“Molly Olly oxen free!” Burt sings to us. He takes the wadded up tissue at the twist, puts it deep in his mouth, swallows exaggeratedly and chases with a shot of vodka. I watch his throat struggle to wash the package down.
“You want us to do the same?” I glance at everyone, Becca looks nervous too. I try to give her a reassuring look, but I feel the same. Jorge is muttering how dumb this is. The others are excited. This is their world. They have way more experience doing stuff like this.
“Are you sure we need this much man? I only did a little last night and it was fine.”
“Yeah! What you did was amateur hour, you really wanna roll? You really wanna do this right? You wanna find out the meaning of life, dance with fucking god themselves? Just trust me.”
“I don’t think I wanna do any of that, dude. I just wanna get high” Burt grabs me by the back of my neck, like a dog who won’t eat, and brings the tissue to my mouth. He gently rubs my head.
“Relax, you’re gonna have the night of your life. We’re all gonna. Now bottoms up!”
He coaxes open my mouth and I stick out my tongue. He puts the tissue full of Molly on it and I bring it back in. I toss the shot on top and swallow hard. Fast. Trying to ignore how much paper I just drank.
“Ima do a bump, anyone want one?” Burt asks, I shake my head no.
“More for me then, can I use your keys.” I hand him my keys. He’s playing tonight on expert mode. Trying to dance with god. I’m fine with novice.
I scan the room. Everyone drops their parachutes, some cringe, Jorge gags a few times, gets up and paces around the room.
“I’m not sure about this man?!” He crosses his arms and It looks like he says a little prayer. Maybe a Spanish thing.
“Little late for that now. Everyone just relax, you’ll have a bad roll if you go into it all panicked. Let’s head to the backyard. The dance party starts in thirty. We should be coming up right when we get there.” He snorts, clearing the desert bump he just took to the brain.
I look at the crew. Nerves, excitement, some giggles. Everyone is as ready as we’re gonna be.
Burt leads us on our psychotic march into the public eye. Not knowing what we have in store for them. Or ourselves.
I rub the back of my neck and my hand comes back drenched. Hot sweat profusely pouring off my stringy hair. It smells. When did I shower last? This bender has been escalating for days. Pushing it; morning booze, Let’s get coke, let’s do molly, let’s do more molly and go to the dance night. Drink this, smoke that. Have you done adderall? It’s a performance enhancing drug. You’ll be like the fucking Barry bonds of partying by ten. It was working. We were escalating alright. We’re all aboard, ready to go down with the ship.
I shiver a little. This is a bad idea, what are we doing? I look at everyone again. Do they feel anything? We didn’t account for weight. I definitely took too much. I’m smaller than Burt and Jorge. Becca is a hundred pounds soaking wet. This is bad. I’m sweating even more. I’m so hot even with the cool night breeze. This feels insane. I shouldn’t have taken so much.
The lights of the backyard cut through the thought like a razor through garlic. I start to feel warm. Like I’m glowing. My whole body buzzes. Ohh.
I smile. Each hair on my body stands up and waves hello. My bloodstream hits a drug dam and reverses. All my cells are fighting upstream like salmon. Dopamine overloading. Serotonin floods every sector. Ah. The wave of bliss washes over me. I look up, full moon. I could touch it. I need to let it know I’m here. I’m changing with the night. Evolving. I should howl at it. No, that’s cliche. Something more subtle. A bark. I try a small bark and laugh. It’s still ridiculous. Ridiculousness is next to godliness.
I glance at the gang and can tell by their faces, it’s kicking in for them too. I take Becca’s hand, her eyes glitter in the dull lamp light. She opens her whole mouth to tell me how good she feels. Nothing comes out but a laugh and I know exactly what she means. Maybe we’ll end up together in the morning. I still think of the one time. As if she can hear my thoughts her eyes go wide, her hand grazes my arm and the glow from her cheeks beckons out to me. I gently trace her face with the back of my knuckle. A trail of goosebumps showing me the way home. We both giggle a little. Wow. I wave to the others as Burt takes my arm in his. His smile looks painted on. Almost mad. We’re off to see the wizard now.
