by Luke Davies
The afternoon clouds over. The rains come, yes. But wait for what’s in store.
Winter comes around again. On the odd occasion when we take time to think about it, we are ashamed, perplexed. Nothing, it seems, has changed. The same awful struggling for money, the scars grow daily up and down our arms. It becomes harder to find veins. My arm swells; I have to take my wristwatch off.
We watch the all-night music video show. Candy is drawing. I finish a book I’ve been reading about the Crusades, then I start The Spy Who Loved Me by Eleanor Philby. But my eyes are beginning to droop. At six A.M. we watch the morning news. Soon after that we fall asleep for a few hours.
It’s good to wake up knowing there’s some dope left. It helps you sleep better. At ten o’clock the day is dark and wet. The rain bleeds down the windows. We hug in front of the heater, listening to the downpour. We take a bath together, leaving the light off. It’s dark and steamy and slowly we spread soap on each other. We dry and make tea and toast. In front of the heater we mix up and have a blast. There is nothing like the morning blast.
Adrift. At times it seems that I am floating in the beauty of docility. Pulling the needle from my arm, I succumb again and again to the luscious undertow of the infinite spaces between atoms. My arm an estuary of light in which all rivers gather.
There’s no real chronology. Things happen in units, one after the other but entirely unrelated, dislocated. Each day’s about the same. Maybe the weather differs. Or the way certain television programs do not appear on weekends.
During the night, stoned, we promise each other we are going to give up. Then in the morning we wake up sick, and the fear is overwhelming. And somehow, the first thing we have to do is score. Later we can think about our promises.
In the streets: the ugliest people in the world. I never notice them behind pinprick eyeballs. But if I’m hanging out, big panic. Now evil pulsates like a heart in the sun. Oh God, shower me with money and I will be good.
We dream of going to India, Thailand, getting properly stoned on real dope at decent prices. But we’ve never got money beyond the next hit. The high point of our life is the moment we plunge the needle. The self-perpetuating fuck. Once upon a time our bodies melted until they were a force field of sweat, the one indistinguishable from the other. Love? We fucked on the rocks at Rye Beach, she scraped her knees, I scratched my back, I tore my shirt. The bright white light of sex—exquisite. And now this.
When a fight starts, for whatever reason, pride plays a part and we keep it up, we can’t back down. Besides, we haven’t slept in two days. We fight about working, about lack of dope. Call your parents. Fuck you, I can’t do that again.
The Speed of it. Our Death Approaching. What scares me, flaring at the nostrils, is The Speed. Each breath is The Speed. There are Speeds within The Speed. The day goes slow or fast, in our greatest distress we really don’t know which.
In the end, life can be seen to be inconsequential, in the way that nothing matters on some vast evolutionary scale. But everything matters, and we know that most when life seems most horrific, when at each instant of time, all the space around us is everything there is.
Suppose this, Candy. Suppose all time was not the way it is with us. Suppose its mellifluous curves and parabolas, its contractions and contortions, the furious or sedate blood of its pulse, were of a different mathematics altogether. Or say the eye that views could view with the remoteness and the slowness of rocks growing, continents being born, galaxies roller-coasting through the universe. Imagine if we could stand above the flow of time and look down on it just as we stood on Mount Dandenong and looked down on the dots of traffic ten miles away and below.
But there is a blackness all around. We can’t imagine anything. We can’t suppose. We are trapped inside the thickest of boundaries.
GPO
Rohypnol! Jesus, the dumb things that we do. Rohypnol, get this, makes you think that everything you’re doing, you’re doing at normal speed. Which you’re not, of course. Which explains the GPO debacle.
It was after our big fight, and the stitches. Candy was getting burned out, that’s the message I got from the fight. I kind of figured I was less than a man, since Candy earned most of the money and I didn’t really pull my weight. I was being threatened with industrial action, and fair enough too. These are terrible things to discuss. It was always a nagging thing in the back of my mind, but more and more now it was like a heavy suit that I wore all the time, all the pockets filled with lead: Candy works as a prostitute, and you say you care about her. I knew I must have stunk inside my suit, but I couldn’t get it off.
I wanted to be tremendously wealthy, of course. Because wealth would mean more heroin. It’s just that prostitution was the quickest way to fast, regular money. I loved Candy. I’m sure she loved me. The question was not, “How do we go fifty-fifty?” but, “What’s the quickest way we can get one on board?”
Still, when I did something like Roger’s wallet, fuck did I feel good. It didn’t happen much. When we had fights like the ashtray fight, I didn’t feel so good.
If I worked really hard, I could get a hundred or a hundred fifty bucks a day stealing and selling books. More like eighty. A hundred fifty, that’s a pretty big day. A lot of lugging, a lot of hours. Barely enough dope for the two of us. I could almost get a real job for that kind of money. And there just weren’t enough bookstores in the whole of Melbourne to do it nonstop. You had to be cyclical with this kind of crime. Anyway, it was nothing like what Candy could earn.
