Pivot (The Jack Harper Trilogy Book 1)

by L.C. Barlow

  Chapter 3

  ATEMPORAL HIGH

  When I first came to college, it made me quite mad. After being outside of society for four years, I simply could not stand what they call, "University life." The problem with it is it never sleeps.

  That's not good for me.

  When I became restive enough, I knew what I had to do - tread my way to a drug.

  Of course, I had not used since the end of high school. That was four years ago, and this vast hiatus posed a question: Should I risk destroying my mind yet again? Drugs have their benefits and their oh so down-hell costs. After considering for a while, I decided I would not start injecting and snorting yet again; but eventually, when the stress of college made me one pulsating and open wound, and I knew I could not make it there another hour, I asked around. Sure enough, there was a house that a friend of a classmate knew of by a row of apartments close to the University property edge. It was West campus, though, and not active, mostly land.

  Though my educational status was on probation, and I did have to meet with the President of the University every other week (he takes a very intensive role with the school), and though I had to speak with my psychologist every month or more, there was no drug testing. It was safe. I was okay to do it. So, I went.

  God, what a shit-hole of a place it was. The front had two very sad looking windows with a brown door recessed into the house's face. The backyard of it was only a sagging porch, and there was no grass. The blinds looked cemented shut, though I did not see aluminum hugging the glass.

  I loathed it, and the very eerie silence surrounding it, and the one porch light out front whose dim glow made the whole thing look diseased and dying and made me feel diseased and dying. It reminded me too much of home. I got in that place. I bought what I wanted - heroin, meth. I got out, breathed, and looked out at the empty night.

  And there she was.

  A brilliant and crisp crimson Maserati GranTurismo Convertible Sport. Hood down, beige leather seating, perfectly polished. It was like a silent bang in the night. I looked around myself, wondering if the world had shifted in the few minutes I was gone.

  It had.

  "You know, I've been told, if you stare too long at her, she'll take your virginity." I looked to the left, by the trunk, where he stood. The first thing I noticed was the hair. Orange? Red? I can never decide. It was messy, a few inches long, and popped out everywhere in spurts like perpetual fireworks.

  His eyes were dark green, his jaw protruded. Slight dimples ornamented the ends of his long lips like a knife had poked him twice. The young man who smiled at me held a cigarette in his hand with an elbow propped against his side. The other arm was hugged across his stomach and touching the elbow of the arm that held the cigarette.

  He was tall, probably six foot two, and thin in the way that exaggerates the deliciousness of motions. He wore a nice suit that throughout the day had obviously loosened on him. The thin black tie was undone and hanging down the sides. The first two buttons of his shirt were undone. It looked like there was lipstick on the white.

  "Is that right?" I asked him.

  "Yes, ittis. It's quite magical." He took a draw on his cigarette, but kept his eyes glued to me. I did not like him.

  "I don't doubt you," I said, and I smiled. "I'm sure it practically abducts women."

  "No. That's usually my accent."

  I laughed one short polite cough and looked at my phone. It was 11:34. I took one step to leave.

  "This is your first time 'ere?" he asked me.

  I looked at him. "Why?"

  He flicked his cigarette to the curb and walked towards me. "What they sell here... you should know it's shit - watered down, or fierce. And I tell you that for your own good. You don't belong here."

  "Oh really?"

  "Of course not. You know it. I know it." He shook his head and his whole body moved with the beat.

  "Are you a drug dealer?"

  He laughed out loud. "No!" he said turning round with his arms outstretched, "But I certainly fit the part, eh? But no no. I am on my way to a party, a party where plenty of the good stuff awaits. The... what do you say? Stuff dreams are made of? You should come. You belong there."

  "Why are you here, then?"

  "Hm?"

  "Why are you here if you're going to some big party where drugs are dripping from the heavens above?" I twisted my hand in the air.

  "Oh, I'm waiting for a friend. He sells 'is shit here, and then he sells the good stuff where I'm headin'. Same guy. You probably saw him inside."

  I looked at the house and closed my eyes at the grim image. I turned back to him, shrugged the despair off.

  He looked at me soberly. "You should come with me."

  "Thanks, but no." I stepped away. He started walking with me, behind me, then beside me.

  "Why?"

  "It's my policy not to do drugs with strangers."

  "Well then, we'll have a few drinks, and we won't be strangers anymore."

  "It's also my policy not to do drugs with friends."

