I was suffering the easily foreseeable consequences. Addiction is the hallmark of every infatuation-based love story. It all begins when the object of your adoration bestows upon you a heady, hallucinogenic dose of something you never dared to admit you wanted-an emotional speedball, perhaps, of thunderous love and roiling excitement. Soon you start craving that intense attention, with a hungry obsession of any junkie. When the drug is withheld, you promptly turn sick, crazy, and depleted (not to mention resentful of the dealer who encouraged this addiction in the first place but now refuses to pony up the good stuff anymoreā despite the fact that you know he has it hidden somewhere, goddamn it, because he used to give it to you for free). Next stage finds you skinny and shaking in a corner, certain only that you would sell your soul or rob your neighbors just to have āthat thingā even one more time. Meanwhile, the object of your adoration has now become repulsed by you. He looks at you like youāre someone heās never met before, much less someone he once loved with high passion. The irony is, you can hardly blame him. I mean, check yourself out. Youāre a pathetic mess, unrecognizable even to your own eyes. So thatās it. You have now reached infatuationās final destinationā the complete and merciless devaluation of self.
