Chapter One:

I feel myself start to become coherent, when a bright beam of afternoon sunlight shines directly across my face. At first, I don't want to open my eyes. I am groggy, and stuck in that place between dreams and reality. It is dark here, safe, and warm. This space is all my own. There is no such thing as dead parents. No responsibilities, no unpaid debts. No one kissing my ass, so that I can in turn kiss someone's ass to keep a roof over my head and food in my stomach. At least… when I'm not high.

I know the number one rule is not to use from your own supply, but sometimes, I can't help myself. I get stressed, and broke. I always tell myself it's just one hit, but ultimately it is never just one. Hell, I have to somehow push myself to write papers that are due, and how the hell am I supposed to keep my image up if I'm sleeping instead of partying with potential buyers.

Yeah sure, the long term effects of crank are pretty fucking disastrous, but at least I'm skinny, and can last forever in bed. The ladies like it, and in turn my suppliers up my cut of the profits because I'm constantly on the go. I hit up every single ratchet party I hear about. Granted, I'm not always invited, but people out there know my face. If they want drugs, I have an arsenal.

It's funny, before my mom was murdered, I thought school was hard. I thought it was difficult getting up for classes at NYU. I thought I was struggling with writing my papers, studying, keeping my love life on the go, and having a social life with the boys. Now, I'm one of the most well-known dealers in Manhattan. Life has a way of giving you everything, and you take it for granted every single fucking day, until it's ripped from your world by a single bullet to the brain.

My mom, Laura Grey, was a prominent defense attorney in Manhattan. She got knocked up with me when she was attending Harvard Law. I never met my deadbeat father, but hey, that's how the world seems to work lately. Men deal out their sperm and then sign away their parental rights without even batting a steel-grey eye. At least, mine did. It didn't matter though, my mom was superwoman. She worked long hours and was able to provide us with a kickass townhouse and as a bonus, I was spoiled. I guess she wanted to make up for whatever daddy dearest wasn't providing. I took her for granted. I took everything for granted that year.

I was in my second year of business administration at NYU when my mother was murdered. It was a sunny Friday afternoon in October. The weather was warm and after my last class of the day, I took my girl at the time, out to a movie and then ended up running into a buddy of mine when I was walking home. The only thing on my mind was my research paper that was due on Monday and how much I wanted to bang Melissa, or whatever her name was.

"Hey, Christian!" I heard a voice yell my name from across the street.

I recognized the voice of my friend from my required English class, so I stopped walking and waited for him to quickly run across the street to me. "Yo, Stephen. Sup bud?"

"I was just heading over to Pete's to grab a couple of beers with a few buds of mine. Wanna come?"

My first thought was about that paper I had to write, I told myself that it could probably wait until tomorrow. Then, for a fleeting second, I thought about my mom. Would she have supper made? Would she care where I was?

I vaguely remembered her saying something about a big meeting with a potential client that she was going to. Was that tonight, or some other night? In any case I decided that it would be responsible of me to call and at least leave her a message on her cell phone.

Of course, I got her answering machine: "Hello, you've reached Laura Grey. I'm either busy with a client or in the court room. If this is an emergency, please call 212-734-5596. Thank you."

I left her a message letting her know that I was going out to Pete's, a bar a few blocks away from our townhouse, and would be late getting home. If I would have known that was the last time I would ever hear her voice, maybe I would have paid more attention to her words during breakfast that morning, maybe I would have tried to call her again. Maybe, I wouldn't have ignored the awful feeling in my gut. If I hadn't, maybe I would have gone straight home and gotten there in time to save her life.

I wouldn't have smelled the unmistakable iron scent that massive amounts of blood tend to give off after sitting out in a warm environment for a few hours. I wouldn't have felt warm tears free falling down my cheeks and filling my mouth with salty despair. I wouldn't have held my mom's cold, lifeless body to my chest and screamed so loud that our neighbours called the cops.

Unfortunately, the maybes in life don't change the truth. The fact is that sometimes bad things happen for no reason. Or maybe they happen to teach us something valuable. You know, natural disasters happen to bring communities, hell, even the world together. Grandparents die to bring families together in a time of memory and mourning. Sometimes, priests molest little boys and the world quickly learns that not even religion can change bad people.

I don't know why my mom had to die. If there is a lesson to be learned in finding your mom lying in the kitchen, soaking in a puddle of her own blood, I have yet to find it. The police said it was a random act of violence, possibly from some crime family she fucked over in her career. That explanation did nothing what's so ever to fix the way my heart shrivelled up and blackened.

Whatever the reason, my mom was gone, and after a few months of trying, I learned that I couldn't go to school, and still work full time. There was no way I could afford to keep the house I grew up in. What was the point? My mom was dead. I had no one.

So I sold the townhouse and most of the furniture in it. I made enough money to pay for most of my classes and to buy a small loft for myself. It wasn't much, but it was enough to keep a roof over my head. I kept pushing so hard, trying to convince myself that everything was okay.

I went to my classes, did my assignments, and worked part-time at a nearby Starbucks. I threw myself into my classes, telling myself that it's what my mom would want. I did my best to keep up appearances, but I didn't talk much. I couldn't. If I let myself think about my mother and the way she smiled, or laughed, or how she still said "I love you", even when she was royally pissed at me, I would cry like a little five year old.

Eventually, my silence caused me to become depressed, and irritable. I stopped seeing my friends, and started ignoring all of the calls from my clingy girlfriend at the time. They thought they were helping me. They said I needed to just get over it. Fuck them. How is a person supposed to get over the fact that they were too busy being selfish, out with friends, while their mother was being murdered? Did I blame myself? Yeah, I guess I couldn't help it.

I stopped going to my classes regularly, and my grades started slipping. I partied all night and barely made it into work on time. I was turning into a wreck, a shattered mess of what I once was. I had fallen into a hole, with no way out. I was too tired to go to classes, but too lonely to stay home and sleep so I could get any work done.

I constantly stared at the ceiling fan, I bought rope, and learned how to make a really good hangman's noose. I once filled the bathtub up and got in, but I couldn't bring myself to drop the toaster into the water. I had no will to live, but wasn't ready to die. That's when I met Travis. He ultimately saved my life and destroyed it all at the same time.

I groaned and rolled over, I could feel a migraine starting at the base of my skull and I tasted blood under my tongue. I could feel tears starting to run down my face. I tried to push away the memories of my recent past, but I couldn't shake the guilt, the fear, and the sickening feeling that was starting to manifest in the pit of my stomach. I was going through withdrawal.

This was a daily occurrence for me. I would shoot up enough heroin to fall low enough to sleep. Then I would wake up and pop a few Adderall to get me through my classes. The Adderall would keep me focused just enough to study and write my assignments. Then, when the night fell and my phone started blowing up with buyers wanted their stashes replenished, I would chase the dragon and get to work. Nothing like a crank high to keep you going all night long.

I wasn't fooled. I knew every single day when my sorry ass was lucky enough to wake up, that my mother would definitely not be proud of who I had become. She would hate my worthless bones. I had nowhere else to go though. This had turned into my life. Travis and his crew had given me a purpose, a shitty one, but a reason to keep moving forward none the less.

I was constantly high, constantly craving, and constantly making money. I thought this was the life, I had nothing to live for except my crew, getting high and selling drugs. Until I met her.