by E. McNew
I decided to be strong and stop my tears so he knew how serious I was. I was not going to change my mind or back down on this. He packed his bags and walked out the door. I could tell he was in tears. I sat down on the couch and, as the girls slept peacefully, I cried openly.
At the age of eighteen I had no sense of time, nor did I know the possibilities that the future could hold for me. I was convinced that, because I was only eighteen and already a single mother of two, no one else would want me because it would be too much baggage. After sitting on the couch and crying for an hour, Derrick walked back through the front door without his bags. “Elizabeth, I just can't do it.”
I don't want to be without you, and if it means giving up cocaine and everything else, I'll do it.” “Well, where are your bags?” I excitedly asked. “They were too heavy, and the walk is too far, so I just left them at my brother’s. Can you give me a ride to go get them?” he said, laughing again. “Just take my car. You're such an idiot, the girls are asleep.” I said, laughing. He came back with his things and put them away. We were now back to the honeymoon phase after the drama settled. He always had a reason for having some kind of sex, and tonight he wanted to have "make up sex." I just dealt with it. I didn't want another fight to happen after the exhausting drama I had already gone through.
Over the next month Derrick stayed true to his word and always came straight home after work. I was proud of him and my trust in him slowly returned. He started to treat the girls a little bit better too. Although he was usually good with Chloe and Zoe, I figured that he didn't really know much about kids since he was never around them, so he had to get used to it.
Zoe began to put up a fight every night when it came time for bed. She never wanted to go to sleep, but I could tell she was exhausted. I always caved in and rocked her for a short time to calm her down and reassure her. After she put up a fight for about the fifth night in a row, Derrick said confidently: “Just let me handle it. You'll see, I'll put her to sleep at night until she knows how to go to sleep without a fight.” “How do you know anything about kids, Derrick?” I asked. I've changed more diapers than you'll probably ever change in your lifetime. You have no idea how many diapers I've gone through with the two girls,” I replied.
Giving Derrick the benefit of the doubt, I let him take the reins. I was curious to see if he really knew what he was talking about. He picked up Zoe and put her in her crib. I walked out of the room because I knew that if she saw me, she would not be able to stop crying. She knew that I would always cave. As I walked out of the dark bedroom Zoe started to scream. I had never heard her scream so much in my life. I panicked and peeked in the bedroom to make sure that everything was okay. Derrick was hovering over her crib and making sure that she remained laying down. Every time she stood up, he would gently lay her back down. He was calmly whispering to her, go "night-night." I didn't interrupt him because I didn't want all that crying to be for nothing. I just wanted her to understand that bedtime meant sleep. He was in her room for about twenty minutes, and she finally calmed down and went to sleep.
The next week, during a lunch break at school, I decided to give Megan a call because I was bored as usual. She had that familiar tone to her voice. She was excited about something. I had a feeling I knew what it was. “Donnie and I are official,” she excitedly announced. “I'm not surprised Megan, I knew that you guys liked each other a long time ago but just weren’t in the right circumstances to have a relationship. Do you think your dad is going to be upset because he's an older guy?” I asked. “I don't know, hopefully not!” she laughed. We got off the phone, and I started to ponder. I thought that it was so odd, and kind of funny, that we initially dated best friends (and eventually married them) and now we were dating brothers. I was excited because that meant that we could all hang out more and do couples stuff.
Megan and I always had big influences on each other. We were immediately best friends from the day we met, and we had so much in common that it was insane. On a free weekend when I had no homework and Derrick was at his brother’s house helping him work on a car, Megan called me. I asked her what she was doing, and she replied with a mischievous tone to her voice. “Oh, nothing,” she said, secretly wanting me to question her further. “Come on Megan, just spit it out,” I said. “Okay, but don't get mad,” she said. “I promise, I won't. Tell me what you're doing you, weirdo!” “Well, the other night Donnie was doing coke, and I was just too curious so I tried it. It is so much fun! Seriously, it’s not that bad - it just makes you hyper and gives you a bunch of energy. You have no idea how much I got done around his scummy house!” she enthusiastically said. “Gosh, what is this hype with everyone and cocaine?” I was kind of curious. Megan knew me best out of everyone, and she knew that I was paranoid when it came to putting anything strange into my body. Even with her diet pill, I just took half to be safe. “All right,” I said. “I'm coming over there. I'm too curious now, and I want to see what this stuff looks like.” “Okay,” she said. “I'll see you in a few minutes.” I drove down the street to her apartment with the girls in the back seat who were excited to play with her daughter. The three of them had become best friends.
As soon as I walked through her front door I could clearly see that she was on something. She was in her pajamas vigorously scrubbing her bathroom floor. I thought it was kind of funny because she didn't typically scrub like that. I remembered how she used to make James do all the cleaning.
She showed me what she had, and it just looked like baking powder. When she did a small line in front of me, and I saw that she didn’t have a heart attack, I was even more curious and wanted to try it. I was thinking to myself once again - if you can't beat ‘em, join ‘em.
