The Plastic Man

Jackson Graves

"This can't be real... This isn't really happening. Am I... going insane?"

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I walked into the bar after a long day. Upon an hour having passed, several shot glasses surrounded the counter I was sitting at. A look of drunken somberness plagued my features, like a disease taking hold of my life. Regardless, I continued drinking.

"Another." I said.

"Hey man, don't you think you've had enough?" The bartender said to me.

"I said... another." I said with more emphasis. The bartender looked at me concerned, but obliged anyways. He handed me another shot, which I downed in seconds, slamming the tiny glass on the counter.

My eyes were unfocussed, and my sight was hazy. I could barely sit up without the unwanted sensation of almost falling over constantly circling through my body. I felt a foreign substance build up in my stomach and try to rise up into my throat. I swallowed back the vomit.

"Another." I said once more.

"Look buddy, no more drinks for you. You've had enough." The bartender said, cleaning a few glasses with a cloth.

"I said more!" I yelled.

"And I said you ain't getting any. No more service for you." The bartender said, as I grabbed him by the collar.

"I have the money. You have the drinks. So you better give me another, or I'll make sure you don't get anymore service from me." I said to him with a drunken slur. He squinted his eyes at me in anger.

"Get the hell outta my bar." The bartender said, as I stared him down as best I could with my glazed eyes. Eventually I pulled my hands off his collar, and walked out the bar with a stumble. As I began to stumble home, I recalled the events of this week which plagued my mind. It all started with a trip to the mall with my girlfriend, Nessa Riley.

We walked along the tiled floors of the first floor of the mall, Nessa dragging an unwilling me along on her shopping spree. While her face was lit up with excitement, and her walk sparked up with a graceful skip in her step, I was uninterested in having to tag along and help her pick out what she would buy. Each step I took seemed to find my feet dragging with unwillingness to participate.

Sure, while being there was probably at the bottom of my list of fun things I'd rather be doing, it did make me happy to see her so excited. The fact that she wanted me to be there to experience her excitement was also a warming thought.

"Cmon Jack! Hurry up!" Nessa said, impatiently.

"Okay, okay. I'm coming!" I said back to her. I wasn't about to let her free from my grasp however, cause I knew that with her gone, our money would follow suit. She dragged me into the closest clothing store she could, and at that point, I let her free. I was keeping an eye on her so she didn't start overspending however.

She practically drooled over some of the dresses, as she picked them up off their hooks and brought them to the dressing room to try it on. Every few moments, she would come out with a new dress on, as I played fashion show, telling her how well she looked in them. Of course, as her boyfriend, I was obligated to always say she looked good, even if she didn't, lest I lose any special "privileges".

"How's this one?" Nessa asked, coming out the dressing room in a dazzling, sparkly blue dress. It really outlined her amazing figure, the pure blue complementing her darker coloured hair, eyes, and skin tone.

"Wow... You look... Beautiful." I stuttered, taken off guard boy how good she looked in the dress.

"Oh staaph you!" She blushes to me, then winks, running back into the dressing room. The next 15 minutes were just round after round of that. Her coming out with a new dress, me giving my opinion, her changing, repeat.