours! It shouldn’t be this bad until tomorrow! I wonder if he gave it to other people on the field. He’s changed everybody’s formula. Maybe that’s why Veronica got so damn desperate…oh my god. I’m sorry. I feel—” My voice was choked away, having gotten so high that I couldn’t keep talking.
I felt a fire underneath us, only an inch under the ground I sat on, and it was very hungry. Overwhelming terror washed over me, and I felt my face twitch and move to its own, quiet beat.
Trying to get up, my shaking muscles failed. My legs were wobbly from running around, and the cooled sweat on my body was starting to freeze my skin. Spitz and Fiona gave me a hand. On my feet, I walked back to the street, only realizing when my shoes hit asphalt that they weren’t behind me. They were going back into the house for our stuff. I wondered why they’d left our stuff alone. But I couldn’t think straight, and they probably couldn’t either.
“We have to, um—” Spitz was saying as he came back out. I stood and waited for them to bring my pack to me. “We have to, um—um—”
He couldn’t finish his sentence. When he held the pack out to me, he almost dropped it.
“Let’s just go,” I said. They both gave me scary, shaky nods and we got moving, walking fast.
I remembered the coins when we reached the first crossroads, and I stopped Spitz and Fiona with my hands out, then held up a finger for some patience. Fiona didn’t have any.
“What? What! We need to move! What?” she screamed.
Spitz took her hand, and she clinched her jaw shut, breathing through her white teeth. When I came up with the money, she calmed down. We huddled our heads around my shivering hands and counted it out together. It took our combined brain power to figure out it was thirty-seven cents.
We stood there breathing heavy and giving each other looks.
Fiona. Fiona had to have it. Because if I had my way, it would go to Spitz, but I understood that if Spitz had his way, it would go to Fiona, so it was hers.
When I took out the twelve cents extra and handed it to Spitz, then tried to hand the rest to her, she just cried. I’d never seen so many tears come out of one person so fast. Spitz still had her hand, and he tried to lift it and open it so she could be forced to take it from me, but she fought him, screaming through her teeth and without words.
“Go to the field,” he was telling her. “That’s your best bet. But ask along the way. We know which way you’re going and we—oh fuck, Fiona, I’m sorry. We’ll come after you running—running, running—if we come across some luck. I promise. We’re gonna be there waiting for our hugs when you—when—I—” He hit his limit, coughing and choking.
“Yeah, we need that hug,” I said, not making sense to myself. I grabbed her by the arm a little too hard and shoved the money into her jacket pocket.
“I don’t want it!” Her hands waved in front of her as if she was warning us off. Maybe she hadn’t realized I’d put the money in her pocket.
“It’s yours now because it’s right there,” I said, pointing at her pocket. “So go find some field—ders—f—fast!” I turned away, unable to say anything else, and not wanting to try.
“Okay baby, I l—love you,” Spitz said. He tried to kiss her wet and snotty face, and barely managed it. “You go. We’re going this way. Nando’s and Doc’s are the same way. We—um—”
“We’ll get some from one of them. They—they’re our friends. Don’t worry—y.” I patted her shoulder.
I couldn’t tell if she was nodding or just shaking harder, but she turned and slowly started walking away from us, off towards the field. She would have to make some unfamiliar turns to get there from where we were, and I hoped she could remember what she was doing. Her sobs were loud, and I’d had enough of sobbing girls. It was a horrible thought, and I hated myself, but I was annoyed by it. I needed to get away from it.
Spitz’s legs were stiff, knees locked, when I grabbed his sleeve and pulled him with me down the other way. After I got him moving at a good pace beside me, I let go of him. He was hissing and mumbling, trying to talk.
“It’s okay, Spizzy, we’ve done this before. Let’s wa—alk—faster. Please?” My voice was high and whiny.
His arms curled into his chest, and he bent over as if his stomach hurt. His mouth opened wide while his eyes shut so tight, tears went down his cheeks.
He screamed.
A short, loud shout at the ground, as if he were trying to scare off a stray dog. Then again, and again, like barking, but tortured. He was just trying to talk and couldn’t.
He bolted without warning, but I still expected it because we’d done this before and survived it. I went after him and caught him in a few yards, just in time to save him from hitting a telephone pole with his shoulder. I wrapped my arms around him and held him just as much for myself as for him. But we didn’t have time for it. I pulled and pushed him down to the first alley on our side of the street and got him down to the end. There was a door with an iron security door in front of it. I sat him down with his back against it and took his pack from him. I had to tie him up and come back for him. He would run into traffic and kill himself if he was given half a chance, and if he didn’t do that, he’d forget how to walk next anyway.
