Needle (51 page)

“Pay me out of the register.”

She then pulled open the drawer, which had only $135 in it.

“I can’t leave the register completely empty or they won’t have a bank to work with tomorrow morning,” Melissa explained.

“So what? They’re not gonna have any customers to work with either.”

“I just can’t do it, Craig. I’m
really
sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it,” I said. Then, a moment after she stepped away to use the restroom, I took the money out of the register and left Gotham City never to return. On the following evening I packed my bag and checked into the Whitehouse Hotel.

94

I’m not exactly sure when I started pumping cocaine into my arm. I know it happened after moving into the Whitehouse Hotel, and I’m almost certain that Perry was present. Unfortunately, memories of this period are among the haziest of all, and the clouded recollections can only be attributed to my ever-expanding and increasingly reckless drug use.

Initially, I had attempted to join Perry at the Sunshine Hotel, but there were no vacancies and I was forced to check in to the Whitehouse. Though my previous exposure to the infamous flophouse had been sufficient enough to make me fear it, to truly appreciate the degradation within one must venture past the hotel lobby and become a resident. Moments after my own residency was established and I headed up the staircase—like an airborne harbinger
of awful things to come—my nose was immediately assaulted by the pungent odor of aseptic cleanser and, as if to justify the sterile noxiousness, the foul stench of forsaken humanity.

I was assigned to stall #38 on the third floor, and would exist within this 8 x 5 foot space for several months. It came without a ceiling and with nothing other than four walls and a cot which claimed roughly half the stall’s total area. This left me with just enough floor space for a duffle bag containing all of my worldly possessions—including a walkman, a few articles of clothing, and a couple of bags of dope that were immediately torn into as I came to terms with my new habitat. Of course, my worst fear had now come to fruition and all the dope in the world couldn’t change that. But as I sat there tapping a vein, a strange calm had settled over me. A
scary
calm had settled over me. I was tired. I was broken. I didn’t even have the desire or energy to rationalize my situation as one last indignity to suffer through before the good times could finally start rolling. Then, at some point, a knock at the door ripped me away from my medicated complacency.

“Yo, man—open up,” said a voice on the other side. “They sent me up here with your sheets.”

Still seated on my cot, I kicked open the door and was confronted by an older resident whose beard was so dirty that I couldn’t tell what color lay beneath.

“It’s like a Turkish prison in here,” I accidentally slurred while peering at the old man from beneath my nod.

“It’s worse,” he responded. “At least in prison a man’s got some hope.”

I would soon learn that the name of the gentleman standing before me was Bill. He had been living at the Whitehouse for several years and was in his mid-fifties, though he looked much older.

“By the way,” he mentioned before departing. “I’d get a lock for this door if you wanna keep whatever shit you’ve got left.”

I heeded his advice. I went next door to a bodega that conveniently sold combination locks and by the time I returned—my walkman had already been stolen. If I wasn’t so fucked up I would’ve been completely pissed off. Instead, I decided to wrap myself up in that false sense of well being and eventually fell asleep.

By 9 a.m. I awoke to discussions, arguments, laughter, and a variety of curses emanating from the stalls that surrounded my own. Unfortunately, I was now sober and the reality around me was even
more difficult to bear than it had been the previous night. I was jobless, homeless, and officially living at the Whitehouse Hotel. Although my immediate instinct was to score and detach, I knew that I first had to find a job…quickly. With that in mind, I decided it was time to get out of cot and begin the search.

Although I had checked-in over twelve hours ago, the squalor of my new dwelling hadn’t fully revealed itself. I was already wasted when I arrived the night before, and without the illumination of sunlight
and
sobriety the surrounding misery had remained largely hidden. Of course, when I opened the door to my stall that first morning—things became infinitely clearer.

The third floor—which was much like every other floor of the hotel—was a gymnasium-sized, rectangular-shaped room. Twenty to thirty stalls lined each wall and within the center of the room was another, smaller, rectangle of stalls. Thus, a hallway separated the rectangles and ran along the perimeter of the entire floor. Everything was dirty and rundown, and the wooden floors were rotting away as the smell of mildew lingered throughout the building.

