High

Two roommates get high together for the last time before one of them leaves.

The moon steps slowly, tentatively in the dim room, walking on slender, delicate tiptoes to avoid the bottles on the floor, yet lighting the wasted pills up gently, careful so as not to draw blood from her feet, add a splash of crimson to the sloshed floor of the room, the ruffled sheets of the bed.

We are sprawled on the floor, feeling the pleasant wood planks creak under our combined weight.

Blooming blue hyacinths on the ceiling.

“You see that, eh?”

I turn my head to look at the voice next to me, he looks at me with the wild eyes of a drunkard and the serene demeanor of a saint.

I nodded, “yeah…”

So, he sees the hyacinths too.(blue? Green? Cyan?)

“What do you think it was, the morphine or the whiskey?”, a sweeping gesture at the bourbon bottled lying with corks unscrewed.

“Must be the LSD.”

“We don’t have LSD, you fool, couldn’t get it, remember?”

Shrill laughter bounced between each other as we clutched at each other, sides aching with glorious laughter.

Sudden drop to sobriety on his part, and he pokes my side.

“You know…”

“I don’t.”

Aching laughter.

An insistent cluck of his tongue as he tries to zero in his gaze on me.

“Seriously, listen. I won’t take the vicodin up with me at that godforsaken place. Whaddwhatsthename?”

“Nevada. And you’re slurring.”

“No, I ain’t slurring. You little- you dipshit- you-you…”

A miffed pause as I support him up against the scratched wall, illuminating him by the moon.

He looks at me with curiosity, as much can be mustered by someone high, but contents himself with a slap on my face, where the whiskey still hadn’t dried.

“And why aren’t you taking the Vicodin?”

He looked at me in the eye, tried to, anyway.

“Be a good man, me. I will be good.”

“That’s not why.”

Affectionate knock with the knuckles on my head.

“Smartass.”

“I know.”

“Well, if you really wanna know, you busybody, I don’t want to see those-”

Squiggles his fingers, long and beautiful.

 “-green-pink y’know, those flowery type s**t, whaddamacallit?”

“Mandalas?”

I tried to help, although I was high up, mandalas were too earthly for my state.

“Yeah, blue hyacinths for morphine, green-pink mandalas for vicodin!

Did you see the lamp dance right now?”

“Colourful lambs-see…”

I pointed towards the right side of the ceiling, trying to make out the pattern of the colourful lambs.

A silence punctuated by our soft breaths.

“Grazie.”

Thank you…I looked at him.

“Why?”

“Getting high with me. I like snorting heroin with you. Kinda takes you off the ‘responsible roomie’ act you put on for me, though?”

Devilish grin.

“For starters, that was morphine we snorted. And I wouldn’t be putting up with your bullshit if well…if you weren’t leaving.”

I looked away and that aching wetness was back in my eyes.

I chugged some whiskey down, hoping to chug the tears down too.

“Poker-face. We’ll see each other again. You know it, I know it. Why the hassle of crying? Your eyes will hurt again, you know.

Cheer up before I stuff vicodin down your throat.”

He tried to.

We struggled on the wood-planks. Him holding me down, laughing and trying to stuff powder down my throat.

“That’s powder!”

“Okay sorry! Why do you even have powder everywhere?”

He completely let go of the powder and it sprinkled all over the floor. Taking advantage, I ambushed him and clamped my hand to his mouth and he in turn pushed me away by the forehead.

This went on for some time. English, Bengali and Italian slurs mixed in the drunken potpourri, flavoured with raucous laughter.

When it cooled, we remained on the floor. Powder on the floor, whiskey bottles and random stains neither of us remembered the origin of.

We settled under the moon.

He scooted closer to me and whispered, like a child confessing a secret.

“You know why I won’t  take the vicodin or morphine up at east Vienna or whatever?”

“Nevada. Why?”

Knowing smile.

“I only want to watch colourful lambs, pink ducks and, mandalas and hyacinths with you. Only you. Not alone, not with anyone else. You.”

“We can snort anything you want when we meet again. Okay?”

“Promise?” Childlike plea.

“Promise…”

He draped an arm around my waist and pulled me close and snuggled his face right against mine.

He smiled, and tears fell down his bony cheeks, wetting my bare arm, and he held me tighter.

“I won’t go…what if you forget me, you idiot?”

I gripped him back as I felt his breath relax, slow down.

He  would go and no amount of morphine could make me forget that.

And we lay on the warm wood, drunken on the ‘what if’s?’ of the future…

And on whiskey.

 

 

 

 

Author's Note

This piece explores themes of substance use, intoxication, and deep emotional connections. Reader discretion is advised.