Three beers

The man shifted uncomfortably in his chair. Looking out on the inlet the water was cool and calling to him. He shifted again. He opened another aluminum can with a snap hiss. Briefly, he remembered a time when his beer had come in glass bottles but the memory passed for it was from a long time ago. Soothingly the amber liquid poured down his throat.

He crumpled the empty can, disgusted. Looking down at the brown paper bag lying on the rocks next to his chair he frowned. Only three beers were left. Was it enough? Another snap hiss echoed the splash from a jumping fish. His eyes focused on the difference in the calm water tracking the expanding rings until they disappeared. More amber liquid poured down his throat, the taste all but extinguished from the quantity consumed. Memories, most long forgotten came unwelcome to his mind.

He hadn’t been a large kid in school. His parents had scrambled for their money and he hadn’t worn the latest clothing, or even clothing from the current decade. He’d hid mostly in the room he shared with a sister. He was afraid of the television, afraid of the man sitting before it. School wasn’t a release. The letters and numbers jumbled in patterns his teachers insisted were impossible. Occasionally they’d coalesce into workable patterns but this became rarer as he progressed in grades.

Kids teased him. Teased him about his clothes, teased him about his teeth and teased him for being dumb. He fought a lot. He lost a lot. One day, after a particularly poor showing against a student twice his size his father had put down his cigarette long enough to look him over with a sneer as he walked up the apartment stairs.

“Get a whooping?”

He was embarrassed and looked at his toes through the tops of his shoes, “Yes, sir.”

“Fight back?”

“Yes, sir, I tried.”

“Good boy. Always fight back.”

Strangely, through two eyes that were swollen enough to not work correctly he thought his father looked pleased.

Another can sailed out into the water and even flattened this one failed to skip across the small white caps generated by the wind. He looked down at his bag and shifted uncomfortably in the chair he used to fish these same waters with. Two left. Two 24 oz tall boys were all his worldly possessions and he wished for more.

The wind picked up a notch, still gentle on his cheeks and he felt his eyes warm before the tears came. He’d never learned to swim but he thought of himself submerged in the water away from the wind where his tears wouldn’t be noticed even if he was alone. A blue moon shifted across the sky, several degrees removed from when he’d last looked up. Maybe three in the morning a voice in the back of his mind informed him.

Snap hiss. It was, he admitted to himself, difficult to get the can open and the coordination required to drink was becoming more difficult but doable. Amber liquid poured soothingly down an infected throat.

He thought about his kids. There were two of them, a boy and a girl with tails. He’d tried to be a good father to them. He’d tried to teach them things but the truth was he didn’t know that much to teach them and it’d been hard. He hadn’t spoken to them since his woman decided he was a layabout and sent him to the streets but he wondered how they were doing. Neither had his problems with letters and numbers and maybe they could make something of themselves in the world. Damn shame he’d whooped ‘em so much. Damn shame how the whooping had made him feel better.

The thought caused a pause and more amber liquid came unsteadily to his lips. Whoopings. He’d gotten them and always felt they were deserved, but maybe they weren’t. Maybe his kids shouldn’t have had to face them the same way he had. But too late, always too late to make it good.

Her lips tasted faintly of strawberries or beer. He couldn’t tell and didn’t care. They were alone together up in old man Kroger’s barn and she was letting him touch her. She was letting him kiss her. This was a first for him. He’d grown accustomed to the girls looking away or ignoring him but this one was different. She liked him.

Must be something wrong with her, he thought, but just as quickly as the thought formed it drifted away. They were kissing again. Nothing mattered except her body lying side by side of his. He felt her arms holding him tightly on his back, occasionally pulling on his bottom, pulling him closer to her. Troubles fell away, this must be what it was like to be alive. This must be the reason his parents got up and died a day at a time on a job and why they sometimes locked the door to their room.

He wanted to take off her bra but he couldn’t make his fingers work the mechanism.

“Come on Frank, get it off me, please.”

