Total pages in book: 91
Estimated words: 87904 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 440(@200wpm)___ 352(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87904 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 440(@200wpm)___ 352(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
I barely registered it as Liam opened the car door behind him and sat down in the driver’s seat. I knew he wouldn’t leave, even as I was watching him do it. I felt like I was sinking into some invisible quicksand in the ground, faster and faster every moment.
I didn’t even know how long my phone was ringing in my pocket. I pulled it out, answering without thinking.
“Red,” Mark’s voice said. He didn’t sound happy.
“Just a minute,” I managed to utter, my voice hoarse.
Liam’s car door closed behind me. In another moment, his red tail lights illuminated, and he pulled off into the street and disappearing.
I still didn’t believe it. I didn’t think he’d go, just like that.
I waited for his car to come back, for him to get out and cry and fall into my arms and tell me again that he loved me.
A minute passed, but the street was silent. Nothing but the yellowy light of a streetlamp illuminating spiraling moths in the distance. The sound of a lone cricket somewhere nearby.
It was empty. He wasn’t coming back.
“No, no, no,” I repeated, my voice a little louder with every word.
“What?” Mark’s tinny voice came from the phone. “You there?”
“Sorry, I…” I said, trailing off. It was like I was underwater.
“I hope I didn’t catch you at a bad time, there, Red. We... we do have some unfortunate news,” Mark said.
I furrowed my brow, barely able to register his words. I kept staring at the street, expecting Liam to drive back, expecting all of this to just be a temporary mistake.
“What are you talking about?” I said, my voice hoarse.
I could already sense what Mark was going to tell me, though. This wasn’t just a quick meeting about the show. This was much worse.
“We got notice this afternoon that we won’t be getting the funding for another season of the show,” another voice said. It was Natalie, clearly in the same room as Mark. “It isn’t going to work out.”
I shook my head, feeling like I was only being pushed further into the sand. “No. I… I’ll provide funding. I’ll do anything.”
“The show is cancelled,” Mark said. I could tell he was as disappointed as I was. The show was his pride and joy, just like the tavern was mine. “Some of the execs at the network are figuring out next steps for us, seeing if we might get absorbed into another franchise. But Boozy Destinations is over.”
“It really isn’t going to happen, is it?” I said.
“I’m so sorry.”
16
Liam
I had always thought it would feel different walking into a liquor store for the first time after being sober. I hadn’t even been thinking as I pulled into the lot, the neon sign flickering over the awning.
I expected to feel some strong, magnetic pull when I walked into the store—my old favorites calling to me like beacons. But instead, as I walked inside, all I felt was numb exhaustion. The fluorescent light was too much. I felt tired down to my bones, like someone had set a leaden weight on me.
I walked down every aisle, expecting to find something I’d want. My limbs were heavy, like I had to drag my body with every step.
But the strange thing was that I couldn’t decide.
Vodka was almost too familiar. It would be far too fitting to grab a handle of that. Rum sounded too sweet, whiskey too spiced. I paced the aisles like a ghost haunting a house I used to live in, expecting to belong.
But I didn’t belong anymore.
I didn’t even feel like I was there.
I still felt like I was back in the tavern’s parking lot with Red, watching as his heart broke in tandem with my own. Watching as I finally told him the truth, and for the first time in my entire life, I’d seen Red unable to form a sentence.
He hadn’t known what to say to me.
It all played over and over again in my head. It felt like an infinitely looping dream, even though it was ten minutes ago.
“Sir?” a voice said from behind me. “Can I help you?”
“What?” I said, briefly pulled out of my trance.
“Just noticed you were staring at that wine bottle for three minutes straight, hun,” the woman said, glancing sidelong at me like she wasn’t sure if I could be trusted. She had a lifetime’s worth of wrinkles around her eyes, and their intense green almost felt like a shock as she scrutinized me.
“Sorry,” I said, clearing my throat.
“If that one’s too pricey, we’ve got some cheaper ones below,” she said. “Either way, it gets the job done.”
I paused for a moment, taking a deep breath. “I’m not sure I want the job done,” I said.
She cocked her head, her frizzy bleached hair swinging to one side. She had a brown plastic name tag that read Linda.