Page 40 of Anxious Hearts

Finn finished the last of his strong, black coffee.

Ashley sat opposite him at the dining table, drinking herbal tea and scrolling on her phone.

Finn stood up, put his mug in the dishwasher and went into the bathroom.

He opened the bottom drawer and took out a bag of white powder.

He measured and cut it into two lines with the ease and confidence of a seasoned user.

The rolled-up money he used to snort with had been replaced by a metal straw weeks ago.

He sucked the lines into his system before he had time to consider whether this was a good idea.

That’s how it had been for the past month now. Snort the coke, take the benzo, stay medicated consistently enough to keep the questions away. To shut down the internal voice. To finally live free.

Ashley entered the bathroom as he finished his second line. She watched him pack away the gear with a face that looked like she was sucking on a lemon.

‘I think you’re using too much, Finn.’

Finn felt the courage and the confidence and the power flow into him like air rushing into a balloon.

It inflated him to his full potential. Made him walk taller, live stronger, and see more clearly than ever before.

He looked into her deep brown eyes. His salvation.

The beautiful Ashley who had delivered him from the very chains of his own existence. Fuck, she was hot.

He placed his hands on her shoulder. ‘I’m fine. Actually, never been better.’

‘Coke’s for partying, Finn. For an extra kick. It’s not for real life.’

Finn drew her close and held her in his arms. ‘My life has never been this real.’

She ran her hands along his ribs. ‘You’re so skinny. You’re not eating enough. You can’t live on coffee and cocaine.’

‘I knew you only wanted me for my body.’

She pushed herself off him. Shook her head. ‘It’s not a joke. You’re a fucking mess. You need to get your shit together.’

A spark of anger rose in Finn’s chest. He was smashing it in his career.

He was smashing it on Instagram. He had signed a new clothing brand endorsement last week and he was still in the mix for the role with Jessica Meadows.

He hadn’t thought about killing himself or how he’d probably killed someone else with his driving or all the other terrible damage he’d done during his life, intentional or not, in weeks.

And she had the audacity to lecture him?

‘I’m flying to Sydney early in the morning and I’m staying there tomorrow night,’ she said.

‘I know. The fashion show pitch you’ve been working on. I’m not so fucked up that I can’t remember your busy and important schedule.’

Ashley moved her jaw from side to side. Flared her nostrils. She was pissed off, but that wasn’t Finn’s problem. She’d started it.

‘Make sure you’re clean when I get back.’

There was a note of disdain in her voice that fanned Finn’s anger. ‘I don’t take orders from you.’

‘Fuck you, Finn.’

‘Oh, that’s real mature.’

‘More mature than a grown man who can’t get through a day without a fucking cocktail of uppers and downers.’

Finn stared at her. ‘I can get through as many days as I want.’

Ashley bared her teeth. ‘Yeah? Well, you’ve got two before I get back. If you’re not clean when I get home, don’t bother coming over.’

‘Maybe I won’t want to come over.’

Ashley’s eyes grew shiny. She swallowed. ‘Damn it, Finn. What did I ever do to you?’

She stormed out of her own bathroom.

Finn stared at himself in the mirror. He clenched his jaw and his fists. Fuck. I don’t need this shit.

When he heard her bedroom door close, he opened the bottom drawer again and fished out a benzo.

***

The next morning, Finn woke alone in his own bed.

The benzo had helped him get to sleep but it had been a restless night and he was tired and irritable.

The sheets felt like sandpaper on his skin and his rapid muscle spasms forced him up and out of his room.

He was too jumpy for breakfast, so he grabbed his keys and scurried out of his apartment.

An elderly woman entered the hallway and took a step back when she saw Finn approaching. He hadn’t dressed and was rushing barefoot in his boxer shorts towards Ashley’s apartment. He ignored the old woman’s look of contempt.

Although Ashley had given him an ultimatum, she hadn’t taken back her spare key.

Finn fumbled with the lock, his hand shaking as he tried to turn the key.

He shut out the dim whisper that was telling him this was a terrible idea.

That he had to stop now. Right now. But he couldn’t do that.

He couldn’t go back to who he was. At least not today.

He burst through the door and raced straight to the bathroom.

He was sweating now and a drop ran from his forehead down his nose and splashed on the bathroom sink.

He opened the bottom drawer and saw straight away that the stash corner was empty.

He thrust his hand in and moved toiletries out of the way to uncover the drugs.

They must have ended up underneath something, somehow.

But the more he rustled, the clearer it became the cocaine was gone.

He began to take out the drawer’s contents.

Toothpaste, shaving cream, razors, a teeth-whitening kit.

He tossed them all onto the floor until the drawer was as empty as his chances of finding the powder.

He slammed his hand down on the counter. ‘What the fuck?’ he screamed. He opened the other drawers, rifled through them, tore out their contents, threw it all on the floor.

Then he moved to Ashley’s bedroom. She had obviously hidden the drugs from him before she flew out this morning – there was no way she didn’t have a supply.

At first, he just moved things around in her closet and clothing drawers, careful not to create too much disturbance.

As much as they were a couple, they hadn’t reached the stage of comfortably rifling through each other’s underwear.

But as the search wore on and bore no fruit, Finn grew angry.

Frustrated. Vengeful. He removed drawers from their rails, tipped the contents onto the ground and fossicked roughly through the contents.

T-shirts, lingerie, gym gear; it didn’t matter, he scattered it all across the room or her bed, trying to locate the little bag of white powder that would be his salvation.

He emptied shoe boxes, pulled down dresses and jackets from their railings in case the stash was hidden at the back of the closet.

He even tossed the bed, tearing off the sheets, lifting the mattress and casting it aside so that it sat askew on the floor, partially leaning on the bed frame. Still nothing.

He moved to the kitchen, the living room, back to the bathroom.

The entire apartment, head to toe, until there was nowhere left to search.

He was sweating heavily, on the verge of tears, and his hands shook.

The old foe was returning and, as he looked at the devastation he had wrought through Ashley’s home, shame slammed into his gut like a heavyweight’s punch.

But it wasn’t enough to stop him. Only one thing could stop him. Finn raced back to his apartment. He was vaguely aware that a professional couple waiting at the lifts was staring at him.

Back inside his home, he grabbed his phone and texted Ashley: Where’s the cocaine?

She called immediately. Her rage reached out like a disembodied hand and gripped Finn’s skull in a painful hold. ‘Are you fucking serious, sending me that message? Are you trying to get us both arrested?’

‘Please,’ Finn said. ‘Tell me where it is. I’m desperate.’

‘Get a fucking grip, Finn. I told you to clean up or we’re done. I want a boyfriend, not a fucking junkie.’

She hung up.

Now Ashley had abandoned him as well.