My Personal Ken Doll

Chapter Four

Falling into bed the night before had been so easy she'd been able to do it blind drunk, but getting up the next morning? That was by far the hardest hurdle that had been thrown at Elsie, harder than any man leaving her sorry ass.

She felt as though someone had stood over her bed while she'd slept and hammered her forehead with a large rock. She'd been hungover before, but this was the mother of all hangovers. This was the kind of hungover she supposed you'd feel after a night of popping pills and doing other illegal activities, not the two bottles of wine that she'd actually allowed herself.

She lay in bed for a good ten minutes just staring at the ceiling, wondering how her life ended up like this. Afterwards, she promised herself that she would never drink again, at least until next week.

Deciding that sleeping in longer wouldn't fix her pounding head and quaking stomach, Elsie slowly sat up; automatically regretting another decision that she'd made.

Food was definitely off the 'to do' list, she knew she'd throw it all back up before she'd managed to taste it anyway.

Thinking back to her earlier pondering, she might have to pop a few pills herself if she was going to get through her day.

Nothing illegal of course, just some pain medicine- perhaps more than 'some'.

Raising her heavy head and glancing towards her bedside table, she hoped for a glass of water and was sorely disappointed. There was nothing but a lamp on her bedside table: mainly because she would never have thought of looking after herself on the morning after.

Elsie attempted to think back to the night before, but her headache just began to get worse. She wasn't going to be able to accomplish anything with her mushy brain without medicating herself and getting some food into her stomach.

Now more than ever, Elsie wished that she was a planner. The type of person to plan ahead on every possible outcome. Someone that would have gotten some water for herself; if she had been, she'd have already been hydrated by now, and not feeling like her mouth was a Sahara desert.

Sadly, the only way to get water now was to track downstairs and get herself a glass.

She'd drink the bathroom sink water, but the last time she did that she had a cold for a week.

Rubbing the sleep out of her mascara-coated eyes, Elsie sighed when she was reminded by her brittle eyelashes that she hadn't washed her face before bed either and was now more than likely supporting a model- like racoon look.

Pulling her king size bed cover off her legs, she set her bare feet onto the fluffy, cream carpet of her bedroom and felt around for her slippers.

Nope, they were gone, and with no other explanation than to blame her drunken self, Elsie stood and made her way to the door.

Getting hit by cold air in the hallway, Elsie rubbed her bare arms and hurried towards the bathroom. She planned to wash her makeup off and fix her knotted her into s comfy bun.

After finishing her bathroom business, Elsie felt like a model. Well, a hangover, not showered, hairy legged, pyjama model.

Either way, she felt so much fresher and a lot better. All she needed now was her pain medicine.

Knowing her pills were in her medicine cabinet downstairs, Elsie hurried down her grey carpeted stairs, and paused outside the closed door of her kitchen.

But her kitchen door was never closed.

 She never closed it, it made her feel better with it open, safer. Even drunk, Elsie knew she was a scared baby, she would never have closed the door.