Chris bought the lie, although he fumed like a peevish schoolboy for an hour because he couldn’t get what he really wanted. Jane wasn’t in the mood to deal with Chris, knowing that his main objective was to get laid and then pass out half drunk somewhere between her couch and the bed. Chris had always been a boor, but his behavior in and out of the bedroom had become gradually more aggressive. The sex had gone from moderately rough to excessively rough, depending on the amount of booze each of them had consumed. Right now, Jane wanted to be alone with her weary mind and notch another night with no anomalous dreams. After a dinner of microwave macaroni and cheese and a can of peas, Jane finished her sixth Corona and still felt on edge. She poured a shot of Jack Daniels and then another shot. She sought that sweet spot of numbness, and it took two more shots of Jack to travel there. She fell back onto her bed, free-floating in the comforting haze. Reaching the center point between all of the past pain and all of the trauma that was yet to unfold, she allowed the booze to dictate her descent into the stillness where she could forget who she was and all she would never become.
