It takes a moment to gather bearings at the tail end of a holiday weekend binge. One fueled by poisons, pot noodles, and objectively questionable decisions.
Surveying the carnage in a dirty motel room booked without memory, it is no wonder why insides ache. And the tongue feels desperately in need of a shave.
Empties scattered everywhere. Overflowing improvised ashtrays clashing with little plastic “No Smoking” reminders. Pages of inked gibberish scattered over the table. They obscure a typewriter embarrassed at having witnessed another marathon spinout of pour me—puke in the trashcan. Puke in the shower. Puke in my shoes.
Why is there always so much puke?
Housekeeping deserves a respectable tip. Something more than the fluid soaked sheets and the nightmare that is the bathroom. Poverty may constantly hover and threaten. But that’s no excuse to be a dick—you pay for your sins one way or another.
How far is the fall? Who fucking knows. Because the bottom just keeps dropping. The lines blur. Things are seldom where they are left. And that triggers panic.
It isn’t even the same city as when the bender started.
It’s dark outside.
Inside, there are just empty pockets. And a head full of sludge. One with just enough room for random snapshots of events fighting upstream against the liquid stupidity to imprint themselves on memory.
Flickers of feeling the weather change over from the season of falling things. Stumbling in some parking lot. Bloody knuckles; flashes of burning bridges. Unpredictable snow squalls blowing in from the big lake. The bite of emotional friction—caution dictates refraining from rereading those texts. No good ever comes from a coherent scroll of shame. Better to save the inevitable embarrassment and just delete them.
That’s just what happens when there is plenty of whiskey to provide a handle on unsupervised distraction. And the accompanying purchases that made the bank account whimper. But that’s tomorrow’s problem. And there are more immediate ones to address.
It wasn’t even the top dollar fancy stuff that was once savored and appreciated. Often paired with tasty cigars, bonfires, and the company of better friends. Those simple pleasures evaporated a lifetime ago—it is a much dirtier world now.
Instead, bottom shelf bottles stood in as affordable substitutes. Some cigarettes to round out the additions. And when those were gone, surrogates hand rolled with the tins of Irish pipe tobacco that friends still occasionally ship over.
They taste like home. Which is a welcome sensation in another strange place. Because they remind me of buried experiences. And make me miss my friends.
Was it the chase for words that lead all the way to this corn-fed cow town? The one three counties over and one down? Or was it that dour bartender who looked cuter behind the bar? Or maybe the thought that she would decide to burn it all down and come help me fuck it all up—again?
Because we did once before.
Who the fuck knows. Confirmation feels impossible; it is best not to linger in hypotheticals.
But a bra of unknown origin sits accusingly at the end of the bed. And that is something tangible. If the pounding brain and dehydration weren’t so stubborn, it would demand an adult game of Cinderella. But chasing down the boobs destined to fill that undergarment will have to wait until the world isn’t quite so shaky. And unpredictable.
A cursory check reveals that the pages captured drunken rambles not really fit for publication. That’s not a surprise. Because it’s mostly the same old story. And clichés are just lazy writing.
But then, it’s been lazy living.
Think. Drink. Write. But not always in that order. And repetition often catches inside that unhealthy pattern with alarming regularity.
It seldom leaves room for any sort of affection not measured in A.B.V. percentages. Because that too often comes with stipulations. And expectations. Temporary is better. Because the hate doesn’t last quite as long without the investment to back it up when it all falls apart.
That is just what inevitably happens when affairs are built on the unsustainable roundness of another bottle used to blunt the underlying dishonesty. Because it always circles you back around to where it started.
It is generally easier to remain unattached. Uncomplicated and unhinged. Free to chase down pours of literary fancy. And liquid decomposition inside a shitty motel room overlooking unfamiliar flyover fields of broken winter corn—the room that reminds me of the one in which she died.
It’s rented for another night. And that leaves space for more hurt drink. Another blank page gets rolled into a machine that clatters and dings its way towards something possibly worth salvaging. Another disapproved cigarette is rolled, left to smolder balanced precariously while waiting for inspiration.
At this point, it has to be about the words.
Because there really isn’t anyone anything else left…
