American Drug Addict: a memoir

by Brett Douglas

  Eventually, Chris dated Dana, but she broke his heart. Drug addicts do that.

  Monique

  I moved out of my parents’ house and, along with Geoff, moved into an apartment with our friend Sissy, who was the only movie star I ever met. She starred in Jaws 2, which was filmed on Pensacola Beach. In the movie, after Sherriff Brody scares the vacationers on the beach, she is on the screen for two seconds giving him a dirty look.

  Geoffrey introduced me to Monique, Andrea, and Anna. We smoked weed and took acid constantly. When I had enough money, I would also shoot cocaine, but never with my friends. Memaw was diabetic. Thus she unknowingly supplied me with fresh needles. No one knew of my bad habit. Yet.

  One afternoon while my parents were at work, I went to their house to get something to eat and, being sleep deprived, fell asleep on the couch. Mom came home early and saw the track marks on my arm. After being confronted with my obvious drug use, I told her I did it once at a party, didn’t like it, and would never do it again. In other words, I lied. Deceit is an important apparatus in a drug addict’s tool box. Perhaps the most important.

  Our apartment became party central. Eventually, eight people lived with us, along with a constant stream of party-goers. We were regularly harassed by the landlord over the noise. More than once, I came home to a house full of people. “Is Geoff, Chris, Anna, Monique, Andrea, Mike, Shelly, or Tyson here?” I asked the crowd.

  “Haven’t seen ‘em,” was the reply I got. Life was drug-filled and chaotic, but, much like the chaos at Richie’s house, I enjoyed the insane commotion.

  Although I was a junkie, I didn’t look the part. I worked at K-Mart and wore slacks, dress shoes, and a shirt and tie, all requirements for my job. My innocent appearance earned me the nickname “Brettles,” from my female co-workers, a name I despised. Despite my legitimate demeanor, drugs seemed to find me even when I wasn’t looking.

  I befriended a salesman named Brian, who looked exactly like the Brawny guy on the paper towel label. Despite our long conversations, I never disclosed my drug habit to him. One advantage of working at K-Mart was they paid their employees in cash. I was leaving work one Friday night when Brian asked if I wanted to go to a party that was being thrown by another K-Mart employee, Jesse, the security manager. He was an older, heavy-set man who didn’t seem to have a sense of humor unless he was busting a shoplifter. I wasn’t sure how fun a party thrown by Jesse would be, but, with nothing better to do, I agreed to go.

  Four people were at the party: Jesse, his girlfriend, Brian, and myself.

  Not much of a party.

  “You cool?” Jesse asked.

  “Of course,” I answered. I had no idea what he was talking about. I just knew it was never cool to admit to not being cool.

  Jesse reached into a cabinet and produced a plate holding a pile of cocaine and some needles. Does everyone encounter multiple opportunities to do intravenous drugs, or is it just me? Realizing this party might be fun, I threw some money on the table, and we shot dope all night.

  Afterward, I asked Brian how he knew I would be willing to shoot up.

  “I didn’t.”

  At the time, I thought the drug gods were watching out for me. I had no idea they were actually plotting my demise.

  After I quit K-Mart, I relaxed and enjoyed my unemployment for a couple of weeks. Geoffrey, Anna, Andrea and I would trip on acid while I explained quantum mechanics or argued against the existence of God. Monique, however, was afraid to do the drug. I decided my personal goal was to change that. She was tall with a solid body and long, light blonde hair. But her most endearing quality was her laugh, which was loud, animated and as distinctive as a fingerprint. Our group was inseparable, and I spent most of my time trying to be funny just so I could hear her laugh. I even started to fall in love but was too shy to tell her how I felt.

  The day finally arrived when I convinced Monique to take acid. Our neighbors in the adjacent apartment were watching some important sporting event on television, and their place was full of people. Moe and I were alone in our apartment. “Just put this under your tongue.”

  Monique smiled. “I don’t know. I’m scared.”

  “Moe, I’m doing this with you.”

  She chuckled one of her amazing laughs. “I know. That’s what scares me.”

