Gentle Reader,
Galloping alongside this gripping murder mystery, this true murder mystery—is the running commentary of a babbling drug addict—me—and the outpouring of my consequential experiences with the drug Special K. It’s a ghoulish tale, told with brutal candor, and it’s not for the faint of heart or the weak of stomach.
But if you’ve paid your money and jumped on board—and you really want to get to know these people I’ve laid in front of you, and understand the choices they made—you’ll need to know something about this drug called K.
Otherwise you’ll be lost in sauce, as they say.
So let’s start at the very beginning (a very good place to start …)
KETAMINE HYDROCHLORIDE is actually:
2—(2—Chlorophenyl 1)—(methylamino)—cyclohexanone hydrochloride
M.W.—274.2 C13H16CINO-HCl LD50 (IPR-MUS): 400mg/kg, LD50 (IVN-MUS): 77 mg/kg
White solid with a melting point of 266°C.
Its water solubility is 20g/100ml.
And it’s not flammable.
It’s an anesthetic used primarily for veterinary purposes—although there are unconfirmed stories of its use in the fields of Vietnam, when on-the-spot amputations were required. It blocks nerve paths without depressing respiratory and circulatory functions, and therefore acts as a safe and reliable anesthetic.
It’s a dissociative drug, and I’ll get into that later, but—PAY ATTENTION PLEASE—it selectively reduces excitation of central mammalian neurons by N-methyl aspartate.
So basically, it fucks you up.
It’s hard to explain, but it bends your thoughts into a non-linear, looping sort of format … it pretzels your thoughts into Möbius strips; you see everything inside and out and curling all around itself.
It’s a powder; you put it up your nose. But first, it comes in a liquid form, in a lovely little bottle with a yellow label, and you should struggle to open it for a good sweaty hour.
Then you cook it. In the oven.
Now, you might be asking yourself, “How long should I cook my K?”
Experts have been debating this matter for centuries. Some say: Air Dry. Some say: Steam Dry. The Net says: Microwave. I have one friend who insists upon an incubator— although I’m just as mystified by that one as you.
Now, I’m not up on your laws of thermodynamics, but I think I have it figured out.
I usually set the oven at 250°.
Then:
Recite the “Once more unto the breach, dear friends” scene from Henry V.
Four minutes of bun-tightening exercises.
Knit, knit, purl. Knit, knit, purl. (Work on that afghan for your mother.)
Then, I have a little medley of show tunes I’ve cleverly clipped together, to while away the gestation period. I always start with “Rose’s Turn” from Gypsy. Then a little Brigadoon, a bit of South Pacific (I recommend “Some Enchanted Evening” over the rather more obvious “I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Outa My Hair” …)
During the Flower Drum Song interlude, I check the oven and tap one foot impatiently, keeping beat to the horn section that is building up to a pulse-pounding, mind-blowing, show-stopping, no-holds-barred rendition of “Bless Your Beautiful Hide” from Seven Brides for Seven Brothers.
Most likely, it’s ready now.
It’s magic time. Scrape the Pyrex, grind it into powder, then … up and away!
Special K.
It’s a clean smelling trip up the nose.
You wait twenty seconds.
Then, there is the roar of a jet engine, so you lie back and wait a while longer.
Close your eyes and it’s a whole new world.
There’s a lot of unfolding. Everything just slides away, like many curtains opening at once.
And your muscles hallucinate—they feel lifted upward, quickly, so your stomach drops. Nothing can prepare you for that up, up, up feeling—when you’re on the ceiling, and the ceiling keeps getting higher.
You are borne upon a wave, and pushed upward and forward.
And then: eyes—open.
But they’ve been open.
You’re in the K-hole now.
When you focus, you look around the room—but is it the same room?—do you know this room? It may seem ultraclear, or hot and shadowy, or ’50s kitschy … and then it changes.
The set changes … a quick turn of the floor and …
There’s a Moroccan influence, or a slick and modern approach, then it blends back into what it is—until it shifts again.
K is a displacer—you are outside of your head, and everything, everything, is new. You must look at that couch for the first time—define what it is—make a connection—and that’s hard.
For some strange reason, that couch looks like a dancing tree frog. Not literally, like an acid hallucination … but subtly, so you can see both, the couch and the tree frog existing at once.
Now if you face the hallucination, and acknowledge it, you can change that frog into, say, a can of corn. The couch is still there, but now it looks just like a can of corn.
It’s the damnedest thing.
The room changes, quickly, and … where was I?
Eyes closed, because something wondrous is happening. The universe is decoding itself to you, and even though nothing makes sense, it all comes together—and if you try to think about it, it’s gone again and you’re back on the ceiling sitting on your can of corn.