I got all our extra clothes out and tied them together as fast as I could with my spastic hands, making a thick rope. People tied up crazy and high people all the time, and the easiest way—if you were dealing with somebody with no coordination—was to tie their legs together, and their legs to something solid. So that was what I did. It felt like it was taking me years, and I was terrified of him dying in front of me, jerking and screaming like a freak.
When I found myself walking away, I had to turn around and see if I’d done it right, because I couldn’t remember. He was laying on the ground crying, his legs were tied tight. He made little efforts to at least find the knot with his hands, but he couldn’t, and the knot on the iron bars kept him from rolling around.
“Wally,” he whined, then sobbed. “Wallyyy!”
“I’m going. I—I—” My jaw locked open.
“If that fucking doc won’t—” Suddenly he could talk, but he l
ooked down at his legs and his eyes went wide.
“It’s—s his fault. He’ll fix—s—us up.” I said.
“If he says no. Just…” He looked up at me, tired and sad. “Just suck his dick, Wally. That’s all the guy wants. Let him—fuck!” His eyes clenched shut and he squeezed his thigh in his hand. “Let him fuck you…it’s…it was better than dying back when I had to do it. Just do it and we can…”
He couldn’t go on. I jumped out of my skin when he started up again with the shouting, barking noises. I left him there and found my way towards Nando’s, and Doc’s, and the big battle by the docks.
I walked for so long I lost track of everything that existed. There was a moment when I came back to myself, and I thought about what Spitz had told me to do. The farther I walked, the worse things got. At some point, I started feeling confused about what time was, and looked up to see I was standing still, right near where cars where driving by in the street. I was lucky nobody had hit me. I kept going, and sometimes tried to run, but the fire under my feet was back, and it was a hell that spread out under the entire city. It was endlessly deep, and I knew that if I fell through, I would feel the withdrawal for eternity. Sick blood pumped through my veins and chilled my heart.
The houses slowly got nicer, the streets got cleaner, and somehow, I still knew which way to go. Nobody was out in the street to stop me. When I got there, I’d do just what Spitz had said. If the doc told me to go away, I’d offer him everything. My whole life was on offer if he could go get Spitz and save him, and make sure Fiona found fielders, and never give anybody his shitty, fucking batches again.
His house was lit up like Christmas. The sun hadn’t been out for days, but it had broken through just to shine on Doc’s house. The front door was red, not like before when it was blue, and it was shining like a fancy, waxed car. I held up both my knuckles and knocked—knocked over and over in a beat, nose to the paint, which didn’t smell new, until the door opened.
Doc was there, tall as a god in the sky.
He didn’t have that nice dad look at all. Was he giving me the hard face that he used for dealers at his door? Had I come to the back door? I couldn’t tell, but it made me look for the gun behind him, or in his hand. I didn’t see it.
We stared at each other, and the longer he looked at me, the more disgusted he was. I’d disappointed him so badly. He hated me for it. His hands were squeezing my sides, and he pulled me inside.
“It’s your special batch—ch—ch.” My voice couldn’t get very loud. A lot of angry things were coming to mind that I tried not to say out loud.
You fucked us over.
We’re going to die because of you.
You killed my family.
I hate you.
I hate you.
He closed the door and while he was turned I let my rubbery legs bring me to the wooden floor. My knees felt the impact, and I knelt there, holding my arms out to him.
“Wally, what the hell happened?” His arms reached down to mine, and I held onto his biceps. His hands wrapped around my skinny elbows. They were hot like the fire underneath us. My body wasn’t real anymore, but his was.
“Let me suck your dick,” I whispered, trying so hard not to stutter that I ended up quiet as a breeze. The effort hurt my throat.
“What? Why would you say something like that?” He tried to pull away, but I dug my fingers in until it hurt.
“I can suck your dick. You can fuck me. I won’t—I won’t mind! I—I’m a virgin still. Do you like that?”
“No, Wally. This is withdrawal talking. You know I don’t like any of that.” His voice was deep and angry. But there was something else, and it seemed weak. Maybe he was lying.
“But if you do it to me,” I said, “and you save Spitz for me, nobody will know. I love you anyway, so I don’t care. I can suck your dick, and you can fuck me.”
He finally pulled away from me. My hands hurt horribly from squeezing his bone and muscle in my fingers, but I grabbed at him as he walked backwards. I tried to get hold of his hips, his legs, and ended up laying on the floor. Doc had walked away from me, and I was laying there on my side. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to want, or ask for, but I remembered Spitz screaming.
“Doc! Wait, please!” I rolled onto my belly and tried to push myself up. “Spitz. He’s tied up! Oh fuck. He’ll die! Doc!”
My screaming turned into something broken off from my body. It wasn’t my voice. I didn’t have a voice or a body.
“I’ve got you.” He came back from out of nowhere, and I was pulled up so that I was sitting against his chest. I tasted something wonderful and familiar.
Bitter.
Chalky.
