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“Go!”
Chapter Forty-Three
I hit the gas, driving on autopilot. I was reeling. I didn’t know what just happened with Carrie. I couldn’t understand. I’d gone from happy to miserable so fast it made my head spin. I thought we’d just gotten back together. She hadn’t mentioned another guy when we talked. I lost her all over again.
I’m engaged. I’m getting married.
I turned left, heading anywhere. The night was dark and the streets empty. Tears blurred my eyes. My heart hurt with how much I wanted her. We’d been so good together, so happy. Tonight had been all I ever wanted. Her arms, her skin, her hair, her kiss.
I love him, too, and he’s better for me and Emily.
I wiped my eyes, realizing something I hadn’t before. I’d thought that if I really got sober, Carrie would take me back again. She had, at first. Shewantedme back sober, and I wanted to be with her sober. Maybe I’d gotten soberfor her, like she was my reward for giving up drinking. But in the end, it hadn’t worked. She didn’t want me either way, drinking or sober. We’d never be together. She was marrying someone else. I couldn’t even hope for her anymore. It was over.
Go!
I turned right, wiping my eyes again on my sleeve. I had nothing, and my mess of a life came back to me. My brother was framing me for murder. My father thought I was a drunk and a loser. My mother was heartbroken. My sister had to prop me up with a job on a case we’d never win. My family was breaking up, and I didn’t know how we would ever be the Devlins again. I wondered what it really meant to be a Devlin in the first place.
I cried as I drove. I felt lost. I felt myself sliding, weakening. I couldn’t stay strong anymore. I felt sorry for myself. I’d never felt sorrier for myself.
I turned right, then left. I drove without thinking, trying to get it together. Maybe I really was what everybody thought I was, just a drunk.
I was caving, crumbling, breaking down. I wanted to give up, to give in, to surrender. I’d been battling not to drink every damn day, but I was tired, so tired,tootired.
I couldn’t go another day, another night, another minute. I was hanging on to sobriety by my fingernails, but they were breaking off. It was the 714th day, and I was giving up.
The car came to a stop as if it had driven itself here.
•••
I knew where I was, but it looked different. Porty’s had been my bar, but it was gone.ellen’s eatery, read a lighted sign, the façade made of pink stucco, embedded with several arched windows. The door was a gleaming white, and next to it a menu mounted under glass, nicely framed.
I considered driving away. I knew Ishoulddrive away. I still had a decision to make. I could just go.
Go!
I wiped my eyes. I blew my nose on an old napkin I found in the car. I smoothed my hair in place and shifted in the driver’s seat. I really should go. None of my old friends would be here. I couldn’t call them because they weren’t in my phone anymore.
It wasn’t Porty’s, but it still had beer.
I could stay or go.
I could drink or not.
It was The Moment.
I’m engaged. I’m getting married.
I got out of the car. I was worn down.
I didn’t have the strength to fight anymore.
And I hated myself for that.
•••
The room was a sideways rectangle, and the bar was still opposite the door, but it was half the size. I didn’t see a bartender, and no one was drinking at the bar. The restaurant was empty except for a group of women finishing up desserts. They must have been a book club because they were yakking away and there was a thick hardcover sat at every place setting. The place smelled like artisanal pizza and waning perfume instead of like booze and stale cigarettes.
I crossed to the bar and sat down, feeling out of place and exposed. The bar itself was clean golden pine and glistened with polyurethane, no longer dark pitted wood with matte blotches where the varnish had worn off. Pricey pendant lights with glass shades shed too much light. Oversize photographs of stone farmhouses hung on the wall behind the bar, having replaced the dusty clutter of liquor bottles and softball trophies. Some would have considered these improvements, but not me. It was all too bright and shiny, and there was nowhere to hide.
