(Book 1) Hayden Mackay & The Forgotten Kingdom

2. A Close Encounter with a Hound

"Hayden Mackay, you are being a jerk!"

I chided myself, again and again. I stared down the half filled glass of beer still lingering in my hands. My mind dared to gulp down another sip. I knew I already had enough and I should put a full stop right now. But if I stopped drinking and tried to be more myself, all the pain, all the memories would come back to me which I didn't think I had the energy to even think of.

The pain beneath my chest was to much to endure. Tears that I was holding for a longer time now, finally crawled down my cheeks. Only if I was in right condition, I would have described my depression as a total absence of color. My whole life changed within a blink of an eye, everything in the world seemed different now. The laughter that came from the group of biker's men sitting across the counter top, enjoying the basketball game, seemed so distant and was making me feel more lost and vulnerable.

It was the match between Dallas Cowboys versus New York Giants. Both the teams immensely admired by my dad. I tried hard not to let my mind ponder towards the times me and my dad spent together watching all the games of the season, debating one another about which team was the better one, that was the topic I and my dad used to spend a lot on. I sighed aloud. I blinked and wiped my tears. He had been world's best father and a friend an eighteen year old guy like me could cherish. I gritted my teeth chiding my fate of losing him and gulped down the glass of beer in a single take. I just couldn't afford to think of anymore. It would cause more pain which I was already having.

A waitress passed by to wait the table across me. She handed the glass of double chocolaty chip ice cream to the couple sitting there. I quickly averted my eyes. My mom made the best chocolate ice cream in the world . She even promised to make one this weekend just for me. I remembered how her eyes used to dance with happiness whenever she watched me enjoying her special recipe made ice cream. I needed to see her beautiful eyes again. I needed to forget everything around the world, put my head on her lap and drift off to a dreamless sleep. God! I miss her.

"Can I get you another glass of that beer?"

Thankfully, the waitress brought my senses back to the present. I looked down and noticed I finished the whole jug of beer.

"Sure, why not?" I said nodding at her.

"Will get that right away," she said and gave me a king smile before walking away. I tried smiling back at her but in vain. All I could feel was the wetness on my cheeks.

In reality, I should be celebrating today. Only two days ago was my graduation. I just got through my high school. I remember my parents waving at me bursting with happiness as I stepped up to collect my degree. I promised a full rock on celebration with them but instead I chose to party with my friends first.

Only if I had listened to my mom and stayed back with her, they would have not gone to the temple and I might have never received this phone call, the call that turned my whole life upside down. The police officer, who called me, informed me that my parents unfortunately met with a horrible car crash on their way back home. I could not believe him until I saw their lifeless bodies in the mortuary. That was the moment I experience all the variety of emotion-shock, disbelief, numbness everything at a same time. In my whole eighteen year life, I never ever felt the emotion of being sad, my parents made sure I was taken care of everything all the time.

The waitress came back with another jug of beer. She said something to me but I didn't even look at not to mention I cared anything she said. I hated my self for drinking so much today. If my mom was here, she would have given me one heck of nag that my dad always had from her.

There was this one incidence a few months ago, when me and my team won a baseball match at my school. I was just about the age to drink and my mom caught me dad encouraging me to taste beer.