Powder [phan]

XII

WARNING: DRUG USE, ANGST

Dan's POV

I lay on the hard floor of the hotel room with my arms and legs stretched far from me and stared at the ceiling.

By now I had no idea what time it was. How long I've been here. Not even if it was day or night. I had closed the curtains and only the artificial light from the ceiling lamp made it possible for me to see something.

I didn't know if I was awake or asleep. Whether I was dreaming or in reality, i felt the coldness of the parquet below me. Didn't know if there was any blood flowing in me at all or if I was just flooded with drugs that made my heartbeat and breathing accelerate throughout, even though I felt terribly tired at the same time.

I clumsily bent my arm and put my hand on my heart.

It was beating.

So I wasn't just imagining that I was still alive. I was still here, but who knew for how long?

Secluded from the outside world, I crawled here and surrendered to the illusions, the fantasies and thoughts that the drugs caused in me.

Maybe I would just rot here. It wouldn't matter.

I swallowed and noticed how dry my throat was. I hadn't moved in ages and therefore didn't drink or eat anything.

The only thing I had absorbed in myself and was still in me was a wide variety of drugs that put me in a paralyzed state in which I could not grasp a clear thought.

I blinked slowly, almost in slow motion, watching the ceiling light blur before my eyes and turn into a ball of light that seemed miles away. Like a train.

So much went wrong in my life.

I was consistently between happiness and misfortune. Between heaven and hell. Between my dream that came true and the nightmare I was now living in.

Between loneliness and a lot of friends.

I had so much fun, the best time of my life and at the same time I lost myself more and more without knowing that the person I had to find and who had to find me had been there all the time.

Phil.

Had I understood that earlier, it might never have gotten this far.

My desperate urge to be loved, to fill the gap in me, wouldn't have driven me to Tyler and thus into the arms of the drugs, but maybe into the right person from the start.

If I had known immediately that I loved him as much as I could never love anyone else, I wouldn't have pulled this fucking friend with benefits thing.

I would've let him in my heart from the start.

Would have let him save me.

Why did I have to break completely to find out how everything could have gone better?

My body was heavy, so heavy that it felt like it was pushing me deeper and deeper on the floor and making sure that I could never get up again.

As if I had just run a marathon after which everything hurt and there was nothing I could do minutes later than lie flat and wait for the stinging pain to stop.

I could no longer count how often and how much I had thrown into it the past few hours.

I had no idea what was in my body.

And nevertheless.

Except for the hazy perception that made everything seem ten times slower than normal, which paralyzed every movement and made me feel like I was in an almost narcotic state, the drugs did nothing.