Junkie Love (13 page)

• • •

To make it convincing, I chose one of the two doors on the top landing and knocked loudly on the wood panelling, hoping that there would be no-one inside. If there was, I would quickly have to invent some bullshit story about a non-existent person, or a mistaken address I’d been given; but luckily, no-one came to answer the door, so I knocked again, even more loudly this time, to make it doubly convincing. Dougie was still lurking about on the floor below, and I was hoping he would leave ahead of me as I didn’t want the fucker following me down the stairs and out onto the street. I was sure that somehow he had intuitively sussed the connection between Cissy and myself (how, I didn’t know, but I definitely felt it), and I didn’t want him following me home with the mistaken idea that I would lead him to her. He didn’t budge, though, and I had to pass by him again on my way down the stairs. Again, no words were spoken, but I felt his eyes burning into the back of my head as I descended, and when I reached the second-floor landing I heard his footsteps start to follow, as if he had suddenly decided that I was, indeed, the lead he had been looking for. I took care not to increase my pace; but as soon as I was out of the tenement entrance, I sprinted along the street and ducked down the first alleyway I came to before Dougie had emerged from the building.

I knew the area well, and after criss-crossing a few more backstreets and alleys I felt sure that I had shaken him off, quickly making my way back to the squat. There, I cooked up a few old cottons to steady my nerves and take the edge off the sweating and the sickness that had suddenly returned with a vengeance. I’d managed to score a couple of grammes with the
little money I still had left after Dodgy Dave had ripped me off, but this had soon gone and I’d been hustling ever since — calling in favours and exchanging the stolen goods I still possessed for the odd quarter or half-gramme wrap. I’d never ripped any of my customers off, or pulled power trips on them, and had often advanced them gear when they didn’t have the readies to pay up-front; but I soon found out that this didn’t mean such behaviour would necessarily be reciprocated. People I’d helped out when they were sick and desperate, and who were now dealing, conveniently forgot about their own past misfortunes, telling me how impossible it was for them to give me credit — no money, no gear — even though they would have loved to do so, if only the circumstances had been different. Not everyone was like this — a few dealers helped me out by fronting me small amounts — but I made a mental note of those who wouldn’t, or who tried to make me crawl, and I made up my mind that if I ever got the chance in the future I would fuck these bastards over, one way or another.

As soon as I’d calmed down, I began to think. I felt sure, now, that Cissy was alive and well, and had gone to ground when she discovered that Dougie was out of jail and on the prowl in London. She would be scared for herself — possibly for me also — and though I still had no idea where she might be, I wasn’t so crazy with worry and dark forebodings as I had been before. Even though we’d been growing apart, each of us immersed in our own mainly drug-related problems, I realised, too, just how much I missed her, and I wanted her back with me badly. But the whole situation was out of my control and there were few options open to me, beyond what I’d tried already. All I could do was to keep on hustling, scoring little bits of skag and methadone here and there, trying to keep the sickness and the nightmares at bay until my luck changed for the better.

• • •

It was another week or so before I finally heard from her. An unstamped letter with my name on it was lying on the hallway mat one morning, and I immediately recognised the handwriting as Cissy’s. I quickly tore open the envelope, hoping to find a lengthy and detailed explanation of where she had been and what she had been doing, together with notice of her imminent return; but instead, all I got was a scribbled note with instructions to meet her the following afternoon at a certain West End pub. I briefly wondered who had posted the letter through our door, whether it was Cissy or some unknown friend — but the important thing was that she had contacted me, and all the questions and explanations could wait until the next afternoon.

