Cocaine Addiction

I was still numb, the reality of being arrested, and for what, trying to please my fiancé, and his family – trying to prove what – my loyalty, my toughness – my love? It all seemed like a dream, one day I was your average girl in love with a handsome young man – and then it all changed when he said we’d need money if we were ever going to have a good life. He wanted money before he would marry – and if I really loved him – the family had a plan. If the deal came off we’d be married and never have to think about money again. If I wanted to stay out of it, then that was ok by him – it was up to me to choose.

What could I do – I was in love, and the thought of losing him to another woman, who might be happy to join in the plan – get him and all the money – just for helping out, I couldn’t bear to think of that. Not being a mule or anything risky like that, said Marcos, just tying up a few loose ends – like booking rooms in the hotels, hiring a car in my name. He said he wouldn’t force me into doing anything I didn’t want to do – he’d leave right there and then. If I never contacted him back – then he would understand – otherwise to call back within the week.

He was gone, and my emotions were all over the place. Of course I knew it was wrong, risky but after a sleepless night decided there was no other way to go and called up Marcos to say I’m in.

So I took a flight to where we were picking up the cocaine – booked the car, hotels. Marcos, his uncle and brother followed on the next plane and after I picked them up in the car, they dropped me back at my hotel. After the flights had gone that they were returning on, I was to pick up the car and take it back to the hire company – get myself on another plane, and get myself back home.

But it never happened like that in the end, because all three of them got arrested at the airport, each with a kilo strapped to them, and when I went to pick up the car in long term parking – a cop wandered over, put his head in the window and said I was arrested on suspicion of narcotics possession.

There was no bail, we had no money – I was surprised how quickly the prison regime completely takes over your life. My love for Marcos had evaporated, I just wanted to survive.

But I heard the stories – an air hostess in Canada jailed for 8 years for narcotics possession – they had four kilos – we had only three but still possession is possession. Other would-be cocaine smugglers had 500 kilos in a boat, worth over $16m and all charged with conspiracy. Then $8.4m of cocaine was seized in the Caribbean.

It was reported in 2009 by the National Geographic that cocaine residues can be found on 90% of American and Canadian bills.

They even found cocaine floating in a lake after a small plane had crashed – and cocaine in the suitcase of a child travelling to Toronto. One Toronto man had to be operated on after he swallowed 45 ping pong ball sized packets of cocaine, the CBC News reports.

I had no idea before how big the cocaine problem is – and trembled with fear at the sentence I would get. Worst of all was how my parents were so cut up about it, sure, we were poor but they had done all that they could to give me honest values, they were distraught, and couldn’t understand why I’d let myself get involved.

Both Marcos and his uncle got given 5 years each, and the brother got 5 as well, I was expecting I would get five, but the judge took a different view – I ended up with three years on probation because of the undue influence that Marcos had over me. Of course it meant that I was made to sound like a fool – that didn’t go down too well with me at all.

I was in love, it was a crime of passion, meant to get us out of the deadly poverty trap we were in, get us up with those people who have personal millions that they never worked for, give us a happy life with all the money we needed.

Then I hear that a lot of rich people are users of cocaine. It doesn’t make sense to me – if I had their kind of money, I never would touch the stuff.

I used to think there’s nothing wrong – doing a line, once in a while, maybe at a party. But lately, I been thinking maybe I’ve gotten in too deep.

I got laid off from my regular job – a dairy hand assistant – getting milk cheaper from interstate – I don’t know how they do it, but if no one buys the local supplies, blokes like me are out of a job. Little nipper under two, another one on the way – and we got one of those no deposit housing loans – over 35 years and every month, we’ve got to find the money. Jeez, one thing I’m not is a quitter. I said to the wife it would be for the best if I got a laboring job, upcountry where the money is better. Sure I’d be away for a while at a time – but I had no work, I’d been laid off and we needed the money.

I got a job through the agency. It’s been serving the agricultural industry for more than a 100 years, providing farmhands and labor to farms. I was happy enough with the rate, and to get time off.

