JUNKIE II. Shawnda Christiansen

to be in control.

      I needed power.

      I needed to end it all. A baby cooed.

      “You gonna take care of that, son?” said my dad, sitting next to me in the meadow.

      “I can’t,” I said.

      “Why not?” he said.

      “You never taught me how to swim,” I said. “You seem to be doing all right to me,” he said.

      A door opened, sending rays of the sun into my face, then overshad- owed by red, a blinding red, as if a super red comet had just come and placed a filter over the ozone layer.

      I was standing over an empty crib.

      I shrugged my shoulders, and walked back to my recliner. I picked up my gun.

      I put the barrel up against my temple and pulled the trigger.

      “My favorite gun is the revolver; can I shoot the revolver today, Dad?” I said.

      “I don’t know, Danny; that’s a man’s gun,” he said. “Come on.” I pouted at him with my eyes.

      “First you gotta WAKE UP!” He turned and slapped me so hard I fell down and woke up.

      “Damn,” I said to myself as I rubbed my face. That recurring nightmare had bitch-slapped me again. There was no baby anymore. There was no anything anymore. My life was just a big pile of dust.

      I had failed.

      I failed to give Emily the world.

      I failed to protect Penelope, the one thing that mattered most to both of us.

      I was a failure as a Sheriff. I was a failure to the world.

      I was the stinking pile of shit junkie that I had despised for so long. There was only one thing left to do now, the one thing I knew I was still good at.

      It was time to end it all.