I text her to let her know I’m going to the park, and grab a jacket. There’s just enough of a chill in the air that I need it. Kids getting out of school rush past me on their bikes, and I pull my hood up to cover my face as the upperclassmen start driving past. I leave the sidewalk and cut into the grass, going down the hill to where the softball fields are. They’re unkempt this time of year, and I’ve started to come here when I can, pulling up clumps of crabgrass with my bare hands. It feels good to have dirt under my fingernails again.
Today I’m not alone.
There’s a Pokémon backpack resting against the fence, and a little girl is trying to toss her own ball in the air, then get both hands on her bat and hit it into the fence. It’s not going well. Her face is red with frustration as she tosses it either too close or too far away from her, and she can’t get her hands back on the bat quick enough.
I pull my hood down.
“Plant your back foot,” I say.
She jumps, alarmed, and the ball falls to the ground at her feet.
“Sorry,” I say. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”
She doesn’t answer, only bites her lower lip.
“Want me to toss for you?” I ask her. “It’s really hard to do it by yourself.”
She looks around, sees that there are other people in the park and we’re not alone. Taking comfort in this, she nods, still not speaking. I crouch down next to her, ignoring the familiar twinge in my hip. She turns to face me, ready to clean my head from my shoulders. No one’s ever done this for her before.
“Nope,” I say, getting back up. “The way you were before, facing the fence. See, I’ll be down here and I’ll toss it, you hit it into the fence. Don’t swing on this one, just watch.”
I toss it and it falls in between us. Her fingers twitch on the barrel. She really wanted to swing.
I pick up the ball. “Ready?”
She nods, but her swing is a mess. Her shoulder dips, back foot sliding all over the place, trying to pull all her power from her arms, not using her hips. I stand back up.
“What’s your name?”
“Angie,” she says.
“Okay, Angie,” I tell her. “I know you really want to hit the ball, but that’s not going to happen until we fix your swing. Will you let me show you how to do it right?”
She nods, but there’s a second of hesitation before she hands the bat over to me.
“All right, look.”
I show her how to stand, how to plant her back foot and follow through, how to use her hips and move everything except her head.
“That stays still. Keep it pointed at Carolina,” I tell her.
“At who?”
“At the pitcher,” I correct myself.
“’Kay,” she says, holding her hand out for the bat. I give it to her.
She’s wearing cheap flip-flops, so her back foot keeps wanting to slide when she pivots, but she gets the bat on the third one I toss, and gives a little yelp of surprise. The next two she whiffs and her face goes dark with concentration when she tries again. She’s under it a little, but makes contact. It sails over the fence and into the weeds, her face sinking as it lands out of sight.
“That’s my only ball,” she says.
“I’ll get it,” I tell her. “There’s poison ivy.”
I pick my way through the tall grass, looking for the telltale flash of white. I spot it, but it’s not her ball. It’s a syringe, used and tossed, waiting here in the grass for Angie or some other kid in sandals to step on it, proof that Patrick couldn’t care less about the message I asked him to pass along.
Fuck him.
I pick it up carefully and throw it into the short grass where I can grab it later and dump it in a trash can.
“You find it?” Angie calls.
“One sec,” I say, spotting another needle. It joins the first, and then I do find a softball, not Angie’s white one but a bright yellow one.
“Cool,” she says when I hand it to her. She wipes the sweat from her forehead, then asks me what time it is. I check my phone and tell her.
“I gotta get home,” she says, slinging her backpack over one shoulder, her bat over the other. “Think you could toss for me tomorrow after school, maybe?”
“Yes,” I say.
“Cool,” she says again. “What’s your name?”
“Mickey,” I tell her, and she makes a face. My heart sinks because she knows who I am and she’s about to tell me she can’t be here tomorrow after all because I’m a junkie.
“That’s a weird name,” she says instead. “See you later.”
I go back into the grass. I find three more needles, and two more softballs. One of them is Angie’s, worn to gray, the stitches frayed.
The needles I throw away.
The softballs, I keep.
Those I’m going to need.
Author’s Note
I’ve been in pain. I’m guessing you have, as well.
In the summer of 2012, I underwent advanced surface ablation. In short, a doctor scrapes the epithelium off your corneas and treats the surface of your eyes with a laser to improve your vision. This is an option for patients who want LASIK but whose corneas are too thin for that treatment.
Also, it hurts.
Imagine that initial sting of being poked in the eye lasting for three days while your epithelium grows back.
To alleviate my pain, my doctor gave me three OxyContin—one for each day. I took the first one believing that nothing would ever make a dent in my misery, but twenty minutes later I was fine.
More than fine. I felt amazing.
I woke up the next day in pain again but aware that I could easily be out of it . . . and I freely admit, very much looking forward to recapturing the feeling of lightness and peace that Oxy had bestowed upon me.
I didn’t get it the second day. I felt fine, quite good in fact, but not equal to how I had the day before. I took my third—and last—pill the next day and was once again disappointed in the results.
Yep—out of pain, but . . . disappointed.
I later learned that this is what’s called chasing the dragon, an attempt to replicate the initial experience of opiates. People who are chasing the dragon raise their dosages in that pursuit, and while I had a very limited supply—three pills—I understood how habit-forming it could be after taking just one.
