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TROUBLED TIMES

matter; she would wait for me. If it took longer than expected and she couldn't stay in Bolivia, then she would fly over from wherever she was.

Now that I had been sentenced, I was worried that everything would change. For a start, I could no longer pay to go out of the prison because the police considered me a higher escape risk. Also, I had spent my last five thousand dollars on bribing the judge. And any money I did get, I would need to save for my appeal.

Yasheeda had never cared about whether I was rich or not, but being completely poor meant that we wouldn't be able to live like we used to. And the thing that would change most would be me. The whole time I had known her I'd been expecting to get out at any moment, so I had always felt like a free man. But now I wasn't.

I couldn't tell her. I did a line and held the CD case out to her.

'Mmm. Not tonight,' she said, looking at the coke out of the corner of her eye and waving it away. 'I'm tired, honey. Let's just relax and watch some TV.'

'There's nothing on. Come on. Just a little one. It's no fun doing it on my own.'

She looked at the coke again and hesitated. 'No, Tommy. What for? It's a Tuesday night. Let's do something else. We could borrow your friend's video player, like you promised.'

'Fine, then.' I did Yasheeda's line for her. She shook her head and sighed loudly so that I would notice, then went back to watching television.

'What's that supposed to mean?' I could tell that she wanted to start an argument.

'You know exactly what,' she said, trying to change the channel with the remote control, but the batteries were flat.

'What, then? Come on. Tell me.'

Yasheeda sat up in bed and leaned forward to get the remote closer to the TV. She held the button down, waving the control in front of the screen, still refusing to look at me. She always did that when we argued. Finally, she answered.

'Tommy, I love you without the drugs. That's not what I'm here for.'

I wanted to say to her, 'That's good coming from you,' but I held back. We had met in a nightclub taking cocaine. She did it every single time I did. In fact, I had never seen her refuse before. Not once. Instead, I said, 'But we always do it together.'