Placebo Junkies Read online

  I met him in a waiting room, fooled around with him later that night, then again a few days later. I kept my low expectations, my no expectations, for a while. Just hanging out. See ya when I see ya. That’s what people like us do, right? He’s cute. He’s tall. He makes me smile. It was plenty.

  But it hit me bam! when he held the bucket. How long ago was that—two months? Six? It was a textbook’s worth of side effects ago, and it’s been obvious ever since: he loves me too. I knew it the moment he walked into the bathroom without knocking, sleeves already pushed up. “What can I do?” he asked, stepping in closer, undeterred by the foul liquid torrents pouring out of me, uncontrollably spraying out both ends at the same time—I was a two-sided fountain of sick. I couldn’t say anything at all, I just heaved and retched, unbeautiful, untouchable, unwantable, and nearly savage with misery. But he stayed anyway, his eyes tactfully unfocused as he held my hair back for me, gently pulling it off my sweaty, vomit-crusted cheeks. It’s a crystal-clear moment in a sea of muddy weeks, one I revisit often, whenever I can: I’m as sick as a freaking dog, pants around my ankles and oh my god the smell, and he walks in, keeps walking in even when he sees what’s going on. I’ll hold the bucket, he says in this gentle, deep voice, like it’s nothing at all, and yes, I could see, I can see it through the tears, sense it through the stench, feel it through the cramps and the waves.

  He loves me.

  And since then, since that night, oh the fluids we’ve shared.

  It’s a special kind of intimacy, I think. All the usual puppy love and teenage sex, sure, but something stronger than that, too, something torn raw then scarred over. I don’t care if it grosses you out, I think it’s romantic. He’s seen me at my worst, and he stayed. Stayed while I sprayed, puked, shat, dribbled, sobbed. And I’ve done the same for him.

  “You’re my blue moon,” I whisper into his skin.

  “Is everything okay?” He’s half-asleep, still curled around me, but I can feel the question mark as clearly as I can hear it. “You’re kind of a mystery lately.”

  I don’t answer. We both know I’m keeping a secret from him—there’s no use denying it.

  It’s getting harder, though. It’s a big secret. The kind of secret that practically vibrates out of you, shining out of your pores—it’s that good. I stuff it back down before I turn to kiss him good night, hoping he’ll take the hint and go back to sleep. I’ll tell him soon enough. In seven weeks, to be exact.

  That’s when Dylan, who should be dead, turns eighteen.

  Dylan, who could still die—his is an IV tightrope walk of a survival—deserves to celebrate. But what do you buy someone for a birthday he was never supposed to see? A freaking sweater and some moo shu chicken from the takeout place down the street just isn’t going to cut it.

  I need to give him a gift worthy of the occasion.

  A trip around the world was my first idea. I could do it, too. There’s good money to be made on the testing circuit if you’re smart about it. Picturing him in all those postcard places so foreign and far away they seem made up—the Eiffel Tower, Angkor Wat, Machu Picchu—just about brings tears to my goddamn eyes I want it so bad.

  But Dylan can’t travel. Not capital-T Travel, months at a time like that, anyway. His remission is still too shaky to untether so completely from his meds and his tests and his scans.

  So I had to pick just one place. One place out of all the places he’s never been. I’d been sweating it for a while, thinking, fuck it, I guess I’ll just trust the masses and pick somewhere popular—we’ll go see the Glockenspiel, or the Leaning Tower of Pisa or something. I’ve never been out of the country either, so what do I know? I was about to do it, to make reservations for some chumpy bus tour of Euroschlock, because I thought if I waited any longer we’d end up stuck at some divey Motel Six in Des Moines, since that’s all that would be left if I didn’t hurry up and make plans to go somewhere. But then that night we were watching Discovery Channel, not even because we wanted to, but because neither of us had the energy to change the channel, and a program about Patagonia came on. They were showing this eco-resort called Castillo Finisterre, which the show’s ambiguously accented (New Zealand? South Africa? Native-born Reality TV?) host translated as “the castle at the end of the world.” It’s at the far tip of South America, perched on the edge of the continent, the very end of the inhabited world, with nothing else around except cliffs and glaciers and the occasional wandering puma. Some dude was paddling around icebergs in a kayak, and I’m not exaggerating in the least when I say it looked like something from a different planet. Otherworldly—that’s the perfect word to describe it.

