Just one for the road.
It made everything warmer, right?
(She so hated the cold)
Stop the shivering
Keep the bones right where they belong
Let them swim and sway
The closest she can still get to the ocean.
What was a good memory without a drink?
She raises a glass. “Ta our arrangemen’, then.”
She raises a glass. “To friendship, and looking forward.”
She raises a glass. “T’ new friends, an’ new business associates!”
She raises a glass. “Ta chance encounters, an’ wherever the hells you got those sunglasses.”
And so many glasses are pressed into her hand
blackberry sour
fine Malbec
whiskey and pomegranate
double of rye, cherry bourbon and cold brew on the side
grapefruit and tequila
watery ale with grain like sawdust
This was right. It was a pairing, a cocktail with two notes.
drink and company, company and drink
Words as soft as silk that say
“I’ll tell you when you’re drunker,”
“Talk like this is better in person over a big bottle of something,”
“Is that still your first glass?”
She never needs convincing, but she’d trust every word from those blue-tinged lips
Thrills every time their fingers brush against each other at the neck of a whiskey bottle
Everything made sense if she said so
Pour herself into her schema
What did a bottle do but give liquid shape
And what shape did she have without
And it lets her feel without breaking
Cry without shaking
Numbness then catharsis
Unlocking doors that she keeps closed
In front of people she hardly knows-
Halls gathering dust that beg for company
Vulnerability with plausible deniability
The escape hatch of “sorry, I was in my cups.”
So she washes herself away
Lets the waves crash against the shore
Wearing rock to sand
But as she sits at the thousandth thousandth bar
To order her third drink of the night
And thrils at the prospect of a friend
Opening a new keg for her nameday tomorrow night
A voice at her shoulder says something new,
“Going to nurse that problem of yours?”
“...It’s less of a problem, an’ more of a talent.”
“Yeah, whatever gives you your fun with easing the shake in your hands.”