Rock Bottom:The Rise of a Crack Whore

I watched the frail blue sky lose to another night through the window of a quiet Carrick bus. Tired, sitting next to my groceries, I just wanted to get home. Just minding my own business when someone lands in the seat in front of me. It was a young woman I've known since I was a kid.

Her pretty blond hair was pulled up on the top of her head in an irritating pony tail that swung wildly, hitting her face, sticking in the corners of her mouth. She sat with her basck to the window, feet up on the seat. Her eyes were thin and suspicious, scanning the bus.

She spoke in a flurry of words as she pulled her knees tightly to her chest. Her ankles were marred with thick, purple scabs. She told me what happened to them before I had a chance to ask. She said that five men jumped her while she was in Robinson Courts, a Pittsburgh housing project, to get crack. She told them her money was in her shoe. They held her down, dug in her socks, gouging her skin. When they didn't find anything, they let her go.

She looked at me with a secret but powerful satisfaction and said: "Ha. My money was in my pocket."

I sat stunned, trying not to stare at her ankles. I looked out the window only to find my own reflection. In the sudden dark, I realized how much trouble she was in. Being attacked by five men was something she could smile about — it was worth the twenty dollars in her pocket. Twenty bucks. Five men. Multiple wounds. All for a few rocks?

I heard rumors that she was selling herself to smoke crack but didn't believe them. I knew she was prone to "exaggerate." She had lived with me on and off for years during the '80s when her mother couldn’t deal with her. I figured she spent a night smoking crack with someone she had sex with and told people she was a crack whore.

I couldn't believe I'd been so flippant about the rumors. How could I have underestimated how severe her problems were? Did I ignore what I heard just to negate my own responsibility — the most common form of denial? But as I stared at her tender ankles, I knew I'd never accuse her of exaggerating again.

I felt like such a know-it-all idiot watching her, which I think is precisely what she wanted. As if she delighted in knowing she was destroying herself in a way even I never had. In the '70s, I had spent months in a Kansas jail for writing my own prescriptions for Dilaudid, a synthetic morphine, and spent two weeks in the hospital draining an abscess I got shooting dope. But watching her on the bus, I knew crack was unlike anything I'd ever done. Selfish as it may seem, my first reaction was thinking how lucky I was that it wasn't around when I was her age.

When I was 19, I did every drug I could. I didn't have to prostitute myself but I did have a variety of "boyfriends." It took years of therapy to deal with the consequences. Now I'm considered a success story. I did the seemingly-impossible and got off hard drugs. But I had never smoked rock.

What was I supposed to do? Give her the standard lecture about how she could change her life like I had — the former-offender cum journalist? Was I supposed to tell her that it's never too late to change when watching her made me feel like she had crossed into a place of no return?

She continued talking, told me how, just the day before, a man put a gun to her head and asked her for money. She said she just stood there thinking that he could kill her, but he wasn't getting her money. So she said "fuck you" to him and he just hit her on the back of the head. She said she wasn't too scared cause they don’t want to kill a white girl. They don't want to get a life sentence.

Her voice was loud, her tone deliberate, even confrontational, like she was bragging or daring the few other people on the bus to hear. No, not daring them. Forcing them to hear her, punishing them. For what, I bet she didn't even know. But I did. I was 12 years older than she and had spent those years figuring it out. Well, I'd thought I had it figured out until that night.

She rummaged through her purse for Chap Stick as she continued talking. Her lips were peeling and nervous. She said she'd been turning tricks and smoking crack with no food or sleep, what she called "chasing it," for three days. When she was too tired to continue, she went to her boyfriend's house but he wouldn't let her in. Her family did the same. No where else to go, she said she was headed back into town to "get money." Said it was a good thing she still had a couple bucks left for busfare and "supplies" at Condom-Nation.

She smiled the entire time she spoke.

I was stiffened by the chilling nonchalance she used to describe the most desperate lifestyle I could imagine — going from the danger and degradation of having sex with strangers in parking lots to the chaos of crack districts.

I couldn't imagine. I asked if she was afraid that someone would hurt her. She looked at me like I was stupid and said, "No, I expect it."

Change of subject. I tried getting her to come home with me, told her I'd make Rice A Roni, joked about how skinny she was. She stopped smiling. She wasn't coming.

All talk seemed small after that. Still, we spoke as politely as strangers until my stop. Right before I got off the bus, I again asked her to come home with me. She shrugged her shoulders, "Maybe." Then she looked up and said, "Let me move in with you."

