Meth A Memoir

by Wayne Huffman

  I looked at Angel and said, “They blew the fucking house up.”

  Now that right there is a perfect example of someone claiming a lab blew up when nobody said a damn thing about anything blowing up. But, hold on, it gets better.

  Linda, Larry, Mitch, Mary, and John got to Ricky’s house a few minutes later. The second they got there, I asked them what the hell happened. Mitch said, a half gallon jar of ether busted, then ignited from the kerosene heater in the shed. The flames ignited two more jars of ether that was sitting there, as well as Johns clothing that were soaked in ether. They got out, and the flames, from roughly a gallon and a half of burning ether, were so hot, they were melting the siding on the house. It wasn’t actually “on fire”, as they had claimed at first.

  I told Mitch, he needed to get his ass back home and get a water hose on that fire before the cops, and fire department, showed up. Which would happen very soon. I wasn’t thinking the water would put the fire out, I was thinking Mitch could make up a good story when the cops got there. Maybe, say a gas jug caught fire from the heater or something like that. Anything, to keep the cops from investigating, which is exactly what would happen if they got there and no one was home.

  Also, and this was my biggest concern, my tank of anhydrous would be found. When I mentioned this to Mitch, he went to the car and pulled the tank out of the back seat. He had run back into the burning building and retrieved it before the fire got too bad. He did get burned getting it but, the important thing then was, he got it.

  Before Mitch could go back home, we heard sirens heading towards his place. Too late. I told Angel to get John into the Bronco, then I told everyone else to go to Angela’s house and wait for me to get there. I got into the truck with Angel and John and we headed to Johnson City. I stopped along the way at a Walgreens to buy up a bunch of burn medications and bandages for John. I knew that the cops would soon have the pharmacies on the lookout for people buying this shit so, I had to get it while I could.

  Once I got to Angelina’s, and explained what happened to her, I had her call her friend, Ken. Ken was a, sometimes, customer of mine, through Angelina. He also worked for a Haz Mat company that did meth lab clean ups. I told Ken what happened and asked him to keep me informed as to what the cops found. John had dropped his wallet at the house, while rolling around to get the fire out. I told Ken, if he got the call to do the clean up, to find the wallet and return it to me. He said he would, but he never got the clean up call.

  Larry and Linda went home. Since Angelina didn’t really want the trouble of John being there, I took him and Angel to Chad’s house. Mitch and Mary followed us there and Chad had no problem with us staying there for a while, even though he didn’t know Mary and only knew Mitch through me and John. It was well known that Chad still had feelings for Angel, but luckily, he didn’t have a problem seeing her with me. In fact, he even told her she was doing good to be with me, instead of some of the other dumbasses she usually gets with.

  I had some pain pills (my Leanna supply) and I gave them to John. He was severally burned on his arms and chest. The fire had burned the shirt completely off his body. Hell, it even burned the shoe strings right out of his shoes. He was in bad shape, to say the least.

  I knew mine and Angels little getaway wasn’t going to happen now. Not anytime soon, anyway. We were going to have to babysit John until he got better, like it or not. He was like a brother to Angel, and Angel never turned her back on a friend. Ever! I mentioned that I needed to sell some dope but I didn’t want to go back to Johnson City. John, since his cooking days were over now, offered to hook me up with his people in Falls Branch, Tennessee where he has a decent customer base established. He figured his friends would need a new hook up, and I was going to be it.

  Chapter 56

  I didn’t know it then but, the fire at Mitch’s house that night was the beginning of the end for me. It was a sign. From who, I don’t know, but over the next eleven days or so, I would have many more signs telling me to stop what I was doing. I don’t know how I didn’t see them.

  We went to Fall Branch around 2 a.m. that same night. Once we were there, we went to see a dude that John said could move a lot of dope for me. Over a three or four hour period, the dude sold about $1000 worth of product for me. That was not bad at all, for being in a really rural area, in the middle of the night. Especially considering, we never left the dudes basement.

