by Mann, Marni
Heroin. This was all the heroin's fault. But it was my fault too, my fault for trying it and continuing to use, not letting my parents take me to rehab at Eric's funeral, or Michael when he found me in the bar and all the times I'd gone to his apartment for money. It was my fault for leaving rehab with Dustin, getting arrested, skipping my court date, and agreeing to work for Big Teddy. I'd gotten Michael killed. And Michael wasn't the only person I'd lost from this drug. Eric and Claire and Heather were dead too. Raul had gone to jail and so had Dustin. Smack had affected everyone around me. It had ruined me, destroyed my body, killed my baby and now my poor Michael too.
I wasn't the same person anymore. I'd stopped caring about everything and everyone. My beliefs—being a good person, treating people with respect, and standing on the right side of the law—had been thrown away when dope had entered my life. I'd stolen from innocent people, I'd lied to my family, I'd sold my body.
I had to take back the control I'd lost. I had to come clean for Michael. And for me too. I had to fess up to my crimes and tell the police everything I knew about Richard, Séamus, and Dustin, and Big Teddy to make this right.
My parents ran into the ER entrance and up to the nurses' station.
“Mom,” I yelled.
Mom and Dad ran over to me. I stood and met them half way.
“How is he? Can we see him?” Mom asked.
I shook my head and looked down at my hands. I'd washed them several times in the bathroom, but Michael's blood was still caked under my fingernails. His blood was on my tank top and skirt too.
“Nicole? Say something,” Dad said.
“The bullet was too close to his heart,” I said. I looked up and into their eyes. “He's dead.”
Mom dropped to her knees and clung to dad's leg. I'd seen my mom cry before, but this wasn't crying. Her whole body convulsed, and screams poured from her mouth. Dad, always the stronger of the two, rubbed the top of Mom's head and then crouched down next to her and rocked her in his arms. His face was red, and the lines of his wrinkles sunk even deeper as they were filled with tears.
I didn't know what to say. I was covered in their son's blood. But they deserved to know the truth. They needed to hate me and blame me because Michael had died for me.
I sat on the floor and they both looked over at me. I started with when I had gone to Michael's apartment and asked him for food and how he wanted me to help myself before he'd help me. I told them how I'd gotten picked up by Big Teddy and worked for him on the street. I explained the fight I'd had with him over money and how Michael had somehow found me and tried to stop Big Teddy from beating me to death. And finally how Big Teddy had pulled out his gun and shot Michael in the chest.
Not too long into my confession, they stopped looking at me. And I understood. I didn't want to look at me either. Hell, I didn't want to be me.
“You already ruined this family,” Mom shouted. “And now you've gotten your brother killed. I can't even stand being in the same room as you.”
Dad stood and helped Mom to her feet. He wrapped his arm around her shoulder, and they began to walk away.
“Dad, Mom, I'm sorry,” I said.
Neither of them turned around. I didn't expect them to, but I wanted them to know I was sorry. And that I was going to do right.
They went to the nurses' station, and one of the nurses took them through the double doors, the same doors the paramedics had wheeled Michael through.
Once they were out of sight, I asked a nurse if the hospital had any extra clothes I could change into. She gave me a pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt, and I put them on in the bathroom and left the hospital.
It was five in the morning and the streets were chilly and dark. I walked and looked at everything around me like it was the first time I'd ever seen trees and sidewalks and stores. The leaves looked green under the streetlamps, and the storefronts were bright with neon signs. Chewed-up gum, in a rainbow of colors, was stuck to the sidewalk. In my head, I made shapes out of the gum like I did when I looked at clouds.
There was something beautiful about Boston. Maybe it was because the heroin had worn off and I was seeing things more clearly. There had to be beauty outside of Boston too, things I'd never seen before and places I'd never been. Twenty-five was too young to die. I didn't want to die like Michael had, getting murdered or overdosing on junk. I wanted to live and be the girl I was in college before I'd gotten raped. In order for that to happen, I had to fess up to my crimes. And I had to quit smack.
The police had come to the hospital right after the doctor had given me the news and wanted a statement from me. At the time, I wasn't ready to talk and I didn't give them any information. But I was ready now. I called Jesse, Michael's boyfriend, told him what happened and which hospital he was at. Then I walked to the police station and told the officer about Big Teddy, where he lived, and about the gun he shot Michael with.
By the time I left the police station, the sun was lighting up the sky, the sidewalks packed with pedestrians and the streets jammed with cars. I decided not to take the train. I wanted to walk and look at the city because it was going to be the last time I'd see it for a while.
I walked straight to downtown and entered the building on Federal Street. I took the elevator up to Melissa's office.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
My cell in the South Bay House of Corrections was dark. There was a small, barred window, but the sky was too cloudy for stars, and I was on the top floor far from the streetlamps. The only things I could see around me were the shiny metal toilet and sink, and the side rails of the bunk bed on top of mine. My celly, Devry, was snoring. Her snores had been keeping me awake every night for the last two months.
