Writer in the Dark

1 Spring, Year 1

I wake up having no clue today would be any different than yesterday. Aches cry out from everywhere on my body. As my legs swing over the side of my rickety cot, my knees give a crackling cry of protest and I am reminded that I am slowly killing my poor, innocent body. What has my body ever done to me? For twenty-eight years, this physical form has served as a vessel for every idea I've conceived, every thought I've grown, every motion I've made for my entire life; it has every right to object after a night of madness such as the one I put it through last night.

While I sit still on the edge of my bed, my head swims with a kaleidoscope of emotions, most of them antagonistic and aimed at myself. Had I really spent another night drowning in alcohol at the saloon? Of course, I had. It had been new year's eve. Even Penny, poor, sweet thing she was, had taken a sip of watered down mead. And as much as I had undoubtedly enjoyed celebrating the changing of the seasons, a night of heavy drinking was neither what my body nor my bank account had needed last night. Yet here I am, stumbling stiffly to the trashcan by my writing desk to vomit. As per usual.

Truly, this is not the best way to start off the year. My new year's resolution had not been to hold my own hair as I spew a putrid stream of last night's regrets. I do just that, all the while wishing Haley and I had ended up sleeping together last night. Not, of course, in the biblical sense, but in the sense that she and I had stumbled home together and fallen asleep in the same bed. This happens more often than it ought to. All of this. The pathetic hangover, the horrific behavior last night, Haley and I falling into the same boat over and over again.

"Oh, Yoba..." I groan the name of the valley's god, sitting back on folded legs and placing my pounding head in my hands. My long hair falls forward to filter out most of the sunlight beaming cheerily through my glassless window, allowing the ache in my head to fade just slightly. The lessening of the pain gives way to a memory of the night before.

Oh, dear. Exactly as I had feared. Haley and I had overzealously celebrated the coming of midnight with her giving me a kiss I still don't know how I managed to reciprocate. I could still feel sunglow blonde curls weaved between my fingers, flavorless lipgloss smearing onto my own lips, the taste of the beer she'd been downing again. It still sent a minor shock through my body, the way she'd grabbed on to my shirt and yanked me over the table.

Of course, I should come to expect this sort of behavior from my best friend, especially under the influence of alcohol. It isn't as though she's never kissed me before; likely the whole town thinks we're together, including that brash boy Alex, who believes he had some sort of claim to Haley since they occasionally speak in the summer and dance together at certain events.

I shake off the greasy feeling that thoughts of that boy give me. There is no use getting even sicker, especially when I have so much to do to get myself back into (mostly) functioning order. While my momentary repulsion had taken my mind off the taste in my mouth, something had to be done about my hangover before I could even begin to try writing my quota for today.

Can I withstand the disappointed look Harvey would give me if I wander into his clinic at...what time is it? Where is my clock? Is it even daytime or is that the moon glaring hatefully through my window? Perhaps I wasn't out cold for as long as I had thought. Or, perhaps, I was asleep for much longer than expected. But one painful look directly out the window assures me that, yes, it is the sun boring into my aching cranium. What a lovely spring day.

Recalling quickly the task at hand, I pat at my shirt, then my pants, then crawl back over to the bed to search for my pocket watch. My hands grasp at the rough sheets, pawing through in a clumsy way while hoping not to find any unexpected sea creature nestling uncomfortably close to where my unconscious body had lain mere moments before. It takes less than a minute of scrambling to find the unpredictable little clock. It seems to have taken up residence inside my pillowcase, so I dig it out and open it to find that it is, regrettably, almost three in the afternoon. Harvey's clinic closes at three as of late, so I am doomed to suffer the rest of today. Just what I deserve, actually.