"No" thundered through my head as a million memories collided. My last attempt to help her ended with me holding her on the floor so she'd stop hitting me. She reached up and bit my left breast. I smacked her across the face but not as hard as I wanted to. But she had braces and when I saw her mouth bleeding, I knew I was no good for her anymore. This was after months of her lying and stealing and destroying everything she touched. Considering she was so much like I was, I should've been more patient but her teeth marked the end of that attempt.

How tempting it seemed to tell myself that I couldn't become — to use the current jargon surrounding the addicted — an enabler, to just walk away until she hit bottom. A bottom lower than having a gun put to her head?

I had to do something but was terrified of letting her move in. I told her to come home with me so we could talk about it. Which meant "no" and she knew it. She said she'd hook up with me later and stopped talking. The stifling silence that followed gradually gave way to the rise and fall of the bus's engine. Then came the startling squeal of brakes at my stop.

But my answer wasn't really a "no." And at least she knew she had somewhere to go. Besides, she was tired. I'd see her again real soon.

That's how I calmed myself. Truth is, I stopped trying to get her to come home with me because I didn't think I stood a chance against the crack. And I didn't want her addiction to ruin my life. Not another word was said.

I got up to get off the bus. I stood there trying to balance with my grocery bags. I'm sorry, but I was grateful to be holding them so I didn't I have to hug her. She told me where she had been, you know? But I loved her so much. And yet I could barely look at her as I said good-bye. I'm sorry, but I was somehow just so relieved to get off that bus.

I stood on the curb and watched her through the window. Seeing her in the eerie green glow of the bus, I wondered if I'd ever talk to her again. I would've waved if she would've been watching, but I was already long gone from her thoughts. I watched the bus pull away and promised God, myself, whoever, that if I could see her again, if she could just make it through one more night, I'd let her move in. Even if I doubted it would do any good. Even if I would regret it again.

One of her most destructive traits is how she systematically eliminates everyone who tries to help. She takes advantage of trust. She makes it a liability to care. But the only way she can confront the world that never accepted her is to self-destruct while they watch.

What's so tragic is the degree of punishment she subjects herself to in order to make "them" hurt for her, care about her. And in the process, she alienates the only people who ever did care. She pushes every limit, assuring that no one will ever love her enough.

I couldn't imagine what her family was going through.

Donna is a 19-year-old, white, suburban female. Her parents were pursuing religious careers when they met and, um, had to get married. Dad drank. Mom started teaching school. After a full day in a classroom, she had to be the housecleaner, laundry-doer, authority figure, nurturer etc., who also had to worry about an alcoholic husband. And after teaching all day, she had little patience left for her own children.

Donna was the baby of the family, the last born, arriving after any dream of a "normal" family remained. And she was a big baby. I used to baby-sit and everyone laughed about how much formula she drank. And vomited. But she was the fussy baby of a tired mom who fed her whenever she cried and ignored her the rest of the time.

Her father drank. Her mother was busy. Doesn't seem so horrific, doesn't seem to warrant Donna's extreme behavior. She was neither culturally nor economically disadvantaged. She wore clean socks everyday, clothes from Gimbles, went to a Catholic school. She'd get whacked on the back of her legs with a baton here and there, but no serious abuse.

But she was always too much: too smart, too strong-willed, too loud, too fat and too needy for her environment. She’s been in psychiatric hospitals, shelters, rehabs and jail since she was ten years old, starting the year after she came home from being forced to live with her grandmother to lose weight. She had to lose two pounds a week in order to call her family. When she was home again, she ate with a vengeance to gain it all back. She showed them.

It's excruciating to watch her wield her self-destructiveness upon her family. One night her mother sent her to her room after hogging all the attention at a sister’s party, so she poured some Drano into her Mello Yello soda and drank it. End of party. When the paramedics arrived, they were appalled at her mother’s anger and lack of concern. Only 14 at the time, Donna had already stolen and totaled one of her mom's cars despite thousands of dollars worth of therapy.

I decided to call her mother and find out what had been happening. She said: “I tell her that she’s going to end up dead, but she never listens. Everything I try to do is just a con. I’ve done everything. I can’t think about it anymore.” She had Donna arrested for stealing her car and got a court order prohibiting her from her home.

