This is it.
The musty fog that envelops the air tells it so. The sound of the livid, soft-harsh thunder that rumbles throughout the walls. The depressing yet warming gentle coldness of it attracts you to its persistent downpour.
The boy slouches up from his bed with his gray woolen blanket draped around him. This is a particularly fine day. With the sooty gray sky covering the joyous sun. He smirks at his reflection plastered on the misty window with his unruly curls running astray to every direction possible. His eyes puffy red from another tear spent on one of his sleepless nights. The bones from his collar showing from his blanket.
This indeed is the perfect day.
He drags himself back to the side of his moss colored bedding to grab the black chest box from under it that was next to a brown woody braids that he neglects for the moment.
It's his last stash of all sorts of narcotics. His remedies. Antidote. His needles. Lighter. Spoons. Papers. Straws. Ties. He then smiles with the anticipation in his bones. The thrill of the high. The promised Neverland. The paradise.
He unfolds himself bare from the blanket and toss them aside somewhere on his bed. He parks himself on the cold pavement and chooses his first poison.
The sudden knock on his locked door makes him jump up and frantically covers himself overly with his blanket.
“W.. Who’s there?” He stammers. Cradling himself protectively with the only piece of dressing he has on.
A delicate old womanly voice speaks up from the door, “Master Harry, breakfast is fixed if you don’t mind joining. Or shall I deliver it through your door?”
“No, sorry. It’s fine. I’ll be down in a moment.” He huffs out a sigh of relief and composure. “Will my father be showing up to the dining table as well?”
“I'm 'fraid not, young master. Master Colin is preparing to leave for the theater any minute now. He’s just waiting for the car out front.” The woman explained.
“Thank you, Lisha. I’ll be down in a few.”
Though not able to see, the woman curtsied before strolling away from the exit and proceeding back down to mend for the first meal of the day.
Harry calms his erratic breathing. He thinks, will constantly think that he will fear who might be on the other side of the door. But for right now, breakfast. He forces the thoughts aside and think back to what to might serve him to the utopia he longs for.
This is it.
Cannabis.
The perfect dope to deliver him high and relaxed and mellow. And it would very well compliment with the food.
He chooses the paraphernalia to start the journey. He's fingers shake from what he guesses as him being giddy.
He tightly tucks and rolls the marijuana, closing them shut with a sliver of his saliva. He stares at the masterpiece and remembers how he was taught on how to do it and instantly regrets going to that train of thought.
Nevertheless, Harry smokes the dope. Inhaling it thoroughly to his lungs and keeping it in until it starts hurting before letting it out with a light but persistent cough. He does this for five more deep drags until there was none. Until, his lungs are screaming at him.
He can’t be bothered with the pain. Right now, At this moment, he’s drifting off.
He lays down on the icy floor and drowns everything in his senses and just looks at the dark white ceiling. Stark naked, just letting the high fly him away.
He starts to get a bit tingly and drowsy and light.
It was soothing. Very much calming. The mood of the weather alongside the float. He’s enjoying this. He’s savoring it. He makes carpet angels. He reaches through thin air and looking at his hand funnily. He hums at the silence of the harsh rain outside the property.
“Master Harry everything is getting cold and your mother is waiting for you.” A light voice reports.
“Yes, I’ll be down.” He responds. He rises up and sighs. He locked the box and placed it back where he got it.
Everything was somehow spinning, but it wasn’t upsetting his head. He finds this rather amusing. Giggling and stumbling on his feet while dressing himself with his blue silk pajama and thin white t-shirt.
His teeth start to ache a bit and his joints as well, but he decides to resolve the matter back later.
“Honey, finally you’re out of your room.” Mother exclaims in glee. She leaves her food and rushes to her son. "Seems like you lost quite a weight. Come let's eat." She said, escorting her son to his usual sit.
“You reek of booze, mother.” Harry whispers.
“Do I? I just had a taste to wake up the system, darling.” Mother giggles.
Harry can't help but giggle along. Uncontrollably even when mother has already stopped.
He pauses for a moment and looks at his mother with a smile and sleepy eyes and said, “I love you, mother.”
