If You Love an Addict
Who doesn’t know a friend, family member, or co-worker struggling with addiction? In the U.S. there are over 100,000 drug overdose deaths a year, with the rise in fentanyl-laced opiates now killing teenagers. I wrote my new mystery novel, STILETTO, to take on Big Pharma and tell the story of those suffering from drug company greed and those who are trying to hold Big Pharma accountable. Here’s a scene from the novel. Please share it with anyone you care about who may be in danger of an overdose.
Once Frankie had surprised his twin sister, Eleanor, by inviting her to visit his rehab center to meet a few of his new friends. For her first and only visit with Frankie’s rehab pals, Eleanor didn’t bring food; she knew most of the addicts had little hunger for home-baked sweets, no matter how tempting. Their hunger was bone-deep, unsated. Instead, she brought flowers from her garden, including white winter roses Frankie loved.
Even though the rehab walls were adorned with gorgeous original paintings by local artists — misty seascapes, old forests, swaying wheat fields, and a radiant Van Gogh-esque night sky — the in-patients walked by them, immune to their vivid colors. Eleanor had seen more life on cancer wards when visiting friends in the hospital. In rehab, people passed her by, deeply preoccupied, their faces flat and fixed on some inner demon. Without their beloved drugs, life was dulled, diluted.
In the Schick Shadel visitors’ room, Eleanor took her seat next to Frankie, determined to say nothing and just listen. Frankie was surrounded by his usual rehab groupies — a bedraggled dirty blonde with fingernails bitten down to the nubs and a nervous adolescent boy who obviously believed her brother was a role model.
As they chatted about the unusual heat wave, their call-and-response was like a melancholy Greek chorus. In a synchronized choreography, all of them lit up cigarettes. The boy nodded, his face shrouded in smoke, the woman sipped coffee, her blood-shot gray eyes riveted on Frankie. She leaned forward hungrily at his every word. She even cast a suspicious glance at Eleanor, as if jealous of their life-long twin bond. Eleanor assumed this ravaged woman and her brother were already breaking rehab rules forbidding romantic relationships.
As if sensing the woman’s jealousy, Frankie soothed her with a radiant smile. “Toni,” he said soothingly. They held eyes intimately as if they were the only two in the visitors’ room. “Don’t worry. My sister won’t come between us. Ellie never does.”
Frankie’s friends laughed, and Toni Fleishman sat back, lighting another cigarette. Eleanor couldn’t prevent a little gasp escaping her. It was the terrible truth — her twin never let Eleanor interfere with his romances, where Eleanor had always put Frankie first before her boyfriends. But none of them preoccupied her as much as her brother.Frankie was her fix.
Toni kept her eyes focused on Frankie. She tracked his every move like a heat-seeking missile. Eleanor admitted a pang of pity for the disheveled young woman. Her platinum hair hung in dirty pigtails, her too-bright lipstick smeared from cigarettes, and her hands were jittery. Eleanor assumed her twin would abandon Toni as soon as his time was served. Perhaps Toni suspected he’d give her up before he would ever let go of his opiates. It might explain why Toni was so possessive.
Eleanor understood Toni’s desperation. She’d known it all the way through university and on holidays when Frankie skipped any semblance of family gatherings to devote himself to some new fling or addiction. The irony was whether it was his twin, his friends, or his lover, Frankie found his one, true passion in drugs. Opiates were a cruel mistress — an unrequited love.
Toni glared at Eleanor. “Your drug company made a fortune off of people like us . . . you and your damn opiates. You’re the ones getting away with Big Pharma murders. You just see me as an addict,” Toni shook her head and her voice dropped. “But, like your brother, I got into drugs because of physical pain. When my docs stopped my scripts, I had to get them on the street. Heroin. Meth. It’s a miracle I didn’t get one of those fentanyl-laced pills killing kids now.”
“Uh, Toni,” Frankie said, “My sister is not here to argue. She’s here for me. She’s trying to work from the inside to get her drug company to help those they got addicted . . .”
Toni pushed on, her face seized with a fury, which made her once lovely face blotched and ugly. She pointed an accusing finger at Eleanor. “You have no idea what it’s like to ache for something so much your body breaks down without it.” Toni shifted away from Frankie’s outstretched arm. “Fevers, the shakes, rotten teeth. I used to be beautiful . . . a model. Now, look at me!”
Reluctantly, Eleanor met Toni’s defiant gaze. Without a word, she took in the young woman’s split lip, the meth-yellowed teeth, and naked, thin forearms scarred by infected track marks and tattoos. It was difficult to believe Toni had ever sashayed down a runway with the stylish nonchalance of a top model.
Frankie pulled Toni closer to him. There was nothing left to embrace but her bones. “You still are still . . . beautiful.”
Next to this broken woman, Frankie still appeared vibrant, his cropped hair curled tightly like Eleanor’s, his eyes keen, if not so clear. It was then Eleanor noticed Toni’s red t-shirt with bold, black letters:
PAINKILLERS ARE KILLING US.
A wave of guilt—after all, as a biochemist, Eleanor had helped create the opiate that had addicted her brother. Eleanor hoped it would help his pain from a montain climbing accident. But her opiates only led to a much more dangeros fall. She would do anything to stop this, reverse the pain her opiates had wreaked on thousands—like her brother. Anything.
“I’m late . . . for a meeting,” Eleanor said and her metal chair screeched as she abruptly stood up to leave.
“Too late,” Frankie shrugged and flashed her his dazzling, crooked smile.
She couldn’t bear seeing one of his front teeth broken. This was only Frankie’s third rehab. Given time and his addiction, Frankie might end up as broken as the woman he was trying to comfort. Eleanor shuddered to imagine her twin as the ghost he would become. ~
Bio: Brenda Peterson is the author of over 20 books,her memoir, I Want to Be Left Behind: Finding Rapture here on Earth, which was selected as a “Top Ten Best Non-Fiction” book by the Christian Science Monitor and an Indie Next “Great Read,” by Independent Booksellers. Peterson’s latest non-fiction book is Wolf Nation: The Life, Death, and Return of Wild American Wolves, chosen as a “Best Conservation Book of the Year” by Forbes magazine. Her children’s books include Leopard and Silkie, Wild Orca, Catastrophe by the Sea, and the new illustrated book, Crane Maiden, with master Chinese illustrator, Ed Young. Her sixth novel, Stiletto, is just out. www.BrendaPetersonBooks.com