Since then, I was told she's totaled several cars and has stolen from everyone in her family. She charged thousands of dollars on a variety of credit cards and her mother is also still paying hospital bills from years ago. And Donna had two windshields, one driver's side window and one back window, busted out in her mom’s car as well as two more windshields in other relatives' cars. Crack dealers throw bricks when she won't buy counterfeit drugs.

Her mom wished me luck. Her dad called five minutes later, threatening to come and drag "that slut" out of my house. I told him I'd have him arrested if he came near my apartment.

She hadn't even arrived yet.

At 6:00 a.m. I heard her pounding on my bedroom window, "Jo, open the fucking door." She'd been knocking and was livid that I hadn't answered immediately. At first I was mad but only because I'd forgotten what she told me on the bus. After the shock of being woken passed, I was so relieved to see her.

When I let her in, she became very sweet and apologetic, said she had to use the bathroom really bad. After a few minutes, I noticed how strangely quiet she had become and knew she was up to something. I pushed the bathroom door open and found her smoking crack.

The pipe was a glass tube with a piece of copper netting in one end. The lighter was turned up so high I heard a muffled roar. She hit the pipe so hard, her head trembled as she watched thin spirals of thick smoke rise with crossed eyes. Her body seized, remaining perfectly still except for a series of small spasms. As she let out her hit, her mind seized. She spoke in fragments. How everyone was going to pay. How she knew what people were about. How she had to stop smoking crack.

She rambled about her night. She said she'd seen her boyfriend, Jimmy. He let her use his car so she could go to a trick's house who was going to tie her up for $350. But when he untied her, he wouldn't pay. She started crying. Not because that man could've killed her. Or because he slapped her around. But because he didn't pay her.

I had no idea what to do. Of course I thought about telling her she couldn't smoke crack in my house. Then what? I just wanted her there, where I could see her. Where I knew she was okay until I figured something out. And after what she had just told me, all I could do was watch her.

I don't know how much crack she had but it was gone quickly. It's called "crack" because of the sound it makes when smoked. Seemed more like sizzling to hear and watch. She kept mumbling about the trick. How he was going to pay. Then she got up and started undressing, asked me if she could borrow a clean pair of underwear. I gave her a whole new set of clothes. She left hers on the floor.

Picking them up almost made me gag. I used the very tips of my fingers to put them in a plastic bag and threw it down the cellar stairs.

She apologized for leaving her clothes on the floor and asked me if she could have something to eat as she rummaged through my kitchen. She was trying to be nice. Still, she spilled Jell-O on the couch, spaghetti sauce on the jeans I leant her, smoked all my cigarettes, burned two holes in the jeans, ate three bowls of ice cream and almost a whole box of cereal.

How do you feed someone who doesn't stop eating until all the food is gone? How do you help someone who makes you regret trying? Who has no respect for your efforts? But how could I blame her for not caring about something stupid like jeans when she treated her body with such utter disrespect, almost contempt? How could she be expected to care about anything?

So why would she care about my home? What would my VCR or microwave be worth to her? A couple rocks? I looked around my apartment, saw stains on the rug from spills she hadn't bother to clean up years ago. And her pounding on my bedroom window at 6 a.m.? I wondered what my neighbors thought of that.

And I wasn't foolish enough to think that my small act of kindness was going to make her stop doing crack. In many ways, it would make things easier. I didn't know what I was going to accomplish besides letting her ruin my life. The more I thought about it, the more aggravated I became. Until I noticed that she had fallen asleep on the couch.

It was hard to look at her in such a vulnerable position. Almost dead. And yet still so young. I couldn't imagine how she got involved with crack and prostitution. I wanted to know because I wanted some kind of revenge. Why do we live in a world that only asks questions when it's too late? So we don't have to do anything?

I hurried into my room and pulled the blanket off my bed. I covered her gently, like even my softest gesture might bruise her while knowing nothing could wake her. Slowly tucking her in, for a wishful minute, I was sealing her in a magic cocoon. She'd be transported back in time, long before she smoked crack, long before she surrendered what was most beautiful about her to a drug that confuses madness and revenge with euphoria.

Staring at her sleeping, I felt a sad frustration, just like when she was a baby and I couldn't make her stop crying.

How easy it is to lose sight of who's doing the suffering — I'd let her stay. No, I'd insist on it.

The Fall

Donna called turning tricks and smoking crack "chasing it." But it was chasing her. Even into her sleep, where it finally seemed to catch up. I don't know how long I sat staring at her, fast asleep, but it couldn't have been more than 10 minutes. It was exhausting.

