‘Critter’

I grew up with Critter and bought weed, painkillers, Xanax, and lean from him. We used a lot together. In the past when I tried to get clean and relapsed, he told all the drug dealers we both knew not to serve me. The last time I saw him I was paying back a drug dealer we both knew for some Heroin he’d fronted me.

‘Bra Bra’

I grew up with Bra Bra. He mainly sold weed until he started selling painkillers too to support his own habit. Buying junk from a junkie is the worst because they’re stingy and constantly fucking their money up, and getting fucked up, so they become inconsistent and their business gets shitty in general. In short, they ‘get high on their own supply.’ Bra Bra was a dick and became more of a dick as his habit progressed. The only good thing about him was that he was always on and down to serve at pretty much any time, which is, in my experience, a rare quality for drug dealers who lives at their parents’ house in the suburbs to have.

‘Lucas’

Lucas was my favorite drug dealer. He dealt in large quantities of weed and sold to me when I was selling. He lived in middle-of-nowhere Ohio and told me he was only selling drugs until he had enough money to move to Florida so he could work at his uncle’s marina. I learned a lot about drug dealing from Luke.

‘Sarah’

Sarah bought her coworker’s prescription of Adderall and sold some to me or traded it for Xanax when I had it.

‘Chewy’

Chewy was Critter’s best friend and sometimes sold painkillers to me on the off chance he had enough for himself and needed to make some money. The last time I saw Chewy he sold me fake 80mg OxyContins.

‘Harry’

Harry was a morbidly obese black man who lived at his parents house and bought alcohol for me every day for a year or so when I was 16. He was soft spoken and gentle-seeming. I was always confused as to why/how he was willing and able to buy me alcohol all the time.

‘Jason’

Jason was my neighbor’s cousin’s best friend who lived in California and shipped large quantities of medical marijuana to us. I never talked to him directly. The period of time between sending the money to him and the package arriving was always incredibly stressful. The last time we sent money to him the package never came and the mail delivery service in the apartment complex changed from deliveries at the door to deliveries at a group of brand new mailboxes near the street. The police also started parking across the street from our apartment for extended periods of time.

‘Dirk’

I went to high school with Dirk until he left to go to another school or rehab or something. We ended up living near each other on campus and he sold me some of his Xanax prescription.

‘Cash’

Cash sold weed out of his dorm room and I bought from him when he had ‘Dumpster,’ a strain specific to Columbus, Ohio that I liked a lot. I also bought Vyvanse from him sometimes.

‘Fran’

I met Fran one weird night when I was smoking outside my dorm building and someone walked up to me who said he recognized me from high school. I’d never seen or heard of him – and only saw him once after that, a year or so later, at a Coinstar somewhere – but he asked me if I wanted to smoke some weed with his friend Fran in her car and I said yes. She said something offhandedly about her doctor upping her dosage of Adderall because of bad grades. I asked her for her phone number before leaving and got in touch with her one day, an unseemly amount of time later, saying something about remembering her mentioning that she had Adderall and how I could really use some for a test I was going to fail unless I studied all night. She said she’d never sold her pills before and asked me how many I wanted. I said something about having been prescribed Adderall in the past but my insurance not covering it anymore, so any amount would help, and ended up buying like half her prescription off her that day. I bought Adderall from her consistently for the rest of my year at college.

‘K.O.’

I grew up with K.O. and bought painkillers and Heroin from him. Toward the end of my use he fronted me large quantities of drugs a couple times, and in a desperate attempt to get some dope despite having no money, I offered him my MacBook as collateral, earnestly believing I’d pay him back before he went back to college. I wasn’t able to pay him back and he ended up selling my MacBook.

‘Sam’

Sam lived with some people I played music with and seemed to have access to large quantities of any drug I wanted. We had a weird pattern of seeing each other frequently for short periods of time then not see each other for months. I bought Kadian, MDMA, MDA, Cocaine, Mushrooms, and Xanax from him. I currently owe him $100.

‘Gino’

Gino was friends with some of my friends and bought Xanax from his dad to sell to me. I also bought Tramadol off him a few times when I was dopesick and trying to kick.

‘L’

L was an obese, innocent-seeming black man who lived with his wife and kid and sold painkillers and shitty Heroin. I only bought from him when I was desperate and did my best to avoid ever having to go through him.

