Wait, wait, wait, wait. What’s happening here?
“Ten bucks only gets you one oxy,” Levi said, opening the bag.
Oxy …
There had to be fifty pills in that bag. Fifty pills that looked an awful lot like the ones Mom liked to take. The kind that made her drop onto the couch and stare at the TV until she passed out.
Where was Levi getting them from?
And why did Billy want one?
“That’s okay,” Billy said. “We can split it.”
Split it? Wait … what? Split it with who?
Billy shot a grin in my direction.
Is he talking about me? No way. He wouldn’t be … right?
Levi dropped a pill into Billy’s hand. Billy thanked him and told me to follow. I did, uncomfortable and stunned, feeling like everything was suddenly even more messed up and wrong than before.
What did Billy want with that pill? Why had he spent money on it?
I had known him since preschool. He didn’t do that type of crap. Kids like him had nice moms and nice houses and no reason to want the pills my mom took.
Yet he had one.
“Dude, she was into you,” Billy whispered, both disbelieving and excited. “You should’ve—”
“Why do you have that?” I cut him off, my voice urgent and hushed against the voices around us.
“Because I saw Robbie take one last week and it looked like fun.”
Last week, I hadn’t gone to The Pit with Billy and Robbie when they asked me to. Last week, I had been too scared to leave Mom alone.
I had wondered what my friends were doing without me. I had felt jealous and left out, worried I was missing something crucial while I was too busy cleaning up Mom’s puke and making sure she didn’t die. But now, I knew, and I wasn’t jealous anymore. I was disgusted and disappointed instead, and I stared at my best friend for a moment, feeling suddenly like I didn’t recognize him anymore.
“Fun?” I lifted my bewildered gaze to the sky and shook my head. “It’s not—”
“Okay,” Billy said, plopping himself onto the ground next to our bikes, “I’m gonna break it in half, and you can take one side, and I’ll—”
“I don’t want it.”
“What?” Billy was incredulous as he painstakingly broke the little pill in half with a barely audible snap. “Come on. It’s fine. It’s not gonna even do anything.”
I imagined Mom passed out on the beat-up couch that had come with the apartment. I imagined the countless times I’d shaken her, making sure she was still breathing. That never looked like nothing to me. But I wouldn’t tell Billy about that. I wouldn’t tell anybody.
“I don’t care. I don’t want it.”
“Fine. Be a baby. More for me.” Billy dug into his backpack for a water bottle and dropped one half of the pill onto his tongue. Then, with a quick sip of water, he swallowed it. “See? No big deal.”
Billy was wrong though. It was a big deal because just a half hour later, his head was lolled heavily against my shoulder, and he was barely able to keep his blackened eyes open. He laughed at the dumbest stuff, could hardly speak in full sentences, and every time I asked if he was okay, he'd tell me to relax.
But how was I supposed to relax when my heart was racing so fast?
***
It wasn’t until a couple of painful hours later, when the sun had set and the moon dropped silvery beams of light into The Pit, that Billy finally announced that he was ready to go home. He said his mom would start to worry about him if he didn’t get back. He said she’d be mad, so we collected our stuff and left, although I doubted his mom could be mad about anything at all.
I insisted on walking him home, making sure he got there safely, even though he'd sworn he was fine.
Mom said she was fine all the time, too, but I knew better than to ever believe her.
“Hi, Soldier!” Billy's mom called from the door, waving in my direction as her son slowly trudged his way up the path. “Do you wanna come inside for something to eat? I made a spiral ham!”
God, when was the last time I'd eaten ham? When was the last time I'd eaten anything that hadn’t come from the school cafeteria or out of a can at home? I couldn’t say for sure, but it had to be before Gramma had gotten really sick and couldn't cook anymore. What I did know was, ham sounded great. Billy's mom was a good cook, and I knew there'd probably be a couple of excellent side dishes to accompany the ham as well.
But I smiled and shook my head. “No, thanks, Mrs. Porter,” I replied. “I gotta get home and do my homework.”
“Oh.” She looked disappointed. Billy's mom was always so nice to me; she always seemed like she genuinely enjoyed my presence in her house. “Well, okay then. Maybe another time. Get home safe, okay? Tell your mother I said hi.”
“I will.” I smiled and waved, all too aware of the painful ache that struck my heart as I began to walk away. “Bye!”
The journey home was long as my feet dragged along the sidewalk. I could've ridden my bike, but I didn’t feel like it. I couldn't stop thinking about Billy. I couldn't stop thinking about the half circle he’d swallowed and the other that was still in his pocket. I should've said something to his mom. I should've taken her up on her offer for a nice ham dinner. I should've done a lot of things, none of which I’d ended up doing, and that was my fault. That was my neglect, and even though I didn’t know it then, I would pay for it forever.
What wasn't my fault though was walking into our crappy little apartment to find all the lights off, including the one Mom always kept on in the kitchen—always.
I flipped the switch beside the front door a few times, up and down, and with every flick, the same thing happened—absolutely nothing.
With my blood whooshing loudly past my eardrums, I dropped my backpack onto one of the two dining chairs and headed through the doorway into the living room, where I found Mom lying on the couch in the dark when she was supposed to be at work.
“Mom?”
She didn't move, and I immediately thought she had died.
What am I going to do? Where will I go? Would Billy's mom let me live with her?
God, I hope I can live with Billy's mom.
Guilt settled cold in my gut as I carefully took a step closer, scared that she was dead. Scared that she wasn't.
“Mom?” I asked again, and this time, she rolled her head against the cushion.
“Hmm,” she murmured.
I couldn't tell if her eyes were open, but she was awake, and a tiny part of me was disappointed.
“What happened to the lights?”
She slowly sat up, lifting a hand and dropping it onto her lap with a dismissive attitude. “The choice was pay the rent or the electric.”
I sighed and sat on a folding chair I sometimes used to watch TV if Mom was sleeping on the couch. “We always had lights at Gramma and Grampa's house.”
“Well, we're not at Gramma and Grampa's house anymore, so fucking deal with it.”
“How am I supposed to do my homework?”
“Guess you're gonna have to do your homework in the dark.”
Mom stood up and shuffled past me to enter the kitchen. I looked over my shoulder to watch her open the fridge and reach into the darkness, and she pulled out the bottle of milk.