Everything Feels Wrong

the kitchen table

I have that fucking table burned into my brain. The wood, painted blue, with the brown rings left on it from the countless cups of coffee, to the newspaper stabilizing the leg that wasn't as long as the other three. When I see it at that furniture store, I cringe at the flashbacks. I get an empty hollow feeling in my stomach. The whole scenario that I've tried so hard to forget floods back into my head like a river after a dam has been broken. I close my eyes and see the tall dark brown bar stools, scratched up from years of use. I see the whiskey glasses. I see what I remember thinking was just a small glass of whiskey. It was one drink. That's all I wanted. That isn't what I got, but it's what I wanted. Sure, that wasn't responsible, but do not begin to tell me that half a glass of whiskey (that didn't even get me tipsy, might I add) was the reason this happened.

These whiskey glasses, they were the fancy crystal kind. The whiskey, cheap and shitty. The kitchen table, blue, like his eyes. I have an image of a room I've been in maybe three times, memorized so well that I could navigate it better than my own kitchen.