Larry said, “Go ahead, Gin.”
Gin sat there for a long time. He would smile for a few seconds and then stop, smile for a few seconds and then stop. Then he finally started talking. “I began using Adderall in college. The first time I used it I felt like I could barely walk because everything was so bright and new-looking. I was in the library working on an essay about the 9/11 conspiracy and I typed eighteen pages in three hours. I got a C- because my professor didn’t believe in the conspiracy. If he just would watch any of the YouTube videos about WTC7…the most-watched result for a search of 9/11 on YouTube is a video that shows that the government definitely blew up both of the main towers. I don’t think the masses can do anything anymore even if the government admitted they helped blow up the buildings. JFK was assassinated by the CIA and I don’t think anything will happen to the CIA or the government at all before they all die. The same will happen with 9/11 and anything else from now on, I think. Maybe if the masses enacted some kind of guerilla warfare and began assassinating high-level officials and made a list of the richest five-hundred people and made it a goal to assassinate all of them, then maybe that could solve something.”
We sat there confused by what he said. What did any of that have to do with drugs?
Larry said, “Okay, enough of the government conspiracies. Gin, you’ll be written up for that. Capri, do you have something to say?”
Capri was a skinny little Italian guy with dark curly hair and sad eyes. Capri bit his fingernails constantly. Sometimes he would chew the nails so far down that he couldn’t bite them, then he would gnaw the skin. I’d had to get him bandages for his bloody fingertips several times.
He didn’t want to be in NEOTAP but like the rest of these middle-class young men, it kind of looked like he didn’t want to be anywhere. Capri said, “I guess doing drugs is a really good way to accent boredom. It’s a really good way to make friends. It’s really difficult to have friends without drugs. Thinking about holding a coherent sober conversation still alarms me. I made friends for the first time in college, and I made these friends because we were all interested in the same brand of fun. Fun involving drugs. Fun involving getting drugs, doing drugs, talking about drugs. When there were no drugs we would drink until drugs were available again. We drank regardless. We drank endlessly. It was fun. People who like drugs always find each other, but I like to think I found the best ones. I haven’t found a drug yet that rids me of anxiety. But there are many that cause me not to care about it. It feels really good. Even the drugs that make me anxious. I like them because I like to challenge myself. Sometimes drugs make work bearable. I went to work at a grocery store during the tail-end of an acid trip once and it was shitty. But now I know that I’m capable of doing it. Doing key-bumps in my car on my cigarette breaks felt like something between recklessness and practicality. It just feels neutral. It feels like maintenance. I’ve always worked really boring, mind-numbing, minimum wage jobs. Of course, they always made me feel anxious. It’s good to have something to look forward to when your shift is over. Some people feed their dog and watch ESPN. Some people play drinking games with their friends and then go to a bar. Some people have sex with their significant other and then check different websites. Some people order Chinese food and read about philosophy. It’s not that these activities are uninteresting to drug users. It’s just…I would prefer to swallow something or smoke something or snort something before doing any of those things. Sometimes being high just feels a lot safer than the alternative. Sometimes being high just feels really comfortable.”
I sat there and listened to Capri. It wasn’t my life but I could see how someone else might view drugs as something that gives life meaning. I wanted to tell them they were nice people, and praise their honesty, but that was not how counseling at NEOTAP worked.
Visiting Lawrence
Monica and I were sitting outside Starbucks, drinking lattes. The sky was a nice pleasant shade of blue. Little white clouds dangled in the sky. The leaves were changing colors. Cars kept passing by.
“Lawrence lives nearby. We should go see him,” Monica said.
“Why? He’s insane.”
“He might know why people are disappearing.”
“He’s only a shift supervisor,” I said.
“He has the authority to pass out meds.”
“Yeah, but passing out meds doesn’t mean he knows why people are disappearing.”
“We should go see him anyway,” she said.
“Should we call him before we go over?”
“No, let’s surprise him.”
“He is totally a work douche.”
“Oh god, I know. He came up to me the other day and said, ‘I’m so proud to be working for NEOTAP. Sometimes when I wake up, I just can’t wait to be here.’”
“What did you say?”
“Sounds good, Lawrence.”
“What did he say?”
“Nothing, he just walked away smiling.”
“So why do you want to visit him?”
“I don’t know,” she said.
We got into Monica’s Honda Civic and drove over to Lawrence’s house. The house he lived in was small. It was nothing to be proud of.
We walked up to the door and knocked. A man — maybe a friend, maybe a roommate, maybe Lawrence’s brother — came to the door. He was in his mid-thirties and didn’t look like a serious person. He was wearing jogging pants and a ripped New England Patriots jersey. We looked at him standing there in his New England Patriots jersey. He looked at us and said, “Hi.”
“Is Lawrence here?” I asked.
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Can we talk to him?”
“If you want,” the man said in a sad monotone voice.
The man led us into the house, which was messy. It didn’t smell bad, but there were clothes piled up in a corner, magazines and newspapers in tumbling stacks, and the furniture looked old and dirty. There were barely any pictures on the walls. It didn’t look like a happy place to live. The word ‘pathetic’ occurred to me.
The man knocked on Lawrence’s door and said, “Hey Lawrence, there are some people here for you.”
“What!” Lawrence screamed from the bedroom.
“People, Lawrence, people.”
“Who are they?”
He looked at us and said, “Who are you?”
“Tell him it’s Monica and Mike from work,” Monica said.
“Monica and Mike from work.”
Lawrence yelled back, “NEOTAP employees can’t talk to other NEOTAP employees outside of work. It’s against the rules.”
Monica said, “Tell him we just want to talk for a minute.”
“They just want to talk to you for a minute, goddamn it. Open the fucking door. What the fuck is wrong with you?”
Lawrence opened the door. We stared at Lawrence and he stared at us. He looked insane.
Lawrence waved us into his room.
Lawrence’s room looked like the room of a fourteen-year-old boy. There were posters of women in bikinis on the wall, several football trophies from the early 2000s, a twin bed, clothes scattered on the floor, and virtually nothing that signified an adult male lived in the room.
Lawrence sat on the bed and said, “Hi guys.”
We stood in the room. There were no chairs and the floor was too covered in clothes to sit down.
“Lawrence, do you know where people go when they disappear?” Monica said.
“Disappear from where?”
“From NEOTAP.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Monica responded forcefully. “Lawrence, I know you know what I’m talking about. You know that Sherwood Burke and several others have disappeared. Even Jay Riddick disappeared and he was an employee. Where did they go?”