PART 5:
DEVOURED & DEVOUT
CHAPTER 1
Drugs became my gospel. I didn’t use—I worshipped.
Every dose was a devotion.
Every high, a hallelujah.
I measured powders like sacraments.
Mixed chemicals with reverence.
I was no longer an addict.
I was a priest in a church built on collapse.
Sex and porn became communion.
Not because I wanted love—
but because I wanted proof.
That I existed.
That someone, anyone, could feel me.
But nothing filled the void.
Not fully.
Not forever.
The more I consumed,
the more I was consumed.
Each escape took a piece of me.
My sanity.
My sleep.
My sense of time.
My ability to connect without a hit
or a fix
or a climax.
And the worst part?
I knew what I was doing.
I knew the ritual.
I knew the consequence.
I did it anyway.
CHAPTER 2
I was devout.
And devotion doesn’t stop when it hurts.
It stops when there’s nothing left to offer.
And I was getting there.
Fast.
I stopped recognizing my own reflection.
My voice changed.
My laughter vanished.
My body moved like a puppet held by invisible strings—
jerking between pleasure and panic,
between numb and never enough.
Even Deacon faded in those days.
The memories twisted.
I couldn’t remember his voice.
I imagined him with others,
happier,
free of me.
I mourned a man who wasn’t even dead.
A man I killed,
not with hands—
but with despair.
He became an icon in my cathedral of shame.
And I prayed to him
with every new mistake,
every new indulgence.
Forgive me.
Forgive me.
Forgive me.
But no forgiveness came.
Because forgiveness requires presence.
And I was too far gone to be seen.
CHAPTER 3
So, I kept going.
Deeper into the temple of self-destruction.
Devoured.
And still devout.
…