The day Elio moved in, I splurged on a dozen sunflowers to brighten up what I could now start calling our apartment. I explained to Elio that when Paul Gauguin moved into their shared house in Arles, France, Vincent van Gogh painted a series of sunflowers as a means of welcoming Gauguin to what Van Gogh hoped would become an artist’s paradise. I didn’t have time to create a series of painted sunflowers, so I just bought some instead. Elio thought it was beautiful and sweet. His whole face lit up as though it were a blooming sunflower.

“Does this make you my Vincent?’ he asked.

I exploded with elation. “His Vincent,” I thought as my whole body inflated with an increased sense of self-worth. “His Vincent.” Being compared to Van Gogh was possibly the greatest compliment I had ever received as an artist and a person, so I couldn’t help but beam with pride as I let the statement “His Vincent” repeat itself over and over in the serotonin-flooded chambers of my brain.

The presence of those sunflowers would remain the only real constant in our daily lives, as our living arrangements proved to be very erratic. Elio’s internship required him to fill in for any position the film crew needed. So, at any given time, he might be working as a camera operator, a cast extra, or simply as an errand boy. It all ultimately depended on the needs of the film and the filmmakers. Therefore, he would be called in to work when necessary and be expected to immediately respond.

For my part, I never kept a consistent work schedule. I always allowed inspiration to overtake me and guide my actions until that inspiration had achieved its successful completion. As such, I would often begin a painting in the early evening and work on it until the morning of the next day.

In a way, this arrangement worked quite perfectly. While unpredictable, our drug-induced states of insomnia proved to be beneficial for my artistic pursuits. After a few lines of coke and the downing of a few stiff drinks, Elio would begin posing for me. I would dress him in costumes I had cobbled together from old clothes and tacky jewelry I’d found at local thrift stores. I felt like Henri Matisse when he painted his series of odalisques as I rapidly produced sketch after sketch of Elio’s beautiful, elegantly posed body. After I had completed these sketches, we would make love till our bodies dripped sweat and our hearts forcefully pounded from exhaustion. When we were done, we would snuggle together in a tight, passionate embrace, like a male version of Gustave Courbet’s erotically charged painting Sleep.

And somehow, through all this creatively created chaos, the dozen sunflowers I bought continued to grow and spread their warmth across every moment that amounted to the totality of my time with Elio.

By the end of our second week living together, Elio had finally secured a weekend off. By sheer coincidence, a punk band from out East, that Elio was a big fan of, was headlining a show in a city three hours south. Itching for a chance to experience more of the province, Elio begged me to take him to see the band’s performance. Always willing to discover new music, and excited at the prospect of a road trip with my new boyfriend, I eagerly agreed.

My parents kept a spare car on hand, which they let me borrow when I needed. I picked it up the Friday before the show, and Elio and I spent the afternoon throwing together some basic supplies and cruising around the city gathering as much drugs as we could find and afford. Upon moving in together, we agreed that I would cover the cost of rent while Elio would cover the cost of our drug supply. While this would seemingly have left my addictions at the mercy of Elio’s whim, I found I could easily manipulate him into buying whatever I wanted. All it took was a few well-placed hands, a pouty smile, and a pleading “Please?” for him to instantly give in.

Using this technique, I was able to convince him to buy a small amount of crystal meth. This was a drug I did very rarely but preferred for road trips due to its long-lasting effects and my ability, with a great deal of willpower, to avoid its chronic use. While Elio had experimented with speed, he was reluctant to purchase it as he was fully aware of his own ability to become a habitual user of the substance.

After a seductive upper thigh massage and a gentle fondling of his genitals, Elio agreed to buy the drug on the condition that I alone smoked it and never allowed him to partake of a single hit, to which I graciously complied.

Following an inebriated, broken night’s sleep, we commenced our journey at nine o’clock Saturday morning. The beginning of the trip was spent in total silence, as Elio focused his attention on analyzing the multitude of city structures that revealed themselves as new to him, while I sipped coffee and tried to remain entertained by the road. It didn’t help that above us loomed an expanse of dark gray clouds, each threatening to pour a shower of rain, which added a somber feel to the start of our trip.

Upon leaving the city limits and entering a stretch of highway I knew from experience was never patrolled by the police, I reached into my coat pocket, handed Elio a glass pipe, and told him to pack it full of speed. After doing so, he betrayed his own prohibition as he took a long hit and passed the pipe to me, explaining how to best smoke drugs while driving. I grabbed the pipe and inhaled the burning chemicals as I steadied my body to perfectly propel the car forward.

“You’ve done this before, haven’t you?” Elio asked as he held the burning lighter below the melting crystals and watched me continue driving while slowly sucking up the ensuing cloud of intoxicating smoke.

“Yup,” I quipped as I exhaled and quickly gripped my hands on the steering wheel to avoid the possible swerving suspicion that would betray my false sobriety.

We finished smoking just as we approached a town located half-way between the province’s two main cities, which served as a resting and refueling station for bored travellers. Desperately needing to urinate, I veered the car to the edge of the highway’s right-hand lane and progressively slowed the car’s speed until I had successfully parked across from a nationally renowned coffee shop.

