This is a story about treatment for drug addiction...

Having been to four different rehabs, I feel fairly qualified to give a few insights into what happens behind closed doors. Residential rehabs often hide away in leafy suburbs, where there are large houses that can accommodate human trash: dirty junkies and nasty alcoholics.

"Death's too good for 'em! String 'em up!" I hear you say.

Yes, yes, don't worry. We'll get to the idea that an addict will always be an addict, and that we should just write them off as a lost cause.

Boscombe in Dorset - an area of Bournemouth - is where many councils choose to send their difficult members of society, from all over the country. Supposedly, being by the seaside will be good for recovering alcoholics and former drug addicts. There are certainly plenty of rehabs in the area. Even Paul Gascoigne has found himself shuffling around Boscombe's streets, buying bottles of gin from the local off-license.

Ironically, many years after moving to Bournemouth, I became addicted to drugs and found myself in the perfect place to get treatment for my addiction.

Let's talk a little bit about drug addiction.

Having a 'drug habit' is not the same as drug addiction. 'Experimentation' is not the same as addiction. Partying is not the same as addiction. Addiction will rapidly destroy your health, wealth and prospects. Hospitals, police cells and prisons are the institutional stomping grounds of the addict, on their rapid descent into the fires of Hell. If you're successfully hiding your habit from your friends, partner and boss, then addiction hasn't fully taken hold. Addiction is destructive.

What about detox?

You can't really rehabilitate while the drugs and alcohol have got their hooks in you. If you abruptly stop drinking, you might get the shakes, become delirious, have a fit and maybe even die. If you stop taking heroin, you're going to feel sick and in pain. If you stop taking cocaine or amphetamines, you're going to be unbelievably exhausted and depressed, to the point where you're in real danger of killing yourself.

"You should kill yourself if you're a junkie" I hear you say.

What you haven't understood is that drug addiction is slow suicide. Do you think the addict or the alcoholic isn't aware that their body is getting utterly fucked up, and they're going to go to an early grave?

Detox is about breaking the physical addiction that the body has to drugs and/or alcohol. Detox is about suffering the worst of withdrawal, in an environment where substitute drugs can be administered to make the process safe, humane and tolerable. An alcoholic literally risks death if they stopping drinking without Librium. Is it ethical to ask people to die just because you're hung up on ideas like "willpower"?

There's the term "psychological addiction" that needs to stop being used. It's better to think about addiction like this: why did somebody get addicted in the first place?

"Because drugs are fun" I hear you say.

There are shitloads of people who take drugs all the time but they aren't addicts. Every weekend, raves and nightclubs are packed full of people taking Ecstasy (MDMA). Vast quantities of cocaine gets hoovered up by the eager nostrils of young professionals in cities around the world. Every day, a huge proportion of humanity smokes cannabis or drinks alcohol. Why aren't all these people raging addicts and alcoholics?

If you ever feel like quitting, remember why you started.

Most addicts' lives were truly appalling before their addiction took hold. For sure, addiction doesn't improve anybody's life, but it's not like there's any hope of a better life just because an addict quits drugs. The cycle of petty crime, scoring drugs, getting sick, being hospitalised and being locked up... it doesn't look great, does it? But what's the alternative? Flipping burgers and still not having enough money to make ends meet?

So, it's obvious that the rehabilitation process will only be successful if it can return a person to a better life than the one they were trying to escape from with drugs and drink.

The first rehab I attended was in Bournemouth, situated in a grand house at the end of a sweeping driveway, surrounded by mature pine trees, on a road of millionaires' mansions. The place was full of people from Greater London and the surrounding counties, ejected by their councils to make room for more rich middle-class people.

The biggest issue amongst my fellow rehab residents was housing. Boscombe has vast numbers of crappy bedsits that can just about be afforded with housing benefits. London and the South-East has no cheap housing for undesirable members of society. My fellow rehabbers were gleefully pushed away from where they were born and bred - and their families - because they were written off.

A typical day at the Bournemouth rehab would consist of a breakfast of baked beans, white toast and cheap sausages, followed by many rounds of tea, coffee and biscuits, until the 'therapeutic' day began. There were two or three sessions a day, where everybody sat in a big room, slouching on comfy sofas, vaping on e-cigarettes and slurping drinks. It was supposed to be group therapy, but it was basically just listening to heartbreaking tales of people's children being taken into foster care.

Most of the day in Bournemouth rehab was given over to matters of court appearances, housing office appointments, social worker visits and attempts to obtain various forms of welfare benefits. Almost everybody in rehab was in poor physical health, due to a life of drug abuse. Almost everybody in rehab had some underlying mental health disorder.

Those were the dregs of society, but they were warm and welcoming and they accepted me as one of their own. I was warned by staff to leave my iPhone at home and watch my wallet, but I never felt for a single moment as if my peers were going to rob or take advantage of me. I was somewhat appalled by the staff members' low opinion of their service users, but I suppose there's an element of the gamekeepers and the poachers: anybody who's keeping you under lock and key is kind of fair game, because resentment is going to build about the power that staff exercise over people in treatment.

Over the course of the 28-day program, my fellow rehabbers and I would build up special privileges for good behaviour, such as being allowed to go to Alcoholics Anonymous, Narcotics Anonymous or Cocaine Anonymous meetings. Being allowed to go into town, accompanied by a staff member, was the next privilege that accrued. Then, trips to town were permitted when accompanied by a peer who had attained 3 weeks of good behaviour. Finally, you might prove yourself to be trustworthy enough to go into town alone or as a chaperone.

Transgressions could include: not getting up in the morning, not doing your assigned chores, not attending group therapy, being caught with contraband, failing a drugs test and - most serious of all - going somewhere without permission.

Being expelled from rehab for going into town on your own might not sound like a terrible consequence, but almost everybody was there because treatment was mandated by the courts, as part of parole or an attempt to retain contact with children. Being chucked out of rehab could result in going back to prison, or never seeing your children again. The line between treatment and punishment was rather blurry.

My next rehab was 5-star luxury by comparison. You might have heard of it. It was The Priory.

If you're paying £12,000 for a 28 day stay in the countryside, you'd expect it to be pretty nice, wouldn't you? The Priory certainly delivered on making me feel special and cared after... for a high price. Therapists outnumbered patients, the bedrooms were very well appointed and comfortable, the food wasn't bad and there were luxuries like a gym and grounds to take a stroll around. Nobody was made to feel like a prisoner under house arrest.

Unsurprisingly, my fellow Priory rehabbers were rich compared to the Bournemouth lot. There were six-figure salary earning executives and heirs to multimillion-pound fortunes. Alcohol was also the predominant poison, as opposed to heroin.

One girl was so desperate for a drink, that she filled a mug with hand sanitising gel - which contained alcohol - and sweetened it with orange squash.

Therapeutic days were packed full of yoga, mindfulness, art therapy, educational videos, as well as group therapy. Supposedly following the 12-step program we only had enough time to complete the first two steps. AA and 'aftercare' meetings were held in the evenings at The Priory, which we were encouraged to attend, but most of us just watched DVDs in our bedrooms.

In my final week at The Priory, I asked "what next?"

Turns out that 28 days just isn't long enough to turn your life around. 28 days is just about long enough to get over the worst of the drug withdrawal and start thinking about how awesome the drugs are going to feel after a little break and three square meals a day. Aftercare programs are almost as expensive as rehab and last 3+ months: who's got that kind of money and can afford to take that long off work?

Having been through an acrimonious divorce, sold my house, rescued a tiny fraction of my most treasured possessions, boxed my life up, put everything into storage and suffered a horrible family Christmas, I was pretty fucked up by the whole ordeal. I needed to get cleaned up and straightened out again.

The next rehab I booked, I asked for a detox. I didn't want to have to get up in the morning and go to stupid group therapy. I hadn't slept or eaten properly for weeks. I'd been taking benzodiazepines for months and it was possible that I'd developed a physical dependency that could be life-threatening. I needed professional medical care.

The rehab I ended up in was like an alternative therapy spa break. There was a hot tub - called the sex pond - and a vibrating massage table, with whale music playing in the pitch black room. The main thing I was there for was sleep, food and a doctor on hand in case I had a seizure. Reluctantly, I consented to have acupuncture and to do some mindfulness: both of which I fell asleep during.

Most of the staff were kind and caring, but the guy who owned and ran the rehab was a complete egomaniac who clearly wanted his own cult. This idiot tried to force me to attend 'group' therapy, which was basically him giving interminable boring monologues about the time when he went into a Native Indian sweat tent. Believe me, the last thing you want when you're recovering from a near-fatal toxic combo of drugs, is to be a captive audience for some total moron.

