Birthday in the Dark

Lance carried his Johnny Walker on ice from the kitchen to the couch. He set the glass down on the coffee table and set himself down on the couch. He stretched his legs out on the table.

The remote control was in his left hand. He looked at his left hand and at the remote control clutched inside it. He had been searching for the goddamn clicker thing for three days.

He was just reaching for his glass of Scotch when he saw two drinks on the table, both with indentical glasses with three ice cubes. Each drink freshly made.

“Wooooa!” he said in an angry howl toward his ceiling.

This was happening more and more frequently of late.

He looked from the one glass to the other and to the remote control in his hand.

“That’s interesting,” he said, meaning the window of time that had shut itself off, again.

Alzheimers.

Throwing the remote control across the room, Lance went to bed feeling low. He was all alone on his sixty-seventh birthday, his phone had not rung all day, and more than just losing his friends, he was losing his mind.

He left both glasses untouched on the coffee table.

Alfred watched Lance turn off the lights and go into his bedroom. Alfred sat down in Lance's spot on the couch. He looked around the shadowey living room of the home he had once lived in. He drank half of the one drink, then half the other.

Lance was going to spend a few moments trying to figure that one out tomorrow morning.

Alfred was an unhappy old soul, and these tricks did little to cheer him up.

He sat unsmiling in the dark room, and remembered he needed to plug the telephone back in.

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