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Last Tuesday, my neighbor Lena dragged herself to the door at 7 a.m., eyes like wet sandpaper, holding a coffee that smelled burnt and defeated. She’d been up until three wrapping a client launch, and her nine-year-old still expected pancakes shaped like dinosaurs. I tossed her a blister card I keep in the junk drawer–modafinil […]

Last March I walked out of a Manhattan pharmacy with 30 brand-name tablets and a receipt for $712.48. The same evening my friend in Milwaukee showed me her phone: she had just filled the identical prescription through a grocery-store discount app–$38.72. The pills looked the same, tasted the same, kept us both awake through overnight […]

Last Tuesday, Maria from Austin opened her laptop at 2 a.m., fed up with the $250 doctor visit just to renew the pill that keeps her brain awake during double shifts. She typed “buy Provigil without prescription”, crossed her fingers, and fifteen minutes later had a tracking number for 60 tablets shipped from a licensed […]

I was halfway through a 12-hour night shift when the floor started to pulse like a bad nightclub. Three espressos deep and still nodding off, I remembered my roommate’s stash–small white pills she called “shift savers.” One half-tab, a glass of water, and 25 minutes later the conveyor belts stopped looking like pillows. That was […]

My roommate, Jess, used to ration her Provigil like it was the last chocolate bar on earth–half a tablet on Monday, quarter on Tuesday, hope for the best by Friday. Then her neurologist’s assistant slid a small plastic card across the counter and said, “Try this; the first fill is ten bucks.” Jess blinked, waiting […]

My college roommate used to set three alarms, chug two espressos, and still nap under his desk. One grey Tuesday he showed up with a blister pack of Provigil, swallowed half a tablet, and coded straight through until sunrise–no jitters, no crash, just steady, quiet focus. The next week the whole flat was ordering from […]

Last Tuesday my neighbor Lara texted me from her car outside the pharmacy: “Third time this month they’re out of stock and the doctor wants another $150 visit just to renew.” She’s a night-shift coder, three kids, zero spare hours. Sound familiar? Same-day dispatch, no prescription asked. That’s the message that popped up on her […]