Fresh Pack of Smokes Read online

  Drying Out

  Instead of procuring drugs in jail I used the time to become sober, soon I started to care about things that I had not cared about for a while like drinking coffee or having a good night’s sleep or eating regularly but the biggest thing I wanted was to connect with another human, like I began to want to be liked and to be desired and to have a friendship not based on drugs but it took a long time for the psychosis to go away; I would be in my living space and think strange things and what’s funny was the paranoia over being watched cuz it was true, we were all being watched through cameras and guards, jail was all about routine and soon I was getting pretty bored so I chased tail and had a few girlfriends on the side which filled a need to be loved whether it was real or not, it was like ice thawing and I had to face the type of person I was, that I took advantage of people and people took advantage of me and I did whatever I had to do to get that rock and slowly the layers peeled away and what was left was a broken woman taking notice of life again.

  Never Ending

  One time when I tried leaving downtown I failed, every time I walked a couple blocks a regular would show up in a car and stop to talk to me, I would find a dealer and with the money I had just earned, buy rock, get high, when I became unstuck and started to walk away, another regular would stop by me and the whole thing would happen again, I was so tired, the sun would rise and set and the night would come and the people would venture out and the same old bullshit would happen, there were men who would pick up different women multiple times, I would see them in their cars driving down Hastings then turning around and going through back alleys and side streets, I’d go two steps and one of these guys would stop me and I’d still be so high I ignored my exhaustion.

  Triggers

  Using dreams are so real and so frustrating, the entire dream is one complicated mission to find drugs and when I finally come across them, I wake up without smoking the rock and so I’m lying in bed feeling like I got bunked or something, smell can be a trigger too like burning wax or plastic cuz it smells like crack smoke or the hose on the end of a pipe, alleys that stink of garbage and urine and shit often make me think of being too high and getting stuck by the Dumpsters smoking rock after rock, I had roamed all over Vancouver and North Vancouver and Maple Ridge and so some locations are triggers like the Downtown Eastside where just being there gives me cravings and makes me nervous that I’ll meet a person I know and get sucked back into that lifestyle cuz I am susceptible to persuasion, even nighttime can trigger cravings as the night makes me excited to go out and wander the streets doing what I want and doing drugs or drinking and having no plans and not knowing where I’ll end up; for so long I used drugs to deal with anything that caused stress like turning tricks or coping with domestic abuse or the energy it took to get dope or the anxiety of not having a stable place to live and so stress is a trigger too since I used drugs to forget about it and now in my sober life I have to live with these things that make my life a little complicated.

  Detox

  Mad respect to the workers on the front line in the youth detoxes in Vancouver, they took me in when I called at my worst and gave me food, board, safety and most importantly a break from the drug life and there was no judging only what could be done to make it easier—one time I was barely there, nodding out during the whole processing part and I sat in detox trying to sip chicken soup, almost falling out of my chair, the detox was in a big house and we had our own rooms and there was a kitchen and big meals and a tv and books and crafts, it was a very safe place and even though I’d be clean for seven days, or leave early, I was still treated with respect and they were still proud if I only had a few days clean—there were the candy people too who walked around handing out candy and the street nurses and the van that distributed rigs and condoms and juice and passed along info to women on bad dates.

  Shadows

  Once when I was sober for a good amount of time I had to face memories that began to bubble to the surface, I thought to myself how could I have done the things I’ve done but I also thought these were just memories so they didn’t bother me, it was one big fucking contradiction; chasing rock is full-time business and it’s easy to get lost along the way and it’s easy to get into trouble and it is definitely easy to get hurt so why do it? I did it to get fucking high and getting high helped to ignore memories of shit I did to get ripped so I guess I have mixed feelings about the trash that comes with drug addiction; I think back and marvel at the danger I put myself in over and over again for that moment of being high and how I have to live with that for the rest of my life; I will always have those memories and that blur of men’s faces, their shadows that follow me quietly.

  Upstanding Citizen

  Once I was sitting on the curb with a couple people and after looking around I took a toke from my pipe and when I exhaled I looked up and saw the cops watching me from their car and I felt like I almost had a heart attack but they rolled on flashing lights to tell us to move on which completely ruined my high and I was fucked for the next ten minutes; sober now I still feel a soft, slight twitch whenever I see a cop car cuz for years while using on the street I’d been looking out for patrollers until it became second nature and I’d make a hole in the bottom hem of my hoodie that I could stick my rock and pipe into in case they decided to frisk for whatever reason; this mindset is slowly going away cuz I have no reason to be fearful of the police anymore and I have nothing to hide from no one, it’s like I turned into an upstanding citizen not breaking the law no more.

  Clean

  I’ve had so much excitement, if you can call it that, in my life that I won’t mind if the rest of my years are simple and quiet, I love that first coffee in the morning while reading a book, my writing, taking the dogs for a walk, being relaxed; I’ve become pretty good at blocking things from my mind so I don’t go crazy from the dysfunction and fear and endless cravings.

  Differences

  I’m not the same as I used to be, I’m more stupid and slow now and I need things explained to me more than once, I’m not saying I’m dumb, I’m saying all the crack I smoked killed a shitload of my brain cells and I need a little more help than I used to, I also feel that I’m more anxious than I ever was and this makes me more afraid of things and more afraid over shit that shouldn’t be feared, I’m a nervous Nelly and this anxiety burns my nerves right up.

  Streets

  It may sound very stupid but there’s something about the streets that always appealed to me, there was a type of freedom where I could do what I wanted when I wanted wherever I wanted and never be tied down to one place, the only rules being those of the street, never staying in one place for long, on an endless journey for more and more drugs until it became the most important task at hand and I could not plan anything because I didn’t know where I would be in any foreseeable future and I had no address, however the flip side to all this was that I was tied up—I was a prisoner and everything that came with it, I was a coin, each side a cell with thick bars.

  Notes

  “xxx” and “Shadows” have been published in Sex Worker Wisdom, edited by Amber Dawn for the pace society.

  “Lonely Men,” “Maple Ridge” and “Love I” are forthcoming in Hustling Verse edited by Amber Dawn and Justin Ducharme, and published by Arsenal Pulp Press.

  Acknowledgements

  I would like to thank my editor Amber McMillan and Nightwood Editions for taking a chance and believing in this book. I would like to thank my friends for their support and feedback. I thank my family for sticking by me and loving me through thick and thin. A special thanks to Amber Dawn who has supported me since the beginning. I also acknowledge the women I have met on the streets, whose stories are important and whose lives are meaningful. Mussi Cho. Thank you.

  About the Author

  Cassandra Blanchard was born in Whitehorse, Yukon, and is part of the Selkirk First Nation. She attended the University of British Columbia and recently r
eceived a Bachelor of Arts. Fresh Pack of Smokes is her first book. She currently lives on Vancouver Island.