ADDICTED

▸ FILE NOTES

The prescription was written in 1996. The doctor was a man you saw three times before he retired. His successor renewed it without examination. So did her successor.

You are now thirty-two years old and the second drawer of your nightstand contains nine bottles, only one of which you started. The others are receipts. They are documentation. They are, technically, evidence.

The compound itself is straightforward — dextroamphetamine sulfate and saccharate, amphetamine aspartate and sulfate, in proportions whose precision implies a chemistry that was not actually doing the work. The work was done by the prescription. The work was done by the appointment. The work was done by the file.

You are not addicted to the molecule. You are addicted to the legitimacy. You are addicted to the slip of paper that says: at the recommendation of a licensed physician.

The shirt prints the label of the apparatus, so the apparatus reads as the punchline.