The Lure Of The Powder

Heroin, Arjun Nath says, in his compelling book White Magic: A Story of Heartbreak, Hard Drugs and Hope, is a coldhearted bitch in a business suit. From chasing her for the first time to hopping rehabs across cities, Nath bares it all.

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If drugs were people you met at a party, ganja and hashish would be the middle-aged guys in dirt starched jeans sitting on the terrace strumming a guitar. They would say things like 'dude, check out the moon' a lot. Acid would be the amateur DJ mixing Buddha Bar and Ibiza trance, trying to catch all the pretty colors drifting from the sound speakers. Ecstasy the young girl touching herself, touching everybody, touching the walls,making love to the world... And heroin. She’s the bitch in the corner, man, just an ageless coldhearted bitch in a business suit. Billy Joel wrote a song about her. Nine years it’s been since I strolled down Water field Road in Bandra to buy a fifty-rupee baggie of weed from The Angel. It had been a hard week at work. I could think of no better wind down than smoking a joint or two, maybe watch a movie with my flat mate. I found Ali, the guy I got my stuff from, squatting under a makeshift tent on the sidewalk. That day he was fiddling around with some strips of aluminum foil, seeming not to feel the wax dripping on his hand from the clutched stub of a candle. I edged nearer for a look and Ali jerked around. In the flickering shadows thrown by the open flame, his wisps of white hair and broken teeth and his jaundiced, staring eyes made him look like a mad person. ‘Salaam, Ali. What’s that?’ I pointed to the gooey dark stuff on the foil. ‘Nothing.’ The foil disappeared under his lap. ‘It is nothing. How much ganja you –’ ‘Tired of smoking that shit. I want what you’re having,’ I said, pulling out a new brushed-leather wallet from the back pocket of my tailored work trousers. Ali stared at my wallet, the gray skin of his face wrapped taut around the bones beneath. Then he shook his head and the tension drained from him ‘Brother, this is brown sugar. You ever hear of smack? The shaitan! It is not for people like you. Go home.&rsquo