We walk up the wooden ramp to the backyard and the pulsing of the bass shimmers up my legs. I feel it in my chest, my heart adjusts its rhythm to the song. Everyone’s body swaying in unison, gleaming eyes and energetic soaked hair whipping back and forth. I’m home. I don’t wanna leave, I don’t wanna stop feeling this. I wonder if I can just lay on the stage and let this last all night.
A hot tingle creeps over my neck. Pins and needles spread down my body. Like acupuncture, from the inside. My eyes need more room, I try to open them wider. No I can’t do that, they’ll fall out. My jaw cracks as I stretch my mouth wide. My body is trying to resize, to fit how it needs to feel. I need to pull my skin wider. No it will rip. Why is it so bright here? I thought it was going to be darker. The colors seem wrong and the floor looks too long. No, I don’t want to be here. I see the bass coming my way, it has a shape. Not like on sheet music, but more like a bug. I can’t be here. I touch the blue in front of me, it’s damp and it shimmers. You’re not supposed to be in public like this.
“Does the air look too thick to anyone else…”
“Hey man, are you okay?” Luke says laughing. Where the hell did he come from? Where’s my Molly-troopers? They abandoned me. They knew I was turning and didn’t want me to bring them down.
This was always the plan, Burt just wants to spend time with Becca. I should have known. Wait no, that’s not right. They’re right over there looking for me, I need to…
“Dude what is going on with you!? You look fucked up! “Luke laughs. Waving his hand in front of my face. My eyes dart to the ground, back to the lights, to the sides. I’m moving all of my body in every which way. Twitching. Tweaking. I notice my jaw doing a lizard motion. I’m an oxygen anaconda and I have to unhinge my jaw to get all that I need. Stashing air in my cheeks like a chipmunk. What animal am I? Pick a genus and stick to it.
I try to focus on his face. His eyes seem to be magnetic opposites. Pushing apart. Too much space growing between them. I need to look away, he’s becoming a living picasso and i’m not qualified to critique him. I force my eyes back down. Just say something. Deflect. Get him off your trail.
“Nah man.” I manage to say. “I’m cool” Good work. I force my hands into my pocket and twist violently from side to side, nonchalantly.
He cracks up. Calls some people over to check me out. I slowly start to turn.
“I think he’s on bath salts or something” I hear him laugh from behind
I gotta get out of here. I go down the ramp. The tunnel narrows . The walls are closing in on me. I need to roll out the shrinking path before I’m Locked in forever.
I look back through the fisheye lens the molly has put on me. I see them laughing. Spit flying. He’s doing an impression of me. I imagine it’s wild. Insane.
I’m sure I’m a sight to behold. Me battling the shrinking tunnel, walking through quicksand, swatting at colors. I feel like a scuba diver plucked out of a Jules Verne book and put into a backyard dance party and I don’t know how to dougie.
His whole crew is laughing now. Everyone at the bar is whispering and giggling.
Mocking the poor Schmuck who can’t handle his drugs. I probably shouldn’t come back here for a while. They might make flyers. Do not serve this drug addict. I’ll be on it, sweaty, with my features uneven and drooping out of place.
I stumble as I step off the ramp back onto the sidewalk. I made it.
“How’s it going?” I mumble to a guy next to me who barely looks up from his phone. I give him a quick half wave, half peace sign to let him know I’m cool. It’s anything but casual. I see sweat slinging off my wild arms. I cross them. Act normal, act cool. Cross the road. Head home. Be chill.
I move my leg in the motion of a step and practically start celebrating. The guy glances at me before going back to his phone. He wouldnt understand. No one would.
Stop. No one cares man. And no one knows, just start walking. I look both ways. I’m shivering again. The artificial pastels of downtown causing a sensory overload. I squint. I want to close my eyes. Maybe I can find sunglasses. I hear a horn honk and look back. I crossed the road and only narrowly dodged a Toyota. I’m built Ford tough. I hate that I just thought that.
