Once upon a time you were in perfect harmony with the greater scheme of things, a happy prisoner of the corner rhythms, an average, everyday dope fiend devoted to the singular pursuit of the perfect blast. But no fairy tale ever lasts, and finally, without warning, you hit bottom.
Only bottom turns out not to be a place, or a particular point on any street-by-street, this-way-to-hell compass. It is, instead, the gradual yet inescapable feeling of horror that leads any drug addict to the most gut-wrenching, agonizing moment of revelation.
You are stunned. You have a right to be: Truth be told, you didn’t even know you were heading this way. You certainly didn’t see any signs, nothing that might have told you to ease up a bit. For years, you’ve been about the business of obliterating yourself; now, without any justification whatsoever, you’re suffering through a prolonged bout of self-awareness. When the initial shock passes, you try what has always worked best: denial.
But even as you drag your ass out to a corner for the day’s jump start, the back of you mind holds to a sickening fear that no chemical concoction can rid you of this feeling, this strange sense that you’ve reached an end. A half hour later, while those around you are deep in the throes of the latest Spider Bag offering, you sit there in the back of the shooting gallery like an old radial with a slow leak, helpless as your high seeps out.