A Kind of Drug:
Volume II – The Good Ol’ Days
by
J.E. Tobal
E-Book Edition
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PUBLISHED BY:
J.E. Tobal on Google
A Kind of Drug:
Volume II - The Good Ol’ Days
Copyright © 2011 by J.E. Tobal
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A Kind of Drug:
Volume II – The Good Ol’ Days
Chapter 4 – Acceleration
I
God, Rash, you’re such an asshole. Even in death you continue to find ways to annoy the shit out of me. Of course, that was always what you were best at while you were alive. So I guess it’s not like I should really be surprised or anything.
Jerk.
Last night, while I was in the middle of scratching down how Ian Decker miserably walked out on his father, I had a minor epiphany. Those words that had been incessantly repeating themselves over and over in my head without rest finally made sense. They finally clicked. Something, at long last, finally registered.
I told Rash I’d never look back. I told him after we left Sobriety, that I’d only look forward. That it was the only direction a sane person could look. He agreed with me, but he had an odd quietness about him at the time. I never knew why.
I only just now realized how wrong I was.
Stupid, brown-skinned jerk-off knew exactly how wrong I was but chose to keep it to himself. Why the hell didn’t he argue with me? Why the hell did he keep his mouth shut and let me get to the point of near suicide? How much of a piece of shit was my best friend?
Goddamn, I miss that son of a bitch so much.
Backwards, not forwards. Backwards is the only way to look. Who the hell could possibly look forward? What the hell is there to look forward to? Even if I make it to Morocco and figure out this big mystery, then what? Then I’m all alone in the universe with the answer to a question that nobody cares about. And what fucking good is that?
No, Rash figured it out long before I did. At this point, I’m not sailing for myself or anyone who’s still left alive. I’m sailing for Vanessa. For my mom and dad. For my brother. For my grandparents. For Crystal and Farrel and the rest of those drunken bastards. For my boss. For Robot. For Beth Vacey. For Mort Decker.
For Rash Kumar.
I’m not going to Morocco for the future; I’m going for the past. As far as I’m concerned, there is no future. There are only five billion people who died or who became Addicts. There is no one else. The whole world has collapsed – ten thousand years of culture gone – and no one can even justify the cause.
I can’t let that happen. I can’t let the world just slip away into the night like that.
So, no longer am I looking ahead of me. From now on, I only look behind. I might be sailing to the east, but my heart has to stay in the west. Bringing it with me serves no purpose. I’ll leave it back in America where it belongs and simply move the rest of my body forward for everyone else’s sake.
This trip is no longer for me. It’s for the rest of humanity.
Ironically, this only makes me want to drink even more.
Funny how that works.
Though, in a horrid bout of sobriety, I think I found the North Star. Or maybe a UFO. Or I had an aneurism. Or I could just be shining my flashlight in my face again. Whatever. Shut up. Stop judging.
But if that is the North Star then for right now, I’m just sailing east. Eventually I’ll hit land. From there, I’ll figure out what to do. But I have to keep moving. I have to.
In the meantime, I also need to keep writing. And drinking. Lonely, semi-suicidal, trans-Atlantic boat trips aren’t exactly good for the soul. I think that’s why I had to keep writing before. Talking about the past was saving me from the future.
Even though what happened next sure as shit wasn’t pretty.
* * * * *
Before Words were officially criminalized, the Word-Rehab clinics became governments sponsored. Huge, multi-billion dollar payouts to any clinic that would take in and support Addicts in their most dire time of need - prohibition. That way, when the law went into effect, the few million people who were about to face possible suicide would have somewhere to go.
And nothing, not a thing, would surprise the government more than how empty those stupid, fucking clinics were the day the law passed.
The government was expecting something like 5-7 million people to enter rehab on the day Words were banned. Only something like 200,000 were admitted. Less than five percent of the expected addicts.
Here’s why:
Word popularity had already been growing steadily throughout the rest of the world for a while. In a number of countries, Words were had not only been legalized, but had become monitored, legalized forms of commerce. It was in these countries – South Africa, The Netherlands, Japan, Brazil, etc – where production centers had begun to copy exactly what the Buffalo City Pulp Mill had begun. They began to print, copy, and, for all intents and purposes, manufacture Words.
Of course, who in their right mind would buy huge quantities of illegal material from overseas factories? Remember, most Word dealers had always just been opportunists, not actual pushers. No one like Jake Johnson with a steady job and health insurance was going to buy soon to be illegal contraband from a Brazilian paper factory.
Who then?
Well, how about the people already importing illegal drugs from other countries?
Yes, this was how Words left the hands of ordinary, curious citizens like Ian Decker and wound up in the hands of every cocaine, acid, and ecstasy dealer in the country. When the US government criminalized Words, all they did was force them out of the hands of normal people and into the hands of proper criminals.
