Addicts sat huddled in the church hall, sucking down bitter black coffee and sniffing their fingertips for that lovely lingering tobacco aroma. They do say people swap their addictions when their usual drug of choice is denied.

"Now we're going to commence a three minute mediation, if you do not wish to partake in this please exit the room quietly," the man running the NA meeting said, the squeaking of chairs commenced as some of them silently slithered out.

Stepping out into the biting cold the addicts once again congregated into a huddled mass to preserve body hit amidst the spitting icy rain, all flicking a lighter's flame onto the cigarettes that dangled from their dry, cracked lips.

"I really liked your share," a man said, eyeing the woman, caught under the dim glow of the streetlight her nose ring twinkled and eyebrow piercing glistened.

"Thank you," she beamed a welcoming smile.

Suddenly the man found himself unable to reciprocate the smile, his shoulders dropped as a heavy sigh escaped his lips, "I feel like I'm gonna relapse tonight," he admitted, his eyes too ashamed to meet those hauntingly piercing pools of baby blue as he instead fixated on the concrete, "can you come back with me and keep me sober?" he asked, quiet desperation straining his voice.

"Of course," she obliged with kindness.

"It's just a small little place scraped together by a housing association," he said as he started to walk to his car, the woman following after him like a lost puppy, bounding with enthusiasm.

"No freezer, no microwave and no oven but I can't complain," he said as he strolled round to the front passenger door, opening it for her, she said a quick thank you and sat inside, "it's a nice cosy little place, I've made it look quite the quirky place," he said, a proud glimmer shining his eyes as he shut the door.

"What like lava lamps and stuff?" she asked as he got in the driver's seat.

"Noooo," he gushed, "good guess, but no, so no!" he chuckled as he started up the car, rolling down the window so he could ash his cigarette.

"I've got a bunch of guitars hanging on the walls from when I used to be a guitarist in this band, promise me you won't laugh at their name?" he asked, glancing over to her with urgency, watching her face carefully.

"I'm not promising anything," she laughed, a wryly humour ringing in his words, the car passed underneath streetlights and illuminated her face in a jaundice glow, however he couldn't help but admire her plump lips coated in crimson lipstick, and her wide doe eyes the colour of hot chocolate on a cold winter night. She radiated a beauty he couldn't help but he intrigued by.

"I guess that's as good as I'm gonna get, okay, so they were called Jelly Baby Abortion," he said, a nervous laughter spewing from his lips.

"N'aww cute but creepy, it's kinda nice, I can vibe with it," she answered, laughing along with him which instantly made the tension in his shoulders drop.

"You'll have to play me a song on your guitar when we get there," she said, "all I remember about guitars is that there's a g string."

"You any good at fingering the g string?" she questioned, raising an expectant eyebrow.

"Some say I am," he laughed, his pierced eyebrow quirked back at her slightly as he attempted to read her expression. It was light and carefree, playful like a puppy but it seemed to almost be teasing, wanting to bring something out of him. It was faintly seductive, the smug smirk that played across her lips seemed to hint at a sultriness. Perhaps he had a shot?

But first, he had to play his cards right.

"Do you wanna be a groupie for the lead guitarist of sensational sludge metal band Jelly Baby Abortion?" he asked, his eyes remained locked on the door as he swerved round a roundabout, quickly darting over to her for just a millisecond to see a delighted expression that immediately relieved him.

"Maybe," she said, dragging out the word to emphasise it, the word seemed to slither around in the car, filling it with razor thin sexual tension.

His eyes slid over to glance at her, a smug tugging at the corners of his lips as he wagged his eyebrows at her, he caught sight of crystal earrings that reflected the streetlights, he slowly lifted his hand to play with the dangling crystals, "care to explain these?" he asked, holding the crystal in his hand, allowing his knuckles to graze the smooth skin of her cheek.

"They're rose quartz, they help with peace and healing," she explained, smiling softly at him as he dropped the crystal, nodding, allowing his fingers to fall across the side of her face, his palm stroking along her jawline for a brief moment.

"Crystals are my new addiction, no joke," she explained, "they're my higher power."

"Nice," he said, "beautiful crystals for a beautiful lady," he commented, she rolled her eyes.

"I'm not beautiful," she confessed, her eyes falling down to stare at the floor as a rose colour deepened on her cheeks.

"You are," he cooed, flashing her a smile.

"Fine," she grumbled, forcing a smile back at him.