“Trying,” he mumbled before he interpreted the clasp and let it free.

Long into the night they stayed in old man Kroger’s barn. He’d be beaten for being out so late but this was worth all the beatings in the world.

She smelled like strawberries and beer.

The waters stirred and shifted on the horizon and he fought to focus his vision away for the effects of the alcohol. He focused on his feet on the solid rocks beneath him. Felt the firm ground up through his legs and used the sensation to balance himself. Slowly the world stopped its spin and came back into focus enough for him to drink from his second to last can.

He found himself forcing his exhales with more and more difficulty. He felt his body forgetting to do the things it should do naturally and getting air in and out was becoming a challenge. Exhale. Exhale. Exhale. It was strange to the man. All of the things pushing down on him, all his failures, he should now be having difficulty with the most basic task.

He shifted again, using his feet to feel grounded against the surging twisting tide. He thought of Karen, their happy months together before something had gone wrong. The years after things had fallen apart. Painful years, sometimes wanted by others, and often not. Children, thankfully smart, unlike him, making things more difficult. Jobs for someone who couldn’t read, and couldn’t fake it, eternally hard to come by and money was tight or nonexistent.

The streets. Living finally by himself. Definitely not wanted by anyone and cursed by most. They had been okay years but his body had aged quickly. Small aches from beatings in bygone years became chronic pains. The winters were bad. Quickly over but bad while they lasted and the drugs and alcohol became his companions. Easing his aches and temporarily removing the memories.

He drank from his second to last beer but none of the amber liquid came. Empty. Shifting his weight he reached down towards his brown bag and felt the chair give way as he twisted his weight. Falling.

“Oompf.” He hit his head on a rock and even though numbed from the alcohol felt the trickle of blood on his head flowing behind his ear. No matter. He picked himself off the bag, sitting uncomfortably on the rocks and opened his last beer, careful not to get any blood on it.

Sitting, always sitting, always with more time than he needed, alone with his thoughts and alone in a city of over a million souls, not one needed him to get by. The concrete was hard on his body and he thought about a new site, one with a ground he could pad himself on. Still, the mart was just a short stumble away, his malt liquor no more than a good football player could run with the ball before getting hit. He couldn’t leave his spot. It was his. To leave would be to give it to someone else.

It was his. He leaned back and drained the alcohol he’d scrounged several hours for and felt the unnatural length of the whiskers under his lips. He’d last shaved in… he didn’t remember. Absent mirrors it dawned on him that his reflection must be quite heavily bearded. Idly, he considered going down to the river to look but quickly relegated the thought from his consciousness. Too far.

The blood had managed to twist from the bottom of his ear and was flowing down his chin. Quicker than he realized for it was a wound to the head but the amber liquid made it okay. He looked at the remnant of his chair, the metal bars broken out of its frame. Unfixable, final

He nodded a salute to his fallen comrade and spilled beer until it mixed with his blood to form a different liquid. Wearily now, he didn’t want to waste any more, the man focused the last of his intellect on drinking without spilling. Satisfied he felt the amber liquid go down into a stomach never to bring it back up.

Nameless lyrics from a nameless song flickered into his consciousness and were gone just as quickly. He looked at the empty can and sighed. No more then, that was the last. He tried to stand but found the action impossible and now blood dripped into his eye, irritating him.

Bereft of his ability to stand the man crawled forward against the still gentle breeze, bleeding copiously from his head. He felt the water, cold even with the booze, on his hands, his knees and finally his toes. Fighting the urge to roll and pass out in the shallows he crawled forward cutting himself in his awkwardness on another stone.

He fought the blackness keeping it at bay. This was his time. He crawled ever further into the water and gasped when it found his crotch and again at his belly button. Bleeding but determined he crawled forward and felt the water touch his chin.

Cold. He tasted the water when it reached his mouth and was disappointed there was no alcohol to be found in it. Finally, successful, he let the darkness overtake him.