While I was at that third rehab, a man was brought in, smashed out of his mind and covered in red wine. He'd been transferred up from the first rehab I'd been in down in Bournemouth. He'd walked out and gone into town to get pissed. Revolving doors.

I had to get away from that place. It wasn't therapy. Fuck knows what it was. Probably just a bit of respite for both family and addict alike.

Finally, I achieved what I wanted: I got back to London. Bullshit family Christmas was over. Divorce and house sale was over. I was free from horrible destructive relationships and nasty people, but I had picked up an addiction and failed to deal with it. My life to that point had been dictated by people who didn't care about my welfare.

I got myself into my fourth and final rehab: a 13 week residential treatment program in Kensington, West London.

Immediately, the place felt right. Rehabs are supposed to be run by former addicts and alcoholics. The guy who I met on my initial assessment had gold teeth and mean tattoos. The guy who ran the place had a massive scar across his face. These were people whose opinion an addict could respect, because they'd been all the way to rock bottom and back again: they'd seen friends die from overdoses and a lot of other rough shit too.

My most important lesson in rehab was how to do time. I had already been heavily institutionalised by working my whole career for massive corporations - with the limits that full-time work and education imposes on your freedom - but I still had lessons to learn about liberty. It helped a great deal that one of my fellow rehabbers was a young lad who'd been in prison twice by the age of 21.

Rehab is literally a kind of house arrest. You can leave anytime you want, but there will be consequences. It was fun to walk up to the gate (pictured above) and put a foot out over the pavement... just stopping short of taking a single step off the property.

It's not too hard to white-knuckle 3 or 4 weeks of abstinence. The first couple of weeks you'll feel awful, but your body is so abused that it's grateful for the sleep and the food. The next week or two are hard, but you know there's light at the end of the tunnel: you'll soon get your fix. You just have to count down the hours, minutes and seconds.

I don't believe you can rehabilitate somebody in just 3 months. So many things get fucked up when you're an addict. You need to get a job and go back to work, pay your bills and any debts that got racked up, repair and replace broken stuff and get a place to live. Everything got fucked up by my addiction: my shoes and clothes were wrecked and everything in my life was in total disarray.

Imagine being a company director through a period of addiction. My accounts and taxes were all messed up, and important paperwork was lost or misplaced.

What about my CV? How could I explain those periods of absence from work?

What about my routine?

Do you realise how much of your life runs itself on autopilot? You pay your rent/mortgage, council tax, electric, gas, water, sewerage, broadband, mobile phone, home insurance, life insurance, car insurance, road tax, MOT, TV license and a zillion other things. You get up every day, have breakfast and go to work. People know and respect you at work and you know how to do your job. You see your friends and socialise. You have your hobbies and you exercise. Do you think you can put all that stuff back together, running smoothly, overnight?

When you're an addict, everybody distances themselves from you. It's obvious that if you even so much as speak to an addict, they're going to steal your newborn baby and sell it to buy crack cocaine. It's obvious that anybody who injects marijuana or sniffs glue is a worthless selfish nasty person who's out to kill you.

Rehabs are necessary because family and friends are judgemental gossips who offer you useless advice like: "have you tried not taking drugs?" or "maybe you should just stop".

Rehab was a holiday from being judged to be an evil failure, morally weak and simply lacking in willpower.

Rehab showed me that I do have the willpower to stop taking drugs whenever I want. Rehab showed me that I'm not weak and I'm not powerless.

By the time I finished my four stays in rehab, I still hadn't run out of money, I had never been arrested, locked up, hospitalised or homeless. I had been nowhere near rock bottom.

I never actually reached rock bottom though. I experienced things that were awful at the time, but I needed to have those experiences.

Stopping drugs is the least of anybody's concerns. Drugs actually help when your life is unbearably shit. Just ask anybody who suffers from depression or anxiety if they'd like to give up their antidepressants or tranquillisers.

Obviously, I'm glad I never got a criminal record or sustained any life-changing injuries, but maybe I needed to come close. Being locked up in a police cell a couple of times and spending weeks in hospital, were not things on my bucket list, but I think they were necessary experiences to complete my adventure.

When the time was right, I got a place to live, a girlfriend and a job. Without those things, life isn't worth living, but equally, those things don't create recovery.

Bullying was relentless and intolerable at school for 11+ consecutive years. Nothing I did was ever right or good enough for my parents. My parents' relationship was appalling - full of verbal abuse and hostility - and I got involved with a girl who physically and mentally abused me, who I stayed with for many years. I got so used to broken, abusive relationships. Do you think that kind of stuff can get healed by 28 days in rehab? Do you think that all my problems came about just because I sniffed a bit of white powder?

You might think I act normally and sound perfectly reasonable, rational and able to string a sentence together, but it's the opinion of the medical professionals who've treated me, that I'm dealing with depression, bipolar and even borderline personality disorder. Clearly, I've had many episodes of mental health issues... including a period of many years before drugs even entered the picture.

This is called dual-diagnosis: the clusterfuck that is both addiction and mental health issues combined. The tail that wags the dog.

I've cherry-picked the best treatment and the most humane and compassionate approach to fixing my addiction and now I've arrived at the situation where - joy of joys - I'm 'just' dealing with depression and anxiety.

I'm itching to press the 'fuck-it button' because life is intolerably stressful, unrewarding and my depression is refusing to lift. What's the solution? Drugs? Been there, done that.

Rehab taught me how to quit drugs cold turkey. Rehab taught me that I'm in control, so long as my life seems worth living.

Addicts and alcoholics are taught on the 12-step program that they're powerless. I'm certainly powerless, but it's over things like whether I get offered a decent job that pays enough money to be able to live. Being powerless to influence the things that really matter to me in life, such as whether I can live with dignity or not, creates incredible stress and anxiety.

I can choose to stop drinking or taking drugs, but why would I, if the alternative is ESA assessments and having my inadequate welfare benefits cut off by somebody who's not even a qualified doctor? Why would I quit, if I have to prostitute my mind and body, to go and work some pointless bullshit job for somebody promoted into a position of incompetence, if I'm 'lucky' enough to be offered a pittance to do the job?

It's so hard to escape the things that drove us to drink & drugs in the first place.

Rehab was important for me to forgive myself for things that weren't even my fault. I didn't make a mistake, getting addicted to drugs: it was a deliberate act and I'd live my life exactly the same if I got to start over from scratch. Rehab was respite from those who wish to scapegoat sick people.

Fundamentally, rehab connected the 'clean' and the 'dirty' world and allowed me to see that they're two sides of the same coin.

Every saint has past and every sinner has a future.

Tags: #addiction #drugs #alcohol

This is a story about the rat race...

I was working out how much time I've had away from the coal face and I figured out that kind of thinking just ain't allowed. If you start figuring out that you don't have to work every hour God sends, then you're an enemy of [status quo] society. What happens when people start rocking the boat? What happens when people start asking if there's a better way?

Obviously, I'm immensely fortunate that I didn't get some childhood sweetheart pregnant and I don't have to run around doing shitty jobs in order to feed and clothe my squawking infant offspring. I'm very lucky that I'm not enslaved to the system, in order to be just about managing.

I came really close to suicide and drug addiction relapse - which are one and the same thing - during the last week or so. I'm not out of the woods at all, but I had a slightly better day today. Some good luck went in my favour.

You know, having a few years of living hell isn't something I would rather not have experienced. Whether it's homelessness, hospitalisation, being locked up in a cell or whatever... my life has been enriched by everything that's happened to me.

Being desperately depressed, stressed and anxious ain't no picnic, but I still live a pretty charmed existence.

If and when I get back into the 9 to 5, Monday to Friday routine, the blinkers will go up and I won't be able to see the wood for the trees. Who has time to stop and smell the roses when it's rush, rush, rush, to get across town and get to your desk? Last summer I sat by the River Thames eating my lunch, looking at HMS Belfast, Tower Bridge and The Shard, but I didn't really appreciate the view: I was glum that I had to go back to my desk within the hour.

I've been doing my full-time career for 20 years, and I've been bitter, jaded and resentful for the working world taking the prime years of my life, the whole fucking time.

"Get over it. We all have to do it" I hear you say.

Yeah, but why? Why the fuck are we stuck in dead-end bullshit jobs when we're young, with no money? When we're old and tired and our health is fucked up and we're about to die, that's when we finally get to supposedly enjoy the fruits of our labour. Isn't there something back-to-front about that?

The biggest crime against humanity, is that when we're innocent, optimistic, sensitive, passionate, full of energy and joy... that's when we're squeezed into little boxes and forced onto the treadmill. For sure, when I'm old and infirm, I'll be grateful to be sat at a desk in a nice warm office, but why the fuck do we chain our young people to their books and to bullshit menial jobs?

