Addicted For Life

“Hi there,” I yawned before getting up to be face to face with Matt. He looked at me smiling—I don’t understand how he could stand my disgusting odor. My hair was greasy, my body was dirty. Yet, this man still talked to me.

“Here you go, darling.” He had always called me darling, more than he called me Nicole. He then slipped the $100 bill into my hand, and I smiled. My first thought: heroin.

“You can’t keep doing this, Matt; you’ve been lending me money for months now. Please stop, you don’t even know how bad I want you to stop. Maybe if you stop, I’ll learn from my mistake—for the mistakes that got me here!” I stood there bawling my eyes out in front of him. I’ve never had an emotional breakdown before, and now here I was having one that was being witness by the one person that cared for my existence.

“Whoa, Nicole, calm down. What are you talking about? You’re homeless, darling, why can’t I help you?” He asked, pulling me into a hug to try and get me to calm down. I felt more relaxed as his strong, tattooed arms held me close.

“I can’t stand to tell you how I am homeless; it disgusts me to know this is who I’ve become.” I sighed, and averted my gaze to the ground. Shame was the only thing I felt right now.

“I’m curious to know how come you’re here.”

“Well I guess I could tell you. Let’s go for a walk on the beach, I don’t want to be here while telling this to you.” He nodded and smiled since he was satisfied to know my story—the story I told no one.

As soon as we got to the beach, I took a deep breath in hoping that I wouldn’t stop midway because of tears. We sat down far away from where the rest of the people were tanning, or just having a good time. This wasn't going to be easy to tell.

“My childhood,” I began slowly and quietly “was fairly good until high school. There I got constantly bullied for liking things they didn’t like. I was a metal head, they hate that. The daily beatings in school never seemed to stop until my senior year when I finally had enough and let all of my anger out on them all. I got suspended for 4 weeks after that. I had anorexia growing up, but mainly it was just a fear of eating. I couldn’t eat food without worrying I’d throw up. I just gave up trying to eat at all after awhile; I never let my parents know of this habit. “

Matt nodded his head, signaling he understood what I had been saying.

“My ex-boyfriend was the one who got me into alcohol and drugs. He showed me PCP, marijuana, and cocaine first. I was in heaven once I tried cocaine. One day he showed up with a baggy of brown powder, it was heroin. He told me to inject it with a needle to get the best effect. I did, and my one true love was now heroin. My boyfriend and I thought we were going to be soul mates until we decided to add a dangerous concoction of drugs and alcohol into our relationship." I paused momentarily, then continued.

"Two druggies don’t last long together from the constant fighting over who has to score the drugs, and eventually greed takes over making one of the two stealing some of the substance from the bag to save for later. Three weeks after we broke up, I heard from another junkie friend of mine that he overdosed one night and died. After hearing that, I made my first trip to rehab, a 14 day admission in hopes to get clean. It didn’t work.” I sighed as a tear fell from my eye. Lance was my boyfriends name; we had it all back then. We were so similar, but then we found drugs. Then drugs found Lance and took him away from me.

“He died from overdosing? Isn’t that enough to make you consider stopping?!” Matt was in disbelief at this. Yes, people do recover after their first trip to rehab, but I’m not one of them.

“It didn’t make me consider stopping at all. At the rehab I read the books, went to the sessions, talked to my counselor, and did every little thing to try and become sober. In the end, I failed miserably. As soon as I was released from the center, I shot up. At 17 I had dropped out of high school. My scholarships were forever gone, and it would take another 4 years of high school to redeem myself of them. I didn’t think it was worth staying another year if I wasn’t going to go anywhere. My grades were already low D’s and F’s. I was too high all the time to even remember I had projects and homework.”

He stared at me dumbfounded, I had my life all set for me. He was probably realizing he had been giving money away that could be curing a disease like cancer. I thought he would’ve walked away, but he did. He just sat and listened.

“Go on,” Was all he said.

“By the time I reached 20, I had made my 8th admission to rehab. I lost all of my fellow junkie friends, and almost all of the trust my parents had put in me. We were a wealthy family, and I took advantage of it. I took money out of the bank to pay for some heroin when I ran out of money. Once I was released from my 8th visit and still didn’t get better, my parents kicked me to the curb. I officially now had no one. I resulted to finding my home in the alley of which I live in now. That’s when I began selling my body,and dignity, to people for a quick buck and a shower. In the alley I live in I’m constantly in fights. I let the wounds heal by wrapping scraps of cloth I found at yard sales around them. I was fucked up, and still am. I don’t know why I even made half of these choices in live, Matt. I’m just a whore and a junkie. That money you break your ass making and give to me is just to fill up a needle of heroin; it’s gone within a day.” It felt good in a way to finally share this with someone, but also it probably would ruin Matt and mine’s 'friendship'.

“Wow,” He paused, unsure of what to say. “I don’t know how you’re even alive! Please, darling, let me take you in. I’ll make you better, I promise. If you told me this sooner, you would be in my house already. I don’t want you to be a junkie; you had scholarships waiting for you! You must’ve been an intelligent girl. Just at least give me a chance.”

“I guess I’ll give you a chance, but curing a junkie isn’t easy. Should we go back to my ‘house’?” I used the air quotes when I said house.

“What do you have there?” He asked.

“Some clothes, a few books I stole, my needle, my cooker, and some heroin.” I had a few more priceless things left there, but I couldn’t remember them.

“Well we won’t need to go back there, will we? It’s time for the world to see a new Nicole.”