  I was barely paying attention, to be honest—I’m not exactly a nature lover. I only happened to see the look on Dylan’s face because I turned to ask him if he wanted to order pizza.

  It gave me the chills, that look. Seriously, it just about broke my heart. He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t need to. I could tell exactly what he was thinking. Two thoughts at the same time, etched across his face like an acid splash:

  1) I want to go there.

  2) I’ll never go there.

  There should be a word for it, that simultaneous stab of both desire and defeat—the knowledge that something is generally possible but personally impossible. It’s like getting a giant middle finger from the universe, a great big fuck you of a dream turned inside out. All I could think while I watched that look spread across his face was, Okay, here’s where it all starts to go to shit. It was like watching bitterness and regret take root inside Dylan in real time.

  So right then and there I knew I had to do whatever it took to make Patagonia happen. I mean, come on—the castle at the fucking end of the world. It puts every other half-assed tourist spot to shame.

  A secret like this one tends to leak through the cracks, though. Especially during moments like these, pressed skin to skin, his breath on my shoulder. But I can’t let it slip yet. Not until the whole trip is planned, paid, and promised. And that’s going to take some serious, vein-popping overtime—the place costs a damn fortune. But I’ve got a lot of skin, and a lot of blood. I’m going to give Dylan his impossible.

  That’s the thing someone like Dylan doesn’t necessarily get about volunteering. For someone like him, it’s a last resort. For someone like me, it’s a starting line—the castle at the end of the world, and everything in between.

  Unlike his, my version of normal sucks. I did the whole fast-food-restaurant job, GED, homeless-teen-in-the-system thing when I first left home. Foster parents, social workers, suburban-wasteland taco-chain night shifts so fourth-meal-seeking stoner assholes can come and eat their chalupas, giving me a hard time, leaning in and waggling their eyebrows for their friends while they ask me to squirt extra sour cream on their burritos but do it sexy this time. Making minimum wage except what the shitbag manager docks from my check because I called the fourth-meal asshole exactly what he was and squirted the sour cream all over his ugly face. And from there, couch-surfing, flophouses, shelters, alleys—barely managing to survive month to month, in the system, under the system, in spite of the system …

  Dylan’s not the only one saved by the experiments they do around here. My whole life was a fucking tumor.

  So yeah, the side effects can be rough. But the money’s good, and the odds of survival are a hell of a lot better here than where I’m coming from. Think about it this way: the researchers and the drug companies have a vested interest in keeping you healthy. They want you to be okay. They’ll let you know if your blood tests come back wonky, they’ll patch up your sores, they feed you whenever you’re in their labs more than an hour or two, tops—I’m talking organic stuff, feta cheese, that sort of thing. They don’t want anyone dying on them—they need us healthy. They want us alive.

  And that, my friends, is a whole lot better than anyone else has ever wanted for me. So sure, this life might kill
me. But in my experience, real life kills you even faster.

  I turn over and wrap myself even deeper into Dylan’s arms, and I fall back to sleep knowing exactly what I’m going to say to Charlotte tomorrow.

  I’m in.

  Chapter 6

  Navigation Tips: Strategies for Flying these Unfriendly Skies

  Okay, Ladies and Specimens. You’re really committed to doing this thing?

  First, feel your skin.

  Go on, do it. I bet it’s nice and smooth. Pick your softest part. The skin on the inside of your forearm, or maybe that little patch just behind your ear. I don’t care how hard you’ve been living, there’s always somewhere that’s still soft.

  Now, imagine that nice, soft place of yours all blistered and poxed. Imagine peaks and crevices, rashes and boils. This life gives you a whole new topography—bumps and bruises, patterns and scars.