I've been over this again & again, but the more that I zig when everybody else zags, the more I feel like a madness is lifting and I can see rationally.

As I travelled through Bank underground station at 9am this morning - making my way home just as 400,000 City workers descended on the Square Mile - I thought: "this is insane".

Of course, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em... but I need to remember to fight the system from within, and to try to protect my mind when all around me people are losing theirs.

Who, honestly, has the time to stop and take in the beauty of their surroundings and marvel at nature? Aren't we all so swept up in the school run and the daily commute? What the fuck point is there in that? To pass the baton of misery to the next generation?

"We can't all be artists and dreamers, skipping barefoot across the grass and daisies" I hear you say, gnashing your teeth.

True, but if there's no time to be carefree and unburdened from the pressures of this modern world we've created, are we building any kind of world you want to be part of? What's the fucking point, if it's all stomach ulcers and stress and exhaustion?

The relentless depression I experience is awful and I live forever with Damocles' sword hanging over me, in the form of endless suicidal thoughts, but at least it forces me to consider an important question: what's the fucking point of being alive?

There's probably no opportunity for me to be an artist, a writer, a poet or anything else authentic, without robbing a bank or making myself penniless and destitute, but the closer I get to death, the more I gravitate towards authentic experiences, rather than the soul destroying life of wage slavery.

Give me liberty or give me death.

Tags: #suicide #depression

This is a story about being naughty...

If you're thinking about what you're going to get me for Christmas, I'd like a tame raccoon or squirrel. But, I know that I've been a bad boy, so I've been crossed off Santa's list. There's a black mark against my name.

How do you know a 'wrong un' when you meet one? How do you know a lost cause? How do you know that somebody's got an evil streak?

I once begged the police to punish me. I was convinced that I was a bad man and I should be locked up. The police have cautioned me four times, but never brought a prosecution. The police deal with bad people every day, don't they? Cops & robbers; cowboys & indians; goodies & baddies; right & wrong; innocent & guilty. If anybody knows what a bad lad looks like, it'd be them, wouldn't it?

But what about all my victims?

Obviously I've shoplifted, pick-pocketed, mugged, defrauded, burgled, assaulted, vandalised, robbed and generally gone on a crime spree, leaving a trail of misery in my wake.

Except I haven't.

Maybe it's a question of morality. Morality is absolute, not relative, isn't it? If a billionaire steals an apple that was the only food that a whole starving family had to eat, that's exactly the same crime as the father of the starving family, stealing an apple from a billionaire who owns all the orchards. Theft is immoral, always. All crimes are equally bad.

Presumably, if there are gods and they smite the wicked, anything shit that's happening to me is all part of some divine comeuppance for my evil deeds?

However, the evidence doesn't show that. Despite being a desperately bad boy, who's misbehaved like crazy, it seems to have done little to destroy my health, wealth and prospects. I certainly don't want to take my good fortune for granted. I'm well aware how close to disaster I've been and I know how much assistance I've received from some lovely people. But... doesn't the conventional wisdom say that I should be disowned, excluded and thrown onto the bonfire of human bodies that we make with anybody who strays from the righteous path?

Lock up your daughters!

In fact, you're probably better off keeping your daughters away from the kiddie-fiddling priests who claim to be moral authorities and pillars of our society. Your children can't 'catch' my mental illness. I'm not an active promoter of dangerously deadly deeds. I don't leave cyanide-soaked baby rusks lying around, and drop HIV-infected hypodermic syringe needles all over the place.

Is there something intrinsically attractive about a bad boy?

Why would anybody want to get close to somebody with flaws? Why would you be drawn to somebody who's sad, vulnerable, lonely, sick?

We know that kittens and puppies instil protective instincts in us, so why shouldn't the same be true of a homme fatale? If I wasn't rescued when I was on my knees, I'd be dead. If all the 'best' boys are taken, then what's the next best choice? Do you go for one of the second-rate options, or do you find a broken one and fix him up?

It's said that men find a woman they love, and they hope they'll never change, but they do. Women find a man they love and they hope they do change, but they don't.

Wouldn't it be good if you could find a bad boy and turn him into a model boyfriend; a perfect partner?

"You knew what I was like when you married me" said I, never.

I tried so hard to re-shape who I was - to bend and twist my personality - to please my ex-wife, but it was the wrong thing to do. I tried to please my parents; to impress them. Waste of fucking time.

'Good' and 'bad' are labels that other people want to attach. Behaviour is amoral, because it's driven by circumstances, environment, upbringing, instinct, natural urges and evolved biases. We have strong views about things that other people should or shouldn't be doing, but we want freedom for ourselves. Our moral code is defined by our own unique moral compass.

So, if you think your kids are being naughty this Christmas: the question is not "how can I control this naughty child and make them do what I want?" but instead you should ask yourself "what is driving their behaviour and what do they want?"

For my part, I've decided I'm going to drink lots of Tizer, bite people, scream, pull the ornaments off the Christmas tree, refuse to sit at the table, repeatedly say "I want sweeties" while crying lots and not let anybody else play with the toys.

Tags: #childhood #christmas

This is a story about the odd one out...

How's your Christmas shopping going? How was your office Christmas party? Have you bought all the food you need for Christmas dinner? Have you put up the Christmas tree and decorated it? Have you wrapped all your Christmas presents? Are you looking forward to seeing friends and family, and having a nice get-together? Are your kids really excited about Santa coming down the chimney in a few days time?

Poor me. Poor me. Pour me another drink.

I'm in a totally different mindset - job hunting and fretting about cashflow - and I'll keep working right up until the enforced 4-day break. I wish I could get into the festive spirit, but it's not part of my personality to take a break from something until I reach my goal: I'm a completer-finisher.

I'm not a Scrooge and I like that London's streets are quieter (except for the shopping precincts, of course) and people are in a more jolly mood. I see men and women in their business outfits, wearing Santa Claus hats. I see pissed up people swaying merrily in the streets, staggering home after a fun night out with friends and work colleagues.

What are you going to do? Turn on your out-of-office email responder and switch off your work phone, I expect. No work is getting done and everything can wait for 2017, can't it? It's the festive season. It's holiday time.

The strange thing is that I can relate but I'm a few years out of practice. Christmas has literally fucked me up for several years. When you're on the limit of the stress you can handle, the very last thing you want is the extra stress of having to worry about Auntie Sue's banana allergy and whether your nephew likes books or socks. Travelling to see people who refuse to leave the comfort of their own homes. Putting up with the shit you normally keep at bay by living far enough away from your family that you can ignore their calls when you're not in the mood.

There's also the enforced holiday.

You'll be enjoying your holiday, because you've got secure income. For me, not working means not getting paid. Boo hoo, right? Yes, it's my choice to be a contractor and not have some shit-paid permie job. Yes it was my choice to write a novel instead of looking for work in November. I'm not complaining: I'm just marching to a different beat from you.

My routine is structured around quarterly dividends, VAT returns, corporation tax, self-assessment and the turbulent market for financial services IT contractors, and of course my own unstable mental health and propensity for self-sabotage. Also: crazy projects.

Most people's lives are structured much the same as a fruit fly's: eat, fuck and sleep... producing yet more clones of yourself in order to swarm all over the fucking place like a plague. Merry Christmas, you happy consumers. May the shopkeeper's festival be forever the highlight of your year. Bah! Humbug!

Those of an insecure nature will probably read that last part and think "what do you know about being a parent? It's really hard but it's really awesome too" or some variation thereof.

Point being: you fell in love (or at least lust) and some baby-batter, love snot or man yoghurt was involved in the insemination of an unprotected womb... millions of years of human evolution did the business and your DNA won the day. You were successfully tricked into doing the evil deeds of your selfish genes, and you replicated those dastardly protein chains. Did you know that there's a specific type of spider, that gets stung by a specific type of wasp, driving it mad, so it spins a web cocoon for the wasp and then sacrifices itself as a tasty snack when it's done. Basically, that's the same thing.

"But Christmas!"

Yes. More than anything I want to give some puppies to my cute young children for Christmas. Somebody I know on Facebook has given his kids a couple of kittens. I've never met his family, but it makes me smile, thinking about them all playing with the kittens. I'm not a fucking monster. I do get this stuff, OK? I'd love to be sowing my wild oats all over the place and fathering a litter of little snot-faced shits. I'd love to adopt a bunch of animals and live in happy squalor. Nothing would make me happier than being a totally useless father who provides absolutely nothing except for a tiny bit of DNA, a string of broken homes, disappointed children with no male role model and a bunch of struggling mothers with fannies all ripped to bits from childbirth.