I gasped each time she leapt off my couch, her body somehow turning itself over with one sudden spasm. I flinched each time she tossed her pretty blond ponytail, now a mass of knots, side to side. Each time she twitched, yelped, grumbled. Each time she almost cried in her dream.

Sitting there, I felt like I was watching her from behind a thick pane of unbreakable glass. Like if I tried to reach through and touch her, I'd shatter the hundreds of tiny bones in my hands. Frustration tingled in my fingertips while the rest of my body went limp.

Powerlessness begins with a calm resignation that's mistaken for relief. I started into my daily routine. But I couldn't stop thinking about her. There were too many questions always ending with, "What am I going to do?"

There was one thing I was sure of — after I knew her story, with her consent, I was going to tell it. I wanted everyone to see what they had done to the little girl with curly yellow hair and mischievous, sparkling eyes. Because I knew she couldn't possibly have ended up like that on her own.

As a child, Donna displayed the classic symptoms of a hyperactive/attention deficit disorder. She talked out in class and had trouble sitting still. But unruly young ladies were not tolerated in school. Girls won't be boys. She was given the usual loss of privileges with an added dose of humiliation for being female. She reacted by being more disruptive.

Not one teacher questioned the fact that those methods weren't working. As she became more incorrigible, it reinforced their original perception Donna was bad. No one was willing to ask for help or admit that they didn't know what to do.

By second grade, she was smoking in the girl's room. When she was 11, she started buying joints with her paper route money. She'd get high behind the gas station, eat, go home and fall sleep.

Alcohol proved to be the perfect fuel for her impulsiveness. One night when she was 14, Donna stole her mother's car after getting drunk with her only friend. The joyride ended in a head-on collision with a tree. Neither were hurt.

Donna's problems were evident long before she started getting high, but drugs gave them a whole new expression. And suddenly, they were treated as the source of her problems. It's a good thing a booming addiction industry waited — it was the only alternative to the law that already had its eye on her.

When she went to rehab, Donna's mom bought new socks and underwear for her and went to all the family groups, even when she had to miss work. Still, she was silently condemned for Donna's behavior. The doctors would never admit that they blamed her, but I saw it in their abrupt smiles and impatient eyes. Sure, Donna "behaved" amid an entire staff. But as a single mother working full-time, her mom just didn't have the time or energy to follow her around with a clipboard.

Donna returned home between institutions. But nothing changed because the experts weren't able to tell her mom exactly what it was that she had done wrong or how to fix it. They were professionals. They did not raise questions they couldn't answer.

For Donna, therapists were just teachers who didn't yell. Of course they cared about her but not enough to make eye contact except when giving orders. Not enough to admit that they didn't have all the answers even though it seemed so obvious in their lack of solutions. And they certainly couldn't care enough to risk a personal involvement. No one wants that. And that's why we have therapists.

The bottom line is that mental health professionals are not paid to care. God knows, we couldn't afford it if they were.

But they did teach her the subtle art of manipulation. I was amazed at how quickly she learned that it was easier to tell them what they wanted to hear than tell them how she really felt and risk their ignorance. Or was it indifference? She called them "clock watchers."

I spent years in treatment including detox, a couple rehab's and a variety of programs. But I found a therapist who was there to help me, not to prove that he was the type of person who wanted to help others. And because he cared, he extended himself beyond his own experience to really understand what I was doing. I was lucky.

Donna went from rehab to the psych hospital to group homes. Each trip into "the system" taught her how to be a better addict. Although marijuana is considered a gateway drug, the people she met in recovery were the ultimate gateway into the drug culture.

At 17, her Alcoholics Anonymous sponsor, a man who was supposed to be her spiritual guide into sobriety, taught her how to prostitute herself, beginning with him. Shortly after, she met a 36-year-old married man who I'll call Jimmy. They smoked crack at a party. It was her first. She asked how she would know when she was high. Her host answered, "When you want more."

Donna didn't become addicted until her second exposure. She spent a weekend with Jimmy. He spent $3,000. She started spending a lot of time in the alleys of the soon-to-be-cultural district of downtown Pittsburgh, selling oral sex to middle-class, married men and proudly taking her earnings to Jimmy. She was in love.

She woke up when I was cooking dinner and immediately started getting ready to leave. After an hour's worth of negotiations, she agreed to stay. We spent the night talking and she agreed to be profiled. She thought it was funny that anyone would want to read about her.