With my toothbrush and toothpaste in hand, I left my stall and headed into a large bathroom near the main staircase as a hairy old man wearing shit-stained underwear scurried across my path like a frightened rodent. I immediately went about my business and after brushing my teeth, momentarily caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror as a strung-out raccoon stared back. I then exited the bathroom and, without showering or shaving, stumbled out of the Whitehouse to find a job.

I remember getting hired almost immediately at what must’ve been a very desperate restaurant on Broadway. It was owned and operated by Arabs, and every day Lauren Hutton came in for breakfast. However, beyond that I can only recall the job generated just enough money to pay for ten dollar-a-day accommodations, what would soon become a sixty dollar-a-day drug habit, and a diet consisting exclusively of Little Debbies.

Each day I worked the breakfast/lunch shift and afterwards, would head over to a new spot known as “Bag in a Bag” on Second Street between Avenues B and C. By this point my habit had increased from three booted bags-a-day to four, and after scoring I would immediately retire to the Whitehouse for the evening. My life had become meaningless. Even so, if someone asked—
I still had big plans for the future
. Of course, the answer was purely rote. I had now
conditioned myself into believing a false destiny and was just too terrified of the alternate ending to be able to acknowledge it. If for a moment I did, my dysfunction would conveniently rise to the occasion to appease me with a self-serving pep-talk.

By the end of April, Perry had departed the Sunshine Hotel to join me at the Whitehouse. He was assigned to stall #67 which was also located on the third floor, but in the middle rectangle. Although, again, I’m unsure of exactly when I started mainlining cocaine, I know that it happened shortly after Perry’s arrival as the notion would’ve never occurred to me on my own. However, once I was introduced to my very first speedball his presence was never again required.

At first, I stuck to the traditional speedball recipe of mixing heroin with cocaine and realized I quite liked the effect of experiencing both drugs simultaneously. After slipping the concoction into my arm, I could feel the coke pummel my heart and marinate my brain with a skewed, slightly electrified variation of the opiate-induced euphoria. However, I soon also realized I appreciated cocaine for the sake of itself, and actually preferred the intravenously enhanced rush to be unadulterated—even though it made me throw up. As a result, a new routine was established. I would start things off with a needle full of dope, and then periodically administer cocaine throughout the evening and in between purges. Then, after the final coke-rush had run its course, I would mainline the last of my dope to ensure a pleasant end to the evening. It was like jumping out of a plane,
and into a big pile of love
.

Unfortunately, besides puking, the new drug delivery schedule had other drawbacks. Because I was now administering both drugs independently, I began sticking myself six or seven times per evening and in a matter of days my veins had significantly deteriorated. In fact, they usually bled extensively at the slightest penetration. As a result, I soon found myself with little in terms of a viable passageway, and on one evening in particular I decided to skin-pop the last of my stash. Without paying attention to what I was doing or where I was doing it, I plunged the syringe into my right arm—just beneath the shoulder and on the edge of my tricep. It was hardly a fleshy enough area to sustain a skin-pop, and though it hurt like hell I didn’t give it much thought at the time. However, within a few days the area around my tricep became swollen and inflamed as an oily orange fluid began to incessantly seep from the puncture wound. Actually, it felt like a
gigantic pimple that was about to explode, and though I constantly tried to expel whatever lay hidden within the volcano-like mound of flesh, my efforts yielded only more of the same oily discharge.

On May 1
^st
I finally paid a visit to a downtown clinic where, after shamefully disclosing my dysfunction to the medical staff, I was told that I’d given myself a hematoma which had now abscessed and was clearly infected. To complicate matters, the mass of bacteria was lodged
beneath
my tricep. Consequently, its removal would require a relatively minor surgery which was scheduled for the following week.

As I sat atop an examination table while a doctor finished surveying the self-inflicted damage, I realized I was actually embarrassed by my own condition. No, wait a minute—
I was fucking humiliated
. It was as if for the first time I had officially unveiled my depraved condition to the civilized world.

