one time, years ago at this point, i was alone at the bar, a pint of guinness and a shot of whiskey sat in front of me, the dark grain of the bar, combined with the thick lacquer reflecting the neon signs dimly back at me

insert generic 70s song in the background, fading into the hum of conversation around me, smoke from the grill and cigarettes filled the air, muting the heavy alcohol smell a bit

i don’t know what round i was on at this point everything had faded into a warm hug in my head, the constant din of voices more mumbles than a cacophony, a good spot to be in, it was warm and the booze made it warmer, outside was cold and miserable

i was between, well, everything, the last relationship ended when the baby was lost, for the best probably, even though it haunts me still, she died not long after that, that haunts me as well, another on the long list of things that fucking suck the taint of a water buffalo, i was in turmoil and doing the one thing that always helped, more

my drug of choice has always been more, more sex, more weed, more booze, more more moron, but when the shit hit the fan i went dark, deep dark, darkest depths of deep and dark, wake and bake into steady drinking everyday, processing, a couple stantstate of buffering, of suffering, of looking through the haze

so this time i am describing could have been one of any over a three month stretch, but it was not, it was one specific night, glued and tattooed, branded into my sordid past

so i did my practiced routine, sip of whiskey, chug of beer, free shot from another regular, hold it up and shoot it back, set more cash on the bar, another free drink chip, a never ending bender, encouraged and accepted by those around me drinking to the devils of their own, rinse and repeat, practiced motions, reflexive at this point, unthinking, machine like efficiency

every note of oak, every guinness mustache, every lucky strike, all reflections of her, of the one that didn’t get away but vanished, banished, and gone for good in deed, in action, but never once in thought, her crooked smile, her well endowed frame, her burning desire, a need as endlessly consuming as black hole, the hole in our souls drawing one another into a fatal gravitational wrestling match, one built on a bed of embers that could do nothing but eventually burn away into silken ash, that once in a lifetime kind of mutually assured destruction, reduction, while redacted, in my mind it was reenacted, protracted by a weakness neither of us could hope to contain, of pain, of distraction, two people running from something and falling into each other, a head on collision, me the iceberg and her on a far from maiden cruise

no one knew about any of this, it had been a whirlwind kind of thing, by the time i knew what was happening we were constantly together, making excuses to meet, a grinding heat and insatiable lust, right at the point of too late, after emotions developed, she admitted to being married

he was mean, blah blah blah, the story i learned a lot of married women use, an excuse to stray, it was always he is neglectful, abusive, drunk, insert negative connotation here, i was the hero, the knight in shining armor sent to rescue yon fair damsel, ate that shit up and let her force feed me seconds and thirds as i dove headfirst into infidelity as only a twenty one year can do, without thought or concern, driven by need, prodded on by deceit, hook line and sinker, reeled in and unaware the dangling worm hid danger until i found myself flopping, suffocating, desperate for one more taste

we continued to see each other, but as much as i wanted it to be real I knew it was just as fake as everything else, but the sex was great, fuck, i have no good excuse, i was lonely, she needed something she didnt get at home and we made a mistake, did not realize how big of one at the time, never really do, it isn’t until you rip the tablecloth off and watch the finery fly that you realize you should have taken a second to evaluate the scene

i am no saint, in fact the tail t in my soul runs deep and true, a chasm of impurity that poisons and destroys, for every lesson learned it took repeated mistakes, and even then sometimes stubbornly i kept on making them, irrational of irrefutable truth, but there are consequences to inconsequential stupidity, the piper needs paid of he leads the children astray

and so the piper called his marker ling overdue, she ends up pregnant, husband is supposedly sterile, he ignores cold fact, lies to himself as we lied to each other, as she had lied to me, as she continued to lie to him, he thinks it is a miracle, bless his heart, while i fade away, pay no attention to the broken condom behind the curtain, she keeps coming back, she is going to leave him, i’m still a wreck from the previous miscarriage of fate, seeking to plug the hole before imi swallowed whole, and you know, my kid and all

fast forward a couple months, to a frantic call, cue a race to the hospital, another dead baby, an emergency admission, a difficult admission, an unfortunate encounter, a fight, the truth comes out, she was never going to leave him, then the husband shows up, a different kind of fight, rage and anguish lashing out in the parking lot, i’m ashamed as i drive away, as he staggers into the emergency room, final shouted threats from both of us, promises of retribution, but enough blood had spilled

