Wasted: An Alcoholic Therapist's Fight for Recovery in a Tragically Flawed Treatment System (26 page)

With quiet and enormous satisfaction,
I pay my rent, stock up on groceries, buy my first new clothes in a year, buy a bus pass and put the rest of the money in the bank. I begin to tackle my debt.

I introduce myself to the loans manager and ask her to tell me my credit rating. She scans her computer screen, looks me squarely in the eye and says one word. “Atrocious. Mr. Pond, if I were you, I’d file for bankruptcy.”

The chorus recommending that course of action just keeps growing. But I can’t. I won’t.

I buy a cellphone at Best Buy, pay-as-you-go. I sail through another random urinalysis.

Dana phones every day to confirm our outing. It’s as if she senses that the ground under this romantic relationship has shifted. I assure her I’ll be there. And that, I remind myself, will be the end of it.

Friday, my last day of gradual return to work, I make my way back to the unit after a quick lunch in the hospital cafeteria up on the second floor. A small, frail man in a yellow hospital gown and blue paper slippers shuffles toward me. Something about him strikes me as oddly familiar. His one arm is in a sling, snug close to his chest; the other supports him on the wall as he painfully
inches along. As I approach, the little man lifts his head and peers out of his left eye. The right one’s swollen shut, a three-inch freshly sutured laceration across the brow. His head is bandaged, as if with a white toque, with one bloodied ear exposed. His nose shattered beyond recognition, he says in a nasal whisper, “Hey, Professor Pond. What are you doing here?”

The voice. I know
the voice.

“Holy shit! Tom. What the hell happened?”

“Pretty nice, eh? I woke up in our bed last night to some son of a bitch smashing me with a framing hammer. They just released me. I’m going to kill that bastard.”

The Tom “Guns” I knew a few months ago bears no resemblance to the one before me. He has lost at least forty pounds. His cheeks are hollow and grey, except
for the blood and bruising.

“Rumour going around was that you were dead,” I say. “I see that’s not far from the truth. Come on, I’ll buy you a coffee and something to eat.”

As we walk to the cafeteria, Tom whispers, shamefaced, “I’ve been using now for a few months. We live in a crack house just off 96th. I owed this guy some serious money.”

“Listen, Tom. I’m going to call
Tim. He just started helping out at Mission Possible. You need to get clean and heal up.”

Tim is a We Surrender alumnus. A more resourceful and resilient guy is hard to find. Tim was a heroin addict and is now sober six years. When he was fifteen, he murdered his abusive stepfather—shot him in the heart with a bow and arrow. He was just a kid, but he did sixteen years’ hard time at Stony
Mountain Institution in Manitoba. When he got out, he lived homeless under a tarp in the forest in Abbotsford.

Tim got sober at We Surrender, and to give back, he provides steadfast, unselfish service to anyone else in need. I call him now.

“Hi. Tim? It’s Mike Pond. Tom ‘Guns’ is here at the hospital. He’s been beaten almost to death. Would you be able to come and get him?” Tim
says he’s on his way and I hang up.

“Tom, sit tight. Tim will be here shortly. Stay at Mission Possible, and for God’s sake, you gotta stay sober. You’ll never survive another beating like that.”

Friday draws to a close. Tuesday, after the long weekend, I become a full-time staff member. I did it. I’m on my way back.

The long weekend dawns sunny and gloriously hot. I wake
up from my short and tortured sleep and head to Vancouver’s West End, to the much-anticipated Gay Pride Parade. A transit officer works the platform, doing random checks for fare evaders.

I flash him my honestly gained transit pass and a wide smile. I grin ear to ear like an idiot. The transit officer, unaware I’m just so darn happy to be able to pay, grins back.

My Motorola pay-as-you-go
reads 10:46 when I emerge from the train, head up the platform and spot Dana in a bright, frothy summer dress. She flashes me her stunner of a smile, and for a moment I’m mesmerized again. She deserves a life better than a drunk’s.

We leave Burrard Station and walk the three blocks to Robson Street. There we thread our way through the throng, past a half-dozen young men clad only in shiny
gold micro Speedos, spraying onlookers with Super Soakers. We bob and weave further through the screaming and laughing mob lined up along Robson in front of the shops. The mood is infectious. My morbid unease lifts.

The parade erupts in a display of exaggerated, over-the-top, in-your-face, fuck-you-if-you-hate-gays sexuality. I focus on Dana, for fear of losing her in the horde. She points
to a small bistro with several outdoor patio tables with red umbrellas.

