Needle (27 page)

As desperation set in, I strolled into Hunter College’s financial aid office to claim loans for the second semester before it ended, and before they realized I hadn’t even attended the first. I collected $1500, half of which was spent on rent and household bills. The rest would eventually go to drugs; however, I temporarily suspended my crack habit because with Matt around, the remaining cash would’ve gone up in smoke immediately.

Meanwhile, each day after work I would report to Lenox Hill to deliver Perry a pack of cigarettes and a bag of dope. Certainly, I knew I was breaking hospital regulations. “No Smoking” reminders were plastered everywhere, and though there was nothing posted about shooting dope—I assumed that was against the rules as well.

Of course, we weren’t fooling anyone. Doctors, nurses and hospital administrators knew that Perry was still using, and every other day he was administered a blood test that would remind them of the fact. But how was he getting it? Perry received regular visits from not only me—but Gina, Katrina, Justin, Anton, Leslie, Chris and many others, all of whom could have been the culprit or culprits. Although they didn’t think he would dare sneak out of the hospital to score for himself, just to be on the safe side the nurses confiscated his street clothes to eliminate him from the list of possible suspects.

On the afternoon of December 8
^th
I made my daily delivery to the hospital, but Perry was nowhere to be found. I would soon learn that just days before surgery, he once again found himself bored and thought he might pass the time by seeing a movie. So, in his gown and with a catheter sticking out of his arm, he snuck out of the hospital and walked nine blocks in 30 degree temperatures to a theater on 86
^th
Street. And yes, once he paid for the ticket he was permitted entry—catheter, gown, slippers, and all.

I waited in his room for about a half-hour, and just as I was finally about to give up—in walked Perry along with two security officers who caught him traipsing through the lobby on his way back from the theater. When I saw him, I could tell he had somehow scored for himself and was already wasted.

“Where were you?” I immediately asked.

“Dazed and confused,” he slurred.

“Obviously.”

“No, the movie.”

“Oh…How was it?”

“I’m not sure.”

From that point on hospital officials were convinced that Perry had somehow been escaping on a regular basis to buy drugs. As a result, they were constantly on high alert and on the verge of chaining him to his bed.

The next day I left work and again headed up to 110
^th
Street to score; however, upon my arrival I immediately realized that something had changed. At first, I wasn’t quite sure what it was, but within a moment or two I realized that the dealers were nowhere to be found, and that nobody was selling anything to anyone—
not even a set of works
. Typically, 110
^th
Street was pure paradise for a dope fiend. At any given moment there were usually several dope dealers roaming about, as “Hot City,” “Hot Party,” and “Black Flag” could be heard as they strolled by and openly peddled their respective brands.

Although the same, old, addicts still lingered—they looked nervous, moved cautiously, and no one said a word to me as I headed east on 110
^th
. Then, as I made a left onto Third Avenue and rounded the corner of 111
^th
Street, I was horrified to see three white junkies with their hands against the wall of a building.

Holy shit! This was the first time I ever remembered seeing a bust go down in this part of Harlem, known as
Spanish
Harlem due to the area’s high concentration of Latinos. I instinctively turned around and
headed back toward 110
^th
Street when I was approached by an old, vaguely familiar-looking junky.

“It’s hot out here and 5-O’s lookin’ at you
hard
, son!” he said to me as he passed.

In junky-speak that meant people were getting arrested while the police were closely monitoring my behavior.

“What the fuck are they watching
me
for?” I turned and asked as innocently as possible.

“Maybe cuz you a white boy tryin’ to buy drugs in Harlem,” he said and kept right on walking.

By this point I’d been a white boy trying to buy drugs in Harlem for about as long as I could remember. Why should things suddenly be different? Here’s why:

The previous month, our beloved Mayor Dinkins was dethroned by Rudy Giuliani who had already made good on his campaign promise to eliminate the “open-air drug bazaars” that plagued the city. Now, I realized two things: one—it took a black mayor to make a white junky feel safe from white cops in Spanish Harlem and two—
you never know what you’ve got until it’s gone
.

I turned around to see a cop in the driver’s seat of a patrol car staring intensely at me. It had become clear that the climate in Spanish Harlem had changed.
Now
, if you were white and in the area you’d better have a good reason for being there—
and a sudden craving for cuchifritos just wasn’t gonna cut it anymore
.

