The tap dripped repeatedly, as it had done all night and the night before that, as it had done for weeks now. The water droplets had become a repetitive beat, the beating of a solitary drum, reminiscent of the last beat to be heard before criminals were hung in old London. Darren stared at the drips, watching for them to fall and disappear. He had stared at the tap now for a couple of hours, looking deeply at the lime scale which had built up around the drain hole. It’s porous miniature landscape showed hills and caves all in a scaly white-brown colour. The surface looked like his life, potentially clean white mixed with a brown sludge and full of holes. It looked like hardened heroin – there was his brown sludge, too many days and nights lying in his own faeces with his mind in that place that hides so much of his fucked up excuse for a life since he became a so-called man. The holes in his life mixed in with the dream induced shit, those holes of a caring woman, not the whores or rabid junkies he had quelled his urges with all those months ago. It had been too long now, but he didn’t care any more, those blurred evenings were stale now, as was he.
The only reaction he showed now was either tears, violence or silence. He felt numb to anything that life could throw at him, nothing mattered any more. Well, apart from the numerous people who wanted him dead, including himself. But that was his choice, not anyone else’s. That’s unless God got in way, if he can? It was his choice when to extinguish his life. This was an insane stand considering he knew of at least one hit have been put out for his life. The problem he had was that his soul-destroying habit cost money. It’s a catch 22, you’re too trashed or ill to earn money; at least legally, anyway. Mugging and robbery usually worked, but these days it’s not enough money and you usually end up running from guns protecting their owners’ homes and purses. He tried drug running a few times, but temptation got too much and a non-delivery earned his first hit to be taken out on him. The police got involved when the hitman fucked up and shot a kid dead, while only crippling Darren’s leg. Once in hospital, he told the police that he knew nothing. Then they showed him a photo of himself alongside spent cartridges, the photo taken from a distance and obviously without his consent, more like a paparazzi shot or surveillance. Darren broke down and told them everything, and once he was healed the police approached him again, this time they offered cash and protection in return for information.
It was easy money for stitching up mates, not that they were mates, only associates. Any one of them would stab you in the back and sell your clothes if they could get scag for them. But the police weren’t interested in punters, they wanted the dealers. Those who served death or salvation at a price, depending on who you spoke too. He had given them names and details, enough to put many of them away. As tax payers’ money rolled in along with seized goods, so the enemies built up along with the paranoia. Now his front door has not been opened for over a month. The stash that Darren had stockpiled to keep him going, while he hid and tried to find a way to escape from the hitmen, was rapidly depleting, only enough left for a day at the most. Darren felt panic spread through him like a bush fire – he can’t run out now, by now most people knew of his dealings with the law and he will only get a kicking or worse if he tries to get any more scag. That was it, he needed to relax again. He forced his eyes away from the dripping tap and walked over to the small table. He looked at the burnt spoon and the needle, and in less than three minutes Darren was on the floor. The needle dropped from his veins with a little squirt of blood. Something in the room breathed in anticipation.
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