this is "nightline." >> tonight, numb nation. painkiller abuse giving way to heroin, hitting families hard across america. >> she was completely gray. eyes were rolled back and she was frothing at the mouth. >> tonight, we're there with agents in the suburbs raiding a home they believe is filled with heroin. and, at the gateway, along the mexican border, where smugglers are using a surprising method to get it across. can this epidemic be stopped? plus, secrets of a geisha. a hidden world where young girls give up the comforts of modern life to learn the tricks of the trade, serving older men. all happening behind closed doors. but we got a glimpse inside. and, that unstoppable lava flow reaching a scenic hawaiian town. >> it is incredibly hot right here. >> we're there in the line of fire as residents evacuate and

the molten rock threatens to swallow their homes. but first -- the "nightline" five. >> take zzzquil and sleep like the kids went to nann a's out fr the whole weekend. zzzquil. it helps you sleep easily and wake refreshed. >> because sleep is a beautiful thing. >> zantac heartburn alert. stop. nexium can take 24 hours to work. zantac is different. for relief without the wait. try zantac. >> number one in just 60 seconds.

good evening, thanks for joining us. getting hooked on painkillers is an expensive habit. many now turning to a cheaper

way to chase that high, with heroin. tonight, we take you inside the epidemic, investigating how this deadly drug is winding up in our neighborhoods. here's abc's senior justice correspondent pierre thomas. >> she was completely gray. she was, her eyes were rolled back in the back of her head and she was frothing at the mouth. >> reporter: that was the shocking day she found her 17-year-old daughter in when she went to wake her for school one morning. >> i screamed to my husband, i'm like, get up here. and we're shaking her, shaking her, shaking her. >> reporter: both she and her husband had no idea what was wrong with nicky until paramedics arrived. >> he asked me, he said, what kind of drugs does your daughter take? i said, she doesn't take drugs. he said, she has track marks all over her arms and i'm like, what? he goes, your daughter is a heroin addict. >> reporter: their daughter was revived that morning, but the nightmare was only beginning. her story is one of just thousands playing out across the

country. is this the house where your friend lost her -- >> right here, yeah. on easter sunday. >> reporter: the heroin epidemic casting a shadow on neighborhoods big and small. deaths from heroin addiction have more than doubled from 2010 to 2012. heroin, it seems, is everywhere. >> you guys want to head out? >> reporter: and authorities are doing everything they can to crack down on the addictive substance. it's just after dawn near st. louis, only about 25 miles from her home. and a team of dea agents and local police are preparing to raid a home they believe has a stash of heroin inside. >> let's go. >> reporter: a few minutes later, it's on. >> dea, police, come on out. come on out. >> reporter: they are hunting for heroin. >> what's going on? >> reporter: and police say it doesn't take long for agents to find some. >> nine months. >> reporter: for dea task force officer juan wilson, it's just one front on a battle that has

consumed him. he lost his father-in-law to a vicious heroin addiction. today, the search inside this home leaves him outraged. what did you find in there? >> we found a loaded pistol. it was underneath the couch cushion, laying right next to where the baby was, where we found the heroin, also. fully loaded. >> reporter: you look pissed. >> it's -- it's one thing to find, you know, the heroin next to the baby, but you find a loaded gun, you know, i've got kids of my own and -- little angry, yeah. >> reporter: more and more suburbanites once addicted to pain pills are turning to heroin. it's a cheap alternative and more potent. it's a quick fix and driving big business. why do you think heroin is so popular here? >> it's very afodable. it's cheap. okay si ckocon sin, dealers cha a dollar per milligram. if you have an 80 milligram

