Wasted: An Alcoholic Therapist's Fight for Recovery in a Tragically Flawed Treatment System (24 page)

When I get off the bus, I cruise into the Safeway. It’s cool, bordering on cold. I pick up a head of iceberg lettuce, a vine-ripened tomato, extra-strong Canadian cheddar, three crusty kaiser
buns from the fresh-baked bulk bin, butter, milk and finally the hamburger—lean Alberta Angus beef. I noticed yesterday all the necessities in the fridge and cupboards at Max’s house. Ketchup, mustard, relish, salt, pepper and Kraft’s Original Barbecue Sauce.

I can’t stop smiling as I pay for my groceries with cash. The summer sun shines brightly as I bounce down the Johnston Avenue hill
toward the ocean, the bulging plastic grocery bag bumping playfully against my calf. I saunter around the corner of Pacific Avenue and pass the
RCMP
station where I spent the night in the drunk tank just six months ago, on one of the coldest winter nights on record.

I spot Rob standing outside the Masonic Hall having a smoke, waiting for the Fiver to start, chatting up two young girls.
He hurries over to me.

“Hey, Mike. Rotten Randy’s really fuckin’ mad. He heard you left the house and that you scooped your cheque. He’s here looking for you. And oh yeah, that doctor’s office called the house. The woman said... let me think. Oh yeah, it was something like...
it’s time to go to the lab
.”

The wind drops out of my sail.

“Shit.” My shoulders droop. “I have
to go for my piss test. I have twenty-four hours.” It’s my first random urine test for Dr. Acres, and it’s the last thing on my mind. I gave his office the house client phone number. Rob and I had made a pact. We’d meet every day at the Fiver. When the call comes in to go to the lab, Rob would let me know. If all goes as planned, I’ll able to afford a cellphone by the end of the month.

Just then, Rotten Randy rounds the corner of the building. Quick-footed, smoke in hand, head strained forward like a big vulture intent on his prey. He jabs his cigarette at me.

“Where the fuck is your rent money, Pond? You didn’t give a month’s notice. I want it right now!”

“I gave it to my new landlord. I’m moving into a house here in White Rock tonight.”

“That money is
mine.” Randy’s cigarette punctuates his words. “You’re not ready to live on your own. You’ll be drunk within the month. You’re so full of shit, Pond.”

“It’s done, Randy. There are lots of guys waiting to get into the house. You’ll get your rent money.”

Randy pulls a big drag off his cigarette and blows the smoke in my face. It’s acrid and sweet. His snakeskin cowboy boots grind
in the gravel as he about-faces and slithers off, smoke cloud trailing behind him.

“I’ll get my money, Pond,” he says. “One way or the other.”

After the meeting, I walk the eight-and-a-half blocks to the little white house on Russell Avenue. Randy’s spiteful prediction still unsettles me.

Fuck him. Fuck them all. I will stay sober this time.

• 23 •

I LIGHT UP THE
gas barbecue on the back deck. It’s 6:57 in the evening, and the sun is still high in the southwest. After the chaos of Mission Possible, the peace and quiet is a little unnerving.

In less than nine minutes, I devour both burgers, washed down by a half-litre of Coke. I can’t believe I’m free of that place and sitting in my own. Max’s
music selection is superb—for someone who’s fifty-four, not twenty-four. The Rolling Stones’
Exile on Main St.
; Led Zeppelin
I
,
II
,
III
and
IV
; the Allman Brothers’
At Fillmore East
. Ah, here’s the one! Paul Simon’s
Graceland
, the best album of all time.

I insert the disc and “Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes” fills the little house and echoes out the door into the back deck and yard.
I lie on the plastic molded lawn chair, intertwine my fingers behind my head and close my eyes.

“Well, hello there, Mr. Pond. You look very handsome lying there all by yourself in the sun.”

My eyes snap open. Dana moves slowly and sensuously toward me in a pair of khaki shorts and a white sleeveless cotton top, red flip-flops flip-flopping on her red-toenailed feet. She slides
her sunglasses to the tip of her nose, lowers her chin and peers straight into my eyes. “I’ve missed you, Mr. Pond. Your little recovery-house friend, Wayne, told me your new address. He’s such a sweet young man. Kind of cute, too.”

Dana leans down and plants a vodka-flavoured kiss on my lips. “It looks like you’re stepping up in the world again, Mr. Pond. You couldn’t have gone much lower,
that’s for sure.” She looks around the yard.