Christ. I hope everyone else is doing better. I need a bed. Maybe I can sleep this off. It’ll get better. People do this all the time and it doesn’t last forever. Which way is my house from here? This is too much man, I hate it. It’s too much. I don’t even like the little bit of reality I get regularly, why did I need so much more. Keep moving. You just need to put distance between yourself and everyone else and you’ll be somewhere you can lay down soon enough.
I take a springy long stride and my next leg feels stuck to the ground. Each step alternates between wet cement or moon shoes. I must look like a monster. I can’t do this much longer.
A field of grass glows alive under a group of street lights. a million green worms trying to reach into the sky. A lone tree whose colors look made up sits atop the field. No, not big enough. It’s a space of grass. A patch, that’s what it’s called. A patch of grass with the tree swaying gently, not the leaves, the whole tree. The ground ripples with it. Waves of grass crashing on its rooted shore. It’s high tide. Most importantly, it looks safe.
I think I’ll call this base camp. I plant my flag, check my phone. 11:03. We’ve been at this for an hour? I lay down. The earth rising and falling with my breath. I hear the city going about its night without me. That’s fine. I’ll stay here and sleep until I’m better or maybe I’ll become dirt. Melt into the soil and feed the bugs and grime. I am a lifeforce now. Feast from my flesh. Copyright, all rights reserved, Christ inc. I take another deep breath and the ground follows along. I’m like Grant laying on that sick triceratops. I close my eyes and let my brain idle. It’s almost over man. Just sleep.
Ya know, You never appreciate the beauty of the inside of your eyelids until it’s too late.
I wake up fully rested. It was a bad dream. My head feels like a jello mold and everything sounds like I’m underwater. Probably the hangover kicking in. Oh well, I’ve dealt with worse.
I check my phone. 11:04
Fuck
I didn’t sleep, I just blinked too long.
Fuck, fuck. I need this to go away, please, I don’t wanna dance with god anymore I just wanna be a normal boring not-high, guy again.
I see someone walking my way. Arms crossed. Muttering to himself.
“Jorge!”
“Dude, I don’t like this shit, I don’t like this shit bro!” His Cuban accent is thicker than ever. Man am I glad to see him.
“We gotta get out of here. I don’t wanna feel this way anymore” his eyes wide and wild, nodding, covered in sweat.
“Let’s go to Nellys? Get some shots? Maybe we can even back out” he nods and we walk towards main st.
Nellys is dark, quiet. A few regulars look up at the two lunatics who just walked in. Neither of us are able to stay still. My jaw is still doing circles. His eyes doing a series of wide blinks into several quick squints. He’s taught himself morse code.
“Play it cool” I whisper to him at full volume. We make our way to the bar. Hyper aware of every move.
“Four shots of jack please” I say, wiping my forehead with a bar napkin. Eyes darting across the room. The lady brings them and asks for twenty dollars. She scans us a few times and smirks. She knows we’re out of our minds. As long as we don’t do coke in the bathroom this place doesn’t care how fucked up you are.
We knock the first two down.That should hit the spot.
“I think I’m starting to come down a little. We did way too much of that shit, but I think we’re passing.” His pupils look so dilated I’d guess he just took an eye exam. He looks unhinged. I’d citizens arrest him if I didn’t know him.
“I’m not so sure about that.” I say through gritted teeth. “Why did we listen to Burt?”
He shrugs and sips his other drink.”
I take Nelly’s in. Halloween decorations still up. The weird stairs that look too small and lead nowhere. Brick, dust, a microwave blinking 12:00. Shamrocks. I can’t stay here. I’m gonna freak out. This is a whiskey-alone bar, not a I’m rollin ‘and I can’t stop grinding my teeth bar.
“Hey we gotta keep moving, I can’t sit still. Not here. Let’s try common grounds.”
I empty the second shot glass, drop thirty bucks on the bar and head back into the street. The cars’ muffled buzzing and streaking tail lights rush past my senses. They look so heavy and fast. Loud. violent. Permanent. One wrong wobbly step and well, be a hell of a way to die, that’s for sure. I make sure we’re good to go and we cross the road.
We get to common grounds and see a sign for a show.
“Little ozzy? One night only? What the fuck is a little ozzy?” Jorge asks. We shrug.
