Blood Sugar(7)

I turned to him and said, “Thank you.” Then I tried to dart out of the car. He grabbed my arm with his giant paw, to keep me from getting out. Fuck, fuck, fuck. My instincts told me he was a sketchy, low-life, small-time criminal with sex appeal who was happy to give drugs to a teenage girl, but not a really bad guy. Not a guy who would make me do anything I didn’t want to do. Was I wrong?

He said, “What’s your name?”

I thought about lying. But at this stage, what was the point? “Ruby.”

And then he happily let go of my arm, no aggression intended.

“Cool. See ya around, Ruby.”

My instincts were on point. He was a good bad guy. And I ran. Feet gliding over pavement until they were gliding over sand. My high heels getting in the way of the speed I felt I had to attain. My legs wanting to pump in time with my heartbeat. I kicked off my shoes and carried them under one arm, like a football player cradling the ball. My mind raced yet was sharply focused at the same time. I could smell the faintly fishy ocean, see every glimmer of moon bouncing off the lapping waves, hear each distant siren responding to gunfire over the MacArthur Causeway. I was the most brilliant, most beautiful, most talented girl in the whole wide world. I wasn’t a seven at all. In that moment I was a ten. And I wanted to stay that way.

So thus began my seen-it-before cautionary tale, an after-school special, typical teen-on-drugs bender. The way it ended, however, the way I pulled myself out, was anything but typical. And when asked why and how I stopped cold turkey, I could never, ever admit the truth. Because to admit it would have meant I was admitting to another unspeakable truth.

A few weeks after the Denny’s night, I lost my virginity to Carlos. A few weeks after that, I lost interest in him. His brutish appeal had worn off. Him stealing that side mirror no longer seemed gallant but instead seemed plain rude. He wasn’t curious to learn new words. He didn’t want to peruse the giant leather-bound dictionary in the dining room with me. Or to volunteer at the bird sanctuary on weekends. All he wanted was to ply me with delicious powder and have sex with me in parked cars, even though my bedroom was available. He was much more attuned to my being a minor than I was, and kept away from my house.

Carlos was the first person to give me coke, but he certainly wasn’t the only person I could get it from. I had savings from babysitting jobs, allowance, a little bit of cash my great-aunt left me when she died. I could easily buy cocaine from other people, so one afternoon, after he shoplifted a Lunchables from a grocery store and offered me a small block of processed cheese, I broke up with him. I knew he had other girlfriends anyway, ones who didn’t insist on using a condom every time. So he didn’t try and convince me to stay with him.

My new dealer was a security guard at my high school, Miss Duvet. Rumor had it she would deal near the flagpole during lunch. And like most rumors, this one was true. The first time I bought a gram from her, she chased me down through the second wing of the dilapidated beige building. Fuck, I thought. This is all some sort of setup. A sting operation. Now I’ll never get into Yale! But she was chasing me down to return a ten. I had overpaid. Miss Duvet might have been dealing schedule II narcotics to high school children while on the clock to keep them safe, but she was an incredibly honest businesswoman with integrity.

Six months into my cocaine-fueled bender, I was back in the Denny’s parking lot, the easiest meeting spot to connect with friends and decide on the plan for the night. I wanted to go to Kremlin, a small gay club with the best techno and most beautiful boy go-go dancers. I felt at home at this club because, with just one bar and one dance floor, it seemed intimate and contained. Everyone in one room dancing to the same music, a way to control an uncontrollable world. And no one there was interested in groping me or leering. It was mostly gay men and the occasional lesbian smart enough to stay away from me because she knew I was way too young to be in there in the first place. The closest I got to anyone flirting with me there was when friendly drag queens would coo over my long, thick auburn hair and matching eyes.

I spent so much time at Kremlin that I actually befriended the woman who manned the coed bathroom all night selling gum, mints, candy, lollipops, spritzes of cologne, and condoms. She was worried about me since I was extremely underaged. She smiled, to let me know I had a friend in this world. And while I waited for a stall, I talked to her. I asked her about her day, her week, her life. Did she even like techno music? Did the bartenders give her free shots? She was happy to chat with me since most people came in and out and barely acknowledged her. Techno was not her favorite, but it was okay. And smelling vomit eight hours a night had definitely ruined her love for alcohol, so she did not partake in her free end-of-shift shot. Her hair was always in a tight bun, showing her beautiful, delicate features. She told me she was from Haiti, her name was Jesula, and she had been in Miami for only a year. She was petite and trim, with high cheekbones and deep-set, friendly brown eyes that seemed wise beyond her thirty years. Her strong, long fingers wiped down the sink after each use, handed people paper towels once they had washed, and kept things tidy and organized. She kept that bathroom so clean I would have done a line off the floor.

But that night my friends, Amy and Erika and Hannah and Sharon, were tired of Kremlin. They wanted to go to the enormous new club, Rox, that had just opened in Coconut Grove and flaunted a different music style on each of the five floors. They wanted to bounce from hip-hop to reggae to emo and be groped by cheesy straight men who would buy them overpriced, poorly muddled mojitos.