Thursday was Giro day, and I got up early to cash the cheque, then blew the lot on a half-gramme of smack. I felt good as I took the 29 bus down to Charing Cross Road — I’d actually showered and changed my stinking clothes for the first time in days and was feeling more like a human being than I’d felt in a long time. As I crossed Cambridge Circus and entered the pub, I couldn’t see any sign of Cissy, so I bought a drink then sat down to wait. I’d been there for about ten minutes when she walked in through the swing doors, sporting a pair of shades, and with her hair tied back in a ponytail that bobbed from left to right as she scanned the pub looking for me. She was wearing high heels and a silver lurex top that clearly showed the outlines of her nipples, under a black fur coat that I had never seen before; and though she was pale and thin — and looked very strung-out — to me, at that moment, she was the most beautiful woman in the world, and I felt my cock getting hard as I looked at her. She caught sight of me and smiled briefly, then breezed over to where I was sitting as if she were a model on the catwalk, oblivious to the stares and raised eyebrows of the office workers and secretaries on lunchbreak. She leaned over
and kissed me on the cheek, like it had been only a couple of hours, instead of over a month, since we’d last seen each other. Then she sat down beside me, removing her sunglasses as she did so and placing them on the table in front of us. Her eyes, I noticed, were very pinned.

“So what’s new? I heard you got ripped off by that bastard Dodgy Dave … what the fuck were you doin’ scoring through him anyway? I ought to be pissed off at you — that was my money, or at least Julia’s, that you lost there. Jesus, you look a mess!”

Typically, Cissy had totally wrong-footed me. I’d been expecting her to be on the defensive for doing a disappearing act and taking half of the money and the methadone with her. Instead, she had gone straight onto the attack, fazing me completely.

“I was desperate. There was a serious smack shortage at the time, if you remember … No fucker was able to cop anywhere, and Dave was the only one who managed to suss out anything at all. Maybe if I’d had a bit of methadone left, I wouldn’t have had to score through him.”

“Fuck off! That was my money, remember? I left you half, an’ it’s not my fault you went an’ gave it all to some crook like Dodgy Dave. Look, I don’t want to get into this again, recriminations an’ blame all the time, that’s why I left in the first place — that an’ your bloody selfishness. You can be a right bastard at times … Anyway, I’ve missed you, shithead, more than you could ever know — but there’s another reason I’ve had to stay away. Dougie’s been released from Peterhead, an’ he’s back in London, an’ he’s lookin’ for me …”

“I know, I ran into him one night when I was passing by your old place. Nice looking bloke, your ex-old man.”

“Oh Jesus!” Cissy went even paler, if that was possible. “He didn’t follow you, did he? The guy’s a fuckin’ psycho, an’ I know he wants me back. I know how he thinks, an’ as far as he’s concerned I’m still his old lady, an’ if he susses that I’m with you,
that’s both of us finished.”

“I’m not scared of ’im — an’ anyway, I lost him around the back of King’s Cross. He’s not so fast, an’ he looks like a fuckin’ neanderthal, I bet his brain’s even slower than his feet.” I didn’t really believe this — I hadn’t forgotten the penetrating eyes, the feeling of intuitive, predatory intelligence that I had picked up on — but I wanted to impress Cissy and make her feel safe, let her see that she didn’t need to worry, that I would always be there to look after her. My words had totally the opposite effect.

“Are you crazy?! You’ve never seen ’im stomp anyone, but I have, an’ it isn’t a pretty sight, believe me. The guy fuckin’ loves violence, feeds off it, he goes into another world completely, an’ I bet he’s even worse after a few years in the nick. Promise me you won’t square up to him if you run into him again, he’s always carryin’ a blade an’ he’s not afraid to use it — just don’t wind him up, whatever you do. Jesus, I’m gonna have to go an’ see him, sort things out between us — he’s been goin’ around all our old connections asking after me, an’ it’s only a matter of time before he twigs who you are, an’ where we live. Shit, why’d I ever have to get involved with ’im in the first place?!”

I didn’t want Cissy going anywhere near this nutter, and tried to persuade her against it. I wanted her back with me right away, but she was adamant that first she had to smooth things out with Dougie, make him see that their relationship was over, just as she had done with Jed the biker. I wondered, briefly, why I always seemed to be attracted to crazy women who were somehow involved with total psychos — I’d been in similar situations a couple of times in New York — but I let the thought pass. I had other things on my mind.

“So what have you been doin’ for money, an’ where’ve you been staying, if I’m allowed to ask?”