I thought it was anything but funny. Next time she went chasing crack, I was going with her.

The Never Ending

"The only angels who see us now watch through each other's eyes."
Ricki Lee Jones

I wanted to see exactly how a crack whore lived — no Pretty Woman version of prostitution and polo. I thought I could go into Donna's world and come back with something that didn't sound like a made-for-TV movie. I would be a magician, make my words so perfect they'd drag every reader kicking and screaming into her reality. Then people would understand what she was doing to herself and would, well, just for a second become willing to see that addiction is more than a disease, it's a symptom of larger problems we're all a part of creating.

I sat on my pink fuzzy toilet seat watching her put on makeup. She made jokes about telling a trick that he had to give her $20 to kiss her, $10 to touch her breasts. She looked at me, smiled and said, "And I meant $10 for each one. Fucker. I make them pay."

She told me to wait by the hotel across from the Greyhound Station. She went about her business while I sat there imagining the worst, wondering what it was going to take to stop her. Then one man after another propositioned me.

It made me sick. Scared. I wanted to scream for a cop. Instead I smiled and said I was waiting for someone.

One guy got mad and said, "You think you're too good for me, whore?" I knew to keep my head down and mouth shut.

Whore. What a handy yet offensive term. We are treated like whores our whole lives and yet we're not even allowed to speak the word. That night, I felt like I was 14 again, wearing bright blue eye-shadow and streaks of blush, waiting to meet boys only to be humped on in church parking lots by fellows who told me they "liked" me but would spit in my hair in front of their friends. I didn't say "no" to them because I didn't think I was allowed.

I sadly admit that when Donna hopped out of yet another Jeep Cherokee or Bronco sporting Penguin bumper stickers, a part of me was terribly glad that at least she was making them pay. But I realized it would cost her dearly. It was going to take her years to forgive herself for selling the precious secrets of her body. If she survived.

She made $150 in a little over an hour. Time to get crack. I drove a car she borrowed up to Robinson Courts. She got out and walked into a pitch dark parking lot and came back with three men. Suddenly a gun is six inches in front of my face, stuffed in the pants of a man saying "give me your money." Another was pulling Donna out of the car by her hair. She screamed at me to drive away but the engine wouldn't turn over. The car finally started and we got away.

That was a rush unlike any drug I'd ever done or wanted to do. No more. She insisted on going back. I pleaded with her to come home but she just sat there staring straight ahead. I got out of the car on Robinson Street and headed down to Fifth Avenue. In 15 minutes, she came back and asked me to drive. She immediately started smoking crack.

And on and on and on. She lived with me for about a month before her mother let her move back home to care for her father who was ill. I let her go 'cause I couldn't take it. Couldn't stand watching "tricks" treat her better than any boyfriend I ever had. Couldn't stand listening to her talk about getting off the rock 'cause she only talked that shit when she was on it. Couldn't stand being so helpless, caring so much while she cared so little.
I tried to love her in the clearest possible language. But I didn't save her. I just wanted her to know I cared. That's all. That's all we need to recover from the self-loathing assaulting us daily. Self-loathing — the core of every addiction and the source of a healthy economy.

Who do I feel is responsible for Donna's self-destruction? The parents of every child who made fun of her for being fat. The teachers who refused to acknowledge her disruptive behavior as treatable instead of a symbol of her "badness" thus aggravating her problems. The therapists and counselors in every rehab, hospital and group home she had been to who never cared enough to break out of their paradigms and really listen to her. Corporate America that thrives on filling us with wants they'll never let us fully sate before we find ourselves needing something new.

Yes, let's thank everyone who confuses the issues of addiction for their convenience. Members of Congress who refuse to acknowledge they know nothing about drugs but defend policy that has never worked except to fill our prisons and line their pockets. Now CIA agents are finally being indicted for bringing hundreds of pounds of cocaine into the country, bought and shipped with tax dollars. And don't forget the federal, state and local police officers who Donna said she "tricked."

And finally, I hold every person personally responsible who ever murmured the usual bullshit about personal responsibility to negate their own duty to help those who need it most.

Did I miss anyone?

Dining Review (I'm serious)

NightFeeding
Confessions of a nocturnal feeder

"I've been feeding you to see what form you'd take ... I just wanted to free your shape." The Tragically UnFit

You've been drinking again. You're surrounded by micro-beer drinking, date-raping weight lifters with perfect skin. Petite chicks with perpetual pouts push by with hair that bruises. And not an "excuse me" all night. Why are the physically perfect so rude? Because they have to look at the rest of us?

