Meth A Memoir

by Wayne Huffman

  Curious, I got up and looked around to see what she was doing in the bedroom. The bitch had gotten her clothes, and left. I was pissed! I went to the pay phone to call her in order to find out what the fuck was up, and to tell her she had better bring me some money, or some of that dope back. She wasn’t answering the phone, of course.

  I ended up calling Lisa’s sister, FJ, who came and picked me up. FJ was happy to let me crash at her house for a while. She always seemed to want whatever Lisa had, and this was her chance, she thought, to have me. At the very least, it was a chance for her to piss Lisa off by giving me a place to stay, and I was all for that.

  In truth, FJ saved my ass that day. I was stuck with no money, and nowhere to go. While Lisa was getting her clothes, she also stole the Red P, pills, and the iodine crystals, so I couldn’t even do the cook! I was so pissed off that I busted the rest of the lab stuff up, cut the tubing, and dumped everything else out.

  I stayed at FJ’s for a few days, then I decided I needed to get my shit together. After all, I was still out on bail, and I had court dates coming up. I called my friend Lea, who I had bought my house from, and asked her if she knew where I could get a job. She said she could hook me up with a good job, working with her. She also said that if I wanted to come stay at her place, with her and her girlfriend, then I was more than welcome to. Luckily for me, Lea was bi-sexual.

  I moved in with Lea that night. She and Casey put me up in one of the extra bedrooms, bought me a carton of cigarettes, and gave me $20 bucks to put in my pocket. Coming off the meth wasn’t bothering me at all, but I was eating like a horse. Since Lea had been a meth addict before, she expected this to happen, so she kept a lot of pizza around the house for me.

  As I got settled in, I finally asked her what the job was that she said she could get me, and was she sure I could get hired. She was positive I would be hired. She couldn’t find nearly enough people to sell those Kirby vacuums. I thought she was joking at first, but as it turns out, she was serious. I was about to be a Kirby vacuum cleaner salesman. This couldn’t suck any worse.

  Lea, being something of the “man” in her relationship with Casey, just happened to have plenty of men’s dress clothes, in my size, for me to wear to my new job. All of my own clothes were full of holes and iodine stains; definitely not appropriate attire for a door to door salesman.

  I went for my first day, and as Lea assured me, I was hired and put into training right away. Training basically consisted of sitting around watching videos that told us how we could get as rich as we wanted to get, as long as we sold, sold, sold those expensive vacuums to little old ladies who might not be able to afford meds, but they can afford a Kirby with one of our easy payment plans. In fact, they couldn’t afford not to buy one, and I was about to be paid to go out and help the people of the world fight the dirt their old vacuums left behind. By doing so, I would be helping these people save their health. I already was not liking this shit, but I didn’t really have a choice in the matter. I was staying with Lea and I pretty much had to do what she wanted me to do right now, and she wanted me to sell these fucking Kirby’s.

  It quickly became apparent that I needed to get out of Lea’s house soon. I spent a week riding around with Lea as she did her demonstrations for people who were only interested in the free carpet cleaning, or the free steak knives (their choice). We would be doing this for 14 hours a day and I knew that once my training period was over, I would be expected to do the same thing, and I just could not bring myself to do this shit.

  When Lea told me I was about to be sent out on my own, I realized I had an even bigger problem that neither of us had thought about. I didn’t have a car. Without a car, I didn’t have any way to get around to do demo’s. At first, I was secretly happy as hell about all this. Then, I kind of began to worry. Without a job, there was no way Casey was going to let me stay with them for more than another week or so. I had to think of something fast.

  The only thing of any value I had immediate access to was the new Dell computer I had recently paid $1800 bucks for. The only problem with that was the computer was sitting in a pawn shop, and I didn’t have the cash to get it out. I mentioned this to Lea, and she said she would pay to get the computer out of pawn, and then we would see if we could trade it for a car.

