Finish The Story Contest - WEEK #24 - Life Dealer

First part of the story written by @calluna who makes an awesome story for us to finish.

I had several ideas that I wanted to explore but decided on this tale that I wrote after several false starts and deleted story lines.

Here is her first part.

The Town That Changed

Change blew in on the air that morning, whispering through a sleeping town. An eerie quiet rested along the main road, early commuters not yet disturbing the grey dawn. A wisp of waning moon, brushed pink with the gentle glow of the coming sun, hung low in the ombre sky.

A subtle shift rocked the heavy foliage of scattered trees, rippling between the houses. The cool silence of night still clung to the shadows. A lone ginger cat stalked between the sentinels of bins guarding the curbs. It paused, hair bristling along it’s back as it sensed a disturbance rushing past.

A lone mournful howl echoed in the streets, erupting into a sorrowful symphony as others took up the canine call.

Not a single harsh bark interrupted the lament that awoke the town that morning.

Back doors opened onto gardens, not quite the same. Concerned residents in an array of dressing gowns, coats and slippers, padded outside to find the same, inexplicable sight.

Theo hadn’t been home in months. He had told his mum he was getting clean. It was a lie. He hadn’t been clean in years.

The dark country road snaked before him, a twisting river of retreating night. She had insisted he came home for the wedding. Theo couldn’t stand her boyfriend, but his mum had half chewed his ear off over it, and he couldn’t deny, he owed her this.

He swore under his breath. The rising itch was dancing across his skin. The hard edge cutting inside him. He needed another hit. He had been driving since 1am, he loaded up before he set off, but the ragged scraping of the comedown was consuming.

He glanced at the road, he hadn’t passed another car in hours, and he knew these twisting roads.

One hand on the wheel, he fumbled through the bag on the passenger seat. He couldn’t face that c*nt sober, Aunt Hazel would help.

His skin flushed with the intense bliss coursing through his veins as he approached the sleeping streets.

Dawn was pushing towards the horizon, her soft pink glow catching the clipped moon.

Theo was speeding when he got to the town. He heard the hair-raising call of neighbourhood dogs, raising their cry as one.

Then he saw it. The change. He couldn’t look away. He didn’t see the tree.

Here is my ending.

He was flying. It was the best rush that he has ever felt and he has done it all. Ice to bring him to new heights, Mary Jane to accompany him down, Hash to mellow out and just chill.

Then a dash of speed to up the tempo some LSD to bring me to blue heaven, pop in a Molly and feel the pleasure heighten after you dose some bimbo with roofies.

Then when you are all alone in your room get some Special K for that out of the body experience and forget the world. Ingest a shroom from time to time so that the sensation lingers.

This experience was way different as time slowed and yet all his senses were firing off. He could feel the cold mountain air caress his skin, he can taste and smell the iron in his mouth, he could hear the crunch of metal and the dogs barking, he could see the rose-colored breaking of the dawn.

He saw flashes of his life, of his young mom feeding him some applesauce while crying as the man he called father was going out the door, a scene that would play out in different stages of his life albeit with different men.

He sees her mom nestling a bag of green peas on her face, no doubt another love tap given to her by her latest deadbeat boyfriend.

At first he tried to stand up for her but he was so little and their hands so big as they pummeled him to an inch of his life.

He hid in his room and sniffed on glue whenever he heard the slaps. He wanted to escape, he wanted to be as far away. He needed stronger stuff to get farther away.

He sees himself behind the bleachers talking to a guy who knows a guy that can score him various stuff. This is his turning point to a life of petty crime.

The more potent stuff tended to be more expensive and the more he craved the more daring his plans were of getting money. Stuff lifted from stores, jewelry of her mom pawned, he even once boosted a car by one of her boyfriends and it was worth the beating he got.

She finally kicked him out and never return until he was clean. He told her she was in rehab and she sent her some money occasionally. He used it to buy teabags from pimply highschool kids trying to be gangster.

He shouldn't have come home even if she owed her. He lands with a thud on the hard pavement, the blood oozing out of his head, his high keeping him conscious but painless in the trauma.

He hears the sirens wail from a distance, getting nearer. The cops would see the dead body in the trunk. A good samaritan who picked up a hitch hiker that slit his throat for his car. He doesn't have any ID nor any distinguishing marks on his body, most of his teeth had fallen out because of his addiction to stuff and his face unrecognizable. His fingerprints burnt and scratched off to make leaving fingerprints harder for a life of thievery.

He would be labeled as a John Doe and be buried somewhere without his mom knowing he died. She would get mad that he never got to her wedding and eventually be forgotten like the man that went away when he was eating applesauce.

Isn't this what he wanted. To escape this reality and be done with his horrid life of artificial bliss. In the end life gives you what you want albeit in a diiferent manner.

First time that I was not able to have it down to 500 words as my story had 611! So hopefully the Bananafish will take it easy on me.

Reference to some of the street names of the drugs used here was from this source.

https://www.centeronaddiction.org/addiction/commonly-used-illegal-drugs