We were as sick as dogs, seriously edgy and sweaty. It was a Friday afternoon. Candy said, “I just don’t care anymore. I just don’t give a fuck.” The usual stuff. “We’ll just be sick, go through it, get it over and done with.”
But I felt I was long past tricking myself into that nightmare. In my demented need, I thought if I could redeem myself in her eyes, she would come good again. I always wanted heroin, but in another way, too, I always wanted to make our love pure. Or as pure as could be.
I just had to get some money. I took some Rohypnols to ease the anxiety.
“I’m going for a walk,” I said.
“Don’t do anything stupid,” Candy said.
I had no particular purpose in mind, which was never a good way to do things.
The afternoon sun was pale and weak. I was sweating beneath my overcoat, but still cold in all the shadows. It never ceased to amaze me how much I could hate the world when I wasn’t stoned. It seemed such a hostile place. And yet, get a good blast in me, and my love for humanity was abundant.
I walked through Bourke Street Mall, through the department stores, the jewelry shops. Opportunity just wasn’t presenting itself. I sat on a bench and watched people waiting for trams. I thought about handbag snatches. Not the glamour activity, but if I could get away with it, it would do. I knew the back alleys to the warehouse, the same back alleys I thought I could reach when Beefboy the cop was chasing me. I thought this time would be different, that I could get around the corner and into that door before anyone would be able to catch me.
I was lost in my thoughts of alleyways and shortcuts when I saw Candy across the street. She’d come down to look for me. You wouldn’t think that’s easy in the middle of Melbourne, but she knew I was on Rohies, so she knew I wouldn’t go far.
She came over to me. “What are you doing, you idiot?”
“Nothing, I guess.”
She knew it wasn’t a stroll to take in the sights. “Come home,” she said. “You’re not going to get any money today. Face it.”
I couldn’t face it. The thought of absence of money filled me with horror.
She sat down beside me. “You know what I’ve been thinking?” she asked. “We have to get out of this country.”
I sat dejected, my head hung low. She held my hand and continued. “The world is out there, sweetpea. We need an adventure. We deserve an adventure. We’ve got to stop using. We can do it. We can start today. We can stop using, and s
ave some money, and go overseas. We can be there in a couple of months. Imagine Europe! We can work our way around Europe. We can start today. We really can. We can start right now. Let’s go into the post office and get the passport application forms.”
Hanging out for heroin, it was hard to believe with any conviction. But we went into the GPO. It was an old building, bluestone and pillars and all that shit. The huge main room was filled with the Friday afternoon bustle. Lines led up to the postal tellers at ornate cedar counters.
We waited in line to ask for the forms. A clock chimed 4:45, a deep single ping. Away from the main line, a teller was counting cash.
Maybe it was the lovely color of the twenties that caught my attention through the muted haze of the Rohypnols. But suddenly I realized that I could grab that money, that it could be mine, that it was a heap more than I could get from a bag snatch, and that I could still skedaddle out of the post office and up the alleys and around the corner and home before anybody could catch me.
It was a very thick wad she was counting. She’d fold every ten notes, wrap them in a thin elastic band, then add them to a thicker pile held together by a thicker elastic band. It was clear that the money was mine. I’m sure no one else in the post office was hanging out like Candy and me. It seemed a natural kind of justice, really.
We got the forms and moved away.
“Come over here,” I said.
We moved to the bench along the opposite wall, where people could fill out their forms or lick stamps or write addresses.
“That lady. Counting all that money. I’m going to get it.”
“What?”
“I’m going to grab it and run home. You go first, go now. When you get to the warehouse, leave the street door ajar.”
“You’re insane.”
“No, no. I’ll just reach across the bench. Real quick. She can’t stop me. I’ll be out the door.”
“Listen to me. You’re insane. Look at all these people.” She swept her arm across the room.
“It’ll be too quick. No one will have time to react.”
“I’m going. I’m not involved. I’m out of here. Don’t be an idiot.”
She grabbed my arm and pinched hard, trying to pull me toward the door.
“Candy, don’t worry.” I took her hand away. “I know I can do it. This is just for today. We’ll still stop. We’re going overseas. I love you, Candy.”
What the hell happens in our childhood, all that TV? I was Tarzan, off to hunt down some food for Jane. If it wasn’t for the way the Rohypnol turned my body to jelly but my spirit to steel, I would have been too nervous to believe I could do this.
But for a mad second I felt powerful.
“Five minutes,” I said. “I’ll be home with money.”
She stared at me. I tried to look earnest. She turned and walked out of the post office. Years later, when someone explained to me that insanity meant repeating the same mistakes and expecting different results, it would be this singular event I would think of—the GPO, a kind of brilliant summary of things—rather than the whole drawn-out and repetitive insanity of addiction itself.
But for now, action stations. I pretended to fill out a money order form. I glanced across the room. The teller was about thirty, a skinny lady with long red hair. She was absorbed in her counting. As I watched, she counted the last of the loose notes, folded them, and inserted them into the thick pile. She opened a drawer and the thick pile disappeared.