So, the boss turns out to be addicted to coke – doing several lines a day, wasn’t long before I took up his offer, and did a line in the morning. The work was hard going for me – I hadn’t done manual labor in the heat since the year that I left school. So I had no problem with doing a line, it perked me up just fine.

It wasn’t too long before I was doing a line at lunchtime too. I didn’t see a problem, I was still getting my regular pay – the boss gave me coke instead of the bonus that we got for work completed on time. I got to thinking that it was fair enough to trade my bonus for the coke. After all, I was the one out there working, in the flies and the heat.

After a week or so, a young lad turned up from the agency, to help out with the work. When offered coke he said no way, he was up there for the money, but he got reported as being no good, and was sent back to the city. That incident made me think a bit, about the wages, and the coke. I wondered if I gave up the coke, I could demand the money instead. But in the end, I stayed with how it was. The pay was covering the mortgage. It was the best that I could do.

Sure, if I got the bonuses, we would have had more money – but I realized if I tried to go that way, I would be out of a job, and the boss would probably give me a bad reference, like he had done to the kid.

When I finally got my fortnight off, I went home with coke in my pocket. I gave it to the wife and said, put it away while I’m home – I’m using a bit while I’m on the job – but I’ve got it under control. In truth I never touched it, got busy and did all the maintenance that was needed around the place.

Next time I came home, it was different, I’d been using three times a day, and couldn’t wait to get home at last, fix myself up with a line and hopefully, relax. My wife was not very happy, and said she didn’t want me using cocaine around the house. She reckoned we’d got out of that, and our party days, when we got the house, and another baby on the way. She even mentioned that she could do with the money that I presumably spent on buying the lines of coke.

I got agitated, pretty much pissed off – if she didn’t want my support, she could leave and go on welfare. I saw tears spring into her eyes, but I didn’t really much care, and later in the evening, did another line of coke.

I went back up country in a mood of smoldering rage, I felt trapped by the job, by my marriage, the kids, my only relief seemed to be doing a few lines of coke every day. I resented the boss, as he was the one who had put temptation in my way, I knew that the coke was bringing me down but I couldn’t get away from it, didn’t really want to you know, it was there, I needed it, just to get through the day.

I stayed with the job, on leave I went home – it was always the same old fights about me using coke, and her not having enough money. Next time I went home, the baby was born, I was looking forward to holding her, but all I found was an empty house – and a note from my wife on the table. Said she had gone to live with her mother, and I would be hearing from her solicitor.

So, I’m sitting here with you, on my leave, in this dingy hotel, I needed to talk to someone about it – tell me what hope have I got.

Just got out from the meeting –yeah, everything went fine – Board’s signed off on the figures, as intended – hey, I’ve got places to go. I snapped the mobile off and headed down to my car. Picked a silver slipper off the top of the back wheel –that’s for when I go searching for my Cinderella, later in the night. I go round to Cindy’s place, find the slipper fits, we do a line or two of coke and spend the night together.

Yeah Cindy and me – the perfect dream team – Cindy never acts out of character – she’s good – I pay her well. But this day, the slipper fails to thrill. Instead of the buzz that I usually get from a spot of creative accounting, cooking a snook at the regulators, I felt nauseous, had a pounding headache that started the moment I got into the lift to go down to my car. The afternoon was darkening, rain was pouring down. I couldn’t face the drive to a seedy row of offices just north of the city where I got my coke, regular as clockwork, every Friday evening.

Guess I was depressed – again – but I didn’t know why – hiding a billion dollar error in the client’s books was almost routine in my position – fall guy for the senior auditor in the group management section. I cut my teeth as a new recruit re-learning the difference between short and long term debt. Five years ago it seemed so smart – the client’s didn’t want to be hampered by over fastidious attention to details -they had to provide audited accounting – we gave them what they needed and of course, we were well paid.