  Your soft parts will never be the same.

  Still ready to say goodbye to that pretty little complexion of yours? All righty, then. Here are some helpful tips on how to make a living in this crazy world:

  1. Stock up.

  The pay is lousy, but sign up for the right consumer-product studies and you’ll never have to shop again. Deodorant, laundry soap, moisturizer, contact lens solution, hemorrhoid cream, tooth whitener. Get in on one of the big nutrition studies and you may even get your meals provided, or at least a few cases of diet soda with that new artificial sweetener that probably doesn’t cause cancer, all just for agreeing to fill out a questionnaire or two. Sure, you might get hives now and then while they work out the kinks, but that’s a small price to pay for a full cupboard, don’t you think?

  2. Choose your poison.

  I’ve said it before—if you really want the big bucks, you’re going to have to suffer. And generally speaking, there are two categories of suffering: deprivation and infliction of pain. But you learned that particular lesson long before you got here, didn’t you? Still, know your limits before you sign up—do a little soul-searching, figure out just how far you’re willing to go. For me, it’s my eyes. I won’t let anyone near ‘em. Makes me break into a sweat just thinking about it. For my good friend Jameson, it’s anything but his brain. His body is a temple, I guess, because the only labs he’ll grace with his presence are the ones that do psych studies. Whatever. It all comes down to personal preference and pain tolerance, chickadees.

  3. The foot bone’s connected to the leg bone …

  C’mon, don’t roll your eyes when I sing. This little tip is the best one I have to offer. See, technically, you’re supposed to wait weeks, or even months, between studies. But fortunately for us, the scientists who run these things aren’t exactly social butterflies. They never talk to people working in the other labs. So, you lucky devil—this means you can hop from floor to floor, study to study, if you just play it cool and stay under the radar. You can even chain your studies together. Did you get burned during the laser hair-removal protocol, perhaps? They’re testing an analgesic cream for that on Six. Are those funny new antidepressant pills giving you night terrors? Why not sign up for the sleep study just down the hall? Sure, you’ll have to stay up for a couple of days, but what a great way to avoid those nasty dreams! It’s actually sort of fun when you get the pieces to come together like this—kind of like a real-life Tetris game.

  So work on your strategy and tune in next week, Warts Fans, for more helpful tips on how to survive and thrive in the Wild Wild West of human-subject testing!

  Chapter 7

  My midnight bravado fades a bit in the morning. Isn’t that just how it goes? Moon swagger: everyone’s a badass in the right light. Today I’m not so sure I want to do anything more physically or emotionally taxing than ordering takeout.

  Reason number one for reconsidering Charlotte’s test marathon: spite. Dylan was gone when I woke up—no note, no explanation. I’m not gonna lie, it stings. It wiped that little he’s worth it glow right off my decision.

  I’m sure he had a good reason. He’s not a love ’em and leave ’em kind of guy—he’s proven that much enough times to deserve a pass … maybe. Just this once.

  And sitting here on the couch with Jameson, my favorite coffee mug in hand and music playing on a stereo that I neither had to pay for or steal, I’m working hard to keep it in perspective. Or at least to keep the sulking to a minimum.

  But that just brings up reason number two for having second thoughts about Charlotte’s plan: inertia. I mean, I’ve already managed to save up a decent chunk of money doing things my way, and Charlotte’s system is, at a minimum, going to get us blacklisted around the labs once they catch on. Which they will.

  And maybe it’s just me being lazy, but I really don’t hate it here. I’m comfortable. Plus, our apartment is the nicest place I’ve ever lived. Granted, that doesn’t say much, but trust me, it’s nice. Homey and clean, with actual curtains, and doors that have never been kicked in. Swirly-patterned carpeting that first strikes you as hideous, but ends up being sort of pleasantly mesmerizing once you get used to looking at it.

  I’m sofa-soothed. Bathroom-tile-tranquilized. I’m not ashamed to admit it.

  Okay, maybe a little.