  We left right before day break to go back to Johnson City. Just a few miles from where we were, the Bronco began to overheat. I always kept a gallon of water in the truck, just in case, so I pulled into somebody’s driveway to pour the water into the radiator. Unfortunately, the water was frozen so I placed the jug next to the engine block, hoping the heat would thaw it out.

  After we sat there for maybe twenty minutes, Angel said she was freezing. She decided she was going to see if she could get some water from whoever lived in the house. I didn’t want her beating on someone’s door this early in the morning, but she didn’t really care what I wanted. She wanted to get warm. After she knocked, a little old man answered. He was fully dressed, so I don’t think we woke him. He probably got up when we first pulled into his drive. He gave Angel water, then he invited us all in to get warmed up. We thanked him, but declined his kind offer. We just needed water and then, we were gone.

  Now that the truck was cooled off, we continued towards Johnson City. Unfortunately, it wasn’t long before the engine began to overheat, yet again. I kept driving until the engine got hot enough to just die. Luckily, we were approaching a convenience store and I was able to coast in, and up to a gas pump. I suggested we all go in and eat, and warm up, while the truck cooled. They were cold and hungry so that’s what we did.

  Angel and John walked around the store for a few minutes, while I bought anti freeze and paid for some gas I would pump after we ate. We all went to the restaurant side of the store, placed our orders, then sat down to eat. Knowing that the Bronco needed time to cool off, we took our time.

  Maybe fifteen minutes into our meal, John pulled the hood from his coat over his head. He started sliding down low in his chair saying, “Oh shit... oh shit... oh shit...” I looked out the window to see two police cars pulling in the parking lot. I told John to sit up and stop acting suspicious about something before he drew attention to us. At first, I figured the cops were there for coffee and donuts. After all, it was shift change for the sheriff’s department. It didn’t take long to find out, that wasn’t the case. They were there for us.

  There was one male, and one female officer. I continued to eat, as I watched them approach our table. I also saw a third officer pull into the parking lot, then enter the store. The female cop walked up to Angel, while the male cop stepped behind me. The female did the whole, good-morning-how-ya-doing routine as the third cop stepped in behind John. This definitely was not looking good and I was beginning to wonder if the old man had called the cops on us for some reason.

  The female started questioning Angel about a hairbrush. Apparently, the store clerk thought she had stolen one, and he called the cops. Angel snapped off on the cop, she was mad that she was being accused of stealing. I don’t blame her a bit. The female cop asked Angel to open her purse, but Angel told her to go fuck herself, she wasn’t doing it. I thought, “Just open the fucking thing so these people will leave.”

  I tried telling the cop that Angel doesn’t have to steal because she knows I will buy her anything she wants. It didn’t matter, the cop wanted to see in that purse. Finally, the cop told her, if she didn’t open the purse, we would all be arrested and she would see in the purse anyway. With absolute perfect timing, John and I both said, “OPEN IT!” Angel grabbed the purse and dumped it in the middle of the table. There was no brush.

  The cop then asked Angel to walk over to the store area with her, to see if the supposedly stolen brush was still there. It was. As the cop stepped away with Angel, she turned and told the other cops to pat us down. I thought, “We’r
e fucked”. I knew John had an entire bag of syringes on him. Myself, I had at least an ounce of dope in my pocket, as well as a couple syringes. I don’t mind telling you, I was scared.

  I had my tank of ammonia in the back of my truck. My gun was in the door pocket. If we were arrested, they would find all of that shit, and we would go down for a long time. The cop behind me said something about letting him give me a quick check, “to make her happy”, he said. I guess she out ranked him, and he saw that this was just a bullshit call to begin with.

  Acting as offended as I possibly could, I stood up. As I did, I reached into my pocket and pulled out all the money I had made that night, and slammed it on the table. “Does it look like I need to steal?” I asked. The cop looked at the money and asked where I got it. I told him, I had been working at Exide for eight years so I had better have some money. Everyone in our area knows Exide is a very good-paying company.