This day I slowly steered my vehicle stop, start through heavy traffic, wishing I was someplace else – anywhere in the world. Then some idiot went through the intersection against the lights, collided with a taxi. Normally, I would have been on the phone, telling Lionel I was delayed, but this day, I sat there, turned off the engine, huddling deeper into depression. I wasn’t the least bit interested as the altercation between the drivers turned into a physical fight, and other motorists tried helplessly to get them to move their cars.

Suddenly, it was Lionel on the phone – said he couldn’t wait any longer – to call him in a few hours. My mind went numb, my hands started shaking, I never realized until Lionel hung up how much I was depending on getting that fix. It felt like I had been deserted, abandoned – with nothing to hold my mind. I wanted to call back Lionel, beg him to stay around, I wanted to get out of my car and run, just get away from it all. I wanted to cry but tears would not come, it felt like a tsunami was about to crash inside my head.

Suddenly, I was back as a child, with my father saying to me that my mother who had been in hospital wouldn’t be coming home. Then I was aroused by the sound of car horns blaring, and a face at the window – “you ok mate, you’d better move on, your holding up the traffic”. Some reflex inside me got the car moving, I finally got home.

Sitting in the lounge room all I could think of was the kitchen drawer full of knives – but something inside said no, I reached instead for the telephone book, and looked up a drug helpline that answered straight away.

That’s how I got started on a drug program that helped me rebuild my life – I don’t do coke anymore, stopped being an accountant. Now I work at the local marina – guess it’s the wind in my hair, and the ocean that really floats my boat.

Us regulars down at the “Cat”, as we called it, were intrigued when old Marjorie sold out, and Paulo, the new owner turned up in a Jaguar XK Special dressed all in black, wearing a clunky silver chain and an array of silver rings. A new type of crowd started to hang out at the Cat – the sort of people that look like they might be top movie stars hiding out from their fans. Us regulars were fascinated by these people who looked a million dollars even when dressed in casual wear – we were a stone’s throw from the beach.

 Paulo was friendly, the perfect host, but he wasn’t one for talking much about personal stuff. We regarded the constant procession of “beautiful people” as a bonus with our coffees. Paulo did some renovating and improved the café décor. We braced ourselves in fear but Paulo never increased the prices at all – we paid no more for our coffees than Marjorie used to charge.

 Gradually, there were rumors spreading that Paulo the new owner was a cocaine dealer, but we put it down to the general aura of mystery that surrounded him. None of us saw signs of any illegal dealings – or traces of cocaine, not that we exactly knew what we would be looking for. Weeks passed by and soon the beautiful people were less of a novelty, although still interesting to observe.

 Paulo always parked out front – he was very much the padrone – we marveled that no vandals ever went near his vehicle. No leaping jaguar missing from the front of Paulo’s car, or scratch marks along the panels.

 Paulo had a mansion way up along the coast – it looked down upon the bay from behind a fortress wall. The neighbors for once had nothing to say – nothing to mention at all. Paulo certainly had money behind him, but he spent most of his time, down at the coffee shop.

 Then one day there was an uproar – Paulo had been murdered – found out back of the coffee shop with a bullet in his head. The police executed a warrant and got into Paulo’s place. No guns, no ammunition, no great big stash of money, but behind a picture on a wall was a small safe that contained a block of cocaine, bearing the stamp of an infamous drug cartel.

 We were all sure that Paulo must have somehow crossed swords with his drug suppliers – we’d all heard of drug deals gone wrong – leaving money outstanding that could never be repaid. There would be an inquest.

 A neighbor close by the coffee shop testified to hearing a noise that night. It made her look out of her window. She saw a light colored van drive away from the back of the coffee shop. Now we all knew someone who lived locally, who owned a light colored van – so we immediately discussed the possibility that it was him. He said however, that he had been in his van but in another suburb where he had stayed the night, an explanation that the lady in question happily verified.

 It was only when the police had questioned her again that she remembered that, of course, Joe had gone out for a while to get a packet of smokes. After that it was easy. The state of the art GPS in Joe’s van had faithfully recorded the routes he taken over a couple of months – and particularly that night.

