Detox

Detox

Mark Coleman

  I just want to find someone to spend my life with. Someone to comfort me when a friend dies. I want what others have.
  It broke my heart to see you sitting on the floor. Head in your hands, crying. Couldn't really understand what happened. Except that you hate yourself for it.
  I just sat there and ate my shitty detox waffles. Trying to think of something to say. Tried to make small talk and failed. But for some reason out of all the open chairs, you chose the one right next to me.
  I caught your name, and that was about all. Asked a guy in my room what I should do with my dirty scrubs. He said that some people keep them or I could hang myself with them. He said that earlier he wanted to shoot himself.
  Told the staff on intake that he was suicidal. Another guy and I asked who the hell says that, and then I joked about the homicidal question.
   "Every time that I come in here. I want to kill all you, motherfuckers!" We had a good laugh. If you know where to look and your timing's not shit, you can have a few belly laughs here.
 Occasionally, someone smokes a cigarette in the shower. I did it myself. Last time, the stunt was pulled they looked in everyone's pockets and rooms for contraband. A madman got dragged to the psych for going for the girls' room with his cane.
  A young DUI kid told us that he had a beer in his bag. As he was getting discharged, he said that he was going to chug it and throw the can at the wall of the facility. An older man with brain damage said he realized he had a fifth of vodka in his bag and went to the bathroom and pounded it.
  Some of us look like boxers with the damage done by falling down on our faces. I asked a pretty Mexican if she had a boyfriend. She did. A boyfriend and three kids that she just wanted to get out and see. At night, they bring out the T.V. and some asshole picks out a garbage movie to watch.
  They had a Gore Vidal and Joyce Carol Oates, I came close to stealing. I came home to broken reading glasses, anyway. Several of us came here, just for walking down the street. The women are all pretty but heart broken. The majority of the men want to fill their souls with something more than this unbearable pain that comes with just having to get up in the morning. With very few exceptions, none of us are bad people.