The Ten Year First Date

The Offer

Still rattled from Jeannie's text, I decided to go downstairs and try and find something powerful to drink. I knew that Imogen kept the emergency stash somewhere and all I had to was obtain it. I crept down the stairs quietly, so as not to wake the twins, only to find that I wasn't alone. Imogen was already sitting on the sofa in her pyjamas, a glass full of dark liquid in her hand. She looked up at me and smiled lightly.

'Thought you wanted an early night.' she said, glugging her drink. 'Want one?' she asked, holding up the glass and the bottle.

'God yes and make it a large one.' I said, flopping down beside her. Imogen dutifully did as instructed. She poured the whiskey into the glass that she was holding and handed it to me.

'What about you?' I asked, noticing that there wasn't another receptacle.

'Who needs a glass when you've got the bottle?' she answered, holding up her beloved Jack D.

'Fair enough.' I said as I downed the infamous alcohol from Tennessee in one gulp. Imogen was already swigging from the bottle. As we sat there, hugging our glass and bottle respectively, it was a complete flashback to our teenage years when we used to steal our parents' wine and drink ourselves stupid until the next morning. There was a reason for it, just like tonight. I knew mine, but I didn't know my sister's.

'Am I a bad person?' she asked, after another long swig.

'What?' I asked, confused. 'Of course, you're not.'

'Then why does everything go so wrong for me?' she asked, pouring me another, albeit, tiny, glass. 'I mean, take today. I was fully prepared, everything was written down, and everyone knew their place. And then what happens? Something as bloody simple as the projector blowing up ruins my one chance of being promoted.'

'Today was a promotion thing?' I asked, sitting up slightly and draining my glass. 'Why didn't you tell any of us?'

'Because if I did, then you lot would have made a big thing of it and bang! I would have ended up like this anyway.' Imogen explained, draining the bottle once again.

'Oh Immy...' I said, placing my arm around her. 'Shit happens sis, and unfortunately its one of those things. It's not because you are a bad person.'

'Poor Ollie...' she sniffed. 'He puts up with so much from me, and I couldn't even do this for him. I am a useless wife, a lousy mother and a seriously rotten P.R. girl.'

'You are none of those things.' I said, a little more sharply than I had intended. 'Ollie adores you, the twins worship the ground you power walk on and as far as P.R, well you have brought more accounts to that firm than anyone there. Don't let a silly thing like this get you down.'

'I shouldn't, should I?' she said. 'I should soldier on, just like you.'

'Yeah, just like me.' I smiled, kissing her forehead. 'Now, let's put Mr Daniels away and get you back up to bed.'

'I don't think my legs will move.' She slurred, holding her arms out. I rolled my eyes and moved the bottle out of the way, before pulling her up by the arms.

'I haven't done this since your twenty-first.' I tried laughing, as Imogen became a dead weight in my arms.

'I don't think I was as bad as this, was I?' she asked, with narrowed eyebrows, as she slung an arm around my shoulder to walk up the stairs.

'No, I don't think you were.' I answered as we started to slowly climb the stairs.

'Oh,' Imogen piped up. 'What were you doing down here anyway?' I looked at my baby sister, all cried out, hair falling into an unruly mess around her eyes and decided that she didn't really need to know.