I mean, a law doesn’t go into effect overnight. By the time Words were actually and effectively criminalized, it had already become a practical joke to a lot of people. The vast majority of Addicts had already put themselves into the hands of proper drug dealers who could support them indefinitely.
Interestingly, it was also in this way that Words became occasionally ineffective. I know it goes without saying, but drug dealers weren’t exactly model citizens. So far as I knew, nearly all of them always skimmed off the top of their wares; took a little bit for themselves and then recut their product with whatever was most convenient. Words ended up being no different. As each bag of Words was handed down, one or two doses would get replaced by blank pieces of paper. Of course, there’d be no way to find this out until the paper was opened. And then afterwards? Yeah, try reasoning with your drug dealer that you got burned on one of your doses. Good fucking luck. What choice did you have? All anyone did was keep buying and allow the loss of the occasional “bad hit.”
And then, just like that, Words became no different than any other drug.
But – and I suddenly feel like it’s very important to bring this up right now - not all of these addicts were like the pieces of shit I’ve been going on and on about for the last few days. I mean, the entire world wasn’t made up purely of Michael Vespas and Beth Vaceys and Mort Deckers. There were a few decent people out there who were addicted to Words for the better.
Take Caroline Swinghammer, for example. Six months after being granted a full scholarship to MIT, her brother died in a car accident. Caroline became hopelessly despondent. It didn’t matter that MIT found her to be one of the most promising astro-physicists they’d seen in decades. She and her brother had been nearly inseparable for almost twenty years. Only a year and a half apart in age, Caroline was unable to cope with life without her big brother.
Three months after his death, Caroline dropped out of school. She moved back home to Minnesota and sulked for over a year. She got a job waiting tables at a local diner and began dating a redneck named Benny. Caroline would close her eyes and night and assume her life was nearly all but over.
Then, one Saturday night, Benny threw a dose of Rapture at Caroline and changed her world. Unlike most people, Caroline Swinghammer didn’t read Rapture and think about how great her life was. Instead, she thought about how great her life should have been.
According to Caroline, her first thought was of her brother. What would he think of me now? she thought. This was Caroline’s own, personal version of Rapture. She then turned and looked at her boyfriend, Benny, in his white undershirt and his dirty blue jeans and was disgusted. She stood up, put her jacket on, and left his house. Two weeks later – and with a friend supplying her with Rapture – she was reenrolled at MIT. Three years later, she was one of the school’s most promising students.
Caroline became somewhat of an oddity; not only was she about to publish a paper on the probability of interstellar travel within our lifetimes, but she regularly made appearances in front of Congress arguing the benefits of Words and why they should be legalized and regulated, not criminalized.
Of course, no one listened to her. Why not? Cause Congress was made up of dickstrings, remember?
Caroline soon expatriated. She transferred to a school in St. Petersburg, Russia where Words hadn’t been criminalized but hadn’t exactly been made legal either. She went on to finish her doctorate as a guest of the Russian government all while a happy and productive addict of Rapture.
And Caroline Swinghammer wasn’t an individualized case. There were dozens, hundreds, probably thousands of people who became not only healthy from Words, but better off because of them. So when Congress cut these good people off, they had no choice but to go from a life of joy to a life of crime.
But a few months later, once the dust finally settled, illegal Words simply became a way of life. There was a long period of time when Lust, Rapture, and Hilarity became your normal brand of illegal drugs just like marijuana, cocaine, or speed. It was no longer the fun, awesome thing to do. It was just another drug. Did you wanna get some Lust or did you wanna rage on coke for the night? The same man brought you the same wares at a competitive price. The only difference was that Words continue to climb in popularity while the other drugs became less and less popular by the hour.
But still, it was around that time when things sort of got back to normal for a while. Addicts simply existed and they bought their drugs and some got arrested and some didn’t and shit mostly went on like it had before.
It was in this brief period of calm that websites like Words of Advice became popular. Now, in all fairness, I loved this fucking website. WOA was nothing more than a collection of short text messages between people describing what had happened to them the night before while they were using Words. The texts ranged from fucking outright lunacy to the funniest shit you ever heard. Off the top of my head, these are some of the messages that will more than likely stay stuck in my head till the day I die:
“You do realize that, Lust or no Lust, having sex with all three of your brothers at the same time means we probably aren’t getting back together, right? Especially since your dad was videotaping.”
“We were on Hilarity, so we laughed until the pastor stopped talking. Of course, when Jack’s body was lowered into the ground, shit got awkward.”
“Look, I promise I’ve never had sex with any of our teachers……In their houses…Without barnyard animals being involved….Maybe.”
“Last night you were so jacked out on Rapture, you kept hugging your pet cactus and telling us you deserved the pain because of your sins.”
