Continued from last months issue. To read the first part of Drowning in a Pool of Shadows please, click here



The next hour is somewhat of a blur. I remember sitting in the studio and feeling completely alone. For all I knew Jeff and Kevin could've been trying to communicate with me the entire time but I was oblivious to everything going on. I felt and heard the music but that's about the only thing I could recognize. I guess it was about this time that I threw up for the first time. The first place I remember getting sick was in the studio itself. After was done throwing up I immediately staggered outside to get some fresh air. This was the first time I noticed how badly I was hallucinating. I had never seen things this way. I was unable to comprehend what was going on. It was very hard to explain what I was seeing so I'll explain it through my friend Jeff's eyes. In as bad of shape as I was in, Jeff was in much worse. After I excused myself to the restroom to throw up again I came back to find Jeff and Kevin leaning up against a wall outside of the studio. Kevin asked me how I was handling everything. I said I was in pretty bad shape. Jeff, however, was pre-occupied having a conversation with a beautiful blond., as he put it. The funny thing is that neither Kevin or I saw anyone there with him. Jeff was having a conversation with a beautiful, blond figment of his imagination. This kind of freaked Kevin and I out because we couldn't get threw to Jeff that no one was there with him. So, we just ended up leaving him alone.

Some more time went by and I still had no clue what was going on around me. I started feeling worse and worse. I told Kevin that I wanted to get the hell out of there. Kevin's house was closer to where we were than mine so we decided to go there. It took a little while to pull Jeff away from figment but we managed.

When we got to my car I told Kevin that he needed to drive. This coming from a guy who was known for driving under any circumstance. This time, however, I knew I was in way over my head. Me driving us would have been suicide.

I only remember a few things about the drive back to Kevin's house. I remember Jeff babbling on about how he could've brought that girl back home with us. And, I also remember trying to roll the window down because I felt like I was going to throw up........not being able to hold it in long enough.......then throwing up half in and out of the car. I'm assuming I went into some sort of blackout after that because my next memory is waking up in Kevin's room.

After I realized where I was I went into the garage where I knew they would be. I went into the garage to find both of them sitting in a pair of lawn chairs. Kevin looked and seemed fine but Jeff was still in never-never land. I felt a heck of a lot better but was in no way close to normal yet. I could still feel the ecstasy and my vision was still messed up.

Kevin pulled me aside and told me some disturbing things that Jeff had been doing. He said Jeff kept asking him who the old lady standing in the bathroom window was. The thing about that is we were the only ones at Kevin's house. His parents weren't there. Whatever those pills did to me was nothing like the effect they had on Jeff.

It was around 7:30am now and the three of us were just sitting around smoking pot and listening to music. My friend Schuyler only lived a few miles away from Kevins house so I thought we should switch locations and go over there.

We showed up at Schulyers guard gate buzzing to get in around 8:00am. The thought that Schulyer would be sound asleep at 8:00am on a Sunday morning never entered my head. The three of us were all to fucked up to think of such things. Rational thought was non-existent.

Schulyer answered the door with sleep in one eye and confusion in the other. After I received an ear full for coming there so early on his day off I began to tell him what had happened to us the night before. Schuyler had done "E" a couple of times before but had never gone through what we went through on this trip. This made it very hard for him to sympathize with us.

When Schuyler finally had his wits about him he took the three of us into his room to smoke more pot. After passing the bong around several times, Schuyler and I began discussing the happenings of the previous night once again. He couldn't believe what happened to Jeff and I. He was laughing at how I was describing mine and Jeffs hallucinations. Right in the middle of our conversation we heard a loud crash in his room. Jeff had fallen over backwards, fainting into Schuylers DirectTV satellite dish. He then struggled to get up and once again fell backwards into Schulyers wall, tearing down a "Scarface" poster. This all happened so fast none of us had time to react. After Jeff hit the poster Kevin hopped up and grabbed Jeff and put him safely on the bed out of harms way. None of us knew what to say. After a moment of silence Jeff turned to us and said, "what just happened?" Before Kevin or I could answer Schuyler jumped in and said, "you just broke my fucking satellite dish, that's what happened." Even though Jeffs eyes were open the entire time he was crashing into shit all over Schuylers room I believe Jeff wasn't aware of anything that happened. The look in his eyes wasn't that of an aware person. It was the look of lost confusion. He had no control over anything. He was blacked out.

I asked Jeff if he was alright. Instead of answering me he sat there shaking uncontrollably. I decided to leave him alone after that. No point in pushing the envelope any further. The previous night had obviously taken it's toll on him.

After smoking pot for another fifteen minutes or so I felt sober enough to drive my own car home. Yes, I just said I felt sober after smoking more pot. Don't ask me how my body used to work. I don't really know how to explain it. All I can say is sometimes while on drugs you need other drugs to even things out. To balance the equation.

After we said our much needed and wanted goodbyes to Schuyler we were off to go back to my house. Even while driving back I noticed that Jeffs hands were still shaking very badly. It wasn't easy making conversation with him. The only thing he kept saying was, "what happened at Schuylers?" We would tell him and he'd freak out even more because he couldn't remember any of it.

When we finally made it back to my place all three of us were mentally and physically exhausted. The only comforting thought we had was knowing we were back in our safe zone. My apartment had never looked or felt so good before.

We spent the rest of the day and night watching TV and discussing the night before. Jeff, although still shaken, was starting to come around at this point. The whole experience scared the shit out of him . He never did ecstasy again.