Ecstasy

FIRST-PART…forbidden story
Drugs.
I never thought I would try them. I made it through high school not even thinking about them. I hung out with people that cared about school and college not drugs. So I assumed I would never touch anything. I graduated in 1998, here it is 2002. It has been four years. Four years since I walked across the stage from confused to knowing all, right?
Wrong. Very horribly completely out of my mind wrong. I won’t go into detail, but I was wrong. One would think, hey four years, that means college graduation. After a faulty year at UC Davis I went on a 2-year binge of work/community college/depression/move back home/work some more/move/move/move/move. I moved a lot. I was so unhappy and confused as to what I wanted to do and who I was.
I moved in with one of my good friends in the bay area and I am staying put. No moving. I am finishing up school and working on writing. Which is something that I hope to make a career out of. We will see. But the important thing is that I finally found some key things out and am here where I type. I am happy for the most part. I still am finding myself. But I think everyone is still finding themselves. I think that is what life is about: finding and finding yourself. A friend of mine from school gave me a little baggie one day. His name was Sonny. I only knew him from parties and he was always the one who was drunk or high or something or other. I had a car so he asked me for rides home a lot. He lived close to me. He is a nice guy sometimes when he is sober, but for the most part he is a little selfish and rude. But I don’t like seeing people hurt themselves, so I came to know him driving him to various parties and then driving him home. I learned how to make Sonny stop rambling incoherently and how to carry his 175 pound frame to keep him from falling.
Back to the baggie. He told me to look at it when I had time. I was late for a class so I stuffed it in my change-ridden pocket and ran towards my biology lab. That night I got home late, calorie formulas running amuck in my head. I pulled out the days goodies form my pocket and threw it all on my dresser. I forgot about the baggie.
Weeks went by and I did my thing as usual not thinking of the baggie that kinda mixed in with the numerous Safeway receipts and the endless change. Then one day I was doing my every-once-and-a-while change roundup. I saw the baggie and remembered Sonny giving it to me. I looked at the contents real close but couldn’t really tell what was inside so I untied the stubborn knot. I emptied the contents into my cupped hand and saw 3 and a half pills. I smelled them and they didn’t really have a smell. Even though I was curious I knew they were from Sonny and Sonny is strange. I put them back and decided to ask Sonny what they were when I saw him next. I still hadn’t seen him since he gave me the bag.
About two days later I got a phone call. A very strange phone call. I picked up my cell phone.
“Hello.”
“Hi is this Cassi?”
“Who is this?” I hate it when people ask if that question. If they are calling my cell then they know that it is me.
“This is a friend of Sonny’s. I was wondering if you enjpyed the alligators.”
“What?” I was annoyed by the call at this time.
“Did you enjoy the alligators? There is plenty where that came from.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about. Tell Sonny to not give my number out.”
“E. Did you try the E?” He stressed the letter E like a stoner might. My brother is a stoner so I am allowed to have that opinion.
“E? I am sorry, who is this?”
“My name is Brad. E is Ecstasy.”
“Ecstasy? Like the drug?”
He laughed at my naïve remark. “Yes the drug. So you didn’t try then?”
“No, Brad.” I all of a sudden realized what Brad was talking about. Ecstasy was the name of those 3 and a half pills on my dresser. Sonny had given me Ecstasy to try. Brad was calling to see if I wanted more.
“Ok. Well when you do, give me a call. You want more, trust me.”
“Why did you say alligators?”
“These pills are alligators, it’s the batch name. I had snowflakes last time.”
“Oh.”
Brad laughed some more at me. “Anyway, call me anytime. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Ok, bye.” I said as he clicked on the other end.
I was a little stunned by the conversation and a little embarrassed. I felt like a nerd. I didn’t know anything about alligators or E or whatever. And there they were sitting on my dresser mingling with the receipts.
I called a friend Jeff, who I had been getting back in touch with. We lived together briefly and went to high school together. We had lost touch, and had just begun to talk more. I asked him if he wanted to try Ecstasy with me. I don’t know why I asked. I trusted him and knew that he to shared the need to experience.
To make things brief, we decided to try it together. I didn’t want the baggie to go to waste. I was scared at first thinking about it. What if I die, what if I become addicted. Little kid things like that, but I thought what they heck, you only live once right?
So we tried it one day not knowing anything about it. We sat around waiting to feel something. We both had no idea what to expect. We both got discouraged and started heading back to the car. We had walked to a little rocky beach near a damn. On the way back Jeff said that he was feeling something. I just thought he was feeling hopeful and was ready to go home.
We sat on his tailgate while he smoked a cigarette. We talked about the failing of the alligators while one and a half still sat in my pocket. I said maybe they were just lame pills and Sonny was playing a trick on me. Sonny would do something like that. As we were discussing this I got up and my limbs felt heavy and tingly. My ears were plugged and my voice sounded far away. I felt like I was floating and falling at the same time. I forgot that I was talking and just stared at the ground, finding it amazing. I felt so wonderful. I realized that Ecstasy was now flowing through my blood and was reeking its havoc on my body.
Jeff was also experiencing the same wonderful feeling. I cannot put words to the feeling that I had that night. It was everything warm you ever felt and everything soft you ever touched. It was the feeling of swimming through deep water and flying through high altitudes. It was everything you could remember of nice and nothing you could remember of bad. It made you see your insides and want to see others insides. I felt a closeness to Jeff that I have never felt with anyone. It was as if we were floating in each other’s souls. For three or so hours we experienced empathy to the highest degree. It was amazing to give it a very unjust word. Since that night, we have planned on maybe trying it more times. I enjoyed it because I was with Jeff. I would not do it ever without him. It would feel wrong. It is a Jeff thing. Jeff and I have never been closer. I can talk to him now about anything. Including drugs. I thought I would never try drugs. I still don’t think I ever will. I am only experiencing alligators.