“Note to self: Laughing till you fall over during a Human Sexuality final equals expulsion. Do you think Taco Bell is hiring?”
“My girlfriend got a second job she didn’t tell me to help fund out Lust addiction. I found out cause she just delivered a pizza to the hotel room where I was fucking her mom.”
Ah, humanity. Sometimes, I don’t even miss you.
And it was right around this time, when things were sort of normal, that a very abnormal thing happened. I met a girl named Vanessa Ashley Cooper.
The girl who would turn out to be the love of my life.
II
Let’s be honest. For the better part of my life, I was never any fucking good at monogamy. I occasionally dabbled in it – sort of like how girls experimented with lesbianism while they were in college – but I was never too successful at it. Instead, I was mostly just a bastard. I dated girls here and there. Had the even rarer girlfriend (which would usually only last a handful of months). And mostly just did what I did. I’m neither ashamed nor proud of this. It simply was what it was.
But yes, I slept around. Frequently. I was never cruel or disingenuous to the women I met, but rather the opposite. All of them knew exactly what they were getting into when they gave me their phone number. Or went home with me later that night. Or even just slipped away with me into the bar bathroom. I don’t know. A lot of my friends used to say I had a way with women. I think I just appreciated them more. Knew what to say. What not to say. How to touch the back of their neck. How to avoid the parts they were self-conscious about.
My friends would tell me that I was a fucking retard. That this was the living definition of “having a way with women.” I told them they were fucking retarded for not having these sort of instincts.
Whatever. Who cares. I only bring all this up because when I met her, Vanessa Ashley Cooper was no different from any other girl I’d ever met in my life. In fact, she was exactly the same.
I met Vanessa through my brother, Andrew. Around Christmastime a few years back, I took a trip down to Florida to visit my family. One night I went out with my brother to grab some drinks and hang out with his friends. One of these friends, a girl named Kirsten, brought along her sister; a young, intelligent, funny, and strikingly beautiful sister named Ashley. And I guess I made one hell of an impression on her cause I ended up going home with her that night instead of back home to my parent’s house.
I used to tell people that I swept her off her feet from day one. She used to tell people that she was trashed and I just happened to be the nearest thing to her with a penis.
We would often agree in private that both stories were true.
Still, after that night, the two of us didn’t talk much for a year or so. I mean, I had known the girl for all of five hours and was living two thousand miles away. It wasn’t exactly what you’d call a budding romance.
However, I got an email from her one day saying how she was moving to New York and was gonna need someone to show her around. This was fantastic news. In so few words, she was letting me know that she’d be new in town and would be looking for an easy lay. Vanessa was emailing me to see if I’d be available.
I replied and let her know that, in so few words, I looked forward to possibly damaging some of her internal organs.
It was a date.
But you know what? I’m a classy son of a bitch. So, her first weekend in town, I wanted to show her a good time. I even told her how I felt bad for not earning the sex with her the first time, so I’d make sure I’d earn it this time. After I told her what I had in mind, this was her reply:
“So wait a minute,” Vanessa told me. “You’re saying I get a free dinner, free alcohol, AND sex on top of it all?”
“Pretty much,” I said.
“Shit. Where do I sign up?”
Yeah, Vanessa was kind of fantastic.
Of course, what happened next was something I never saw coming: Vanessa actually had a sort of an amazing personality.
That first night, between dinner and drinks, we talked for something like five hours straight. At first, shit was awkward. Obviously. I mean, what the hell do you say to a girl you’ve really only known for a few drunken, sexually explicit hours?
“Um, so, you’re ass looks way better naked than it does in jeans.”?
So, for the first two hours, we both did what everyone does on a first date: We pretended to be people we weren’t. But once the alcohol got in our blood, we started opening up. Bits and pieces at first. Little shit. Like I found out she was also sort of snobby about what kind of wine she liked. Then, at the bar I took her to after dinner, some people were dancing towards the back.
“Oh, no. You’re not ask me to dance, are you?” Vanessa asked me.
“Are you kidding me? Do I really look that gay tonight?” I replied.
“Oh, thank god,” she said, breathing a sigh of relief. “Lets get shots.”
This crap went on and on for hours. At first, I was worried that I was enjoying her company a little more than she was enjoying mine. But then at one point she was outside having a cigarette and she told me how weird it was that we had so much in common. I felt considerably relieved. Then, out of nowhere, I almost screwed it up.
“So, I know this may seem like a bizarre question, but indulge me,” I began.
“Go for it,” Vanessa said, mildly intoxicated.
“The last guy you dated. Why didn’t it work out?”
Yeeaaahhh, this was a retarded question to ask a girl I was about to sleep with and was now beginning to show actual interest in. But alcohol is dumb. And, in this case, brilliant.
