Forgiving Paris: A Novel(4)

1998 2





Death was calling for Alice Michel.

In a hissing sort of whisper, it called her name, threatening her, taunting her, clawing at her. And it never stopped. Not ever. Like a living, breathing being of darkness, death wrapped its tentacles around her, dragging her into ever deeper levels of hell.

Until she hardly knew if she were dead or alive. Even her mother had rejected her. Alice didn’t blame her.

How could you change the locks, Maman? Alice trudged down the cold, indifferent allée—four blocks from what used to be her home. She clenched her jaw. I’m not your daughter. I never will be again. The thought weighed on her and worked its way into the vast cavern where her heart used to be. She wouldn’t go home ever. There was no turning back.

Alice shivered and ran her fingers over her right arm, then her left. They felt heavy and cold. Like the arms of a corpse.

There was only one place to go now, back to the underpass alongside the Seine. Cops hated that homeless people shuffled along the river. But the shelters were full and in the homeless camps around Paris, drugs ran the day. Indeed, Alice wasn’t sure how long the prison of heroin had held her. Two years, three? Time stopped under the haze of heroin.

She shook harder now. The dull ache in her arms worked its way up through her bony shoulders and along her collarbones. Her legs hurt, too. Streaky pain from her hips to her knees and her knees to her ankles. A few more steps and the headache set in. Alice knew what this was. The feeling was as familiar as her name. Drug sick. She was drug sick.

Faster, she told herself. Move your feet.

And she did, as fast as she could until the group of tents came into view. Dirty, dilapidated, rain-beaten and sun-bleached. Yes. She was almost home. The only home she knew these days.

Already she could imagine the relief, sense the way her body was about to come to life again. Because someone would have the drug for her. The people of the underpass shared. Last week she’d bought the junk, so today her tent friends would step up. They all swapped needles, so Alice didn’t need one of those, either.

She’d take the hit anyway she could get it.

Anything to feel alive again—normal… even for a few hours.

Alice carried a bag with her, a crocheted bag with a long strap that once was the colors of the rainbow. Now it was the color of dirt, like everything about her existence.

Push, she told herself. Get to the tent. Just… a few… more… steps. Alice pushed herself until she dropped to the mouth of a crowded tent. Three girls were passed out near the back. Another two—a married couple—were nodding, succumbing to the rescue of their latest dose of heroin.

“I need it.” Alice’s entire body convulsed now. She pulled her knees to her chin and rocked. “Please, someone. Hit me up.”

Needles lay scattered on the torn tent floor. Tonight, sweet, handsome Benji was the most alert of the group. “I got you.” He grabbed a needle from a filthy bowl and grabbed Alice’s hand. “Hold out your arm, Alice.”

It was all she could do to obey. Her muscles were tense, cramping. Benji looked a little high, and he wobbled as he crawled to her with the needle. But the sharp silver point found its mark, somewhere along the tracks of heroin memories that made up her arm.

“There, Alice, baby.” The minute the needle was out of Alice’s skin, Benji used the syringe to fill the vial again. “My turn.”

With every heartbeat, heroin flooded Alice’s veins and pumped through her body. And as it did, the aching stopped. Her arms fell to her sides, no longer shaking, and her legs stretched out in front of her. “More, Benji.” She closed her eyes. “Give me more.”

“No.” He leaned back against the tent pole. The drug was working for him, too.

“I need it.” Alice leaned closer and put her hand on Benji’s arm. “The sick… it’s worse today.”

Benji shook his head. “This is strong stuff, baby. That’s enough.” Benji used to be a med student with a dream of being a surgeon. The druggies in the camp trusted him.

“It’s not that strong.” Alice stared at the man. He was twenty-five, maybe thirty. No telling with heroin. Addicts aged a decade overnight. Alice had asked him once, but Benji said he didn’t know. “Too many years.” That’s what he had told her. Too many since he’d checked out of life and given himself to the drug. Everything about his old self was gone. All he had these days was the needle.

By now Alice’s headache should’ve let up. But instead her temples pounded. She stood on her knees and looped her arms around Benji’s neck. The two of them had found solace in each other’s arms more than once. When they were sober. When they weren’t sick or high. She kissed his dry lips and stared into his droopy eyes. “I need it, Benji. Give it to me.”

If he were sober, Benji never would’ve agreed. He knew when a batch of heroin was strong, and he knew when it was maybe laced with fentanyl. Peppered, he called it. But tonight, in this moment, Benji was too high to care. He returned the kiss and worked his hands into her hair. “You’re beautiful, baby.” His words were slurred. “You know that?”

“Give me more.” She pressed herself against him. “Please, Benji.”

And then, as if he was as intoxicated by her presence as he was by the drug, Benji did as she asked. He leaned back and felt around for the still half-full syringe. She helped him stay steady long enough to find her arm, to find a vein strong enough to take the jab.