Chasing Butterflies

Dark Times

"Hey girly! It's been like a whole week. What were you doing?" Cassie's high pitched voice began rambling as soon as the door swung open.

"Oh uh, nothing I guess," Cassie was too drunk to fight for a real answer. Her sharp fingernails cut into Izzy's arm as she yanked her into the tiny apartment. As usual the place was filled with a haze of smoke and a pile of multicolored pills was spilling from the coffee table. The bare light bulb that hung from the ceiling flickered annoyingly and Jae was lounging on the crappy old couch, just like when Izzy had left.

"You've been getting busy with those guys that were with you last time, haven't you?" Cassie whispered in Izzy's ear, her beer breath blowing over her face, and released a drunken giggle.

"Uh n-no! No, nothing like that," Izzy's throat felt dry, she was far more than uncomfortable being in that apartment, especially with Jae's piercing eyes following her every move.

"Yeah whatever," Cassie dismissed. "Come check out the new stuff Jae's guy brought last night," she dragged Izzy by the arm and shoved her onto the floor by the coffee table.

Jae, in all his wrinkled-boxers glory, sat up with a groan and stared her down. "Take off your jacket, Izzy, get comfortable," the way he scanned her body made Izzy's stomach churn and she prayed that her breakfast would stay down.

Despite her discomfort she did what he said and peeled the leather from her body, leaving herself in a cropped beige sweater which she had to tug down to cover her midriff. Izzy carefully placed the jacket behind her, making sure that it was far away from Jae.

"So what are you in the mood for? More DMT?" He rested his elbows onto his knees and leaned forward, shuffling the pile of pills around the table.

"Whatever," she whispered guiltily.

She couldn't help but feel the guilt seeping into her every bone as Jae scooped up a couple white pills and dropped them in her awaiting hands. It looked a bit like DMT but there was no limit to the varieties of small white pills, so this particular drug could be anything. She didn't feel like asking. Izzy threw the pills back dry, swallowing past the dryness in her throat. A whole week of progress had just been flushed down the drain. What would Jimin think? Izzy dragged her hands angrily down her face. Why did she have to do this? Why did she always let Youngkyun get to her? The answer was staring her in the face, and it looked like a little white pill: because she was weak. That's the only explanation her drowsy mind could come up with.

"What is this stuff?" She mumbled to no one in particular as she laid back onto the floor, using Jimin's jacket as a pillow.

"Morphine," Jae answered with a scratchy chuckle.
"Morphine? Don't they use that for surgery and stuff?"
"Among other things—"
"I found beer!" Cassie's loud shriek cut off her boyfriends cryptic sentence.

The excited girl bounced over to the living room holding a six pack of cheap beer and slammed it down on the coffee table, crushing a few pills in the process.

"Here babe," she thrust a cold bottle into Jae's hands before throwing one to Izzy, who barely caught it before the glass bottle could smash on the floor. With an experienced hand Izzy slammed the metal cap against the table edge and it popped easily away from the bottle, flying through the air and landing somewhere across the room. The room was silent as the three of them drank their beer. Cassie was the first to finish her bottle and throw it down on the floor.