Seriously, I'm at the point now <condescending> where I don't see anybody else acting responsibly </condescending> so I might as well say fuck it and start a family without giving two fucks for the consequences. I know it'll be good for me so fuck the welfare of the children who didn't ask to be born. Fuck the happiness of the poor wretches who have a bloated belly, bad back, squashed internal organs, incontinence and then 36 hours of agony as an alien tears their groin to shreds and wrecks their sex life forevermore.

Women seem to divide into four camps: those who don't want kids, those who want kids, those who have an unplanned pregnancy and those who get talked into motherhood by the father. Men are in one camp: love their kids, but they're so fucking noisy and annoying and life was so much simpler and fun before the kids and for God's sake woman come and get your son because he won't stop screaming and our daughter's hanging out with the wrong crowd and I'm going to beat up all her boyfriends until she's 30 and I can let her out of the tower where we keep her safe and ah fuck I'm going to work and then out for beers with the boys and I'll be back late smelling of alcohol and looking for a drunken fuck at 3am.

Anyway, as you can tell, I think I'm oh-so smart don't I? I'm better than you and I've got everything all figured out. I'm an insufferable know-it-all.

Actually.

I'm jealous of all you lot who had childhood sweethearts and had your kids when you were young and you've now got wonderful families of your own and you're going to have a fabulous family Christmas with your spawn. I hope you got them kittens and puppies. I hope your Christmas is filled with lots of hugs and smiles. I really do. I do get it... maybe a little bit, don't I?

Maybe I'm just a monster.

Tags: #christmas

This is a story about being well presented...

It was gone two o'clock in the afternoon and I was woken up by my phone ringing.

"You've forgotten haven't you?"

It transpired I had an interview in the tower of broken dreams for a contract with Megabank Plc. I was late and I had to get from Camden to Canary Wharf. A journey that would take at least 40 minutes.

"Get going and I'll make an excuse for you."

There was no way I was going to be able to get showered, put on my suit and get across London in an acceptable amount of time. There's only so long that a recruitment agent can stall for. There's late and there's ridiculously late. I went back to sleep.

The phone rang again.

"OK, they're going to wait for you. Are you on your way?"

I lied, saying that I was. I collapsed back on my bunk. How had I managed to keep my suit pristine? How had I managed to have a neat line pressed into my trousers? How had I managed to keep a shirt freshly laundered and uncreased? How had I managed to keep a pair of leather shoes so shiny? My interview outfit was hanging on the bunk bed in the hostel dormitory, ready to go. Reluctantly, I hauled myself off to the communal shower, shared with 13 other people. It was the middle of the day, so at least I didn't have to wait.

How long have I been doing this for?

Surviving by the skin of my teeth.

When you get ejected from the system, it doesn't know how to cope with you. There are valves, barriers, gatekeepers. It's a one way street. You can fall from grace, but there's no way back. Entrepreneurs brag about their bankruptcies. Startup founders brag about the mistakes they made. The world of career, reputation, CVs, references, credit checks, proof of address and security clearance doesn't have any way of coping with somebody who's going through hell. You're doomed to slide all the way down the greasy pole to the bottom, and stay there.

You literally have no idea how hard it is to get yourself off the streets and back into the system.

I've papered over the cracks pretty well. It's remarkable how beneficial it is having a place to live, but it still takes a huge amount of time to restabilise. You might take it for granted that you've got all your Direct Debits set up, your stuff all in one place and unpacked, and your life running fairly smoothly, but my life was smeared all over London's streets. I moved around so many times. So many things were lost or damaged.

Just renting an apartment was exhausting and destabilising. Living out of a suitcase and working on an incredibly stressful project, I was skating on thin ice. The added stress of the London rental market and dealing with a letting agent tipped me over the edge. I had a place to call home, but it cost me my health and my job.

Anyway, this isn't a sob story.

The point is, that when I pulled my overcoat out of the wardrobe for an interview, I could see very visually just how worn down I am: I'm in need of replacement parts. There are scars and war-wounds. The evidence of a very shit few years is still there, if anybody examines my life with any close scrutiny.

I'm wondering, just how obvious is it that I'm out of place? I'm not supposed to come back from the dead. People who've gone through what I've been through are not supposed to dust themselves down and resume their careers.

My suit -- that I proudly wore on Demo Day at the end of the Springboard technology accelerator program in Cambridge -- is now so threadbare that the dry cleaner told me they couldn't wash it more than a couple more times. I need a new pair of black shoes. I need a new overcoat. I need some new shirts.

I'm banking on the fact that scruffy engineers usually have their mind on the job rather than their appearance. I'm banking on my skills and experience carrying the day. I'm banking on people not looking too closely, and seeing that I'm looking a little worn out.

My fatigued business attire is a metaphor for me: past it; has-been; burnt out wreck; failure; loser.

Obviously, I don't believe that. It's nothing that a shopping trip couldn't solve, but if I'm doomed to failure, splashing cash on fancy clothes and shoes would be a waste of money. I can't quite bring myself to have the double-whammy of having the office doors slammed in my face, and having to look at a lovely new suit and overcoat gathering dust in the wardrobe.

I managed to get a good contract earlier in the year, despite my shitty business attire. I considered covering up the semicolon tattoo behind my ear with a sticking plaster, but I risked it. Nobody ever commented on my tattoo for that whole project. Perhaps we only see what we want to see. The superficiality making smalltalk and pretending to get along with our work colleagues: we barely take in what we're seeing.

Why on earth would anybody suspect that I have some secrets? Why would they think I have a dark past? What reason would they have to believe that the man in a suit and a 19+ year career in IT might have had a troubled period?

"So, tell me about mental illness, divorce, drug addiction, homelessness, near-bankruptcy, the loss or destruction of nearly everything you own and the other shit that doesn't seem to have made it onto your CV."

That just hasn't come up... yet.

Tags: #career

This is a story about rambling...

I'm self-censoring. I've written entirely without a filter for well over a year, but now I'm holding back. I'm watching my words. As a wise friend advised me, I'm writing as if my girlfriend's mother was reading this... almost. I'm certainly writing with a certain amount of self-consciousness that I haven't had for the best part of a year.

When I wrote my book, it was easy. I was in the land of fiction, so I could therefore always say "I made that up" if something didn't go down too well. However, my blog has always been a mad blend of 'stream of consciousness' stuff, unflinchingly honest biographical accounts of mental illness, homelessness, addiction, sex, masturbation and all the other gory details that we repress as deeply as we can possibly can. I'm struggling to switch modes.

I'm starting to build up a list of things that I want to write about again, but I'm a bit bored of it to be honest. I've wound myself up and stressed myself out. I've wailed at the moon and yelled at the top of my lungs... and then the world fractured anyway. The bleeding-heart liberals -- who care about social justice, equality, fairness and preventing the regression of the human species into some kind of disgusting bestial form -- have been beaten by the populists, the racists, the bigots, the xenophobes, the sexists, the chauvinists. Basically, the hand-wringing appeals to human decency have reached a cul-de-sac. I'm bored of being reasonable, rational, measured, fair and even-handed.

The other thing that's fun to write about is the stuff that challenges assumptions and prejudice. I like being polite, well-mannered and well spoken enough to lull people into a false sense of security. "It's OK, he's one of us" they say, and then I unleash the punchline: "Ha! Ha! I'm actually a mentally ill homeless bum benefits-scrounger junkie addict unemployed loser". To be honest, it's the kind of joke you can only do once, and then it's not funny anymore.

I know what I've written to date has been horrifically repetitive. I've laboured some of the same points over and over again. I had open wounds. I was hurting. My self esteem, confidence, self-worth: they were all destroyed. I was caught up with ethical conflicts and I wanted to burn bridges that led back to anywhere I shouldn't go. I was bitter and angry. I found a platform to vocalise my side of the story, and put some balance back into the world. I was like a little yapping dog, barking "don't tread on me" as people who sat in idle comfort and security ganged up on me when I was sick and vulnerable. Writing was my megaphone, to shout down a mob of bullies.

I've ended up with a few things worth preserving, by good luck or good judgement. Most of the former rather than the latter, I think. I don't want to screw up a relationship that's going really well. I've started to reconnect with friends and have some stability. I've got a lovely apartment and I've managed to offload a third scrounger twat who thought they were going to live on my dime, not paying rent and bills. I'm well positioned to be able to get another couple of contracts that should bring me the financial security that I deserve.

Deserve??!? So entitled!

