Billy walked out of the house with a jacket but no coat. It wasn’t that cold, even though it was December. Plus he was just going out for a smoke. Billy’s old man had made it clear that he could only live there if he stayed sober, so Billy wasn’t going out for the night. He wasn’t even going down the street to the beer store. Or he did not intend to go to the beer store. But he did need some cigarettes.
So he went down the street. Work was closed tomorrow, so he got paid a day early. Maybe he would get a real pack of smokes, not Barclay’s or some shit, and a Mellow Yellow. He’d been back since Thanksgiving, pretty much not drinking, and working every week. He deserved a Mellow Yellow. And some Marlboros. Exactly. Something nice for himself since he had been working so hard.
Which was something his father completely did not appreciate. It’s not like he was glad to drop out of school. Sure, this semester had been a waste, and the one before that not much to speak of, but he had been good at school once. Sort of. He sure as hell didn’t fail, and it was a lot better to withdraw than fail now. Assuming he could still withdraw.
Which, according to the letter he pulled out of his jacket, he could not do after December 15. And today was …? Shit. Today was shit. Today was too late to withdraw. Which means that he would now fail because he would now have missed exams and everything. Any case he had to make to his old man about how hard he had been working was shot now because of the school thing. Dammit.
What to do now? He had to think but the impending train wreck that was about to be his house kept making too much noise. He took the cigarettes and the drink outside, but even after he smoked one, there was too much going on in his head to sort out on his own. He needed a drink. Not a lot, but something to take the edge off and give him room to maneuver through all of these problems. Back in the store, he got a 40, which would have been more than a little drink if it were not beer.
Sitting behind the now defunct Hooters, he wondered how many people knew there was still a picnic table back here. Probably not many. He wondered what the Hooters waitresses did back here on their breaks. Tiffany had worked over here. He could not believe that, the first time he came back from school. But there she was, not the hottest cheerleader but still a cheerleader, working at Hooters. She was nice to him. Let him buy beers. He tried to thank her by grabbing at her orange shorts.
“What an asshole,” he thought as he threw the bottle against a retaining wall. Even then he did not succeed: the bottle failed to break. “Screw it,” he said to no one in particular, and started walking aimlessly in the direction of the ABC Store. Not that he was thinking about that. He was back to his father, who would once again be proven correct. Billy was massively fucking up. You couldn’t call this bad luck anymore. He knew better than to do the stuff he was doing, but he did it anyway.
The thought was depressing enough that, finding himself within the store, Billy went ahead down to where the vodka was and found the stuff they make in Kentucky. This state is known for liquor, of course, but not for the Russian national drink. Maybe that’s why vodka from the Bluegrass State is so cheap. Whatever the reason, Billy was for it. He got a pint.
Back at the picnic table, he poured out a third of the Mellow Yellow and filled up the bottle with vodka. From experience he knew that he could drink the mixture fairly quickly and then be buzzed enough to drink the rest of the pint straight. By the time he finished the cocktail, it was starting to get dark outside. Billy took the pint out underneath the big cowboy sign of the hotel next door and sat sipping on it for a while.
With no more sun to warm him up, Billy started to shiver a little bit. Standing would be a bit of a challenge, but once he got moving, he felt sure he could warm up. Besides which, he would be passing the liquor store again, and having gone this far down that road, he figured he might as well make this bender count. Finishing off the pint, he threw it into a storm grate.
Billy took it as the first good sign of the day that the bottle shattered into a hundred pieces. The look on the face of the woman in the passenger’s seat of the car next to the grate indicated something else to him. It was the same look his father got, one of disbelief mixed with disgust. The moment soured, and Billy stepped into the ABC store. Which was warmer than he remembered from before. A little too warm maybe, and he loosened his scarf. The vodka section played some hide and seek this time, but he found another pint bottle and managed to get it payed for without incident.
When he walked back outside, a blast of cold air knocked Billy back a step. He tightened his scarf back and tugged at the insufficient jacket.
Rather than go back under the cowboy sign, he started for downtown figuring the mile walk would warm him up a bit. Once he got there, maybe he could find a warm spot to sit. Bars were no good because they charged too much for drinks or else you had to get food. Nothing ruins a bender faster than food. He took a couple of hard slugs to get warm.
Maybe it was a couple. Maybe more. Details were starting to elude Billy at this point. Somehow half the bottle got gone by the time he could see the city’s lone “skyscraper.” Not really a skyscraper in Billy’s book, and he started to explain why until he remembered that no one was listening. Before he could think about how this might mean it was time to slow down, Billy found the bottle in his hand nearly empty.
It always seemed to go like this. Billy was not too sure what had happened to get him started, but he was totally beyond where he intended to go now. If he could, he would just want to sit down for a few minutes. Just a few. Off to his right, he saw a few people go into the basement of a church. He got a little closer and saw some more people hanging around the door smoking.
He lit a cigarette and drifted up to them with a studied casualness that he hoped would not give him away. He also drained the last of the second pint and dropped the bottle into a bush when he passed. A minute or two after he reached the edge of the circle of smokers, someone said, “I think it’s time,” and the group shuffled toward the door. From behind them, Billy could see a room of folding chairs in rows.
Sensing that he might be able to get a free place to sit for a while and get himself together, Billy tagged on to the back of the group. Inside the room, he saw a large coffee pot, a cup of which might be just the thing to get him together. Despite some attempts by a couple of people, he managed not to have any sort of conversation while simultaneously pouring, sugaring, and stirring a cup of coffee. All without spilling.
He managed sitting as well, and found himself in a deep sweat again. The room was warm, very warm, and Billy opened up his jacket. Just about everyone in the room who had not been aware of Billy when he came in was aware of him now. The sickly sweet smell of ethanol mixed with perspiration began to permeate the room. As Billy slowly passed out, there was no reason to move him. He would not disrupt the meeting. But he would be a stark reminder to everyone there of what they had to be grateful for, at least for one night.