Dennis was the first detective at the scene of Sasha’s death. He’s also an old classmate of mine. We’ve known each other since we carried lunch boxes. Big and blond with an easy smile, Dennis moves like a man now, someone who has a family. He tells me he needs PT. So many car chases. He’s seen some real shit beyond the confines of our small suburban town.
At first, Dennis didn’t realize it was Sasha lying on the ground. EMTs had pulled her out of the car to work on her. Her license said Alexandra, which he didn’t recognize. But Bowers he knew. And even though the address on Sasha’s license was her last apartment, Dennis remembered where my house was, where my mother still lived. He would be the one to tell her. When my mother saw the police car in her driveway and answered the door, she thought, Well, it’s finally happened. She got into an accident.
I think about Dennis walking up the sidewalk to the door. Preparing to break a mother’s heart.
I ask him about fentanyl. He can’t say for sure that’s what this is, but he knows there’s fentanyl-laced heroin out there. He sees a lot of overdoses.
I tell Dennis I can’t imagine Sasha shooting up. But he tells me that’s not the only way people use heroin. He says she could have snorted it. Smoked it. There’s also the possibility of a pill form. I feel stupid.
He tells me no drug paraphernalia was found in her car, only an empty Ritalin bottle, a couple tablets of Lexapro, and some Suboxone, the opioid inhibitor she had been prescribed. People call them “subs” or “strips,” little rectangles you put under your tongue and let dissolve. I tell him I saw a text in her phone: Got any strips?
He asks if I know how the drug works, but I don’t really. I knew Sasha had a prescription for it. It was supposed to be helping her. He tells me Suboxone is a partial opioid, buprenorphine mixed with naloxone, a.k.a. Narcan, the drug that can stop someone from dying of an overdose. It keeps you from going into opioid withdrawal. When taken consistently, it can help you function, get your life back. Because if you use opioids while on Suboxone, you can’t get high. Sasha should have been taking hers, but it’s pretty clear she wasn’t.
I tell him about an old text thread I saw in Sasha’s phone with a fellow clinic patient named Yasmina, the only woman Sasha appeared to talk drugs with. Sasha had given her strips to ward off withdrawal sickness. Dennis says this is a common use for it, and having a prescription can make you popular. Please don’t mention my name, Sasha texted, otherwise I’ll get in big trouble LOL. Instead of charging her, she said Yasmina could pay her back by going to her appointment, advocating for herself, and feeling better. Proof you don’t have to be a dick about drugs. I want Yasmina and Sasha to be friends. They called each other sweetie.