  "No worries. I'm rich, and the rich never make true friends. A perfect balance between intimacy and total abandonment. Besides..." and he hit me in the arm, "what could go wrong?"

  I shook my head. "I think the real question is, with the nouveau riche, what could go right?"

  "Lucky you, I'm not nouveau."

  "You're not American, either."

  "So you're holding that against me?"

  "No. I don't carry those kinds of grudges."

  "Well, I hope you'll hold something against me. Or maybe me against something?" I looked at him, and he winked - a twinkle in his eye that could have been crystal meth.

  "Keep talking like that, and you'll get me all geared up for the worst experience of my life."

  He laughed, and his voice echoed against the set of apartments ahead of us like a cannon. "Thank you! Now that your expectations are low enough, I can't possibly fail."

  "Nowhere to go but up."

  "Exactly."

  I smiled, and I looked at him as we continued walking. "I'll give in that you're amusing... and I admit that meeting an Irishman driving a Maserati on a dark and deserted road is bewildering enough to be a drug in itself... a high that I almost feel like I owe you for. It's not the weirdest thing that's happened in my life," I considered this long and hard, "but it's remarkable. But really, I'm on my own tonight. I don't want your drugs. I don't want to go to your party. I don't want..."

  "Wait. Wait. Look," he said, and he put a warm hand on my arm, stopping me. "I'll be straight. When you were inside 705, I went in for a short while an' saw you. You, I will be pure frank, are a striking person. There's just something about you... I want to talk to you. Give me a chance an' just, just answer me this...

  "When was the last time you were absolutely, extraordinarily happy? Hm? And you have to answer me truthfully." He shook his finger at me. "And if that moment turns out to be more than a year ago, you have to come with me tonight. Well, not 'av to 'av to, but you should. Fate says you should. Because that's what I'm fucking shooting for tonight. I am going to this party, and I am going to absolutely fucking forget this world, and live so much tonight that I don't give a shit what happens tomorrow. There is no tomorrow. And you should, too. Because you're not like them in there," he pointed to the house, "and you're not like those out there," he pointed to the University, "And you're not like me," he put a hand on his chest. "Obviously. But I think we'll get along together. Just... take a ride with me. Take a high with me. You. Will. Not. Regret it. I swear on that."

  The streets were absolutely dead on this side of town. No people, no animals, no strangers, no friends. Just this cinnamon haired, annoyingly energetic young man. But he did make me curious, and feeling that was like feeling electric pulses in a distant land that had been trying to zap me into consciousness for years from afar. It was nice to feel that strange sensation after so long of feeling numb. "You're honest?" I asked.

  "Of cou
rse."

  "Alright. I will be honest, as well. I'm carrying a loaded .38 revolver. I take it with me when I walk alone... on dark nights... to drug dealers' houses. I do not have a concealed handgun license. The serial numbers are scrubbed away. But, if you accept that I have this, I will proceed with you on this insane and hopeful adventure of yours. Because you're at least a little right. And you, too, are 'striking'... What is your name?"

  "Patrick."

  "Patrick. You accept me and the fact I wouldn't think twice about shooting you... and I'll follow you to Oz."

  "Fantastic!" he said immediately. He shook his head insanely and looked to the sky. "Excellent!"

  He beamed all of his teeth at me, and he held out his elbow as would a 19th century gentlemen. "I have one more condition, as well," he said. "You cannot look in the trunk of my car." I, of course, agreed.

  These are the kinds of decisions that get people killed. I was used to making them. So, it seemed, was he.

  In a matter of moments, we were on the other side of the campus, dropping off his friend at his own car. Then, we were on the highway. Patrick was driving 90 miles an hour, sometimes 100 or more, weaving in and out of traffic.

  "What's your name?!" he yelled out, struggling against the wind's moan.

  "Jack," I said, and I looked at him.

  "Jack what?"

  "Jack Harper"

  "It's a pleasure to meet you. Will you do me a favor, Jack, and open that glove box?"

  I steadied myself by holding onto the passenger side door, while Patrick swerved to the right to avoid hitting a white Honda Accord. When he was driving straight again, I reached down and opened the compartment. There was a cobalt blue pipe inside, a little baggie under it.

  "Smoke it," he said. "You won't regret it."

  "You keep saying that." I peered into his green eyes, and he smiled at me with a devil's grin. He raised his Clementine eyebrows back and forth in a wave, and the effect was comical.