“I’m
really
sorry about all of this.… I’m gonna quit using,” I lied, hoping that for just a moment she could see past the degradation festering before her. “I’m not kidding. I’m definitely gonna quit… I swear it.”

I really needed her to say something—
anything
that would help me look the other way. Unfortunately, I hadn’t the foggiest notion of what that might be. I wasn’t necessarily looking for sympathy, concern, or even medical advice. Maybe, I just needed her to acknowledge the fact that I wasn’t like all the others, that I wasn’t a hopeless, run-of-the-mill street junky destined for prison or an early grave. I mean—after all—
I was special
. I still had great things to look forward to,
didn’t I?
Regardless, she said nothing and continued to finish up her business as if I wasn’t even in the room. After a long and awkward silence I finally decided to give it one last-ditch effort.

“I am
so
embarrassed… I can’t believe I let this happen to me.”

Finally, she responded:

“Oh well, you know—shit happens.
”

95

I walk fast, but I don’t run. I walk like I have an
appointment
to make. A very
important
appointment. The
most
important appointment. Avenue B, Avenue A and then First, Second and Bowery before I’m home at last. In through the front door and up the staircase—three steps at a time—past the second floor and then on up to the third.

Holy shit…my heart’s already racing and I haven’t even gotten started
.

I hang a right, a quick left, and then finally another left. Thirty-three, 34, 35, 36, 37—
stall #38
. This is my home. This is where
I live
. This is where I do things that horrify. This is where I break the law. This is where I hide from the world. This is where I hide from the truth. This is where I hide from…
myself
.

I tear into the dope, empty it into a spoon, cook it up and ram it in.

Ah yes, my old friend…now meet my new friend
.

I rip into the cocaine, empty it into a spoon, cook it up and
OOOPS!!!

Stop right there. Never cook-up coke unless you’re making crack—and everyone knows that
crack is for fucking losers
.
Nope, straight from the spoon and into my vein…any vein…please find a vein. Ah yes, there’s one! No, it’s fucking shot. How about old reliable? Oh—come on, just one more time—just one more. Please baby, please
…
YES!!!
There you go
…
and again, and again, and again!!!
Ignore the blood
—
ignore it!
Now keep looking the other way and
HOLY FUCKING SHIT!!!
My heart is pounding, sweat is dripping from every pore, and the orange discharge is mingling with blood as I’m ramming a broken needle into a broken vein and thinking,
man—it doesn’t get any better than this
.

###

Sometime in early May, Bill died peacefully in his sleep from unknown causes. Allegedly, however, his body wasn’t discovered until a few days later when the aroma of death was finally able to establish itself as the King of All Stenches.

Although I never had any interactions with Bill beyond the first
day when he delivered my bed sheets, the distinction he drew between the Whitehouse and prison was more profound than I first realized. In prison, or even jail, one’s freedom is stripped away as are, of course, the means to improve one’s condition. However, this is usually a temporary situation and in most cases a new beginning will eventually be on the horizon. Thus, to the incarcerated psyche, things can
only
get better.

By contrast, a grayish despondency pervaded the Whitehouse Hotel. Everyone and everything in it was hopeless right down to the rotting floorboard, seemingly in a contest to outlive the forlorn souls that traipsed upon it. And whereas most prisoners ultimately have their freedom to look forward to, many Whitehouse residents had already come full circle. For them, there was simply nowhere left to go besides the street, a shelter, back to prison or an early grave. In fact, I’ve often considered that Bill’s sudden death was due to complications brought on by terminal despair. Usually, you could see that despair on the faces of residents—unless they were high, though drug addicts were only one of the many forsaken demographics on the guest list. Of course, my situation was about as bleak as anyone else’s and at times I knew it. However, I could quickly neutralize that awareness by coating it in a thick layer of cocaine, followed by a rich finish of heroin just to make sure it didn’t know what the fuck was going on.