The Big Fix Read Online Free PDF

and a phone number written on a piece of paper. Who the fuck is this? I don’t recognize the name. Some dealer, I am sure. The world starts spinning. Must be dehydration. The only water I get these days is drawn up with drugs in a syringe. Ugh. I’d better lie back down.
    The throbbing in my hands is nearly unbearable. Why did I decide to binge like that? I got tired of spending my whole paycheck on mixed drinks every Friday night. Or on a bag of weed I would smoke up in one sitting. I needed something more. My friend at the bar told me he could getme some heroin. I hadn’t had any for a while. I was getting scores from medicine cabinets here and there, but rarely could I get heroin. I was excited. I would need to wait until he got back from Dayton the next day, he had told me. He promised he would make it worth the wait. He leaned into me to let me know what he had in mind. I know he was just using me for my money. He had been a junkie in San Francisco before coming to this podunk town. He knew how to get what he wanted. So did I. I am sure the gin factored into my poor decision making when I told him yes.
    The following day we were sitting on the floor of my apartment, where I trusted him to inject me in my hands with an old battered syringe. This was the only tool we had at our disposal. In fact, new syringes were so scarce, one couple I knew had spent an entire weekend hooked up to saline IVs so they had an open port to inject into. I had never even used a new syringe. I prepared the dull instrument. I had sharpened the needle on a matchbook in hopes that it would slide into my skin like butter. This was magical thinking. The fishhook needle bore into my skin with a vengeance. We nodded off, puked, ate cookies, and nodded some more. He wandered back to the bar at some point. He came back the next day smelling like cheap vodka and sweat to do it all over again. Now, a few days later, I am broke.
    Ah, of course—the number in my wallet. It starts to come back to me. This guy wants me to call him as soon as I get paid again. I owe him $20 for a shitty bag of coke that I split with my friends, plus I think I might have let him feel my tits at the bar to get him to buy me a few drinks. My life is a constant series of new highs and mostly lows. I takeinventory: several bags of heroin, cocaine, a few Vicodin, and cheap booze. I had a productive weekend, I think, as I sit here feeling my loneliness.
    I haven’t had my phone turned on at this apartment, or else my mother would surely be calling by now. The last time I saw her, she knew something was going on with me. It’s been a few months since then. I had gotten a DUI trying to navigate my way back to West Chester under the influence of a few too many cocktails. For me to be able to continue in school, I had to move out of my parents’ house in the suburbs and back closer to downtown Cincinnati. At least when I lived with my parents there were some constraints on my behavior. Now there were none. I imagined the next time I would see her. She would have to get my brother or someone to drive her to come get me to take me back to the house. We would do these check-ins once a month or so since the first D had come home on my report card. My mother was none too happy with what she saw as another rebellious phase. Between the black clothes and my new tattoo, my mother was wondering if I had suddenly become possessed by some kind of devil.
    â€œWhy haven’t you called me?” she will inevitably ask.
    During my last visit, my time was spent dodging eye contact. The sunglasses concealed the dark circles under my eyes. A long-sleeved shirt hid the bruise the syringe had made on my forearm. I had lost a few pounds, but nothing drastic enough to draw much attention. She wasn’t focused on my appearance; for my mother, it is more about my mood. She’s always interested in how I answer questions. As I sat in the living room sipping my diet soda