  The cop asked if knew a certain person, and by chance, I did. I began talking about the person like we were best friends. The cop ended up telling me to go ahead, sit down, and finish eating. John was standing across the table from me. He and the other cop were listening to our conversation. I could really see in John’s eyes that he was calculating his chances of making it out the door, if he made a run for it. I’m glad he did not try, but for a second, I thought he really was going to.

  The second the other cop grabbed a hold of John, to search him, John yelled out. The cop kind of jumped back, then asked John if he was alright. John answered by pulling his coat sleeve up, exposing his bandages. The cops seemed very concerned when they saw them. They asked what had happened to him and John said he was burned while working on the carburetor of my Bronco. He said he had gasoline on him, and when the truck backfired through the carborator, it set him on fire.

  That story was the lamest bullshit I had ever heard, but they believe it. I was just hoping no one looked outside and noticed the “electronic fuel injection” sticker on the fender. They didn’t, thankfully. The female walked back over with Angel and bid us a good day. We decided to get the hell out of there, quickly.

  We walked out as the cops did, trying to make it seem like everything was cool. I put the gas that I had already paid for in the truck, as I waited for the last cop to leave. He was obviously waiting on us to leave first so, we did. I turned down the road one of the other cops had gone down, figuring we wouldn’t seem suspicious if we were following another cop.

  The road we were on was a very long, straight road. There were a lot of little hills so, every time you went up a hill, you could see a long ways ahead of, and behind, you. It was at the top of one of these hills that I noticed the first cop car. It was about a mile ahead of us, traveling slowly. The one that waited for us to leave, I also noticed, was coming up fast from behind. I told John and Angel that we were about to get boxed in, and pulled over.

  John, knowing that area better than I, told me to take a left onto a road we were approaching, so I did. There was an old barn ahead of us, John told me to pull in behind it until the cop passed the road we had turned on to. Once the car passed, we continued on this back road until it brought us out at the store again. The Bronco was beginning to overheat again, but I wasn’t about to stop at that store again.

  I continued on towards Johnson City, traveling down state highway 81. I wasn’t stopping for shit, unless the truck blew up, which I seriously hoped wouldn’t happen. I was beginning to get extremely wigged out. By the time we got to Jonesborough, the engine was knocking loudly, due to it being so hot. One place you do not want to have car trouble is in downtown Jonesborough, Tennessee. The cops there live to harass people.

  Wouldn’t you know it, the Bronco engine finally quit on us right in front of the Jonesborough courthouse, at 8 a.m. I jumped out of the truck and pushed it out of the road, and into the courthouse parking lot. I was convince now that a cop was about to pull in behind us, and take us all to jail at any second. Any other time, that is exactly what would have happened. This, it seemed, was our lucky day. I just didn’t know it yet.

  While we sat there, waiting for the truck to cool off, I had the radio on. The top story on the news was the fire at Mitch’s house, the night before. The news reporter said that police had notified local hospitals, and pharmacies, to be on the lookout for people with burns. I always wondered if the cops got that message right after we left that store, and that was why they were going to try to stop us.

  I did have to laugh at one part of the news story. The reporter (and this is why people don’t know as much as they think they do) said, “Witnesses to the explosion reported seeing several vehicles leaving the scene immediately after the blast.” Okay, there was no “explosion”, there was no “blast”, there was a fire. That’s all, just a fire.

  I would be willing to bet, that if you asked around, in Gray, Tennessee, you would find maybe a thousand people, who would claim to have been driving down that tiny stretch of interstate, at the exact moment that shed burned down. Every one of them would claim to have seen the place got up like the fourth of July, but guess what, it never happened that way. It was simply a fire. That’s all.

  We sat in the courthouse parking lot, just long enough for the engine to cool enough so that it would start. Once it did, I drove it over to the Auto Zone, a couple of blocks away. When I parked, I got out of the truck and walked away from it. I was completely convinced the cops were watching it from somewhere and I didn’t want to be in it. I sat on a bench, in front of a grocery store and Angel walked over, and sat with me. I told her that I just could not drive anymore. She understood and called her friend, Jimmy, to come get us, and take us to Marks.