“God, he just wanted so much from me. Like…” she paused.
“Take your time,” I told her. “I ain’t in no hurry.”
“Alright, maybe this is saying too much, but I’m not exactly a very emotional person. I’m not one of those girls that gets into all the girly, romance shit. Yeah, I know how to dress and do my hair and I like cute little puppies, but that doesn’t mean I believe in happy endings and true love and a house with a picket fence and all that other garbage. Ugh, I mean who’s so dumb and delusional that they actually think that that’s how life works?”
I reached over and grabbed Vanessa’s hand. Looking into her eyes, I spoke. “I think that might be the sexiest thing a girl has ever said to me.”
She laughed and suggested we get another round.
The next morning, we parted ways. I put her in a cab and gave her twenty bucks for the cab fare. I told her I’d talk to her soon and swore to myself that I’d wait several days before texting her just to make sure I didn’t seem incredibly creepy.
The very next day, I got a text message from her. Our conversation went something like this:
“Hey there, stranger.” – Vanessa
“Good day, miss. How you doing today?” – Me
“Oh, not too bad. Still on the job hunt. Sucks. Got any plans this coming weekend?”
“Hmmm. Not sure. Let me consult my calendar. Oh look at that. It says I’m a loser and have no plans till the end of time. Also: I may need a new calendar.”
“Haha. Well then would you wanna see lil ol me again? Someone told me you’re a good cook and I was hoping to get a meal outta ya.”
“Oh, you did, did you? Interesting. And why am I gonna cook you an expertly crafted dinner now?”
“Cause your dick doesn’t suck itself. :)”
“Ahh. Yes. Very accurate. See you Saturday then?”
“Saturday sounds good. See you then, cowboy.”
Three months later, Vanessa and I were engaged in the most bizarre kind of relationship in the known universe. Privately, the two of would say the sweetest shit to each other. Mostly when we were inebriated. Sober? In public? People would ask if we were dating and we’d just look at each other, shrug our shoulders, and say, “I guess that’s what you could call it.” If the issue got pressed further, we’d just tell the person in question to fuck off.
Of course, Vanessa Ashley Cooper probably didn’t look like what you’d think. I mean, hell, mentally to physically, she didn’t look like how I’d think either. She was only 5’2” with fair skin and the lightest set of blue eyes you could possibly imagine. God, I remember I used to look at those things for hours. Ah, shit. Anyway. She had dark brown hair but she always had it dyed a perfect, natural-looking shade of blonde. She attributed her ability to not look like a cheap stripper to the few courses of cosmetology school she took before she dropped out.
“I suddenly realized I wasn’t nearly as vain as I thought I was,” Vanessa answered when I asked her why she had dropped out.
“Well I still am. So thank god you learned a little something or else I might’ve had to kick you to the curb,” I replied.
“Aww, you don’t wanna do that now,” she said. “I mean, then I’d have to sleep with your friends and that’d get awkward really fast.
“God, I hate you.”
“You too, baby.” She kissed me.
Did I mention Vanessa also had a huge rack? God, what a woman.
Soon enough, I introduced her to my best friend. A kid I’d known since high school. Someone who managed to stick with my demented ass for fifteen years. Someone I thought of like a brother.
“Vanessa, this is Rash,” I said as the two shook hands.
“Good to finally meet you,” he said. “You’re just as hot as I’d been told.”
“Okay, look, I don’t know what this asshole told you, but we aren’t having a threesome tonight,” Vanessa said.
“Dammit!” Rash shouted and looked at me while raising a fist. “You said we were touching balls, you bastard!”
“Not in my face! That’s my money maker!” I comically retaliated.
“Oh wait,” Vanessa chimed in. “No oral? That’s a whole different story. Let’s talk about this.”
“Shotgun anus!” Rash yelled out.
From that day forth, Rash and Vanessa got along sort of famously. Which made me ecstatic. I mean, there’s nothing worse than your best boy and your best girl not really hitting it off. My old friend Josh could definitely attest to that one. Man, when he got engaged, I made that shit real awkward.
Ah, fuck it. No sense in worrying about it anymore, eh?
So, anyway. A long time passed where shit was really as good as it could get. Vanessa got a job doing some sort of sales assistant work she wasn’t really qualified for. Luckily, her boss wanted to stare down her shirt all day and she was fine with this for a decent paycheck. I kept waiting tables and the two of us went out whenever our schedules permitted. Every few months, Rash would take the bus up from Baltimore and we’d all party like we were still nineteen.
Though, in case you were wondering, no, the three of us never did actually have a threesome.
Perverts.
