Trigger warnings:
Mentions of drug use (no actual drug use)
Allusions of dying/overdosing (no actual death)
Mentions of addiction
Mentions of substance abuse / substance abuse programs
*    *    *

Josh nervously picked at a loose string at the edge of his frayed fingerless gloves, his foot bouncing up and down as he stared at the community center through the windscreen of his friend's vehicle. It was cold out, unusually freezing for late March, but he figured he should be used to the Ohio weather by now. Or, maybe he'd spent too long with various substances dancing around his bloodstream to be worried about the cold. Either way, he was fucking freezing.

"Dal, could you please turn the heater on higher," he asked softly, his top lip sticking to his teeth as he tried to rid himself of the dry mouth by licking around his gums.

"Yeah, sure," Dallon mumbled, reaching forward to turn the dial up a couple of notches.

Josh didn't say anything back, just burrowed further into his light jacket as he continued bouncing his leg. Honestly, he never thought he'd be here. He thought he'd wind up dead before he ever made it to any place that would offer help. The small white sign plastered to the community center door reading "Narcotics Anonymous" felt almost like it was mocking him. Maybe he shouldn't be here. Maybe if he begged enough, Dallon would just let him go home and sweat it out in the bathtub. Maybe let him drink a shit ton of water until he pissed himself clean.

He knew that wouldn't happen, though. He agreed to let Dallon take him to NA on the condition that he didn't try to give him an intervention again. He was tired of seeing the tears plastered on his friend's and family's faces and tired of hearing their poor attempts at begging him to "stay clean this time." He knew he was a lost cause, why couldn't they see it?

"Fuck," Josh said suddenly, "why are we even here so early? Doesn't it not start for another thirty minutes?"

Dallon let out a small chuckle, shaking his head. "Because I knew if we tried to leave on time, you would've made an excuse to back out at the last minute. I figured if we got here early enough, it wouldn't give you a chance to think of a reason."

The curly haired man cursed internally, knowing Dallon was absolutely right. He should've snuck out the night before like he'd planned on doing, but the line of coke he'd done just an hour before he planned to leave left him passed out on the kitchen counter and in no condition to walk out of the house. "We should've at least gotten breakfast," he said softly.

"Would you have even been able to keep anything down, right now?" Dallon's counter had more of a sad edge to it than a bite, but it still made Josh want to snap his neck.

"For your fucking information, I'm starving," he said, his arms crossing over his chest like a petulant child. "So, yeah, I would've appreciated some food if we were going to be leaving so early."

Dallon let out a sigh, trying not to feel the pang of hurt in his chest as he knew it was the drugs making Josh so ornery. "I'm sorry, okay?" Josh just kept his face pointed at the building in front of them. "I bet they have stuff to eat in there. Maybe donuts or something? Maybe they even have coffee."

Those words forced a bit of the tension from Josh's shoulders as he sucked on his teeth, shaking some chills from his body again. "Maybe," he said quietly.

Dallon let out another sigh as he motioned toward the door. "Why not go ahead and go in? There's already another car here, maybe it's the NA sponsor. I can go down to the gas station and get you some cigarettes, and I might even stop by McDonald's before I swing back over here and get you some breakfast. How about that?"

The younger man felt his lips twitch slightly at the offer, turning to his friend. "You'll get me two sausage, egg and cheese McGriddles?"

The older man laughed gently. "And an extra hash brown. But only if you go in there and actually try to take this seriously, J."

Josh felt himself go rigid again, his leg bouncing even harder. He knew he should do it. He knew he needed the help. The drugs only helped for so long, and they were doing more harm than good. He knew that. Why was he still so fucking afraid?

"Josh," Dallon continued, unaware of his friend's inner panic, "you know we're only doing this because we—"

"You care about me, and you don't wanna see me kill myself, and my mom doesn't want to have to bury he oldest son, for fuck's sake I get it!" He climbed out of the car, adjusting his clothes with one last look at Dallon's pain stricken face. "Just hurry back and get me the fuck out of here."

He slammed the door shut, a little harder than intended, but he was too busy trying to calm the shakes to focus on the tears escaping his own eyes, let alone Dallon's as he lit his last cigarette and walked to the front of the building.

***

"You think they're gonna, like, make me stand up and do the whole 'Hi, I'm Tyler, I'm addict' thing?" The young man's words were almost coming out faster than his brain could keep up with, his hand coming up to pinch his nose as he sniffled in gently and laughed. "Because I'm not, you know. I'm not an addict."

Tyler's mom and sister gave each other slightly saddened glances before Maddy spoke up. "We know you're not, Ty," she said gently. "We just thought, y'know, this could help you catch it before it does get that bad. Like, preventative measures, and all that."

