Prisoner #56

Chapter 8

From that day on, I was addicted. I remember once my high was over when I got home that night, scared the pain would return, I went to the bathroom and took some more heroin, just to be safe. As the high kicked in again and I skirted that unbearable pain, I felt instant relief. When I came out of the bathroom and felt high as a kite, my wife questioned why I was so happy after being depressed for over a year. I had asked her, 'Does it matter?' and then I dragged her into the bedroom and we had the best, roughest sex we had had in years. She was all over it, and so was I. I forgot who I was, what I was, but it didn't matter. With heroin, I could be anything that wasn't me.

As time went on, I found myself shooting up any chance I got. At work, after work, at home, any chance that I felt my high start to fade. I needed it, craved it. I couldn't live without heroin. However, the more heroin I took, those days when I was happy and high turned into ones where I started to get paranoid. If I was unsure when I could take my next hit, or it got delayed for any reason, I would get irritable and irrational.

My judgement was clouded, and I started to not be able to function like any normal car would. I couldn't perform my job at all; my performance worsened. I transferred money into wrong bank accounts. I left the vaults open. One night I forgot to turn on the security alarm. I got write up after write up, but I didn't care. How could I, when I had heroin?

My wife and son finally started catching on that something was off with me. I was there less and less for my son. I was never there to greet him when he got home, even if he barely acknowledged me anyway. If you think I was barely there for my son, then I wasn't even there for my wife. Those fun nights where we had crazy sex dwindled to nothing. Instead, I found myself after work, hanging out with Jack, buying heroin and shooting it up on the spot. I would get home, eat my cold dinner my wife left out for me, and go to bed. Sleep, wake up, shoot up, repeat. That was my life. All I thought about was heroin and in reality, that's all I wanted.

It got worse and worse and soon I could barely function at all. One day at work, I got caught taking heroin by the back vault of the bank. I had shot up many times at work, mostly in the bathroom, but I had become more brazen and started to take it in places where I could get caught. I wanted to add a little risk to my life. Well, that day I was fired on the spot. I remember driving home, bursting through the door, cursing and yelling that I lost my job. I remember my wife driving up to me, ready to get confrontational, our son cowering behind her.

"Marlin! We need to talk, NOW," she yelled.

"Shove off, bitch. Why even bother talking to you if all you do is scream at me anyway? I lost my motherfucking job! Dammit woman, I need my space," I spat. I tried driving past her, but she blocked me.

"Well, I think I know why you lost your motherfucking job. Explain these, Marlin," she spat back, pushing a box in front of me. I looked down at it, the box of my used-up heroin needles before me.

I didn't know what to say. I was caught. My face turned flush, but I think that was from the drugs more than anything.

"So, you've been taking drugs this whole time. Heroin, of all things. Goddammit Marlin, what's going on? Why drugs? What's happened to you, Marlin? WHY?!"

I couldn't answer her. Even then I couldn't tell her the truth.

"Because it's the only way I can feel good these days. Can't I enjoy anything without you getting on my case?" I rebutted.

"Marlin, these are drugs we are talking about. Drugs in our home, with our son! This is unacceptable. Please, let's go to therapy, rehab, anything. Let's get you off this. Let's go back to being a family," my wife pleaded, her anger subsiding a bit. Back then she wanted to help me, she could have too. Yet, I was too addicted, too clouded to see that. Instead, I yelled at her.