“Let’s stop here and have a drink.” She winks.

“No, let’s stay and watch the parade.”

A float blasting Madonna’s “Like a Virgin” inches by. Young men decked out in white wedding gowns sing into wireless microphones.

Dana joins in the chorus, “Like a virgin. Touched for the very first time...”

“Come on, party pooper.” She pulls me into the bistro and sits at one of the tables. The waitress approaches.

“I’ll have a Smirnoff lemon cooler and a double shot of vodka on the side.” Dana rattles off her order without thinking. The waitress brings a bottled Smirnoff cooler and a tumbler half full of ice. Dana pours the foggy cooler into the glass, then splashes in the double
shot of vodka. I’ve never noticed until now how ritualized drinking becomes for drunks. Each time, the same amount of ice, the precise measurement of liquid, the pause and the inevitable first sip—it all enhances the pleasure.

Dana downs half the glass in one gulp and then pays bright red lip service to my sobriety. “I hate to drink in front of you, Mr. Pond. You’re doing so well.”

I’m on the edge of not doing well at all. I’m ready to rip that cooler from her hands.

As Dana gets drunk, the parade passes us by. We skip the beach.

We sit in silence on the long SkyTrain ride back to Dana’s sister’s place. We arrive there to find Doris on the back deck, trying to get some air.

“Hey,” Dana says.

“Hi. Did you have a good time?” asks Doris.

“Yes, we did. I need a drink.” Dana heads straight to the kitchen. Bottles and glasses clink. Her bedroom door clicks shut.

I sit with Doris on the deck. She shakes her head and looks out into the backyard.

“She started drinking Friday,” Doris sighs. “She just won’t stop.”

“She’s an alcoholic, Doris. That’s what we do.”

Doris gets up stiffly. “I’m going to
bed. I can’t stand this anymore.”

After waiting what seems an eternity for Dana to emerge, I knock on her bedroom door. No answer. I open the door. Dana lies face down, passed out in her coral bikini. A half-empty bottle of Smirnoff sits on the nightstand, an empty glass beside it.

I stand in the doorway for a long time before I walk over to the nightstand. My hands dangle by my
thighs. My head turns slowly to Dana, unconscious on the bed, then back to the bottle.

I pick it up. I screw the lid on slowly. I want it now.

Four months sober, man. Don’t do it.

Breathe, Mike. Just breathe.

The lid is on, tight.

I conceal the bottle behind some pots and pans in a kitchen cupboard. I close the cupboard and go sit in an easy chair. It’s
dark now.

From somewhere in the distance, the unmistakable low rumble of thunder as a Harley Davidson rolls up the street and stops with an abrupt bang. I peer out the front window and see an extremely large man dismount a stunning black and yellow chopper, shimmering in mirrored chrome.

Dana told me that Stu, the other man she’s been seeing, was six foot eleven. She wasn’t exaggerating.
Stu is a mountain. He wears a black leather jacket, blue jeans and black Daytons—very large Daytons. He rests his black skid lid helmet on the extended handlebar of the chopper and strides toward the house. He has a mass of thick dark hair and hands the size of baseball mitts.

With some kind of death wish, I walk to the front door and swing it open. Stu freezes.

“Where’s Dana,”
he booms.

I will myself not to shake.

I feign disinterest. “She’s in bed passed out.”

“Fuck! She’s drunk.” He looks me up and down, which doesn’t take long. “You’re that fucking Mike guy, aren’t you? Is she seeing you again?” His eyes narrow.

Again? I wonder what lies she’s been telling him.

“Looks like she’s seeing us both.”

“Fucking slut!” Stu
stomps back to his spectacular Harley, kick-starts it, U-turns and yells through the engine’s roar, “I’ll be back.” The Harley roars up the hill.

He’s gone. I’m here. Still alive. My knees buckle and I make a beeline back into the kitchen and open the cupboard, retrieve the bottle from behind the pots and pans. I twist off the cap. And throw back one, then two big gulps. The sudden searing
burn stuns my trembling gut. Within moments the familiar and oh-so-missed mellowness returns. How I hate myself.

I pour a few ounces of the Smirnoff into a tumbler and top it up with orange juice from the fridge. I sit back in the easy chair by the front window, ready for Stu’s inevitable return.

I had my chance to disappear and save my sorry ass. Why am sitting here, resigned
to my fate?

Because I’m drinking again and if he kills me, I won’t have to worry about doing it myself.

