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(Extract)
CHASING SHADOWS
So here is the Third Ring Road. Yaroslav Station is just around the
corner. My brain is no longer being stoked with opium fuel. The agonies
are beginning, the precursor to abstinence, to put it in medical
terms, when the body loses the last glow from the dying embers of
that very thing. I urgently need another dose, but I, Peter Petrovich
Parfenchikov, have run out. With the last remnants of willpower I
suppress my desperate craving for the enchanting bloom. I am suffering
a coughing attack, my mouth is filling with saliva, my nose
is running, my eyes are watering, and beads of sweat are popping
out on my forehead. My undershirt and shirt are sticking to my
back. My socks are damp, it feels as though I have been walking
through puddles. My stomach hurts, my heart feels heavy, my pulse
has quickened, my eyes are clouding over, and a stubborn thought
bores into my mind, "If only I can hold out another thirty minutes
or so. Otherwise my withdrawal symptoms threaten to knock me
flat right here in the street. I might find myself in the hospital suffering
from horrendous convulsions or kicking the bucket in hellish
torment without fulfilling my promise to myself: to leave this
detestable Moscow and finally attain freedom!"
I look out of the window. The gray May morning nods despondently
at me with a frown. Drizzle falls silently on the windscreen,
fragmenting my moribund thoughts even more. My mind is becoming
increasingly impartial, I seem to have lost it altogether. Only
fragments of earlier experiences flash chaotically before my eyes.
Now I assiduously wipe the sweat from my forehead with a satin
handkerchief and greedily chew on it, hoping to deaden the pain of
abstinence, now the five-cubic syringe of morphine does not have
a needle and is impossible to find... In a kind of profound frenzy I
try unsuccessfully to stick it with all my might into my vein. The
fight with my unyielding body finally gets the better of me. I am
covered in blood... Suddenly I find myself in a poppy field. I am
surrounded by the cherished plant as far as the eye can see. The size
of a fist, it stands tall, its blooms with their yellowish, white-blue
petals are driving me crazy; I have this overwhelming desire to eat
them until I burst. But I am helpless, my arms are tightly clamped
to my thighs. I want to break off the heads with my teeth and chew
them as quickly as possible, enjoying the wondrous milk, feeling
the luxurious high, but my mouth will not open. My teeth are
clenched as though pinched closed by an overwhelming weight.
Damnation!... At that moment, the scene changes. Not understanding
what is happening, I lose my last sense of reason, I am on the
brink of insanity. I swallow codeine pills by the fistful, but the withdrawal
symptoms do not abate. Usually five or six pills not only relieve
me of the agonies, they provide quite a reasonable high. But
now I feel nothing! My agony not only continues, it is getting
worse. I am feeling worse and worse. Now I no longer feel human.
I have become a faceless, senseless, unrecognizable creature. "Is
this really me? Is it me? Me?" Parfenchikov harped on to himself in
confusion. His state was becoming intolerable. At this juncture it
should be noted that Peter Petrovich had the habit of thinking about
himself now in the third, now in the first person. Incidentally, this
was not the only strange thing about him. Thank goodness that a
new topic distracted him from his awful conclusions, otherwise he
would have driven himself to complete hysterics with his questioning.
...
