Dreamseller

by Brandon Novak

  My ploy works. He extends his arm in what seems to be an honest handshake of friendship. Ha-ha! We shake and Frantz pats me on the back. “Okay, Brand. The good news is, I consider you a friend, and I’m a pretty good friend to have. So, let’s forget this bullshit and go make a movie.” He opens the bathroom door and motions, as if to say, “After you, Novak.”

  I look back at the bathroom and again at Frantz. A strange grin has come over his face. Does he know I was about to shoot up prior to his entrance? If so, is this his sign of victory, to cut me off? Or is he so happy with himself after his little speech that he has forgotten that if I had actually come in here to take a piss, I still haven’t? We go upstairs. I am irate that I am not as high as I really wanted to be.

  A few days later, I had hidden my Heroin and needle in the bushes next to Bam’s miniramp. Ryan Dunn, a short, stocky guy who was in the CKY videos and Jackass, is visiting the Margeras. They are all seated in the kitchen, where they have a clear view of both the miniramp and the bushes. All I have to do is wait an hour and retrieve my stash when no one is around. But I want to get high and can’t wait.

  I go out on the ramp and begin skating. Acting as if I am having an “off day,” I purposefully mess up a few tricks, shooting the board into the bushes in order to create opportunities to find my bag. I realize how this looked to everyone inside the house when Ryan Dunn storms out to confront me. “Dude, it’s so fucking obvious that you have something hidden in the bushes. I can’t believe you think we’re so goddamn dumb that we can’t see what you’re up to!” So fucking what? What the fuck do you care? As if my drug use has any consequence to you!

  Dunn searches the bushes for my Dope, which he doesn’t find, thank God. “I can’t believe you, Brandon! You’re supposed to be off this goddamn shit, and here you are, doing it right under the noses of all the people who care about you!”

  I ask myself, “Why is Dunn, who doesn’t even know me, who doesn’t give a shit about me, who doesn’t even talk to me when he sees me at the bar, suddenly interested in my well-being?” Then I see it: Bam is videotaping our argument through the kitchen window. Reality slows down for a moment, as I make several observations.

  I think, If I was a black homeless guy, covered in piss and sleeping on the street, Dunn wouldn’t give me a dollar to save my life. But now that the camera is rolling, and he sees an opportunity to use my addiction to be the center of attention, now he shows concern. I get it, he’s acting for the fucking camera.

  I look at Bam as he holds the video camera and films the entire scene with a shit-eating grin on his face. He’s enjoying this. To him, videotaping the misfortune of my life is like watching a TV show. I am this kid’s fucking entertainment.

  I make a decision. If situations like this will make my free ride at this house last longer, and give me the means to remain an addict, I’ll play the game. I make up my mind to be an actor in Bam’s little world, and to let him be the director. The scene ends as Ryan and I embrace, with Dunn acting as if he is so worried about me that he sheds a tear. Now that Bam had seen the plot unfold, he devises a resolution. “Okay, Novak! Tomorrow, I’m taking you to get a tattoo that says, ‘No More Fucking Heroin’ right on your stomach, where you can see it every time you look in the mir-or. And from now on, if you ever do heroin again, you’ll see the tattoo and you’ll feel like such a piece of shit.” Gee, Bam, do you actually think this will work?

  The next day, to Bam’s satisfaction, I get the tattoo, as he films it. All this footage ended up in the documentary, The Making of “Haggard.”

  I tell Guy Leeper, “Now that I look back, I realize how much I misjudged things. I was so accustomed to using people, and being used by other people, that I forgot the human traits of kindness, generosity, charity, and tenderness. Of course Dunn could have cared about me without really knowing me. Of course Bam could have been concerned about me, even if he did videotape my argument with Dunn. Hell, maybe this was his way of dealing with his friend’s addiction. But I was so caught up in my drug world, I could only see through a junkie’s eyes. My rationale, that Bam was using me, allowed me to use him back.”

