one mike's house

Mike's house was somewhat of a phenomenon to the untrained eye, but in reality it was a very calculated and careful continuous experiment.

By experiment i mean that - nothing ever happened the same way twice, and EVERYTHING that happened at mike's house was completely backwards to how it would happen everywhere else.
I came and went at all hours of the day and night.  There would never be anyone home besides Mike, and somehow, he'd never have the keys to his own fucking door, so we'd end up climbing through a window in the garage to get into the house.
If i couldn't sleep on a Monday night, i'd head to Mike's house, and find him laying in the living room at 530 in the morning watching cartoons drinking a case of MGD.  So i'd knock on the window, he'd open the door and we'd get shitfaced for an hour and a half before getting in the car to go to school.

Afternoons were where the experiment would be in full effect...  His parents would work, but not far from home - so we were always on edge because we'd have no idea when they'd walk in the door.  So one minute i'd be doing lines of china white off his kitchen counter, and slinking around looking for another bottle of cough syrup...and the next we'd be jumping off the balcony in the front of his house because his Mom came in the back. [without cleaning up a thing....there'd be crack pipes made out of foil, empty bottles and resin everywhere, and we'd just jump ship.  Our reasoning would be the cycle that kept everything spinning - at all times - at Mike's house.  Like we were spinning plates...one would start to slow down and we'd run over and spin it some more, and then another one would start to wobble, and we'd run over to it and spin IT some more...just constantly moving on impulse out of sheer convenience.]

These days never stopped either.  We'd steal his brothers car at 3 am and drive to the harbor just to walk around, get higher, and waste away for a few hours. watch the sun rise, fight traffic to get back, drop the car off without anyone noticing, fill our backpacks with beer, and go sit on a patch of grass in an alley and chainsmoke until late afternoon.  Then break in to Mike's house [again, through the garage] run around breaking shit with the music as loud as it could go for a few hours.  i'd smoke more crack, snort more china white, have a few drinks, and then we'd leave again before anyone showed up. 
ride our bikes to the park and lay around for a while, or go mooch a free meal at a restaraunt we knew someone at.

In the end, Mike turned out to be a lot different than the person i'd known for years.
He cleaned up, just enough to not get caught as often, and we grew apart. 
But he will always be one of the best friends i ever had.  As insane as shit got with the 2 of us, he saved my life multiple times - and not from Overdosing, or falling off a fucking balcony....he saved ME from ending my life.  He'd get serious at the strangest of times....[as if time was normal at all to us]
and tell me how much he'd miss me if i left.  and the kid would do ANYTHING to cheer me up.  concert tickets, 5 star dinners, he'd "borrow" someone's car if i wanted to leave somewhere, just to get me the hell outta there.
truly one of the best, and i wish it never had to end.