this kind of thing fucks you up, all the regrets and bad feelings, mistakes are one thing, going nuclear is some thing else, this was the biggest mistake that turned nuclear i had ever been a part of, too much to handle, and i was ashamed and couldn’t bring myself to tell anyone, too late to ask for help, too much had occurred, too difficult to speak of, i ruined 3 lives and nearly a 4th

they decided were working on their marriage, i spoke to her once, awkwardly apologized, she said we could run away together, start all over, a similar song and dance to a beat I couldn’t find the rhythm too, i knew we wouldn’t, couldn’t, and damn well shouldn’t, two weeks later i saw where she killed herself and her husband with the car running in the closed garage, the fumes got her and then seeped into the house and took him out as well, yet again he was the unwitting victim of her schemes

accidental death, it was cold out and they assumed she was warming the car up, i like to think that as well, even though it was precisely how she said she would do it, every detail drawn out to exacting degrees, but makes it easier than remembering her telling me, staring me in the eye and making the very declaration that foreshadowed the deed

so i shut down, hung up the closed sign, no vacancy, you don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here

this night at the bar was three weeks after, i sipped and slammed, numbed and medicated, but it didnt have the intended effect, so i went home and ate a bottle of sleeping pills, promptly passed out, on my stomach

the next afternoon when i rolled out of my stupor and saw the mess, the partially digested pills and empty bottle, the hazy recollection of wanting to sleep and never wake up, i knew what i had done, i attempted to do the big end to a temporary problem,
in all of my life of self hatred, in every moment of weakness, of the shame, the guilt, the lapping waves of misery that rocked my boat off course, i nearly drunkenly stumbled on the one way trip to nada

i broke out of my funk, locked down all the bad shit in a corner and swore to leave it alone, did good for a long time, when i found out Maia was on the way i went back there for a bit, but this was my chance at redemption, my umpteenth chance to do right in a laundry list of failed second chances, but one i knew i had no choice but to succeed in

no two griefs are the same, no loss can be comparable to someone else really, so i pretend mine never existed, but recently i was reminded through another’s pain, so i poked around to see if it had left a scar or not, couldn’t stop poking, woke the beast, wanted to say i understood but knew i didn’t, couldn’t, mine wouldn’t have been understood either, or seemed like a piling on kind of thing

no one likes a bandwagon rider, and this is more of a hearse rider, and that is just wrong, never belittle someone for their pain just because you do not feel it, i refuse to see someone in crisis and not look at the person they will be, the one they are now is fluid, the one they were is gone

as for me, like then, i am handling it now, but i finally decided to share, still shut down, stopped social interaction, social media, leaving the house except for work, but let’s play a game with this new found terrible knowledge, shall we

let’s pretend it is fiction, just a story the funny looking guy made up to pass the time, shooting the shit with an old friend, and let’s not speak of it, sweep it under the rug, just a sad little tale told in a fit of sorrow over the steaming pile of failure he wallows in,
we won’t mention that the baby was going to be named joanne, after my grandmother, or luc because we liked the name, in another world she left him and we had that kid, maybe lived to an old age together and never had a regret

instead it is what it is, fiction, pure and simple, a made up tale, i never drove past the cemetery, and it wasn’t raining, and i never shed a tear, not a solitary shred of sorrow pierced my aching chest

i want cuddles, when Mai is moody and Dax is sleepy and grumpy, i want to feel a head on my chest and an arm around me, naybe hear a soft i love you, and just fall asleep like that, not stare at this ceiling, wrapped in lingering regret, but we reap what we sow, weap and we grow more bitter as we age on the vine, the long gone days of sweet rememberance just another silent movie on repeat in the dusty rooms of the mind

don’t feel bad or try and put yourself into this fucked up situation if mistakes being escalated by mistakes and two wrong don’t make a right but three lefts do, this isn’t a plea for sympathy or understanding at all, it’s a true story, or it isn’t, whatever helps me sleep at night when i stare at the ceiling and hate myself for every mistake made and like told and life lost and for never holding joanne or luc, it’s a ghost story, a fireside tale, a beddy bye rhyme, a lucid dream, a living hell, a nightmare born on an angel’s wings, it’s that, it’s more, it’s less, it’s me, inside me and outside me and it’s nothing, which is me if you saw me as i see me, that’s all