Cold Turkey

Howard raised the hammer above his head to smash the disc on the unstable workbench. Too many days had been wasted; too many guilt ridden, sleepless nights spent alienated from his wife. With this final decisive action his life would change, he would salvage all the ambition that was lost when he bought this home wrecking disc on that vulnerable night. With the band saw, shovel, lawnmower, and weed-whacker as his witnesses, he stretched his arm as far as his tendons would allow above his head and slammed the hammer into the plastic disc. Pieces of it sprung to life and ricocheted off his cheek. He hit the disc again until it was impossible to salvage. The hammer rose and fell again and again until it hit nothing but plastic debris and the top of the workbench. The hammer finally dropped to the cement floor from his loosened hand. He wiped his forehead with his shirt and forced a stuttered sigh. It was finished.

Howard’s addiction started as an innocent hobby, as most do. When he first bought the disc he felt like an adolescent boy again, exhilarated with anticipation. It only took a week of stealing precious moments day after day until his desire took control. A couple quiet minutes here and there turned into hours. Then, as his obsession took root, it turned into a race between him and the clock. Every night he began longing for Brenda to go to sleep early so he could creep from the couch to the chair in front of the computer. Slowly, carefully, he would push the power button while covering the speaker to mute the clicks and tune of the computer loading. It always seemed to resonate inside the house at nosebleed volume. He would sit glued to that computer and only looked at the time when he heard a small creak in the floorboards upstairs.

He was mesmerized by the sounds that came out of the computer speakers, which were turned down so he had to bend uncomfortably over the desk to hear. He was charmed by the sight of bodies thrashing against each other, sometimes in violence, and for what seemed like only a short time. He was fascinated by how the images moved. He couldn't tear his eyes away from the screen for even a second just in case he would miss something. He was sick, obsessed, demented with the need to watch and interact with it. It overtook him. He was a slave to it.

Bedtime for Howard got pushed back every night until 2, maybe 3 o’clock in the morning. Every night his willpower weakened. It became harder and harder for him to log off the computer and tiptoe upstairs to his bedroom.

As his nights became longer, his addiction became more obvious. Of course Brenda knew what time it was when he finally slipped into bed he would think to himself. She was probably awake the whole time, kneeling on the floor with her ear pressed to the carpet, listening with heart-pounding misery. Sometimes an incoherent mumble would pass her lips, a sure sign she was only half asleep.
Brenda was a nurse and would always wake up early in the morning for work. He used to wake up with her to see her off, but stopped after he began staying up so late. He would still wake up every morning out of habit, but now, instead of a kiss, he feigned sleep. He hid from her knowing looks and concerned eyebrows underneath the protection of the comforter.

All hobbies start out harmlessly at first; they become destructive only when they cease to be relaxing and turn into what seems like the only source of happiness. Because his sleep was cut short his days became shorter. They were filled with blank looks and incomplete sentences that were concealed only slightly by energy drinks. Classes seemed to drag on and his days off were spent at home with that mind-numbing disk. Instead of researching his thesis topic, his time was occupied by more pressing matters of self-indulgence. His neglect of normal life began to show and Brenda started taking note when she came home from work each day. Their conversations turned into fights; their favorite television shows turned into much needed breaks in their arguments. They eventually stopped talking to each other almost completely. Howard could never concentrate on anything other than that disc feeding information into the computer on that desk while he sat in that chair with his hand clicking that mouse. And he imagined Brenda upstairs sound asleep.

The awkwardness between them continued to grow until, finally, she confronted him during a commercial break while watching CSI: Miami.

“I know what you do every night,” she said.

His heart froze.

“I hear it through the floor. It’s not that thick, you know.”

He stopped thinking about the disc. What disc?

She continued, “I really think it’s becoming a problem. You never come to sleep anymore. All we do is sit and watch TV and eat nachos. We don’t even talk. What kind of marriage is that?" A forensic montage with electronic sincopated music broke her concentration.

"I’m just worried about you. You are neglecting more important things.”

She stopped talking again to watch a commercial that usually made her laugh. This time it wasn’t funny.

“I think you need to break it and throw it away or something, so it’s not a temptation for you anymore.”

She was right. If it came down to that disc or their happiness he knew what he had to do. He had to destroy it. He walked down the stairway to his basement the next day. He knew it was an obscene addiction and he knew it had come between him and Brenda. It was time to be rid of it once and for all, cold turkey. With determination and a new sense of clarity he grabbed the hammer, set the computer game on the workbench, and closed the door.