  When Jimmy got there, I had him pull in behind my truck. Once Angel and John were in, I grabbed the tank of ammonia and my gun, then I dove into the bed of Jimmy’s truck with them. When we got to Mark’s house, I ran into the garage. That’s where I stayed, basically hiding from my own imagination, for the next several hours. John and Angel fell asleep in Jimmy’s truck and Jimmy hung out with me, in the garage. Sometime later that day, Shawn showed up and I sent him to fix my truck, then bring it to me. I gave him $20 for a new thermostat, knowing that’s what the thing needed to stop the overheating. I never did get the change back from that twenty.

  That evening, John, Angel, and I went back to Chad’s house. I was still really wigged out so Angel and I locked ourselves in a bedroom, then went to sleep. We should have never left that room. Things around us were about to get bad.

  Chapter 57

  When Angel and I woke up about twenty-four hours had passed. We got up and took our showers, then ate before we got high so we could function. When you have an addiction like I had, like everyone around me had, you no longer get high to enjoy the feeling; you get high to be able to function.

  Chad wasn’t home when we got up. He had to go to court in Virginia, or maybe it was N. Carolina, and he wouldn’t be back until the next day. John was asleep on the couch, probably in great pain, so I didn’t wake him. Mitch and Mary were there so they sat around getting high with Angel and me.

  Sometime around midnight, Angel and I went to Chad’s bedroom to fuck, We were having us a good ole time when, about 3am, Angels best friend, Brittney, called my phone. I answered, thinking Angel would want to talk to her. They spoke for a minute then Angel handed me the phone, saying Britt wanted to ask me something. I got on the phone, and Britt asked if I would drive Angel over to her mom’s trailer, to see her. Britt’s mom was out of town, but the boyfriend, Benny, was there. From the noise in the background, I could tell that several other people were there, as well.

  I told her, I really didn’t want to go anywhere that late but she insisted it was important. Angel was shaking her head, to let me know she didn’t want to go. I was just about to give Britt a final “no”, when I heard a familiar voice in the background. I asked Britt if Queeny was there, and she said he was. I talked to Queeny for a few minutes, asking him if he had any pseudo pills I could
get off of him, for a cook I was planning on doing later in the morning. He said he did have some for me so, I told him we would be right over.

  Before we left, I smoked a foil with Mitch and Mary. The whole time, Angel was whining that she just wanted us to forget about going, and go back to bed. She said she had a bad feeling about going over but, I didn’t care. I needed those pills so we were going, whether she liked it or not.

  We got to the trailer around 5 a.m. Besides Britt, Benny, and Queeny, Angels ex-boyfriend, Adam, was there. Adam was also a friend of mine so, he wasn’t upset about Angel being with me. Not that I really cared how he felt about it. Angel asked me for some dope so I gave her a gram to smoke with Britt and Adam, while I talked to Queeny. Benny was in his own little world as he surfed the internet.

  Queeny had a cook going in the kitchen, and was in the process of gassing off another one. He showed me a glass dish that had several piles, of what appeared to be dope in it. The products of several cooks he had done throughout the night, he told me. I sampled the different piles, at his request, and none were really any good.

  I asked Queeny, who had been teaching him to cook? He said he was just doing what he had seen other cooks do. Not always a good idea because, he might have seen someone do something that he shouldn’t do, and that could cause a fire. So, basically, he was teaching himself, which I could respect. The problem I was having was, pills were no longer as cheap, or easy to get, as they were when I taught myself to cook. He was wasting a lot of pseudo, and money, every time he attempted a cook. I hated to see that.

  I told Queeny to pack his lab up; I was going to show him how to do this the right way. I told him, we would go to Chad’s and I would teach him in exchange for a few grams of finished product. He was happy to hear this, so he started taking his lab apart to pack it up. He had a lot of stuff to pack, too. Way more than any cook would ever need.