My father insisted I eat red meat. 'You'll lose your brain without food,' he said. A meal to him without beef was starvation.

His presence suddenly made things feel off-kilter, gorgeous as if being crushed in lush velvet while cascading off the edge of a cliff.

I thought he had come to save my life.

We both knew no bounds to our escapism.

I knew beauty for me would only ever be derived from loss.

I asked the boy who wept what it felt like, crystal meth, the prettiest name for a drug besides heroin. Crystal methamphetamine. His head fell back. He closed his eyes, then opened them. 'Come on, you know . . . you're just high as fuck.' Then in a dramatic whisper: 'Everything goes silent like a midnight of the mind.