Blackfly Season

43

KEVIN TAIT, PERHAPS MORE than most men his age, had wide experience with emotional ups and downs—being a junkie, even an intermittent one, will do that to you. First, there is the omnipresent guilt that is the addict’s lot, whether his drug be heroin, alcohol, chocolate or sex. Then there’s the constant fear of getting caught—caught using, caught buying, caught selling, thieving, lying, betraying. The fear of arrest was such a constant that there seemed no remedy for it other than the next needle. And when dealing, there was the fear of rivals who might take violent exception to his horning in on their territory. Kevin had almost wet his pants one night in Toronto, when a sometime Hells Angel had threatened to kill him. But that was nothing—that was low-grade anxiety—compared to the black drug of terror that now coursed through his veins.

He regained consciousness curled up on a rough wooden floor. There was very little light, but he knew immediately which cabin it was by the smell; it caused him to vomit the moment he woke up. His skull throbbed, and he knew his scalp was split because his face was sticky with blood.

His hands were tied behind his back, his feet tied together. He tried to get to his knees and fell forward in agony. That would be the wound in his side from the pitchfork. That was probably what had bashed him on the head, too. He curled up again on the floor and waited for the pain to subside.

The pain did recede after a while, but what did not attenuate in any degree was the unbelievable smell of this place. Thick and soupy, the air pressed a filthy finger into the back of his throat and held it there, wiggled it every time he moved, as if the air itself were composed of vomit.

When, eventually, he did manage to get to his feet, the cabin swung and tilted under him so that he toppled and fell hard. The wound in his side hurt like hell. It took many tries before he stood more or less upright, leaning against a table. The only light in the room seeped through the cracks between the planks of the floor and walls.

A large iron cauldron, big enough to hold twenty or thirty gallons, sat on the table. Plump flies buzzed around it. Sticks perhaps a yard long bristled out of the top, leaning at all angles. One hop toward the cauldron verified that that was where the horrific stench was coming from. There was no way Kevin was going to look inside.

He wondered how long he had been unconscious. He was not hungry, but that didn’t mean anything—the stench would take care of that. Besides, loss of appetite was one of the first signs of heroin withdrawal. Goosebumps were another. He had those, too; he could feel them stippling his arms and the skin over his rib cage. Soon he would be in the full throes of cold turkey.

He turned to face a long table, hoping there would be tools of some kind, something he could use to untie his hands. Filthy newspapers were spread all over it, stained brown with what he figured by the smell had once been blood. He was hoping to God it was not human. He turned his back to the table, leaned forward and clamped his jaws tight against the waves of nausea that roared through him. Then, using his tied hands, he tugged the newspapers away from the table. Please, God, let there be a knife, scissors, a nail file, anything I can use to get the hell out of here. But when he turned around again, there was nothing.