The devil is in the details

... and the angels are in accounting.

Ever get the feeling someone you love may be a drug addict?

Don’t check their phone. Even if you could confirm the worst, it’s nearly impossible to go back from what you’d have become — someone who violates a sacred trust. And it is a sacred trust to leave an unlocked phone on the couch without worrying about prying eyes.

In fact, I’d argue that, unless someone’s life is in immediate peril, their phone is strictly off-limits. It holds so much more than just text messages to drug dealers. It’s the new diary. A pixelated window to the soul.

Believe me. It’s much easier to follow the money. Check a bank statement or an ATM receipt if you can. No addict is so meticulous about their paper trail for so long. They’ll trip up.

Why did you take out $500?

I bought a collector’s edition Star Wars Lego set, darling.

It makes sense that my final reckoning came at the hands of an accountant. I had followed a giant sign in a downtown alley: FILE YOUR TAXES HERE.

It was her job to paint people by the numbers. For me, she painted a portrait of an addict.

“You earned $110,000 in 2021,” she says, staring at a T-4 slip. “That’s good money.”

“Yeah,” I replied. “It was a good gig.”

“Where did it all g—” she caught herself.

The numbers already knew the answer.

All that income. No taxes filed. Not for six years!

“In 2022, you made a big deposit to your RRSP,” she said, staring at a screen. “That’s good.”

“And then in 2022,” she added, “you withdrew it all. That’s not good.”

I never imagined a list of financial transactions could carry so much emotional weight. My voice thickened a little when I tried to explain my misadventures. For years, bank accounts swelled and bottomed out.

“I’m sorry, Rozie,” overcome by shame. “I really appreciate this. But I wasn’t in a good place.”

“Don’t be sorry,” she said. “This is a really important part of your recovery. You’re going to get through this and then you’re going to feel so good about yourself.”

It’s true. I went clean, but years of unclaimed taxes still loomed over me. It’s the one, awful thing I just couldn’t face. Until I did. I can’t plead ‘addict’ to the government. To them, I’m just a collection of data. Unchecked boxes where all my tax filings should be. I was an unchecked box where a person should have been.

Not to Rozie and her compassionate calculations. Who would have thought numbers could be so relentlessly indifferent and hopeful at the same time? She’s doing everything she can to help me sort this out, even finding tax breaks in the unlikeliest of places — “You’re a journalist. You can write this off. And this too.”

She knows I’m trying to make it right. But she also knows there’s no mercy clause for addicts. Just the unflinching truth of accountability. My return won’t show up on a balance sheet.