The Detox Blues: A Memoir (Part Four)


(Wife out of detox and we’re both high; just cut someone off on the road accidently but he’s after us now.)

The cat was on us again like maggots on garbage. Coming real close and looking real grim when I peeped at him in the rear view mirror. We were just getting into town and the lights on the highway were green. I saw that the light by the Mobil gas station just changed to orange and I had to stop. When I stopped I left some space between me and the car in front of me.

I looked into the rear view mirror and I saw him ripping out of his car with a crow bar in his hand and he looked like this giant Paul Bunyan woodsman over six feet tall and I knew that I was screwed.

I figured I’d have as much chance as a pigeon in a wolf pack if I went physical with him and I was so frightened that my bowels felt like they’d turned to oil. I hit the gas and yanked the steering wheel to the right and flew through that Mobil gas station like it was an interstate. My wife yelled at me as we pulled out into the adjacent roadway as an oncoming car swung wildly around us blaring on the horn and I told her to “just shut up” and she did. The guy chasing us jumped back into his car and was on us again.

He had anger fueling his jets but I was running for my life so I had some edge on the creep. The light turned red ahead and I flew through it like it was bumper-car city and pulled a sharp right with my wheels screaming for mercy. Looked back. Heart pounding. Sascha yelling at me. The cat was still coming but he’d lost a little ground. The thought of the gun back at the house ripped through my head and I knew why I never carried it with me anymore.

Red light ahead. Cars stopped in my lane. Sascha screamed as I crossed the line into the oncoming lane and took a left through the traffic. Horns were blowing and the screech of brakes all around, but I didn’t look back and hit the gas and the stores and people were flying by the truck in what was once the quiet streets of Rutland. I looked back to see if the guy was still coming.

When I looked back to see if the guy was still after us, I saw that he was nowhere in sight. I kept going, not to take any chances, and made rights and lefts as I flew through the streets of Rutland. Finally I was in the residential section of town.

I slowed the car down and my head and heart was still racing. I knew it was time to head home. I felt like my head from the drugs was almost gone but I figured that if I ate some more pills that it would creep back. So I did.

The next thing I remember was we were back at the house and the rabbit was in the wood stove. I had a glass of wine in front of me and Sascha was rolling a joint and talking about calling the detox tomorrow to see if she could get back in. We fell asleep and the rabbit burned all on the outside and we picked away the burnt flesh in the morning and cut up that meat that wasn’t burnt and ate it for breakfast. It was a good rabbit.

Sascha called the detox and they said the only way she could come back was if I didn’t come there to visit or call her. She decided to go and I dropped her back at Canterbury Farm.

The next day, sick and shaking, I checked into Serenity House and that put about 40 miles between Sascha and I. They had to medicate me heavily for about five days so I wouldn’t have a seizure.

I was still being withdrawn slowly from the Klonopin and I had been there seventeen days when they called me into the office. My counselor was there and they told me that they had something important to tell me and they sat me down. Right away I got frightened. I knew it was about my wife.

I was right. They said they had to tell me that my wife had left treatment this morning. She left with someone else. Another guy. I felt like my whole world spun into black holes and I got dizzy and didn’t know what to do. I wanted to run. I wanted to get high. The counselors talked to me for a while and I don’t remember much of what was said but my throat hurt all the time they were talking.

They kept talking and then gave me an extra dose of medication and they said that I could stay an extra 21 days because they thought I needed it. I said I would stay.

That night I had a dream. I was walking into a church and a man with blond hair and a black robe was standing there. He asked me if I had come to pray and I said that I wasn’t sure why I was there. I looked around and it appeared to be a Catholic church but something was different and I couldn’t tell what it was. I walked up the aisle between the benches and he walked with me. I looked up at the crucifix and she was up there all white and with her head tipped to the side and the nails were driven through her palms and feet and she hung there with marble tears on her cheeks. (To Be Concluded)