Cocaine Addiction

It was Sunday afternoon, picking through the library selection of biographies and thrillers, I came upon a title “Crack House” by someone called Keeble. About how the Haringey police in London shut down a 100 crack houses in one year – stopped black on black killings completely, reduced crime over night. I added it to my pile. Later, on a tv program it was reported how the Haringey police, in February 2011 had reached the 200 mark in closing down north London crack houses. I felt as if I knew all about it because I had read the book.

 I take an interest in crime and criminals, doesn’t everyone, and keep my house secure. Have a good job as a property manager with the biggest realtor in town – keep the tenants orderly, and paying on time for the owners. Pretty pleased with the way my sons had turned out – both had studied at uni and got an education. – Tony worked as well, while he was a student – can never work too hard he said , always was a high achiever.

 My other son isn’t that way, so driven to make money, to make success of himself. He fritters his money away – parties, the beach when he isn’t working – always making excuses to his brother not to get into some property, start getting some capital behind him. He is always out and about, having a good time. Well, each to their own, I thought. I have to say that visits from my younger son were more interesting, more pleasant sometimes than the talk about money, high finance and real estate that I got from Tony, when he had time to drop in.

 One day Tony had a plan about getting more real estate – he was hesitant I thought, but said it would be a better deal, if I got involved, used my house as security, perhaps used some of my savings. I thought about it, saw a chance to make money, perhaps retire early, so I said count me in. He did all the arranging, I just came up with the money.

 A few weeks later he was in a car accident, nothing serious he said, a few bruises and two black eyes where he hit the steering wheel. He took some time off work. Came round to see me, said Dad, I’ve been thinking, I really have to get out – take a break, have a holiday – perhaps travel around the world. I said that surely he needed to keep on working to cover his investments, didn’t he need to stay on at work for a few more years until his investments were more secure. This wasn’t like the Tony I knew – he looked strained, tense –edgy. I put it down to the accident, and was relieved when he said – Sure dad – I guess you know best – just like you’ve always done – I really need a holiday, but I guess it will just have to wait.

Didn’t see him for a long while, he said he was busy working – and I left it at that.

 Without any warning one day I got a default note on the mortgage – panicked a bit, I like everything in order. Tried to get Tony on the phone – the problem had to be at his end – no answer, so I went around to his place and couldn’t believe what I saw.

 Newspaper blowing all over the lawn, that hadn’t been cut for weeks. Letters stuffed in the mailbox, overflowing onto the driveway. The house looked locked up and empty – I saw a tag on the meter – the gas had been disconnected. I went into a state of shock. I hammered on the door but got no reply. Then I saw a neighbor walking down towards the house. Looking for the men that lived there, she asked – they’ve gone she said with satisfaction – drug dealers you know – used to sell cocaine. Things got a bit nasty a few weeks ago – fighting and shouting late at night. Lucky they left next day – all the street was worried that we might get a drive-by.

 Still in a state of shock, I had to get to the office. All the talk was about the breaking news in the morning paper – I never read the paper until I get into work. There was a picture of my son on the front page – a drug dealer done a runner, gone overseas and wanted by the police. They said it was pretty brave of me to come into work – they all assumed I knew. I went into see the boss, told him what had happened, he gave me the week off, unless it would make me feel better to keep on coming in.

I never guessed, I never knew, it keeps me awake at nights. The only good thing is I had enough money to refinance my house and save it. So much for the early retirement – its set me back ten years.  But it is better I have to work than stay home, and be thinking about my son.

Two years ago I was the happiest girl in the world, all set to marry Trevor next fall – I had known him all my life – it seemed to be fate – we were so together – everything felt so right. Then one afternoon Trevor called round with a serious look in his eyes- said I have something to tell you – I think it will break your heart, but I can’t go through with this marriage – I don’t think I am ready yet – I need to get around some more – see something of world. Perhaps we could go together, I thought – my mind was clutching at straws.

 After a week or two I was so depressed that I could hardly eat. Stopped going to work, I didn’t need to. I still lived with my folks. I used valium, tried alcohol, nothing seemed to work. Trevor was gone leaving a gaping hole that nothing and no one could fill.

 It was while I was in this miserable state that my car broke down while driving on the road, on my way back from visiting a little park that I used to go to with Trevor. Next thing I knew this handsome fella had stopped his pickup truck, asking if he could help. If the cure for love is another love, or at least an infatuation, right there and then I was cured. Turned out he was a mechanic, knew about engines, so my car got towed to a repair shop and Tyson asked me back to his for a cup of coffee then took me back home, leaving his telephone number in case I might need more help.

