Challenges of Sobriety in a Weekend of Confines

Prologue

(**Copyright Parker Nystrom, 2013-2019. Any unauthorized reproduction, duplication or distribution of this work without consent of the author is in violation of copyright law. All Rights Reserved.**)

CHALLENGES OF SOBRIETY IN A WEEKEND OF CONFINES

It had been over a year now since those awful, awful circumstances fell on her. Over a year since her world had shattered, crashing into shards that she cut her toes and wrists on. Over a year since she had become this girl I could hardly recognize.

In that time, all of her closest friends had forgotten about her. Besides me. That was the reason I was the one who came out here in the first place, the reason I was the one locked up in this house with her all weekend, the reason I could never leave her in her solitary sorrow. It was about time I did something so drastic. I couldn't let her waste away like that anymore.

I pressed myself up against the front door and hit it with my forehead, leaning one knee onto the balancing chair I had shoved under the doorknob to keep it shut. It felt so flimsy an obstacle, so weak a barricade that either of us could move it in an instant, had we enough drive to do so. And yet, I just stood there, propped against the front door as if I would be any better of a blockade than this silly old dining room seat. I knew I couldn't leave her, I had put this chair here to remind me of that. Even if it all killed me, be it the booze or the shouting or whatever else she'd do to me, I knew I'd have to stick it out the whole weekend. The whole damn weekend. She was my friend, that broken down, sorry-sick girl. She was my best friend...

But perhaps I should try not to get ahead of myself, perhaps I should try to explain in better detail before I paint that beautiful girl in the dim light she shone on herself.