Dopefiend. Tim Elhajj
side of the room, much closer to where I imagined the sounds had come from. “I want to see,” I said.
“You’ll get shot.”
The unseen speaker’s tone was somehow both plaintive and blunt. It wasn’t a command, more a simple statement of fact. I pulled up short. Nobody else had made a move to the windows. Coming back to the center aisle, I grinned at the person speaking to me.
“Good point,” I said.
Mike introduced himself. He was the blackest black man I had ever seen. He wore a tight white T-shirt and folded his muscular arms across his chest. His skin was so black, shadow didn’t seem to register on his face or arms, giving him an unsettling two-dimensional appearance, except for the cut of his strong chest, which showed in relief against the cotton of his shirt. Mike grinned, a toothy white smile. “If it was gunshots, you don’t want to see.”
“I didn’t even think of that,” I said. He had a magazine folded in three and tucked under his arm. He looked about twenty-two years old, which would make him five years younger than me. There were a few other young men standing nearby him.
“Where you from, Country?” Mike asked.
“Pennsylvania,” I said. Feeling a little put off by the nickname, I added: “It’s only four hours out of the city.”
“Is Pennsylvania south?” he asked.
I nodded, amused by what I took for his lack of geographic awareness.
“Then that’s the country,” he said. All his friends laughed. “You from the country, Country.” Mike grinned.
His smile lit up his face, emphasizing his boyish good looks. I found it hard to stay annoyed at him.
“What you got there,” I asked, nodding to the magazine under his arm, just to change the subject.
“Porn,” he said, tugging the magazine out and handing it to me.
“Oh. . .” My voice rose unintentionally. Pornographic magazines were most likely contraband. A small infraction to be sure, but I hadn’t intended to break any rules. My job was to stay out of trouble until after my court date. With all the guys looking at me, I felt as if it would have been rude to refuse the magazine, so I took it and held it in front of me. “Is having porn against the rules?” I asked.
“Yup,” Mike said. There was an awkward silence. “You going to tell?” He cocked his head and I could hear mild disbelief.
“No, no, no,” I said. Breaking the rules was bad, but being labeled a snitch was certainly much worse. “I just wondered,” I said.
“A’ight.” Mike looked at me evenly. “Go take care of that thing,” he nodded toward the bathroom. “Then bring me back my magazine.”
“Oh, right,” I laughed nervously.
I felt a sudden and jarring shock at the way the conversation had turned. The small group that had formed around us scrutinized me. “Right,” I repeated.
Feeling self-conscious, I wasn’t sure how to gracefully exit the little group. I started to walk backwards toward the bathroom, waving the magazine around in front of me, like some circus buffoon. I tripped over something in the aisle and then laughed nervously again at my own awkwardness.
Mike and each of his friends looked at one another and shook their heads. Someone clucked his teeth. I felt grateful for the darkness in the room, for I could feel my face getting hot.
One week into treatment, I was making my way back to the dormitory after Evening Focus. Focus meetings were held twice daily, morning and evening, in a large auditorium on the first floor. One of the counselors, a short man named Angel, was standing in the hallway, urging anyone who was a parent to go to the north wing of the first floor where the administrative offices were. The hallways on the first floor were always packed after focus meetings and meals, but especially during the workday morning and evening rush.
“You got a kid.” Angel said to me. “Over there,” he pointed. It wasn’t a question and he didn’t wait for an answer. He gave my shoulder a little shove.
Jostling my way through the crowd, I made my way to the north wing and found a line of people that stretched the length of the building. I went to the end of the line and stood, wondering why I was there.
I asked the person in front of me, but he had no idea. Five minutes later the line had not budged, but another person or two had come to stand behind me. None of us understood why we were here. Growing impatient, I made my way to the front of the line.
As I asked further up, someone said, “Toys.”
Craning my neck, I could see a counselor listlessly sitting in an office with a great pile of packages behind him. Inside the office, a person from the line stood rubbing his chin as he surveyed the stack of packages.
“Donations,” I heard someone else say.
Donated toys. We were standing in line to select a donated Christmas toy for our kids. I could feel something terrible rising in my chest. As I walked back to my place at the end of the line, I felt myself growing agitated and irritable.
I wasn’t sure where my son lived. It had been months since I’d seen him. He would be four years old the month after Christmas. I knew his mother had recently moved, from Shamokin back to Steelton, but I wasn’t sure if she was staying with her mother now, or on her own. Last I heard she was seeing Jack Driscoll, who owned a house across the street from my mother’s house.
Standing in line, I began to feel distressed. I sighed heavily and ran my fingers through my hair. I wasn’t particularly concerned with getting a toy, but I complained aloud about the length of the line and fidgeted.
“This is so stupid,” I said to no one in particular.
“You too good for our toys?” Rick, a lanky counselor with a bald head, had come out of one of the nearby offices. His presence surprised me; his sharp tone put me on guard. I hadn’t meant to draw attention to myself.
“No,” I stammered. “No. . .”
“What’s up?” he asked.
“I just feel. . .” I had to think for a minute.
Groping for the right word, I finally said: “Bad.” I winced at my inability to convey what I was feeling. Suddenly I felt my eyes well with tears. The intensity and speed of my emotions shocked me. “Really bad,” I added.
He looked me directly in the eye. He didn’t smile, but something in his manner softened. “You feel bad because you’re in treatment and have to get your kid a donated toy for Christmas,” he said.
I shrugged. “I don’t even know where to send it,” I admitted.
With these words, my irritability disappeared and despair took its place. I felt limp and useless, like a wet towel on a clothesline in the middle of a downpour.
Immediately after the holiday lull, Rockford went into an uproar. The entire community filed into the auditorium for Morning Focus, a meeting typically only attended by the facility’s newest members. Vans had been halted, the laundry shuttered, and the administrative wing locked down. The kitchen remained open for breakfast, but only a skeleton crew remained to clean up and prepare a simple lunch. Something was going on.
As the auditorium filled, I took a seat in the right wing, close to the stage. There were at least five hundred people seated and still more passing through the double doors. The quiet roar of confusion filled the great space. I could hear senior members complain about the vans being stopped: They were missing work, trade programs, or appointments at clinics or social service offices. The gang of women I had seen in the lobby