Just One More Hit
Twilight Sparkle is an addict. But in the wake of scrupulous crack-downs and bans, she has to turn to unsavory sources to get her fix. It’s fine. Just this once. After that, she’ll be done.
She knew from the start that it was a bad idea to come alone. Loitering around a waxed and polished red Mercedes-Benz behind her school’s track field, in the empty corner of the parking lot where students once went to smoke or hook up, was a circle of unfamiliar faces in familiar school uniforms.
“About time you showed,” their leader, an unassuming petite girl named Sour Sweet, leaned off her car and stuck her hand out in greeting. “But I don’t know why we had to come to this dump. If you want a hit, my house is the perfect place, I even got a separate rec room too, if you want privacy.”
Whether she was trying to change their deal or just acting sleazy—her calm, aloof tone and confident smirk told Twilight it was a bit of both—she didn’t have the patience to play games with her dealer. Already her body was feeling hollow like the strength had been sapped from her, and the bouts of insomnia, stress, and anxiety had been ill company during her withdrawal. When was her last hit? Three weeks ago? A month? She had endured long enough, she just needed a little bit to wean herself off. Twilight gripped tight the ends of her skirt, wiping away from her palms the cold sweats that came with anticipation. Then, she shook her hand briskly so that he wouldn’t notice her shivering, the summer night was too warm for that, before reaching for her wallet.
She paused before she showed off her cash. “Did you get what I asked for?”
“Don’t freak, I got you.” Her dealer motioned to one of the other Crystal Prep students, a freshman whom Twilight didn’t recognize, to open the trunk of her Mercedes. Immediately, the musk of fresh paper was as if she had walked into a cluttered, overstocked bookstore, making Twilight’s head swirl and her skin itch. She almost reached out and grabbed the product from the trunk, until she took a look at what he was actually selling. Ever since the Grand Censor, she had been desperate to find reading material that wouldn’t bore her half to sleep, even resorting to rereading books three or four times just to remember what it was like to see an original idea. All that was left in the libraries and schools were whatever the Grand Censor thought wouldn’t challenge traditional social norms. Even private books stores, when enough pressure was put on them, gave in and discontinued most of the titles on the Grand Censor’s “prohibited materials” list. But Twilight still wasn’t desperate enough that she didn’t have standards.
“What are these?” she asked, pointing an accusing finger at the books in her dealer’s car. “I wanted to read A Clockwork Orange, not,” Twilight paused and squinted at the bootleg books, doubting if she was even reading them correctly. “The Steampunk Apple? Seriously?”
Sour’s cocky smirk quickly turned into a frown. “Hey now, it wasn’t easy getting a hold of these, you know.” She grabbed the first title off the stack. “Sure, it’s spoofed a little bit, but that’s just to throw off the Censor Police.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t think this is for me,” Twilight said. “I know times are tough with the Censor but your product, it’s contaminated. You understand why I can’t trust this, right?”
Sour Sweet’s fist balled up and her arm trembled. The other students hanging around her seemed to rouse with her frustration, but they stayed in their places, drinking beers on the hood of Sour’s Mercedes and watching for any roaming teachers. “For God’s sake, I didn’t come all this way for you to skip out on me! What’s it going to take to make a sale, huh?” She pushed away the top layer of books to reveal more titles beneath. “Go ahead, name a book, I’ll have something you want.”
“Sour—”
“Don’t give me that, Twilight,” her dealer snapped. “You think it’s easy getting a summer job at the library in this climate? The Censor found yuri manga on our shelves and halved our budget. So. Name. A. Book!”
“Okay, fine!” Twilight surrendered. “Uh, 1984?”
“Ah!” Sour Sweet snapped and brightened with a smile. “Yes! I have that one!”
“You do?” It seemed like an impossibility, but for a moment, Twilight allowed herself to hope. She leaned forward and watched at the bright red cover and large white font seemed to glow under the park lot’s street lamps.
“Holy shit!” She rarely swore, there were so many better words in the English language to use, but this time, Twilight could not contain her excitement. Without asking she pulled the book from Sour Sweet’s hands and opened it up. And there on the first page was the full title of the contents. 1984: A Historical Atlas.
“No,” Twilight whispered, throwing the book back into Sour’s car. “What the hell, do you have any real books? Do you have To Kill A Mockingbird? ”
“I got the next best thing.” Sour Sweet ripped a book from the bottom of the scattered pile and shoved into her hands. Twilight looked down, her throat dry and void of life.
“This just says Bird Murder.”
“Yep,” Sour Sweet nodded. “It’s basically the same, except everyone is a bird. No white people, no black people, no controversy. It’ll slip right past the Censor, trust me.”
“But it’s not the book I want,” Twilight protested.
“That’s okay, totally understandable. You want something exciting, something revolutionary, well I got more. Check this one out.” She flashed another from her collection, this time a Harry Potter book, though the cover had been drawn over with a sharpie.
Twilight glared at it, eyes wide with disbelief. “Is that Harry, smoking a blunt?”
“I know, right?” Her dealer flashed a stretched grin. “This is a Crystal Prep original. I paid some poor kid to skip class to finish writing this bad boy. I call it: Harry Pothead and the Sorcerer Stoned. It’s the same story but there’s no magic, everyone’s just so high that they think they’re real wizards. That way, the Censor can't complain about exposing kids to witchcraft.”
“But your version has drugs— actually, nevermind. I don’t care.” Twilight threw up her arms and stepped away. “I’m not here to buy your fanfiction rewrites. These banned books can’t just be replaced, they’re literary icons that have forced people to confront controversial dialogues. Why do you think Gender Queer was banned? The people operating the Grand Censor want us to run away from the hard questions the stories pose.”
“Funny you should mention that,” Sour began.
“Don’t,” Twilight groaned, “just don’t.”
“Relax, I’m not going to shill you a knock-off of Gender Queer. But how would you feel about A Dozen Hues of Gay? It’s like Fifty Shades except it’s about twelve ripped gay dudes living together.”
“No—”
Sour Sweet cut her off before she could finish her thought. “It even has professional illustrations at the end of every chapter. Really raunchy stuff.”
She hated admitting it, but that made Twilight pause. She nibbled her lip, debating how desperate she was for something, anything, to read. Over 1,600 books had been banned by the Grand Censor, and every day that number rose. They cornered small-business book stores, used secret police to raid book deliveries, and every school and library had a noose around their budget, threatening to hang them if they even considered breaking the bans. It was impossible to read anything that didn’t conform to the ideals of the Censor’s Board of Directors.
Twilight eventually sighed. “You still have Lemon Zest’s ecstasy?”
“Always.” Sour tilted her head. “Why do you ask?”
“I’ll take two pills, and the, uh, gay book. At least I can still get high and read smut.”
Her dealer chuckled, already reaching for her purse where she kept her drugs. “You got it, girl. Nowadays, that’s just about the only thing any of us can do.”