SECOND PART…Fiction Forbidden story
Drugs. I never thought I would try them.
The lights were mixing with the atmosphere. Brightness seemed overwhelming. Everything was pretty. My tree friend hugged me as I hugged him back. Jeff’s hair felt so nice. It was wet and a little sticky. It made my hands tingle like I was touching a thousands coils of electricity.
Jeff was with me and I was so glad. He had on a Spiderman outfit. It looked good on him even before tonight. The tight fit made him seem a thousand times taller. Now standing there sitting in the tree. He was there perched in the tree in all his glory. I don’t think I would give so much credit and mention to the tree had it been any other normal night. This was heaven. About two weeks earlier I got a phone call. A very strange phone call. I picked up my cell phone.
“Hello.”
“Hi is this Cassi?”
“Who is this?” I hate it when people ask if that question. If they are calling my cell then they know that it is me.
“This is a friend of Sonny’s. I was wondering if you enjoyed the alligators.”
“What?” I was annoyed by the call at this time.
“Did you enjoy the alligators? There is plenty where that came from.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about. Tell Sonny to not give my number out.”
“E. Did you try the E?” He stressed the letter E like a stoner might. My brother is a stoner so I am allowed to have that opinion.
“E? I am sorry, who is this?”
“My name is Brad. E is Ecstasy.”
“Ecstasy? Like the drug?”
He laughed at my naïve remark. “Yes the drug. So you didn’t try then?”
“No, Brad.” I all of a sudden realized what Brad was talking about. Ecstasy was the name of those 3 and a half pills on my dresser. Sonny had given me Ecstasy to try. Brad was calling to see if I wanted more.
“Ok. Well when you do, give me a call. You want more, trust me.”
“Why did you say alligators?”
“These pills are alligators, it’s the batch name. I had snowflakes last time.”
“Oh.”
Brad laughed some more at me. “Anyway, call me anytime. I’ll talk to you later.”
“Ok, bye.” I said as he clicked on the other end.
I knew that Brad was referring to a baggie I received about two weeks prior from a friend who liked to party way too much. I forgot about the bag until that phone call.
I called a friend Jeff, who I had been getting back in touch with. We lived together briefly and went to high school together. We had lost touch, and had just begun to talk more. I told him if he wanted to try Ecstasy with me. I don’t know why I asked. I trusted him and knew that he too shared the need to experience.
So we tried it one day not knowing anything about it. We sat around waiting to feel something. We both had no idea what to expect. We both got discouraged and started heading back to the car. We had walked to a little rocky beach near a damn. There were all these strange sounds and strange animals living there. I heard that this damn was the sight of many a biological experiment back in the day. On the way back Jeff said that he was feeling something. I just thought he was feeling leftover bad vibes from the old time experiments and was ready to go home.
We sat on his tailgate while he smoked a cigarette. I noticed how the light bounced off of Jeff’s Spiderman outfit. He had bought it before we came at a store in Old Sacramento called Evangeline’s. I told him that he has got to wear it. He obliged and looked pretty hot. We talked about the failing of the alligators while one and a half still sat in my pocket.
So here we are dancing wonderfully in our tree. Sparkling and splattering of silver and green. The moonlight and the starlight hurt my eyes if I looked too long. I find solace in Jeff’s welcoming and oh so kind bright eyes. His eyes say things to me that no one has ever told me. They have secrets. I am queen of the night. The breeze hugs my heart and whispers into my ear “Requiem!” I realize that the whisper is not a whisper at all but Jeff screaming at me from across the tree.
I laugh and my breath is one with my lungs. My lungs escape and float around for a while before they tire and retreat back to my body. I embrace the air and fly to Jeff who is busy lighting another cigarette.
We sit together like we have never before. Two wandering souls finding a perch. Perfect like no other night-ever.
Drugs. I really never thought I would try them. Requiem? Indeed.