“Just make me a tiny, tiny line.” I said to her, a little bit paranoid. “You know about those stories where someone tried coke once and rolled over and died? That better not be me!” She laughed and announced to me, “I know how you are, and I wouldn't give my best friend something if I thought it was going to kill her.” She took a card, chopped it up and made me a line. It was only about half an inch long, but I still thought it was too big. I told her to cut it in half because I was nervous. She did, and handed me a cut up piece of a straw. I hovered over the line that was laid out on a plate on her stove for about twenty minutes. Every time I went to snort it, I got scared and backed out. Finally, she was frustrated and said to me, “Look, if you don't want to do it, just don't do it. It's not that big of a deal.” After she made that statement, I picked up the straw and just got it over with. It didn't hurt my nose like I thought it would. The only thing that bothered me was the taste dripping from the back of my throat. It was really disgusting, and I had to sip on a soda to wash it down.
Before I knew it I had more energy. I didn't feel weird or disoriented; I just felt like I could get a ton of things done that I normally wouldn't feel up to. We were laughing and joking about Donnie and Derrick, and after about a half hour it started to wear off. I wanted more, but she was out. “Do you think that Derrick is over there doing cocaine right now since Donnie has a bunch?” I asked her. “Probably.” she said. “Let's go over there and bug them, but don't tell them that I did it with you. I don't want him to get mad for doing it behind his back,” I requested. Sadly, I wasn't surprised that she thought Derrick was probably still doing cocaine, despite his promise not to. Deep down, I felt like I contradicted everything that I held valuable to myself. First, I made him promise not to ever do it again. Then, what did I do? I went behind his back and used cocaine for the first time. I knew that it was wrong, but I didn't foresee any consequences. I felt like having more energy could only do more good than harm, especially when it came to taking care of two babies.
Megan and I pulled into the long dirt driveway. The guys were outside working on a car. There were more people there than I had expected and they were blasting music. It was clear that there was a party going on. I walked up to Derrick with a big smile on my face. He asked me why I lo
oked like a doofus.
"I officially want to try it!” “What are you talking about?” he asked. “I want to try coke! Megan said that she tried it, and it’s really fun. I trust her judgment because she knows me. She knows how paranoid I get over things. I know you guys have some.” After playing dumb for a few minutes, he gave in. He knew that I was stubborn and I wasn't going to let up. He led me into the back room where the plate was, stacked with lines and lines of cocaine. I couldn't believe how much there was. It was kind of exciting. This is where it all began...
Chapter 28
It was a Thursday afternoon and my shift at the Community College Bookstore was just about to end. Normally, getting off of work was a good thing. It signified the end of my busy day of classes and hours of putting price tags on tons of textbooks. Thursdays, however, were different. The Court had ordered me to attend an Anger Management course every Thursday, for one year. It wasn't that bad because, ironically, Megan had also been ordered by the Court to enroll. She had kicked her ex-husband in the groin, and he called the police. That was when their marriage ended. I had known all along that it wasn't going to take much. Things change when couples have children. We all like to have this delusion that having a baby will solidify a marriage or relationship, but if your marriage isn't already solid it’s just going to cause even more stress and break it down further. In the case of Megan though, it seemed that she was with James for the opposite reason - to have a baby, whether it affected them as a couple or not.
It was like being back in school again for us. We always sat next to each other and made fun of the creepers who were in the class with us. On top of that, we always had something to say about everything. That's because we were now adults. We were eighteen years old and knew everything. We had life all figured out and then some. We thought that we were hot because we had older boyfriends, and using cocaine on a semi-regular basis was nothing but innocent recreation in our eyes. We always seemed to somehow cause a scene no matter where we went.
We both had agreed that we had a mini crush on our Anger Management teacher. His name was Mickey. There was also another man named Marty. He had been friends with Megan’s father and was around his age. Megan and I always tried to kiddingly seduce him. We liked to see what we could get away with and thought it was funny that every guy we encountered would have some sort of weakness for us. We were a disaster waiting to happen. When it happened, we would hysterically break down laughing because everything was just so incredibly funny. Growing up in such a small town, we had no idea what the real world was like. Even the most rundown neighborhoods in Tahoe would no doubt seem like a heavenly escape to the most poverty-stricken families from the big cities. Before leaving Tahoe, I never truly believed that it could be unsafe to walk down the street alone. I didn't even know what it really meant to “watch your back.” Perhaps being surrounded by complete beauty for the first twenty-two years of my life instilled a false concept in my mind that the world was beautiful and safe, and it would always remain that way.
I clocked out of my job at the bookstore and realized that I still had an hour before my class started. I hated it when that happened because I didn't have enough time to go home, but there was way too much time to just sit in my car smoking until the class started. I called Megan to see what she was up to, and find out if she wanted to grab a smoothie before class. She answered the phone and instructed me to head over to our friend Byron's house. He lived just a few blocks away from the Women's Center where the Anger Management class was held. She told me Derrick was over there. Derrick and Megan hated each other, and it had always been that way. I figured only one thing could be going on. Normally this didn't happen until Friday because Friday was payday. By Sunday, every little speck of cocaine had been sucked up our noses or rubbed on our gums as if our survival depended on it. I walked through the front door. Byron and his girlfriend were sitting on the couch, and Derrick was on a chair beside them. Of course, there was a glass coffee table with a white, shiny dinner plate displaying that wonderful pile of excitement that I had grown to adore.