For the first time, Cissy did look slightly defensive.

“Oh, champagne hustling in one of the clubs in Soho. You know, tourists and sad old fucks who come here looking for good times, an’ get totally ripped off. Basically, you talk to ’em for half an hour, get ’em to order a bottle of champagne, then they get hit with a bill of about a hundred quid, an’ you get a commission on it. I did feel a bit guilty about doin’ it at first, but it’s good money, an’ anyway it’s their own stupid fault — anyone who steps into one of these dives needs their head examinin’. Ali put me onto it, an’ I’ve been stayin’ at her place to avoid Dougie.”

“Who’s Ali?”

“Oh, I’ve known her for ages, I met her in Holloway — she used to be on the game, an’ her pimp was a dealer too, a real gruesome little fuck. But she’s rid of him now, and she’s cleaned up her act. She’s really helped me out a lot, gettin’ me this job an’ puttin’ me up at her place — it’s out of the area, an’ Dougie doesn’t know anything about her.”

A thousand questions raced through my mind, but I knew better than to ask. We’d just end up in a flaming row again, which was the last thing I wanted right now.

“Ali was the one who put the note through the door. I heard you were goin’ around like Joe the Gumshoe with some ’orrible old picture of me, asking questions, so I thought I’d better get in touch. An’ I have missed you babe, honest. Look, don’t look so miserable — everything’ll work out fine, just wait an’ see. Anyway, I’ve got a mate with a flat around the corner, an’ I’ve arranged for her to be out for the afternoon, so let’s stop yappin’ about the ifs, buts an’ maybes, and go an’ have a good time!”

I took the hint and kept my mouth shut. I hadn’t had sex in ages, and the more wasted Cissy got, the more beautiful she looked to me. We spent the rest of the afternoon in bed, and when it was time for her to leave for work at the club, she gave me Ali’s phone number and a hundred and fifty pounds in
cash. It felt like prostitution in reverse, but I wasn’t complaining. The more messed up we both got, the more impossible the situation, the more truly I seemed to love her — an intense and doomed love that burned my heart and went on forever, the only thing left (apart from smack), that could lift my spirit above the dross that existence had now become.

• • •

Days passed, and there was no further news from Cissy. I tried calling her a couple of times at Ali’s, but the answer machine was always on, and as there was no phone in our squat she couldn’t return my calls. I didn’t want to pressure her anyhow — she obviously needed some space to sort out her affairs, and though I was worried about her meeting with Dougie, it was her decision and I had to respect it. And so I carried on in my own happy way, copping for other people while always taking a little extra “commission” for my efforts. It was a miserable existence and I was sick more often than I was high, and finally I began to think about getting onto some kind of methadone maintenance or reduction programme. I’d always avoided doing this in the past, firstly because it meant registering with the Home Office as an addict, and secondly I basically hated the stuff. In the States, it usually comes in “biscuit” form, or is dissolved in orange juice, while in England it is prescribed as a linctus: a thick, sweet-tasting, green liquid that resembles cough mixture and is loaded with sugar. It certainly works, and half an hour after drinking it you feel a warm glow start to spread outwards from your stomach to all the other parts of your body — a high that resembles that of heroin, but without the flash, or the rush, that comes when you shoot smack. The effects also last longer than gear, and one dose of 30-40 mls. will keep you straight for twenty four hours; but although I had often used it in the past to get through times of heroin
shortages, or when I’d had to go away from the city for any length of time and couldn’t cop, I had always promised myself that I would never use it on a regular basis. It is actually far harder to kick than heroin, and if you develop a methadone habit it takes weeks rather than days for the withdrawal symptoms to end. Even if you gradually reduce to 5 mls. a day, and then come off — which is what you are supposed to do — the stuff hangs around in your system for so long that thirty six hours later withdrawal will begin; and though it might not be as intense as if you go cold turkey straight from using half a gramme of smack a day, it seems to go on forever: two to three weeks of endless aches, chills, sweats and sleepless, pain-wracked nights.