  Lea is quite a dealmaker, and by the end of the next day, she had found me a Chrysler 5th Ave. that someone was willing to trade for the Dell. I checked the car out, and it ran great. Other than a little faded paint, it looked really nice as well. I got the title and tagged the car with some money I borrowed from Lea. That night, I assured Lea I would see her the next day at work, and then I hauled ass. There was no way in hell I was going back to that Kirby store again. I left to go visit the twins.

  Chapter 24

  When I got to Lisa’s parent’s house to see the twins, they were gone but Lisa was there. We went to the girls’ bedroom and Lisa had some dope, so we got high. I had gone without getting high for almost two weeks and here I was, right back at it. Lisa and I talked, and she started with her bullshit “I love you” crap, and making it out to be my fault I had not heard from her, because I moved in with FJ, and then with Lea. Forget the fact she took her clothes, and left me stranded with no money, and nowhere to go.

  Lisa asked if I wanted to take off and cook. I figured that I might as well, since I didn’t have anything else to do at the moment. I told her that we could go cook, but that I was keeping half of the dope. I would try to sell it myself at the bar. Lisa borrowed some money from her dad, and we took off in her Saturn. We left my car there at her parents’ house. Lisa’s lab was in the trunk with some clothes we had packed. We were heading to Pigeon Forge again to get a motel for a couple of days. We decided to take the old highway to Greeneville TN., because it would save us about forty-five minutes of driving time.

  It started to rain slightly as we rode toward Greeneville, on Hwy 107, which dead ended into State Hwy 81 in Greeneville. From there, we would get on I-81 to Pigeon Forge. As usual, we were arguing about something, and when we got to the end of Hwy 107, neither of us noticed the 3-way intersection until we were halfway through it, going at about 50 mph. Lisa hit the brakes, but on the slippery road, they didn’t do any good at all.

  We hit the slight embankment and the ditch directly in front of us at full speed. For some reason, I threw my hand up on the dash to brace myself, not thinking about the airbag. I ended up dislocating my shoulder when the bag deployed. I also twisted my ankle pretty badly in this crash.

  I must have been stunned, because before I realized what was going on, Lisa was already out of the car with the trunk open, yelling about the cops coming. I got out of the car, and pulled my shoulder back into the socket. That hurt like a son of a bitch. I looked around, but thankfully, there was no traffic due to the late hour.

  I tried to find a place to hide the lab, but the only thing around was a huge area of red clay mud that had been leveled for construction work. I grabbed the lab, and found a low area to put it in, then I covered it in mud to help it blend in. Since Lisa’s lab was in a bright pink duffel bag, it needed a lot of mud. I walked back to the car, but my ankle was really starting to hurt.

  As we checked around the inside of the car to be sure nothing incriminating was left in it, someone pulled up and asked if we needed him to call 911. Even though we probably didn’t want to say it, we told him yes, we did. The cops eventually showed up, and sent a wrecker for the car. The car was completely totaled. The cop noticed my footprints in the ankle deep mud, and I told him I walked out there to piss. Luck was on my side, and he believed me.

  As the wrecker loaded the car, the cop offered to drive us to a motel. We accepted the ride, and when we got there and checked in, Lisa called her dad, and he said he’d come pick us up in the morning. The next morning, I could barely walk. Lisa’s dad came and got us, then took us back to his house. We jumped in my car to get me to the hospital for my ankle. That’s where we said we were going, anyway
. Really, we went back to the crash site in Greeneville to retrieve the lab, which luckily, was still there.

  Lisa didn’t care that I couldn’t stand to put pressure on my leg; she refused to get dirty by walking out into the field to get the lab. I ended up hobbling out there, and getting it myself. When I got it back to the car, we went to get the stereo, and a few other things out of the Saturn. Once we got everything, we went to Pigeon Forge, to go and do the cook that we originally set out to do.

  Lisa pretty much slept the entire time we were at the motel. That was fine with me, because I could tell she’d been up for a few too many days, and she was beginning to be a total bitch. I definitely preferred her sleeping, than bitching. I got the cook done, and I let Lisa sleep until I had the room cleaned, and the car packed and ready to go.

