OD rewrite

He told her to kill a man. He couldn’t justify any meaningful reason, other than the fact that he is a hopeless human being; a pathetic waste of time and space.
Joel is pacing the cheap linoleum floor of his apartment building’s lobby. The sand colored paint on the walls is chipping, exposing more and more rough white as the days go by, weathering away as the days grow colder. It got dark fast tonight. The only light is overhead, fluorescent and flickering occasionally. The lamp holding the bulb sways, as does Joel, with the wind coming through the propped open door. His palms are clammy and cold as his fever creeps higher and higher. He’s sick. Joel’s head is so full of thought that he begins to question if he will ever think clearly again. The fever is starting to get to him and he wonders if he will be able to stand for much longer. Joel looks down at his slipper clad feet. He can feel them getting clammy, wetting the soles of the plush material, forcing a squeak of friction as he paces on. He needs his fix.
She was just so willing, so excited, to do anything that would bring him joy. What she didn’t realize was the feeling others know as happiness is absent in his vacuous shell of a life. He hasn’t felt the sun touch his skin in years. He’s forgotten how to laugh, or how a genuine smile actually feels as it creeps across a face, he’s void of all humanity. He hasn’t felt the twitter of first kiss butterflies in so long he can’t remember what love even feels like; if he’s even experienced it at all. There’s only one thing on earth that can simulate a feeling of any relevance with this world, and she’s killing so he can have it. What a girl. She loves him.
She. Where is she? She’s been gone for hours, she should be back by now. Every minute she is gone pushes Joel further into his head, fearing the worst, wanting his fix. The heat in the lobby is making him spin. Joel stops pacing and looks at his watch. The face is sliding around his wrist and he can’t make out the numbers and hands. He wishes so desperately to go outside, get some fresh air, but that’s not part of the plan. He shakes his head sharply as if to clear the haze plaguing his vision, and goes over the steps of their plan again. Don’t even look at her. She’ll walk in and head directly to the main stairwell to the left of the elevator, which is what he will be taking. They cannot be seen together. A precaution just in case names are dropped and they are find. She will take the fall. What a girl. Just as Joel feels a wave of sickness approaching, the light swings violently overhead with a big gust of wind from the door; she’s back.
Without a word spoken, Joel waits for the elevator as Celia takes the stairs, so as to avoid the watchful eye of the security camera. Joel is so weak that the push of the elevator causes his legs to give out. It’s one of those mirrored elevators. Great. A 360 reminder of how pathetic he is; as if he wasn’t seeing double already. He grabs the railing in the elevator to help himself up as he reaches the sixth floor. The burgundy blood colored carpet stretches, seemingly endless, down the moldy smelling hallway. For a moment Joel forgets where he is, he’s so sick, but then sees a flash or reddish blond hair. He knows where she’s hiding. Celia.
Joel rounds the corner of the hallway and stops in front of his door, his fingers shaking as he fumbles with his keychain, he can’t seem to steady himself. He manages to fit the right brassy key into the lock and pushes hard; the goddamn door always sticks. Teetering, Joel rests his forehead on the cool and glossy wood of the door, catching his breath. He has to keep going. It’ll be alright soon. Before he was all the way inside he felt her behind him; her scent like a cool breeze, her energy like a hot slap in the face. Celia rushes past him, avoiding even the slightest brush of skin, and plops down on the couch. Joel still stood by the door, astonished at her aloofness, considering what she had just done. She actually did it. She did it for him.
“I think it’s pretty good shit, but it’s not like I really got to dip in while I was there, the asshole wouldn’t stop breathing.” Celia is occupied with the bag now. Her wavy red hair, straight out of a CVS box, is covering her face. She’d been crying. For the first time in a long time Joel feels something other than dope sick; sympathy. She tucks one side behind her ear and looks at Joel for the first time all night. “By the end of it all I pretty much just had to grab the stash and hope he was dead.” Her eyes were streaked with cheap mascara, most of it running down her cheeks, she was a mess.
Just the sight of her makes Joel feel his sickness in full force. Of course she fucked it up. Nothing is ever this easy. He feels a hot anger color his sunken cheeks as his hands push on the sockets of his eyes. He doesn’t want to see the stupid girl on the couch; her faux fur hooker coat and ripped stockings. What a goddamned joke she is. Didn’t make sure he was dead? Is she fucking kidding? They’re dead. He knew she was a bad idea from the start; cheap and easy, willing to do just about anything for something that might one day be considered love. For a moment he keeps his hands over his eyes, wishing he hadn’t gone through with this, but she did give him what he wanted. He had almost forgotten about the huge brick of beige powder on the table. Joel’s hands fly from his face and pull him violently towards the big bag on his plastic coffee table. Pushing Celia off the worn in couch, he digs into the stash; fuck her. He knows she’s in a state. Why shouldn’t he be?
“How could you leave without making sure he was dead? How could you be so careless?!” Joel’s arms are shaking angrily as he cuts off a large piece of the stash, the endless outcomes of Celia’s departure from the scene unfold unforgivably in his mind. So many things have gone wrong. So many terrible things are about to happen. It her fucking fault. But he can hardly bring himself to care: He got what he wanted. He knows what he has to do. His left jerks upward to extend a pointed finger at Celia.
“They followed you here! They know where I live! How could you be so fucking stupid?!” She’s trembling, tears flowing once again, and Joel knows that she’s afraid of him. Taken aback for a moment he realizes; she really does love him. She would do anything for him. His pathetic being would do anything for Smack, like asking a nineteen year old girl to kill a drug dealer, he has to be fucking crazy. She was only doing what he told her to do, what he was too cowardly and dope sick to do himself, because she cares. His glare softens.
“I’m sorry. I’ve been sick and worried about you all night. I know you did what you could, and I’m thankful. I bet no one even saw you there at all. They’ll just find their dude there tomorrow, and no one will know who did it. It’ll be ok.” His voice is quivering with anticipation of the huge shot he was about to take and he could tell he was convincing himself, making excuses for Celia’s carelessness, just so he can shoot up as soon as possible. Joel looks up and sees Celia’s face. He knows he hurt her. He wants so badly to stand up and be a man, console her, but his arms have already started going through the motions that they know so well. He ignores his yearning to hold Celia and instead grabs his worn out leather belt by the buckle and slides it through his dirty 501 Levis. He focuses on the shot in one hand and the pock mark in the center of his now bulging vein of his left arm. The shot’s too big. He knows he’s supposed to do this.
Joel pulls the belt even tighter in his teeth as he pushes off into nothingness. As he exhales, all of his sickness goes away, he was born to do this. He’s gonna die doing it. He felt his body go limp as Celia’s eyes widened. She rushed to his side, the sound of thumping footsteps in the hallway outside wasn’t enough of a distraction, she threw herself onto Joel’s limp figure. His eyes slid shut for the last time as the heavy door to Joel’s shit-hole apartment was kicked to the ground with a bomb-like thud.
“No.”
It was the last word uttered by the one who loves Joel as the love of his life, his only true companion, slowly fades his pulse. Heroin. His true love took him far away from the three men who broke into his apartment to steal Celia away. She’s screaming as they rip her off of Joel’s lifeless form. The three men leave his body for dead as he floats away with the love that flows steadily through his veins. He wanted this to happen.