"Cast your cares on the LORD and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous be shaken"....





"Is that from the Bible?" I ask "Are you quoting the fucking Bible to me right now while I am in the bowels of hell?"





He takes a drag from his cigarette "yeah, it's from the Bible. How did YOU know?" He leans back against the brick wall, pushing his long bangs back into his hat. He is a handsome man. At 5'9" or so, just a tiny bit taller than me. He has that untamed muscular body that comes with an angry energy. His blue eyes peep out from underneath unkept bangs. In another life, In another place, he would be riding a skateboard not chasing a bag. The skateboard and the guitar and the xbox are long gone, just the Thrasher shirt and the Van remain. He doesn't have those blood stains yet. He isn't quite that seasoned.





"Um, that would be from four years of Catholic School..." I throw down my blankets next to him. "Are you seriously trying to impress me with some Bible shit when I am dopesick? What kind of perverted motherfucker are you? " The kind I like I think to myself.



He reaches out for my shoulder "...I am trying to make you feel better darling..." he leans in for a kiss. Between the sores on his lip and the sickness on mine, it is an awkward moment in infectious disease history. Hopefully, it isn't herpes. I've already the Hep A<B<C.





The prospects for the morning are dismal. He doesn't care, I think to myself. He is a tweaker, a completely different type of user. When he doesn't get his fix, he might turn grouchy. He might fall asleep. He might go steal something. I am not really sure. We are just trying to feel each other out in the game. I have sworn off tweak since my last four day run ended up in a suicide attempt. Those voices swirling around my ears, telling me the things I already know- YOU ARE WORTHLESS, NO ONE LOVES YOU, WHY TRY. These are the same things I have heard replayed since I was twelve years old.





"You do realize I am sick," I tell him. I feel the heaviness start to creep up in my legs. If I don't get moving soon. I never will. Just for once, I would like to sit here. I would like to not be controlled by the magnets in my brain that are pulling me to find more drugs. I like the man sitting next to me. I don't really know him, but I would like to. He has a pleasant face, a hard shoulder to lean on. He gingerly rubs my back the way I would like him to rub my front if dope hadn't made me a sexless creature. I could see myself with him , I can see it would be easy to succumb to a wave of emotions, drowning out all reason.



I feel the dry heaves coming on, telling me it is time to move. He grabs my hand "wait here" he tells me as he hands me the last of his cold coke. The ice in the cup feels good against my head. I feel hot all over. I wish I could crawl into this cup of ice. The sweetness of the coke is soothing for a moment as it makes the short trip to my empty stomach. I think he might like me, this one. As I was walking down the street, he was looking back at me. Looking so hard, in fact, he ran into the back of the bus stop *whack*. It was a bit of levity in a long week of broken luck. We had been hanging together for a few days. The literally ups and downs of street life.



In less that five mins, he has returned red faced. He quickly pulls me up "let's go". Uh ok.



He nearly pushes me up the hill, passed the parked cars, and back into an alley. He grabs my hand and pushes a bag into it. "here" he tells me "But you can't shoot it".



HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. That is funny. Wait, is this dope?



I don't even finish my sentence before I am ripping that shit open, pulling out my rigs, cooker. I AM SERIOUS, he tries tells me as he hands me foil. What the fuck am I suppose to do with this. Oh my GOD he really expects me to smoke dope that he just gave me. Things quickly escalate to the junkie red zone which quickly escalates in him trying to snatch the dope he gave me back which quickly escalates into the death of a relationship. As he sees me push the burning tar into the veins in my stomach, I see the blood run away from his face. It is one thing to be attracted to a junkie. It is another thing to see me in my natural habitat. As he runs his bit of crumbs on his foil, I see all the actual drugs go to waste. Thank Goodness. I don't want to share my affliction with him. I don't want to share my affection with anyone. As the sickness disintegrates, I wish he could rub my shoulders again. But he hates me. And I hate what I have become.