  “You know I would never let anything happen to you.”

  “You’re gonna freak me out with all that crazy shit you talk about.”

  “Okay, no physics or God talk. I promise. We can talk about whatever you want”.

  “Okay. I’ll do it.” She was still smiling. “You better not fuck with me.”

  “I swear, I won’t.”

  “You’re lying.”

  “No, I’m not. We will do this together.” With that promise, Monique took acid for the first time.

  For those of you who have never taken acid, let’s take a break from the story to discuss…

  What Acid is Like

  Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), or acid, as it is commonly known, is a hallucinogenic drug created by Albert Hofmann in 1938. It was brought into the modern culture by Timothy Leary in the 1960’s. Typically, the substance is applied to a small piece of paper, called a hit, which is placed under the tongue.

  The following chart explains what experience can be expected while on acid after unexpectedly being shown a picture of Angela Lansbury’s face.

  ¼ hit – Immediately upon seeing her face, you will burst into the hardest, most gut-wrenching laughter you have ever experienced. You will continue laughing for hours for no apparent reason. Soon, any object, such as a coat hanger or litterbox, will cause an equal amount of laughter.

  ½ hit – You will still laugh uncontrollably, but the laughing fits will stop occasionally. You will notice Angela Lansbury’s face is distorting, and her skin appears to be breathing. You will realize her hair is actually a small animal and be unable to discern which end is the head and which is the tail. You will notice her mouth is moving and, for the first time in your life, you can read lips. She will seem to be telling you she lost her pancreas and wants you to go outside and look for it. You may or may not go. Suddenly, you will start laughing again.

  1 hit – You will doubt you exist. You will clearly see the absurdity of things which seemed important an hour ago. Angela Lansbury is no longer in the picture but instead, is sitting next to you. Over the next five hours, she explains the meaning of life in Latin, which you completely understand. Your mind will expand to a degree you never knew was possible. In reality, you have been making fart noises for the last fifteen minutes.

  As fun as acid sounds, the risk of a “bad trip” is always a possibility. I discovered this fact after my first date with Dru, a Goth chick I met at one of the many parties which spontaneously occurred at our apartment. I finally met someone who liked the same music as I and held my cynical outlook on life. I really liked Dru but made the mistake of inviting her to take acid with Chris and me. She had never taken the drug before but had no reservations about trying it. For some reason, Chris wanted to spend the evening with a redneck couple he just met. The five of us all took one hit a piece and waited for the fun to begin.

  Chris, Dru and I sat in the redneck couple’s living room, watching their small parrot walk across the floor like a wind-up toy. Chris was slamming beers faster than normal, so by the time the acid started to take effect, he was incoherent. Dru and I, dressed in black, were left to interact with the redneck couple while we were tripping. Since we had nothing in common, the four of us sat in an uncomfortable silence. Dru went to the kitchen to grab a beer. Chris unexpectedly woke up and followed her. Suddenly, I heard her screaming. I ran to her aid and saw Chris trying to rip her clothes off. He was staggeringly drunk.

  “Get him off me! Get him off me!” Dru cried, mascara running down her face. I threw him to the ground and attempted to console her. “I don’t like this shit. I don’t feel right. I want to go home.”

  I walked her to th
e car, only to discover a torrential rain had started. Sitting in the driver’s seat, I remembered the car had no windshield wipers. Normally, driving in a storm without the aid of wipers wasn’t a problem, but the rain was falling exceptionally hard, and, not to mention, I was tripping balls. “There’s no way I can drive like this,” I told Dru as I stared at the sheets of rain hitting the windshield.

  “How long does this shit last?”

  “Uh…about eight hours.”

  “What?! Oh, my God!”

  With no other options, we decided to go back inside and wait for the rain to subside. As soon as we walked through the door, Chris grabbed her and started pulling at her clothes. The male redneck punched him in the face. As Chris lay motionless on the floor, the rest of us sat in silence, listening to the rain and Dru’s sobs as we watched the little parrot walk across the floor.

