EUPHORIA / NAMGI

ONE

   "MY NAME IS kim namjoon, and i'm an addict."

the plastic chip stamped with '90 days' is cold, brittle, as it's placed into his palm. congratulations and claps from all around him. all he can hear is the rush of the AC, the beating of his drug-free bloodstream.

"hi, namjoon."

they don't let you have sharp objects in rehab. that's why the chips are plastic. they're not even allowed shoes—not real ones anyway. just loose, old people slipper shoes, or flipflops, which slap against the hospital-like vinyl flooring. you drink from paper cups, eat with plastic knives and forks, you're supervised left and right. namjoon never felt an urge to hurt himself, not like that; maybe the drugs were his version of a razor blade.

"i'm here because i, um, i overdosed."

ninety days sober. two thousand, one hundred, and sixty hours. one hundred and twenty nine thousand, six hundred seconds without any drugs in his system. three whole months; all of summer vacation spent in what, if described only vaguely to someone who had no concept of a rehabilitation center, would sound like either a hospital or a prison. it's sort of a mix between both.

"i—i was addicted to cocaine. to xanax. vicodin. um, oxycotin... to that feeling when you can't feel anything. where the whole world just disappears and your head is finally fucking quiet. i chased that feeling."

it feels weird, moving out of his room in the rehabilitation center. he was roomed with oscar, a bearable, if not disgustingly hormonal, alcoholic, sex addict and frequent stoner, who spent more hours talking about fucking ( well, raping, would actually be the better word for it ) women than he actually having sex with anything other than his hand. namjoon won't miss him. he won't miss anything; especially being sober.

"h-how did overdosing make me feel? uh... pretty fucking shit? i, i was in a coma... for four days. uhm, my dad was mad... more sad than mad actually. it was kinda hard for him to be mad at me. i coulda died, you know? he didn't want to, like, yell at me after that."

putting on clothes, regular clothes, feels good. he could wear his hoodie after they were convinced he wasn't suicidal or a self harmer, that he wouldn't do anything with the metal zip to whatever, but that was all he had of his life on the outside. his dad dropped off clothes the day before he got out; this big t-shirt that soobin bought for him while he was in rehab, black with a little smiling sun painted on the pocket, with his favourite cosy sweats and his falling apart red converse. his prized possession. namjoon looks at himself in the bathroom mirror. he looks like him again; his brown roots are growing into his bleached hair, but it looks okay. his mom's necklace hangs around his neck, the little sun pendant pressing against his heart.

"i—i think i just wanted them to smile, you know? i was sick of dad and soobin just looking at me like—like i was gonna break any second. i think was i still high, even after four days. the way i was acting... dad said it was like i wasn't even aware of what had just happened. i probably wasn't. my brain was so fuckin' fried..."

he pulls up his hood when one of the nurses comes to get him, a soft smile on her face. "you ready to go?"

he fingers the chip, tracing the letters with a fingernail. ninety days. he swallows softly. "y-yeah." a small bag contains his life for the past three months. it's not much. a book his dad bought over from namjoon's large collection, a small figurine soobin won at the arcade he went to with his friends, an empty bottle of axe spray, a toothbrush and toothpaste, his old mp3 player because he wasn't allowed his phone, broken headphones. his antidepressants; the only pills he's legally allowed to take.