dose, you can pay $80 for one pill, versus one pill or one dose of heroin in a capsule could cost you anywhere between $5 to $15. >> two females. >> reporter: we're at that same house before, undercover. >> they want to make the money. >> reporter: we set up a safe distance away, watching with binoculars to see if buyers drive up to the home for drugs. >> we're seeing transactions gone on while the mail is being delivered. >> reporter: we watch car after car pull up in what police allege are customers chasing a high. >> they'll starterly in the morning, they'll finishate at night. they'll do this all day. >> white male and white female are sitting in the black car. >> reporter: convinced they just made purchases, police pull over suspected customers. >> yeah, we got him. >> reporter: the passenger got picked up by his friend over here and even with a child in the car, decided they were going to come out and buy some heroin today. the passenger attempted to snort

as much heroin that he could and then flick the rest of it out the window. what kind of average do you have? >> two, three grams a day. i snorted some. >> right. i can see it on your nostril. >> reporter: not far away, agents pull over another suspected buyer. this one thought to have hidden heroin. >> they're concealed down there. she's having -- >> are they inside you right now? >> how do you want to do this? do you want to reach down and give them up? >> reporter: she gives up quickly. >> these are called beans or button. there's usually a half gram in there. >> reporter: for juan, fighting heroin is not just a job. he grew up here. and hern has cost him dearly. >> i've got a personal stake with it. >> reporter: you lost your father-in-law? >> yes, sir. he was a long-time prescription pill abuser and a long-time heroin user. one day, he got a phone call to come to his apartment where they had found his body. >> reporter: understanding how

heroin has infiltrated small town america requires tracing it to its biggest source. mexico. we went to ground zero. the gateway. the southern border. to understand the huge scale of the problem. we're at the busineest border crossing in the country. we're talking an incredible volume. 45,000 cars per day. it's a game of cat and mouse between customs and border patrol officers. and an army of smugglers whose job it is to get thousands of pounds of heroin into the u.s. are they getting more creative? >> they are being creative. deemer concealment. tough for us to get to. we have to call mechanics. >> reporter: in the inf infrastructure of the car? >> in the structure of the car, yes. >> reporter: while we're there, agents see something that doesn't look right in this van. they run it through an x-ray machine. they find nearly 100 pounds of marijuana, vacuum sealed and

neatly stuffed in the gas tan-ne the cartels are smuggling heroin by any means necessary. through tunnels, submarines, even inside the bodies of live puppies. if it's caught, it's sent to a super secret government facility like this. a site so sensitive, we can't tell you where it is. the concern that heavily armed cartels and other drug dealers might come to steal this precious product. your family doesn't know where this place is, flight. >> no. >> reporter: warehouse is packed from floor to ceiling with these drugs, kept under padlock. >> we're looking at a couple thousands pound us. >> reporter: what would that translate into, millions of dollars? >> yes. right here what we have is essentially white heroin. right here what we have, is what we call brown heroin. and depending on what they cut it with, you're going to see different shades of the brown. this last one here is what we

would call your black tar heroin. >> reporter: we're looking at ruined lives, we're looking at death. right in that bag. >> yes. >> this is an amazing city. >> reporter: back in st. louis, dea special agent jim shroba says the cartel devised a marketing plan to boost heroin production. >> they brought in better k chemi chemists. a better refinement process. they wanted to open up the market to individuals whose idea of heroin was the sir ring. they made it so pure, they gave new users, suburban users in this region the opportunity to snort it and get them hooked. >> reporter: in some cases, heroin sold on the street, once only 6% pure is now a staggering 90% pure. and the st. louis suburb where juan grew up, the death toll is alarming. >> in the st. charles county area, 2004, there was four overdose deaths. in 2013, there were 26. it's highly addictive.