  After that evening, I never heard from her again. At least I gave her an unforgettable date.

  Anyway, back to the story…

  Moe and I each took one hit. We could hear the commotion at the neighbor’s apartment, and I wanted to see what was going on. Moe protested, “I’m tripping, Brett. I can’t be around people.”

  “But I’ll be with you.”

  “No. I don’t want them looking at me.”

  “Monique. Just follow me. We’ll sneak in and stand in the back. They’re all watching some sports bullshit anyway. No one will notice us.”

  “Okay, Brett. Don’t you dare leave me.”

  “I got your back.” I wonder how many times those were the last words someone ever heard.

  We walked to the adjacent apartment. I cracked the door and looked inside. It was full of people who were all fixated on the television. Occasionally, everyone in the room would cheer, indicating the game they were watching was of some considerable consequence. The television was positioned in an illuminated entertainment center, which gave the room a pleasant ambiance. I visually tracked our path to the back, then turned to Moe. She looked terrified. I placed my extended index finger over my lips and whispered, “Shhhhh. Follow me.”

  I quietly slithered along the wall to the back of the room. As the crowd cheered at the game, I noticed Moe had not entered yet. Once I made my way to the back, I motioned with my hand for her to come to me. Our acid experience was peaking.

  Moe quietly entered the room and closed the door. She started moving along the wall, pressing against it in a desperate attempt to render herself invisible. Her shoulder touched the light switches, one of which controlled the power to the entire entertainment system. Suddenly, the television lost power, causing everyone in the room to look at Monique and scream, “HEY!”

  Monique fled the room as if it were on fire. I had never seen her move that fast. I ran after her, laughing hysterically. When I finally caught up with her, she was shaking. “You motherfucker! You did that on purpose,” Moe yelled, terror distorting her face.

  “I didn’t do that. You did,” I laughed. We spent the rest of the evening alone in our apartment.

  Andrea

  Although I never formally dated Monique, I did date Andrea. She was short with wavy, sandy-blonde hair, a uniquely 80’s sense of style and an equally unique European beauty. Andrea was more grounded than the rest of us, but for some crazy reason, she was interested in me.

  Andrea loved to get high and explore places we had no business investigating. Next to the Pensacola Civic Center is St. Michael’s Cemetery, which dates to the Civil War. We got stoned and decided to walk through it at midnight. As we perused the tombstones, I noticed a mausoleum with an open door. Naturally, we investigated. Crypts lined both walls, and two stone slabs rested on the ground, marking two additional tombs. I recalled a scene from one of my favorite movies, The Omen, where someone pushed the granite slab off a tomb and found a skeleton. One of the slabs had been pushed aside slightly, so I suggested we try to open it further. With some considerable effort, we managed to increase the opening by a few inches, enough to put a lighter down in the gap to see what was inside. We knelt, lit the lighter, and slowly drew closer.

  Suddenly, something leapt from the opening, just inches from our faces. I almost shit my pants. We fled the graveyard screaming. As we sat in her car shaking and panting, we tried to process what the fuck just happened. A black cat had climbed into the opening and jumped out when we stuck the lighter inside.

  Andrea was a lot of fun, and I loved spending time with her. But I tend to destroy relationships I cherish. One evening, I got drunk and said some rather harsh things to her. We didn’t date long.

  Applebee’s

  After my two-week unemployed vacation, I got a job at an Applebee’s restaurant. I erroneously thought I had to be of drinking age to serve alcohol, so I lied about my date of birth on the application. Keith, the manager, told me to wear khaki pants. Although I agreed to do so, I had no idea what a “khaki” was. Mom later told me they were light tan dress pants. I had no money, but I did have a tan pair of polyester pants which were a size too small. I had never waited tables before and struggled to keep up with the pace. I was unaware of my new coworkers laughing behind my back at my ridiculous pants.

  I’ve always used humor to ingratiate myself with new people. Two hardware-store bull-dykes were having lunch when I approached a fellow employee, Lisa, and said, “Boy, those women are sexy.”

  “I know. They make me want to turn gay,” she replied.

