First day of Secondary School
I was 11, it was the end of my first day of secondary school. I commuted to school from my village on the train with a lot of other kids. Waiting at the station with them, I had a couple of minutes spare, so went to the platform toilet.

I walk in.

There are two men standing in the middle of the large tiled room.

They have belts around their biceps, and hypodermic needles deep in their forearms.

They see me, look straight at me, say 'Shit!' loudly...and turn 45 degrees to the right.

What am I supposed to do? I'm 11, in school uniform, and 2 junkies have just seen me staring at them shooting up, not even in the cubicles (which I presume had blue lights in) but in the middle of the room.

I walked as calmly as I could to the urinals, and pretended to pee for the next minute. I'm standing there assessing the situation, convinced that any second one will come up and grab me, threaten to jab me if I tell anyone.

Instead, laughter: 'He didn't even fucking see me! The little dick didn't even SEE me!' More shrieking laughter. That's right smackie, obviously I didn't see a thing.

I zip up, not having released a drop, and walk out. As I leave the room, I realise that, as I'd entered and witnessed the tableau, I'd nearly said something smart-arsed like 'Jesus guys, put it away'. I am thankful I wasn't that arrogant, even if I was that young.

Yet now I look back and think about how I probably dealt with it much better then than if I had been in that position now.
(Tendency, Fri 15 Feb 2008, 21:49, Reply)