But did Vanessa and I have a handful of threesomes with girls we met through friends and coworkers? Maybe. But those stories are too messed up to detail, even for this notebook. Hopefully, those stories will go with me to the grave. Cause Lust or no Lust, this kid right here sure found his way into a number of insanely compromising situations. And in some ways, I’m glad there’s no one in the world left who remembers them.
And in some ways, it sucks shit.
III
A couple years back, Rash came up to visit for a weekend in October. We were celebrating Vanessa’s birthday and so naturally, all of us went out on the town and proceeded to get obliterated beyond all reason and function. The next day, the three of us woke up so hungover we could barely form words. I’m pretty sure I remember mumbling the phrase, “Please don’t hit me with the fish,” over and over while still laying bed.
When the Chinese delivery guy finally arrived that day, he was greeted like he was the fucking messiah of eggrolls.
Later that Sunday, after we finished nursing our hangovers for a bit, we all sat down on my couch and started flipping through the channels. And it was on this random afternoon that Dr. Kenneth Danley, more commonly known to the public as Dr. Ken, announced to the world that he had finally figured out how Words worked. Vanessa, Rash, and myself watched curiously as he announced to the world his great and disturbingly sensible theory.
“There is no doubt,” Dr. Ken began in his deep, Southern drawl, “That these Words are essentially the ultimate addiction. Recent tests show that Words have an immediate addiction rate of 99.8%. That is a higher addiction rate than both cocaine and even heroin.
“Now, some of you out there may have heard the name Carl Jung before. Dr. Jung was a brilliant psychotherapist who worked alongside Sigmund Freud for a long time. Eventually, the two went their separate ways and this was mostly because Jung had a lot of theories that differed from Freud’s. One of his theories that’s been proven to be true time and time again is the idea of the collective subconscious.
“A lot of people are confused by this concept, but what it means is actually quite simple: Every sane person on this planet has a volume of basic ideas locked away in their brain. These ideas – or what he called archetypes – are familiar to everyone on the planet. For Carl Jung, they mostly existed as basic types of humanity. These archetypes range from the relentless, justice seeking hero to the kind, caring mother. They are simple, common human characters that all people can understand and relate to. They are facts of life that we all understand without ever having to be taught them. They are simply part of us.”
“Okay, are we really watching this?” I chimed in. “I’m changing the channel. I want some fucking cartoons.”
“No, shit, hold up, man. This is cool,” Rash said as he sat on the floor with a box of noodles in his lap.
“Are you for real?”
“I’m with Rash on this one,” Vanessa added.
“God, you both suck. I need to hang out with more people who like programs involving anvils and coyotes. You’re all too highbrow for me.”
“Shush,” Vanessa said. “I’ll make it up to you.” She put her hand on my crotch. I shrugged my shoulders and tossed the controller aside.
Dr. Ken continued. “Of course, by now, you’re probably asking yourself what Words and Carl Jung have to do with each other. The research I’ve done recently suggests they have a lot to do with each other. You see, like the archetypes, Words never have to be taught to anyone. There’s no one on record that’s opened up a copy of Lust or Rapture, looked at the markings, and said ‘I don’t understand this language.’ All of these different Words seem to be imbedded within our brains since birth. And it was this that made me think of Carl Jung’s collective subconscious.
“Like those other archetypes, these different Words are concepts and ideas that we can all recognize. These, too, are part of every human being. Just like when we think of the hero archetype and become filled with a sense of pride and nobility, when we see the Word for Rapture, we become happy and carefree. These Words are just another set of ideas that are part of being human.”
“Great. Good work, dick. What exactly does that prove?” I asked.
“What this proves about the nature of humanity and addiction is fascinating,” Dr Ken replied through the TV without missing a beat.
“Haha. Daaaamn, suckah!” Rash yelled out. I threw a couch cushion at his face and told him to go fuck himself. “I will do no such thing,” he replied.
“I will if no one else will,” Vanessa replied and jokingly began to stand up.
“Hot damn!” Rash said. “Bout damn time. Come here, white girl!”
“You wish,” I said. “If Vanessa wanted meat that tasted like curry, she’d go to the Indian buffet down the block.”
“Yeah, that’s sort of true,” she agreed and sat back down on my lap.
“Hey, wait, shut up,” Rash said. “I think this bastard is actually getting to his point.” We all turned our attention back toward the TV.
“…was the addictiveness of Words. That’s what caught my attention. Why were so many millions of people instantly addicted to these symbols to the point that suicide seemed like the answer if they couldn’t have them?
“So, after extensive study and research, what I have concluded is that Words are the archetypes of addiction. I know that might seem like a hard concept to understand, but consider this for a moment: Everyone is addicted to something. If it isn’t hard drugs, it’s over the counter drugs. If it isn’t over the counter drugs, it’s alcohol. If it isn’t alcohol, it’s tobacco. If it isn’t tobacco, it’s caffeine. If it isn’t caffeine, it’s sex. If it isn’t sex, it’s computers. Or dieting. Or religion. It can even be the addiction of not being addicted. But everyone, every person on this earth has something they are all addicted to.
