Most nights, he’d find what he wanted on the streets, money changing hands under lampposts staining the pavement with dirty, mustard yellow pools of cold light. The sellers always asked him what he wanted, greedily eager to provide him with the instant gratification he craved. They did no selling. They did not need to persuade. They simply relied on a punter’s appetite and dished out what was wanted, if they had the cash to fund the transaction. No questions, no warnings, no thought for his wellbeing. What they peddled would do nothing but cause problems for him, sooner or later, but that was not their concern.

He found a bench, barely visible within the murky shadows and luring him to it with the offer of unobserved privacy. He got the stuff into his body with something just short of animal lust. Almost immediately, his foul craving died leaving him if not released from his demons, then ephemerally liberated from their savage appetites. The bag, now empty had no value to him and he absent mindedly crushed it into a crumpled ball, before launching it and the evidence of his cravings, into a nearby bush. Similar bags littered the shrubbery and ground like incongruous snowballs faintly glistening in the weak moonlight.

This new supplier had replaced a previous source. Though fractionally more expensive, he got more for his cash with this guy. Fundamentally, he only exercised any form of preference when he had both the cash and the opportunity to do so. They all sold the same thing and the quality, though never guaranteed, was seldom a distinguishing difference. If it looked pukka, it probably was. At the point of purchase, he did not trouble himself with questions of provenance, or welfare.

The fix began to lose its hold on the rattling chains of his insatiable craving. He debated buying more of the same, but reasoned that this gear was not going to hit the spot. He needed something more. He headed for the arcade, confident that he’d score there. He’d be able to shoot up all he wanted, so long as money allowed. His mind buzzed excitedly at the thought of gaining access to all he desired. The gateway to pleasure was only another tempting transaction away. He checked his pockets for the cash he needed and set off, the adrenalin pumping around his body in pulsating waves.

His habit was taking its toll. Unable to concentrate and always exhausted, his overstimulated mind was holding his body hostage to its desires. He barely slept anymore. When the early morning alarm went off each day, he’d open his sore red eyes and pull the duvet over his throbbing head. If he did arrive, they told him his work was substandard and he was risking being kicked out. He’d been disciplined several times and thrown each one of the official warnings in the bin before leaving.

His dad had moved out years ago, leaving the dingy flat home to just him and his mum. They barely spoke. He came and went as he pleased. She had given up on him a long time ago and prioritised vodka and fags over anything approaching maternal care. He could hear her during the night as she coughed her guts up and lit another cigarette, each not finding sleep for different reasons.

It was eight pm and his mobile erupted into life, its dark screen suddenly bursting with a radiant, harsh light which hurt his sensitive eyes. He squinted at the screen, his vision gradually worsening as a callous consequence of his habit. A group of those he knew were going to meet up and check out the new girl’s place. She’d invited them over, the house all to herself until her Grandad came back from Brighton. He was tempted to join the gathering. She was fit.

He had watched her smoking with the others at lunchtime, watched the way she flirted with anyone who gave her any attention. Watched her take a sip from the flask and hand it back furtively to its owner, laughing nervously at the thought of being caught by those placed in charge. He figured she was easy pickings. She’d only started recently and would be keen to fit in, find new friends and all he’d have to do was be nice. It was a faintly tempting reason to go in, be productive for once, but he had increasingly found more gratifying reasons to stay at home.

His mother would eventually leave the flat. She wrapped the soiled green dressing gown around her gaunt figure and shoved her dirty feet into the shabby pink slippers he’d given to her as a belated birthday present. He heard the door slam behind her, and he waited momentarily in the silence before walking into her dishevelled room. He knew where it was.

Unscrewing the lid off the cracked jam jar, he took two ten-pound notes from the thick bundle, and dipped his greedy fingers back in, taking an additional fiver just because he could. She would never notice. She noticed nothing but the emptiness of a bottle or a cigarette packet. Social Services helped her to keep both grim nightmares at bay.

He glanced around the room, the bedcovers lying on the slimy carpet next to an empty bottle of vodka and a half-eaten takeaway, its gelatinous gravy shimmering in the unforgivingly brutal light coming from the naked bulb dangling plaintively above the bed. A thick pile of brown envelopes sat on the windowsill, their comrades in arms littering the floor below like fallen petals from an ugly, cartoon flower.

He saw a discarded syringe poking out from beneath one of them and wondered if she had injected its contents into her arm, or not. It was empty. What value it had ever had, now discharged and the needle no longer able to offer comfort. He thought about her habit and angrily resented her use of the syringe, contempt building within him, before igniting his own appetite for a release from the fetid reality he knew as life.

He grabbed his keys, stuffed the plastic notes into the back pocket of his grease-smeared jeans, and headed out into the night. Billy would stick to the usual plan. Grab two double cheeseburgers and a portion of fries from the van near the arcade, sit on his favourite bench and hit the arcade after he’d eaten his meal. The arcade’s machines formed their multihued, flashing phalanx in his imagination and its cacophonous allure became irresistible, pulling him seductively into its noisy embrace. He’d stay until they closed… fuck school. He had far better things to do with his life.