 I started spending time with Tyson, his life was so different from mine – fascinating, colorful, and exciting, Tyson was everything I needed to put me back on my feet. I wanted to be with Tyson for the rest of my life. So, it was like a blizzard in July when Tyson and some of his friends told me one night that they used cocaine and would I like to try some. I wanted to cry, my world was shattered, all I could think was why? Why did someone as great as Tyson need to use cocaine. I felt torn apart – I said I would stay, but I wouldn’t use it, and in this way me and Tyson stayed together, although I disapproved, and hoped that he might change his ways if I stuck around.

 Soon after that Tyson didn’t answer his phone so I went round to his place, saw two of his mates coming out the front door, I asked after Tyson – they said he got busted for drugs –  and was down at the station. It was all too much for me, I turned and went back home. Heard he pleaded guilty, and was given 6 months.

 I just went into a shell. I was back to square one with my depression, until in the mail I got a letter from Ty, sent to me through the prison system. The letter was short and to the point – would I wait for him to come out – he had been thinking about me all the time – wanted to marry me, and do rehab when he was released.

So, I started visiting him every fortnight, and got to know him better. I looked up for him a good drug rehab that would do cocaine, that didn’t use drugs for detox.

 When it was time for his release, I picked him up in my car, and never felt so nervous – back in reality, how would it go, would he stay off the cocaine, would he still want me, that night we made love and discussed him going into rehab. Would he go in or back to cocaine – I was so happy when he said that he would start rehab next day – wild horses couldn’t stop him. So, there is a happy ending, for me and for Tyson – we’re getting married in the spring – I can’t believe how lucky I was that my car broke down at that time and particular place – maybe it was fate.

No one else in my family, was particularly tall. So it was all the more embarrassing for me when I just grew and grew so that I was 180cm tall by the time I was 16 years old. That’s five foot and eleven inches – 71 inches tall, there wasn’t a day when I didn’t feel terrible about myself because I was so tall. People suggested basketball. They meant well, of course, but I was not into playing sport, didn’t hang out much with friends – somehow it made it worse to be one of a group of girls – all of a normal height. I tried stooping my shoulders, wore only flat shoes but always I was miserable because I had grown so tall.

 One day a new teacher took me aside. Said I hope you don’t mind but I can’t help noticing how sad you always look – is it because of your height. I was so annoyed that she would intrude into my private pain – s’okay for you I said – you wouldn’t know how it feels to be so ridiculously tall. She said no, but she understood and said that taking a course in modeling might help me to feel better. So, I thought why not, went along to the local agency – they said to come back with a portfolio of photos.

 I contacted a photographer, told him what I wanted. He spent a couple of hours getting some really good shots to show the agency. Posing in front of that camera did me a world of good – I felt suddenly empowered, forgot about my height. The agency was pleased, said if I would take their modeling course, I would be assured of work.

 How ironic that a top model should feel unhappy about her height and body image. But when I went out on that catwalk, all attention on me, I felt like the queen of the world,

 I got to work glamorous locations and places around the world – exhausting, but always exciting, waking up to a new day, in another city. A lot of models used cocaine to help keep off the weight. I never had a problem with that – I was naturally slim, but I got in with the crowd, and started to use cocaine – not a lot, but it perked me up,

 Before long I was a regular user, first thing I did, at a new location was to find out where to get the coke. I didn’t think I had a problem. I was in control. That was until the day that some scaffolding collapsed, I slipped off , hit the ground and badly sprained my ankle. It meant taking weeks off work, and I sort of fell into a hole. Not being able to work, I was totally depressed. Modeling was my life –without it, I felt worthless and alone. I munched on painkillers for a few days, but was hanging out for coke, took them both for a while, and then I decided to get by on coke and pop a couple of sleeping pills when it kept me awake. I didn’t swim, or work out as usual, or even eat much food.

 Then I found that instead of  getting high on the coke, it only made me nervous and upset, I couldn’t even settle down to watching afternoon tv. I paced around my apartment like an animal in a cage, unhappy at being indoors, not wanting to go out, not to parties or anywhere. I looked in the mirror one morning and saw a haggard ghost – it gave me such a fright to see how I looked, that I immediately went to the bathroom to do some more cocaine.