“The one thing in common I’ve found with ALL Word addicts is that once they become addicted, whatever their previous addiction was becomes obsolete. Pastors have forsaken God for a dose of Hilarity. Smokers of sixty years have traded Cuban cigars for a dose of Lust. Cocaine addicts become clean after becoming addicted to Rapture. All of them leave their previous addictions and never look back.
“So, what my research tells me is that these Words are simply the perfect addiction. They aren’t just a kind of drug, they are the ultimate, immaculate drug. For whatever reason, God – in His infinite wisdom – chose to put these symbols into all of our minds. I believe that, in the long run, they will do us good. For now, we must simply ride out this wave of horror until it passes.
“And so, with all that said, I would like to make an announcement. I, Dr. Kenneth Danley, of sound mind and body, am an addict of Rapture…”
“For fucking real?!” I yelled out and began laughing. “What an asshole! That last sentence is a goddamn contradiction! It fucking negates everything that crazy hillbilly just said!”
“I dunno, dude,” Rash said. “He kind of has a point.”
“I know! That’s the problem. His argument is actually really solid. But then he had to fuck it up by saying he was addicted to Rapture. It doesn’t exactly make him an un-biased researcher after that.”
“Ooohh, yeah. Good point. Oh, well. It’s still kinda cool.”
“What you think, Vanessa?” I asked.
“You don’t wanna know what I think.”
“Huh?” Rash asked.
“Yeah, why?” I said.
Vanessa sighed. “Despite the fact that he himself is an addict, can we all agree that, logically, and on paper, his argument is pretty solid?”
“Uhh, yeah,” Rash said.
“Okay, fine, sure,” I conceded.
“And even he admitted that he was now an addict, yes?”
“Yes, yes, the point?” I asked.
“Well, no matter how much of a hoakey, TV doctor he is, Dr. Ken has a point. This is the ultimate, human imbedded addiction. We’re all programmed for it. Every one of us.”
“We got that,” Rash said.
“So what happens when every last person alive looks at one Word or another? How long will it be till every living person on the planet is an addict of Words? What then? What’s to stop everyone on the earth from being nothing more than a mind-altered addict?”
“Oh,” I said and looked at the TV. “That’s not good.”
“No shit it’s not. This asshole figured out the problem but he didn’t figure out a solution.”
“So, what’s that mean?” Rash asked.
“What’s it mean?” Vanessa replied. “It means say goodbye to humanity. It means we’re all fucked.
* * * * *
A few months after Dr. Ken’s public announcement, it was estimated that the amount of Word addicts tripled. Once every drug addict and abusive alcoholic in the nation heard that they could be rid of their costly and socially problematic addictions without rehab, they switched to using Words without hardly having a second thought. People soon became addicted to Words not by the individual, but by the county.
Dr. Ken’s speech also prompted the coining of a new term, as well. From that point forward, there was only one type of addict – the Addict. An Addict was a habitual user of the finest and purest drug in all creation – Words. An addict of any other kind simply became a user. When alcoholics went up to stand at the front of their AA meetings, they no longer said “I’m Joe and I’m an addict.” The line changed to “I’m Joe and I’m a user.” The term Addict became the sole property for those who enjoyed Rapture, Lust, Hilarity, and the other Words that would soon follow.
And then you know what happened next?
Only the worst possible thing one could imagine.
Life continued to persist.
And, if you ask me, that was about as bad as it got.
IV
In case I haven’t made it completely obvious by now, I’m a big fan of liquor. Huge. Love the stuff. But, oddly, I never developed a taste for anything harder. I tried pot and popped pills a couple of times, but just never really got into it. And by the time you hit your late 20’s, experimenting with drugs really just isn’t the cool thing to do anymore. Not being into drugs meant that when Words first came out I never tried them. And then as I heard more and more about them, I slowly came to despise them. Point being: To this day, I’ve never once experienced what it’s like to use any kind of Word.
My brother, Aaron, on the other hand, got into Lust early on and became quite fond of it. Unlike me, my brother still lived in south Florida and he soon discovered that Lust and Miami went really well together. Imagine that. Of course, it was sort of hard to blame him. He was twenty-two when Lust hit and lived in a world populated by girls in bikinis, girls on spring break, girls who had father issues, and combinations thereof. It was practically Lust gone wild.
Which was exactly what the producers of the series of porn movies Lust Gone Wild thought when they began filming. But that’s for another day.
