hard




vinny bombora



Sergio was hard. You knew it when he walked into the room; it was the attention, he stole everybody’s and not in the way some rake from the films grabs attention. Sergio pillaged like a thug. Serg was the real deal; he devoured your spirit.

The time he came round to mine, I hadn’t seen him for a while and we scored for some speed; back in the day when you still could before meth flooded the market. He asked if I had a fit. I had a few in the cupboard: just for old time’s sake. We fixed up, Serg didn’t even tie off; he just rolled up his sleeve, bent his elbow and shoved that needle into his vein. No preparation, just an ability to hit that mainline. I looked on in awe as I wrapped a belt just below my bicep… they don’t come any harder than Sergio.


He’d enter the room, everybody chatting and though no one acknowledged it you could register it in their eyes; a certain unease. He’d stand off to one side rubbing his shaven scalp, gazing downwards and he’d have everyone. He didn’t say anything or look at anyone but all would be aware of the threat.


No one drank as much as Sergio; he took the crown for consumption. It was mainly wine; he always had a bottle in his hand and never stopped slugging on it. He’d roll out of bed and grab one. He wore his alcoholism like a badge of honour and believe me all around looked up to his rare talent. A few times I saw him looking clear and fine; Sylvie pointed out that he hadn’t had his first for the day. Years later Greg told me over a few at the pub that Sergio had had to book himself into rehab to dry out; he just couldn’t stop.

Despite the constant drinking he was lean; a defined torso rippled down onto a six pack stomach. A body made hard by the manual labour he carried out. He kept it all sheathed in a tight black t-shirt. That’s all he’d wear black accompanied by black; it said it all, spoke of his soul. A chiselled, unshaven jaw line framed his tough features.

Serg also had a tendency to be rather unkempt. He was always covered in a dried film of sweat. His hair when it was there was always messed and directionless. His clothes looked as if he’d been in them for days on end and the reason behind this was obvious. Yet the women craved him; a bit of the rough trade.

He slept with Greg’s girlfriend back in the day and no one could get away with that. Then he went and parked himself in Sylvia for a while. It was after we’d split and I’d left the country; sure enough he drove his car right inside… I’d seen it coming for months; we’d all be walking down the street and suddenly the two of them would drop back for a private chat. What the hell did she want speaking with him? I’d think but at a deeper level I knew just what she wanted; he wanted.

He started mauling Sylvie in a bar at a recovery one Sunday, swinging his arm around her shoulder and planting one on her cheek, all the while glaring in my direction. I took hidden refuge in the fact that we’d broken it off the day before but really that was no consolation.

Oh and then there was Francisco’s Jamaican girl, yeah there she certainly was… he did her too, right after the pair had an argument. All our girlfriends stood around dainty-like feigning innocence while pining after the brute and to his credit he slept with them all.


Lucia was Sergio’s off again/on again girlfriend and she was quite well... too much. She was tall and slender with straight as a knife hair that cut its way down to the small of her back. Her eyes were what really grabbed you; those Latino eyes seemed to bulge out of their sockets. I always thought that the years of stress from living with Sergio had resulted in the disturbed eyes. The two of them seemed to be splitting every second day. He claimed he loved her like no other and yet he was always off with someone else. I wanted a bit of Lucia and although I got close, I never got there.


At one stage he was sleeping with this flaky, upper crust girl. She had this strange boyfriend who was a go-go dancer in a club. We’d all met him a few times when he’d come round the house. She had one of those huge set of dreads; all matted and beaded. I would’ve if I had the chance but Sergio was. She’d come around on the off days and they’d be in his room doing what Sergio evidently did best... hell knows how in his state.

There was a knock at the front door; I opened it and there was the go-go boy. I wasn’t sure what to do but then I decided to tell him that she was in Sergio’s room. He went and knocked on the door and she screamed she’d be out in a minute. It was a prolonged minute as Sylvia and I waited with him in the living room. We made banal conversation whilst we acted as if there was nothing odd about her taking so long. I couldn’t work out if he knew. She eventually strolled out, dreads strewn all over the place, kissed him and they parted. Sergio emerged from his room strutting like an outlaw over to the sink to down a glass of water to calm his nerves.


He’d lurk around the edges of the room while everybody became increasingly agitated and then he’d take a seat amongst the group. He’d sit there with a sneer eyeing off everybody one by one. He didn’t need to vocalise; he got his message across.

Thing with Sergio was the way he moved, it cut a line straight through the moment; quick jolts that created an edge. He wore a look of contempt; hardly ever a smile. What did one have to smile about? If you did catch one it was a snigger about something nasty.


After we shot the speed we headed up to a party. It was at the house of the dreadlocked girl. She still had the hair but it was years later and the go-go boy was long gone. We had another quick whack in the bathroom and wandered up to her room where a small crowd had gathered. The inane chatter was almost amusing as I tried to consume some crumbling hash cake. Dreadhead told me she had half a point of crystal in her pocket. Yet it was all cut short when Sergio decided to lean across the bed and grab her on the breast. This was the moment when we were rather impolitely thrown out of the house like the creeps we were.


He got into shooting smack as well. He’d be sitting round the house with dull, pin-pricked eyes, scratching at his nose doing next to nothing. You’d find the empty fits strewn around the place.

I looked out the window of the car for a moment and when I turned back there was Serg steering with his punctured arms. Yet it wasn’t him, there was a sweating, writhing creature in the seat beside me. He was twisting his head from side to side, eyeballs trying to escape their sockets.

“Vinny, I want out. I want off this stuff but I can’t stop it,” he spat as he wiped the sweat from his brow.

I turned and looked back out the window. When I looked again I found a more composed Sergio: the guy who never showed the slightest trace of weakness. He turned left at the lights onto the main road.


His face was a bludgeoned mess when I saw him up the pub by chance one night. He finally slept with the wrong guy’s woman. Who’d even think of looking sideways at Stavros let alone go down on his girlfriend? Stavros had found the two of them in a nightclub together and broke a bottle across his face.

Later that day at the recovery party after the ecstasy had worn off and he’d given up on trying to grab at Sylvia, I had to help wrestle three guys off his neck. He’d called the girlfriend of the guy running the party a bitch.


So he’d be sitting there in the room glaring at everyone as they tried to continue the conversation. Then he’d say something, a line that was meant to somehow sum up the whole conversation; it was in a hard, humorous manner. Instead what it often did was break the spell he’d been casting; it never quite hit the mark.


He pulls back on the plunger and violet swirls drift into the liquid in the barrel. He pushes back down and the heroin fills his veins with warmth.

Serg is older now. He doesn’t quite cut the figure he once did. His face has wrinkles. His stomach can now be called a belly. There are less people to knock around with; a lot were scarred by the past and learnt there wasn’t any reason to take it anymore.


His head lolls down to the side, his muscles slacken…

He gazes over at the television just before he nods off.

An image of a man on fire running in New Delhi; he’s Tibetan. He’s set himself on fire to protest the occupation of his country.

Something in the man’s face haunts him… is it a look of horror or elation?

Now that’s hard.


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