I want a drink. I reach for my diet Coke and take a big, unfulfilling swig.

Dana takes my hand and we go into the bedroom, lie on Max’s king-size bed and have sex. It’s frenetic and brief at first, then unhurried and lasting till close to midnight. Only now that she’s here do I allow myself to admit how much I’ve missed her.

I wish the night would never end. I wish we could just curl up together and go to sleep, wake up and make love again, make coffee and go to work like real people, not like drunks. Already the act of leaving has begun. She dresses and pins her hair wordlessly in the mirror.

How many times have I discovered those pins hiding in the sheets? How many times have I watched her leave in the middle
of the night? How many times have I wondered where she goes after she leaves me?

I think back to the first months of our relationship when we were both trying to stay sober. That was another Dana—bright, funny, engaging and mesmerizing, the perfect balm for my loneliness. We went on road trips to Whistler and the Kootenays; stayed in romantic B & Bs. Shot pool. Played tennis. Slow danced.
Made love.

That Dana doesn’t come around so often anymore. Her alcoholism has advanced considerably since we first started seeing each other. Her life now seesaws between increasingly shorter periods of regret-fuelled sobriety and devastatingly destructive benders. I want to be with her. I hate myself for wanting to be with her. I have met my perfect match.

“I have to go, Mr. Pond,”
Dana says to her reflection.

“Are you still seeing Stu?” I ask. Stu is Dana’s new giant biker-boyfriend.

“We won’t be talking about any of that now, will we, Mr. Pond?” She shifts and poses in the mirror. “Let’s not ruin a beautiful evening.”

I lean on my elbow in bed and watch her smooth her shirt and shorts and pick up her purse.

“It’s the Gay Pride Parade soon,”
she says. “Why don’t we make a date to go and then head down to the beach at English Bay?” She gives me a fleeting peck, wipes the red lipstick from my cheek and slips out into the warm July night.

I stand at the front door to watch her pull out.

The black retractable roof of the Miata
MX
-5 comes up as Jon Bon Jovi yowls “You Give Love a Bad Name.” She’s an eighties girl, and she
doesn’t want to mess up her hair.

My mood sinks as I watch the
MX
-5 peel away down Russell Avenue. I have to go to Surrey in the morning to give my urine sample. I want a drink and I want it badly. But I won’t. I can’t. It’s after midnight and thank you, Lord, the liquor store is closed.

When I wake up, the clock radio by Max’s bed reads 6:41. I haven’t peed since Dana left last
night, and my bladder is going to burst. Typically, I get up in the night at least once and then I go again when I wake up. I have to hold my urine until I can give a sample. If I can’t give a sample, I will have to wait at the lab for up to an hour to make another attempt. If I can’t give a sample it will count as a positive test which is a fail. If I can’t give a sample, I’m done.

Across
from the bus loop, an old street guy with a full shopping cart takes a leak against the wall of the community centre. That could be me. That
was
me. An even worse realization: that could be me again. It would be so easy to slip. What seems an eternity later, I get on the next bus and get off at King George and 96th Avenue. I shuffle to the lab. Thank God, there are only a few people waiting. I
take a ticket and sit down to wait.

The lab tech behind the counter calls out, “Number eleven.”

I look at my ticket. Fifteen. Shit. Breathe, Mike, breathe.

A few minutes later, “Number twelve.”

Still later, “Number thirteen.”

Even later, “Number fourteen.”

“Number fifteen.” Finally. Thank you, Lord.

Close to tears, I squeeze my knees together,
clench my jaw, and waddle to the counter and hiss, “My name’s Michael Pond. I’m here for a drug-screen urinalysis.”

The lab tech purses her lips and says, “Can I please have your health card and driver’s licence?”

I pull my British Columbia
ID
card out of my pocket. “I don’t have a driver’s licence. I don’t have a health card. My number should be on your file. Dr. David Acres has
ordered this monitoring.”

The tech’s large brown eyes narrow into a hint of a scowl as she takes my
ID
. “Do you have a requisition?”

“No, I don’t. They didn’t give me one. This is my first sample. Listen, I really have to go. Can we hurry this up?”

“I’m sorry.” She sniffs. “I can’t do the procedure without a requisition. And I need your health card.”

“Look, I got
the call yesterday from Dr. Acres’s office. I have to give this sample today. Can you call his office to get a requisition?”

“It’s Saturday, sir. I’m sure his office is closed.” She blinks at me.