>> reporter: so many have died, juan decided to tour schools to warn young people. that community outreach led him to meet gee. her batter's battle touched him. they became family. nicky went through three years of rehab. she was in college on the path to recovery, but it was a struggle. >> this is not your child anymore. physically, it looks like them, but the inside is not them anymore. that is someone who is controlled and owned by heroin. they all become lying, cheating, steaming thieves. >> reporter: nothing could save nicky. >> i got a phone call from a local police officer, there's a sick call at your house. i immediately went home, i pulled up and there was, our wholcourt was filled with police and there wasn't any sirens on. i saw my husband just collapsed on the front porch and i knew. i can so vividly remember that moment of just sitting there, thinking, oh, my god, she died. i want to tell everyone thank

you so much for coming out in such short notice. >> reporter: she and her family have turned their immense grief into a calling. >> thank you for coming out. >> everybody ready? >> reporter: they walk to raise awareness of the dangers of heroin in communities that may not realize they have a problem. >> there's not one person here that is not been affected by heroin. >> reporter: some come with pictures of loved ones who have died from heroin. juan has been with gee every step of the way. >> this is my calling. in the past couple of months, two to three people have died from drug overdoses. people that i went to school with and that i knew. >> reporter: death's from heroin, an indiscriminate killer that does not care what neighborhood you're from. for "nightline," pierre thomas, abc news, st. louis. next, them woirps of a geisha gave us a peek behind the curtain of this mysterious life. but what is it really like to go to geisha school? plus, the molten onslaught, as lava swallows part of ah ha

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for many of us, the word gave shea conjures up exotic images. but there's much more than meepts the eye to this centuries-old tradition. tonight, we got special access to the life of a geisha in training, for a rare glimpse into this hidden world. skin painted like porcelain. her lip and alluring red. her eyes shyly shadowed. for this teen girl, every detail must be perfect to please her date for the night.

she is a geisha in training. hers is a world of glances and innuendo. there is also an undercurrent of sex. and it all happens behind closed doors. an ancient tradition made famous in "memoirs of a geisha." young girls using any means to please young play mates who pay. >> i wanted to see you in p private. >> reporter: we were invited inside the tea house where it takes years to perfect her skill. entertaining clients with ancient performing art. like dancing. music. and drinking games. this is every college frat person's dream. it may look silly, but this is not a mere game. she can earn hundreds per night. her livelihood depends on her ability to delight and entice her male clients.

yes, it's a tradition, yes it involves the art, but it invo e involves serving men. don't really think about it. >> reporter: you don't feel it that way. >> i'm really comfortable serving. >> reporter: she says she grew up dreaming of being a geisha, much like american girls dream of being a princess. for as long as you can remember, you wanted to be one. >> yes. >> reporter: and she wanted to be a regular teen. that's her playing trombone in a community band. these days, she has a new instrument. do you ever miss modern music? do you ever want to listen to taylor swift or something? >> sometimes. >> reporter: most teenagers listen to taylor swift. >> and bruno mars. >> reporter: bruno mars. geishas are a dying breed in japan. 100 years ago, there were 80,000. today, just 1,000.

when she is out in public, locals and tourists alike descend like paparazzi, trying to catch a glimpse of such a rare sight. >> reporter: you are constantly being gawked out. >> they think that i'm like a mickey mouse going around the disney land. >> reporter: they think of you as a cartoon character than a real professional. >> i feel like that sometimes. >> reporter: right. it's a lifestyle perceived as old fashioned and depicted as brutal. >> your cape is untouched. men like. that. >> reporter: where even a woman's virtue can be bought for a price. >> you must sell it to the highest bidder. >> reporter: what are the biggest misunderstanding about geisha? >> they think, like, movie. >> reporter: they think it's like "memoirs of a geisha." >> they -- they think that i was sold to this tea house or something. >> reporter: they think you are

forced into it. and that's definitely not the case. >> no. >> reporter: and there's not -- because there's alsoen undercurrent of of sex that people assume. is that a big misunderstanding? >> yes. we don't have that culture anymore for long, long time. >> reporter: she may not be having sex, but here, she's still admired by many. mostly men, like this man who has seen her perform seven times. he's kind of a groupie. what does he like about her? because she's still in training, every cent she earns on the job goes directly to the tea house mother who runs the business and provides room and board. she also gets the privilege of wearing antique kimonos. gorgeous. which, like coutoure gowns, can

