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I closed my eyes, and for a moment I felt as if my whole life literally flashed in front of me. So fucking cliché, but that’s what happened. Everything I could remember – all the times I had been tossed out, unwanted, unloved…and I had moved on anyway. I remembered every time I hit someone out of anger, frustration, hatred – either of myself or the person I hit – it didn’t matter. I remembered all of it. I remembered that fucker in the group home and the look on his face when he’d finished with Theresa – the same look he had when I was charged with assault. I remembered the street fights, and I remembered the first time I killed someone in a tournament. Then I remembered the second time. And the third. I remembered all of them. I remembered the gut-wrenching feeling when I realized Jillian was gone with my child. I remembered opening up a bottle of Jack afterwards and downing the whole fucking thing in a night. I had done the same the next night. And the next.
I remembered everything Landon had said to me.
If you aren’t up for this, just say the word and I’ll end you right now.
You have no idea what you could do, and your self-pitying nature means you’ll probably never actualize any of it beyond staying alive in the tournaments.
You don’t have to live like that, Bastian, but if anything’s ever going to change, you’re going to have to let someone inside again someday.
Get up, you son-of-a-bitch! You aren’t hurt that bad! Fucking GET UP!
I remembered the sixteen people who were herded together and tortured to death for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I remembered the first nightmare and the trial. I remembered looking for a bottle of Jack and only finding vodka in the cabinet. It knocked me out cold for the whole night. I remembered everything that had happened. I remembered all the reasons I took to the bottle. I drank to forget it all. I drank to make it all go away. I drank because I thought I was a worthless piece of shit – unwanted, unneeded, and unloved.
With Raine, I felt different.
Raine wanted me. Raine needed me. Raine loved me. She loved me.
I opened my eyes and saw first the glass of clear, unassuming liquid posed right before my lips. Then I saw the bartender over the rim, looking at me quizzically and waiting for me to make a move. His eyes flickered over towards the door where he could probably still see Raine on her way out. On her way out of the bar, away from me and out of my life.
I wasn’t a strong person. I was muscular, and I knew a lot of shit about how to survive, but when you got right down to it, I was weak. I was weak, and on some level, I drank because I wanted to die and was too fucking pig-headed to just end myself. I was going to let the alcohol do it for me. That had always been in the back of my mind. Eventually – either through the violence that ensued, the stupidity that followed, liver failure or a fucking overdose – the drink would kill me. I had wanted to die.
Was I different now? Did Raine make me different? With her I had something I had kept at bay for so long, too afraid of being left again to let anyone get close enough to hurt me. With Raine I had another chance – a chance at love, and even more so – a chance at life. With her I could have a real life, without the constant threat of pain. I’d lived through a lot of shit. I’d survived abandonment, betrayal, endless violence, and the elements, but could I survive Raine? Could I live with her, in her world like a regular person? Was I strong enough to do that?
No, I wasn’t. I was fucking weak.
She deserved better, and this would be a quick and easy way to end it all.
My fingers tightened reflexively around the shot glass, and my arm moved ever so slightly closer to my mouth. I wanted it. I wanted it so fucking bad. It would take less than a second to drink it, and then I could forget everything again. I could go back to the way it was before I had even met her.
I stared at the shot glass, precariously balanced between my fingers with the clear liquid sloshing slightly from one side to the other, a mere half inch from my lips. Vodka – sweet, evil vodka.
Just one.
My head turned, and I looked over my shoulder at Raine’s retreating form. My gut lurched, my jaw clenched, and shooting pain radiated from the center of my chest. I looked back at the glass in my shaking fingers, and slowly lowered it back onto the surface of the bar. When I looked at it, there was want. There was need. There was a shitload of fucking desire. I was drawn to it as if it was calling my name sweetly and offering to suck my dick. I fucking wanted it bad. It felt like I needed it more than any other substance in the world.
But I could live without it.
There was something – someone – I couldn’t live without, though, and she was walking away.
“‘If you call forth what is in you, it will save you. If you do not call forth what is in you, it will destroy you,’” I whispered aloud. I pushed the glass away with my fingertips, rose off of the bar stool, and turned around to follow her.
I didn’t want to drink.
I wanted to live.
I guess I was going to survive Raine after all.
~~The End~~