‘Darnelle’

Darnelle was my best friend when I was 7. In high school he sold me large quantities of pills, weed, and lean. The second-to-last time I saw Darnelle I was going to buy a large quantity of weed from one of his connects because mine was out of town and he set me up to get robbed. The last time I saw him he gave me ~200 Xanax (~1/4th the value of the money he stole from me) and apologized.

‘Red’

Red was one of my best friends from ages 11-13 and the first person I remember drinking alcohol and smoking weed with. Once he, another friend of ours, and I all watched porn together and masturbated with our penises in our pants. His sister brought us Vaseline mid-jerk. Sold weed.

‘Berry’

I grew up playing baseball with Berry and bought Adderall from him. He was really nice and I liked him a lot. Once, at the only frat party I ever went to, I got into an argument with one of the people who lived there because he was yelling at a girl who allegedly took one of his Bud Lights from the fridge, and in the middle of him telling me how badly he was going to kick my ass for not minding my own business, a large black man stepped in between us and said ‘Are you Jordan Castro?’ and I said ‘Yeah’ and he said ‘Did you used to play baseball with Berry? I’m friends with his uncle’ and I said ‘Yeah’ and he told the frat boy to leave me alone and the frat boy apologized and offered me a beer and told me I was welcome there any time.

‘Mojo’

Mojo supplied most of the pill dealers I knew. I went to him once to buy a large quantity of painkillers and Xanax. I picked him up after driving home from New York City through the night and was practically hallucinating via no sleep. He yelled at me for driving so erratically and left his watch and cell phone in the car when he ran into the trap spot to grab the drugs. I convinced him I was selling what I bought from him so he didn’t rip me off or treat me like a junkie. He called me multiple times a day for the next couple weeks and I never called him back or saw him again.

‘Casino’

I bought painkillers and lean from Casino, always in different suburbs. I’d heard from someone that his dad was a big-time coke dealer, which seemed strange to me because Casino was a low-time, unreliable, sketchy-in-general pill dealer. The last time I talked to him he wanted to buy a large quantity of weed from me so I gave him Lucas’ number and he robbed him.

‘Jose’

I met Jose during college orientation and bought OxyContin and ectasy from him during the first semester, before he transferred to a satellite campus.

‘Kara’

Kara was one of my best friends and a sort of mother figure in my life. I learned a lot from Kara. She took care of me when I was in a bad way and sold weed.

‘Malik’

Malik and I got out of jail at the same time and exchanged numbers. I introduced him to my mom and gave him a cigarette. He told me to call him that night and he’d bring me free Heroin. People talk a lot of shit in jail so I didn’t believe him, but I was desperate and fiending and broke and his was the only number I had because the police had my cell phone so I called him and he showed up an hour later with a half gram of the best dope I’d ever done. I called him the next day and his girlfriend answered, crying, and told me Malik got locked up again on a firearms charge.

‘O.J.’

O.J. was my first and main heroin dealer. I’d call his number then he’d immediately call me back from a private number. We met on various streets on the eastside, most frequently ‘the brick road,’ which I thought was a nickname (like ‘brick’ road… a brick of heroin…) until I pulled up for the first time and saw that the road was actually made of bricks. We’d make our transactions through our car windows, or I’d park my car and get into his. O.J. usually weighed the dope in front of me, which was nice, and when he fronted me and I owed him money he’d still serve me, which was also nice.

‘D’

D looked exactly like 2 Chainz but used a wheelchair because he’d been shot and couldn’t walk. I think D’s real named was Damien because once after copping, an obese black woman ran up to me as I was getting into my car and said ‘Hey, hey, Damien said y’all got the last of his bars and he’s all out and I just wanted to get one. Please, I really need one. I gotcha five dollas here f’ya.” I told her I didn’t know what she was talking about and drove away quickly. I didn’t like buying from D unless I had a couple hundred dollars to spend because if I had anything less he’d make me wait a long time and say things like ‘Man I gotchu this time but I usually only like to fuck with bigga niggas’ and ‘This forty, fitty dolla shit ain’t workin’ G.’ Sometimes while I waited for him he’d have me go inside the pizza place we met at and order him a pizza, or while he was weighing the drugs he’d make me pump his gas, which I’d always assumed was a power thing, a drug-dealer-flexing-on-junkie type thing, but now realize it was probably just because he couldn’t walk.