  I pull up my shirt, and show Guy my tattoo, which reads, “No More Fucking Heroin.” “Getting this goddamn thing was a joke to me. In my mind, it was nothing more than Bam’s bragging piece. He had just turned twenty-one and could now take me to the bar, command me to pull up my shirt, and show people his accomplishment. I began to feel like Brandon Novak, Bam’s trained animal.”

  Guy stares, waiting to hear the rest.

  “But, Guy, this really mattered little to me. I had learned to hide my real feelings years ago. I had the means to kill my negative feelings with Dope. And so, I was determined to make the most of West Chester for as long as I could.”

  Bam’s friends and the people in town viewed me as “that guy who was addicted to heroin.” My identity became that of the drug addict. But, oddly enough, I wasn’t ashamed. I felt liberated. If I messed something up, I had an excuse: I was an addict. And if I did the normal things a person is expected to do, such as return a borrowed item, show up on time, or not steal, I was given praise. People were proud of me for doing nothing all day, as long as they believed I had stayed clean. I was in a no-lose situation.

  Because I was constantly seen with Bam, and he was always talking about me, I became a local celebrity. I brought excitement to the quiet town of West Chester. Excitement!

  West Chester is a college town, full of kids whose parents encourage them to enroll in West Chester University so they can attend classes, get an education, and become more well-rounded. What the parents are really paying hundreds of thousands of dollars for is a four-year party.

  The college girls I met were complete sluts who didn’t have to be talked into anything. College gives some women a license to sleep with anyone, drink as much as they can, do as many drugs as they want to. After all, when they graduate, they’ll move away to a place where their reputation is a clean slate. Then they can settle down with the right guy who will never find out they were dirty, filthy, disgusting whores for four years of their lives. Their college years are a period when the consequences of their actions will never catch up with them. Not that I am any better than them: I slept with every one who threw herself at me.

  The guys were even worse. Insecure, unworldly kids, they haven’t figured out what they want out of life. They desperately want to fit in and belong, going through the motions, floating from one identity crisis to another. Their idea of a meaningful experience is smoking pot and listening to the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band or tripping acid and watching the film Pink Floyd The Wall.

  To these kids I was cool, mysterious, and they got to live vicariously through my stories. At parties and the bar, I was the center of attention. Ludicrous as it seems, it was an honor for them to keep my company and a privilege to buy me a drink. I made people feel special, as if they were learning something from me. As if, by befriending me, they were accomplishing something that allowed them to go to class the next day and brag that they had hung out with a Heroin addict! Ha!

  Every day I would sit at the bar and wait for classes to let out and the barrage of free drinks to begin. The kids would swarm around me. I’d look at their books. Psychology. Sociology. Ethics. These kids resented their professors who worked for years to achieve their degrees in order to teach them valuable knowledge. Here I was, a junkie at a bar, a hero. I was like Jesus, with his apostles sitting at his feet, holding their breath for the next gem of wisdom. I looked at the naïve faces, hanging on to my every word.

  STUDENT #1: So Novak, you were addicted to…heroin?

  ME: Yep, since I was seventeen years old.

  STUDENT #1: Oh shit! What was that like?

  STUDENT #2: What’s the craziest thing you ever did?

  ME: (clearing my throat, as if ready to make a speech to promote world peace) Did I ever tell you guys about the time I shot bleach by mistake?

 
STUDENT #1: You shot what?! Bleach?!

  STUDENT #2: Oh shit, man! That’s fucked up!

  STUDENT #3: How? Why?

  ME: Well, I used to know this junkie named Kaitlin from Park Heights, Baltimore, who would score Heroin for me when times were tough. She used to rip me off and pinch from the bags she’d score for me, so she would always come up with some bullshit reasons to pick up the Dope without me.

  STUDENT #1: Was Kaitlin black?

  STUDENT #2: Did you know a lot of black people?

  STUDENT #3: Shut the fuck up and let him tell the story! I wanna hear this. Go ahead, Brandon.