  I picked up the baggie and looked at the contents. There were greyish white grains.

  "What is it?" I asked.

  "What do you think?" he said.

  I licked it. Pungent. Strong. I had not had that quality since early high school. I told him to slow down. He did. I leaned forward in my seat, managed to get the contents into the bowl without the air eating everything. Patrick handed me a lighter. It was in the shape of a poker chip. And then, dazzling.

  There were no cares in the world.

  There was no world.

  There was no me.

  But there was Patrick, and there was the night, and the air, oh the air!, and there was the cement road that turned to water, and we swam through it.

  Then the road shifted up and over me, and I knew that soon we, too, would be upside down. And, God, there was ecstasy in everything. The red lights on the cars in front of us appeared to me as glowing, thrumming hearts that with my mind I could hold and feel warm again.

  I remember I looked to my right, and there was a white semi. It said Schway. I was right beside it. I reached out, effortlessly, and touched it - or almost did - before I was glided away. And then there was a car horn.

  "Shit! Motherfucker! That was close, right?!" Patrick yelled.

  I just laughed.

  And he laughed.

  Patrick turned the music on, and there was a deep bass, fast, techno-ish sound. And it made me feel like I was God with a violin.

  I felt into my coat pocket for my .38. I could never remember if I still had it. Then, I would reach in again and feel it. Then I would remark upon the fact that I could never remember it was there. And then I would look at Patrick.

  I unbuckled my seat belt so that I wouldn't have to scream, screaming then seemed impossible, and I leaned over to him. "Thank you for that," I said, and then I relaxed, falling within the leather.

  He laughed at me. "It will make you believe in God, won't it?!" he yelled.

  The rest of the night was a blur.

  We got to the party. It was held in a massive home. Almost all of its walls were windows.

  I met Monica. I met Bryce. I met Steven. I met Matt. I met Carl. John. Felicia. Dujan. Sarah. Brian. Javier. Two Jessica's. Mark. Young. Carla. And others known by their last names. An O'Malley who was not Irish. A Wolfe. A Fields. I couldn't count the number of people.

  I remember at one point a guy named David stripped. Jessica took her shirt off and handed him her pink bra, and he did push-ups on the pool table while the players continued their game. He threatened to take off his reindeer boxers, and the guys finally shoved him from the table. They let Jessica on, instead.

  After this, all the lights turned off, and one of the girls with massive breasts undressed as well and held a flashlight under them. They lit up like giant, ugly jack-o-lanterns from the implants, and there was a collective silence over the crowd. I don't know if it was from disgust or awe. All I could do was stare at the veins.

  Around two in the morning, someone set off a firework in the kitchen, and it shot throughout the house like a demon. It took ten pitchers of water to get all the fires out, and there are still black spots everywhere. By that point I was just looking for orange juice.

  Before the firework, a boy named Jared dropped acid and, while in the kitchen, wrote on all the stainless steel cupboards, and floor, and dishwasher, and stove in sharpie about the meaning of life and the connections between spiderwebs and iPhones and pumpkins and erasers and the Higgs boson particle. He talked to me while I searched for juice, and I could neither agree nor disagree with him. It made sense at the time. When the firework went off, he thought his written truths had made our known universe explode, and I had to calm him.

  At another point, a man showed his balls to Patrick. I can't remember why. Patrick jokingly prescribed him penicillin.

  A few streakers and skinny-dipping. A couple of the guys kept making bombs from the pool's hydrochloric acid and balls of aluminum. There were clumps of burned grass everywhere. Nothing special, and yet all so lovely.

  And Patrick was playing one of the pianos, a jazzy thing, and he sang to it. And a couple of the girls stripped and danced to it on the piano, pulling at their hair and breasts, before we all got tired of being away from the frantic activity in the other rooms and returned.

  One of the girls whispered to him that she wanted to make love to his accent. He shot a smile at me. "See?" he said. It was then that I wanted his accent.

  At the end, we were dancing, and someone was teaching me the salsa, and the rumba, and the fox trot, and the west coast swing. Finally, the east coast swing. Then I was dancing with no order with Patrick and the others to club music. We crushed so many pills beneath our feet on the table, it looked like a chalkboard, and I forgot to search for my .38 for the first time the whole night.

  Nothing special, and yet all so lovely. Dear God, I was happy.