run up to tens and thousands of dollars. she sleeps on a wooden pillow. where do you sleep with it? on your neck? >> on here. >> jimmy: so it doesn't mess with the side or the back. you probably haven't had a full night's sleep since you started. i think that means yes. but for a young girl, the biggest sacrifice is being away from her family. >> sometimes i feel homesick. >> reporter: she may be giving up the chance of a future family, as well. geishas, by definition, remain unmarried and childless. do you ever want to get married and have kids? >> i want to be -- >> reporter: maybe down the road, might want to -- >> i don't know. >> reporter: you don't know. you can't think that far ahead. >> no. >> reporter: as she disappears into the darkness, she's not focused on her feature. she's helping preserve her country's past. next, residents of a

picturesque hawaiian town forced to evacuate as lava threatens to incinerate their homes. our rob marciano is in the thick of it. tigers, both of you. tigers? don't be modest. i see how you've been investing. setting long term goals. diversifying. dip! you got our attention. we did? of course. you're type e* well, i have been researching retirement strategies. well that's what type e*s do. welcome home. taking control of your retirement? e*trade gives you the tools and resources to get it right. are you type e*? the setting is perfect. but then erectile dysfunction happens again. you know what? plenty of guys have this issue, not just getting an erection, but keeping it.

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after filling out their hogan iquestionaire, aight. hogan was awarded an a- from the nra. but now he refuses to release his responses. the nra opposes comprehensive background checks. they want to weaken maryland's gun safety laws. even support letting suspects on the fbi terror watch list buy guns. on gun safety and terror, the nra is wrong. hogan gets an a- from the nra. on protecting maryland, we just can't trust him.

right now, on hawaii ya's big island, lava as hot as 2,000 degrees from america's most dangerous volcano is spreading in alarming ways. and reporting from the line of fire, we welcome abc's senior meteorologist, rob marciano to "nightline" with this report. >> reporter: a river of blistering hot lava flowing from

kilauea has now reached the backyards of residents. and the first local structure falling victim to this searing heat. today, with residents still evacuating, officials announced a plan to allow them to watch their own homes burn from a safe spot. >> it's really scary. you have to be on alert. >> reporter: so, what is it really like to live in the specter of fiery annihilation? we took a treacherous journey to find out. we got a ride up this dirt road. we're going to have to go in by foot. it wasn't long before we could see the glowing embers. this just broke out here. a lava breakout on top of the already crusted flow. we're going to get a little bit closer. and feel the burn. this is just incredible. it just broke out from underneath of what was cooled, hardened lava. it is incredibly hot right here. we're still three miles from the lava front. this is only a few yards wide. you can just imagine lava front over a football field wide would feel or look like going through your neighborhood.

as the lava spreads, the safest course of action is getting out of dodge. for "nightline," i'm rob marciano in hawaii. >> of course, we hope everyone gets out safe. thanks for watching abc news. tune into "good morning america" tomorrow and, as always, we're online at abcnews.com. good night, america. hey. hey. you know, i almost died today. really? that's what you say when i tell you i almost died? what am i supposed to say? "oh, my god, ray! are you all right?!" what happened? i'm in the press box, right? i'm watching the game, and i'm eating a soft pretzel, but these pretzels they have,

they're not moist, you know. they're bigger than the otherer ones, but they're very dry. anyway, the salt doesn't stick to them. it just falls everywhere. oh, my god. are you ok? you gonna mock? you just gonna mock? all right. i'm sorry. ok. so the salt didn't stay on your pretzel. yes. all right, so, i'm... i'm bending down to wipe the salt off my shirt, and bam! a foul ball comes flying into the booth. it came this close to hitting me. yeah? yeah. i felt its wind. and then i turned, and andy, who just got a turkey and cheese sandwich, the ball knocks it off his tray. the soda, pickles, chips, chocolate cake, everything. you get chocolate cake in the press box? it was friday. we get a different cake every friday. but you're missing the point. i'm getting the point. a ball bounced into your world and disturbed paradise.