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Atlas: Eighteen Years Old
Four hours later, I had finally found Kaleb. He was slumped down in an old and busted lawn chair. The living room was trashed with leftover food wrappers, miscellaneous boxes of garbage, and syringes. He wasn’t the only body in the room, but he was the only one I was concerned with. This was the third Den I had visited today in my search for him, and here he was, out of his mind, in the filthiest place he could possibly be.
His life had been on a rapid decline since he got his first taste of the high life, and now that we were eighteen, it was spiraling out of control. My parents can’t afford to send him off to a rehab facility, and all of our interventions have fallen on deaf ears.
Kaleb was my best friend; we did everything together. But now? Now, I spend most of my days searching for him while he chases his next high instead of his next lay. I missed those days, the days when we would fight over a pretty face instead of the lack of seeing his.
“Kaleb. Get the fuck up.” I smacked him across the face, attempting to wake him from his delirious state. He was so frail now compared to me. We were twins, but at this point, you could barely tell with how sick he always looked. He didn’t even care to wear nice clothes anymore. It pained me to see him in this state and his rapid decline of humanity. I couldn’t even begin to imagine what I would do if he died from the drugs he favored so much.
I blew out a sigh as I lifted him by his arm, draping it over my shoulder and practically dragging him out of the Den. I needed to get him home. Mom and Dad started to worry when he didn’t come home before one in the morning this time around. It was five now, the dawn breaking on the horizon. I didn’t get any sleep last night; he was more important to me, even if I wasn’t to him anymore.
“You need to get your shit together… I can’t keep doing this for you anymore. I’m not your fucking babysitter.” I mumbled my words more for me than for him. He couldn’t hear me in his drug-induced state. I opened the rear passenger door and laid him on the back seat when we got to my car. Once he was entirely inside the car, I shut the door and drove us home.
I glanced into the rearview mirror as I pulled away from the curb, and I couldn’t help but notice just how tired my eyes were looking these days. The dark purple that hollowed out my under-eye area. No wonder I can never pick up a woman anymore. I’ve been so busy caring for Kaleb that I’ve stopped caring for myself. I guess that’s the kind of man I am when it comes to the ones I love. I will do anything for them if it means keeping them safe.
One Month Later.
“Atlas, have you seen this article?” Kaleb strode into the kitchen of our family home and placed a printed article from a reputable medical journal on the counter. I picked it up and briefly glimpsed at the title.
“Relessen, free yourself from the vice that controls you.” I read the title of the article aloud and raised a brow, my gaze meeting his over the paper. During the past month, Kaleb had been struggling to resist the temptation to visit one of the dens he had been frequenting over the past year. One of our close friends died two weeks ago from a drug overdose, and I dragged his sorry ass to their funeral to give him a wake-up call. It worked, for the most part. He hasn’t been to a Den since, but I can hear him stirring at night in his room.
I refocused on the article and continued reading. After finishing it, I placed the sheet back down on the counter and rubbed my brow with my thumb.
“Well?” He asked, gesturing to the piece of paper.
“Well, what?” I sighed, crossing my arms.
“What do you think? Should I apply?” Kaleb bit his cheek and scratched the back of his neck. He was coming to me for advice, which he didn’t normally do anymore. I wanted to help him; I had tried helping him, but a clinical trial on a drug that sounds too good to be true…
“I don’t know, this just sounds too… unrealistic. A drug that can ‘cure’ addiction? Do you really want to be a guinea pig for some Big Pharma company?” I shrugged my shoulders and picked up my mug of coffee that I had set down on the counter before he entered the room.
“I’ll only admit this once and never again. Mom and Dad can’t afford to send me to rehab, and I don’t want them to have to bury me anytime soon. They stated that all participants in the clinical trial would receive the medication for free as long as they signed a non-disclosure agreement and followed all trial requirements. What’s the harm in it?”
“The harm is the fact that you don’t even know what is in this drug. How does it even cure the addiction of the user? What happens if the trial kills you?”
“What happens if my addiction kills me, Atlas? What then? Wouldn’t you rather I took a chance to regain my life back instead of accepting defeat? Isn’t that what you’ve always told me to do? To fight? Well, here I am, I’m fighting.” He held his hands out; his breaths turned heavy as an adrenaline rush spiked through him.
I didn’t trust this trial and didn’t want him to do it, but if he wanted to fight…
He wasn’t wrong; this was his best and only option at this point, putting his faith in an unknown, untested pharmaceutical drug.
I dropped my head back and blew out a breath, and when I returned my gaze to meet his, I gave him a soft smile.
“Alright, tell me what you need me to do,” I said. I would take the chance and do this for him. If this was his best shot, I would support him every step of the way.
“Registration starts today, so if you could drive me there, that would be great. They want a primary support person present.” He placed his hand on my shoulder and squeezed it. “Thanks, brother. I owe you one.”
“Just get better, Kaleb. That’s all I ask.” I sighed, pulling him into a brotherly hug. He returned the gesture and wrapped his arms around me, patting my back. We stood like that in the kitchen for a few more minutes before he broke our embrace, checking his phone.
“Shit, we gotta go. They close in two hours, and it’s a thirty-minute drive.”
I nodded, throwing back the last of my coffee, setting my mug down on the counter next to the medical journal, and following him out the door. I grabbed my keys to the car as we passed by the entryway table.
“Let’s go get your life back,” I said as I closed the door behind me, and we left for the clinical testing facility.
Six Months Later.
“Mr. Jensen?” the medical assistant called from the hallway, and Kaleb stood and stepped towards her. “Right this way, please.” She gestured him past her and down the hall.