  “Yeah, me too.”

  She laughed. I was now a member of the in-crowd. Lisa and her friend, Sherri, were the hottest, most popular employees at Applebee’s. They took me to the mall and bought me some khaki pants.

  I soon became friends with Keith. He asked if I would like to go out after work, and I, with nothing better to do, agreed. We left Applebees’s and stopped by his house so he could change clothes. As I waited, Keith asked, “Can you hook up my VCR? I can never figure it out.”

  I set up the machine and inserted a VHS tape. As I pressed the play button, Keith ran into the room. “No. No. Don’t use that one!” Too late. I was faced with two men having sex on the television screen. I looked at Keith.

  “I’m gay,” he said.

  “Well, I’m straight, but most of my friends are gay.”

  I don’t seek out gay friends; they find me. Suddenly, all the gay people at Applebee’s, about half of the staff, were now my friends, but Keith, Lisa, Sherri and I were tight. I loved my job and the people I worked with. A year would pass before a new hostess was hired, a person I would regularly see for a long time to come.

  Paula

  Throughout every person’s life, we encounter tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of people, most of which are average and of no mental consequence whatsoever. They are forgotten just as quickly as they are acknowledged. But occasionally, we see a person who is so elegantly beautiful, so tastefully unique, we look at them for just a second longer, and sometimes, remember them for years after.

  Paula is one of those special people. She had long brown hair with tight curls, huge brown eyes, round, puffy cheeks, a “toothpaste commercial” smile with too many teeth, and flawless skin. Her beauty was a classic type, with perfectly proportioned features arranged on an unblemished canvas of silk. She had exceptionally large, bouncy breasts and a sexy awkwardness in her walk. Every time she walked by, I took an extra second to gawk at her. Of course, she didn’t notice me. A goddess like her could have any man she wanted. I wouldn’t be in the running. Anyway, I had other interests.

  Cocaine and I had parted ways, but unlike my human romances, this love kept returning. One busy dinner service, Keith approached me. “Brett, can I see you in the office?”

  I nervously followed him to the back of the restaurant, unsure as to what would justify his stern tone. Much to my surprise, two lines of cocaine were lying on his desk.

  “Shit, man! You sounded serious,” I laughed.

  “Hurry before someone comes back here.” We snorted one line each. Keeping up with the din
ner rush was no longer a problem. What a persistent lover cocaine turned out to be. Keith became my new source of the drug.

  Within a week, I started shooting cocaine again. Waiting tables puts cash in your pocket after every shift, which made daily injections possible. I even did it while I was working. The shirts Applebee’s required us to wear had short sleeves. Since my ability to cleanly hit a vein was not as developed as it would eventually become, I exposed bloody track marks to my customers whenever I reached across a table to grab a plate or refill a drink. That fact, however, didn’t stop me.

  Keith noticed my appetite for cocaine exceeded his own and eventually commented on it. But I did my job and was punctual, not to mention he was selling the drug to me, so his protests were ineffectual.

  Sherri, on the other hand, had no such constraints. She was the first person in our group to piece together the clues to my secret. Her boyfriend, Duke, was Keith’s source of cocaine. Thus, Sherri was aware of the amounts I was purchasing. While my friends would buy it for the weekend, I usually purchased some twice a day. Sherri noticed the change in my demeanor when I did coke, which was even more apparent when I wasn’t high on it. The least subtle clue, however, was the swollen and bruised whelps in the fold of my arm. Sherri pulled me into the back of the restaurant and turned my left arm over, exposing fresh track marks. “What the fuck is this?”

  “I cut myself shaving.”

  “This is not funny.” Sherri forced my eyes to meet hers. “I love you, baby. But if I see this again, you’ll be cut off.”

  “I only tried it once. It won’t happen again.” I had told that lie before.

  Sherri hugged me. “Please baby. Not again. You promise?”

  “I promise.” Deception was becoming a habit, a prerequisite for survival. Promises were no longer an agreement of trust but meaningless words to keep the truth in its entirety from being revealed.