I had never previously liked to alter my sense of reality. That sort of thing made me feel out of control, and when I felt out of control, I started to panic. Cocaine, however, didn't make me feel that way. It gave me a feeling of renewed energy that I had not known or felt in my entire existence. I had felt abnormally tired for as long as I could remember. In elementary school I would have a hard time staying awake to get through class until lunch. My eyes would water so bad from yawning that it would look like I had been crying. I even remember having my first feelings of fatigue when I was only seven. I never wanted to play sports in school like the other kids, because I knew that I didn't have the energy to be competitive enough to win. This new energy I found made me feel normal for the first time in my life.
Megan and I had fun at Byron's house “powdering our noses" and headed over to the Anger Management class. We were lucky that the instructor didn't call the police on us. He never directly said that he was suspicious, but he kept giving us weird looks.
The next day while I was at work I got a phone call. It was the lady that managed the townhouse complex that I was trying to get into. “Congratulations Elizabeth! I just wanted to let you know that in spite of your misdemeanor in vandalism, my manager approved your application and you are all set to move in.” I was so excited to get this phone call because I honestly didn't think that I was going to get a place there. After several Court dates, the District Attorney agreed to reduce my Felony Vandalism charge to a misdemeanor and completely removed the Child Endangerment charge.
These townhomes were very well kept because management was more on the picky side. She asked me when I wanted to move in, and I asked her if next week would work. I didn't say it out loud, but I was worried about how I was going to come up with the $1700. I knew that if I could at least have a few extra days, I could find a way to get the money together and get Derrick to pitch in. I told Derrick that I got the apartment and he said that he would help out. He also said that he just got a pretty good paycheck. I was also supposed to be getting paid the following Monday, so I figured that between the two of us we would be able to move in on Tuesday. I should have planned my weekend a little bit better.
After getting off work and picking the girls up from daycare, I was excited that it was the weekend and I could take a break from school. When I got home it was already six o'clock in the evening. Derrick’s cousin dropped him off right behind me. Derrick didn't have his own vehicle because his driver’s license had been suspended over a domestic dispute with his ex-girlfriend, and he hadn’t finished his required Anger Management course.
Whenever I asked him about what happened, he explained it as if his ex-girlfriend were to blame. He said that she was spun out on cocaine and acting like a psycho. He pushed her away, out of self-defense, and she ended up falling down a set of stairs. The way he described it sounded pretty believable, and he had never acted violently toward me. I didn't think much about it. Derrick walked into the carport to help me get the girls out of the car. "Let's hurry up and get these girls fed. We're going over to chill with Lance and Tara tonight." Lance was his cousin and Tara was his cousin's fiancé. They also had a young daughter together who was about three. Byron was also going to be there. We all knew what that meant – party time.
We walked through their door around seven. There were a few people I hadn't met before. All of the kids were playing together, and the adults were in the kitchen. I had never seen so much cocaine before. Derrick snorted a huge line and still had a bunch left. He offered it to the other people, but I think everyone else was already too high. "I'll take it!" I announced, trying to come off as hot shit. Derrick didn't oppose, and I grabbed the straw and prepared to snort the biggest line I had yet to snort.
I did it too fast. I had to sit down immediately. I managed to play it cool, walking over to a chair in the living room. I sat down and, as each second passed, my heart raced a little mo
re. My heart was pounding even faster than it did when I was forced to run a mile in middle school. I started to worry. Composing myself, I started to pace my breathing, taking in long, slow breaths and slowly releasing them. After about five minutes, my pulse started to slow down. Derrick announced that he was ready to take the girls home and put them to sleep because it was getting late. We drove home, put the girls in bed, and finished our party. Derrick had a lot of cocaine, and I was wondering how much money he had spent on it. I didn’t want to ask.
Normally Derrick would lay a line out for me about every thirty minutes, but that night he was being extra stingy. I also noticed that each time I snorted it, instead of giving me the numbing effect, it gave me a sharp pain in the side of my head. I wasn't coming down as fast as I normally did either. I started to become suspicious. I paid close attention the next time I snorted a line. I noticed that it looked a little more chunky than usual and it was also clearer. It resembled small shards of glass. High out of my mind, I grabbed my laptop and started to do research. By the end of the night I concluded that my cocaine was laced with crystal meth. Nobody had told me this.
The next morning I called Megan and told her about my suspicion. Donnie happened to be over at her house, and they were getting high off of the same batch. “You didn't know that it was actually crystal?” she asked. I started to cry. I was so pissed! I really never wanted to do that. Yes, it was stupid of me to be doing cocaine, but the addiction that results from crystal meth is a more dangerous one. Everyone knows that. Cocaine is also highly addictive, but I thought it would be much easier to recover from it. I felt betrayed. I was mad and feeling overwhelmed. It hurt my head to think about it. I didn’t know why Derrick was sneaky about the crystal meth. Why was he forcing it on me? I wasn’t sure.