I hopped in a cab and decided to give the Hell’s Kitchen spot by my apartment a try. When I got there I was mortified. My slippery-looking Colombian with bad skin had his hands against the wall and was about to be loaded into a police van.

“Holy fucking shit!” I said to the cabbie. “Change of plans. Bring me down to Avenue D and Sixth Street.”

Amazingly, when we got downtown the scene was much the same, as the new mayor’s drug crusade had apparently penetrated all of my regular haunts. Although I didn’t notice anyone getting busted at this particular location—cops were everywhere. The only other spot left to try was 18
^th
Street, and those dealers didn’t come out until later.

That was it. I was out of resources. I went back uptown to Lenox Hill, and by that point I’d already spent over $50 in cab rides just to come up empty.

“Where the fuck have
you
been?!” Perry demanded, obviously
referring to my much later than anticipated arrival.

“Trying to score.”

“Did you get anything?” he asked, expecting me to answer in the affirmative.

“Negative.”

“FUCK!!! Where’d you look?”

“Everywhere.”

“Did you try on 106
^th
Street?”

“A hundred and sixth?” I asked, as I was totally unaware of the spot’s existence.

“They sell nickel bags out of an apartment on the corner of First Avenue, and they’re actually pretty good if you boot two.”

“I’ve never been there and I’m not gonna knock on some dope dealer’s door.”

“Don’t be such a pussy. He’ll buzz you in.”

“Fuck you!” I said. “Wait until the dealers on 18
^th
Street come out.”

“By Beth Israel?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s not until at least 9:00 and visiting hours are over by then,” he told me.

“Well then I guess you’re shit outta luck.”

“Fine! I’ll go to 106
^th
Street myself, you big pussy.”

“Just wait a second,” I said, trying to dissuade him from yet another stupid escape. “I’ll go downtown and wait for the dealers to come out. After I hook it up, I’ll cab it back to the hospital and talk my way in.”

“They’ll never let you back upstairs. Come on, let’s go,” he said and of course there was no arguing with him.

Perry and I were forced to leave the hospital through a fire exit, as merely the sight of him in the lobby was enough to sound the alarms. Then, the moment he tasted freedom, he flagged a cab and within minutes we arrived at his secret, 106
^th
Street location.

“Wait in there a minute,” he said to me while pointing at a White Castle located just across the street.

I went inside, ordered four cheeseburgers, sat down and waited for Perry. Within minutes I noticed him enter the restaurant and dart into the bathroom, and I quickly abandoned the tiny burgers and followed him in. After getting off, I returned to the table with Perry in tow to finish eating, though the dope made consuming any more than two of
the cheeseburgers an impossibility.

“You want one of these?” I asked as I offered him a cheeseburger.

“Get that shit out of my face!” Perry said with a bit more passion than I expected.

“Why?”

“I’m not allowed to eat cheese right now…it’s against medical advice,” he said while high on dope, dressed in a hospital gown, and wearing a catheter at a White Castle in Spanish Harlem.

53

Recording sessions were to begin on December 10
^th
at Fast Trax Studios on 28
^th
Street and Eighth Avenue, two days before Perry was scheduled to undergo heart surgery. That afternoon, I had arranged for Justin and Chris to meet me there along with Matt at 7 p.m.

I was worried about the session. I really had no idea where to begin, especially while Perry was in the hospital and there was such an emphasis placed on being cost efficient. This urgency was stressed by Catherine, who was a little annoyed by our refusal to record digitally and instead opt for an analog recording which was considerably more expensive. In the mid-nineties, many musicians weren’t yet convinced of the merits of the new technology, and a rumor persisted that the warmth and resonance of certain instruments couldn’t be reproduced digitally. Of course, this was pure rubbish as the “warmth and resonance” we were all so mesmerized by would eventually be identified as hiss and background noise. Had we gone along with the digital option we would have saved thousands, and the CD would have sounded even cleaner and better produced.

On December 10
^th
I decided to delay the dope purchase until after the session concluded, as Matt was scheduled to record guitar tracks and I thought it wise to keep him as sober as possible. Unfortunately, upon returning home from Serendipity I discovered him too dopesick to function, and this was far too important of an occasion for me to just sit back and enjoy the sight of him suffering. With that in mind, I headed back downstairs to score each of us a bag. Thankfully, ever
since his last visit to the emergency room Matt had no choice other than to wean his habit down to a single bag a day.

