56. The First Needle

We left the party and moved in together. It was that simple. There was a house which two beautiful Japanese boys had found; I had been staying there with the Israelis before I came to the party on the lake. I told you about it and we drove out, found a window open, climbed in. It was wooden floors in a jungle, brightly coloured rugs under eaves, dripping leaves in an Australian storm, tree frogs and kookaburras calling. It was clean and bright and beautiful and furnished and empty and we took it without asking, it appeared to be made all for us. Those three months we spent in that house in Possum Creek, they were the best of us, they were water unchartered without letting each other down and shouting. I peroxided my hair. You introduced me to your friends. We rolled through thunderstorms, picnicked on the floor, made a nest of art all our own. And early on you introduced me to something else, too. We were on a dirt road, a steep drop away to our left, the jungle rising to our right on our way to a party when you pulled over and told me to hold out my arm. Was it speed the first time? I think so.I think it was after that we moved on to methamphetamine, once I had a taste for a taste which I had instantly. You gave me my first needle but you weren’t to know how much I’d love it, how it met with the longing I’d had since forever and made a dance with it. Or were you? I’ve thought about this for a long time, this question of responsibility because you said hold out your arm and I did and it cannot be undone. I cannot un-know and maybe you didn’t want to be alone in the knowing and after that dirt road you weren’t. You had a partner in the secret about finding god and discovering him absent. We could be faithless together. Needles are for those who’ve been abandoned and need to prove it. They are the evidence for loneliness and neglect. I flexed my arm against the sting, felt the speed in my veins, you put the car into gear, we drove on. “Upon the highest throne in the world we are seated, still, upon our arses.” Michel de Montaigne (1533 - 1592) This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit eleanoranstruther.substack.com/subscribe