It’s been ten years since I had a drink. Ten long years filled with almost relapses, angry outbursts caused by withdrawals and learning how to live with life while sober.
Today was the day I decided to throw a middle finger to my sober life.
Today was also the day of new realizations. Realizations I thought were always myths; old wives tales from bored people.
It’s been ten years since I had a drink. I decided to pull the trigger on my sobriety by taking a shot, literally.
This is me now.
Let me show you how I was then.
I was a person who didn’t care for much.
One could say “she’s not a girl who misses much” which was quoted by the infamous band, The Beatles. Ironically, the title of the song is “Happiness is a Warm Gun. I say ironically for a few reasons that are too premature to explain now.
Anyone who tries to explain their ordeal they call life with the preceding statement: “Where do I start?”
I could conform to such norms but I rather not.
Maybe I’ll start backwards to the beginning like many movies that are out there.
Another cliche.
Another conformity.
It’s been ten years since I had a drink. I’m taking shot number three.
I was ten years ago that I moved into the house I’m in. It was ten years ago, I was living a carefree yet fruitful life.
Fresh out of college with a great paying job for a first year, entry-level, young adult, I was in pure merriment once the keys to the house was inserted into the lock. Never would I have thought the clicking of metals would sound so amazing and hopeful of the future.
I could go on with more cliches like how my cheeks were rosy and my eyes glistening with a promising future or how the smell of the fresh paint never smelled so gratifying.
The empty house that was waiting eagerly to be filled with new furniture.
The bare walls that are patiently anticipating decorations and frames filled with pictures of loved ones or beautiful, innovative, modern art. The ones you see in modern home modeling magazines where the art doesn’t make sense yet the confusion is what brings the creativity out from these contorted, bright images.
Shot number four.
I’ll spare you my life details and zoom into why it’s been ten years since I had a drink. I’ll omit the part of a cheating partner or the crazy parties with friends. The highs of my life where everything was placed perfectly in the puzzle I call life. The lows where I felt beneath the world and thought it will never get better. Eventually, my life began to stabilize itself. After numerous fights, laughter, memories,friendship gained, friendship torn along with broken hearts and hearts that were full of love, I started to live my life as a full adult.
I only lived that lifestyle for six months before it came crashing down again.
Shot number five is numbing in the most perfect way. Lifting me away again as my problems are left behind. Everything feels great. No worries or fears.
It’s been ten years since I had a drink.
I pour shot six.
It began after the holiday party at my work. A colleague who also was a close friend of mine decided to throw an after party to a select few along with her friends. We drank. We smoked. I popped a few pharmaceutical pills. Drank more. Smoked more. Popped more pills.
Everyone was having a blast.
I staggered to reach my keys and purse. No one noticed me. No one intervened and said, “Hey, you can’t drive!” No one cared. Everyone was having a good time that they noticed no one else but their own inebriation.
Not thinking clearly, obviously, I drove home. I don’t remember much of that night since I blacked out but I will always remember the outcome of that night. Always.
Shot six stares at me. The room is spinning and shot six’s glare is distorting it even more.
I woke up that night in the hospital but I vaguely recalled what happened. I remember driving on a dark road. I remember seeing the yellow lines sway in my vision. I remember seeing a young, teenage girl. I remember the crushing sound of metal. No longer will the sound of metal joy me as it did that first day I moved into my house. I heard the glass shattered on my windshield. I remember the pain.
I shoot shot six down without ease or regret.
I crashed into a guardrail at such force that I was lucky to even be alive. I asked about the girl. No one knew what I was talking about. They said there was no girl. It was just be on the road in twisted, crushed metal wrapped around a guardrail.
Once I went home, I went straight to bed with my mind full of thoughts. I know I was drunk and high that night but I could’ve sworn that there was a girl. It was the only fresh memory in my memory of that night.
The next day I woke up groggily out of bed. I walked to the bathroom to observe the wounds on my face. The face staring angrily at me was not my own. It was her face glaring back at me. I stumbled backwards almost falling. I was full of fear.
I thought I envisioned it so I went back to the mirror. She was staring back again. I cried out and ran to another mirror yet she was still there.
I thought I was going insane. I started calling friends and family to explain yet they all eventually told me the same thing; I was indeed insane.
I decided after a few weeks of this that I would stop telling people that the girl I thought I killed the night of the accident is haunting me through mirrors and that I haven’t seen my own reflection since the accident. People began to have conversations with each other about taking me to a mental hospital. I lied and told them I started to see a psychiatrist who began treating me with medication.
I stopped telling them about her. I had to keep my fears as a secret.That in itself was torturous.
I called someone who knows about seances and performs them. I shouldn’t have delved that far.
She came by one night to perform the seance. It was the last time I saw her.
Nataliya was her name. Brown hair that was braided at some parts and wavy at others. Her hair full of beads and feathers. Her skinny arms adorned with brilliant bracelets that glittered and allured in the light. Nataliya was soft spoken yet she had power to her voice. She came by with a luggage full of items to perform her seance and seance rituals.
Together we conjured the spirit of the girl in a room we filled with mirrors. She spoke through Nataliya.
Nataliya, who was possessed briefly by the girl so she can communicate with me, said to me in a growling voice, “I will haunt you until the day you die!”
I shoot down shot six because we are getting close now. We are getting close to the end.
Since then, she remains in the mirrors. She takes over my reflection. Just recently, she started speaking to me. Most of the time, she is yelling and growling at me. At other times, she is softly telling me how she is planning to kill me so that she can steal my soul once I am dead.
She wants to take all from me like I did to her when she was alive.
I can’t take it anymore. All I hear is her voice. It overcomes my thoughts now. I haven’t seen my reflection in such a long time that I probably won’t even recognize it if I was given the chance to view myself.
I sit in the dark now. No lights. No sound but her distant voice screaming at me.
Shot seven, eight and nine follow quickly after each other. The room is spinning wildly. I can’t feel anything.
Perfect.
It’s been ten years since I had a drink. I decided to pull the trigger on my sobriety by taking my last shot then I decided to pull the trigger on myself.
I’m finally free of her. Finally free.
They were right. Happiness is a warm gun.