Fallen Ash

Chapter Twenty-Three: Heather

The glass slipped from his grip and clattered back onto the beer mat, the dregs of whiskey dripping like melted wax down the side back to the bottom. Austin didn't need to call for the attention of the bartender - it wasn't busy. All he needed to do was make eye contact, and his glass would be full again.

Soon the crowd would swell, and there would be people dropping in after work, but without the usual throng of students, things would remain somewhat relaxed even in the early hours. It was that kind of pub after all. The drinks were cheap, and nothing was remotely close to good quality - you could get drunk and rowdy quickly if that was your scene. It had been Austin's scene for almost three years now. He had even played guitar upstairs, where they held intimate gigs, so drunk that all he knew was music and Steph's throaty vocals and the crowd became a black mass. For a brief moment he had thought that he might be able to reclaim those glory days.

Only very briefly, though.

Steph was mad. Seriously mad. When he stormed back into the rental space, she had finally clocked their absence and beelined it to him to see what they had been talking about. She had, after all, become his closest confidant as far as Ash was concerned. He regretted that now.

He should never have talked to her. Or better yet...

He wished Ash had never tried to infiltrate his regular life. She had been apart from it - part of another life, a new life, with potentially a group of people who hadn't been there during his darkest moments. At the start, he had felt like he was in a parallel universe when she was by his side - a world where everyone's memories had been wiped, and his soul was as pure as a new-born baby.

Instead, Steph had tried to find a way to slot her into everything that didn't concern her - the party, the rehearsals, the group. Ash wasn't even like that. He didn't even know what kind of music Ash liked, or what she read and where she liked to go. Something about green spaces - he knew, somehow, that she liked being outside, and that was it. It was information he had gleaned, not because it had been prompted by him with a question, but because she had simply stated it. All he had done was try to probe into matters that hadn't concerned him.

No wonder things had reached this point.

He was trying to take a step back and really think, but the alcohol he had steadily been consuming since early afternoon was clouding his mind. When he closed his eyes and thought hard about what had transpired and what had been said, he couldn't get a firm grasp on how he had been perceived by others throughout all of this.

Another whiskey appeared by his elbow, and grappling for something to do with his hands, he picked it up and held it in front of his chest. He had left his phone in the pocket handing on the bar stool - it was going crazy right now, with phone calls and texts, all because he stormed out of the rental space like a child and worried them all. He couldn't look at it right now.

He didn't care. Let them worry.

If they knew him that well, and cared that much, they'd find him.

As the doo-wop influenced crooning and chords hailed the start of a new song from the speakers above, he tilted his head back and took a slug of his drink. All around him, the emerald-stained panelled wood that lined the bar and booths started to merge together, studded with gold bursts from the wall light. Someone took the seat beside him.

He was getting pretty drunk now.

He wanted to forget it all. He would block her number - that seemed like a productive thing to do. That feeling of freshness and novelty that he had felt with Ash wasn't unique - he would find it again. He just needed to force that leaf to turn. It was done. It was over. Manic pixie dream girls didn't exist in real life - he had been living in a fantasy world.