I steeled myself and stepped inside.
The room was dim, with only the snatches of sun sneaking under the curtains for light. It smelled musty; mildew and sweat and the stale smoke of old scotch. It was fairly basic looking inside — lots of rough wood, gnarled furniture, an open fire place against the far wall. It felt rustic, like a cabin should, although the vibe was somewhat ruined by the liquor bottles that littered the floor.
Logan was lying on the sofa, an open bottle of Jack Daniels precariously propped up against his chest. Even without the obvious clues, I'd have known straight away that he was drinking again. The transformation was incredible. He looked hollow, shrunken, like a wilting flower that had been cut at the stem. It had been over three months since I'd seen him, and that time had wreaked havoc. I almost couldn't reconcile the broken wreck before me with the man I used to know.
At first, all I could do was stare. I felt tears rising behind my eyes, and I had no idea if they were for him, or for me, or for the things he'd done. I wasn't the only one who'd been destroyed by this. I couldn't understand how we'd reached this point, how we'd caused each other so much pain.
Initially, I thought he was asleep but, as I took a step forward, his eyes flicked open. He blinked rapidly for a few seconds, like he couldn't believe what he was seeing, then he started to laugh. There was no mirth in it. It was a horrible sound, the laugh of a man who feels like the universe is playing one last giant joke on him.
"Why are you here?" he asked, making no effort to get up. His voice was coarse. I suspected he hadn't spoken in a while.
No hello. No apology. He seemed almost angry that I'd come. "I needed to see you."
He spread his arms. "Well, here I am." Somehow he even managed to make that sound bitter, like it was an affront that he was still alive at all. Thankfully, he didn't seem too deep into it yet. That's why I'd arrived early in the day — hoping I could catch him relatively sober.
I moved closer and sat on a nearby stool while he continued to watch me with glassy eyes. I'd rehearsed this moment in my head a million times, while lying in that damn bed, but now that it had come, my tongue was frozen. The things he'd made me feel were so raw, so intense, that I had no idea how to even begin putting them into words.
"You fell off the wagon," I said eventually.
He laughed again. "I didn't fall. I jumped." His eyes danced across discarded bottles. "May have set the fucking thing on fire on my way down, too."
"Why?"
He shrugged and took a long slug from his whiskey. "Maybe I was thirsty."
I sighed. Part of me had seen this going a different way. I had images in my head of Logan being so overcome with emotion at seeing me alive and well that he just broke down and apologized for everything. Obviously that was just naive optimism. I hadn't exactly been a picnic to deal with when I was drinking. There was no reason to think he'd be any different.
"What happened, Logan?"
He looked away and gave the barest shake of his head. "I don't want to do this." There were cracks forming in his facade now. His expression sagged, his muscles tightened. The bitter humor was falling away, revealing the broken man underneath. If I'd had any lingering doubts about the way his choices had affected him, they were now gone.
"Well I do."
His mouth twisted into a snarl, and he looked poised to get to his feet. "That's too bad, because you need to leave. I'm not joking. I don't want to see you. Get out!"
"Or you're going to throw me out? Go ahead, but I'm going to come right back in. I'm not going anywhere until you start talking, Logan. You owe me that much."
Conflict raged across his face. Even now, I knew he'd never actually lay a finger on me. Eventually, he changed tactics, fixing his eyes to the floor and doing his best to ignore me.
I couldn't believe I'd gotten this far without breaking down. Inside me, it was chaos. I wanted to burst into tears. I wanted to scream. I wanted to run over and wrap him in my arms and tell him it was all going to be okay. Most of all, I wanted to snatch the whiskey from his hands and down it in one go, to hit the self-destruct button and let nature take its course. Somehow, I'd managed not to pick up a drink since being discharged. It had taken every ounce of willpower I had. But being so close to an open bottle had my nerves on a hair trigger. The scent of it burned my nostrils, coaxing that ravenous hunger to fever pitch. I closed my eyes and focused on my breathing. I couldn't break. Not yet.
"Did you really think I was just going to move on?" I asked. "Forget about you? About this?"
"You should."
Anger flared in my chest. "Don't do that. Don't you dare act like I could just brush this off. This meant something, Logan!"