The outside world had become a blur of omnipresent lights hours ago, but it wasn’t an issue, not tonight atleast. I had enough booze in me to give a blue whale cirrhosis, and it was becoming increasingly difficult to give a shit about anything but what I was doing. Yesterday and tommorrow were irrelevant, fickle things, and the future consisted only of my next shot. The past simply didn’t exist, who wants to ruin their night thinking of the unchangeable?
Wild Turkey was the drink, and the place was some slummy bar in Dorchester, or was it Allston? It didn’t matter really, all that’s important is that I was sitting between rows of shotglasses and staring at a tacky neon sign for the majority of the night. I’d arrived with friends, but they were all gone by the time I’d burned through my first twenty dollars. None of them were very fun anyways.
There were other patrons at the bar, but most of them were baby boomers and the children of baby boomers, there was no way we were gonna relate. I wasn’t very fond of the place, but it was the only hole in the wall I remembered didn’t card. This night is important in the grand scheme of things, it was when I supposedly hit rock bottom, but I like to think of it as I just fell into a pile of my own shit. I was already plastered when my father’d walked in, with clenched fists and fire in his eyes. He’d given an earful to the bartender before dragging me out by my collar. One of my friends must have tipped him off, I never did find out who it was.
“What the fuck’s your problem?” I remember mumbling as he pushed me in the passenger seat of whatever shitbox he was driving at the time. He didn’t offer me an answer, and I figure I passed out on the ride home because that’s as much as I remember. Me and my dad were real close before that night.
The next day was hellish, probably the worst hangover of my life. My head felt like it was trapped in the cool grip of an iron maiden, and my heart couldn’t decide if it wanted me to run a marathon or stay in bed. Ultimately I decided it would be best not to deprive my body of it’s fuel, and within a few hours I was sipping cheap grain liquor straight from the bottle and trying to recall what had happened the night before. It paid having buddies with cars and I.Ds.
For a while I contemplated stocking up on booze and asking my friend to drop me off by some highway in Vermont so I could become my very own Alexander Supertramp. It was just a thought though, and he didn’t have the gas nor the time anyways. After a while the hangover subsided and I was beginning to feel the type of optimism that only a drunk can. Only slightly more rational than a manic stricken lunatic, but far more persuasive.
“Wanna stop by the recruitment center? I could use an excuse to get out of this country, and what excuse is better than doing it for the sake of the country?” I laughed a little too much at that, failing to note that my friend had found it far less amusing.
“Sure, but you ain’t gonna enlist anyways you fucking idiot.” Donnie muttered, that’s my friend’s name by the way. He isn’t Jewish though, I always thought that was a little strange. He was a good guy though, he bought me my booze and gave pretty sound council when I took the time to listen.
Anyways, Donnie was right, we just ended up spending twenty minutes parked outside the place while I drank some more. I ended up heading home early and drinking in my room, my father still didn’t find the time to mention the night before. Sadly, this was the tail end of a vicious cycle. Whenever somebody asks why those were the best years of my life, I say it’s because I can’t remember them much.
-
sonality likes this
-
spacecadet-- likes this
-
brokowskii posted this
