A Very Cambridge Drug Deal

I’m no stranger to drugs.

Not that we’re close friends. More like acquaintances. The kind of friend you bump into at Fez, spend some time with then never see again.

I had never met a real drug dealer until a few weeks ago. Instead, I had a friend who’d not only pick up the lovely drugs from the scary person but kindly wrap them up in cigarette paper for me to swallow.

Our artist’s impression of the lesser spotted ‘dealer’

Kings Mingle was coming up: I knew most of my friends would be off their tits on MDMA, and I wanted to be too. Unfortunately, I hadn’t really worked out how I was to achieve this dream. I asked around but, surprise surprise, nobody had anything going spare.

Instead, I was given two phone numbers. I literally didn’t have a clue what to do with them so I texted the first quite straightforwardly ‘Can I pick up some MD tonight?’. He replied with ‘Out’ and ‘Please don’t be so obvious next time x’ – I thought the kiss was generous.

Is this real life? x

The second number proved more successful and he asked if I could come to the train station. I jumped on my bike and was there in twenty minutes. Unfortunately, he was not: the glamour of the drug deal started to wear off as he took his sweet time. He then told me to go to a street close to the train station.

Unfortunately, this is where things started to get messy. I couldn’t find the street so just wandered aimlessly round the backwaters of Cambridge (which are, on consideration, still pretty nice). Finally, my phone started to buzz – it was him. Finally, I was talking to a drug dealer.

‘Hey man, where are you?’ said the drug dealer.

‘I think I’m here..?’. At that point my phone died.

Damn, my phone’s gone flat. Guess I’ve have to buy a new one…

Maybe any sensible person would have admitted defeat at this point, but I really didn’t want to go to this party sober. Yeah, I know you don’t need drugs to have a good time but, let’s face it, they help.

Anyway, at this point I started to panic. Every person I walked past was suddenly my drug dealer: I approached them and tried to make suspicious eye-contact with them. If they responded, I’d ask ‘Are you Stephen?’(apparently the man’s name). Of course, none of them were.

Miraculously, my phone recovered enough for me to have a five second phone call with Stephen before dying again. This happened twice more and I could tell he was starting to get annoyed.

Excellent question

At last, I found a guy smoking on a bench with headphones in. Perfect.

‘Are you Stephen?’.

I maintain that at this point he said ‘Yes.’

So I sat down next to him. He didn’t say anything, so I tentatively asked ‘… so it’s a half, yeh?’. He looked quite shocked and then said ‘I’m not Stephen.’

By this point it had been at least twenty minutes and I had burnt through four cigarettes so my lungs were a bit worse for wear. Just as I was walking down the street one last time looking panicked (and probably like I needed drugs) a man shouted my name. It was Stephen. He was actually much less pissed off than I thought he was, though I was already gushing my apologies.

He told me I ‘had the worst phone in the world’ to which I thought the appropriate response was ‘I’m getting a new one for my birthday’. I gave him money, he gave me a little baggy of drugs and we parted ways. I thought he was a very nice man, which is a shame because the MD was shit.

So remember kids, don’t do drugs, not just because they’re bad for you, but because they’ll waste your time and make you look silly.