part two.

On my 19th birthday I was thrown a surprise party by some stoner friends that I’d met in some way associated with acid, or dope, or speed. When I got there I was already trashed from raiding my parents bar the night before so the names of a lot of the people there escaped me. However, since I was always under the influence then I was sure any names I’d known were wrong anyway. But I went around and hugged and kissed and greeted everyone anyway, just made sure not to attempt any names. Thinking back it probably wouldn’t have mattered because I’m pretty sure they didn’t even know what they’re names were either. We’re talking hardcore burn-outs.1

So I spent the night with cocaine and Jose Cuervo. Blabbering on about how much it was like the old days from my horrible boarding school. I must have had about ten lines in ten minutes and I was flying. But cocaine is so short-lived. Hence how easy it is to find yourself addicted to the substance. You are happy, and you just want everyone to know everything about you, then you crash. And that’s when you really need more, until it becomes your life. You get money to quickly blow it on cocaine that lasts about 2 weeks, if you’re lucky. I’d taken more than I ever had before and I was without doubt higher than I’d ever been. Forty five minutes later I got dizzy, typical of me when I’m having a rough crash. I just made myself feel better with a cold Heineken. But it didn’t go away and I became irate. I promised myself no more cocaine but I had to have another line. Or another five.2

It lasted fifteen minutes before the feeling came back. I wasn’t overdosing, because if I was then I’d have been dead by now. But there was something very wrong with what was happening to me. I went into the bathroom and drank some water, which mixed with the drip that was still running down my throat. Watery cocaine is not tasty, trust me. I didn’t feel better and I’d been hiding out in the bathroom for over five minutes. Suddenly I wondered if my guests even cared that I was missing. I figured they only were here celebrating my birthday with me as some lame excuse to get wasted and shoot up, as if they don’t do it anyway. My mind was screaming at me that I was a waste, this whole thing was a waste. I was that girl who took drugs and fucked a lot. Then I cried. I cried and cried all the salts and waters out of my body and once that was gone, I grabbed a razor and decided to empty the thing that held so many demons: my blood. I wanted all the meth and all the heroin out. I wanted to be 16 and innocent, kind of, again.3

I slashed up my arm pretty bad and was going to move onto my leg when a loud knock came at the bathroom door. My friend Mike’s voice asked me if I was okay in there. I tried to reply but going in and out of sanity made it difficult so I groaned loudly instead of actually putting together words. Not good. Apparently everyone was in a state of panic, thinking that I was in some sort of epileptic coma on the bathroom floor alone. Eventually they picked the door unlocked and burst in only to find me carving “Yayo” into my left ankle.4

One girl screamed, I’m guessing from the shock of all the blood on me and floor, coming from my arm and ankle, but I just kept carving as though I wasn’t being watched. It was the strangest thing and even now I don’t really know how I can describe the feeling. But I knew I was being watched, I knew everyone was standing and staring at me, but I kept on like they weren’t. Like in my mind at the time they weren’t all there, the door was still closed. I don’t really remember much after. I think Mike cleaned me up and drove me to the hospital, but I’m not positive. All I really know is I woke up with and IV stuck in my hand and in a hospital gown. My parents were in the corner of the room, whispering with a nurse. When they turned to look at me I could see my mom was crying, she came running over to hug me and tell me how stupid I had been. My father stood in the corner, scared and in denial.5

I ended up actually going to Silver Hill, a rehabilitation facility in New Canaan, Connecticut. It costs about 15 hundred a day and since I was then addicted so many different drugs I had to stay for about two and a half months. Withdraws were terrible, but I had the support of so many people. Sooner than I thought, I was gaining some weight back and my skin was becoming peach again and less splotchy. At the time it made me awfully depressed, like I’d never feel beautiful again and I’d die alone. But I was reminded that being perfect for a whole bunch of people who wouldn’t remember me the next day is not worth my life. And plus, in true fashion of rich snots, I met the love of my life at rehab.6

He came about a month after I did but was there for alcoholism. He drank himself into a nonexistence and one day woke up in an apartment he didn’t even remember buying, but it was his. So he checked himself in. I took to him right away, he was in every way my type. Tall and blue eyed with dark hair that looked as though he’s just crawled out of bed. Not emo-kid scene hair and not Kurt Cobain long, just scruffy. He had a “five o’clock shadow” and pale skin. It was love at first sight, on my part anyway. We made love in the elevator a few days later and were inseperable ever since. We supported one another even though he was 22 and I was just 19, we made it work. Now I’m 21 and he’s 24, we’re still together in that apartment in the city, the one he didn’t remember buying. We have a kitten named Tarzan and a corgie named Roxie.7

Since meeting him I haven’t touched or really wanted to touch a drug. Aside from the occasional drink, and never in front of him, and the occasional toke, I’m pretty much all cured of my sicknesses. The scars from that night are still on my arm and I like them. They remind me of what a mess the drugs caused and how I never want to be that girl again.8