 Next thing I woke up in a hospital – I would be dead but my manager called by, and found me on the floor, A decision was made that I had to go into rehab, and that was the luckiest day of my life. The rehab they chose used drug free detox and part of the drug rehabilitation helped me to overcome the issues I had about my height. I came out drug free and really happy for the first time in my life.

 I went back home for a while, and caught up with the photographer just for old time’s sake. He asked me out to dinner, we got married a year later. He’s quite a bit older than me, and very much shorter, but I am comfortable with that. Never went back to modeling, never think of using coke. We are thinking of starting a family – and joke about whether our kids will turn out to be tall or short, or medium.

He sat back comfortably, in a large upholstered chair, swirling Camus Cognac Cuvee in the club’s finest  lead crystal brandy glass, looking every inch the man about town that he used to be, although we had agreed by mutual consent that this time the bill was on me, given his present little “difficulty” due to  imminent forclosure by his bank.

 I’d known him since we read for the bar, fell in with his easy charm. Making your way as a young barrister, unless you are extremely well connected, never is very easy – I settled for taking briefs on urban planning and development – steady, safe and reliable – old Gavin decided that his talents would get better recognition if he killed two birds with one stone. Spent his days down at the racetrack, in nightclubs, got invites to all the best parties, started to carve a career and make a name for himself.

 Gradually he developed up a busy criminal practice, solicitors that he didn’t know would brief him – on the recommendation of their clients. Within a few years, it was all the rage and fashion to have Gavin take your case and raise a defense to the outrageous claims that society people suffer from – like dui, insider trading and mother’s in law caught shoplifting – Gavin did them all – moving the jury to laughter or to tears, it really was surprising how often he got them off.

I have to admit, deep down inside, I envied Gavin his lifestyle. Until I married several years later, it was usually late nights for me, reading up on the latest amendments to dull and boring laws – with a glass of cheap wine and a take away meal for tea. It got so that although we still had rooms in the same chambers, we didn’t meet up very often – Gavin was popular – in demand – always invited to make up numbers at dinner parties and gatherings. No one saw any warning then of how things would turn out for that promising young barrister, that smart young man about town. He only made one social mistake in his life – that was getting involved with a happy crowd who considered it “chic” to use cocaine.

You wouldn’t think a fellow that had put so much work into building his career, would stand by and watch it go up in smoke, well, wrong, not smoke – Gavin told me once that he was actually snorting coke – made him feel like a champion – he suggested I drop by sometime, but by then I was married – didn’t want to step out of line. Truth to tell that was only an excuse – the whole idea of Gavin using cocaine shocked me to the core, I didn’t even want to go there.

 Then I heard around the traps that Gavin wasn’t doing so well. Apparently people thought he’d become arrogant, and difficult to work with. Solicitors were suggesting that their clients might do better putting their case in more professional hands – Gavin got a reputation for being aloof and pompous, and often totally unreachable when his advice was needed. Sometimes I saw him come into chambers late, looking quite worn out, looking to see if there was any work, or unanswered messages. Society people can be fickle, and one day there seemed to be a unanimous decision to drop Gavin from the usual social lists.

 It was soon after that Gavin asked if we could speak sometime about a confidential matter, that’s when I invited him to my club and sat down with him to dinner. Over the cognac, he got down to business and put the hard word on me – long friendship, good pals – he needed $50k in a hurry. I hesitated about what to do, I didn’t have that kind of money to spare – I was still making my way. I said Gavin, I’d like to help but I don’t have any money.

 His face went hard, his eyes were narrow, I’ve never seen a look of such hate before on anybody’s face – now you don’t fucking let me down, you’re the only hope I’ve got – he stared at me like he was pleading, Well, how much are you good for – how much have you got. Come on man, don’t let me down, I’m in a bit of a fix. A voice in my head said- don’t listen to this, he’ll never pay it back. I told Gavin that I had to leave, an early start next morning – told him that I would have to discuss it with the wife. Gavin gave me a look of withering contempt and strode off out through the door.

 A week later it was in all of the papers – Famous Barrister Dies of Cocaine Overdose – I felt deeply sad but had no regrets about refusing him the loan – it wouldn’t have helped him any way – a lot of people owed him money, he couldn’t get any of them to pay. According to the office gossip – he had fully refinanced his house – cashed up all his investments, and recently sold his car – he’d spent the whole lot on cocaine, there was nothing left.