Dealer’s Goods

by J. Loseth
July 6th, 2006

Rage. It was burning, fiery, coursing, singing like a hurricane through wind-bent trees and thundering like a tsunami. He felt his teeth clench and grind, his eyes widen, his nails cutting two crescents of half-moon wounds into his palms. His thoughts cascaded together, mind like an avalanche. He couldn’t see straight. Everything seemed covered in a veil of red. Until now he’d thought that was just a cliché. Anger consumed him, roaring through him, and Harry rode it until it finally died away. When the tide ebbed he was left gasping, fists clenching and unclenching within the protective restraints, grasping for more.

“How was that one?” Leroy asked, his voice hushed and mouth grinning as he leaned in over Harry. “Good shit? You were tripping balls, man.”

Harry only had the strength to nod. “That’s the stuff,” he said when he had enough breath. “Grade-A. We can get a half-mil a pop, easy. God damn.” He craned his neck forward to wipe his forehead on the top of his sleeve, wriggling in the safety chair. “What’s next?”

“You’ll like this one,” Leroy said, already loading up the needle. “You can’t get this shit anymore. It’s been bred out, treated before we even know we have it by all that shit the government pumps into the water. This’ll sell for sure.”

“Well what is it?” Harry asked, squirming in the chair, trying to read the label on the bottle.

Leroy smirked. “Sadness.”

Harry’s mouth dropped open and he leaned back, arm twitching with anticipation as Leroy shot him up. He let his eyes roll back into his head as he waited for the drug take effect. It happened all at once; the chemicals reached the nerve endings in the brain, and suddenly the world dropped away, replaced by a gaping void of hopelessness and despair. Harry experienced a true and complete sensation of worthlessness.

He had never known such bliss.