Closing Time: 11 PM

1. A Soul Not Broken

You took my light

You drained me down

But that was then

And this is now

-Part of Me, Katy Perry

#

It had been ten years.

I haven't seen her since that night that she took back her phone, clutch, and silver shoes she removed just so she could run after him.

She and Ethan apparently got back together that night. I refused to be interested in finding out what happened between them and hid somewhere they couldn't reach me. Just two days after our graduation rites, I was already walking down the streets of The Lone Star state - Texas.

Most people who live there, especially the cities near the boundaries, are from Mexico or Spain. They use the waters to illegally enter the US and start living another life.

I arrived thru a plane, of course.

I went there to live a quiet life alone and start moving on. Crazy as it seems, she has affected me too much that I knew then that I have to stay away for me to forget her. My uncle owns a ranch somewhere in San Antonio and it was pretty much far from the mainstream. I would hunt squirrels and whatever animal my sling gun can kill. I would go back to our house, grab a bottle of beer while my cousin plays the guitar.

And no, I'm not wearing a cowboy hat and that jumper style of clothes. I was normal.

I became a farmer and earned lots of money with my hands. I didn't expect that this would be my job after finishing my course but I know that I excelled with what I did. My crops were sold within the whole state and I maintained that kind of life.

I want to think that I am a man-made-millionaire thru my own efforts. I could buy what I want and take pride with the products of my soil. I was able to have any woman I want, any woman I do not want, jump from my bed to another woman's bed but I never became satisfied.

And so, I further jumped.

More people knew me, more women drooled on me, more wives cheated for me and shortly, the Lewis Ranch on San Antonio, Texas became the capital of cotton and flirting.

But they never got me satisfied the way Raffy's stare held me down.

#

I woke up one day after drinking heavily the previous night with two of my farmers. My head hurt so bad and so I remained lying on my bed for a long time even if the sun rays entering my room were already scorching my skin.

After thirty more minutes, I didn't have any choice but to stand up when my househelp Jaida knocked on the door. She is at least ten years older than I am and has a child.

It was a Sunday and I realized today's the day wherein she has to get my clothes and wash them. I stood up feeling heavy.

"Howdy? Had a good drink with Garza last night?" she asked me. She's not Spanish. She was from Arizona originally.

"Yeah," I answered. "And we drank all that we bought until we dropped."

"Well, only happens once in a while," she said as she gathered the clothes that I used for the past seven days.

"If you call drinking one to three bottles a day with a major blackout drinking session once a week as once in a while, then I'll toast you with that," I laughed.

"Chad, Bill saw an invitation for you. I don't know where it came from but ask my son where he put it," she told me.

"Is that an invite for a drinking session?"