Chapter 2: The First Overdose
I guess I always knew it was a possibility, in the abstract sense. Did I ever believe it might happen to my roommate or I? No, absolutely not. The fact of the matter was that I was usually quite careful about my dose. While the same couldn't be said for Andy, he had such a high tolerance at the time that I was not at all concerned about it. I've seen only two overdoses in all years of using strong opiates (note that by “overdoses” I mean someone who is nodding out so hard that they clearly need to be given naloxone/narcan). While there have been many times when I simply feel asleep, usually waking up with my face in a pile full of dope, I have never actually overdosed to the point that it may have been dangerous, or even fatal.
When I could no longer keep Andy awake through normal conversation, I began to panic a little bit. I slapped him, hard, across the face twice, which elicited literally no reaction from him at all. Ok, now I was really scared. I was not about to let my roommate die from drugs that I had given him, but I wasn't sure how to proceed. I pulled out my phone and was on the verge of calling of 911, when Jeff stopped me.
“Reese, I got way too much on me. You can't bring the cops over here. I have narcan nasal spray in my truck. Lemme go grab it and let's see if we can bring him back ourselves.”
I really didn't know what to say because I had never been in this situation before, but Jeff was probably right – if you call an ambulance for an overdose, they're obligated to notify the local police as well, which would definitely not have been a good thing. I remember not saying anything, but I nodded, and Jeff took off running towards his truck to grab the narcan. Despite what I said earlier about Jeff being chronically late, he obviously did know how to hurry up when time was of the essence.
By the time Jeff returned, Andy's lips had turned almost completely into a purplish-blue color, and his breathing was extremely shallow, but I could tell he was breathing. Jeff gave him two puffs of narcan, one up each nostril, and within about 20 seconds, he immediately sat up and puked all over our floor. The thing about giving narcan to an opiate addict is that in addition to reversing the overdose, it throws an addict into instant withdrawal, hence the immediate vomiting. I breathed a sigh of relief. At least we weren't going to have to call 911 and have the cops show up to what was basically a trap house of ours.
“What the fuck? What just happened?” Andy asked. Jeff and both let out a chuckle.
“You lucky I had that narcan in the whip boy,” Jeff answered.
“Oh shit... Fuck, I must have taken too much xanax.”
“Yeah, you think, Andy?!” I responded, obviously angry, though in hindsight I realize I should have tried to be a little more understanding. He obviously didn't intend to overdose and was just using a bit of the alprazolam powder to make the wait-while-in-withdrawal a little more bearable.
“It's all good, man. We good now. I'ma leave y'all another narcan spray bottle. If he starts to fall out again after about 2 hours, give him another two sprays up each nostril like you saw me do. He'll be aight.”
“Thanks Jeff, you're a lifesaver man. I don't know what we would have done otherwise,” I said, thanking Jeff profusely. For all the bullshit that Jeff puts me through, there were times like this, when he's been around at exactly the right moment, with the ability to help whatever the situation might be.
Andy was clearly not feeling so good after taking the naloxone, but there was no way I was letting him redose anything for at least a good 12-16 hours.
“What the fuck was he on, Reese? I've seen that boy snort way more oxy than that, was he drinking or something?”
“He took some xanax earlier trying to get rid of his ill. It was that pure powder – he eyeballed a dose that was obviously way too high.”
“The fuck you let him do that for?”
“It's my bad man, I was in bed and didn't see how much he took, I knew I shouldn't have let...”
“Reese, you know how that boy do. He don't know his fucking limits. Never did. Y'all need to tighten the fuck up. I'm about to put nearly 2 grand worth of dope and oxy in your hand – that shit is serious dog. Fuck was you gon' do if I didn't have narcan? Call an ambo? The both of you would be in fuckin' bracelets right now.”
Jeff was right, I couldn't argue. Andy and I were no longer students. Students get a break in most states – if they call in a drug overdose, nobody gets charged with anything, they just treat it like a health issue. But we were no longer students. Our crib would have been searched to high hell, and like Jeff said, we'd almost certainly be in the back of a squad car right now.