Where do you want to draw the line? Am I entitled to oxygen, water, food? What about shelter, warmth? If you think that kids should be grateful to their parents for having sex, you're a special kind of stupid, aren't you?

Oh God, I've really taken this "rambling" thing to heart, haven't I?

I think I understand why people write fiction now. Having a fictional outlet allowed me to deal with a load of shit that was bothering me, while also demanding that I fit it to a narrative. I was able to write with structure and express concepts that I'd written about at length, but it was much more cohesive and coherent than trying to write these [supposedly] single-topic blog posts that often go off-piste.

Anyway, I don't know why I'm yapping on. My writing serves me well as a kind of heartbeat to let my friends know I'm still alive and kicking, but I need to think about why else I'm writing. Am I a social justice crusader? Am I lifting the lid on mental health and addiction treatment? Am I campaigning for housing reform? Am I a fiction writer?

I guess if I get another job I'll be writing because I'm bored as fuck.

Tags: #writing

Contents

Chapter 1: The Caravan

Chapter 2: Invisible Illness

Chapter 3: The Forest

Chapter 4: Prosaic

Chapter 5: The Van

Chapter 6: Into the Unknown

Chapter 7: The Journey

Chapter 8: Infamy

Chapter 9: The Villages

Chapter 10: Waiting Room

Chapter 11: The Shadow People

Chapter 12: Enough Rope

Chapter 13: The Post Offices

Chapter 14: Unsuitable Friends

Chapter 15: The Chase

Chapter 16: Self Inflicted

Chapter 17: The Holiday

Chapter 18: Psychosis, Madness, Insanity and Lunacy

Chapter 19: The Hospitals

Chapter 20: Segmentation

Chapter 21: The Cell

Chapter 22: Wells of Silence

Chapter 23: The Box

Chapter 24: Jailbird

Chapter 25: The Scales

Chapter 26: Descent

Chapter 27: The Syringe

Chapter 28: Anonymity

Chapter 29: The Imposter

Chapter 30: Wish You Were Here

28. Anonymity

When Neil's work, the crisis team, the police and Colin first called Lara, she was shocked and worried. As time wore on, she became exhausted by the ups and downs of Neil's mental health. When Neil had disappeared, she compulsively checked her phone for any missed calls or messages, desperate for any news. Months later, the nervous energy dissipated and she became emotionally distant and withdrawn; numbed.

Lara had a voicemail and few missed calls on her mobile phone when she finished her shift. It was Neil's parents' home number. She listened to the message.

"Hi Lara, it's Colin here. I appreciate you're probably at work but phone me when you get a chance. Also, see if you can take the weekend off. You might want to come away on a trip."

Spying Anne going to her locker, Lara walked over to her.

"Can we swap shifts this weekend?" she asked, in a hushed tone.

"What the hell, Lara? You were supposed to be coming out with us on Saturday night."

"I know, but it sounds like something important's come up."

"Important how? Is this about Neil? You know how upset you were last time you got mixed up in trying to find him. You only had the memorial service a few weeks ago. Try to take your mind off everything for a while."

"It's not like that, Anne. Neil's dad sounded... different this time. I think he's made a big breakthrough."

"Well find out and let me know. It's going to take a lot to convince me though. I think it's a bad idea."

Sat in her car in the hospital car park, Lara phoned Neil's parents' house. His mum answered.

"Oh hello, dear. I expect you want to speak to Colin, don't you?"

"Yes. I'm returning his call. He left a message."

"The phone has been going crazy this week. Since the service, quite a few of Neil's old friends have been in contact. We met some of them at the service, but it seems there was something in the news and... well, I'll let Colin explain. Here he is."

"Hi, Lara?"

"Yes, Hi Colin."

"Great. Did you meet Neil's friend Anthony at the memorial service?"

"No, I don't remember meeting him, but there were a lot of people there."

"Well, he phoned us up a week later and said he'd seen something in a local newspaper. Said he didn't want to mention it because it was probably nothing."

"Umm, OK."

"Well, he posted us a newspaper clipping. It's a grainy black and white photograph of a man in a hospital bed, but I'll be damned if it isn't a dead ringer for Neil."

"But it isn't Neil?"

"Well, the newspaper says it's an Eastern European man who's lost his memory. He seems to have forgotten how to speak."

"How do they know he's from Eastern Europe?" Lara asked.

"He had an ID card in his wallet. He's from Estonia and he's called Romet Kukk. Did you speak to Matthew at the service?" Colin asked.

"No, why?"

"Well, Matthew knows Anthony. They were all at school together. Matthew phoned up and asked about Neil's disappearance. He reckons he knows somewhere Neil might have been staying."

"Staying?"

"Yeah, like a secret den from when they were kids."

"Where's this?"

"Well, the hospital is in Exeter in Devon. The den is in the same county."

"Sounds like we'd better go down there and see what we can find out."

"Good. That's exactly what I was thinking."

The memorial service had stirred up a lot of emotions and it had been very upsetting to finally let go of Neil. Friends, colleagues and family members had spoken about his life, which was moving. However, Lara had already been to the funeral of an ex-boyfriend. She was tough and she had emotionally shielded herself to some extent. Lara's parents and brothers had helped her move out when Neil was getting seriously unwell and she'd kept things at arms length as best as she could. She couldn't possibly imagine that this doppelganger would be her missing financée. She had no idea what use it would be, going to a place that Neil and Matthew used to visit years ago. It all seemed too co-incidental.

Leaving messages with the local newspaper and the hospital, nobody had been able to answer any of their queries. Lara left early on Saturday morning to pick Colin up, then the pair continued to Bristol to pick Matthew up. They drove straight to the hospital.

"Hi, we're here to see Romet Kukk. Can you tell us which ward he's on, please?" Lara asked.

"Friends or family?" the receptionist asked.

"We're family."

"Are you listed as next of kin."

"I don't think so."

"Does the patient know you're coming? Are they expecting a visit?"

"No."

The receptionist's expression was icy cold. Lara casually flashed her NHS security pass, pretending to rummage for something in her handbag.

"Let me just check where they are. Kukk was it? Mister or missus?"

"Mister." said Lara, relieved that the receptionist was going to help them.

"Oh. It says here they're not at the hospital anymore."

"Discharged? Transferred?"

"The system doesn't say."

"Which ward was he staying on?"

"The system doesn't say. I'm not allowed to see information like that. I'm sorry, that's all I know."

"That's alright. You've been really helpful, thanks." said Lara.

Spying an unmanned reception desk, Lara could see a phone number for the hospital's main switchboard on a piece of paper. She punched the number into her mobile phone but didn't dial it. Grabbing Colin, who was lingering nearby, they went back into the car park where Matthew was waiting with the car. Lara got inside and phoned the switchboard.

"Hi, can you page the bleep holder for psychiatric liaison, please?"

"Sure, no problem" the operator said.

After a few minutes wait, the operator came back.

"Connecting you now."

There was a click on the phone line.

"Psych liaison" a different voice said.

"Hi, my name's Doctor Sutton from UCLH. I was trying to find out who'd been dealing with a patient of ours at your hospital. Name of Romet Kukk" said Lara, lying.

"Yep, I was handling the case with a couple of my colleagues. Piers Cowley. How can I help?"

"Well, to be honest, we were wondering where he was. He doesn't seem to have been referred back to us."

"Yes, that's right. He wasn't discharged. He just disappeared."

"Disappeared? When?"

"About a week ago. Look, can I phone you back in about half an hour. What's your extension at the hospital?"

"Can I give you my mobile number?"

"I'd really rather phone you back on your extension if we're going to discuss the case notes in more detail. What was the number?"

"I'm in a bad signal area, we might get cut off. It's 1-3-5..." Lara hung up. "Shit."

"What's wrong?" Colin asked.

"I think he just rumbled me."

"Did you find anything out?"

"That patient isn't at the hospital anymore. Romet Kukk disappeared."

"OK, Matthew. You'd better show us where this den of yours is" Colin said.

"It's about an hour's drive from here" said Matthew.

Next chapter...