“Fifteen to get in, please,” a college kid says without looking at us. It’s Better that way.
“Oh, our friends inside, his Uber is here we just need to go grab him” Jorge says quickly.
“Whatever” he sighs and puts two bands on us. We walk in the door and the unmistakable riff for Ozzy’s ‘Crazy Train’ fills my ears. The iconic bassline, being played slightly wrong, slugging through the house system. The deep tom’s following along for the accents. Someone cackles into the mic. I can’t see him from the back. Little ozzy? Maybe short covers.
“I’m gonna go up front” Jorge yells
I order two more shots of whiskey. The sounds are starting to be more normal. More real world. More treble. The fisheye receding a little. I’m evening out. Thank god.
No drug stands a chance to gallons of well whiskey.
I finish one and slam the second shot down before taking a breath of air and head to the front.
“We’re going off the rails on a crazy trainnn.” someone sings several notes off key.
You said it brother.
I find Jorge, stage left towards the speaker. Arms crossed. He looks pissed. I look on stage and see who he’s glaring at. A three foot tall guy dressed as Ozzy, stamping around the stage. Throwing up little peace signs. Sticking his little tongue out at the crowd.
Oh, little Ozzy. Literally. Makes sense.
“How are you maniacs feeling tonight?” He asks us shuffling his little feet across the stage as they go into the last chorus.
“Yo, fuck this dude. He’s giving me some dirty looks! Fuck this guy, yo.” I’ve known Jorge long enough to know when he starts saying yo, fights are just around the corner.
“I think he looks at everyone crazy, he’s little ozzy, that’s his thing, plus we’re on enough Molly to kill him. I wouldn’t trust our judgment”
“Nah fuck that yo. ” I put my arm around him and usher him to the door and look back one more time as little ozzy spits water like a pro wrestler on the front few rows. The drummer starts a tom heavy solo I don’t remember from the original song and the guitar follows with his own. We’re all off the rails alright.
Little Ozzy throws double horns up to the crowd who eat it up and lose their mind. Hands go up to the leads solo, showing him they appreciate him with wiggly shredding fingers. Drug paranoia or claustrophobia starts to creep back in. The crowd blurring into one, raucous fan. Yeah, I can’t be here either.
We walk back out into the night. I feel more speedy than molly high now. I notice how tired I am too, not sleep but exhaustion. My bodies been through the ringer tonight. I check my phone. Almost one. How the hell?
“I’m gonna find Burt,” he said. “The rest of them are still at the backyard. I think I’m good enough to go back now.” If you say so man.
“Alright, I’m gonna head home. I’m over tonight.” We hug and I walk North. The car’s tail lights still leave little trails in space. Their engines sound right beside me. Still a little high I guess. And I’m drunk now. I have to watch each leg step in front of the next. Making sure I keep going. Who knows how much time I lose every stop.
I’ve been walking easily for an hour now. I see the crappy blue two story house my landlord refuses to do repairs on. The broken window on the side staircase from when I stumbled home drunk. Was that the night I met becca? Probably, every night could be any of them these days. I walk up my steps to my house. Phone says three. Did I get lost? I don’t remember the last few hours. I check my phone again. Ten missed calls, twenty unread messages.
Shit. I’ll figure it out tomorrow.
I fumble with the doorknob. Locked. I grab at my keys. Shit, not there. I check all my
Pockets.
Shit. Must have left them at Burt’s. Oh well, I’ll just text Steve and tell him to let me in.
I sit in the porch chair and wait for his reply. The air whispers past my face. I shiver. I pull my arms into my shirt. I’m still damp with sweat. What a gross way to spend my hard earned money. I check the phone again. 3:10. Shit. Well he’ll find me soon.
I close my eyes, my head feels stuffed into my skin. At Least that’s where it belongs. My breathing is regulating. It’s peaceful. Almost relaxing. My chest rises slowly while my heart beats. Faster than I care to think about, but starting to calm down.To normalize. Wild To know how resilient your body is. Togo through self-inflicted hell and come out the other side. Still just pumping air and moving blood along. I take a deep breath and smile a little.
You know, the inside of your eyelids really are beautiful.