Within minutes, I hear the Harley thrump-brump back down the hill.

Stu climbs off his bike, grabs a stuffed green plastic garbage bag from the buddy seat and chucks it on the front lawn.

“Dana!” he bellows from outside. “Dana. Here’s all your shit. I want the
fucking house keys. Now.”

Dana’s sister shuffles to the door in her pink velour housecoat. “Dana!” she shrieks, and pounds on Dana’s bedroom door. “Dana! Get up! Get up!”

Dana wakes up, peers out her bedroom window, runs into the front yard, still in her coral bikini. She glares at me as she passes. Busted.

“Stu.” Dana fights to catch her breath. “What are you doing here?”

“You’re a lyin’, cheatin’, drunken slut. Give me the house keys right now.”

Dana flies into the house and returns with her purse, rummages through it and throws Stu the keys. He climbs onto his Harley and roars off again. Dana slinks back into the house.

“You son of a bitch. Look what you’ve done now,” she hisses.

“Me. I’m just standing here.”

“I hate you.
I hate you.” She swings at me with her fists and slams my face and chest.

Her sister walks away, disgusted.

Both fists clenched, Dana staggers back into her bedroom, banging and crashing around. “Where’s my bottle? Where the fuck is my bottle?” Those blue eyes ablaze, she corners me in the kitchen. “What the fuck did you do with my bottle, you prick!”

She stomps back to
the kitchen, spies the bottle on the counter, snatches it to her chest, then holds it out in front of herself and screams, “You’ve been drinking it! You son of a bitch! This is my bottle!” She supports herself on the wall with one arm as she returns to her room and whips the door shut.

It’s seven minutes past midnight. I walk out of the house.

The night air is warm as I walk the
streets for what seems like hours. Finally, I head to the Brentwood SkyTrain station. The city is quiet. I walk to the platform, drop down onto the long plastic bench by the tracks and wait. The trains are done running for the night. I look at my cellphone: 2:47.

I sit there on that plastic bench for almost six hours waiting for the first morning train. Six hours wide-awake filled with
self-disgust, agitated, craving my next drink. It’s a holiday Monday. The train whirs into the station at 9:00. The car is empty, except for two teenage girls sitting together in the back seat texting, probably to each other.

Almost five months sober and I’ve blown it again. I need to drown my disappointment in myself. God, I need a drink.

• 26 •

I STEP OFF THE
train at Surrey Central Station, walk straight to the beer and wine store, grab a four-pack of those Smirnoff coolers Dana drank at the bistro. These should last me the bus ride home. Then I pick up a fifth of Absolut, the really good stuff, as if anyone can tell the difference. I climb onto the 321 bus to White Rock, sit in the very back
and twist the cap off the first cooler. By the time I arrive at the White Rock Centre stop, all four coolers are gone. I stagger off the bus with my precious Absolut clutched under my arm. I buy a two-litre carton of orange juice at the corner store and almost run to the little white house.

I wake up on the couch. I look around the house. The bottle of Absolut stands condemningly empty
on the worn coffee table. A congealed puddle of orange something—is it vomit?—pools on the table and on the hardwood floor beside me. I snatch the bottle and drain the teaspoonful that’s left into my mouth. I hack. I’ve got to go to the liquor store.

I bring home a forty-pounder of Grey Goose. I’ve got money. I’ll buy the best.

I drink and black out and pass out and come to and
drink more. Night becomes day becomes night after night after night of insanity and I know all the staffers on all the shifts at the twenty-four-hour liquor store. From deep in the recesses of my spongified brain, I drag out an image of a poster my boys wanted to put up around Penticton. My face captured like a mug shot under giant words:
DO
NOT
LET
THIS
MAN
BUY
ALCOHOL
. In their mounting anxiety,
my teenaged sons concocted all kinds of schemes to prevent me from drinking. It was Taylor’s idea—he was working in a liquor store at the time. Now I wish they’d done it.

Will, a friend from
AA
, checks on me daily. He peers in the window as I lie on the couch. “You okay, Mike?” he says in his strong Polish accent. “You ready to stop today?”

“No, not today, Will,” I say to the blurry-hazed
shape in the window. He comes into the house with a bag of groceries.

“There’s deli meat and bread here, Mike. Some first-class kolbassa sausage and Havarti cheese. You have to eat, Mike, or you will die. I have some Gatorade for you, too. You need the electrolytes. I’ll leave it all in the fridge.”