  Once we got started on our trip back to Lisa’s parent’s house, Lisa asked me if I wanted her to go sell the dope. This would mean she would need to borrow my car, and I was not about to play that game with her. I told her, I’d take care of it myself. Lisa blew up at me, a favorite tactic of hers to get what she wants, and started running her mouth, saying I’d never be able to move it without her help. I said we would just have to wait and see.

  When we got back to her parent’s house, the twins were there. I gave them some dope, and asked them to go sell it, which they were happy to do. Lisa was pissed off, because I trusted the twins more with my dope than I did her, but that was how untrustworthy she proved herself to be. I explained to her, that I never had to worry about the girls ripping me off, like I did with her, but in her mind, she never stole from me, so she thought I was in the wrong. Well, fuck her.

  I ended up giving Lisa two grams, instead of half the dope, for the money she had put up for the cook and for the room. I left as soon as the twins got back with my money. Lisa tried to get me to take her with me, since she had no way to get anywhere, but I didn’t want to be stuck with her. Besides, it served her right for leaving me stuck without any way to get around a couple of weeks ago.

  We would end up hooking up again several days later, when she showed up at another motel I had checked into. She said she saw my car in the parking lot, and asked the owner of the motel which room I was in. The dickhead actually told her. When Lisa showed up at the motel, she was driving a beat up Buick that she said she traded some dope for. She saw that I had my lab unpacked, and asked me if I wanted to split a cook. She would supply half of the supplies, and do half the work, and we’d split half the dope. That was fine with me.

  I was nervous about cooking in this motel. It was a mom-n-pop motel that was owned by an Indian family, and they pretty much watched everything that went on around there. Another problem with cooking in this motel was that the bathrooms didn’t have vent fans to pull the smoke and fumes out during the cook.

  Despite all that, we did the cook anyway, and after we finished, we opened the door to let the room air out. I went to the store for something to drink, and when I returned, I ran up the stairs as fast as I could to get back to the room. Something I didn’t notice until I had gotten out of the room for a while was that there was a foot thick cloud of smoke floating in the room near the ceiling, and it started rolling out the door, as if the room was on fire. I shut the door, turned off the lights, and peeked out the windows until daylight waiting for cops, and fire trucks to show up. They never did, so as soon as it was daylight outside, we grabbed our shit and left the motel. We left the door open so it could air out while we were gone. Thankfully, the smoke wasn’t as noticeable during the day as it was at night.

  Another thing that happened at this motel occurred one night when I ran into Lisa while I was out buying supplies for a cook. She wanted to split another cook, and I figured it wouldn’t hurt. Besides, I wanted to get laid, and Lisa is a guaranteed fuck. We went to the motel, and while I was setting up the lab and breaking down the pills, Lisa decided to take a bath. She was in the tub for a few minutes, when she started screaming, then ran out of the bathroom dripping wet and completely naked. I ran into the bathroom to see what the hell made her react like that, and as it turns out, the water handle for the cold water had broken off in Lisa’s hand, and a heavy stream of cold water was shooting across the tub at face level.

  It scared the hell out of her, but I thought it was hilarious. The only problem now was that we had to pack the lab back up, and go get the motel owner, who turned off the water and gave us a new room. These kinds of things would happen all the time at this place. It’s a wonder why we cooked there at all. I guess it was just inexpensive, and convenient, and it seemed like a good place to avoid the cops pretty good. And, for awhile, it was.

  Chapter 25

  Lisa had a brother, Donny, who lived across the road from their parents in a house he had been building, albeit slowly, for years. The house didn’t have running water, or electricity, but he made do with water from the spring that ran along the property line. This spring was a source of water for many of the houses in the area.

  As for electricity, Donny had run several, hundred-foot long drop cords, end to end, down the hill and across the road to his parent’s house. This gave him enough electricity for a lamp, a stereo, a TV, and hot plate. Unfortunately, he could only use two of the appliances at a time, or he’d trip the breaker. There was a wood burning stove for heat, and cooking. Since there was no plumbing, he had to piss and shit in the woods, but other than that, the place was great. It sat high on a hill that was covered with trees, which made it kind of scenic. The trees blocked the view of the house from the road, but you could see the road from the house.

