Cold Turkey

Addiction at it's finest.

"Stop this, you're being crazy."

Calm, collected, cool...in control.

    

     "Well," I lectured, "we're all a little crazy."

    

     "Now you're just being melodramatic." he chuckled.



     I aimed my gun right at his chest. I screamed, "And you're going to be a dead man if you don't knock off the s**t!"

     He put his hands up, smiled, and slowly paced back and forth a few steps. He did not mind the gun. He did not mind the situation. His raised hands were just for show; to keep me content. He just wanted me to believe that for once in my life I was in control. Truth be told, I was terrified. I could not quit shaking.

     He inspected my uncontrollable movements. "You're jittery," he grinned, "you need more."

     "All I need is for you to quit running your godda..."

    

     "You can't survive without it", he interrupted.

    I was drenched head to toe as if I had just gone for a swim. I felt as if tiny pins were constantly piercing my entire body. The anguish. The f*****g pain.

    "You know," he remarked as he slowly lowered his hands and kicked around a pile of trash on my bedroom floor, "you should really tidy up this s**t hole."

    

    I produced a "reach for the sky" gesture with my weapon. "Get your goddamn hands back up."

    He laughed, "Beer bottles everywhere! Not to mention the f*****g smell! This place reeks so bad..."

     I rushed right up to him and shoved the gun close enough to his face so he could get a whiff of the metal. "I said to put your hands up."

     He smirked and practically whispered, "The stench is so bad you can almost taste it."

     I grabbed is shirt collar, "NOW!"

     He didn't flinch, "You can almost feel bubbling sensations on the back of your throat."

    "Stop it." I begged, slowly backing away from him.

    "You can almost feel your belly full of courage." He snickered.

     I clasped my head, gun still in hand, quivering my face back and forth as if I were motioning the word "no".

    "Stop..." As I backed up, he pressed forward towards me.

    "Hopes, troubles, ideals...they all seem the same when you're staring through the bottom of a bottle."

    I backed up against a wall, still trembling, still pathetically pleading. I was nearly inaudible, "Please stop."

    He was progressively getting louder, still advancing, going in for the kill, still in control. He gave an ugly grin and his eyes grew wide. His eyes grew hungry..as if they craved blood:

"No worries, no regrets, just empty."



    "It's as if all the opinions, dreams, and problems of this miserable world amount to nothing!"

    I could barely speak. "No more..."

    "No more?!" He was now mere inches away from my face. "NO MORE RUNNING AWAY!" He screamed, "THIS IS WHO YOU ARE! You're a black hole that sucks the f*****g joy out of everything life has to offer; a coward with no sense of honor or dignity. You are scared s**t less. You're a drunk! Face that fact, move on, grab a drink, and stop running away from the real you. F**k the consequences! Come out of your rabbit borrow and help yourself to Mr. McGregor's garden!"

    At that moment, at that point in time, at that instant just before I had abandoned all hope, he whispered two little words in my ear:

"Stop hiding..."

    I let out a horrific sound that seemed to have been birthed from the depths of hell and kicked him as hard as I could in the stomach. He landed on the floor with a thud. As I aimed the gun down, he swiftly closed his eyes and shielded his face with his hands. I started firing. I screamed...and I fired. I screamed until every shell casing from every bullet in my clip made their last tiny metallic clink on my dirty hardwood floor. When the dust settled, he was no where to be found.

    After taking a few moments to compose myself; after my return to reality I thought, "That was a bad one. If I keep this s**t up the neighbors are gonna call the cops for sure." My one hope was I didn't kill anyone on the floor below me.

    I wandered to my window and opened the shades. Light flooded into my room as if it were drowning the darkness; the nothing. I swung my window open and relinguished my pistol to the alley. I set my gaze on the city skyline, the sun was shimmering with joy.

   

    I felt closer to peace. After being roommates with chaos for most of my existence I wondered if peace was something I could actually obtain or something that I would forever be in pursuit of.

    "The pursuit would be my new struggle." I thought.

    As I felt the breeze on my face, I contemplated "tranquility or not, no more hiding."

    There was a knock at my door. I turned away from the window, still in pain, still sweating and shaking. I roamed sluggishly to the pounding at my door thinking:

"What excuse can I use this time?"