Through The Eyes Of

Thoughts of a Closet Junkie

Izzy

Fuck. Me. I was hoping to find some smack before I got to this point but it happened faster than I had planned. I had planned on rationing what I had picked up in LA before we left so that I'd at least make it to Seattle where I figured I'd be able to score. Duff told me once that one reason he'd left Seattle was because so many of his friends had become junkies and a few had died from overdoses. So I tried to keep my habit hidden from it but Axl told me the other night that Duff was on to me. We'd been on the road longer than I had thought we would be and I have like zero ability to ration out my shit anyway. When I'm high or about to go through withdrawl I'll use more to feel better and know that I'm going to regret it tomorrow but it doesn't matter, I'll do it anyway; I can't stop myself.

I've been dry heaving for the past 15 minutes after throwing up everything I'd eaten since we got here. I had a few shots earlier trying to stave off the sickness and knock me out for a few hours but apparently that didn't work. Now it's like three in the morning, my stomach's on fire, I can't stop heaving, I'm soaked in sweat, shaking, my skin's crawling, and every joint in my body aches. Axl's being a prick about it too. I know he's angry at me but being a prick is not going to help anything right now.

"Izzy," I hear a voice say, "are you drying out man?" It's Duff.

"Yeah," I whisper and nod miserably. "Make it stop, god somebody make it stop," I beg and clutch my stomach collapsing back into the pillows where Axl propped me up on the pull out bed we're sharing.

"You should have thought about that before you started shooting that shit into your arm!" Axl snarls. I just glare at him, I don't have the energy to fight with him anymore.

"That's not going to help right now Axl," Duff says. "We can get him clean when we get back to LA but not right now and not on the way back, not after the shit we had to go through to get here. We can't have this happening in the middle of nowhere if we end up there again."

"Get him clean, he's a fucking dealer Duff!" Axl snorts.

"Well it's feeding your ass isn't Axl?" Duff points out. Axl just looks pissed.

"Slash, will you go get Izzy a glass of water and a cool washcloth please, there's washcloths in the closet in the bathroom," Duff tells him. Slash nods and gets up and walks into the bathroom, picking up a clean solo cup from the pack Duff's friends had put downstairs for tomorrow night's party that's being thrown in honor of Duff's homecoming.

He comes back and Duff starts to wipe down my face with the rag but Axl snatches it away. "I'll do it," he snaps. I roll my eyes but Axl wipes down my face and neck carefully; much more gently than I was expecting. Slash hands Axl the water and I rinse my mouth out and spit the water back in the trashcan I threw up in; I don't want to drink it, it'll just come back up.
"You want a joint Izzy?" Duff asks.
"Please," I rasp. Duff gets up and goes upstairs coming back with a couple of joints and fishes his lighter out of his pants. He lights the weed and hands it to me and I inhale deeply. Shit whatever kind of weed this is it's strong. But the high at least settles my nerves a little.

"Izzy, I can get you straight until we get home but you've gotta stop this when we get there, understand?" Duff says to me.

"See, even Duff's telling you that Izz! It's not just me!" Axl growls butting in.

"Shut up Axl! I snarl. I'm tired of him being up in my face tonight. I turn back to Duff. "Yeah, ok, I know, trust me I know!" I tell him. "There's money in my wallet, I sold that coke earlier tonight and there's still $100 left from the truck driver. Steven and Slash have the money for the trip back. Stevie's grandmother gave him some money and so did Curly's mom and plus we'll get paid here. Please Duff!" I groan.