So, anyway, about three months after Dr. Ken sealed the world’s fate with his television broadcast, I decided to go back down to Florida for a long weekend. The plan was to just hang out and see my parents and some old friends. Vanessa, also being from Florida, decided to come with me. Of course, her parents had moved out of the state ages ago and so Vanessa had the option of either staying with some friends or staying with me and my parents. Not even thinking about what we were doing, Vanessa opted to stay with me.
We had clearly not thought this out.
“It’s so nice to meet you,” my mom said as she gave Vanessa a great big hug. “I’ve heard so much about you.”
“Really?” Vanessa said nervously as she hugged my mom back.
“No,” I said, watching Vanessa cringe. “She hasn’t.”
“Oh, shush, you’ve told me plenty. You’re a waitress, too, right?”
“No, I’m a sales associate at…”
“But you used to be a waitress, right?” My mom interrupted.
“Well, yeah, I guess. A while back when I lived in Florida,” Vanessa said, trying to be decent.
“Oh, well, that must be what I’m thinking of. I’ve just heard so many stories about you it’s hard to keep them all straight.”
“No,” I added again, this time rolling my eyes. “You haven’t.”
That’s when my father walked up and luckily broke up the oddness of the conversation.
“My main man!” he said and gave me a hug. “How was your flight.”
“Still not the same since they got rid of those honey roasted peanuts.”
My dad laughed. “Yeah, but don’t you have the option of getting cookies now? How can you go wrong with cookies?”
“Ha. Yeah, right, dad. So, where’s the car? Vanessa and I just wanna get home and relax for a bit before we do anything else. I know it’s only a three hour flight, but after the party we went to last night it sort of felt like a ten hour flight.”
So, after some slight awkwardness, we all got in my dad’s car and drove back to my parent’s house. The conversation on the way home was peppered with a number of uncomfortable questions involving how long we’d been dating, what Vanessa’s parents were like, and where we saw ourselves in the future.
For Vanessa and I, it was like having a stranger walk up to us and poke us in the eye.
With their dick.
Repeatedly.
Well, maybe for me at least. Kinky bitch probably would’ve been into that.
So, in an attempt to avoid my parents at all costs, we quickly made plans for the night with my brother and some of our old friends. Vanessa and I went out, got shitfaced, came home, had great sex, and woke up hungover the next morning.
And that’s when I saw the single most disturbing scene of my life play out.
Walking into the kitchen, with only one, bloodshot eye half-open, I watched as my parents traded two twenty-dollar bills for a small, plastic bag filled with folded-up paper. The person giving them the bag was my younger brother.
“The hell am I seeing?” I asked, both freakishly confused and only too aware.
“Oh, you’re awake,” my mom said. “Eggs?” She turned toward a frying pan on the stove and picked it up as though it were the most natural question in the world.
“I’m okay. Um…I’m just gonna go back and check on Vanessa now. You all okay?”
“Yeah, everything’s cool,” my brother said. “Why, what’s up?”
“No, nothing. Be back in a minute.”
I ran to my room and crawled back into bed. As I latched onto Vanessa, she stirred. “What is it, babe?”
“Nothing,” I said. “Please, just hold me.”
She turned toward me, kissed me on the cheek, put two arms around my waist, buried her head in my chest, and fell back asleep before she even knew what had happened. As she snored, I kissed her on the top of her head.
Now, my family and I were never very close. Even before I moved to New York City, I first moved three hours away from home to Orlando and had accidentally become distant. After that weekend, I became even more distant. I think Vanessa knew how I felt, but she chose not to press me about it.
Even to this day, I really wish she had.
Two days later, we were flying home. After drinking heavily in the airport lounge and having another cocktail on the airplane itself, I got a little loose-lipped. I told her how I felt like her and I were the only two Sober people left on earth. That I was getting scared. That I didn’t want to lose her and that I knew it went against everything that we believed, but I couldn’t help how I felt.
I asked her if she’d be my girlfriend.
“God,” she said as she held my hand. “I thought you’d never ask.”
“Really? All you ever wanted me was to ask?”
“Silly boy,” she replied. “It’s all a girl ever wants.”
“But what about what you said? Emotions and houses and families and not being good at any of that shit?” I asked. “I mean, not like I’m any better at it myself.”
“Hey, calm down, tiger. It’s not like you asked me to marry you. We’ll just take it day by day,” Vanessa said. “Not like either of us know what the fuck we’re doing anyway.” I looked at her, smiled, and kissed her on the forehead.
Then we hailed the flight attendant and ordered another round of drinks.
A few months later, right around when everything seemed to be equally miserable and perfect all at the same time, a girl at work mentioned how she had just tried some new Word and how it was nothing like the other three Words that were out there.
“Acceleration,” she said. She pulled a tiny, folded-up piece of paper out of her pocket and showed it to me. It was sealed with a small, orange sticker that depicted a stick figure running with motion trails behind it. “It’s gonna change the fucking world. Just you wait.”
