Another missed call from Dad.
Another voicemail.
Another regret.
Powering off my phone, I shove it into my pocket and take another drink of beer. I savor the familiar burn as I swallow.
The Drunken Sailor is busy tonight. I watch the hockey game that comes from the TV hanging above the bar and pretend that I'm an invested, die-hard fan. Neither team is winning, but I am compelled to root for both of them. Everyone deserves a win once in a while.
Except me, apparently.
Already on my third beer, I'm teetering on the edge of almost completely drunk. I remember my college days. Well, the last year of college anyway. I went to all these parties. Back then I was a "fun drunk." The partier. The goofball. The clown. Now, I'm the depressed and self-loathing drunk.
Oh, how the mighty have fallen.
How do you like your "little fighter" now, Mom?
I wince at the memory of Mom's old nickname for Liam and me. She only started using it in the middle of everything bad that was happening at our new church – all the ugly and spiteful people – she and Dad fought hard every single day. As a child and a teenager, I admired their tenacity, their unflinching courage, and their unwillingness to compromise for anyone. And Liam and I were her "little fighters" – every Sunday, standing by their side, supporting them through the hurt.
Until it got to be too much.
How do you like me now?
Despite all my hopes and dreams, I became the broken link in our family history, now a rich heritage of faith interrupted.
Finishing the last of my beer, Amy appears in front of me from out of nowhere. It's been a few weeks since we spent the night together, but it feels good to think that she remembers me after all this time.
"Hey, stranger," she says.
"Hey." I offer a half-smile.
"What's got you down today?"
"Same ol' story."
"Well, that's no fun."
I chuckle. "Yeah. That's one way to put it."
"Tell me about it," she says as she ties the apron around her waist and proceeds to wipe down the bar top.
"Let's see," I start, taking a drink, "I lost my job, my apartment, and I can't paint to save my life. You tell me."
She smiles and nods as she dries a glass mug.
"Any luck finding work?"
Staring at the empty bottle in front of me, I shake my head. "No one wants to hire a drunk. Especially one with an incomplete degree in art." I laugh at the absurdity of it all. At the absurdity of my own disaster.
"Chicago's a big place. I'm sure you'll find something. You just have to keep trying."
"I hope so." But I doubt it.
"Hey, uh... You taking care of yourself?"
I nod. "As well as I can."
"Good." She clears her throat. "You look good, Ezra. For a while there I was worried that something bad had happened to you."
YOU ARE READING
Every Bright and Broken Thing
Teen FictionSometimes things have to break just so they can be put back together - bigger, brighter, better. Both haunted by the last question their mother ever asked them before she passed away, the Greyson brothers and their father, a pastor, struggle to pull...
