blurring_the_edges_16_drop_in_drop_out birdmad The deal with the guy you all call MeeKrob Jones paid off big-time. You used some of the money to pay the rent on the Apartment now that some of the others have been dropping out of the game. You keep your party clothes and some of your personal stash there. You make sure that nothing exceptionally loud or obvious happens there. The remainder of the cash you had to pay was just under what the feds require to be reported. Of course, knowing what you know from your law and Criminal Justice courses, you knew what and where that threshold was and paid appropriately until then. There are 400 grams of China-white in the lockbox in the apartment bedroom as well as 20 grams of coke. That small volume of coke, three years ago, would have been enough to finance a good portion of the haul of smack you have laying around. Fashion. Suddenly in this depressed economy on the fringes of the Reagan Era, that coke induced euphoria seems to be out of place. Eleven years ago, that senile, red-headed hypocrite proclaimed on television that it was "Morning in America." Years of manipulation and deceit have turned things into a very dark evening, for a lot of people. It brings a rueful smile to your face to think of the number of people who in public might trumpet the bullshit cry of "Just Say No" but in private have drug habits that would make Betty Ford cringe. You are Nancy Reagan's worst nightmare, the diametric opposite of the type of situation that current drug policy would prefer to see created. It is funny, in its own weird way, kid from a place that can't make up its mind about whether it is the "barrio" or lower-middle-class suburbia, dealg dope among the affluent up in the high-priced real estate. Funnier still, the so-called "conventional wisdom" tends to suggest that you would be the corrupting influence on these nice upstanding children of privilege. Truth is, you had never even considered the notion of committing an illegal act until you started running with these guys. It is end of the first week in November and you are such a junkie now that you accept half your payment for any job that you do in junk. Elena is back in town again and you have just enough of shit to keep you high for a couple of weeks. Sooner or later, you are going to need to kick or this shit is going to give you away. Stay sharp. Your mom has been looking progressively more and more ill and uncomfortable. Wednesday she will go to the doctor to follow up on an exam she did with her doctor. That pain in her chest and shoulder has become a chronic thing and now it seems obvious that something has to be done about it sooner than later. The doctor is going to perform a biopsy and hold her for observation, if it turns out to be nothing, than she will be released. If the results turn out serious, they will perform a mastectomy and get her started on a regimen of chemotherapy and radiation. You back out of a couple of jobs that you lined up with Henry, Tony, and Billy. You arrange to have Billy meet you at the cafeteria on campus so that you can give him the key to the apartment and the lockbox. You warn him that you keep a running tally on how much of everything you have so that he should only take what he's ordering and no more. "Remember, Billy. Partners or no, if you cheat me, it's your ass. You've been a little out of control lately and it's got me bothered. Plus, i don't like having to pay out to help cover your tracks when you get out of hand anymore. Henry knows where i'm coming from on this and says he won't stand in my way if i have to fuck you up." "Alright," Billy nods, sniffling. He seems to be the only one still heavy into coke. Tony has gotten clean, Henry smokes a little pot and occasionally shoots up with Eric, and Zoe and Tricia are fast becoming hardcore junkies on the same scale as you are becoming and like you, they are worried about becoming the same kind of zombies as your regular customers. Oh shit. You made a date with Elena before your mom's hospital appointment for the State Fair. You get home after school and smoke three more of your cigarettes in the park before walking back in. You call up Elena and start trying to postpone to a better time, but your mom overhears you and insists that you go out. You tell Elena you'll call her back and hash it out with your mom, arguing that you don't feel comfortable going out and trying to have a good time knowing what she might be up against. "Your sisters will be with me the whole time, i won't be alone, mijo. Don't worry about it." "I know mom, but..." "Just go out with her," she cuts you off, "you don't seem to get to see her too often lately, so i think you should." Much, if not all, of the resentment you have ever harbored towards her for always trying to keep you under her thumb for so long evaporates in this moment. You walk over to her and kiss her on the forehead before taking another walk around the block to smoke again and regain your composure. If you were paying for your drugs, you imagine you would have roughly a $200 dollar a day habit. You call Elena as soon as you get back, letting her know that the date is back on. You make your plans with a heaviness in your heart and your head that no amount of dope seems to take away. 030418 what's it to you? who go blather from