  The day Lisa and I got back from the last cook in Pigeon Forge, I went to visit Donny after the girls got back with my money. Although Donny was a bit of a hermit, I knew he loved to drink, and smoke a little meth. I took Donny to the liquor store and bought him a bottle of vodka, and then we went back to his house to party. By the next morning, Donny was suggesting I start cooking at his house. The place was secluded, he pointed out, and the wood burner was perfect for getting rid of cook trash.

  It wasn’t an accident that I went to visit Donny that day. The truth is I knew that once Donny got high he’d want me to stay at his place. Since I didn’t have anywhere else to go, I kind of manipulated Donny into letting me stay there. My only other alternative was to stay with Lisa’s parents, and I definitely didn’t want to do that. Not with Lisa staying there, anyway.

  Lisa was stuck. She had no car, and the twins weren’t stupid enough to let her borrow theirs. After a couple of days, she walked over to Donny’s to ask if she could borrow my car “for just a few minutes.” HELL NO! Eventually, she got someone to come pick her up. I wouldn’t see her again until the night she showed up in the beat up Buick, and found me at the motel, which was a couple of weeks later.

  Even though I was staying at Donny’s, and it was a great place to cook, I still liked to get out of there to go cook in a motel from time to time. Sometimes I would go find Trina, Shane’s ex-wife, and take her to the motel to play with while I cooked. Sometimes, Donny was just way too wigged out for me to want to be around, so I would go to the motel just to get away from him.

  For a while, things were going good. I was selling enough dope to keep me going, and Lisa and I were getting along, most of the time. Even though neither one of us considered us to be “together,” I still loved Lisa. When we would hook up to do a cook, I enjoyed our time together. She learned to keep her phone off when we were together, because if some dickhead called her during “our time,” she and I would start fighting again.

  It was during this time that I started noticing that I was being followed quite often. Lisa said she was noticing the same thing. There were certain cars that would follow us, everywhere we went. If I sped up, they sped up. If I stopped to get gas four times in thirty minutes, they would stop and do the same. There were several different cars, but after awhile, we got to know all of them. Once we figured out what was going on, we turned the whole thing into a big g
ame of “Follow the Leader.”

  The Drug Task Force has a super-secret hidden lair in Johnson City where they hang out and hide their super-sneaky undercover cars. IT’S IN THE OLD KROGER’S BUILDING ACROSS THE STREET FROM ONE STOP! Oops, did I just let the secret out? My bad.

  What Lisa and I would do is drive through the parking lot at Kroger’s around midnight. As we pulled out onto the road, two or three cars would come out behind us. Now, the object of the game is to get away from the pursuers, and hide from them. If they find you, they usually keep driving around so they will see when you take off again, and its game on.

  We had quite a few tricks. Lisa’s favorite was to get on the twisting, turning roads out in the Limestone Cove area where she grew up. She could drive these roads blindfolded, and knew where a straightaway ended in a sharp curve. Lisa would be hauling ass, kill the lights, and then use the emergency brake to slow down for the curve. A few seconds later, you would hear the cop lock his brakes up to keep from crashing. Sometimes they ended up in the ditch. It was great! My favorite move was to get far enough ahead of the cops, so they couldn’t see me driving with no headlights, then kill the engine and shoot across a couple yards and come out on another street. You kill the engine to keep from waking people up.

  One night, I was being followed by several under-covers, and I couldn’t seem to get away from them. I pulled into a small neighborhood and parked behind a church. There were only two roads in and out of the neighborhood, and the under-covers, I knew, would be waiting for me at both of them.

  Earlier in the day, I had bought several cans of white spray paint, and they were still in the trunk. I got out of the car, took off the hubcaps, and painted the steel rims white. Then, I painted the lower part of the car white to make it two-toned, broke off the radio antenna, and drove out of there like nothing was wrong. It actually worked. I got away from those dumbasses.