Seventeen - Part 1

The sound of a lighter flicking echoed through the room, cutting through the Sublime CD that was playing on Colin’s stereo and the flame bent as I tipped the Bic to the side to light the bud of weed that was packed into the bowl. I could hear the plant sizzling inside and inhaled the sticky blue smoke that the flame had created, sucking lightly until the chamber was full. Taking my finger off of the carb, I breathed in deeply, allowing it to scorch my throat all the way down. I kept breathing in the smoke until I was unable to take in anymore and removed my lips from my mouthpiece, handing it over to Colin along with the lighter. My lips felt numb from the warmth of the mouthpiece and a cough scratched at the back of my throat. I held it back, making small wheezing noises in the back of my throat, determined to hold the smoke in for as long as I possibly could. Silently, I thanked the five wrist bands that trailed up each of my arms, Colin’s room had always been a freezer and even getting stoned didn’t help.1

The Bic flicked on again and I heard the now charred green leaves sizzling in the bowl, followed by the sounds of Colin inhaling deeply and the subtle whistling noises of air getting through the screen.2

“You should really get a new screen for that… you’re getting too much air into it.” I mumbled. He nodded, handing the bowl over to me. I took another hit off of it and passed it back to him, nodding my confirmation. Grimacing, I pushed a small, black piece of burned weed to the front of my mouth with my tongue and picked it out with my fingers. “Yeah…” smoke came from between my moving lips. “Put something in that… I’m sucking in the actual weed. It’s not cool.”3

Just call me the escapist.4

Not long after the incident in the alley, my mom had bought a house a good four hours away from the city and we had moved in in less than two months. It didn’t retract the attention from me; it was a pretty widely known crime, so it still followed me. I’m pretty sure it will continue to follow me until I die. 5

I was pretty toasted after about four more hits and told him to take the rest. I stroked my “License to annoy” wristband absently. The stitches of the band felt soothing underneath my fingertips, and despite my efforts, I couldn’t keep the stupid grin off of my face and stop my legs and neck from twitching.6

The phone rang and we both let out a groan, “Can you get that?” Colin asked me, poised to take another pull from the bowl.7

Nodding, I grabbed the receiver, pressing the “on” button and held it to my ear. “Hullo?” My voice was heavy and sounded slow. It was hard not to giggle. I twitched.8

“May I speak with Roscoe please?”9

“Hi mom.” I mumbled, feeling another grin sliding onto my face. “Can I help you with something?” 10

Paranoia set in, suddenly terrified that, just by the sound of my voice, she would know that I was high. My heart pounded in my chest heavily and my stomach coiled.11

My mouth was dry.12

“I’m leaving to come get you right now. I should be there in about ten minutes.”13

“Why?”14

She sighed on the other end of the phone, “You’ve got therapy at five, group at seven, homework to finish and supper to eat.”15

I closed my eyes tightly, pinching the bridge of my nose between my thumb and forefinger and just tried to stay calm. I’d never come this close to being caught before, if you’ll believe it. “Yeah, but it’s only three.”16

“I know, sweetie, but you know we have to eat early on Thursdays or else we never get any dinner until nine-thirty.”17

Ugh…18

“All right, see you then.” I hung up and looked over at Colin with wide eyes. “I need clothes… my mom is on her way over.19

“Shit,” he grunted, blowing smoke out of his nose. He stood up, running a hand through his shaggy, dirty blonde hair and opened the door to his closet. It took Colin a few seconds to yank out a shirt and pair of jeans, which he tossed over to me. I held the shirt in front of me and blinked; it was white with a smiley face on it, the face had a cat tail sticking out of its mouth and the words underneath it said “I EAT PUSSY.” I cleared my throat, getting his attention. He caught sight of the shirt, let out the stereotypical high laugh, you know, the one where your face crunches together and you look like your laughing, but the only sound that comes out is the air leaving your lungs?20

Yeah, that one.21

Colin tugged the shirt from my fingers and grabbed his Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” shirt, handing it over and busied himself with opening his bedroom door and spraying air freshener around to make sure that the smell of weed didn’t stick to my clothes while I got dressed. I grabbed the eye drops off of his computer desk and pulled my glasses off, tilting my head back, pulling my bottom lid down and dropped two drops in each eye.22

They stung immediately. 23

Hot, white pain hit my pupils and spread through my pupils and straight into my scholera. I closed my eyes, pressing the mounds of my palms into them, gritting my teeth together to keep silent. “Colin, I fucking hate your eye drops.” 24

“So start buying your own.” He said, cackling and slipping back into the chair in front of his computer. “I love those things.”25

“That’s because you’re a freak.”26

“Hey,” He said, going serious again. “They work. And they’ve saved your ass on more than one occasion. So shut up and deal with it.”27

“I didn’t think my eyes were this shot,” I groaned, adding more pressure to my eyes. “They never sting like this.”28

“You smoked a lot today.”29

A car horn honked outside and I jumped, climbing off of his bed and tugging my shoes on. “I’ll see you later.” I walked out of the room and jogged down the stairs, out the door and into my mom’s car. My back rested against the seat peacefully, the drops still stinging my eyes. I closed them, feeling them dart around behind the lids. It always felt cool, having my eyes move around like that when I was stoned. It was calming to me. My leg bounced up and down on the floor and fingers tapped on my thighs. My neck twitched. 30

