“He started closing accounts left and right, and two weeks later, as a sign of friendship, I asked him to take a ride into the city with me to see my accountant. October fifteenth was right around the corner, and I was still on extension for my ‘87 taxes. Of course, Danny happily agreed, and off we went. We hopped into my pearl-white Jaguar and we headed into Manhattan on a Wednesday afternoon.
“Now, mind you, up until then I thought Danny was completely normal. He dressed conservatively, he acted conservatively, and he came from a very good family. He'd grown up on the South Shore of Long Island, in the town of Lawrence, which is a very wealthy area, and his father was a big-time nephrologist. Danny referred to him as the Kidney King of Brookdale Hospital.
“However, on the home front, Denise had been hearing some very strange rumors about Danny: namely, that he and his wife, Nancy, were first cousins. Of course, I told Denise she was crazy, because there was no way Danny would withhold such a fact from me. Most of the time we spent together he was bitching about his wife, explaining how her sole mission in life was to make him as miserable as possible.
“So, I figured, why wouldn't he confide in me that he and Nancy were first cousins? It made no sense. I mean, if it was true, it would definitely be playing a role in things. But I could never figure out a way to broach the subject with him, so I just kind of brushed the whole thing off, dismissing it as a vicious rumor.
“In any event, after I finished with my accountant, the two of us hopped back in my Jaguar and headed out of the city. We were somewhere around Ninety-fifth Street on the edge of Harlem when the insanity started. I remember Danny saying ‘Jesus Christ! Pull over! You gotta pull over.’ I pulled over and Danny jumped out of the car and went running into a dilapidated bodega with a cheap yellow sign Groceteria.He came running back out a minute later, holding a brown paper bag. He jumped back in the car with this insane smile on his face, and he said, ‘Drive! Hurry up! Head north, to One Hundred Twenty-fifth Street.’
“ ‘What the fuck is wrong with you?’ I muttered. ‘That's Harlem, Danny!’
“ ‘It's all good,’ he said knowingly, and he reached into the bag and pulled out a glass crack pipe and a dozen crack vials. ‘This stuff will make you into Superman. It's my gift to you, for all you've done for me.’
“I shook my head and started driving. ‘You're fucking crazy!’ I snarled. ‘I'm not smoking that shit! It's pure evil.’
“But he waved me off. ‘You're exaggerating,’ he said. ‘It's only evil if you have constant access to it, and they don't sell it in Bayside, so we're in the clear.’
“ ‘You know, you're a real fucking retard!’ I sputtered. ‘The chances of me smoking crack right now are less than zero. You got that, pal?’
“ ‘Yeah,’ he replied, ‘I got it. Now, make a left up here and head toward Central Park.’
“ ‘This fucking guy,’ I muttered to myself, and I shook my head in disgust and made a left turn. Fifteen minutes later I was in the subbasement of a falling-apart Harlem crack den favored by toothless hookers and Haitian winos, and I was putting the glass pipe to my lips while Danny held a torch to the bowl. And as the crack sizzled like a strip of bacon, I took an enormous hit and held it in for as long as I could. An indescribable wave of euphoria overtook me. It started in the base of my aorta and shot up my spinal column and bubbled around the pleasure center of my brain with a billion synaptic explosions.
“‘Oh, Jesus,’ I muttered, ‘you—are—the—best—friend—I—ever-had, Danny!’ and I passed him the pipe.
“ ‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘You are too; we're brothers to the end,’ and he reloaded the pipe with more crack.”
OCD shook his head in disbelief. “What the fuck is wrong with you? Why would you do that?”
The Witch said, “Because they're drug addicts, Greg; they have no shame.”
“How long did you stay there for?” asked the Bastard, in the tone of the morbidly curious.
“For a very long time,” I said, nodding. “You see, the thing about crack is that once you get started, there are only two ways to stop: The first is to run out of money, and the second is to die of a heart attack. Fortunately, our binge ended with the former, not the latter. I only had about seven hundred dollars in my pocket and Danny had about five, so we pooled our money, like good socialists, and were able to keep our binge going well past midnight.”
I shrugged. “On the brighter side, though, I was able to gather some very valuable intelligence during our binge. You see, like all drugs, there are various phases of the high, and with crack they're particularly acute. If you'd like, I'll share them with you.”
OCD shook his head gravely. “You know, it's a mystery to me why I'm interested in hearing about this, but since you've let the genie out of the bottle, you might as well get on with it.”
I flashed OCD a knowing smile. “It would be my pleasure, Greg. The first phase of a crack high is the euphoria phase. This is when you feel soincredibly wonderful that you want to just scream from the fucking hilltops: ‘I love crack! I love crack! And all of you out there who ain't smoking this shit don't know what you're missing!’” I shrugged. “And if you think I'm kidding, just take a hit of it yourself and you'll see what I mean.”
“How long does that phase last?” asked the Bastard.
I shook my head sadly. “Not long enough,” I replied. “Maybe fifteen or twenty minutes; then it's over and you slide into phase two, which is almostas good, but not quite. It's called the diarrhea-of-the-mouth phase, which is somewhat self-explanatory. In this case, however, the sort of drug-induced oral diarrhea spewed out differs from your garden-variety oral diarrhea that the typical sober bullshit artist slings at you.”
“What's the difference?” asked the Witch, searching for a way to peg a bullshit artist when she saw one.
I narrowed my eyes sagely. “Well, it's very difficult to describe meaningless drug talk to those who've never immersed themselves in it, but let's just say that it consists of an endless stream of inane ramblings, which other people in the phase think are brilliant. Yet, to all those outside the phase, they sound like complete nonsense.”
OCD seemed to understand: “So it was during thisphase that you did the bulk of your intelligence gathering, I assume.”
“Indeed, Greg; that's a very logical assumption. Danny and I were sitting on a concrete floor, beneath an asbestos-laden ceiling, with our backs against a cheap plasterboard wall, which was in the process of shedding two coats of lead-based paint, while three toothless crack whores looked on in admiration, and I said to him, ‘I can't think of a better place to ride out a crack high than this, buddy. Right?’
“ ‘No way,’ he mumbled. ‘Think I'd steer you wrong?’ And he put the pipe to his lips and took another hit.
“ ‘Let me ask you a question,’ I said. ‘You know, there are some pretty crazy rumors floating around the building about you and Nancy being first cousins. Of course, I know they're not true and everything, but I just figured I'd let you know, so that you'd be aware that people were spreading rumors about you.’
“Suddenly he started coughing violently. ‘ Ho-bee Jesus….’ he muttered, ‘ho-bee Jesus,’and he shook his head quickly, as if trying to gain control of the rush. After a few seconds he said, ‘It's not a rumor, buddy, it's true. Nancy and I arefirst cousins. Her father and my mother are brother and sister.’ He shrugged.
“ ‘Aren't you worried about inbreeding?’ I asked him. ‘I mean, Jonathon seems pretty normal so far, but what about your next kid? What if he comes out deformed?’
“Danny shook his head. ‘The risk is low,’ he said confidently. ‘My father's a doctor and he checked it out. But if I do get dealt a shitty hand, I'll just leave the mutant on the institution steps. Either that, or I'll lock it in the basement and lower down a bucket of chopped meat once a month.’