  I was nervous as hell when I first moved in. I felt like such a kid, just some punk trying to impress a bunch of people who seemed so adult at first—so inaccessibly stable. Not that Jameson is even that much older than me. He’s somewhere in his midtwenties I’d guess, and Charlotte’s the same age as me—she just seems older because she’s been on her own basically forever. But here were two people with a fixed address and all these grownup accessories—things like two couches that actually matched each other, hand towels, a freaking food processor. It took me a while to get comfortable.

  We get along great now. We’re all a lot alike—even Jameson, once you get to know him. I know he didn’t have it easy the way he grew up—he swears his mom named him for the whiskey she was drinking when she went into labor, though I’m pretty sure that’s just part of his me and my brain against the world shtick. But you can see all the little signs of a hardscrabble start if you know what to look for, like the way he gets really anxious around anyone who could remotely be considered an authority figure. His weird little throat-clearing goes into hyperdrive until it’s just us in the room again, and then he’s fine. He’s happiest when he feels like King of the Castle, I think, even if the so-called kingdom is populated almost entirely by freaks and weirdos (present company included, of course). You almost never see Jameson sitting in a room by himself. Which is fine, really, because he’s a useful guy to have around.

  Charlotte, on the other hand, I call the Queen of the Fuck Off—a title she adores, incidentally. She’s a ranter and a door slammer and a loud talker, but also a hell of a lot of fun, and it’s completely impossible to stay mad at her. You’ll try—she’ll pull one of her tantrums or flake out on whatever you had planned, and you tell yourself you’re completely done putting up with her shit, and then two minutes later she’s worked her evil-bleached-pixie magic and she has you laughing so hard you have tears streaming down your face and you can’t remember why you were ever mad in the first place.

  It’s funny. For as close as we are now, for as much time as we hang out, genuinely like each other, we don’t talk much about our pasts. It’s a common theme among guinea pigs. You don’t exactly get here aboard the Yuppie Express, you know? If you’re willing to sell your skin here, chances are you probably sold it in some other way before you got here, too. Boo freakin’ hoo, I know. Yours, mine, and everybody else’s sob story. I’m just saying we’re not the types to sit around and wax poetic about what used to be.

  We talk, though. About a lot of things. Just usually in the present tense.

  Like now. Jameson’s trying to talk me out of my bad mood this morning, conspicuously avoiding all reference to Dylan. He prefers to talk about work, anyway.

  He
frowns when I get around to telling him about the Beagle, though, especially when I tell him the part about the nurse leaving the rest of us alone. You can always tell what he’s thinking when he hears about stuff like that—that it would never happen if he ran the place. Like I said, he should’ve been a doctor, and I think it burns him up sometimes that he isn’t. Jameson is the picture of thwarted ambition.

  I, on the other hand, am the picture of comforter-wrapped complacency. I burrow deeper into the couch, pull the blanket up to my chin, and make up my mind to officially forgive Dylan. Nothing decided while feeling this snuggly can be wrong, can it?

  “Are you still writing?” That’s Jameson changing the subject, just like Charlotte did when I tried to tell her about what happened. I told you—people around here don’t like talking about bad outcomes. It’s a superstitious thing, I guess. You don’t call out the boogeyman‘s name. You don’t rattle locked cages.

  I shrug. “Kind of. When I find the time.”

  We both know it’s a lame excuse. It’s not like I’m trying to write the next Great American Novel or anything—it’s just a blog for people who want to learn about drug testing. It was originally Charlotte’s idea—she thought we might even be able to make some money out of it somehow from the newbies who come wandering in with questions about how this stuff works, or how much that hurts, or whatever. We’re supposed to be doing it together, but she’s hard to pin down sometimes when it comes to anything resembling actual work. Charlotte tends to be all spark, no fire.

  It doesn’t matter; I like working on it myself. It makes me feel halfway useful, since everyone’s nervous when they first show up here. But you find your niche, I tell them. Your comfy little hidey-hole. And soon enough you wonder what all the fuss was ever about. So that’s what I write about.