Codeine

A pill to make you numb
A pill to make you dumb
A pill to make you anybody else
    — Marilyn Manson, Coma White

I’m sat here torturing myself by listening to music while the bassline of the music the guy upstairs is listening to comes smashing through the ceiling, turning the world into a hideous off-beat cacophony. I don’t deal well with clashing noises. This is why I can only stand going out to clubs if I’m too drunk to care. In a moment I may go out to get some food from the local take-away shop, but then again I’m warm under my duvet so who knows if I can be bothered?

Sometimes I wish I was a lot more psychotic than I am; that way I could actually carry out the murderous thoughts that run through my head, instead of whispering “fuck you” to the ceiling. Alas, I know right from wrong, or at least fear of consequence from seems like a good idea at the time.

They’re laughing about something up there. Fuckers.

It snowed today and it’s been incredibly cold. My hands are freezing. I have my window open because I smoke, even though it technically violates the terms of my lease. There’s no central heating and the portable heater the landlord supplied broke last year. I haven’t replaced it or told him. I could get another, even with my limited budget. Hell, my mother seems worried enough about me that she’d buy one for me if I asked. But the truth is I rather enjoy the cold. Even though my hands sometimes ache with the coldness. It’s not so different from cutting yourself, really.

So many ways to self-destruct, so little time.

Tomorrow, if I get up in time, I’m going to cross the road to the pharmacy and purchase me a pack of co-codemol tablets. There’s a very simple procedure for extracting the good stuff (codeine) from the bad stuff (paracetemol). The paracetemol’s there to deter abuse. It doesn’t work too well, but I imagine it fucks up some dumb kid’s liver. The joys of prohibition. (The trick is this: Codeine dissolves; paracetemol doesn’t, much.).

Then, once I have my codeine (in solution, as it happens), I’ll swallow it down and, bless my opiate-naive brain, I’ll drift off into the warm, calm seas of narcosis. Codeine is to heroin as caffeine is to methamphetamine. If I had a serious opiate habit, it wouldn’t even touch the sides, but since my veins are free of puncture-marks and I’ve never chased any dragons, it’ll do me just fine. It’s a hell of a lot cheaper, too.

Is this use or abuse? Am I self-medicating or self-destructing? Would it do me more or less harm to finish off the vodka I have left? It’s not that I want to destroy myself, but I’ve always been one for following the path of least resistance.

On the drug forums they have a word they use when they want to avoid incriminating themselves. SWIM. Someone Who Isn’t Me. I’d love to be SWIM and trite though it may be, right now I’m not SWIMming, but drowning.