I was familiar with the South Bay House of Corrections; actually, it was the same jail Henry was in. I never thought I'd be living four floors above him. I guess that was what happened when you were stupid enough to get caught. But this time I wasn't stupid; I'd done the right thing for once. I'd met with Melissa, and she set up a meeting with the detectives and the DA. I told them everything I knew about Richard and Séamus and Dustin. When the DA presented me with a plea bargain of two-and-a-half years in jail, I took it and stood in front of the judge and plead guilty.
Dustin's trial was set to begin in a few months, and I knew my testimony was going to get him a sentence of at least twenty years, plus the time he'd get for his previous arrest. He deserved twenty years for trafficking heroin to dealers who got people strung out and killed on that shit. I deserved my two-and-a-half year sentence too because my involvement with the run was just as wrong.
During the months that followed Renee and Jose's death, I'd been too addicted and in love to care about what Dustin had done to them. At the time, I thought Renee should be punished for letting Eric die, and Jose too for threatening my life and hitting me with his gun. I thought Dustin was a hero. But he was a murderer. No one deserved to die. Eric had been dead for three years, and it had taken me all this time to grasp how much I missed him. I missed Claire, too.
This morning, I enrolled in the jail's ninety-day substance abuse program. I thought being in prison would be enough to keep me sober, but drugs floated around in here, and if I had the money, I could buy them. I hadn't yet. But I was tempted, and that made me realize I needed help. Just like when I was in rehab, the counselor wrote the Twelve Steps on the board while all of us addicts sat at desks with notebooks and pencils in hand. In my head, I recited Step One: We admitted we were powerless over our addiction – that our lives had become unmanageable.
Before I came to prison, I'd lost all power and control, and my life had definitely become unmanageable. Today was only my first day and I'd already graduated Step One. I was doing a lot better than I'd done during my one week in rehab.
I listened to the other women tell their stories, how drugs had affected their lives, and then I told mine. What I didn't want was sad faces looking back at me and pity in their eyes while I confessed all the mistakes
I'd made. I'd chosen to use heroin, and everything that had happened to me was my fault. I didn't deserve sympathy. And I didn't receive any of that. The women told me my heroin cravings would start to subside and achieving sobriety, even after all the bad shit I'd done, would happen in time. I thought about Michael every day. I didn't think I'd ever get over his death and I'd want to use just to block it out, but I trusted my counselors and the women who were in my group. Trust was part of sobriety, so I was working on that too.
I hadn't spoken to my parents since they left me in the waiting room at the hospital. But I got a letter from them, written in mom's handwriting. She wrote that they had buried Michael in the Mount Hope Cemetery in Bangor and they visited him every day. She said she was proud of me for turning myself in to the police and giving them all the information on my dealers so the cops could take them down too. I guess she had followed my case. She wrote that she'd lost one child and didn't want to lose another and hoped I was getting help and starting the process of recovery. She ended the letter by saying she'd like to see me, and she and dad would be coming to visit at some point, but they weren't ready for that yet. She didn't say anything about forgiving me. I knew that would take time. I hadn't forgiven myself, and I wasn't sure if I ever would.
While in prison, I realized what heroin really was. Like the cop had said during my fifth grade D.A.R.E. class, heroin was a terrorist. And it had destroyed me. But I wasn't dead and with time and help from my counselors, I had a chance to mend everything I'd broken. I didn't know how that was possible, how I could live a normal life without being filled with anxiety, haunted by my past, and not reach for a needle to erase those memories. But I guess I had two years and four months to figure all that out.
The only thing I brought with me to prison was Henry's gold band. Like me, it had survived living on the streets, and I hadn't lost it like everything else in my life.
I leaned off the bed and grabbed the ring off the sink, where I'd kept it since coming to prison, and rolled it around in my palm. I hadn't put it on yet because I didn't want to disrespect Claire. The ring was for sobriety.
I pictured my life in ten years. With a felony on my record, teaching at a school was no longer an option. During the day, I'd work at a rehab center, helping kids with their own addiction. At night, I'd come home to my loft in the South End. My children would be home from school and I'd help them with their reading, vocabulary, and math. From all the damage I'd done to my body, being able to bear children would be a gift in itself. After dinner, Pork Chop, our Boston terrier, would need to be walked, and the kids and I would take him to the park. On my ring finger would be Henry's gold band, and I'd never take it off. Not even to shower.
I placed the ring back on the sink. For now, that was the perfect place for it.
I heard for some people there was life after heroin. At least that was what the other inmates said during chow and my counselors made us believe during my drug classes. All the junkies I knew were either dead or in jail. And if they weren't in either of those places, their story wasn't a happy one.
Mine wasn't either.
My memoir is no damn fairytale. But my story isn't over yet.
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