what the dread gets blocked with
dropped QuoVadis or oral narcotics or turned on Mr. Bouncety-Bounce extra loud or busied himself in his silly chef's hat in the Ennet House kitchen or made sure he was at a Meeting sitting way up close in nose-pore range, to block it out
Context
The substitution mechanics laid bare in a single list that runs from using straight into recovery without a seam: the same lifelong late-day dread that Gately once blocked with QuoVadis and oral narcotics he now blocks with the Ennet House kitchen and a front-row seat at a Meeting, nose-pore range. The Substance and the program are shown doing the identical job — holding off the same terror — which is the sober addict's open secret, that recovery isn't the absence of the need to block it out but a less lethal thing to block it out with.