A Conversation

Story? Chapter? This is only a conversation, the rest is unwritten

“He doesn’t need you to judge him right now” I told him, I’d never looked at him like this before, Andy was always so warm and we didn’t disagree on anything, but I couldn’t just let this one slide by... or so that I agreed with him when I absolutely didn't.

“So you think it’s okay what he’s doing!?” Andy narrowed his eyes, offended by the suggestion. I struggle to look at him when he sits only in front of me, on his bed, with his legs crossed, where we always sit but this is different, the place is the same but everything else is different.

“He doesn’t need everyone to tell him what he already knows, he’s not stupid.” It was true, he wasn’t, he knew and he’d always been relatively straight forward when it came to these things, it was out of character, but then these things usually are. “He just needs you to be there and to know that he can save himself and then you’ll be there, after.”

“But he needs to know it’s not Okay” he says shaking, thrusting his hands at me. 

“It’s not okay, but its not as, it’s not exactly how it looks” I struggle to make eye contact at this point, I’m assuming, I can’t speak entirely on someone else’s behalf.

“How would you know?” Andy bites at me and I realise I need to be more persuasive here, without painting a picture I'm just arguing with him and he hates that.

“Think about the most religious person you know, and how they follow the rules because it’s what they believe in, they’re dead certain that’s the right thing and it keeps them strong, it keeps them good and happy, but then if one day you could somehow magically prove to them that god isn’t real… how would they react?…. Anyone would be lost, you just put a hole in their life, and when that happens you can’t control what comes with it.”

He stares at me for a long while as I speak and after I’m done talking considers for a moment, “so you’re saying you were on drugs.”

“Yes.” I say, knowing that I can’t lie about this, I shouldn’t and that it’s not as black and white as it so often comes across.

“How did you get addicted?” He asks, trying to hide his look of disappointment but not doing a good enough job of it.

“Something in my head was there” I can’t stress what it is, how it felt, but I go on, “then in my chest and it moved into my stomach, and I never realised I could feel so much, it moved all through" I almost cinge at the memeory of the feelings that came over me, "and I felt weak and half of myself, and then it was gone and I couldn’t feel anything… And I was stuck like that.”

He looks past me as he asks “What happened?” The way he looks at me doesn't make it any easier, to tell him something I've not really told anyone in this detail.

I tell him in my lowest voice, "I got lost, and went back to some things I'd tried before, and then got lost again." He stares at me as the room fades to black, "and then I stopped taking anything until I couldn't feel anything."

Reviews

[TL Boehm]

This is a good start and I believe there is a powerful little story here. My suggestion is - tense. Make sure that you stay in either the present or the past tense throughout so your reader can place the time frame of the story - looks/looked etc. The ending is catchy. I want to know more.