THIRD PART…telling of how I wrote the story.
I sat for a total of around 5 hours in front of the computer trying to think of a forbidden story. Hopeless drafts and really lame first paragraphs came out of those 5 hours. I could not think of something that I could not write. Strange. Not being able to think of something that you never could write. It is almost comical.
I was thinking of things about my family but I have written countless stories about them. I was thinking of so many things. I think that I made a list of forbidden things and most of them I have written about. I write about so many things that this was such a difficult assignment. I write when I find something tough. I write when I need clarity. I write when I want something out of a moment. So I seem to have covered a lot of ground during these writing moments. A friend of mine from high school told me that I should write about Ecstasy. I told him that I don’t want to and that it was weird to write about it for a class. I was thinking that it was inappropriate and crude. Forbidden? Ah-ha! I had my paper.
Jeff also called me and told me that he wrote a little thing on our experience. I told him to email it to me. He did and his story was the backbone and inspiration to my story here.
I sat at my computer with Jeff’s one page account right on the word page with me. I typed and looked and typed and looked. It was as if I was using not only my words but his also. We told this story. We wrote it.

FOUTH PART…combination of the three parts.
I read an email from my friend, Jeff. It was a story he had read to me the night before. I was reading it again hoping to find some inspiration for a paper I was supposed to write about something forbidden. The email went like this:

“A few months ago Cassi and I tried something neither of us have ever done before, Ecstasy. Ecstasy is a drug which...(put definition later)
I was hesitant to take it at first, after all I had heard stories of the bad that could happen, but I figured what the hell, you only live once, right? We tried it, not really knowing anything about this drug, and waited for it to kick in. It eventually came, and it was one of the greatest feelings I have ever had.
I grew up in a household where everything bad was wrong and I only knew of what the "right" thing to do was. My dad was a Highway Patrolman and my mom was a teacher. Of course my dad never let anything bad come into the house and my friends were not the type who would go out in the night to cause trouble. I guess you could say I was in the "good crowd", whatever that’s supposed to mean. For a moment in my life I believed I was truly happy. Boy, was I stupid.
It wasn’t until my senior year in high school when my "perfect world" bubble popped. I’m not sure exactly how it hit me, but when it did, it knocked me down hard. I suddenly realized that my life made no sense, I was very confused, and I was unhappy. It was definitely not the way I wanted to end high school. My "friends" suddenly stopped talking to me, I broke up with my girlfriend of 11 months, and I was about to graduate in a month. Life couldn’t have been any worse.
It’s been about 4 years now and nothing much has changed in my life. My life still doesn’t make sense and I am still unhappy. I wanted to try drugs because I heard it makes your problems go away and you forget about everything that’s wrong in your life for just a moment. For those few hours, life changes somehow. It stimulates your mind and let’s you be who you are inside for just a moment. It brings out the you inside and you feel more alive. From my experience, I have realized that I could be so much more and it truly is changing my life.
Cassi and I have never been so close to each other before, and our friendship has grown tremendously. I am very thankful that we have become good friends and I hope we remain this way forever. I can’t believe something so bad can make something so good.”

I read this again and I was really moved by Jeff’s sentiment. I decided that, yes, I was going to write my paper on Ecstasy. I was really nervous writing it. Just because it was for a class and I was always so used to being the good person in class or anywhere for that matter. That is what forbidden things are made of right? My paper had to be on a forbidden something. So I wrote away.

SEE PART ONE…and INSERT PART TWO.
I sit here now writing the last paragraph of my paper. I am thinking of calling Jeff and seeing what he is up to. He is supposed to be seeing Spiderman tonight. It came out today. I’ll wait a little later to call him. I wonder if he wore he Spiderman outfit to the movie. I wonder if he remembers screaming requiem at me. I wonder if he even knows what requiem means. Drugs. Say no to drugs kids. Seriously, I never thought I would try them. You might say I forbade myself to ever try them. And look at me now writing an English paper at 11:15pm on the subject. Drugs.