“Aight homes, I'm finna jet, but take care of that young bull, man. You know I actually like the both of y'all, right? I don't be goin' out my way for nobody except y'all.”
“I know, Jeff. You know I appreciate it.” Jeff nodded in acknowledgement.
“Reese, just take care, aight? I'ma call you in a few hours and check on you. Don't be stepping on that dope neither, you feel me? That's why it's all bagged out. We givin' 'em to you at $60 a bundle and the shit is good bruh. Ain't no need to dance on it.”
“Got you. Love.”
“Love.”
Jeff gave me a pound and made his exit.
I wasn't going to cut the heroin anyway. I barely knew anything about heroin at that point and I was not about to try playing amateur chemist. I was glad everything was already bagged out into $10 bags, where bundles of a dozen would sell for $100.
For the next 12 hours or so, my phone didn't stop ringing. My customers were waiting – many of them also in withdrawal, just like I was. But I couldn't leave Andy alone, no fucking way. I had to tell most of my customers that they were just going to have to wait because I had an emergency to deal with. I did allow the two people I trusted most to come over and grab their pickup from me. After I marked the price up by 10%, of course. These were OC40s, not OC80s, after all. I still had to figure out how the hell I was going to sell all this heroin, though.
About 6-7 hours later, Andy appeared to be pretty much fine. He was fully awake and alert, wasn't slurring his words, and was now once again in pretty serious withdrawal. He was literally begging me for a line of oxy but I wasn't having any of it. He was going to have to wait the full 12 hours. A minute later, my phone rang with Jeff's name on the caller id.
“What up, baby? Your boy aight now?”
“Yeah, you know, he's gettin' there.”
“Sup with that D though? You sellin' it yet?”
“Nah man, I been stuck at home taking care of this fool. I'ma see what's up tomorrow though.”
“Aight, bet. Let me know when you do.”
I then took a closer look at the bundles of heroin that had just been dropped off, and couldn't help but smile at the fact that the first bags of dope I'd be selling were stamped “Anniversary”, with the text under a Champagne glass being raised in celebration. How appropriate.
After all was said and done, Andy recovered more or less without incident, and was fine by early afternoon the next day. Obviously he was “jonesing” pretty hard, though. I had been holding off on doing any of the heroin myself, because I wanted to make sure I was awake enough to look after Andy, but now that he seemed to be ok, I knew that the first thing I had to do was sample the product. Unfortunately, I knew nothing about different grades of heroin, so there was really no way for me to tell if I was selling gold or dog shit.
“Can I please finally have something to take my sick off, man?” Andy desperately asked me. It had now been over 12 hours.
“Yeah. Sorry I had to make you wait man. Don't eyeball that alprazolam powder again, aight? You know that shit is bad news in combination with opiates.”
“I know. Fine. Please, can I get my sick off now?”
“Yeah, you wanna check out this H with me? I was thinking about busting open a couple of these bags to check the quality and what not.”
“Yeah bro, let's do it.”
With that, I grabbed our mirror off the wall, now coated in oxy residue, and brought it over to the coffee table we had taken a seat at. I carefully unwrapped two of the Anniversary-stamped waxpaper bags and poured out the light tan contents, quickly taking a razorblade to the flakes and chopping them up as finely as possible, eventually cutting it into a total of six lines – three for each of us.
“Andy, make sure you wait at least 15 minutes between lines, ok? I don't want a repeat of last night.”
“Fuck you dude, you know my tolerance is way higher than yours anyway.”
“I'm not the one who fucking OD'ed last night! I'm trying to look out for you. Chill.”
“My fault, you're right. You're right.”
I leaned down and inhaled the first two lines, putting one into each nostril. This was good dope – even I could tell despite knowing practically nothing about heroin. There was no burn whatsoever. The drip actually tasted slightly sweet. And it came on FAST. Within minutes my entire body was warm. Oh yeah, this was good dope. I was going to sell the shit out of this. Now I just had to figure out how I was going to do that.
Up next - Chapter 3: How I Became The Local Dope Man