Glorified high ✓

III

I remember it still. It was a Wednesday, a random day, middle of the week. Nothing monumental should have been happening on a Wednesday afternoon, I thought. I was about to start working on my essay, hoping that getting a head start on homework would be helpful. I have liked most of my professors so far. What surprised me was a loud knock on my door, followed by a violent entering, not even giving me the chance to say come in. My roommate dropped a beer bottle on my desk, grinning, and asked me to get out, open that beer and have some fun. He and his friends were organizing a small party in the apartment and he invited me to join them. I was puzzled, it was three o'clock on a Wednesday.

What he said to me next I didn't quite understand at the time but it's a mantra that I would soon adopt. "Our weekends start whenever we want to, not when some ancient Babylonians decided by creating a calendar or seven days in a week. The concept of time is only an illusion made up by human memories, everything that has ever been and ever will be is happening in the now."

When I finally left my room to see what all that hippy gibberish was all about I was genuinely confused when I saw you, standing in the middle of our living room, holding your phone to your ear and telling our address to the person on the other side. My first thought was how dare you call someone to come over, this was my house, did you ask my permission, I needed to study and you people just barged in uninvited, but then you suddenly looked at me across the room and you smiled. Wide, all teeth and dimples, like you just saw a dear friend even though you never saw me before in your life. It was clear seconds later that you smiled at whatever the person on the phone with you said and not at me. There would come a time when you smiled like that with me, only me. It wouldn't last long and I wish I knew that then because at various points throughout my life I would analyze the moment of that day, methodically and obsessively.

Two more girls and two more guys joined our impromptu house party, one of them was a local DJ and she brought some of her equipment and started spinning records. In the haze of alcohol and weed and voices and strangely intense tones of the music that I never personally listened to before I came to realize that I could get used to this, that I didn't mind this. This is what university life was all about - floating around at parties and meeting new, exciting people. I was convinced I could manage studies and this kind of socializing, these guys did it and they all seemed to be students according to a few conversations I held with them during the day. But I should have known that there was a line I shouldn't have crossed. That I could've played but shouldn't have played too hard. And it dawned on me, unfortunately much later - what you do now can fuck you up later for real.

The moment I stepped into our kitchen and saw you drawing lines on the kitchen counter, so casual and skilled some part of me had known where things were headed. I noticed the silver rings on your fingers while your hand moved your credit card cutting lumps of white powder. I noticed a small tattoo on your forefinger. You had a dozen or so more that I would get to know every shade and line off. It was late in the afternoon but the setting sun was still peeking through our ugly blinds and the first time you talked to me you offered me drugs.

"Would you like some?"

The smirk on your lips mirrored the one of the devil himself but when I declined your expression softened, angel-like, relieved, maybe you were pleasantly surprised that there's some innocence left in that dystopian world of which you were the uncrowned King. "That's cool, more for me."

Your voice echoed and then you bent down, inhaling the poison, leaving me speechless as I stood rooted to my spot, entranced by the movement. You noticed my wariness and instantly pinned me with a merciless stare so icy cold that I could feel the chill down to my toes. "There won't be any problems? Roomie?" I sensed the threat in your voice - you were definitely suspicious of me and my sudden presence in your friend's life, even though technically you were the intruder who just showed up uninvited in my home doing illegal business on top of my kitchen counter.  But like I already mentioned, you had all the reins, your authoritarian mode, your effortless charm, and no-fucks-given attitude demanded respect, sometimes fear, or at the worst turning a blind eye to all your potentially dangerous affairs. I wasn't ever going to be that person, I didn't tattle, and I would never rat on my friends, not that I considered all of you friends at that point nevertheless, I didn't want trouble. And I was going to mind my business, and let you mind yours.

"Definitely not my problem if you want to poison yourself, I don't even know you, man." 

You blinked and an expression blossomed in your face exuding the kind of bliss seen on angels in medieval paintings. The shade of your long eyelashes danced on your cheekbones, it was a strange thing to notice, but I did, it must have been the light from the outside that just hit you that moment. There was a suggestion of otherworldliness hovering around you. You held your hand for me to shake and introduced yourself with a delightful smile, attitude instantly changed from your previous murderous stare. I shook your hand. "Now you know me. So be careful, might become your problem after all."