Back to ClubPsuedo. You've been trying to keep your hands to yourself but each wine cooler takes you closer to the edge of Spankville. But drinking as an alternative to sex is like trying to put out a fire with gasoline. Desire bludgeons your blazing loins as Madonna's "Borderline" plays. Why, why is there always Madonna?

You have two choices, humiliate yourself into some sex or just walk the hell away. The lowest road outta there is what the Secret Order of the Chronically Single recommend: NightFeeding. Eating as an alternative to sex is like putting out a fire with milk.

But please, please keep these late-night feederies to yourselves. If word of this PostGrunge ritual gets out, everyone's gonna want to gain 50 pounds in search of the perfect midnight smack. I mean snack.

10-ish. You're driving through the filthy drizzle of an October night in Pittsburgh. You can't remember when you've ever been so hungry but the feeling seems familiar.

Your eyes scurry up and down Liberty Avenue in the heart of Bloomfield. Your mind seizes amid the confusing choice of eateries. Perogies at the BBT or pasta at the Pleasure Bar? You keep driving. You're craving protein.

You spot a soft pink glow buzzing just ahead. The awning of a new place? Couldn't be more than a few months old. It's name? MOJO BAY — written right above a little sun. Tears fill your eyes. You'll never be alone again.

Everyone at the bar seems to know each other but there are too many people for that to be possible. Friendly bartenders can do that to a place. You order a Jack Daniels and Coke without thinking. Oops. Well, you won't order an appetizer.

That thought disappears once you look at the menu. Two striking choices: smoked salmon chowder served in a sourdough Tuscan loaf and the oysters baked with a garlic almond butter, served on a bed of sea salt.

Your waitress comes. You ask her what's available at such a late hour. She tells you they'll prepare anything, even full dinners until 2 a.m. You think you're hallucinating until the food arrives. Then you're sure of it.

Man, the colors in the Cobb Salad — perfectly placed rows of chicken, bleu cheese, minced bacon, diced tomatoes and egg are lovingly laid on a bed of mixed greens you can't even see. And on the side, a lite raspberry vinaigrette.

You're munching and crunching innocently when the waitress brings another plate. You see it staring up at you, spread wide open. It's the famed Muffaletta sandwich — layers of baked ham, Genoa salami, prosciutto, provolone and mozzarella overwhelm a bun the size of a bus.

You bite into the bitch. Again and again. Soon your head feels heavy, your neck, weak. The room's spinning. You're not the NightFeeder you thought you were, eh? Loosen that belt. Stop your whining and order desert damn it. How about some white chocolate cheese cake with a raspberry swirl? Or a Peanut Butter Dream — chocolate brownie crust topped with a peanut butter melt-a-way, smothered in a peanut butter mousse, finished with whipped topping and drizzled with chocolate sauce? Oh, the verbs.

You know you're not worth it. You eat it anyway. All of it. Your personality disorder kicks in. You know what you have to do, where you're headed next. MAD MEX. You want food that's gonna bite back. And with their late-night, half-price special, it won't take a bite out of your wallet.

11-ish. You think you're a cliché factory but that's just what happens driving out McKnight Road. You keep your eyes peeled for the striking green light of the psychedelic-southwestern sign. Your innerfeeder taunts you, "Are we there yet, huh, huh?"

The Rolling Stones' "Let It Bleed" plays as you walk in the door, "I'm a seething, feeding monkey, all my friends are hunkies." And on an excellent stereo, no less. The place is dark but not depressing: seductive. The sharp edges of steel sculptures capture your eyes. Bare bulbs trapped in green jars hang from ropes above the bar. You sit in a corner and need a cigarette just to touch the branded leather menu cover.

You sink into an adult-sized Kiwi Margarita made from fresh fruit. Their bartenders have to come into work an hour early just to squeeze lemons and limes. After only one, you want to eat with your hands. You want to lick your fingers. You want to burn your mouth, your lips, your tongue. A fine sweat overcomes your brow as you read descriptions of food even healthy people would love.