 In a way it was kind of tragic. We had got on with Paulo alright – he never caused anyone any trouble – and because of what had happened, it was months before the cafe re-opened. 

At Joe’s trial the truth came out – Joe had owed Paulo for coke. Paulo for all his wealth, his connections, was a user, and only a small time dealer with people that he knew, and thought that he could trust.

 He trusted Joe, and sold him some of the best. Joe had chosen to murder Paulo rather than repay a $1,500.00 drug debt.

I was heavily into cocaine before I stopped. It was nearly dying that brought me up short and made me decide to quit. It wasn’t enough that it was costing me all the money I earned, and that it was all that I thought about. It’s a very seductive place to be in, addicted to cocaine.

 I was a young guy when I first started using cocaine. It made me feel better about myself. Took me months in rehab before I could say what I can say now – I was really very timid and shy, but I put on a good face for the world, even to myself. Learned a trade and set up my own business when my time was up. I found it hard to socialize but the business kept me busy. It’s not hard to find cocaine – or perhaps it’s cocaine that finds you. Being on my own at home, no one even knew about my cocaine habit. I used cocaine to socialize, when I did paperwork. I used cocaine when I had nothing to do, used it when I needed more energy.

Slowly I got comfortable with cocaine – at first I always thought that there would be cops banging on the door, the moment that I used it. But I never had any trouble with that. I guess that I was lucky. I decided grow my business – took on apprentices, got someone to do the books. Always working, always busy, but I never seemed to make any money. I didn’t want to stop growing the business – I now had more employees, but the pressure of finding new work, meeting wages, covering expenses until customers finally paid, started to get to me, took up all of my time. Having no wife, or regular girlfriend I got more heavily into cocaine. I snorted and cocaine sort of solved every problem that I had.

 One day I got some pains in my chest, the doctor said it was angina – not too serious if I took some medication. But it got me thinking about my health. I started doing early morning beach swims – cleared my head from the coke, made me feel refreshed.

 It got to be something I had to do, go down to the beach for a swim – no matter how tired I was, no matter if I got up late, it got that I needed to have the swim, I cut breakfast, didn’t recognize how exhausted I was starting to look until one of the lads at work, after I had been particularly snappy with him, muttered something under his breath that sounded like I could use a holiday – it would give him a break. I looked in the mirror at home and saw I looked unwell. I thought better to do more swimming –even though it was starting to interfere with me getting to work.- what with the late nights I had staying back and sorting out mountains of paperwork. Then we went through a lean patch – that was when it dawned on me how much I was spending on coke, so I decided not to use it for a while, and save a bit of money.

That’s when the problems really started, it was like I suddenly got the flu, my head was pounding, I felt tired and depressed, every muscle ached. No problem I thought, I’ll start using again – it seemed to fix me up. I still didn’t see my cocaine habit as a problem. I had to let two apprentices go – I couldn’t meet wages through the downturn. They both got taken up straight away by another company – my rival.

 That depressed me some more, I felt like me and the business was starting to unravel, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on a reason for it.Then two more ‘prentices wanted to move on. I didn’t replace them, downsized the business, but it took just as long for me to try and manage it – somehow I lost the plot and spent an entire weekend, phone disconnected, just shovellin in the coke.

 Come Monday it was a struggle to get down to the beach. I got in the water, and drifted out with the tide, suddenly the beach was miles away, I panicked, I had no energy to ever make it back. Then this young fellow on a surfboard came alongside me, said I thought you looked in trouble pal, hang on, and I’ll tow you in. I nearly didn’t make it even then, and fell unconscious on the beach. The doctor in the hospital said they’d run some tests – keep going the way I was, I’d be probably dead in a month.

 So, I quit what was left of my business, got into a drug free rehab – the detox part was sheer relief, coming to terms with why I was using cocaine was quite a bit harder, but they never gave up on me. Now I’ve retrained as a primary teacher, I really love the work, whenever I get the chance I mention to the kids about how they should never do drugs.