𝖈𝖔𝖓𝖉𝖚𝖈𝖙𝖔𝖗;
//
Intravenous drug use had done little but rot his veins and bring him ever closer to the intoxicating release of overdose. Each high seemed briefer than the last, and in a permanent bid to escape his crushing reality, he'd searched for a stronger habit.
A blue substance, something-mixed-with-something, it smelled like battery acid and paint thinner. To anyone else it would seem insane, to pump a foreign, unknown chemical into your body, but for Bee, it was just another Tuesday.
The high had been monumental. His skin fizzed all over as a warm glow encased him in a protective womb. He fell into a hazy space between awake and asleep, bare feet sinking into marshmallow sandcastles as he chased fluorescent fairies through a kaleidoscope chapel.
But when Bee awoke, a full twenty-four hours later, the twinkle of rainbow stained glass had gone.
Instead, the dim streetlight above his concrete cradle seemed to explode in a shower of blinding light. He'd reflexively curled away, eyes clamping closed as he scrambled onto his feet. Assuming it was little more than a bad hangover, he headed towards the greasy diner on the corner.
Every streetlight. Every stop sign and shop doorway, every car headlight, every string of gaudy fairy-lights decorating a late-night pitstop, each and every source of light 𝘴𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘥 his gaze. Pulling his black hood up to avoid the luminescent onslaught, he failed to notice how every single glow intensified as he passed it. He failed to notice how bulbs, long since extinguished, seemed to blaze back into life as he scurried rushed steps past them. And with his focus firmly on his greasy refuge ahead, he failed to notice how, just like last night, his skin seemed to crackle effervescent.
Originally written and shared as part of Verbuary 2020: https://tinyurl.com/3nrpwfbv