“What are we doing here?” Elio asked as he undid his seatbelt.

“I gotta piss and I need another coffee,” I replied as I quickly slipped off my own seatbelt.

Almost simultaneously, Elio and I stepped out of the car and slammed our respective doors. As I glanced at him through my sun-glassed vision, I saw him looking at me with a delirious smile.

“What are you smiling at?” I asked playfully.

“You!" he replied. "The way you do everything with a deserved confidence that betrays the edge of your appearance. I mean, you have this petite frame but this larger-than-life attitude that you seem to have turned into a never-ending live performance.”

I blushed and brushed the hair away from my face with my right hand.

“Like right there,” Elio stated as he pointed at me. “It’s like you’re striking a pose with every subtle gesture you make. Like the world is a runway and you’re this effortless fashion model. I mean, you don’t even have to try to look good, you just do!”

I tried to fight back the huge smirk forcing itself across my face, but I couldn’t. No one had ever paid me such a generous compliment before, and I was both embarrassed and elated. “Come on,” I said as I nodded my head towards the coffee shop’s entrance, “let’s go inside.”

I exited the bathroom and found Elio already sitting at a table, chowing down on a ham and cheese sandwich. “I got you a coffee and a bagel,” he said as I took the seat across from him. “Plain, with just a bit of butter because I figured you wouldn’t want cream cheese.”

“Thanks,” I muttered, trying desperately to hide my resentment at Elio having purchased food for me. I took a sip from my extra-large coffee and stared disgustedly at the bagel.

“Come on, dude, eat it,” Elio prodded. “It’s been, like, two days since you ate anything.”

I flicked the bagel a few times with my right index finger and ground my teeth together. “I find it really hard to eat when I’m high,” I hissed as I glared at the tiny plate of food.

“Dude, you’re high, like, all the fucking time,” Elio stated through a mouth-full of sandwich. “You need to eat something! You can’t just survive off of drugs your whole life.”

“I know!” I sharply retorted, my eyes darting towards the dirty coffee shop floor. “I just find eating to be such a chore. I mean, I’d rather live off drugs than live off food.”

“Well, believe me, you can’t,” Elio replied as he wiped a napkin across his mouth. “So, eat something. Now. Okay?” Elio sounded firm as he struggled to grab my gaze.

He reached his hand across the table, gripped my chin, and forced my head upward till my eyes locked onto his. “At least eat half of it, okay?” he said to me, his progressively watering eyes undermining his commanding tone. “Eat half and then we’ll leave. Got it?”

I glared at the lightly buttered bagel and watched as it morphed from a browned circle into a misshapen monster, replete with sharpened teeth, oozing pores, and a toxic green tone. “Eat me if you dare!” it growled at me, though I never saw any indication of a moving mouth amongst its altered form. “Come on, I know you wanna!” I heard it say as an echo reverberating through the back of my brain. I jumped back, unsure if what I had just seen was real or the product of my drug-induced imagination.

“Are you okay?” Elio asked as he placed his hand on my shoulder.

“I’m fine!” I blurted out as I shook his hand away. “I’m just fine! I’m fine with everything! Including eating this bagel!”

“Okay,” he slowly said as he pulled his hand away and went back to holding his sandwich.

I stared suspiciously at the bagel, trying to decide if I should consume it. I felt like everyone’s eyes were on me, demanding that I eat. Especially Elio’s, whose expectant gaze I caught upon a quick glance upwards. I could feel the pressure mounting, like a dark, black void weighing heavy on my shoulders. I wanted to scream. I wanted to cry. But instead, I just sat there, shaking, sweating, and wishing that moment was over.

After what felt like an eternity, where my hand reached and recoiled from the butter-soaked sphere of bread, I resentfully scarfed down Elio’s requested half bagel.

“There, I’m done, let’s go!” I spat as I gulped down the last of my meal, grabbed my coffee, and speed-walked directly out of the coffee shop.

I immediately lit a cigarette as I slid into the car’s driver seat and slammed the door behind me. My anger had cooled considerably once Elio had positioned himself in the passenger seat and gently shut his own car door.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Cut me a line,” I replied as I tilted my sunglasses and slowly surveyed the parking lot.

“Are you sure it’ll be okay?” Elio asked as he scanned the vacant vehicles of the current coffee shop patrons.

“Yeah, yeah, just do it already!” I said with a flippant gesture of my right hand.

Elio quickly cut a long, rough line of coke that I snorted through a hastily rolled up five-dollar bill. The uncrushed shards sliced through my nostrils, driving the drug ever deeper into my bloodstream. I lit another cigarette, then soared out of the parking lot and onto the highway, faster than my drug-addled mind could process.

As we once again reached a stretch of barely policed road, I insisted that we spark a joint. Neither one of us was particularly well-versed at rolling joints, so the first one we smoked was pitiful. It tasted like mostly paper and seemed to contain very little weed. Needless to say, I was disappointed. It wasn’t until the second consecutive joint, which really pushed me over the edge, that I lost myself in the beauty of the everlasting highway.