"So," he started, eyeing her with intrigue, "are you a sponsor?" he asked as they pulled up at red lights, the streetlights twinkled on the rain splattered glass.

"No, no way," she laughed, "not ready for responsibility like that," she explained, he chuckled along with her, before edging his hand closer to her.

"What's triggered you to want to relapse?" she asked, glancing over to him with eyes that bled concern yet were eager to help.

"Life's just been getting on top of me, I just wanna take more olanzapine and pregabalin than I should, mix it with opiates and some nice vodka," he said, a small smile creeping onto his lips as he imagined the high, craving it so hard he could taste the vinegar smoke of heroin and the stinging burn of straight vodka.

"What's been getting on top of you specifically?" she questioned. I'd like you to get on top of me, he thought to himself, biting back a smile that was desperate to burst out.

"I dunno," he sighed, running a hand through his unwashed and greasy mop of hair as the lights went green, the car growled as he started down the road to his house, "just everything," he explained.

"I haven't been long out of a psychiatric ward, real life is scaring the shit outta me," he said, "I mean on the ward you have staff there twenty four seven, here there's just...just no one," he said, looking to her with desperation, she met his calamity with serenity, her expression soothing and comforting.

She slid her hand over to his and he held the steering wheel, giving it a gentle squeeze, "I'm here," she stated, stooping her head slightly as her eyebrows knitted with worry, a small smile played across her lips, one that attempted to tease a smile from him.

The smallest of smiles flickered across his lips before extinguishing entirely, his eyes burned as they welled up with tears, "y'know I was cutting myself yesterday, with this scalpel, anyway, the whole time I was willing myself to cut deeper and just end it," he confessed, an aching weariness lingered in his voice, "I wish I could've been strong enough to do it, it's just another thing I failed at."

Her hand moved up to hold the ends of his sleeves, inch by inch she peeled them back to reveal huge, gnarled scabs that looked sickly under the yellow glow of streetlights, the sight caused her breath to hitch in her throat, as the car rolled along they were plunged back into darkness once again. 

"It's not a failure, you stayed alive," she stated, her tone matter of fact, "sometimes surviving is the bravest thing you can do" she said, wiping the budding tears from his eyes and reaching over to embrace him in a massive, tight hug of warm-heartedness.

"I know," he said as he drove the car into his space, pulling up directly outside of his front door, "it's just difficult to remember that, especially when I don't feel strong."

"Hey," she said as he switched the car off, reaching out to hold his jaw and gently turning it to face her, she stared deep into his eyes with an expression that forceful and determined, "look, I promise you this, you're a fighter-if you weren't you wouldn't be here, and you wouldn't of asked me to keep you from relapsing, as of right now you've survived every day, everything life has thrown at you you've taken it and survived."

"And sometimes surviving isn't pretty, but to thrive first you have to learn to survive," she explained, a small smile twitching across her lips as she took in the same smile on his lips, "every flower must grow through dirt in order to blossom, remember that one," she said, getting out the car and loudly slamming the car door shut so hard the vehicle shuddered.

He got out of the car, looking to her with shocked surprise, "fucking hell, you trying to break my car or something?" he asked, she giggled.

"Nah, that's just how I close all car doors," she said, flashing him a warm smile that lit up her face to allowed her natural beauty to shine as her hair whipped wildly around in the brisk, biting winds.

"At least I know it's definitely closed," he chuckled, fiddling in his pockets to pull out his house keys, they jingled as he inserted them in the lock and twisted, stepping inside and out of the cold and the rain.

The woman entered behind him, taking off her shoes and leaving them by the door.

"Wanna drink?" he asked as she observed the room, it was a kitchen and living room combined, the kitchen was made with glossy blacktops and the living room had a lovely and inviting looking carpet.

"You know I can't drink," she said, snapping out of her ogling.

"No, I mean like water," he said, laughing.

"Oh, then yeah sure I'll just have a glass of water," she said, he nodded and began to search through the cabinets for a glass.

"Y'know every time I ask for a drink of water I always think of when I asked my little brother for some water when we were kids," she started, shaking her head at the stupidity of her story before continuing, "and he gave me a glass of half hot and half cold water, saying it was a cocktail," she laughed, he laughed along with her as he poured her a glass of tap water.

"Promise this one isn't one of your brother's cocktails," he said, a warm smile enveloping his face.

"You promised me you'd play me some of your songs on guitar! You gotta do it!" she exclaimed suddenly.