Fielders.
I moaned in relief.
“S—Spitz, too?” I asked. “Fiona?”
“Where are they? For fucks sake!” He took in a breath, and his arm around me got tighter and hotter. “Why didn’t you fucking call me, you idiot!”
“I don’t have a phone.” After I said it, I knew it wasn’t true. I’d forgotten I had a phone. We all forgot.
“Where are they?” He shook me when I didn’t answer. I wasn’t sure if I remembered.
“Spitz. I tied him up…”
A pain tore out of my chest, and I screamed. It wasn’t a pain from my body. It was worse than that. It was worse than any cut, or burn, or punch could ever hope to be.
It was the worst thing possible.
Nameless and complete, it was eating me alive. When it had its last bite, I would die, and a zombie would be left behind. The doom was coming towards me fast, and it was hovering over Doc’s house, over the city, black and big as a mountain.
“You took the fielders. It’s going to go away any minute. Don’t cry. Quiet, son. Hush.”
My eyes couldn’t open. His words, and the sweet feeling of being rocked back and forth, were the only good things in a universe of agony. I rode them like waves. The sound of each word carried me.
“Near the corner,” I told him, trying hard to make my head work in sentences, “with the bright green shop. Not far from the ’burbs. Couple blocks, I think.”
There. I’d told him where Spitz was. I remembered now how the doc really was. He would have saved all three of us for sure if I’d called him, and he would definitely hurry and get to Spitz. Nobody would get that shitty batch of fielder’s again either. Things would be fine because he was the doc. People thought all kinds of things about him but I knew him.
“Fiona headed for the field,” I told him, and then I was gone.
I was shoved up at the ceiling, and before I could hit it, I snapped into action and grabbed at the air in front of me, stopping myself.
I was looking down at me and Doc. I could see him holding me. His face was twisted into something I hadn’t thought I would ever see on such a confident man. My own face was filthy and wet with tears and snot. But I was relaxed, and my head was tilting back, eyes open.
Up! Up! Up!
A choir of deep voices sang the words in overlapping rounds. In place of drums, hands clapped in time, feet stomped. Doc’s house turned see-through. It was just smoke and steam. I went right through the ceiling, the roof, the clouds. I stopped and looked down at the city lights. Up above me, stars. I remembered learning about stars as a kid, trying to memorize constellations out of a ratty, old book. My mind was blown when I found out what they were, how big everything was.
But I wasn’t interested in the universe tonight. I wanted people. I went to the field by instinct—my home—and joined in the dancing.
I looked around. I was surrounded by brick walls, but there was no ceiling, just black sky. There was a tall gate. It was closed. Weeds grew all around.
Fiona and Spitz were there dancing. Fiona’s sweat-damp hair flew wild around her head. Her open hands were in the air, now and then touching her face. Her eyes were open to the sky. This was an old batch, and it was beautiful. She was finally dancing. It was perfect. I knew it was a weird thought
, but I wished her baby had lived just so they could see how beautiful their mother was.
Spitz danced past me, and I saw the house behind us. I’d never been in the back garden before, but I knew it was Doc’s place. How had he gotten all three of us back there? He was a fucking angel. I swore to myself that, after everything, I’d worship that guy. He’d made mistakes, but I could have trusted him to fix it. After what I’d put him through with that scene at his door, and getting us all into his backyard, I figured he might be sleeping, so I sat in the covered doorway and watched my friends dance. I was there for a long time, and got bored enough to start singing to myself. “Rock You Like a Hurricane”, “Time After Time”, and “Whip It”.
My mouth went dry, and I sounded like shit. None of us had our packs on, and they weren’t in the garden. I wasn’t about to go inside looking for water though. I wouldn’t bug Doc in the middle of the night after he’d saved us. I stopped singing and curled up with my head on my knees. It only took a minute to start dozing off.
When the locks rattled and the door opened, I hurried to my feet. The doc looked like someone had beaten him up where it didn’t show. He stared at me with red eyes, and I couldn’t help wanting to help him somehow.
I hugged him.
As soon as I did it, I was worried it was the wrong thing. But if I was going to hug the guy, I was going all in, so got my arms up around his shoulders and made it a bear hug. He patted my back and carefully pushed me away. That was when I saw a man standing behind him. Fuck. I’d ruined the doc’s badass reputation. I stepped away and ducked my head.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, and rubbed my nose.
“It’s alright,” he said. He still looked and sounded miserable. “Come in and eat. There’s leftover pizza.”
I touched my stomach. The mention of food made me instantly feel the hunger, and getting my hands on some water sounded amazing. I looked over to Spitz and Fiona. When they came back, I wanted to be there so they wouldn’t worry.
“Eric,” Doc said to the tall guy still standing behind him, “do you mind bringing some pizza out so Wally can be with his friends?”