  ME: One day she had me wait at her house while she scored. I started rooting around in her stuff and found a small bag of heroin that looked like she had once hid but forgot all about. I didn’t have a needle, so I found hers and started to clean it out with bleach—

  STUDENT #1: Why bleach? Why did you do that?

  STUDENT #2: Does bleach get you high?

  STUDENT #3: No, you stupid asses! The bleach was to clean out the diseases like AIDS that she might have had. Stop interrupting the story! Go ahead, Brand.

  ME: So, there I am, cleaning out Kaitlin’s dirty needle with bleach. I was sick and strung out at the time, and real nervous because I had no idea when Kaitlin would come home. And I panicked! I did the wrong thing, and mixed up my bowl of bleach with the water I was supposed to use in the cooker, and I ended up shooting up a needle full of heroin and bleach by mistake.

  My audience is speechless. One asks, “What did it feel like?”

  “It felt like my veins were on fire for about three days,” I tell them.

  They sip their beer as if they had just experienced an alternate reality.

  As I tell my story to Guy Leeper, I explain, “So I was in this crazy position. I mean, my whole life, everyone despised me for being a drug addict, and now, the tables had turned, and it was like, I was now being rewarded for it.”

  Guy tried to provide insight. “This is what is called positive reinforcement, when someone is rewarded for their behavior. It is dangerous when a person is given positive reinforcement for negative behavior. So you were in a position in which you no longer had anything to dissuade you from your addiction.”

  “Almost anything,” I tell him. “But that’s where Bam’s friends and family stepped in.”

  chapter twenty-eight

  Paradise Lost

  The enabler is a best friend of no value, a living paradox. He nullifies the aid that he gives to the addict by maintaining the lifestyle that makes addiction possible. He is the junkie’s greatest asset, more valuable than the needle itself.

  To the junkie, the world of relationships resembles a chess board on which Heroin is in full control of the game. The pawns are all those who have ever cared: parents, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, grandparents, old friends, old girlfriends, neighbors, friends of friends. Every square represents a place where the junkie has been and can make a move, create a scam, or pull a hustle. To a mind possessed by Junk, friends and family cease to be human. They are simply resources.

  The addict and the enabler share a reciprocal relationship. While the addict is dependent upon the enabler, the enabler also needs the addict. It is almost as difficult to break the cycle of the enabler as it is to break the cycle of addiction. One might ask, what’s the attraction for the enablers? How do they justify helping an addict? What are the rewards of selflessness? That’s easy. Like the junkie, they get to feel good for a while. For one brief, shining moment, they get to feel as if their tiny, insignificant lives actually matter. As if the fact that they ever existed will make a difference in the scheme of things. The junkie is a dreamseller: a mirror on which those who help him can peer into their own souls. The enabler is like a monkey trying to touch his own reflection in the water. But when he does, the image ripples outward, then inward, right back at him.

  The best way I can describe this phenomenon is through the following diagram:

  The Cycle of the Enabler

  First, the enabler is motivated to enable the addict, usually out of a sense of obligation or duty. This is why most enablers are family members or friends.

  Upon enabling the addict, the addict is forced into a position where he must betray the enabler. He has no alternative. Betrayal is what addicts do.

  The addict will then push the boundaries of betrayal until the enabler can no longer tolerate it. Naturally, a confrontation ensues. The confrontation may take the form of a fight, an argument, crying, or screaming, but in any event, emotions are introduced into the relationship. These emotions replace the logic that was once the driving force to help the addict.

  After the confrontation dies down, the addict is forced to make some temporary amends with the enabler. He may admit he was wrong, he may promise to never screw up again; he may check into a rehab. But this resolution will give both the enabler and the addict the false sense of security and hope. “I’m sorry,” “I love you,” and “I promise” are often said during this stage.

  Here the cycle of the enabler comes full circle. The enabler has now made an emotional investment and will be afraid to let go. His thought pattern will be controlled by his emotions, and he will cling to his relationship with the addict as does a child to his security blanket. The addict, in turn, will cling to the enabler for dear life. This cycle will then continue until either one of the two comes to his senses or dies.