I really, really, really wish she had been wrong.
* * * * *
Jenn Parker was the first person I ever knew who was an Addict of Acceleration. She was also one of those people who surprised the shit out of you when she told you she was an Addict. Jenn was somewhere around 5’3”, had a petite frame, a pixie haircut, pale skin, and barely ever wore make up. She had a real outgoing personality, laughed a lot, and nicknamed me “Nips” because the first time we met I was topless in the locker room at work. All in all, she was pretty fucking awesome for a lesbian.
Wait, does that sound bad?
Yeah, I think that sounds bad. Real bad.
Doesn’t it?
Ah, fuck, whatever.
Jenn Parker was a part-time hostess who went to college full-time studying social work. It was somewhere in the middle of her junior year that she discovered Acceleration. A friend suggested she try it out when Jenn was mentioning how she had to write a 20-page paper by Monday yet had to work all weekend at the same time.
“I’m not even kidding you,” Jenn told me. “I wrote the whole paper in one night. And got an A. And slept a full night’s sleep. Shit’s unreal.”
“What?” I asked. “How is that even remotely possible. Do you type super fast when you’re on it or something?”
“No, you live super fast. So far as I can figure out, you function four times faster than everyone else. Like, you actually think, breathe, eat, and move four times faster. So, in just one full, twenty-hour day, I actually have four whole days to work. That means four nights of sleep, twelve meals, and seventy-six hours of work. In one day. That’s what Acceleration does.”
“Holy shit! That’s bananas. So, like do you do everything super fast? Like what about sex?”
“Of course you of all people would ask about sex.”
“Hey! It’s a valid point of concern!” I said. Jenn laughed.
“Well, that is one of the major drawbacks to Acceleration. Not necessarily sex, but that you can’t watch TV or listen to music or anything.”
“What? Why?”
“Cause your brain is moving at four times the speed. Imagine every song you’ve ever listened to or movie you’ve ever watched played in slow motion. Sort of boring.”
“Holy shit that’s weird. Waiting for water to boil must feel like a small eternity.”
“Oh, you have no idea. I haven’t tried that specifically, but even waiting for the toaster oven to heat up. God, I thought I was gonna die of starvation.”
“So, what’s the other major drawback?”
“Huh?” Jenn asked.
“You said that was one of the major drawbacks to Acceleration. I assume there’s at least one more.”
“Oh, yeah, the other one’s way worse.”
“How the hell does it get worse than that?”
“Emptiness,” she said. “And the slow down. I mean, Acceleration actually only works for about twelve normal, human hours. That’s two, full Accelerated days for us, mind you. After that, there’s two hours where you decelerate back to normal speed. It’s pretty fucking horrible. And, as if to make it even worse, Emptiness hits you before you even finish decelerating.”
“Jesus fucking Christ!” I said. “And you’re okay?”
“Yeah, it’s pretty bad, but I got over it. You know short time users don’t feel Emptiness for too long. I was fine. I mean, I’ll probably even more than likely use it again next semester.”
“What?!” I asked and had to stop myself from slapping the poor girl upside the head. “Why the hell would you do that to yourself again?”
“Are you kidding me?” Jenn replied. “Two days worth of work in a half day? You realize all I have to do is get through Emptiness and I can do two week’s worth of homework in one day? Why wouldn’t I?”
Jenn Parker and I didn’t talk much after that. Even though I liked her as a person, her addiction sort of made me question exactly what the fuck was wrong with her.
Especially since, over that very summer, every news outlet exploded with the story of a Japanese man named Yoshi Haraguchi and how Acceleration ended up changing his life forever.
V
For the meantime, forget about America. Consider it a different universe. Because for the time being, I’m not talking about the US anymore. For now, I’m talking about Japan. And in Japan, Words were received much, much differently than they were in the US.
Japan had not only legalized Words, but had embraced them. Near instantly, they became an integral part of Japanese society. So when the bizarre mind-fuck that was Acceleration hit their small island, they didn’t shun the Word, but immediately incorporated it into their lives.
First, it started with music and television. Apps and add-on’s were created for computers, televisions, and cell phones that would allow an Accelerated user to still enjoy TV shows, movies, and music. Next were the videogame system modifications that allowed a user to play at four-times normal speed. Special, ultra-sensitive controllers and receivers had be built specifically for the Accelerated user. Also, new computer keyboards were developed to accommodate those on Acceleration. Even extra-intense microwaves were made to cook food at an accelerated rate.
And this all happened in about two months. Japan took to Acceleration like a Jew took to accounting. In Japan, Addicts could experience Acceleration almost as though it were no different than normal reality.
Which, when you first thought about it, asked the obvious question – Well then what was the fucking point?