Blondie Wannabe: A Billy Hargrove Fanfic

Risk and Reward

"What's your poison?" His hand inched higher by the second. "Crack, heroin, meth?"

"No, no, none of that," I said hastily.

He rolled his eyes. "Pills then, figures."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Vicodin, Percocet, Codeine, they're the favorite of orgasm-deprived housewives and teenage anorexics alike; it makes sense a girl like you would fall for them."

Fall for them? Like I was in love. Yeah, I'd grown attached to my morning pill, plus a pick me up or two throughout the day, but I also like cigs and kinky sex and good books and peppermint bark, but I hadn't fallen for any of those things, I just liked them.

"You seem to know an awful lot about it."

"Of course I do; my dad's in pharmaceuticals, remember?"

Did I? Had we had a conversation about our father's careers? My brain felt fuzzy as I tried to search for the memory, but I came up empty. I'd smoked too many cigarettes in too short a period, and this marijuana felt like a thumb on the jugular, delaying the return of blood to my heart.

"His company talks a big game about wanting to help people and ease suffering and all that bullshit, but they just want to make money. And getting insurance companies to fund soft-core junkies' habit is the ultimate get rich quick scheme."

"So you have some?" I asked bluntly.

"Have what?"

I stubbed out the butt of the joint, brushing some ash off my skirt. "Pills, you have them in the house?"

"Uh, yeah, what do you want?"

"Codeine?"

Billy smiled, but it wasn't his usual, self-assured smirk, an uneasiness behind his eyes. "You and Susan would get along. That shit's kept her sedated since we moved here."

I sank deeper into the couch, giving him a good look up my skirt. When I slipped into my red lace underwear this morning, it was only because I missed a laundry day, but the fates were with me, Billy's mouth visibly watering. "If you could get me some of that, I'd be ever so grateful."

He disappeared like lightning, not up the stairs this time but past the kitchen to what I only presumed to be his father's study. The thought made me chuckle; it wasn't like Mr. Hargrove conducted experiments on the medication he sold in his own home. That was just his stash; a bunch of pills his wife, son, and God knows who else could take whenever they felt like it.

"How do you like it?" Billy asked.

I looked up to see his bare, chiseled torso staring down at me, his muscles so defined they cast shadows. "How do I like what?"

"The Codeine, do you like it wet or dry."

"I don't know what that means; I just swallow it."

"Really?" he asked curiously, joining me on the couch. "That's so boring; it's basically a sedative that way."

"It relaxes me," I sniped defensively.

"Yes, but you said you weren't stressed, you were bored," he reminded me. "If you want to have fun, try it my way."

Billy put three pills inside a dollar bill, pressing down on the edges to prevent anything from escaping before crushing it with a glass milk bottle, bludging the damn things so hard I worried he'd shatter the bottle and cut himself. But he knew what he was doing, emptying the powdered Codeine onto a paper plate, slicing it up into six neat lines.