“Such a joyous little angel.” Mother continues to eating her soup as he’s being given his, along with a mildly toasted grilled cheese and butter on the side.
The soup was bright red and steaming. The heat of it travels straight to the skin. And the spices used were very prominent to the senses. Hamish gulps, and he feels like vomiting.
“Deary, your face is turning green. Is there something wrong?” Mother worries.
Harry doesn’t speak and forces a smile as his eyes wells up. Still, he struggles to swallow the tomato soup. He can't tolerate it. He can’t keep it down. The cup of water was already ready on his side as soon as the other maid sees him choking, but he stands up and grabs himself his own glass and water from the tap from the kitchen.
He shuffles back limply, out of strength, sobering to the beige room to see his mother pouring herself a glass of vodka and then looking at him.
“Are you okay, my love?” Mother asks, stepping towards Hamish.
The deafening rumble of the thunder startles him. Making him jump from his skin. He can't breath. He feels like he’s suffocating. Hamish feels himself hyperventilating as mother moves closer. He's shivering with cold sweats, throat closing up. He's tripping badly. He needs another blow. Another high. Another distraction.
Before mother could reach him, he runs away and storms to lock his room. He quickly scrambles through his black box and picks up the next thing he wishes would bring him elsewhere. Back to somewhere better.
He barely hears his mother yelling and pounding on his door, calling his name. All he can hear is his thumping heart and erratic breathing.
With every crash of the thunder makes him feel like someone is skinning him alive.
He needs to go somewhere. Immediately.
This is it.
He takes the spoon and tears off the packaging of the needle, setting it beside him. He cooks the substance with his lighter, heating it up the bottom of the spoon.
Once finished, he sets it down for a moment.
He grabs his tie, tying it around his upper arm tightly and shoots up the heroin through his vein.
Everything was so fast, then slow. Spinning, vision zooming in, then out. He limply unties the knot and slumps down to his bed.
He feels like he is floating again. Feels like he's physically floating off from reality. Slowly and relieving.
He feels a drop on his face and wipes it. Then another. Until it’s a full downpour on his bedroom. He plunges down and everything was a storm and it's flooding his room rapidly. Harry tries to get up, but he finds tied up. He tries to toss and turn, but unable to move. He works to gasp for air before the water reaches his nose and die. He tries to scream but only static noise passes through his ear. He grinds his teeth, struggling to free himself from his bindings.
This is not it.
He doesn’t want this.
He didn’t ask to be born.
He did nothing to deserve this suffering.
He loses the air and doses off, still feeling the cold water but the burning temperature of his body.
He drifts off to pitch black and to nothingness. To frustration and stillness.
The stickiness of his skin was uncomfortable and the humidity of the air just doesn’t let you go back to sleep. It was extremely irritating. And the heat came with the hot streak of light that penetrated through your eyelids.
Harry groaned and rolled over, searching for a cooler part of his bed to try and catch a bit more of sleeping.
“Young master, it is already noon. Your father is looking for you.” The maid not more than 58 years old opened his door and made herself welcome.
“Lisha, can you not just inform my father that I am not here?” He moaned through his pillow. “I just woke up. I didn’t even wish to wake up.”
“Master Colin has news and would like you present. It's rather important, I'm guessing. So if you don’t mind.” The maid announced and bowed before stepping out of the room.
Harry sighed and stretched out of his bed. He looked around his dark emerald green room lazily, pondering on what could be so urgent that all of a sudden father called for his presence.
He wrapped himself with his purple embroidered dressing robe and fled downstairs to the dining area where his father sat reading his papers. Mother was by the gigantic window, sporting her sweating glass of, what it looked like, one of their aged whiskey from the mahogany coffee table next to her.
What a sight.
“Good morning, mother.” Harry passed his mother who hummed in response, he seated himself a chair away from father who sat in the middle. A young maid who was just a few years older than him served him coffee with all the fix-ins, while an older one with colored skin served him fresh toast with soft salted butter.
He took a heavy bite and a loud sip to get attention from his father.
“Have some manners, will you?” Father exclaims, setting his papers down on the dinner table with vexation.
