Eat sleep rave repeat

I hadn’t been in London that long when I started flyering to pay for the weed I bought from the Somalian shopkeeper on the corner. I was in my early twenties and very naïve. I didn’t mind standing in the West End during the twilight hours in the freezing cold. Stuffing flyers into the hands of ravers gurning with their eyes wide and chaotic as they sauntered out of clubs and into illegal minicabs.

I didn’t mind as I was one of them, choosing to rave on a Sunday daytime at a club under the arches after a breakfast of bananas and a nourishment drink. Emerging from my ecstasy-induced come-down on a Tuesday morning to start the week again.

The night shift was pretty easy, I didn’t need to think, there was no stress. Turn up, get a ride to the location, hand out flyers, get home at six in the morning. Sleep. It suited me as I was living a nocturnal life anyway. I had no responsibilities, no drama, no career path, no destination. I lived for the party and was happy to earn a bit of cash in hand on the side.

There was one particular night when we travelled outside of London to a rave in Brighton. I clambered into the back of a van, no seatbelts - no seats in fact - just seven of us rattling around like snowflakes in a snow globe. I can’t remember if there was much conversation amongst the random group of strangers, I must have been stoned as I was always stoned back then.

I do remember one of my colleagues had obviously dropped an acid tab and started to come up wildly during the bumpy long ride. I witnessed his spiritual climb to a place that none of his fellow passengers went. Fascinated by his face contorting in the shadows with the occasional beam of light from passing cars.

When we got to the rave it felt strange to be outside the city and by the sea. We shuffled about and duly handed out our flyers for a couple of hours. The acid guy still managed to do his job and the driver waited for us in his van, reading the paper and eating wotsits.

Eventually we crawled back into the van for the journey home. This time the acid guy was becoming a nuisance so I pretended to sleep as my buzz was waning and felt tired. We reached West End just as the police pulled us over and I managed to walk away without being cornered. I figured that was the end of my shift tonight.

I walked along Piccadilly and looked for a phone box so I could call my boyfriend. This was the early nineties so there were no mobiles back then. Mindlessly scanning the prostitute cards I put some coins in the slot and dialled. He agreed to come and get me and I waited outside MacDonald’s, watching the nightwalkers glide by.

When he reached me and parked up, we decided to hit a club nearby as there were still a couple of hours left to party. We dropped an E whilst waiting at the bar and I nursed my water bottle, refilling it periodically in the toilets (luckily this club hadn’t turned off the cold water). We danced and bonded with our fellow ravers, everyone smiling and open.

My boyfriend set about his night shift selling vitamin B tablets coated in nail polish remover. I was always amazed at how many people would come back to him for more and shake his hand saying how amazing his pills were.

Whilst dancing by the speaker I saw him get ambushed by two bouncers who roughly dragged him to the exit and turfed him out. I deliberated for a second, wondering if I should just stay, but guilt made me follow him outside. He looked pissed off and complained that another dealer had grassed him up. It was a regular occurrence. We often arrived in a club to be ejected twenty minutes later and visited several in a night.

We called it a night and walked back to the car. As we set off they must have been watching us as a police car screeched up and demanded we pull over. This time I couldn’t escape and we were kept there for a long time whilst they searched us and the car. When they found the pills on him they thought all their Christmases had come at once.

As the sun was starting to make an appearance we trudged into the station and I sat for several hours, waiting in reception. I had nothing on me so I was okay but they took him away to be questioned and sent the pills off to be tested.

I read a magazine that was left, ate a mars bar from the machine, had a weak tea – also from a machine – and eventually he came out looking knackered. “Stupid cunts didn’t believe me they were moodys” he said as we exited into the bright mid-morning.

The car was miles away so we jumped on the tube to collect it and finally got home, too tired for sex. We slept until dinner time, waking up as the darkness was descending again. We watched the news as I heated up some tinned ravioli and made tuna sandwiches. Had a few spliffs with my flat mate and made plans for the evening ahead.

Showering cleared my mind somewhat, I felt a little fuzzy, and after getting ready I went out to catch the tube again for another night of flyering. As I walked to the station I wondered how long we could carry on doing this – living off benefits and cash in hand, taking drugs and raving. My parents had paid a lot of money for me to go to university and I was throwing it down the drain.

Maybe in the morning I would look for a job, a proper job, in a bookshop or an office. Start thinking about where I was heading instead of just existing. Of course I didn’t look for any jobs the next day, or the day after that. I got stoned and dropped a few pills and danced with sweat dripping off the ceiling into my hair.