The mellow feeling of serenity took over, the calm before the storm.
Anxiety nipped at the edges of my mind, hissing threats harshly at my sanity.
Clammy skin met the bitter chill of the night air, the sweet caress managing to send disturbing shivers down my spine.
Bodies quivered and teeth chattered,
Every noise was just too LOUD.
Panicked, bloodshot eyes flickered, scanned, never truly seeing.
A thin sheen of sweat collected over unnaturally pale skin.
Dirty, stained fingers crawling like spiders through grimy, muck filled hair.
Relaxed, but on edge.
It was just one drink.

The gravel crunched harshly under my bodyweight,
Jagged edges sinking violently into denim covered skin.
Head pounding, almost nonexistent heartbeat, and breathing too severe to be normal.
My legs were shaky as I attempted to stand, like those of a newly birthed fawn.
Through the haze nothing could be seen, nothing heard, and nothing felt.
Nothing. I am, I was, nothing.
It was just one pill.

The light was too harsh, hissing and baring its glistening fangs as if it were a feral animal.
My pulse ran rampant, and panic, fear, the feeling of overwhelming unease set in.
The world seemed anew, exotic uncharacteristically jovial.
A dreadful laugh rang clear around me, like a siren luring in its next victim.
The hallow shriek piercing through the haze and echoing its shrill howl repetitively within the confines of my mind.
It never registered that that laugh belonged to me.

I was floating, coming dangerously close to colliding with the sky,
Only a breathe away from hitting that nonexistent barrier, the only thing preventing my drift through the unknown.
Hands outstretched, fingertips grazing delicately along the glassy surface, the twinkling reflection of the stars surely shimmering in vacant eyes.
In that moment, once again I was nothing.

One pill became five.
Five become ten.
Ten become the entire bottle.

“I’m fine,” I whispered in a voice that seemed alien
“I promise, really,” replaying, stuck on repeat, the words ricocheting within my skull.
“Just tired,” Lying came easily now, the words slipping through clenched teeth.
When did I become like this?
“I’m okay,” leaving my lips even when I knew I was the furthest thing from okay.
For months, it never stopped.

How to stop?
A recurring question, never to be answered, constantly ricocheting in my skull.
My will power left without a trace.
My own mind was sluggishly rotting itself, leaving behind nothing more than a shell of what I once was.
My future, disappeared as if it were only a mirage of what could have been.
Control over my own body, a sacred temple which only I should command, vanished.
All I’ve strived for, gone.

Yet again, I’ve lost.

It did eventually stop, when the life began to drain from my still living body,
When I was nothing more than a shell of who I once was, who I could have been.
It came to a halt when the last pill slipped with ease down my throat, when the bitter sting of booze trailed after it, washing it down.
When my pulse began to weaken and my hands to shake
When my lungs had to struggle to fill, even when no air seemed to reach
My own reflection mocking me in the mirror, sneering and slurring with vulgarity that was inhumane, leaving me to crumple into myself.
The pounding in my head slowed and the world tipped on its axis, losing its balance.
When my head struck the tile for the last time, only bouncing once before it halted,
It did stop.
Everything stopped.

My mother wept, as the casket was lowered.
My father stood with silent tears streaming down his cheeks, as they covered the glossy wood with earth.
My brother cried, the memory of finding my half dead body laying still against the bathroom tiles ingrained forever into his skull.

I could’ve stopped, should’ve stopped.
I shouldn’t have started.
Yet the world seemed ugly, monochrome, and unsatisfying, only exploding into a kaleidoscope of color when intoxicated.

Was it worth it?
Was it truly worth it?
Just one drink,
Just one pill,
Turned out to be one too many.