4

 

“Oh my god,” I said as the last person I expected to see in this ragged old excuse for a building appeared in the doorway of my room.

Donna grinned. “Hey, J.C. Long time no see.” She gave the room a once over, then added, “Nice digs.”

She was teasing me, but that was okay. There were lots of street kids squatting in this old office building on the edge of the Tombs—some runaways, too—but nobody was really taking care of the place, and it had been pretty much already falling down on itself when we moved in. I shared the room I lived in with a couple of other girls: Ellie and Alex. There wasn’t much in the way of furnishings. After dragging them in from a room down the hall, we’d laid old metal file cabinets down on their sides in between our mattresses and bedding to create the semblance of privacy.

It worked fine when you were lying down. Ellie had made some brick and plank bookcases on which she stored a collection of dried flowers, bottle caps, and other found objects. I’d used my bricks and planks to make a night table to hold my candle and books.

“It’s warm and dry,” I said.

“And away from the eyes of social services.”

I shrugged. “I made a deal with my last foster parents. They can keep collecting their cheques if they don’t rat me out, and I’ll keep out of trouble and not rat them out.”

“Sweet. So how’s keeping out of trouble working out for you?”

“I’m managing a low profile.”

She laughed. “If your profile got any lower, you wouldn’t exist anymore. You need to stand up for yourself more. Didn’t you learn anything from me?”

“Only how to get into trouble.”

“Now that hurts.” She cocked her head and added, “So don’t I at least get a hello hug?”

When she stepped away from the doorway, I got up from my mattress and we met in the middle of the room.

“I’ve really missed you,” I told her.

“Me, too. Everybody treat you okay back at the Home?”

“They left me alone.”

“Well, that’s something, right?”

I nodded. “It was enough.”

I returned to my mattress and she joined me. Her gaze went to the set of works sitting on the board I was using for a night table. I figured she was going to give me a hard time about it, but all she asked was what I was shooting and if I had any more. I had enough for both of us, so we shot each other up, then lay back on the mattress and got caught up through a cloud of bliss.

 

* * *

 

Here’s the thing about heroin. Yeah, when you’re strung out, you’re basically shooting up just to stop the sick feeling. You know you’re messed up, but it doesn’t matter. All you care about is the next hit. But what nobody really talks about is why people get addicted. They don’t become junkies because they think there’s something cool about the shakes and the puking and the desperate need to get a fix. They become junkies because when you first start, it’s just so damn sweet. There’s not another high that can compare. And everybody can control themselves at first. They do just enough to get that sweet, dreamy buzz.

But somewhere along the line, it turns on you and you stop shooting up to get high. Eventually, it comes to the point where it’s, screw getting high. All you’re trying to do is survive.

But I wasn’t at that point yet, and neither was Donna. We weren’t even thinking about it. Like every other about-to-be junkie, we were totally in control of the dope; it wasn’t in control of us.

 

* * *

 

Donna moved into the squat—we got another room down the hall—and it was party central for us whenever we had the money to score. I’m not sure when it started to go downhill. In retrospect, I guess it was after I started dating Rob.

Donna never liked him, but while I was willing to listen to her about a lot of things, Rob wasn’t one of them.

“He’s just playing you,” she told me the last time we argued about him.

“Why do you say that? He’s hot and he digs me—what’s so bad about that? Are you mad because he’s into me instead of you?”

I remember how sad her eyes got when I said that.

Guys were always going for Donna, and you only had to look at her once to know why. She was generously built and carried herself with a natural sexuality that wasn’t remotely forced. It was just the way she was.

“You know I’d never stand in the way of your happiness,” she said.

“I know. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”

“It’s cool. We’re just not going to talk about him again—deal?”

“I guess.”

But that was when we started to drift apart. I don’t know exactly when she went from casual user to junkie, but it couldn’t have been long after that. I know it wasn’t for me. Everything kind of spiraled out of control and it got to the point where I’d do anything for a fix, and that included letting Rob pimp me out.

The last time I saw Donna, I was so messed up I could barely see straight. Then I heard about her getting into a fight with some straight guy in a bar and my life stumbled into a black hole that it took me a couple of years to climb out of.

I had help. I couldn’t have done it on my own. All the strength it took I borrowed from those around me, except for one little bit, and that was Donna’s voice talking to me out of my memories. Telling me to be strong. That I didn’t need to be the victim. That just because people hurt me, it didn’t mean they owned me.

So I got past it. The need. The jones.

When I put it like that, it seems so simple. But I had to claw my way out and I know for a fact, I couldn’t have done it on my own. Except in the end, I was the only one who could do it. I was the only one who could make the choice to use, or not. To redo my life, or just give it up to the shadows that were forever crawling around in my head.

I chose to be better.

I chose to be strong.

God knows, it’s not always easy, but it’s a funny thing. Once it starts to get to be a habit, once you start to define yourself by a new set of needs and desires, the old ones don’t seem to be able to muster as persuasive a hold on you anymore.

I think the biggest change—the thing that really turned it around for me—was that I wasn’t scared anymore. I don’t know how I got so brave. It certainly wasn’t that I didn’t care. Actually, I cared more. I cared about everything and everybody.

Maybe that’s what made the difference.

It wasn’t me against the world anymore. It was me connected to the world, and wanting it to be a good place for everybody.

I know. It’s an impossible task. But if nobody makes the effort, if nobody tries to make a difference just around themselves, in their own neighbourhoods, then it’s never going to get done, is it?