“Please. I have to do this today.”

“I understand that, sir, but I need the requisition. Number sixteen.”

“You can’t do this!”

An older lab tech overhears us and
slides over to the desk with an empathetic glance at me.

“Let me have a look at Mr. Pond’s file.” She pecks on the keyboard, waits a few seconds. “Ah, there it is. Yes, Mr. Pond. I see Dr. Acres’s order here, on your Fraser Health file. It’s a chain-of-custody procedure. Chain-of-custody means the process is safe-guarded against anyone tampering with the specimen. Please have a seat and
someone will be right with you.”

“Thank you very much,” I say, almost peeing my pants with relief. The anticipation of finally going is unbearable. I pace the waiting room, breathing deeply as if in labour.

A young lab tech calls out into the room, “Michael Pond.”

“Yes. That’s me.” The waiting room is full now and everyone watches the show.

“Follow me and empty
all your pockets and put the contents into this.” The tech hands me a plastic Ziploc bag. I put my wallet, a few coins, the house key and a flat white rock I found at the beach months ago. A girl on the street called it a worry stone. It has been rubbed shiny smooth.

“Is that it?” She stares suspiciously at me as she wiggles her fingers into vinyl gloves. She’s done this a thousand times
and has good reason to be suspicious. Hardcore addicts are notoriously inventive when it comes to passing drug screens.

Other patients perched on chairs giving blood samples watch the process.

“Now use that disinfectant and wash your hands thoroughly.”

I follow her instructions. The tepid water on my hands makes me want to pee beyond imagination. A warm dribble leaks into
my jeans.

The tech opens a small white box, lifts out a urine sample bottle in a tiny plastic bag and draws a line at the three-quarter mark with a black Sharpie.

“Fill it at least to this line. Any less and it’s unacceptable as a valid sample. Go into that washroom. Do not turn on the faucet, and do not flush the toilet. I’ll be here waiting. When you come out, give it to me directly,
then wash your hands again.”

I go into the washroom. The toilet lid and flush handle are taped unceremoniously with brown packing tape. So are the sink handles and faucet. The toilet bowl is full of dark blue disinfectant.

My hands shake with anticipation as I hold the tiny bottle at the end of my penis. I’m afraid I will blow the bottle out of my fingers with the coming torrent.
Here it comes. I squeeze the bottle tight. Urine sprays and splashes everywhere, and within 2.75 seconds I overflow the bottle. I gingerly set it on the small counter and continue to pee into the deep blue bowl for an eternity. I close my eyes, lift my head to the gods and moan in utter relief.

The lab tech takes my dripping sample and checks the bathroom for any monkey business. She unfolds
a multiple-copy form.

“Initial here, here, here, and sign and date here.” She wipes off the sample bottle and seals it with red tape, drops it in the plastic bag, stuffs it in the little box, places the white copy of the form in the box, closes the box and seals it with more red tape. She scrawls her initials on the tape and instructs me to do the same.

She hands me the yellow
copy of the form, and I’m done.

I jump on the bus and enjoy a relieved ride back to White Rock. I did it. I gave my first chain-of-custody sample. Odds are I have a two- to three-week reprieve until the next one.

I spend a good part of the day watching
TV
and listening to music, stuff non-drunks do. Mid-afternoon, I explore the house and the tiny attached garage. The garage is
full of Max’s work tools and welding equipment. I spot an electric mower with a hundred feet of cord by the door. I plug it in and press the red start button, and the blade whines. For the next hour and a half, I cut the scraggly, dandelion-infested lawn, front and back. It feels good to work. When finished, I take another hot shower, get dressed and walk to the Fiver. I must attend the Fiver every
day. This is my program. And this time, it will stick.

• 24 •

MONDAY, JULY 13,
2009: the start of the second week of my gradual return to work. Three full days, one more than last week.

The ward is full with ten kids aged twelve to eighteen, all suffering severe bouts of mental illness. All very sick, otherwise they wouldn’t be here. Major depressive episode, anxiety disorder, bipolar disorder,
obsessive-compulsive disorder, schizophrenia, substance-induced psychotic disorder. As I walk past fourteen-year-old Amar, who is struggling with a major depressive episode with psychosis, I flip up my shirt and say, “Hey, Amar, ever see a grandpa’s six-pack?” The sight of my scrawny grey-haired chest and wrinkled washboard abs cracks him up. It cracks up the staff, too.