​Journey to you

As he takes a drink of his Jack Daniels, his throat burns. His cigarette tastes like hope. He yearns for love. He lost the only woman who would love him just for existing. His armchair feels more comfortable than usual. The crossroads he’s at doesn’t feel any better. The radio plays. Drake makes his ears bleed. He turns the radio off. He thinks to himself, “How could this day get any worse?” He stands up. Jack has more of a grip than he thought. He walks over to the window. Thoughts full of despair and old stories of what life used to be like fill his mind. He says, “I wonder how Lisa has been,” as he calls her. The sting of knowing he’s blocked resonates through the phone speaker. He doesn’t understand how her cheating leaves him the bad guy. He puts his cigarette out and lights up his joint. A friend knocks. The Pitbull, Stella, barks. It’s Mark, with a 12-pack and a bottle of bourbon. They crack open a longneck at the dining room table and get to talking: politics, weather, the chick at Mark’s gym with the ass of a half-moon. They take a couple of shots of bourbon. He takes out his notebook and writes, “Not everything deserves your reaction, not every time you have to say something, it’s not like everyone wants your opinion” — Mystery Man, 2025. Mark lights up a joint, and both of them unload heavy emotional support for each other, given each other’s terrible six months of relationship, work, and personal life, this is something they both need. He orders pizza and wings from the local place. He and mark head to the living room. He sits back in his armchair with his notebook, trying to write something down, those meaningless quotes that he doesn’t know the meaning of. His own contradiction will kill him.he closes his notebook, clicks his pen and Stella comes up to him—loyal, authentically loving, and the only one who gives him unconditional love. He embraces Stella. His heart slows down. His anxiety slows. He knows what to think and do, knows what things to say and write. The comfort of Stella’s existence and the warmth of his armchair make him feel like it’s worth living. The seal must be broken as he heads to the bathroom. Stella follows, as she always does. The guy he sees in the mirror and the guy he thinks he is are on different sides of the spectrum. The guy he needs to be is in the middle. Everything in between is a failure or not enough. Getting to the middle is like running through the middle of the 2000 Ravens’ defense—utterly impossible. At this moment, the person he wants to be is someone who isn’t even feasible to achieve. He leaves the bathroom with the intent of not being a drunk asshole. The door knocks. Stella barks. Pizza and wings—the feel-good food in his eyes. Both Mark and he got their own pizza and eight-piece wings. Before he digs in, he opens a beer and takes a swig from it the bottle. “I want to end the sorrow, Mark. Seems like an uphill battle of despair and chronic mental misfortune.” Mark says “what’s happiness without a little bit of pain my brother” They eat, and Mark passes out on the couch. He takes the dog outside and rolls a joint. As he smokes, he wonders what’s next. His mind ponders While he’s drunk, his thoughts are sobering. The noise on the TV is just that. Noise. Mark’s Snoring is earth shattering; he wakes him up to fix the way his neck was situated so he doesn’t stop breathing in his sleep. He turns out the lights and heads to bed. Stella in tow. He wakes up in the worst possible way. Dehydrated and still drunk. He lights up a cigarette and takes a piss. He hates himself more than yesterday. No growth. Just despair. He is ready for change but doesn’t know where and how to start. Every night he thinks the bottom of the bottle and the butt of a cigarette is a good place. As he walked into the kitchen to make some coffee and eggs he looked at Mark. His best friend. The only person who gets him or at least has an understanding of how he works. He shakes mark awake for some with breakfast and some coffee how mark always took it. Milk and sugar. He always wanted it to be cream and sugar til the coffee was so sweet it made a candy bar seem bitter. After breakfast Mark leaves and he showers. Tempted to say fuck it and head to the liquor store but he doesn’t. Something lights in his head. An idea. A complete sentence to start even the most simplistic stories. “As he takes a drink of his Jack Daniels, his throat burns. His cigarette tastes like hope.” He keeps writing wondering if it will stop. He has a page done and hits a wall. “I need some inspiration” His type of inspiration is a mixture between the sweet juices of a woman much older than him and the smell of an old bar. The only things that they inspired are his despair and bouts of depression. He needs something new. Wife? Some kids? Growing up needs doing. He knows this and says “grow up? I’m 22” he thought. He hates when someone in their 30s calls him “kid” he lives on his own, has his own car, and makes his own money. But yet he was still a kid. Makes immature decisions. Especially when it comes to women. The book he’s writing should be the one that gets him in the game so he can move on to bigger and better places but it’s been an off and on thing for weeks. Sits down and gets up in an hour later sometimes with not even a credible sentence written. But he’s found someone. Something that feels like real love. His mind stabilizes and he’s ready for this. He sits down and he takes a swig of his Jack Daniels. Burn as treasured like the love of a good woman. The wall comes crumbling down. He can now write freely. He feels at home. He feels comfortable. The crossroads now feels like Route 66. A streamline. He finds love in the process of writing the book. The women he finds inspiration in. He finds peace. He puts down the bottle and picks up his kids. Something worth loving. No more alcohol. No more despair. He found himself and now he’s free, that’s all that matters.

The End.