She wrote some figures in a ledger, then reached into the drawer and placed on the counter a new pile of loose twenties. It was about an inch thick. A fucking decent whack of busy Friday money. Mine, all mine.
I sauntered across the room. It all seemed so simple in theory. I grab the money, taking her by surprise. I’m out the door before she even screams. People chase me but I’m across the street and into the alleys already. Even the most athletic guy is fifty yards behind me as I round the final corner. I slip out of view into the door that leads up into the warehouse. I slam it shut behind me. I take the stairs six at a time. I fling the warehouse door open. Candy and I hug each other. Candy says, “You’re beautiful, I love you.” We count the money. I calm down slowly and catch my breath and watch TV and smoke cigarettes and Candy goes off to get the dope. (I have to lie low for a couple of hours.)
But now, despite the brash simplicity, I was nervous. I moved closer to the counter. I was sure I looked casual, innocuous. But when I thought, Do it now, my legs wouldn’t move. I started counting down.
Okay. In five seconds I’m going to do it. Five—four—three—two—one!
And again my legs wouldn’t move.
All right. This time. Five—four—three—two—one!
Nothing.
I looked at the clock on the wall. It was eight minutes to closing.
I sighed. It had to be done. There was no choice. I thought of the spoon, the mixing, the needle sliding into the vein.
Five—four—three—two—one!
I lunged.
By the time I realized how hard it was to move fast, my momentum was carrying me forward and it was too late to stop. I grabbed for the money with both hands.
My fingers clamped on the side of the wad. And hers clamped on her side. What the fuck was she doing? This was not in the script.
She was so strong. I watched in disbelief as our hands did a tug-of-war. She pulled in her direction and I pulled in my direction and our arms rose in the air as we fought over the money.
At the instant she screamed I gave a final almighty tug. But as I pulled hard up and away from her, my fingers squeezed down on the top and the bottom note. The rest of the money exploded in a fountain of color all over me. This was the moment where, had I been able to take stock, I would have realized that normal speed does not occur on Rohypnol. I watched the whole event in slow motion, like I was outside my body.
At the same time, as the notes fluttered around my ears and down over my shoulders, I felt a huge sense of relief, and sadness, that the thing had failed, that it was over now.
I turned my body toward the door. I hadn’t even taken a full step when I was tackled from behind, heavily. I remember feeling thick and slow, but I was grateful for the bulk of my overcoat, just like when Beefboy tackled me. In Sydney, with all that warm weather, these things would probably hurt more.
I resisted. I didn’t hit the ground. But in an instant every concerned citizen in the place joined in the show. Citizen’s arrest. Citizen’s Twister. I was hit from all angles.
I was held tight in armlocks and leg locks and neck locks. My limbs twisted in every direction. At one point I was horizontal to the floor but no part of me was actually touching it.
“All right, all right!” I tried to gurgle. I wasn’t struggling. They lowered me to the ground. My arms were wrenched behind me. There was a knee in my back. My face was scrunched into the carpet. All I could see were feet. There was a lot of puffing and panting.
The Rohypnol was really kicking in. I just wanted to go to sleep. There was a bit of a commotion about “call the police” and “I’ll get security.” It all seemed so normal now.
Two security guards came. The other men reluctantly dispersed and the guards pulled me to my feet. The whole fucking room had gone silent and everyone was looking at me. The guards held my arms really tight. I didn’t have to move my legs too hard to walk. They marched me across the vast room to the staff door beside the counter. The customers parted before us. I felt like I was a camera and they were the extras, told by the director to stare intently but move aside. I was a camera. What a nice thing that would be.
I was led into an office in the bowels of the building. They shoved me into a chair. One of the guards remained at the door.
The police came. They took one look at me and laughed.
“You look pretty pathetic,” the fat one said.
I shrugged. I was full of regret. I was not happy to see them.
“Can we trust you without handcuffs?�
�� the fat one asked.
“Of course you can,” I said. “I’m not going anywhere in a hurry.”
“Cuff him,” he said.
I walked handcuffed and flanked through the Bourke Street Mall to the paddy wagon, and the camera thing happened again. I would do the same myself, I guess. Stare, I mean. I love a good drama. But I didn’t feel good about being Moses like that.
We went back to the station. They didn’t see me as any great threat to civilization. They were even kind enough to call it attempted theft rather than theft, since I assured them, and quite rightly, that the money was never fully in my hands.
They bailed me on my own recognizance. I didn’t know what the word meant, until the fat cop said, “It means you don’t have to pay any bail, which is good, because we know you haven’t got any and we can’t stand the sight of you.” They gave me a date to appear in court. Really, the climax was the money shower. The rest was just paperwork. It took me about four hours to get out of there. By that time even the Rohypnol wasn’t doing me any favors.
I walked through the freezing dark city, back to the warehouse. The door swung open as I trudged up the old wooden stairs. I guess at least I felt like half a man. I mean, I’d tried. But now I was seriously sick; that seemed to be the important thing.