Harry wasn’t shaken up, he was hoping it. “You requested my undivided attention, yes? Might as well give what you want, father.”
Father ticked his tongue. His face faltered from a frown to a disturbing sweet grin. “Ah, yes. Mary, why don’t you sit yourself down and listen for a moment.”
Mother silently sat herself and father proceeded, “I’ve acquired a bit of help from a friend of mine. Which he had agreed to.”
“What was the favor, darling?” Mother asked with a doped smile.
Harry rolled his eyes in bitterness. ‘Such a perfect obedient wife’ he thought to himself.
“The theater in New York demands a bit of publicity. A lot more since we have compromised a lot of wealth for it.” Father pointed out, his face was displaying a fake happiness that Hamish has mastered to distinguish about six years ago. “While I was taking care of the building, I ran in to this old colleague of mine from Uni back in Edinburgh.”
“Is that it? Delightful story, father. I’ll go ba—” Harry was cut off by his father banging his hand harshly on the table.
“Sit down, Harold. Do I look like I finished my story?”
Mother stared at Harry with knowing eyes, pleading eyes. He sat back down and plastered an unamused poker face to insult his father a bit further.
“Continue your story about the miserable man then, father.”
Colin ignored the remark with a growl, resisting the temptation to slap his son, but shifted it back to a happier demeanor, “Well, long story, short. I have persuaded him here for two weeks as a symbol of our gratitude.”
“Our gratitude. That’s a great suggestion, father. Tell me what part do I play? I assume you prefer me to perform a part like mother does, right?” Harry sarcastically asks.
Colin bit his cheeks but answered the question, gradually dropping the smile and producing a dark undertone to his voice “I need you to be on your best behavior. Be accommodating, if you will. And don’t be like that. Don’t be a fucking brat. This man is prominent and a great friend. So if you don’t mind ruining that.”
“As you wish.” As if I had a choice.
Without another sound, Harry walked out and went ahead to the back porch of the house. Just staring at the green surrounding of the burning summer.
Thinking on why he was given to this type of family. Thinking while he snoozed off.
“Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent.
For here I am infront of you, father. Here I am. Is this plague that you give me better rather than tenderness? For who am I to you? Who to give such a cold pavement to sleep on at long nights? Who you give mere rags and bronze to make a day? You’re mindlessly thinking. You are no wiser than me. A fool you are, father. Look at me father! LOOK AT ME! Forget me not for I will rebel. Love me not for I will be who you have molded me to be. You and you alone will not be spared the wrath of the cold flames for your iniquity and hypocrisy. Forget me not father. FORGET ME NOT!”
The curtains closed as the applause slowly faded, as he just stood there, immobile and unknowing to the surrounding until a soft familiar voice called out his name. He ached to run to it and wet it’s clothing with childish tears.
But he had enough of the sweet nothing. To the hallow embrace. It has gutted him and scorched his heart to ashes, reduced to only misery. He felt not only bitterness but also a never-ending abyss in the pit of his stomach, making him nauseated.
“Harry, my love. You’ve done magnificently.” The sweet melancholy voice whispered, holding out its arms to an embrace which he has ignored and walked pass over.
“Harry.” It kept calling to him until it drowned away.
“Master Harry, your father wanted to know if you were already getting geared up for the guest.” The 19-year-old maid woke him.
“Guest?” he groggily asked. The rocking chair strained his back.
It was already becoming dark but the air still held a heavy, humid heat to it. Harry could hear a far off racket in the kitchen, which made him more confused.
He frowned and just looked at the housemaid who was still in front of him. “What guest, Anais?”
“The friend your father had mentioned.” she responded patiently. “Shall I tell your father that you're getting to it?”
He nodded, stretching again till he has picked up a pop and crack in his bones that satisfied him and relaxed his muscles.
Harry sighed. He was wearied of the routine of acting in front the public. Putting on a persona that only satisfied his father.
He thought to himself that 'A higher power must have really hated how he has completed me, that he just shoved me to an unhappy married couple.’
He has to endure this. Tolerate the life handed over to him. Toughen it up till there is no space to bear the pain he will be holding.
But will it ever light up?