Her Sweet Flavour

a new buddy

POV: Adeline

My head feels all fuzzy and blurry.

I know it's because I smoked yesterday, falling back on my old coping mechanism and habit, but I still don't appreciate it. It's making me regret my decision but I really needed a way to relax since I was feeling so horrible all the time I was at home.

Thing is, now that I'm awake I'm starving and I don't have any of the foods that I'm craving in the apartment. It just means I'll need to go out today despite feeling horrid.

There's a small corner shop just down the road, though it would be about a thirty minute trip since I have to walk it. I'm so hungry though so I'm going to have to makes the trip myself.

I groan and take a little bit of time before getting up, slowly shuffling around my apartment to make myself look decent. I don't have work today so I'm not putting on anything nice, just a baggy grey hoodie and joggers, but I need to be at least a little presentable when I step outside my apartment. It may be a crappy place but I don't want to look completely horrible.

With as minimal effort as I can, I scrape my hair back into a loose bun, hairs still sticking out everywhere but it's good enough. I'm not trying to impress anyone.

No one ever pays me any attention anyway, so why does it matter if I look decent or not?

With me looking somewhat decent, I grab my wallet, phone and keys before stepping out of my apartment and taking a deep breath of the outside air. The windows in my apartment may have been open, but the air still had quite a heavy hint of weed despite them being open all night.

It's kind of refreshing to have some air that doesn't have the strong smell of weed, but the freshness of the air is tainted as Mike approaches me.

He always has an aura of different drugs and if this were a cartoon it would be possible to physically see his scent trail behind him. I just wanted some fresh air and now he's contaminating it.

"Enjoyed your night?" He slyly asks. "Need anymore? Maybe more weed? Cocaine? Heroine? Anything at all?"

"No!" I snap at him, more irritable than usual. "I shouldn't have bought any last night! And I certainly don't want to buy any more."

He raises his hands in surrender and backs off. Mike knows that I sometimes fall back into smoking when I'm stressed, but he isn't going to force me to buy more and get fully addicted again. I don't want that since it made me always feel horrible and look even worse than I usually do.

"Just know that my offer for more is always open," he reminds me as he walks off back to his apartment and leaving me to get the food I'm craving.

I sigh and pull the hood of my hoodie over my head and tuck my hands into the front pocket as I walk out of the apartment building and towards the corner shop that should have what I'm wanting. They usually do.

There's a lot of alleys I have to walk past on the way to the small shop that always has some odd sounds, but I usually ignore them. As I pass one now though, there's there's noise I can't help but get curious about.

I peer into the dark alley, not wanting to go into it since it is really sketchy with used needles and trash bags everywhere. Just as I'm about to give up on finding the source of the sound and brush it off as my mind making this up and getting me paranoid, I spot a cardboard box next to one of the massive bins that is definitely the source of the small sound.