Why Would Anyone Waste Cocaine?
As I sat next to Kurt in this room full of strangers, I watched the guy at the head of table – who appeared to be finished organizing his garbage: some foil, a lighter, silverware, some liquid, a pocket knife, powder, some straws, a mirror.
Everyone else was watching him, too.
Finally he put a little white rock into the pipe, put the pipe to his mouth, and lit it. He inhaled, held the smoke in his lungs, and passed the pipe to the guy next to him, who did the same thing.
When the pipe got to Kurt, he did it, too.
“Is it PCP?” I whispered when Kurt handed the pipe to me. I didn’t want to be uncool, but I hoped Kurt remembered our unpleasant PCP encounter.
Kurt shook his head and pushed the pipe at me. “Coke,” he mumbled.
It’s cocaine? In a pipe? That made no sense to me. Why would anyone waste cocaine by smoking it?
I didn’t have time to consider my options, though. There were no more lines on the table. So I smoked the little rock of cocaine, too. I put the pipe in my mouth and inhaled. I held the smoke for as long as I could while passing the pipe to the next person.
Before I even exhaled, I could feel it.
Within a half-second, my inhibitions were completely gone. It was like my brain had disappeared and I felt free, beautiful, extreme serenity. The euphoria that came from snorting cocaine was nothing compared to this.
Instead of feeling like I was floating on a cloud, I felt like I was a cloud. I was simply flying through the air while still sitting in my chair, peaceful and one with the world, awestruck and inspired and clean and clear and 100% perfect.
Smoking cocaine created the most pleasure I’d ever had in my life, unrivaled by any other drug. Inside my head, the world was ablaze with a glorious summer sunshine, muted only by rainbows, and I was floating through with flawless ease.
I couldn’t speak or move or think.
This feeling lasted maybe 11 seconds.
Then it vanished completely.
Within a minute I was fully back on Earth, back at the dining room table with a bunch of strangers, hyper-focused on the guy with the garbage.
Having experienced ultimate bliss, I became immediately and suddenly completely devoid of all happiness.
My brain screamed, wailed, moaned: MORE MORE MORE! I NEED THAT AGAIN! WHERE IS IT? MORE! MORE! MORE! WHERE IS IT? WHAT IS IT? HOW CAN I GET THAT FEELING AGAIN?
And now, like everyone else at the table, I was watching the guy with the garbage. Because he was the one making that feeling happen for all of us, somehow, out of the mess he had in front of him.
I looked around at all the people watching him and thought, did they all feel that? I didn’t know what they felt when they smoked cocaine. Nobody was really talking about it. Nobody was doing anything.
Everybody was just watching the guy. And I watched them watch him, knowing why. I understood what we were all waiting for.
So I sat and watched him fiddle with the garbage, just like they did. We didn’t talk. The radio continued to blast. The only thing that mattered was that pipe was going to come around again.
And I was going to be there for it, waiting. Just like all the other junkies at the table.