The car was hot; uncomfortable and it made the tips of my fingers prickle with irritation, almost like they were falling asleep. My mouth felt sticky and full of sludge, my throat was insanely dry.31

“Do you have anything to drink in here?” I kept my eyes closed, head resting comfortably against my seat. The sun shone through the window, tainting the black behind my eyelids with a faint yellow, warming the skin that had been exposed to it. I’d always liked the sun. even before everything changed for me. The incident, however, only increased my love for daylight.32

My mom’s voice came out only a little annoyed. “You know that I don’t like liquids in the car, Roscoe.”33

Excuse me for forgetting. I wanted to say. I’m just a little high and the only thing I can really focus on is how fucking dry my throat is right now.34

But, as I always did when my mom would start with this kind of thing, I just let out a quiet sigh and kept my mouth shut. Instead, I just dreaded the upcoming therapy session. I never did anything while I was there. My therapist did all of the talking, telling me cheesy stuff like “if you spend too much time worrying about the past, then you forget about your future completely.”35

In reality, I think she should be the one paying me.36

The car was silent for a long time before my mom spoke again. “Did you change your clothes?”37

“Yeah, I spilled soda all over myself, so Colin gave me some of his clothes to borrow while his mom washed mine.” Good cover.38

“Did they stain?”39

“No, it was just Sierra Mist. I’ll get ‘em back tomorrow probably.” Through all of this, my eyes never open once. My leg twitched and I waited for my neck to follow suit, but it didn’t. The rest of the ride home was silent, the only noise coming from the radio station that played softly over the speakers. That’s always been the thing with my mom and me. We don’t feel the need to talk while we’re in each other’s company. She’s too busy blaming herself for what happened to me, and I’m too busy trying to forget.40

When she finally pulled into the driveway, I climbed out and walked straight into my room. I was halfway to my bed when I remembered how thirsty I was, and walked back downstairs. Opening the refrigerator, I blinked at its contents absently; cranberry cocktail that had long since expired, milk, lemon water, Crystal Light, and pineapple juice. I grabbed the pitcher of Crystal Light and grabbed a clean glass from the dishwasher, filling it to nearly the brim. When I went to put the pitcher back into the fridge, I spotted a plate of leftover pizza. Pausing for a moment, I snatched the plate up, threw it into the microwave, setting the timer for one minute.41

When it dinged, I pulled it out and jogged upstairs, walking into my bedroom.42

After what became known as “the incident,” my mom realized that I’d rather be alone than sit around and watch her blame herself. So she forked over enough cash to get me a small TV and DVD player for my room. I made good use of it. 43

Plugging in my copy of Fight Club, I sat down on my bed and took a huge gulp from my cup, feeling the wad of cotton in my throat shrinking slightly. I hit play when it came up and snatched a bite of my pizza. It was greasy, but it tasted good and filled up the hole in my stomach that had been hollowed out while Colin and I had smoked up. My body felt heavy as my high began to crash and I took another drink of my Crystal Light, closing my eyes and trying to take in its flavor, but my taste buds were still coated with whatever seemed to make my tongue so thick every time I sparked up a bowl, and I could only get the aftertaste.44

I was only able to half-pay attention to the beginning of the movie, but I knew it so well that I didn’t need to keep my eyes on the screen to know what was going on between Jack and Tyler. I already knew. I can still close my eyes and picture the credit sequence, soaring through the nerve endings and synapses in the brain, dripping through Jack’s pores in a bead of sweat and finally zooming out to see the whole being. Instead, my attentions stayed with the plate and the now half full glass of liquid that I’d decided would be gone within the first three minutes of propping myself onto my bed. 45

When the plate and glass were empty, I set them on my nightstand and glanced up to make sure my door was locked. It was. In a few fast movements, each of the wrist bands that donned my arms were taken off and sat lifelessly on my bedspread. With my right hand, I carefully examined the deep, still healing gashes running up my arm, searching for signs of infection or something that could royally screw with my heath. Just to be safe, I leaned over and tugged the shoe box out from under my bed, placing it in front of me and opened it up, pulling out the brown, plastic bottle of peroxide and the now barely full bag of cotton balls. 46

Removing one of the balls from the bag, I unscrewed the cap on the bottle and put some peroxide on the cotton ball, rubbing it up and down my arm. The sting came immediately, white hot, making my entire arm throb straight down to the bone. My face curled into itself, teeth gritting against the pain, feeling it all, only because I didn’t have the ability to remove myself from it, as much as I wanted to. I kept doing this until each of the cuts had stopped bubbling, and then repeated the process on my other arm.47

When everything was fine, I immediately stuck everything back in the shoebox, including the used cotton balls, and pulled my wrist bands back on, tucking the box safely back under my bed. Finally, I was able to just sit back and glue my attentions to the screen before me. My Nightmare Before Christmas blanket made its way over my legs and I leaned against the Husband pillow sitting against my headboard.48

I didn’t bother looking at the clock to see how much time I had before I was dragged out of the house to therapy. I didn’t care. 49

All I wanted to do was be alone, even inside my own head. I wanted to be lost inside the depths of my room and not have to think.50

On days like this, that’s exactly what I was able to do.