Down and Out on Murder Mile Read Online Free Page B

called. Why the fuck didn’t we score some smack before we left? One balloon to make the flight bearable? Bullshit bravado, that’s all it was. We were terminal fools. The book was a trashy paperback about—what else?—a couple who sinks into heroin addiction. I figured it would pass the eleven hours until I hit London.
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    We made it onto the plane. Right up until takeoff I expected the pigs to rush onto the plane and bundle us off. The pilot to announce: “Ladies and gentlemen…do not panic. We have fugitives on board and they are about to be removed…. Do not interfere with the apprehension of the suspects.”
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    When the plane picked up speed on the runway I had the sense of the Devil itself chasing the jet, snarling and slobbering and snapping in frustration as we climbed just out of reach. The sky, though, provided no sanctuary from my toxic thoughts.
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    The fat American businessman next to me took up half of my seat as well as his own. Susan was anxiously looking out the window. Even with her hair washed and clean clothes on, she looked likea junkie whore. Aw Jesus, I had to tell my parents that I was married again. This time to a fucking junkie! The crash from the cocaine was dwindling to a throbbing sleep-deprived headache and the relentless hum of post-heroin-withdrawal anguish was returning, as I knew it would.
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    Jesus, it was hot.
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    Aren’t planes supposed to be air-conditioned? I tried to get comfortable but either hit Susan’s bony elbow if I moved too far left or the businessman’s hammy arm if I slithered too far to the right. My squirming and jostling for position was obviously irritating him. He stared at me, round and pink and disgusted for a moment, before returning his attention to some banal magazine aimed at men. Cars. Gadgets. Women with big tits and white smiles. A world as alien to me as that of ecosystems at the bottom of the ocean. I smelled. I smelled like a man who had been shitting and vomiting and sweating out the heroin for a week and cleaned himself quickly in the sink of a motel with a ratty-looking washcloth before he left for the airport. I smelled like a man whose last act before leaving that dark cave was to take one final hit from the pipe and watch his face carefully in the mirror as he exhaled plumes of white smoke, while a cab honked outside in the parking lot. A man who had vaguely considered just staying there and trying to rustle up more credit for crack, just stay in that room and just be . To simply wait until the cops or death came and put an end to the whole sorry mess.
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    He cleared his throat, irritated. The fat pig was irritated by my presence. This tub of fucking lard that was taking up half of my Goddamned seat with his flab—flab no doubt put on over expensive business lunches and good brandy—was irritated by me! Self-righteous anger bubbled up inside of me.
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    Who was the real monster? M or this self-important cocksucker? This businessman? This evil corporate dick-sucking bastard? WHO WAS THE REAL MONSTER?
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    Calm down. Breathe. You’re crazy right now—you’re sick. Keep it together. Order a drink and shut the fuck up for the next eleven hours. You need to make it home without getting arrested.
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    Suspended somewhere in the sky I sat in the tiny toilet and looked at myself. I looked as if I hadn’t slept in years. I jerked off quickly and brutally—it was over in seconds, one of the odder effects of heroin withdrawal. The climax sent a small rush of serotonin to my brain, giving me relief for a few seconds at least. I knew in a few hours I was going to arrive at Manchester airport to see my parents for the first time in over a year. Then I was going to return to London in an attempt to somehow insinuate myself back into the music industry. Beyond that, I had planned nothing. Especially here, absurdly suspended in a toilet thousands of feet in the air, I knew the