You order wings. They come in three flavors: mild, wild and insane. The San Franciscans are covered with honey mustard, garlic and a red pepper flake sauce. You bite into a wild one. The sauce tingles your lips. You want to touch yourself. Yes...it's time for squid. The calamari is excellent, kinda like oceanic onion rings. You dip them, one after another after another, into thick white sauce that slides down your throat like a million secret wishes.
When you think you can't take it anymore, the waitress brings your Nachos Grande. Red, white, blue and yellow corn chips are piled helplessly on a plate, no, on a platter and are smothered with Monterey Jack, salsa, jalapeños, black beans, sour cream and the only guacamole you've ever actually liked, made fresh everyday.
You're biting your fingers in the frenzy of a feedfest. You're drawing blood. And stares. Time to go. Doesn't matter. You got what you came for. You leave a big, juicy tip for the waitress.

12-ish. You're sitting in your car with no particular place to go. The windshield wipers slap slap slap slap. The Meat Puppets play on the radio, "Where do fat folks go when they die? They don't go to heaven cause they're too fat to fly." Why, why does there have to be fat? You think you hear someone laugh at you. You check the floors of your car. And what do you find but a so-happy cigarette.

La la-la. Silky smoke softens the edges of everything. The Innocence Mission plays, "I've come to the end of me again." You're suddenly William Blake in a station wagon returning from the road of excess. You head downtown to the CLUB JOY, a new dance club and late-night restaurant next to the Chinatown Inn.

Up to the second floor. Chinese videos play while people sing karaoke. No one's speaking English. The waitress comes, dressed in a white satin gown. She serves tea in cute little cups. You add four packs of sugar and get your second wind. You order wanton noodle soup. You chew languidly on shrimp-filled wantons, slurp slowly the wonderful noodles and savor the pungent broth.

The soothing pink and delicate blue decor dissolves your dysfunctional defenses. The truth behind your need to feed ripples through your thighs. You're in love with Adam Duritz, the lead singer of the Eating Crow. Quit calling him a whiner and admit it. And there's only one thing that will ease that ache, Mr. Jones — a trip to PEPPI'S in the Strip District. You're headed back into the underbelly of your obsession.

1-ish. Bright lights, big hoagie. You drink a Stewart's orange cream soda that's a liquid dream while you read the menu. Maybe you'll have a vegetarian sub called the Shady Side. You'd rather eat boiled Birkenstocks. You decide on the Big Wheeler. It's served on a roll from Mancini's bakery that's stuffed with a steak and sausage mix, grilled onions and melted provolone.

You begin with a huge plate of Cajun fries and some slushy lemonade that puckers your lips. You pinch yourself. You dip crispy fries in the Marzetti ranch dressing served with it. Your eyes roll back in your head when you realize how perfectly they blend together.

Your sandwich arrives. With the first bite, you realize that you’ve never had a real steak sub until now. And no wonder. At Peppi’s, they shave their own steaks daily. The difference is incredible. Time stands still while you chew. You have to remind yourself to breathe. Then, like waking to a nightmare, you look down and find an empty plate. You don't know how long you stare, wondering where it all went. Life is like that. Time to move on.

2-ish. They say you always return the scene of your first feed. You're parked across the street from TOM'S DINER in Dormont. Their large gyros and fried mushrooms spoiled you for all others. Your mouth waters as memories flood your mind.

You don't want to deal with the crowd waiting to get in but know you have to. You're about to get out of your car when you see a young couple in line sucking face. How quickly you'd forgotten that food isn't really what you want.
But a little breakfast seems pretty harmless.

3-ish. MIKE’S LUNCH on Brownsville Road, next to the St. Vincent De Paul Store in Mt. Oliver, has been in business for over 70 years. The decor is circa ‘69 — burnt orange vinyl stools, striped wallpaper to match. An old Dolly Madison sign hangs in the back.

John the cook is cute, tattooed and hilarious. His mother’s working the late shift with him. His grandmother’s been employed there for 25 years. The dishwasher, for three hours. They’re open from 6 a.m. ‘till 4 a.m.

Yinzers abound, but you didn’t go there to stare at them like insensitive pseudo-hipsters might. If you’re throwing the right vibe, if you have nothing to prove, you’re in for a real treat. These strangers love to talk.

You order coffee. Smoke a cigarette, watch John cook your breakfast with an amusing precision. He's not a cook, he's a performer. A friend of his stumbles in mumbling, "My wife is going to kill me." Classic.

At least he has someone. What you wouldn't give to be taking someone home tonight. What you wouldn't give — exactly.

Sure, NightFeeding's not as fun as having sex but when you wake up tomorrow, you'll only owe yourself an apology. Which is more to be proud of than you know.

Published by a paper that fired me and went out of business