“We’re gonna be in there for at least five hours,” he said as I handed him his dope. “Maybe you should get another bag or two.”

“Maybe you should get some money,” I suggested.

“Oh, don’t worry about it, man—it’ll work out. I have some weed and a six-pack of Old English that we can bring along.”

“Oh good, because I was really worried that you weren’t gonna be fucked up enough,” I said, as once again Matt demonstrated the fact that he was always cocked and loaded to get out of control. Although one bag of dope would be sufficient to keep him straight, it certainly wouldn’t be enough for him to obliterate himself. As a result, he felt he had no choice other than to supplement his buzz with marijuana and alcohol. And incidentally, though Matt really didn’t care for Old English 800—I absolutely despised it so it was always his six-pack of choice as he could rely on being able to hoard it all. The fact that he purchased the malt liquor with my money seemed to matter little.

We headed downtown to the studio, and when we arrived Chris was already arranging the drum mikes with Nick, the engineer who would be recording the CD. I liked Nick. He was from New Jersey and had volunteered for the project because he was impressed with the old demo.

“I think their might be a problem with the sax, though,” he said.

“Don’t worry about it,” I told him. “The problem’s been eliminated.”

For two hours, while Chris and Nick worked diligently to arrange the microphones, Matt strutted around the studio—smoking blunts and drinking malt liquor.

“Hey Dr. Dre!” I snapped. “Why don’t you tune your guitar or something?”

“I already did!”

Sometimes I really hated him
.

“By the way, can I have one of these?” I then asked, pointing to the six-pack of Old English 800.

“Really?!”

“Yeah, fucking really!”

He begrudgingly handed over one of the cans, and as I went to the bathroom to pour it down the drain I was yet again mesmerized by his selfishness.

Justin arrived at about 9:30 and shortly thereafter we started. “The
Wish” was the obvious song to begin with, not because it was possibly our strongest—but because Matt was the only one who could play the rhythm guitar track. The fact that he was presently living in my apartment offered little confidence with regard to his reliability, and since he was at the studio and in working condition I thought it best to complete the one portion of the CD for which his talents were indispensible. Unfortunately, while running through the song, the complexity of the chord progression prevented Chris from coming up with anything cohesive, and for almost two hours they bumbled along, never capturing the energy that the music was written with.

“Hey guys, you know what?” I said to Chris and Justin. “Why don’t you call it a night? Matt and I’ll try to get this straight so you have something decent to work with later.”

Although it hardly justified the expense of the evening’s session, with the help of a click track to compensate for the lack of percussive time-keeping, Matt was able to record a perfect rhythm-guitar track. But unfortunately, with all the time wasted it took us five hours to do what should have easily been accomplished in one. Obviously, even with that one success the session was considered a waste of time and money.

The day after the session, which was the day before Perry was to get cut open, I made my usual visit to the hospital. However, I decided to spare him the news about our lackluster recording effort and instead save it for a post-operative surprise. Before surgery could commence, however, Perry had a big decision to make.

When I arrived at Lenox Hill, Perry and his heart surgeon were discussing the pros and cons of replacing his damaged valve with that of a donor’s, or with a synthetic valve made of metal. The metal version was generally more durable and less likely to require surgical maintenance in the future; however, it did require a specific blood consistency, so much so that not only would Perry be forced to take blood thinners for the rest of his life, he would also be prohibited from ever again sticking himself with a needle. This was no idle warning. Even though the valve was synthetic, Perry would still be entirely susceptible to a reoccurrence of the infection due to the development of infection-friendly scar tissue and other factors resulting from the upcoming surgery. Consequently, if endocarditis was to reappear, and even a tiny piece of bacterial vegetation was to break off into his bloodstream, the synthetic valve would likely suffer a catastrophic failure resulting in almost immediate death. As far as the donor valve
was concerned, it was better equipped to endure such rigors without immediately shutting down; however, any transplanted valve made of tissue had an expiration date of approximately ten years, at which point it would again have to be replaced—regardless of whether it was attached to the heart of a junky or not. Of course, a valve made of tissue was—in and of itself—also susceptible to a reoccurrence of the infection. For a committed junky it was simply a no-win situation.