Enjoy!
Today I disappointed my baby brother. I told him I was going to take him to the movies. We were going to go to the one o’clock show of some hour and a half long little kid’s cartoon I can’t quite remember the name of and he’s been dying to see since it came out a month ago. I told him I would take him to go see it. We’d make a day of it. Go to lunch together and everything. He was excited. We hardly ever got to do anything, just the two of us.
But instead, I went to my friend Joe’s apartment. He told me he’d picked up some really good junk and that he wanted me to come over there and try it. Fish was going to be there. So were Ethan and Juliet. Juliet. All he needed to say was her name and I was there. The fact that he sounded excited about his junk was just a bonus. I agreed to come over right away. No way was I going to miss this chance.
Then I remembered my baby brother and called him two hours after I was supposed to pick him up. I’ll never forget the disappointment in his voice.
This’ll be the last time.
Today is going to be the day I change. I’m never going to do that to my baby brother again.
***
Yesterday I argued with my older brother. I asked him if I could borrow money. The rent was due on the apartment he helped find for me and there was no food in the house. I told him, promised him I was going to use it for those and not for drugs. No drugs, just food and the apartment, I said. I promised him the way we always used to promise each other when we were little: with two fingers crossed behind my back. I was desperate. I needed the money to pay back what I owed and get more. But he wouldn’t give me anything if I told him that, so I kept it to myself.
He started crying because he knew it anyway. He told me I needed to straighten out. Get a job. Get a life. Stop being a loser junkie like I was. He told me to get help. He’d help me. Get myself checked into rehab. Get better. Start over. He’d help me. He’d be there for me. He loved me and he hated seeing me like this.
I knew he wasn’t going to give me the money, so I hung up on him.
This’ll be the last time.
Today is going to be the day I change. I’m never going to do that to my older brother again.
***
Last week I scared my two younger sisters. I told them they could come over and we’d watch the Wizard of Oz on television together. It’s their favorite movie and one of mine. It came on commercial-free every year on some movie channel I can’t remember the name of. We always watch it together except for the last year or two after I got my own place. They were so happy that I remembered this year. They told me they’d bring candy and popcorn and even bring the “ruby slippers” they each wore for Halloween one year but their feet are much too big for now.
But an hour before they were supposed to show up, Juliet came over bearing drugs. I told myself I could do it once now and by the time they came over, Juliet would be gone and they’d never know a thing. But Juliet got playful. I told her I couldn’t but when I didn’t want to tell her why because I thought it sounded lame, she didn’t care and kept going. My little sisters walked in on us and I yelled at them to go away. Juliet was just too good. The drugs were just too good.
This’ll be the last time.
Today is going to be the day I change. I’m never going to do that to my little sisters again.
***
Last month I beat up my younger brother. He plays the drums and I told him I’d jam with him one day. He’d gotten a new drumkit and said he’d written a song he wanted me to help him with. It’s been a long time since we’ve played together and I wasn’t sure I even knew how anymore. I didn’t especially want to do it, but he was proud of his new song. He wanted to show it to me. So I agreed to come over about three and stay for dinner.
But it was Fish’s birthday that day. It was his twenty-first and we wanted to celebrate with an all day drinking marathon despite the fact Fish had gotten drunk plenty times before. It was just an excuse to get shitfaced and besides, it was amusing to get thrown out of bars and things. We must have gotten kicked out of every bar in the city before hitting the liquor store and going back to Joe’s place. By the time I got back home, I didn’t know up from down. I found my younger brother sitting calmly on my couch. I started to apologize, but then I noticed emptied bottles by the sink and the way the drawers and places I kept my stuff were all open and empty.
I hurt him pretty good, too. He let me, though. He let me do it. He just stood there yelling at me loudly but I didn’t want to hear him, so I don’t know what he said. We haven’t talked since.
This’ll be the last time.
Today is going to be the day I change. I’m never going to do that to my younger brother again.
***
Last year I broke my parents’ hearts. It was their thirty-fifth anniversary and they were going to renew their vows. It was something they wanted all of us--my siblings and myself--to be a part of. We were expected to offer our own words on their marriage and the success of it, how proud we were they had made it that far. I told them I would be there and I would make my own speech. I even practiced it in front of my siblings and they all told me it was beautiful and touching and that our parents were going to love it. They were so pleased I was planning on participating in this.
But that day Juliet invited me over to her friend Joe’s apartment to meet her other friends, Ethan and Fish. There they had drugs and offered me some. It was only a few hours before I had to be at the house where my parents were going to be celebrating. But they pushed and curiosity won out. I shot up and missed the entire ceremony, though they waited for me an hour. They went on without me, thinking I had maybe gotten caught up in traffic or something. But it wasn’t the same. My mother had cried when she realized I wasn’t going to be there. She cried over the phone, too when I told her why I hadn’t been there. She said she’d known for a long time I was using drugs, but didn’t think it would go as far as heroin. I even read her my planned speech in apology. But she said it wasn’t the same and hung up on me.
That was the first time.
But this. This’ll be the last time. Today is the day I’m going to change. I’m never going to do that to my parents again.
***
I’m still at Joe’s and he was right, the stuff he got is really good. We all wonder where he got a hold of it, but he won’t tell. He gets good money off us when he has good stuff and we all need a hit.
Juliet is here. She barely listens as Fish and Ethan banter back and forth about some actor they disagree on. I’m not listening, either. I’m watching her. She sways back and forth to music none of the rest of us can hear. She’s practically a skeleton, but she’s beautiful and the music must be beautiful, too, if it makes her look like that.
It’s been a while since my last hit and I’m beginning to feel it. Juliet is so beautiful and it’s obvious she’s in a beautiful place. I want to be in a beautiful place, too. I don’t want to think about my problems with my family anymore. They don’t know me anyway.
But these people do.
So I cook up and take another hit. It’s magical. It makes me forget.
But later, I’ll remember.
This’ll be the last time.
Because tomorrow is my day. Tomorrow is the day I’m going to change. I’m never going to do this to myself again.