  This is the relationship I now shared with Bam Margera, and it was a cycle in which I couldn’t lose. Bam became my enabler, I became his addict, and my life became a continuous stint at the bar, separated by periods of sleep and television viewing.

  April began to cramp my style. One argument sticks out in my head. I was watching television when she returned home from shopping. As she made several trips to the car to bring in all the groceries, she looked at me from the corner of her eye. What? Did she expect me to help?

  As she put away the groceries, she questioned me. “So, Brandon, what did you do today? Do you have any plans to do anything productive?”

  What the hell do you think I did today? I woke up at two, now I’m watching TV. And yes, I have plans. Tonight I’m going to the bar with your son to get drunk and laid. “I’m not feeling too good today, Ape. Do you need any help bringing in the groceries (now that you’re done bringing them all in)?”

  “Well, you know what would make you feel better?”

  “What’s that, Ape?” I say with zero interest in what this annoying woman is telling me.

  “I think it would make you feel better to go out there and skate. There’s a ramp right in the backyard, in case you haven’t noticed. I’d think that you would be taking this opportunity to practice every day.”

  I decided to test my boundaries. “Ape, would you get off my back?! Nag nag nag.”

  April said, “Well, I don’t think I’m being a nag at all. It’s just that I think you really need to do something constructive with your time rather than sit in front of the TV all day. It’s not like you have a job or anything, or any place to be.”

  I thought, I do have a job! I’m your son’s fucking companion. I do whatever he says. I listen to his stories all day long and act as if I care. I laugh extra hard at his jokes to boost his ego. When he gets into an argument with someone at the bar, right or wrong, I back him up. Whatever he wants to do, I go with him and have to act like I’m interested just so he’s not seen around town all alone. When he runs out of interesting things to say to people, he makes me tell them stories about my addiction to entertain them. My life revolves around your kid, lady. I’m your son’s personal fucking slave, isn’t that enough to satisfy you? What the fuck else do you want from me?

  Looking back, I really can’t understand the mixed emotions that I was feeling. On one hand, I appreciated all that the Margeras were doing for me. On the other hand, I resented them when they expected something in return: for me to be something I wasn’t. And I somehow ended up using this resentme
nt as justification to lie to them, to cheat them, to steal from the very people who were doing so much for me. Why did I feel this way? Why was I so full of animosity and bitterness?

  But in the meantime, I had real worries. I had an addiction, and no way to pay for it.

  And so…

  Bam’s garage was a warehouse of merchandise, which was replenished monthly by all sponsors who paid him to license his name and image for their products. One entire wall of the garage was stacked with skateboards, ball bearings, skateboard trucks, wheels, sunglasses, sneakers, clothes. The way I saw it, I was entitled to whatever I wanted. After all, Bam had way more stuff than he could possibly use, and I needed money. Hell, he owes me, I thought as I would stuff the products into the trunk of Bam’s black Audi, drive them to FDR skatepark in Philly, and sell them for one-tenth their value.

  With a means to pay for my addiction, I used increased amounts of the drug with greater frequency. No matter how much Heroin I would bring back to Bam’s house from my trips to Baltimore, I couldn’t seem to make it last. I had no willpower or ability to ration out my stash. Any Heroin I brought into Bam’s house was gone within a few days. I began stealing more than ever to cover my habit, and Bam’s sponsorship merchandise dwindled.

  Bam got pissed at my numerous excursions to Baltimore, and I was running out of bullshit reasons to go. One of the last times I went, I was so high that I gave Bam one of the worst excuses ever offered to a human being for anything, ever.

  “Why the hell do you need to go back to Baltimore all the time? I don’t get it,” Bam asked as he dropped me off at the bus station. “Why do you have to go? Tell me! Why? So far this month you’ve had to take care of your mother, you’ve had to take care of your mother’s dog, you’ve had to help your friend move furniture, you’ve had to help a friend’s neighbor paint his house. And those don’t include the times you disappeared with my car for days at a time, probably using it to drive to Baltimore yet again. So what’s your reason this time? What?”