Lost Echoes

20

Tad woke up certain that during the night a cat had shit in his mouth, but not owning any cats, he decided that, unless he left a window open somewhere, this wasn’t likely.

He sat up in his bed, only to discover he wasn’t in his bed.

He was under the dining room table, him and some empty glass and aluminum soldiers lying this way and that.

He managed to bump his head on the table bottom, as well as rattle his noggin by disturbing the cans and bottles around him. The sound of them being touched, moved, was loud in his head, and in that moment he thought:

What if that kid is telling the truth?

Maybe he does hear sounds.

And maybe, like me, he’s just a drunk.

Either way, he’s fucked-up. And if the sounds are real, he’s double-screwed.

Tad crawled out from under the table, got to his feet, which only seemed to take about a week, made a quick wobble to the bathroom, got down on his knees, dunked his head over the toilet bowl and let it fly.

It was like his insides were going to come up with it, not to mention his balls.

Goddamn, he thought. I been drinking quite professionally for a long time, but I must have tied a good one on last night.

He vomited repeatedly.

When he finished, he noted there were drops of blood in the vomit.

Rawness from his throat.

That was it.

God, he hoped that was it.

He reached up, flushed, then fell back against the wall.

He sat that way until his brain came back down from outer space, bringing along with it an anvil that dropped right on top of his head. Using the toilet bowl as an aid, he got to his feet, wandered into the kitchen, got a beer out of the fridge, and sipped it.

Hair of the dog that bit him.

He stood by the refrigerator for a while, stumbled into the dining room, sat at the table.

In front of him was the note Harry had dropped off.

He read it.

“Shit,” he said.