2026/w8

i’d had this rule with heroin ever since i was a teenager. i’d try it, but only ever in one v. specific scenario: somehow i’d come into posession of it, but had no idea how to acquire any more.

later on i’m twenty something. the summerhouse with nothing but a piano and a bed. but then fiancee, inevitable, and the leaving suddenly in the dark of night with grandfather’s whiskey. but there’s a party in the big house with the girls from the charity. i’m working my way through a line of coke and that extremely tall loud software engineer that josie likes comes in the room and tells me amy winehouse died.

at the end post wind down, there’s josie out on the steps leading up to the door. we sit beside each other for a while and look up at the stars. we kiss a little and say “this feels terrible” and “can we not do this again?”. i tell her i have nowhere to live and she invites me to stay in the room above her mother’s kitchen with nothing but a cello and a bed.

and i walk through the city as the sun starts to rise. “can i borrow your phone mate?” a guy on the corner of the street. he tells me im tryna call a guy to see if his wife’s gone so i can drop by. so i asked what he was buying? heroin. how much does that cost? he makes the call. took my cash, up the street and back with a bag and some advice: don’t take it.

and back to josie’s house and it’s a small room but warm and sometimes her mother comes in and teaches me a little cello. here’s how to hold a bow, how to turn it when you pull. i like the cello. i spent a few days snorting h, making websites for my first real web dev job, reading books and playing cello. i gathered my things and got on a plane to chicago where i would embark involuntarily upon the dark quinquennium. but yes, i can see the appeal. no pain, no anxiety, no world around at all, no fear, in heaven phasing through memories and imaginary worlds and always where you are, but chitter chatter with little sepia ghostlies as you maybe-here-maybe-don’t and all the while it’s like she’s holding you. at some point i threw up in a pizza box. papa john’s.

this week, though… i worked a lot. talked to some people. wrote little bits of songs i can never commit to record at least until they aren’t true anymore. i’m taking the next few days off to get every little thing in boxes. the kitchen’s pretty much done now. just need to trash one cupboard of trash. i am gonna have a lot of boxes. most of the apartments i’ve found so far may be too small to fit the boxes. i said, she said. eyes wet, cheeks red. goosebumps, deep breath. scruffy angel on, yes, the chopping block. bless her cotton socks. get the coffee pot, set your pocket watch, let a bottle rocket off. unless you lost a lot, i guess you walk it off. skyyyyrockets in flight, afternoon delight. of course that’s your contention you’re a first year hospitality student just got through eating some gastronomical schnitzel, cordon bleu probably. thrift store hunting, little driver seat, cooper, self preservation society, like homecoming, eurostar “get it?” like quantum physics (in your window). like quiet party, jerry springer messy— black and white, under water, up in the sky. jack up, rose up, car crash, hook line and sink and a day later, weak forty eight, two hours and forty drenched, but we’ll be okay, we can wait, eighty-eight and twenty-three (and three), ADH and LSD and R-QP. an hour a day five days a week keeps the doctor at bay, silent, asleep. quiet and sweet. try it and see. i’d like to be under the sea in an octopus’s garden in the summerhouse with nothing but a piano and a bed.