The Unconventional (A Short Story)

The Unconventional

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters,
places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual
persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or
locales is entirely coincidental.

** Please note this is a short story
**

Death visited me in the summer of 2002
on a dusty street somewhere in the middle of Afghanistan. I don’t
remember the explosion or the pain or the loss of my two comrades.
I don’t remember any of that. All I remember is the ringing. That’s
what gets to me. The goddamn ringing.

That was the first time Death came to
see me. I was young and invincible when I looked him in the eyes
and defied him. But it was the second time I wasn’t prepared for.
It was the second time that this story is about. It’s about the
time Death made me choose.

***

My name is Archie Briggs. The date is
January 26, 2007. I don’t know it yet, but today is my reckoning
day.

I slide onto the stool at Flanagan’s
Bar and study the bartender’s smooth face. There’s no mistaking
Brad’s my brother. We both have blue eyes, goatees, dark hair,
tight jawlines, and don’t look a day over thirty. He’s already
getting my whiskey sour ready like he does every night.

Had I known what I know now, I would
have had my whiskey sour with some of the good shit. Crown Royal
instead of Kessler’s. But that’s the thing about life. You don’t
know when your number’s going to be called so you do the same shit
that you do every day. Put on the same clothes, go to the same job,
order the same drink, and say the same goddamn thing you say every
night in the same bar.

“
Light on the sour,” I say,
even though Brad’s already got the drink made and is setting the
glass down in front of me. I take a swig of the amber-colored
liquid, letting it slide down my throat.

“
How was business today?”
Brad presses his hands against the counter.

“
Smooth as usual.” It’s a
script I follow well. “Hank’s still got a stick up his ass.” We
both smile when we think about the time when we got busted for
stealing a pack of baseball cards from Hank’s grocery store. Brad
was twelve; I was ten. Hank peeled out of the store with a baseball
bat, but he couldn’t catch us on our bikes. Hank’s now the best
customer at my illegal gambling table I run in the back of my
pizzeria, Archie’s Pizza.

I take another swig and expect the
conversation to move effortlessly through the usual stuff. It was
cold as hell today. Sarah and the kids are doing fine. The crowd
will pick up later tonight because it’s payday. But Brad does
something entirely unexpected. Something entirely
different.

He slips a piece of paper in
front of me without saying a word. I set my glass down, eyeing him
with suspicion before I pick up the paper:
United Methodist Church. 7:30 p.m. Open session.

“
What’s this?” I ask,
holding the paper in front of my
face.

“
You know what it is,” Brad
says as he pulls the towel off his shoulder and wipes down the
counter to avoid eye contact.

“
Brad, I – ”

“
I’m doing this as a
brother, Archie, and a friend,” he says, finally stopping the
towel. “Sarah said it was about time I grow some balls. Tell you to
get some help. It’s a support group kind of thing.”

“
A friend?” I slide the
piece of paper back toward him across the bar. “No way am I going
there. I don’t need any help. I don’t have a goddamn drinking
problem.”

“
It’s not the drinking I’m
worried about,” Brad says, lowering his voice.

“
Then what is it? The
gambling? You know I don’t gamble on any of those tables.
Everything I do is fair and honest. Some win, some lose. Everyone
gets what they deserve, and they’re all satisfied
customers.”

“
It’s not that,” Brad
replies with a sigh.

“
Then what is it?” I ask,
tipping my glass to gulp down the rest of the drink. I slide the
empty glass back to him and repeat, “I don’t have a drinking
problem.”

“
It’s everything else,” he
says, looking at me with disappointment. He knows I’m going to blow
this off. He leans across the counter and says it quietly like it’s
a goddamn disease that’s going to spread. “You know, everything
that happened five years ago. It’s called PTSD.”

“
I know what it’s called.
I’m fine.” I got every pamphlet on the planet handed to me after I
flew back to the states. I was on a hospital bed recovering from
third-degree burns on forty percent of my body and lacerations cut
to my bone, unlike Gary and Jerome who traveled cold and in
coffins. Every pamphlet was the same. Usually they were some shade
of blue with soldiers hugging or a soldier with his hands covering
his face or some variation of the statement “When your life falls
apart.” Every therapist was the same. Useless as hell.

“
Come on, man. That’s like
saying a camel doesn’t have humps or Peggy down there doesn’t have
the clap,” he says, nodding his head down the bar to the blonde
with botched red lipstick and fishnet stockings. Peggy Olsteen is a
regular here. “It’s a support group for addiction.”

“
Are you kidding me?
Addiction? I’m not – ”

Brad puts his hands up. “Hey, just try
it. Just once. For me. You’re not the same Archie I remember from
back in the old days. I miss that Archie. The guy that let a goat
loose in the middle of the hallway during the last day of school or
the guy that chased Morgan what’s-her-last-name down to the docks
just so he could grab her boob.”

“
You want me grab Peggy’s
boob?” I ask.

