I’m writing a revenge story. This guy or girl comes from a rich family. Their dad is a doctor and their mom is a lawyer. The kid is in their 20s and is a drug addict. Their family cut them off because of it.
The dealer kills them because they couldn’t pay the money they owed. Then a loved one goes after the dealer for revenge.
Is this good? I didn’t want to overcomplicate it by giving it a huge conspiracy, but at the same time, realistically, couldn’t they have gotten the money some other way?
Have you ever watched the news? We have many highly publicized examples of rich people being addicted to drugs.
For fiction, I like the approach they took on the tv show House. Maybe not rich but certainly privileged enough to get away with an addiction that would have ruined anyone else’s life.
But maybe a good approach to your story is to imagine an unusual dealer:: a wealthy person is not visiting the neighborhood crack house. For example Michael Jackson’s addiction was fed by an actual doctor authorized to write prescriptions so his drugs were “legal”
Rich people absolutely get addicted to drugs. They just have sufficient resources that it doesn’t affect their lives as detrimentally in many cases. Elon is up to his eyeballs in ketamine on a given day.
Look at RFK. Shipped off to private schools and spent plenty of that time getting kicked out and transferred to other private schools because he was a dick and on drugs.
Elon Musk uses so much ketamine he ruined his bladder. He’s also a nazi pedophile, but that isn’t related
Bro narcotics are probably the most reliable thing that kills rich people
Elon Musk is still alive tho
Define “alive”. Seems like his brain was replaced with whatever the fuck Grok is.
Yeah his drugs of choice are of the “talked to Sauron and tweak out on the internet” schedule that you have to take a lot of to get any organ damage. But maybe we’ll get lucky and somebody will lace his shit one day.
While we all wish he would die early, unfortuntely we don’t actually know how heavy his usage is. We hype any percieved ailment to the moon like Trump’s usually non-lethal skin cancer. Hard to catch something late when these bastards have doctors on retainer.
Take a look at the Reiner story. Being rich and famous doesn’t stop drugs from ruining families.
The murderer was schizophrenic. He used drugs to cope with the schizophrenia. But it was schizophrenia that caused the murder.
The thing about rich people is, that Ehen you have the money to buy all the drugs you want, you can do quite a lot of them until it starts to affect you financially.
Just think about how much cocaine rich people like to snort.
Rich people do get addicted to drugs.
The unrealistic part is the fanily being killed because they can’t pay.
Why can’t they pay? I thought they were rich? And a drug dealer isnt going to kill the only people who could conceivably pay him.
A more believable story might be blackmail/extortion. Why kill the source of income?
I’m assuming they can’t pay because the family cut them off. OP will need to come up with an explanation for the family refusing to help. Just being an addict would not be enough in a normal functional family, but it would depend on the protagonists past (mis)behaviour or maybe the family is very much against drugs for religious reasons.
OP is suggesting the rich family can’t pay. So unless its a typo it doesn’t really make a lot of sense.
Rich family WON’T pay is more realistic imo
OP is using they/them to refer to the junkie. I see what you mean, but I’m not sure it’s the family that will get killed or just the junkie.
Ahhh. Now I’m rereading it, that kind of makes sense.
Dealer shouldn’t plan to kill them, just threaten them, then accidentally kill them in a scuffle
Killing your junkies don’t make sense. Even with small dealers they know how much they can ‘lend out’ to their clients. After the client gets to the point they get cut off. But they will have 20$ next time. You will give them 10$ material and keep the other 10 for their loan.
How they got the money, you don’t ask. Customer service even in drug business is the key to long term success.
And sometimes people who went to jail come back months later, because they hit big and they can afford to pay back that 16$ that you never thought you will see again… and then spend more money that you didn’t think they had.I mean…
Exhibit A: Succession…
Literally every episode has drugs…
Its not a show about bussiness… its just parties, drugs, famiky therapy, a board meeting coup-attempt in between, more parties, and DRUGS
Never kill someone who owes you money - that’s terrible business. Kill for revenge or to send a message…
Probably makes more sense to kill their dog or something like that. Hint that there’s more where that came from.
Yeah, the message is “pay this guy or he’ll kill you”. How is that not clear?
They have another name for criminals that lend you money and just ask you pay it back over time with some interest tacked on. They’re called banks.
There are plenty of rich addicts. Charlie Sheen and Whitney Houston spring to mind. Anna Nicole Smith was a literal billionaire.
“Tough love” is also a real thing. Families throw addicts out all the time. the idea is that if things get bad enough the addict will “hit bottom” and seek help.
The idea of a dealer killing a customer is the part that makes little sense. The dealer wouldn’t give an addict drugs without cash up front. Dealers know exactly how unreliable addicts are.
How about the addict tries to steal from the dealer and the dealer kills them in self defense?
You might want to look up the case of Carrol O’Connor. Famous actor, his son died after an overdose. O’Connor called the son’s dealer a murderer and the dealer tried to sue him for defamation of character.
Drug addiction can happen among rich families, yes. Coke is common among them because it tends to be an expensive party drug.
As Noel_Skum mentioned, the dealer likely wouldn’t kill the guy who owed them. Some much more likely ways the dealer would act:
- Kidnap the debtor and ask for a ransom from the family
- Get info on the family in order to kidnap some relative
- Steal from the family home (likely convincing the debtor to do that, as they likely know where mom’s jewels are, etc)
- The two make a plot to kill the parents so the child can inherit the entire fortune and pay off the debt.
All of these have happened in real life
Elon is addicted to ketamine.
Not to mention all the celebrities who have OD’d throughout the ages.
If they were some kind of nepobaby and just given everything in life without having to work for it, it would be fairly realistic that they may not have the ability to make money of their own quickly enough to satisfy their dealer.