Contents

Chapter 1: The Caravan

Chapter 2: Invisible Illness

Chapter 3: The Forest

Chapter 4: Prosaic

Chapter 5: The Van

Chapter 6: Into the Unknown

Chapter 7: The Journey

Chapter 8: Infamy

Chapter 9: The Villages

Chapter 10: Waiting Room

Chapter 11: The Shadow People

Chapter 12: Enough Rope

Chapter 13: The Post Offices

Chapter 14: Unsuitable Friends

Chapter 15: The Chase

Chapter 16: Self Inflicted

Chapter 17: The Holiday

Chapter 18: Psychosis, Madness, Insanity and Lunacy

Chapter 19: The Hospitals

Chapter 20: Segmentation

Chapter 21: The Cell

Chapter 22: Wells of Silence

Chapter 23: The Box

Chapter 24: Jailbird

Chapter 25: The Scales

Chapter 26: Descent

Chapter 27: The Syringe

Chapter 28: Anonymity

Chapter 29: The Imposter

Chapter 30: Wish You Were Here

26. Descent

She could hear the car crawl to a slow and follow her at walking pace. She had grown accustomed to the sensation of being stalked, stared at. She could feel a pair of eyes burning a hole in the back of her head. With the subtlest of movements she looked out of the corner of her eye at the road. She didn't recognise the vehicle or the driver. There seemed to be somebody in the passenger seat too. The car drew level with her and the passenger wound down their window. She glimpsed short hair full of styling gel, a white tracksuit and prepared herself for unwelcome sexual advances from a dimwitted numbskull.

"Hey!" came a surprisingly hushed call.

"Psst!"

This was not how things usually went. Normally lecherous creeps would lead with their best line, full of false flattery and often beer-induced bravado.

"Hey you!"

It was irritating, but a different and more measured approach from what she was used to. She was sure that as soon as she even acknowledged their existence, they would launch their full chat-up offensive. This was just the preamble.

"Hey!"

She was sure that their patience would quickly evaporate and she would be loudly cursed as a "stuck up bitch" and the car would roar off into the distance with its loud exhaust and bass-heavy music thumping out from their souped-up boy-racer chariot.

"Nah, she doesn't want to know" said the passenger. It looked as though he was addressing somebody in the back seat. Lara risked another glance backwards and sure enough, there was another passenger, slumped low with their coat pulled up high around their face as if they were trying to hide.

"He says he knows you" the passenger tried again.

"Who?" asked Lara, now looking in through the car window and surveying the scene, while keeping walking.

"Sam" said the passenger, pointing his thumb at the back seat. "He's sick. He needs some help getting into his flat."

"Why can't you do it?"

"We're just giving him a lift home. We've got to be somewhere else, pronto. We ain't got time."

"Some friends, you are." Lara mocked.

"Look, just help make sure he gets in OK, can you? We could just dump him nearby, but there's no telling if he'll get into his place on his own in the state he's in."

"What's wrong with him?"

"He's just had too much to drink."

"That's a really shitty thing to do to your friend. To just dump him like that."

"He's not exactly a friend. We hang out, but it's not like that. We're doing him a big favour driving him home."

"Yeah, BIG favour" said Lara sarcastically.

She couldn't help herself peering in the back windows at Sam. He was very dimly aware of what was going on. His head drooped and his eyes were closed, but he wasn't asleep. He didn't look boisterously drunk or like he was going to throw up. He was just intoxicated.

"Alright how far away is it?"

"Just down in the town centre. Jump in."

Sam was reasonably well co-ordinated and not slurring his words. He didn't even smell of alcohol. He could walk and talk without staggering, but he kept slipping into a catatonic state. His sentences would tail off and he would be half-asleep on his feet. As long as she kept repeatedly reminding him where they were and what they were doing, she could coax him towards his front door.

"Come on, Sam. Nearly home!"

"What? Eh? Oh" he said, as he seemed to remember what he was doing and take a few more steps, opening his eyes a fraction. He leant on the front door, dozing.

"Get your keys out, Sam. We're at your flat. This is where you live, right?"

"Yeah, uh. Right" he fumbled in his pockets and unsteadily directed his key at the lock.

With the door flung wide open, Sam made a bee line for his day bed and collapsed on it face down, before rolling into a slightly more comfortable position. Lara was still stood at the threshold, gazing into the large loft apartment, taking it all in.

"OK, I'm going to close this door and go home now."

"Don't go. I need you" Sam said, holding up a hand and beckoning her in.

Lara took a few steps towards the day bed.

"What do you need me here for? You're home now."

Sam patted the bed next to him. Lara didn't get the sense that he was trying to get her to sleep with him, but that he wanted her to sit. She sat awkwardly on the edge of the futon.

"You're home safe now. You can go to sleep. You'll feel better when you wake up."

Sam now opened his eyes much wider and tried to look at her. There was a kind of fear that played across his face.

"You can't let me sleep. I'll die" he said.

"What are you talking about."

"If I fall asleep, I'll stop breathing."

"If that's true it sounds like you need an ambulance."

"No!"

"Why not? What's wrong?"

"Overdose." he said, with the effort of his honest admission seemingly causing him to slump. He relaxed. His face was tranquil. Lara leant over him. He was breathing, but very shallow.

"I'm going to go phone 999. You need to go to hospital" Lara stood up and walked towards the door.

"Nooo! Stay with me" Sam called out, reaching towards her from where he lay. She hesitated at the door and looked back. "I'll be OK soon. Just stay with me a little while."

Babysitting him while he fought through a near-fatal overdose, Lara was torn. She could see his lips getting slightly purple as she fought to keep him conscious enough to keep breathing. In waves, he would get so relaxed and comatose that he would sleep peacefully and could barely be roused. She would be close to running for help. Then, he would come round a little, gasping for air and she would plead for him to stay alert and keep breathing. She knew instinctively that in the time it took her to go away, find a phone and give the address, he could very easily slip away. It took little more than an hour before he started to come round, but it felt far longer.

The experience shook them both and Sam said that he never wanted to risk dying like that again. At first, he was resolute that he needed to quit heroin and that the close call was the wake-up call he needed. He was so grateful to Lara for keeping him alive and for avoiding a hospitalisation. Then, he explained that his body would start to go into a painful withdrawal and he would feel like he "needed" his next fix. Quitting wasn't so easy and he'd need to wean himself off. Would she help him?

He genuinely meant everything he said.

In reality, Lara became his regular babysitter, so that Sam could shoot up big doses of heroin, knowing that there was somebody there to keep him safe if he overdosed. At first, Lara didn't know it. She felt that she was helping him to get cleaned up and off the dope, but after months going round to his apartment almost daily, it was clear he wasn't giving up any time soon.

She adored his tortured soul and his fascinating life. She loved their asexual relationship, which still had a kind of comfortable intimacy. Sam's first love was heroin, but Lara didn't mind being his mistress. She felt like she could make a difference.

Eventually they quarrelled. He had no intention of ever quitting, she said. He did, but it was hard, he explained. He said he'd try harder, but he started to be more secretive. He hid his habit and Lara knew it.

"You'll always keep using if I stay with you" were the last words she ever said to him. He didn't even reply. His eyes were filled with tears, but he knew the truth. Perhaps he would quit one day, but that wasn't the path that their relationship had followed. He used and she was there to keep him safe. That was the way it had been since day one and that was the way it was always going to stay.

She'd gone back to the apartment on the pretence of picking up some things she'd left there, but really she was checking up on him. Making sure that he was OK. He was so alone. His mum had left when he was little and his dad had died leaving him the inheritance that paid for his apartment and his drug habit, but he had no real friends: only drug dealers and addicts hoping to mooch off him. He was no fool, so he didn't indulge the parasites. He had nobody.

Lara knew right away that it was different from the other overdoses that she'd witnessed. There was no life left in his body. He'd been dead for some time.

Poor little rich boy. He had a kind of infamy amongst the local drug users, with many plotting to rob and cheat him out of money. He was even known to the police as a tragic addict: a dead man walking.

By the time she had left him, she was prepared for the worst. Or at least, she thought she was. Of course his death was more traumatic than she could ever have imagined, but she knew that the burden of his life was more responsibility than she should ever have been asked to shoulder. She could forgive herself, but always wondered if things could have turned out differently.

Neil's behaviour was completely different. He seemed in control, even though he was unhappy. It was Neil's desperate wish to be happy and productive again that made him so different from Sam. The addiction that she'd known had no end to it. Without a doubt, Sam would take heroin forever, given an unlimited supply and no consequences. Neil was different. He only ever took his pills begrudgingly and always talked about "recovery". His mental health problems were just a blip, in his eyes. Medication was a means to an end: like a plaster cast on a broken limb, helping it heal.

It seemed unthinkable to Lara, the idea that Neil had lost control and was slumped somewhere, dead from an overdose. She'd known so many years of him being steady and dependable. She'd seen him go through depression and psychotic episodes. However, he didn't seem to be hiding a drug habit and it seemed unimaginable that he could have been consumed by an addiction so quickly that she would never have seen it creeping up. The evidence suggested that somebody flicked a switch and her fiancée went insane. It was impossible to know somebody so well and for them to hide a whole other side of their personality. She knew what addicts were like when they hid their habits.

She confronted Colin.

"You're not telling me everything."

