Powder [phan]

XXV

I slowly raised my hand and touched the glass of the mirror as if there was another world behind it in which none of us had to endure all of this.

I looked at myself and my reflection answered the question I had asked myself for a long time. The bad guy in history was none other than me. Phil had done everything for our good fortune, while I had only ever tried to counter it.

I lazily turned around so that I could see the nightstand. I sat on the edge of the bed and opened the drawer, pulled out the pills, opened the pack and took out the package insert to patiently unfold it.

The orange light disappeared as I read through the side effects and instead of the setting sun there were only the dark shadows that filled the room. The information in black and white proved to me that my medication can affect the psyche.

Automatically, I pushed one of the tablets out of the packaging, then the second. A third followed and then I stopped counting. I lifted my head a little and looked at the wall opposite, while one tablet after another landed on the inside of my hand.

I closed it in a fist and went back to the living room, opened the glass cabinet and took out a bottle of vodka. I actually hated this stuff and it wasn't meant to be drunk straight, but I didn't have anything else in the house.

Again I sat on the sofa next to my garbage with the white powder residue on the table in front of me and examined the pills in my hand for quite a while before moving them quickly to my mouth. Swallowed as many as I could. A few remained, for which I had to make a second attempt so that they also disappeared.

I trembled, unscrewed the cap from the bottle and put it on, took a few large sips of it, ignored the disgusting taste, before suddenly the strength left me and it just fell out of my hand. The alcohol spread over my shirt and boxer shorts before the bottle rumbled to the floor.

I fixed it in silence, watching the puddle continue to spread.

My thoughts became unclear.

Fault. The tablets were to blame. Philip, Tyler, me. Myself was to blame.

Myself.

I closed my eyes wearily and leaned back.

"I don't want to lose you!"

"No, no, please don't."

"Wait, I'm going to get someone, okay? Everything will be fine."

"Dan, you can't die."

I opened my eyes in a flash and still heard Phil's voice from the past, breathing quickly, shallowly, and startled. Rushed into the bathroom, put my fingers in my throat, several times, and voluntarily vomited the tablets and the alcohol, hopefully before it worked. Panting, I dropped to the floor and buried my head in my arms.

I wanted him back.

Whatever I tried to fool myself into, it didn't work.

I wanted to live with him, for him, with him. I wanted him. Wanted everything related to him. I wanted to belong to him, surrender to him, hand me over to him as long as he was with me again. Love for him filled my heart so much that it didn't stop beating.

Again tears that I had long thought to be extinct ran down my face, but this time it was different. Never before had I been so painfully aware of how often he would have used me and that I had always been so incredibly powerless against myself. I wanted to be there for him, to give him everything of mine, and yet I couldn't help but destroy us.

To continue killing myself with the coke my body was craving again and to kill him with me.

I was helpless. Without a plan. Didn't know what to do.