Page 17 of Dark Room Junkie

I was relieved when he told me about his cooking apprenticeship. At least I didn’t have to worry about him, unlike his other job. But he didn’t want to hear that from me. And before I could start, he hugged me tightly again and held me close.

“Good to see you again,” he said, giving me a kiss on the neck.

“Thanks, Juri-Rock.” It was always hard for me to say goodbye to him.

“It’s okay, Bro. See you around.”

“Yeah. See you.”

Before going home, I bought milk and yogurt from the tiny Greek shop and hoped there were still cornflakes at home. A cool wind picked up as I arrived home at sunset. The weather was about to change, which made me feel a bit uneasy. It was one more reason for me to show up here again. The denim jacket alone wouldn’t be enough to keep me warm in the coming weeks.

I emptied the mailbox and quickly sorted through the mail. Nothing for me—thankfully. Most of the time, it was just bills or reminders that I couldn’t afford to pay. I had no idea how much debt I owed to my health insurance or what the status was. Maybe they had already kicked me out of the system after realizing there was nothing to get from me.

The sound of children laughing came from one of the apartments, while in another, people were arguing intensely. I tried to block the negative energy around me, but some days it was tough. Today was one of those days, and I couldn’t avoid it.

Hopefully, she’s not here.

The apartment door wasn’t locked, which didn’t mean much. Mom never locked it; there was nothing to steal here. I closed the door behind me, turned on the light, and took a deep breath before going down the hallway. As I turned around, I noticed fresh blood splatters on the walls. I paused for a moment, closed my eyes, and tried to center myself.

“Mom?” I stepped into the kitchen and set my mail and backpack on the table. Then I opened the fridge, put the yogurt and milk inside, and threw away the rotten food scraps. Apart from a few eggs and orange juice, there was nothing left.

“Mom, are you there?” A steady breathing came from the living room, so I went to check. She was lying on the couch with a needle in her arm, completely out of it but not entirely gone.

Shaking my head, I approached her. Just seeing her caused me stomach pains. I hated her for it. Even if she managed to get clean, which I no longer believed in, she could never make up for what she had done to me over the years. She was the one who had taken away all hope that my life could ever be different.

And yet, she was my mother.

I removed the syringe from her arm and set it aside. As I sat next to her, I stared at the low table, cluttered with paraphernalia. I rubbed my face in disbelief and pushed the negative emotions back into the dark depths of myself.

“Noé, is that you?” she murmured, touching my arm.

I yanked my arm back and stood up again. I hated it when she touched me as if she were a loving mother. Maybe she once was, but not anymore.

She was twenty-one when she had me. Now she was forty-four and looked like fifty-five. Addiction had eaten her from the inside out. Her teeth had fallen out, and her skin was covered in eczema that wouldn’t heal. In her presence, I felt like a stranger because there was nothing that indicated we were even remotely related.

“I brought yogurt,” I said and disappeared with my backpack into the room that used to be mine.

On the broken wooden floor lay an old, dirty mattress with an even dirtier pillow and a musty blanket. A single light bulb hung from a wire and illuminated the room. I went to the closet and pulled out the bags of dirty laundry. Along with the clothes in my backpack, I left the apartment and headed to the basement, where the laundry room was. Luckily, the washing machine was unoccupied, so I loaded everything into it and returned to my apartment.

“Do you have any money?” my mom asked from the living room.

I rolled my eyes. She could barely sit up, yet she was already asking for money from me, even though she didn’t even know how I earned my money or where I spent most of my time. There were moments when she tried to talk to me, pretending to want to know more about me, but I kept most of it to myself. The more she knew, the more she could take from me.

I lived in two worlds. When I was in one, the other didn’t exist. And I intended to keep it that way. Here, I became a robot who just functioned and deep down harbored the desire to leave, far away, no matter where, but I was trapped, carrying around a rage I suppressed in my other life. Because there, I got ahead with kindness and nice words, even managed to live a life that wasn’t bad by my standards. Although I had fallen through all social networks, I got by on my own. And as long as I could maintain this status quo, I had nothing to complain about.

“Noé? Did you hear me? Do you have any money?”

“No,” I said coldly and returned to my room, where I searched the closet for warm jackets. I found my leather jacket but couldn’t find my winter coat. I kept searching because I knew it had to be here somewhere.

“Mom! Where’s my coat?”

“No idea,” she replied, appearing in the doorway with a cigarette. She exhaled the smoke and stifled a yawn. It surprised me that she was already standing upright again, but when someone like her wanted something, unexpected forces were released.

I was almost a head taller than her, but that had never stopped her from attacking me. Like a monkey, she had once jumped on me, knocked me to the ground, and waved a knife around, so that in the end, I had no choice but to knock her down with a right hook. While bleeding, I had fled the apartment, and only at Juri’s house did I notice the five cuts on my arm. Juri treated my injuries while I sat there apathetic. I couldn’t believe I had hit my mother.

“It was here! My winter coat was hanging in this closet, along with the scarf.”

“Oh yeah? Was it black?”

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