He sighed. "What you don't know can't hurt you."

"If there's stuff you've found out, I want to know."

"I think we just need to let Neil go and keep our best memories of him intact."

"What do you know?" asked Lara, now looking horrified.

"It's a lot worse than we thought" replied Colin with a grim expression.

"I really do want to know absolutely everything."

"He was taking some highly addictive drugs. I'm sure he's gone now. We should probably talk about some kind of memorial service."

"I guessed as much. I've been reading about those legal highs and they're nasty. Not many deaths though."

"Yes, but he was getting some really dangerous ones direct from China at 99% purity. I'm almost certain he overdosed."

"How do you know?"

"I found some traces at the house. I'm so sorry, Lara. I've been waiting and hoping that the body will be found, so we can grieve properly, you know?" said Colin, his eyes pricking with tears.

"You're a good man, Colin. I don't blame you for not telling me" replied Lara, hugging him.

Next chapter...

Contents

Chapter 1: The Caravan

Chapter 2: Invisible Illness

Chapter 3: The Forest

Chapter 4: Prosaic

Chapter 5: The Van

Chapter 6: Into the Unknown

Chapter 7: The Journey

Chapter 8: Infamy

Chapter 9: The Villages

Chapter 10: Waiting Room

Chapter 11: The Shadow People

Chapter 12: Enough Rope

Chapter 13: The Post Offices

Chapter 14: Unsuitable Friends

Chapter 15: The Chase

Chapter 16: Self Inflicted

Chapter 17: The Holiday

Chapter 18: Psychosis, Madness, Insanity and Lunacy

Chapter 19: The Hospitals

Chapter 20: Segmentation

Chapter 21: The Cell

Chapter 22: Wells of Silence

Chapter 23: The Box

Chapter 24: Jailbird

Chapter 25: The Scales

Chapter 26: Descent

Chapter 27: The Syringe

Chapter 28: Anonymity

Chapter 29: The Imposter

Chapter 30: Wish You Were Here

25. The Scales

The crisis team - part of the community mental health team - social services and the police had all been quite helpful when Neil had originally gone missing. The police had quickly discovered that Neil had left his phone, wallet and passport behind. All the services were very concerned about Neil's welfare and had attempted to establish his last known movements as well as searching for him. Because Neil was considered a vulnerable person at risk of suicide, there had been a lot of initial effort, focus and attention on helping Lara, Colin and the family to make sure he was found safe and well.

With all avenues exhausted, there was little more that any of the services could do unless new information emerged. Lara and Colin were main points of contact, liaising with a police detective who was in charge of the ongoing - but parked - investigation.

Frustrated with a lack of progress, two highly regarded private investigators were contacted by Colin. After initial discussions they decided that there was insufficient evidence for them to be able to pursue the case. The truth was that nobody really wanted to touch the case, because of the number of government bodies already involved: National Health Service, mental health services, the police and social services.

Colin had eventually taken matters in to his own hands and gone to the house to look for more clues, when he found the transactions that had led him to the ongoing prosecution of the businesswoman and her associates. Once he'd found the names of the defendants, it was a simple case of searching the register of directors and finding the trading address of their company in the public records.

Now, he was back at the house once again. He regretted involving Lara so closely, but she wanted to play an active role and had discovered vital information that he himself - a grey-haired man in his sixties - would have been unlikely to have been able to extract from anybody embroiled in the court case.

Colin had sounded out friends - retired police officers, solicitors and even a judge - about bringing their own case to court. "Not a hope in hell" were the exact words of one former Justice of the Peace. His sentiments were pretty much echoed by everybody else Colin consulted informally.

"Imagine if a person was selling rat poison as heroin" said Bill, the retired judge. "Now, if that person was to sell rat poison in place of sugar, they might be convicted of murder or manslaughter. But as soon as they sell it as heroin, they'll be convicted for supply of a controlled substance, even though rat poison is not illegal to sell per se."

"But that's insane! Surely the charge of murder should take precedence over the charge of supplying a controlled substance" protested Colin.

"Well, it's about the buyer. If the buyer thought they were buying heroin, then nobody really cares whether that junkie dies. The seller will be convicted as a drug dealer, not a murderer."

"So the law really doesn't care whether you sell a junkie sugar, caffeine, heroin or rat poison?" asked Colin.

"Yep."

"What if the buyer didn't know what they were getting?"

"What did they actually buy?" Bill asked.

"A controlled substance."

"What was it sold as?"

"A chemical for laboratory research."

"There's no chance it could have been confused for a foodstuff? Was it marked as hazardous? Unfit for human consumption?"

"Yeah. It's not like it was sold as sugar or anything" Colin replied.

"Well then, the only conviction you could possibly get would be for supply of a controlled substance."

To make matters worse, everybody advised Colin not to mention the drug use to the police. One whiff of drug abuse and the case would be filed in a dustbin marked 'lost cause junkie'.

Back at the house searching for more clues, he looked high and low before finally he decided to search the attic. Boxes of Christmas decorations and long-neglected exercise equipment, the attic contained very little else except for a disused hot water cylinder and a galvanised metal cold water tank. There was a chipboard lid on the tank and Colin noticed that it was an inch or so out of place, overhanging on one corner. Lifting the lid, there was a green plastic box floating inside with a black plastic handle.

In the kitchen, Colin towelled off the green box so it was clean and dry and took it through to the dining room. Unclasping the two black plastic latches, the lid was stuck tight until the airtight and dust proof seal released the pressure. Inside the box was grey foam to protect the delicate instrument contained within: a laboratory-grade weighing scale.

Normal kitchen scales might tell you the weight of something in grams, but not very accurately. If you needed to weigh 10 grams - approximately the same as a one pound coin - then your kitchen scales would be woefully inadequate. Even fine balance scales with small weights would struggle to weigh anything lighter than a gram. Some digital scales could weigh one tenth of a gram with reasonable accuracy: 0.1g. The scales that Colin had found could weigh at a sub-milligram accuracy. Less than 0.001 grams. Even breathing on the instrument or standing too near the table on a wooden floor would cause measurement fluctuations, so there was a special stand, cover and calibration weights to ensure the readings were accurate. The "quick reference" instruction manual inside the case was a hefty pamphlet.

There were some spatulas and a metal dish inside the green box. A tiny amount of light brownish powder residue was visible on the foam that held the dish and the spatulas. There was also a very small plastic resealable bag which was almost empty except for the tiniest residue of powder in the corners.

Colin spent the whole next day searching the Internet and phoning testing facilities, before he finally located a laboratory that would be able to swab and test the tiny traces of drugs that he had found. Using gas chromatography mass spectrometry, the lab was able to then search the 'signature' of the chemical compounds and to find a match in their database.

After sending the scales by courier to the lab in the Netherlands, it took 3 weeks before he got the results emailed to him. There was no conclusive match, but there were several compounds that were 97% similar to chemicals that were held in their database. He had been warned that a 99% match was the highest that he could expect anyway, so it was a good start.

Searching the Internet, he found detailed online encyclopedia entries for two chemicals, as well as a brief summary of a third. The compounds were stimulants from three different families of drugs. Two had been developed and patented in the 1950's and 1960's, but had never been marketed to the public because of serious side effects. Colin found a shorter acronym form of the full chemical name of each of the three compounds and started to search the Internet for more information.

Quickly, Colin was immersed in a world of online discussion forums. Thousands of Internet users from around the globe were talking about their experiences of self-experimentation with chemical compounds that had been abandoned by pharmaceutical companies or not even patented. Some of the chemicals had only been thought of as theoretically possible, but a laboratory somewhere in the world was cooking up these drugs for people to buy and try on themselves.

He couldn't read any more. What he saw was immediately horrifying. Hundreds of stories of addiction and horrible psychotic episodes, health damage and hospitalisations. Internet users were swapping stories about how awful these chemicals were and that they were the most addictive drugs they'd ever tried. Many lamented the day they ever first experimented. One message stood out as clearly as the obvious warning to never take these substances: accurate measurement was the difference between desired effects and overdose.

Perhaps Neil had two sets of scales, but one set alone was worth almost £1,000. If he had overdosed at home, surely he would have been found there along with his scales?

From what Colin had read, a powerful dose of those drugs was just 0.005 grams. If Neil had half a gram delivered from China, that would be 100 doses. The effects would last well over 12 hours. That meant Neil would have been on a nonstop drug binge for 50 days with just one free sample, assuming he was measuring accurately.

He felt sick. His son had got mixed up with something so dangerous that it had overwhelmed him and taken his life in the blink of an eye. There was no way to sugar coat this. Was there even any point in telling Lara and the family that Neil had been completely consumed by addiction and stimulant psychosis? In less than 6 weeks these powerful Chinese drugs caused him to flee his home to his final resting place.

