You walked the 3 blocks over to my house. The ocean was
unusually noisy that night, rhythmic thump of the waves crashing, dusk birds
squawking.
We sat outside on the lawn. I held back tears. You spoke of
confusion, being torn in two directions, seeing the future for what it was,
embarrassment, sadness, the feeling of not missing someone, watching me skull a
bottle of Rose on a Tuesday morning, lying in the hospital bed awaiting surgery
crying about the reality of it all
I don’t want a drunk
for the mother of my children. I’m sorry Caitos.
Its ok. I understand.
Take care of yourself
hey.
You met my sad smile with hurt blue eyes and then turned to
walk away, down Overton Gardens and towards the beach, baseball cap pulled low
and hands stuffed in your pockets. The sun streamed red all around as it fell
rapidly and the blue hour moved in.
I sat there for a while, hair crumpled around my face, watching the night set in. I heard David
Gracia’s voice years earlier in that dark street in Montreal, saying to the
kid: this is one of those moments in life where you make a decision, you have a
choice, what am I going to do with this, who do I want to be? Do I keep on
going like a scum bag or do I be the man I want to be?
With a sigh I collected the physical pieces of me and moved
inside.
Simon wandered into the kitchen to fix himself dinner as I
was fishing around between cleaning products and sponges under the sink for a
bottle of vodka.
Was that Matt? You ok?
Yeah.
You ok?
Yeah, Ill be fine.
I poured the last inch into a mug, added a little juice and
washed it down.