My eyes popped open to a dark and unfamiliar bedroom and it took me a few minutes for the fuzz to clear from my brain, for me to remember where I was. I was sprawled out, face down, on the bed in my parents' old bedroom and my whole body ached from head to toe. I felt like I'd been hit by a semi. How had I made it to bed? The last thing I remembered was puking up my guts and throwing out the trash after dinner. How had I lost track of things again?
I wouldn't exactly call it losing track of things this time. Samantha's sarcasm echoed inside my throbbing head. Let's be honest, Rach. You got shit faced drunk last night and it's about time you loosened up a little anyway. You always were a little on the uptight side.
Hazy pieces of last night flashed through my head. How many bottles of Dad's old whiskey did I drink? Had I remembered to even put out the fire in the fire pit? Probably not. I was lucky the whole cabin hadn't burned to the ground, or even better yet, I wasn't lying at the bottom of the stairs with a broken neck.
The digital clock on my cell informed me it was only three-thirty in the morning, hence the still dark bedroom. I rolled over on the bed and watched shadows dance across the ceiling in the moonlight, my eyelids glued wide open at this point. I tried rolling back over onto my stomach and back to sleep, but it was no use. I just couldn't get comfortable enough in my stiffening clothes and aching muscles. So much for sleeping the rest of the effects of the alcohol off, I might as well cash in on the rain check I'd given myself on that hot shower last night.
I padded into the bathroom in my bare feet and wrinkled my nose. I smelled of Eau de soured whiskey and tequila like it was oozing from my pores, hell it probably was. I ran my tongue over the roof of my mouth and my fur coated teeth, resisting the urge to gag again. I was afraid to glance in the mirror as I stripped off my clothes. I smelled and knew I probably looked a lot like the homeless man who camped outside the grocery store where I did most of my shopping at in Arcadia.
I twisted the hot water faucet to on and burned my hand as I ran it under the water to check the temperature. Great! Another item on my list of to do's around the cabin. Take a look at the water heater and attempt to readjust the temperature. I had no idea how to readjust the temperature on a water heater, so it looked like I was going to have to learn how to DIY it. If I didn't get it fixed I'd end up forgetting and burning myself sooner or later.
There was a bottle of expensive pink bubble bath perched on the edge of the tub, so I decided on a hot bath instead of a shower. There was no point in letting all that bubble bath go to waste, right? Besides a hot bath would help my stiff and aching muscles a hell of a lot more than a shower would. I poured at least half a gallon of the bubble bath into the running water and regretted it almost immediately. The smell that wafted through the steaming bathroom was nothing like the smell of roses.
I wrinkled my nose and held my breath as I dipped my big toe into the water to test it before sliding into the tub. It was a toss-up between eau de soured whiskey and eau de stinky rose water and I wasn't too sure which one was worse. At this point all I could do was hope eau de stinky rose water was the better choice and I sank up to my neck in the scented bubbles. My stiff and aching muscles screamed in relief and I leaned my head back on the cool porcelain and closed my eyes.
My eyes couldn't have been closed for more than five minutes when I heard it, the same as I'd heard it last night. The back door slammed against the wall downstairs and my eyes were popping open. I jumped up, nearly slipping and breaking my neck on the edge of the tub, and yanked a towel off the rack on the wall next to it. I wrapped the towel around my body thinking once again I was in the vulnerable position of being almost completely naked and facing a possible burglar, or the serial killer from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, or something just as disturbing. Something as disturbing as David, or that little weasel Scott breaking into my cabin.
