Author's
Note: Ok guys, this is my first shot at Mark angst. How'd
I do? Scroll down to the review button at the bottom of the page and let
me know!
I walk down the street quickly, trying not to think too much about what I'm about to do. I just walk, my body on autopilot, down the streets until I find myself following a familiar path…a path in which I'd followed Roger so many times in the past. I command my brain not to think. If I think I won't do it. And I need to do it. I need to find some way to show them that I hurt too, that even I, Mark Cohen have problems, nightmares, demons of my own! This is the only way to show them that I need to be taken care of too. And as much as I hate to do it, I know there's no other way.
I see the figure standing in the shadows, his face covered by the oversized hood of the overcoat he wears – despite the unusual warmth of the winter thus far – and I pause. All those months spent with Roger in withdrawal…hating him for doing it to himself, to me. And now here I am about to do the very same thing.
I take a deep breath and walk shakily up to The Man, not saying anything for a second, trying to gather up enough strength to form the words that have been playing around in my mind for the past 15 minutes.
He looks at me and I can see a sort of humor playing in those cold, gray eyes of his.
"Looking for 'Lover boy'?" he asks, his voice oozing with sarcasm.
My mind is saying it, repeating the words over and over…commanding me to speak. But nothing comes out. I can't help but ask myself again, why am I here? Why am I doing this? I know the consequences…I've seen them in my best friend. I've seen so many lives taken over, destroyed by this…and here I am, about to inject it into my own veins, my own life.
And then the sounds of Mimi and Roger in the apartment downstairs begin to play in my head again: the giggling, laughing, moaning, the slamming of the headboard into the wall… the silence of the loft. Oh, the sound of silence. How I've gotten so used to that nonexistent sound in the past few weeks, ever since Roger moved out of the loft and into Mimi's apartment. And suddenly I know the answer.
'It's the only way,' I repeat firmly to myself and somehow manage to reach into the pocket of my worn, plaid jacket and pull out the crumpled bills I had been saving and shove them into his hands.
He raises an eyebrow and then after a few seconds he finally seems to get it and he starts laughing. I hate that laugh. He shakes his head, still laughing, and hands me a small plastic bag containing white powder.
"I'd have never thought you of all people…"
But I don't hear the end of his sentence because I'm already walking away, running far away from that place, from him, from this whole situation.
It isn't until I'm back at the loft that I realize I forgot to purchase a needle. Stupid me. Now what am I going to do?
I glance at Roger's vacant room, trying to get the thought out of my head, knowing it's stupid, knowing it's suicide, knowing all these things but the need is there pushing all other thoughts out of my mind.
I can be safe. I can wash it first, I can sterilize it and things would be fine. And it would only be once. Just this one time until I get my own needle…or until my "friends" find out and I won't need it anymore.
So I walk slowly into Roger's room and open the drawer by his bed. I know he never got rid of them. He didn't use them, but he always saved them to remind him of what he went through, to remind him not to go through it again. And here I am about to go through it myself. As I spot a needle and pick it up carefully by the end, I wonder if it's supposed to be reminding me the same thing. Reminding me of withdrawal, of AIDS, of April… and it is. But my need for care and attention and an outlet for the pain is stronger than all those things. So I carefully carry it into the kitchen with me, only stopping to grab Roger's lighter from his dresser, and wash it over and over again until I'm sure it's safe.
After I'm sure I have everything I'll need – a spoon, the smack, a lighter, and the needle – I set up my camera on the tripod and focus it on myself.
"January 14th, 11:00 p.m. Eastern Standard time. Here I am with a needle that I stole from Roger and the smack I bought from his old dealer. What the fuck am I doing? I don't know. All I know is that I can't take living like this anymore. I'm not perfect. Just because I'm always solving everyone else's problems doesn't mean that I don't have problems of my own. Just because I laugh and smile and joke with my friends doesn't mean that I'm laughing and smiling on the inside. I need them to know that I hurt too, and that I need help. And that even if I can't verbalize my need, it's still there."
I look down at the needle and white powder in my hand and sigh, remembering everything I went through getting Roger off this shit.
"But is it worth it? To get the attention I've always needed from my friends but never had? To be the one getting helped instead of constantly helping for once? To get the pain that threatens to tear me apart inside out of me?"
I look down again at the needle and smack and hear Mimi and Roger's moans through the thin walls of the apartment downstairs. Roger's one flight of stairs away…and I haven't seen him in weeks. He lives 14 stairs down from me and somehow he managed to push 6 years of friendship and companionship out of his mind for the woman he met only a few weeks ago. And forgot completely about poor Mark.
I look straight at the camera and without hesitation I answer my own question. "Yes."
And with that thought calming my mind, and the moans from Roger and Mimi strengthening my decision, I quickly melt the powder down to a smooth liquid and push the cool tip of the needle in my arm.