Next chapter...

Contents

Chapter 1: The Caravan

Chapter 2: Invisible Illness

Chapter 3: The Forest

Chapter 4: Prosaic

Chapter 5: The Van

Chapter 6: Into the Unknown

Chapter 7: The Journey

Chapter 8: Infamy

Chapter 9: The Villages

Chapter 10: Waiting Room

Chapter 11: The Shadow People

Chapter 12: Enough Rope

Chapter 13: The Post Offices

Chapter 14: Unsuitable Friends

Chapter 15: The Chase

Chapter 16: Self Inflicted

Chapter 17: The Holiday

Chapter 18: Psychosis, Madness, Insanity and Lunacy

Chapter 19: The Hospitals

Chapter 20: Segmentation

Chapter 21: The Cell

Chapter 22: Wells of Silence

Chapter 23: The Box

Chapter 24: Jailbird

Chapter 25: The Scales

Chapter 26: Descent

Chapter 27: The Syringe

Chapter 28: Anonymity

Chapter 29: The Imposter

Chapter 30: Wish You Were Here

21. The Cell

"If you don't mind, please empty everything out of your pockets into this plastic tray."

Neil put his wallet, mobile phone, house keys, loose change, used tissue and a folded piece of paper into the grey plastic tray, which had a sticky label on it with "Neil - Room 8" written on it in red marker pen.

"Do you have anything sharp in any of your pockets that could hurt me? I'm afraid we have to check we've got everything."

"No."

The nurse patted Neil's clothes down and checked the waistband of his trousers and underpants.

"OK, would you mind taking off your belt and your shoes, please. Just pop your shoes down on the table here next to the tray."

Neil complied.

"We have to keep your belt, sorry. I saw you brought a dressing gown and we have to keep the cord from that too. We're also going to have to take the laces from your shoes. We'll go through your bag from home in a minute but you can't have necklaces, cables - such as mobile phone chargers - razors, scissors, keys or anything else sharp."

"OK."

"If it's alright with you, we'll hang on to your mobile phone and keep your wallet safe here at the nurse's station. If you need something for any reason, you can ask one of the staff to get it for you, but we'd really like you to try and relax and get used to the ward for the first few days, so we'll be keeping your phone right here."

The nurse was now coiling the dressing gown cord and putting it in the tray, as he went through rest of Neil's belongings.

"We have to keep aerosols here. If you need your razor you can have it while somebody supervises you shaving."

"I'm not feeling suicidal" Neil said.

"OK, that's great, but there are other patients here who might be. The bedroom doors aren't locked so we have to keep all these high risk items here for everybody's safety."

The nurse showed Neil to his room. The door had a window with a blind which could be opened and closed from the outside. There was a single bed with a foam mattress, a writing desk, a plastic chair, an open wardrobe with drawers at the bottom, a sink and a plastic mirror screwed to the wall. A big window was secured with a wire tether so it could only be opened a few inches. There were no curtains. Across the hallway there was a wet-room with a shower. There was no shower curtain. There were no locks on any of the doors.

"Get yourself settled and then come and sit in the lounge. We try to encourage patients to not spend time in their rooms during the day."

Neil sat on his bed with his bag next to him for a few minutes. He thought about unpacking but he really didn't want to give the impression that he was OK about being detained in hospital against his will. He'd been told to bring a few essential clothes and toiletries. Visitors could bring him anything else he needed once he'd settled in.

In the main part of the ward, there was a lounge at one end with several sofas arranged around a big TV which was hung on the wall. At the other end of the room were a number of tables and chairs. There was a nurses' office and two rooms with sofas in, which had big windows so you could see in and out. There was a doctors' office and an examination room which were private. There was a door leading to the male bedrooms and another one leading to the female bedrooms. A recreation room had a pool table, table tennis table and books in it, as well as a number of patients' artworks displayed on the walls. There was also a small kitchen for the patients to be able to make their own drinks and snacks.

A noticeboard displayed a timetable of the week's events, which had many of the same things that Neil was familiar with from day hospital: art therapy, music therapy, drama therapy and community meetings. A whiteboard had the first names of the 18 patients who were staying on the ward, with their allocated nurse's name written next to it in green marker pen. The ward was at its maximum capacity, with 9 men and 9 women.

There was a dispensary hatch where patients would queue up to get their medication several times a day. There was a door that led out to a small courtyard surrounded by high walls on all sides. That was both the smoking area and the only place that patients were allowed outside without staff supervision.

CCTV cameras were everywhere, except in the bedrooms and bathrooms. The ward was secure but the patients were considered low risk. There was only one locked door between the ward and the main corridor of the hospital that led to the other wards and facilities. For a few days, Neil had to stay on the ward, but then staff members were allowed to escort him to and from the drama studio, art studio and music room.

Some of the patients had obvious scarring on their arms where they had cut themselves. A girl's neck was bandaged. Other patients had problems that were more subtle. A man with a big beard smelt of pooh and always wore pyjamas. Many were quiet and withdrawn and a few would shout randomly, talk or sing to themselves.

"BBC one, BBC two, ITV" a man started. "Channel four" he said, raising his voice an octave higher. He repeated this same phrase over and over in a lyrical and rhythmic way, like he was chanting a mantra. It was quite catchy and Neil found it stuck in his head too.

"I just want to be dead."

This is what Michael said loudly every single morning before breakfast. Neil was a late riser, but he could hear his fellow patient shouting all the way down the corridor.

"OK, Michael. Time for your morning medication" a staff member would coo, coaxing him towards the dispensary hatch. Michael would shuffle along in his slippers. By the time Neil got up for breakfast, Michael would be sat quietly at a table with a vacant stare and a half-eaten bowl of cereal in front of him.

"NEIL! What are you having for breakfast?" Nicole shrieked with excitement.

Nicole was young but some developmental disorder meant that she was even more childlike. Her eyes were always half-closed with her bottom lip protruding. Saliva dripped liberally from her mouth. However, despite her tenuous grasp on almost all aspects of reality, she had latched onto Neil, much to his annoyance.

"I don't know. I might have toast."

"I was going to have toast."

"Actually, I might have corn flakes." he toyed with her.

Nicole hesitated for a moment, looking crestfallen. Then her face lit up.

"I'm going to have corn flakes."

Neil swiftly poured himself some rice crispies and dashed out of the kitchen to find a table with only one spare seat.

"Those aren't corn flakes, Neil." said Nicole, coming out of the kitchen and looking with dismay at her own bowl. "Sit here with me" she gestured, standing by an unoccupied table.

"How's it going?" Neil asked a patient who he didn't know, sat at the table next to him, ignoring Nicole's entreaties.

"Not great" the man replied.

Nicole huffed and sat down to eat her breakfast. A staff member rushed over to join her, fearing there would be an upset outburst if the poor girl felt too overlooked.

In his first three weeks in hospital, Neil saw the psychiatrist three times. He had a few meetings with mental health nurses and a physical health check-up, but his life was one of ordered institutional hospital routine: medication, mealtimes, planned activities and lots of time spent watching TV.

Suddenly losing his liberty had been terrifying and his natural instinct was to yell for lawyers, demand his human rights and to complain about the arbitration that had led to him now being held under lock and key. However, he also feared the power of the state institutions. The police, the National Health Service, the government, the law: he was no match for these massive entities and he knew that he would only make things worse for himself if he made a fuss.

He now deeply mistrusted the system and regretted seeking medical help at all. He felt betrayed by his doctors, he felt that the medications had made him sick, he felt that the crisis team and Lara had conspired to lock him up. He was angry that the police were used for his "welfare" when he really felt they simply provided the muscle to drag him away from his home if he tried to fight for his freedom.

Neil's faith in medicine had been completely shattered, but now, as he lay contemplating his wrecked body he knew he urgently needed medical help. He was dying.

The can of cola that he had found in the shopping bag he'd left outside the caravan had worked its way quickly through to his bladder and he needed the toilet. Grabbing a half-full glass from a nearby shelf, he urinated into it. His urine had been getting more and more cloudy and smelled terrible, but now there was a copious amount of blood present.

His organs were failing. His lungs were flooding with fluid that he couldn't cough up. His chest was tight and his breathing was laboured. His ankles were swelling up as his heart struggled to pump blood around his body. His dehydration and malnutrition had reached the point where his body had start to eat itself and his muscles were wasting away. He was so fatigued that he struggled to move and he blacked out from low blood pressure if he raised his head too quickly.

Death in the filth and darkness of the caravan was nearly upon him.

Next chapter...