"Okay, okay," he said, taking a guitar from all the wall and sitting down, cradling it slightly in his arms.

He played through riffs and intros and verses and choruses, amazing her with his dexterity. Her mind wandered, to a secret and dirty place, wandering how good he would be at fingering her, if he was this good at fingering the guitar.

And when he was done he took a bow and she clapped her heart out for him, whistling for him.

"Encore! Encore!" she yelled excitedly.

"No, no, I'm sorry my adoring fan but alas I have exhausted myself," he laughed as she continued to clap.

As she clapped for him her hand accidentally knocked against her half empty glass, sending its contents splashing across her top and leggings, "oh no!" she exclaimed.

"Don't worry," he said, picking up the glass, "it's not that bad," he said.

"Let me go to the toilet for a second," she said, "where is it?" she asked, he pointed to a door on the left and she quickly entered in a flustered state.

After a minute had passed he went up to the locked door, "everything alright in there?" he asked, he could hear a fumbling sound from inside the walls of his toilet.

"Yeah, just gimme a second!" she yelled back.

Inside she stood nude, apart from a lacy black bra and a tight thong, her soaked clothes on the floor, she stood staring at her reflection in the mirror as she hurriedly reapplied her thick coat of crimson lipstick, the colour the same as the man's deep scabs.

"Right, what are you gonna say to him?" she asked her reflection in a hushed whisper, she put away her lipstick and frantically combed her hair so it cascaded over her chest, glossy and smooth as a waterfall, "what if he's not into it?" she asked, sorry creeping into her voice.

She remembered back to when she got her twenty one day chip, how the fog of narcotic withdrawals had freshly bleed out of her system and once again she felt alive-she craved life, and went off the rails into sex addiction to get a new high. She slept around so much it would make a rabbit blush. Surely he wouldn't turn her down? All addicts' libidos came back with a vengeance after they were a ways into their sobriety.

"If it's not then just put on your clothes and never go back to an NA meeting for as long as you live in case you bump into him," she giggled at the absurdity of her thought, she had to. Always better to laugh than to cry, as her grandmother always said.

She pulled a seductive pout at the mirror, her eyes were ignited with passion in the midst of her smouldering eye makeup, "my clothes aren't the only things that are wet,"

"I had to take off my clothes because they got wet...now something else is wet, care to guess what's wet now?" she asked, putting on a low and gravelly voice that bled eroticism. 

"I'm still wet for you," she said, running a finger down her chest.

"No, damnit, not clever enough," she snapped, her hands curling into fists as a sharp sigh spilled from her lips.

"Just be natural," she said, looking to her worried reflection to search it for any trace of reassurance-there was just a meagre glimmer that sparkled in the deep pools her pine green eyes.

"You okay?" he called through the barrier of a toilet door.

"Yeah, one second," she said, placing her hand on the door knob and feeling its smooth coolness, allowing it to let her muscles to unwind and breathing to slow to a calm, rhythmic pace.

"I was all wet," she breathed, taking in his expression of total stupefaction.

"So I had to take my clothes off," she whispered, playing with the strap of her bra.

"Wanna help me take the rest of them off? Because you're making me so wet right now," she asked, quickly raising a perfectly plucked eyebrow.

He nodded, gulping, as a grin of disbelief smeared across his face as he drank in the sight of her. Her luscious, sensual curves all wrapped up in delicate, see through laces.

He took her hand and led her upstairs, first her bra dropped on the staircase, within the padding of her bra a small gem sparkled, purple and white, he looked to it with confusion, the brilliance of it shining in the corner of his eye.

"That's my amethyst crystal," she explained, he nodded, "supposed to help addiction," she shrugged as he placed wet kisses on her neck.

"Guess what's getting to be as hard as one of those crystals?" he asked, she rolled her eyes as a giggle ushered from her lips.

"Cheeky," she reprimanded him.

"Wanna search your bedroom for relapse triggers?" she said, a sultry smirk overcoming her features as she leaned up to kiss his rough lips.

"Yes," he played along, "especially the bed," he humoured her.

"How long do you think it'll take?" she asked.

"About two minutes," he said, she raised an eyebrow as her face dropped in disappointment.

"Just kidding!" he exclaimed, kissing her softly, "it'll take as long as you need," he said, leading her into the bedroom where they collapsed onto his mattress, tongues entangling and bodies entwining in a heated wave of passion.