Opioids treat pain, yes, but they also allow the user a sense of relief and peace, something that people suffering from mental and emotional trauma are in deep need of. The ease of a trapdoor out of a sometimes cruel reality proves too tempting for many.
Do all opioid users abuse them? No. Plenty of people use opioids daily to treat pain, never sliding down the slippery slope.
The exact formula of what it takes to create an addict is unknown, but the debate includes factors such as environment, genetic predispositions, and childhood trauma.
I chose to write Heroine from the point of view of an addict because addiction begins with a single pill prescribed by a doctor, carrying no hint of illegality or allusions of shame. Many of us have been written that prescription or given those pills by hands we trust.
It could be you. It could be me. It could be any of us.
If you or someone you know struggles with addiction, please be sure to check out the resources section at the back of the book.
—Mindy McGinnis
Resources
There are many resources available for those struggling with addiction. Below is a short list of some of the well-recognized programs that can offer help.
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA): www.samhsa.gov
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) is an agency within the US Department of Health and Human Services. SAMHSA devotes its resources, including programs, information, and data, to help people act on the knowledge that behavioral health is essential to health, that prevention works, that treatment is effective, and that p
eople recover from mental and substance-use disorders.
SAMHSA’s site features a treatment locator, a helpline (800-662-HELP), and a suicide prevention hotline (800-273-TALK), as well as educational materials spanning prevention, treatment, and recovery.
National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA): www.drugabuse.gov
NIDA is a federal scientific research institute under the National Institutes of Health, US Department of Health and Human Services. Their mission is to advance science on the causes and consequences of drug use and addiction and to apply that knowledge to improve individual and public health.
NIDA’s site features educational resources for parents, teachers, kids and teens, and family and friends of addicts, as well as resources for those struggling with drug abuse themselves.
NIDA for Teens (www.teens.drugabuse.gov) has the latest on how drugs affect the brain and body, featuring videos, games, and blog posts relevant to teens.
Narcotics Anonymous (NA): www.na.org
NA is a nonprofit society of people for whom drugs have become a major problem. Recovering addicts meet regularly to help each other stay clean.
NA’s site features literature about the program as well as a meeting locator.
Alcoholics Anonymous (AA): www.aa.org
AA is an international fellowship for people who have had a drinking problem. It is nonprofessional, self-supporting, multiracial, apolitical, and available almost everywhere. There are no age or education requirements. Membership is open to anyone who wants to do something about their drinking problem.
AA’s site features program information, video and audio PSAs, as well as a meeting locator.
Al-Anon & Alateen: www.al-anon.org
These groups offer help and hope for families and friends of alcoholics. Al-Anon and Alateen members are people who have been affected by someone else’s drinking. They are parents, children, spouses, partners, brothers, sisters, other family members, friends, employers, employees, and coworkers of alcoholics.
The site offers an FAQ, a First Steps podcast, member resources, and locators for both Al-Anon and Alateen meetings.
Self-Management and Recovery Training (SMART Recovery): www.smartrecovery.org
SMART Recovery is an abstinence-based, not-for-profit organization with a sensible self-help program for people having problems with drinking and using. It includes ideas and techniques to help change lives from self-destructive and unhappy to constructive and satisfying. It teaches commonsense self-help procedures designed to empower users to abstain and to develop a more positive lifestyle.
The extensive site offers information about treatment programs, a providers locator, a suggested reading list, and urgent help resources, as well as an online community forum and a message board.
Acknowledgments
No book is easy to write; this one was even more difficult.
For their continuous and unwavering support, huge thanks goes to my editor, Ben Rosenthal, and my agent, Adriann Ranta Zurhellen. The entire team at Katherine Tegen Books deserves a nod from me as well. This is my sixth book with them and I can easily say they are one of the best imprints to work with.
To my steady and reliable critique partners, R.C. Lewis, Kate Karyus Quinn, and Demitria Lunetta, go my unending thanks, as well as to Lydia Kang, who answers all my emails about wounds without flinching. I also need to thank Jay Willis, who answered my legal questions.
Lastly, I relied heavily on my friend John Nash, an addiction counselor, for resources and information regarding addiction in general and opioids specifically. His clients are lucky to have him.
About the Author
Photo credit www.amyparrish.com
MINDY MCGINNIS is the author of Not a Drop to Drink and its companion, In a Handful of Dust, as well as This Darkness Mine, The Female of the Species, Given to the Sea, and the Edgar Award–winning novel A Madness So Discreet. A graduate of Otterbein University with a BA in English literature and religion, Mindy lives in Ohio. You can visit her online at www.mindymcginnis.com.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.
Books by Mindy McGinnis
Not a Drop to Drink
In a Handful of Dust
A Madness So Discreet
The Female of the Species
This Darkness Mine
Heroine
Be Not Far from Me
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Copyright
Katherine Tegen Books is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
HEROINE. Copyright © 2019 by Mindy McGinnis. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
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Cover art © 2019 by plainpicture/fStop/Dual Dual
Cover design by Erin Fitzsimmons
* * *
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018939881
Digital Edition MARCH 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-284721-8
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-284719-5
* * *
1920212223PC/LSCH10987654321
FIRST EDITION
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