The town is scarce this summer, the population of Pennsylvania dwindling, expanding out onto the shores of dirty East Coast beaches, places where garbage mingles with the sand, shells and surf, a liquid dumpster at the surf.

The grass is sparse this summer, beneath our feet, the August sun pummeling down like fists and we are sitting in the shade of a dilapidated barn, a place where animals used to be fed and then slaughtered. This is where we come when we ditch work, escaping from the long lines and French fries, the dirty milkshake machines.

The farmer's wife is long gone, leaving behind a rotted out kitchen, front porch, empty shells of life all around us. Jad is kicking at the evaporating dust, cursing, screaming.

"I'M FUCKING OUT" he yells. The words seem to bounce off of the landscape and come back in another voice, a fainter one. "I'M FUCKING OUT AND WHAT HELP ARE YOU?"

There is a joint, a perfectly rolled finger of sweet weed, in my pocket, tucked into a cigarette pack. But the joint will be the equivalent of showing porn to a nympho, just a projected reminder of what he really wants. I light my own cigarette, settle in for the show.

"Dr. Beigi, no fucking help" he rants. "Dr. Deichman, he won't do shit for me, don't you fucking get it?"

He is tense, wiry, tan. His skin is stretched up against his bones, taught like leather, and the lump on his nose is protruding as if he is some kind of bird. His white T-shirt is drenched in panic, frantic need. His jeans hang from him as if he is not a person but a clothesline, just empty fabric dangling.

The sun is still relentless, the clenched fingers of drunken fathers down on our faces, shoulders and chests. I exhale Newport smoke.

"You have to calm the fuck down" I tell him. I know that he will not. We have been here before, many times, little death vacations.

He curses me under his breath, calls me a fat bitch. I pretend not to hear and look over the front lawn, the rusted farm equipment like skeletons crawling out of long-dug craves. Beneath the violent sun, Jad's car sits at the edge of the property, where the dead grass meets the gravel road, our own Jersey beach.

Jad lets out a terrifying scream that grabs at my blood and makes me drop my cigarette in surprise.

"Goddammit, Jad, what the fuck do you want me to do" I yell and hear myself come back quieter, meeker, in the echo. It doesn't matter if it is repeated. He is already stalking across the scorched front lawn, grunting. He throws himself onto his knees and begins ripping at the dead grass as if he is tearing hair from his head, a frantic pace that gives off a telltale whiff of insanity.

I think about the barn, what I will do if things escalate, if he leaves me here.

"Jad? Jad?"
"What the FUCK do you WANT?"
"Come here."

His back tenses through his shirt and he stands up, the grass falling off of his clothes, and comes back to the porch. His eyes are itching for the white pills, he wants me to have pockets full of him, a Pez dispenser ready and waiting at all times. They will suck the life out of his eyes and replace it with a coma.

"What, what is it?" he says. His eyes look like the eyes of children on Christmas morning, before the wrapping paper massacre.

I open the cigarette pack and slide out the joint. His eyes turn to obsidian, flashing from brown to heated, shimming black, simmering asphalt.

"Sure, I'll have some" he says and he plucks the joint from my fingers. Immediately, he crumbles it in my face, the weed tumbling down onto the dust, the paper scattering in the stale breeze.

"What is WRONG WITH YOU?" he screams at me. Split flecks out from between his lips and lands in cool little dots on my cheeks. "YOU KNOW WHAT I NEED!"

I remember the first day, at his parents' house. His family was the richest in the neighborhood and the house was inlaid with sweet dark wood that worked its' way through the halls and up around the doors. Throughout high school, there were rumors that his father took shits on a gold-plated toilet every morning. I was one of the only kids who had seen the celebrity bowl and could confirm it existed.

On the most lovely spring day, he dragged me into the house, which quickly swallowed us into the foyer. Jad took my hand and began up the giant staircase, towards his parents' wing of the house.

"Jad, we don't need to be here" I started, and he silenced me with a quick glare. I fell into line.

We walked the long hallway quietly, breaths held. I had no idea where his parents were or when they might come home and there could be a housekeeper at any corner. We pushed the door to his parents' bedroom open gently, our footsteps hushed on plush carpet. He led me through the darkness towards another door, pulling it open gently to reveal a walk in closet. I felt as though I could get locked in that closet and no one would find me for weeks. He flicked a light switch and flooded the closet with brightness.

There was a faint hint of his mothers' perfume permeating through the fabrics, the Chanel suits and quiet high heels beneath them, as if invisible legs were standing still.

Jad walked straight towards a deep mahogany armoire in the back. He lifted the lacquered lid and diamond rings and gemstones shimmered against velvet, little cocktail rings and large, offensive pieces of glittering jewel. His mother was a gaudy woman.

He slammed the lid back down, and slid open a giant drawer at the bottom of the armoire. There, like so many diamonds, tucked into the velvet lining, pill bottles shone white with their little tops.

"Mmm" Jad said. His fingers moved over the bottles like so many pale spiders.

By the time we crept out of the bedroom, his pockets were bulging, sagging. That's how it started.

Now, he is seething at me, the joint on the floor. I shrug my shoulders.

"Can't help you" and light another cigarette.
"I'll fucking help myself" he growls.

He stalks back across the lawn, towards the car. Fear punches at the pit of my stomach.

"Where are you going? You fucking better not leave me here" I say with a weak laugh.

Instead of answering, he yanks the front car door open. He isn't looking at me as he hunches down. He sits in the driver's seat, leaving the door open, and rolls down the window, resting his hand on the hot leather ledge.

He slips his shoulder between the car and the door.

"Knock it the FUCK OFF JAD" I bellow but he's already started. I cover my eyes as he bangs the car door against his shoulder, the sound of him grunting and metal hitting flesh. I force myself to look up as I scream again.

"WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU" and I am pushed close to tears, the chorus of thuds against my ear like the hum of death drums. He begins screaming and banging the door harder and then there is a crack.

I look up and the car door is hanging open. Jad is against the front seat, his arm hanging awkwardly out of the car, as if it is a part of him that is dead. There are tiny spots of blood blooming onto the seams of his t-shirt.

"WHAT THE FUCK HAVE YOU DONE!"

"I told you I can take care of myself," he pants back. He looks satisfied. He pulls a cigarette from his jeans pocket with his good hand and uses one arm to put it in his mouth and light it.

"Get in" he says.

"What?"
"Get in the fucking car, we're driving back to town."
"You're fucking crazy, you can't drive."
"Fucking watch me" he says.

And I know that he can. I know that he will drive, safely even, because he wants those pills like other men want sex.

I get into the car and he uses his right arm to start the engine, puts the car into drive and then takes hold of the wheel. I exhale the last drags of my cigarette out of my open window, into the shitty heat, humidity like acid on our skin, the blood still blossoming.

We drive back into the town, dipping down from the rolling hills, watching the patchwork farmland come into view. There are sheep, horses and goats, fenced in everywhere.

There is music on the radio. I know that we are going to see the doctor now. We are creatures of habit.

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