Tyler nodded, his fingers drumming lightly against his thigh. "I'm not an addict," he repeated, looking out the window at the community center. "I'm really not, I can quit anytime I want to."

"We know you can, baby," his mom, Kelley, said as she placed a hand on his arm, not missing the way he flinched. "But, it'll be good to be able to be around others that need help like you do—"

"I never said I needed fucking help, did I?" He was aware his words were coming out rushed and strangled and he felt his entire body shaking and twitching as he tried to pace himself. He snatched his arm from under his mom's touch, rubbing his hands over his face. "I shouldn't even be here," he continued to ramble. "I shouldn't be forced to sit around with all these fucking junkies! I'm not fucking like them!"

"Tyler," Maddy said softly, leaning forward to hug her brother over the seat, "it's okay. No one is calling you a junkie and no one is calling you an addict, okay? Hey, look at me." The brunette allowed his face to be turned so he was making direct eye contact with his sister, who had tears in her own brown eyes. "I need my brother, Tyty. You have to let me keep him, okay? And the only way I can keep him is if you go in that building, and you listen to what they have to say and try to let it sink in. Can you do that? For me? Please don't take my brother away from me."

Tyler felt his eyes well up with tears as he nodded his head, leaning forward with closed eyes as he allowed his baby sister to kiss his forehead. With one last watery smile to his mom and his sister, he exited the car and walked up the concrete steps to the community center's front door. As he went to reach for the handle, a voice stopped him. "Door's locked," the voice said, showing no sign of genuine interest or focus. "No one's here yet, I've already tried it."

The brunette turned his head to be met with a man who looked to be around his age, a couple inches shorter and just a bit skinnier than him. He had a cigarette dangling between his lips, his cheeks were sunken in and his almost hollow eyes were trained on his phone as his bony fingers typed rapidly against the screen. Tyler cleared his throat a bit, nodding to himself as he walked over to the man. "You got a lighter I can bum? I would've had one, but I don't smoke my cigarettes around my parents. Don't want to disappoint them by having another bad habit they can be ashamed of me for."

The curly haired man in front of him looked up from his phone then, giving him an uninterested look before taking his lighter from his jacket pocket and tossing it to him. Josh watched with unwavering curiosity as the man put his cigarette to his lips and lit the end of the stick before pocketing the lighter. He made no attempt to remind him that it wasn't his. "I'm Tyler," he said with a toothy grin.

Josh just nodded, going back to looking at his phone. "Nice to meet you, Tyler," he answered, void of emotion.

"Aren't you gonna tell me your name?" Tyler asked.

"And why would I do that?" Josh quipped back, still not looking up from his device.

"Well," Tyler started, a smile on his face, "gonna be hard to scream your name later if I don't know it."

That got Josh's attention. He stopped typing away on the screen, looking up at Tyler's shit-eating grin before shaking his head and rolling his eyes. "Pretty bold, aren't you?"

"Can be," he answered with a laugh. "Come on, I'm gonna find out your name in there anyway, so you might as well tell me."

Josh gave him one more look, rolling his eyes again. He hated that he had a point. "Josh," he said, almost too quiet for him to hear.

"Josh," Tyler repeated.

Josh nodded, but he wasn't really paying attention anymore. He felt the fingers that weren't on his phone twitching inside of his jacket pocket, itching for something other than the nicotine spreading through his lungs, and he hated that he didn't think to pocket any of his coke before he left the house this morning. Stupid fucking Dallon, rushing him out of the house an hour before he was supposed to even be here.

"Hey, you okay, man?" Tyler's voice was concerned, making Josh's irritation rise.

"I'm fine," he said, his words short as he kept his eyes downcast.

"I'm sorry if anything I said upset you, I didn't mean—"

"I said I'm fucking fine," Josh snapped, throwing his dead cigarette off to the side just as another car pulled up to the community center and parked, a man in a sweater over a collared shirt and dark grey pants getting out and walking up the steps.

"Good morning, gentlemen," he said, his english accent coming out thick as he smiled at the two. "I assume you're here for the Narcotics Anonymous meeting?" Neither of the men spoke, Tyler feeling like he'd overstepped a boundary and Josh feeling like he'd be sick if he opened his mouth. "Right, well, I'm the NA sponsor Mr. Akinade, you can go ahead and come in, everyone else should be showing up here soon."

Josh immediately followed Mr. Akinade inside, Tyler hanging back to finish his cigarette. The curly haired man heard the sound of Tyler's quiet voice offering him another apology, but he just kept walking, trying to tune him out. He couldn't fucking wait to get out of here.