“
That’s not what I’m saying.
I’m saying that you’re almost forty and you don’t have a wife or
kids. You haven’t had a girlfriend in the last five years. You run
an illegal gaming table in the back of a restaurant, which only
stays open because of the money you earn from the ring. I don’t
think you’re happy, man. That’s all I’m saying.”

“
Are you happy?” Archie
asks.

“
Just go. Once. Make Sarah
happy,” Brad says, leaning against the bar again.

“
Isn’t that your job?” I
throw down a five, spin off the chair and put on my jacket. Brad
stares at me and then takes the piece of paper and crumples it in
his hand. “See you tomorrow.” I head toward the front door and slam
it open with both hands. The bell clangs a feverish, high-pitch
sound.

I would have said something different
had I known better. Hell, the whole conversation would have been
completely different had I known better. But the thing is, you
don’t know any better.

All I hear is the goddamn
ringing.

***

The streets are dark and silent except
for the spotted glow of streetlamps. My ears are burning, and I can
barely feel my toes in my sneakers. I’ve been walking for the last
fifteen minutes back and forth on the seventh block of Richmond
Street. The faint flicker of a light catches my
attention.

It’s a basement room in
United Methodist Church. The window is half-covered in snow, but
there’s no mistaking the light in the room is on. It’s the room
where the opening meeting is being held for people
unlike
me, addicts. I
don’t do drugs. I don’t do prescription painkillers. I’m not
addicted to sex. I, on occasion, drink more than I should, but I’m
not an alcoholic.

But there was something that
made me walk down this road. Maybe it was the sadness in Brad’s
eyes or maybe it was disappointment in his voice or maybe it was
because for once, he did something completely unexpected and
different. Whatever it was,
something
made me walk to this church
in the goddamn freezing wind with my hands shoved in my jacket,
trying to conserve any ounce of heat.

I’m standing in the middle of the
sidewalk when I realize how stupid this is. How idiotic it is to go
to a meeting like this where real people have real problems. People
I potentially know. For Christ’s sake, I grew up here. It’s a town
people don’t leave. They grow up, get married to the girl down the
street, and breed here for generations. The odds that I know
someone here are high. and that’s the last thing I need. Poor
Archie Briggs, wounded veteran, turns to addiction.

I’m about to turn and hightail it back
to the pizzeria when I hear the faint breath and footsteps of
someone behind me. I step to the edge of the sidewalk and turn to
see a woman walking toward me in a black trench coat and matching
gloves and hat. In fact, she’s covered in black except for a bright
red scarf wound tight around the lower half of her face and neck.
All I can see are her big, beautiful eyes.

“
You coming?” Her voice is
muffled through the scarf, but it’s clear enough to hear that it’s
warm and enticing. It’s less of a question and more of a statement.
She expects me to say yes.

She keeps walking, not waiting for me
to respond as she passes. She expects me to follow her. So I do,
and I forget about the fact that I don’t think I’m an addict. Half
these people probably think the same thing, anyway. It’s called
denial, at least for them.

I jog to catch up to her quick
strides. The wind bites at me with sharp whips so I keep my mouth
shut, and my head ducked down. Her black boots are laced all the
way up her shins, the bow of the laces near her knees bouncing
lightly with each step. I take the stairs by twos and beat her to
the matching wooden doors brightened by an overhead light. I pull
the left side, but it doesn’t budge. By the time I make it the
other side, her black glove is already on the handle. My hand
crashes against her glove and then she meets my eyes in a momentary
gaze.

Her skin is smooth and flushed a deep
pink from the wind. The corners of her eyes are damp and her irises
glisten beneath dark lashes. Her eyes are steady on me, curious, as
she finally opens the door and says, “After you.”

I would argue this point since I’m
typically a chivalrous kind of guy, but I’m freezing, and the
longer we stand out here and argue who opens what door, the odds of
frostbite increases. I have pretty horrible luck so I duck my head
into the warmth and dim lighting of the church foyer. Besides the
two sconces lit near the door, the rest of the church is black. The
smell of incense and oil seeps through the air. She follows me in,
slamming the door with a shudder.

She stomps her boots.

I stomp my shoes.

“
What kind of fool are you?”
she asks, pointing down to my shoes. Her voice is still muffled
through the scarf. “And no hat? Some fucking people.” She pulls off
her hat and shakes out her hair. The black wavy locks are wild and
big with blue tips that look as if she dipped the bottom of her
hair in paint. She pulls her scarf from her mouth, keeping her eyes
on me the entire time.

“
We’re in a church,” I
whisper, studying her delicate nose and the curve of her pale pink
lips. Her cheekbones are high and her features are small, except
for her eyes. The woman’s all eyes. They’re mysterious and a deep
toffee color, the kind of eyes that hold more secrets than you can
possibly imagine. More secrets than someone her age should have. I
don’t peg her much over twenty-five.

“
Fuck,” she says as she
makes the sign of the cross and genuflects with a smile on her
face. “Sorry Father. Absolve me of my sins.”

She stands back up, and for whatever
reason, I find relief that I’m in this church standing next to a
woman who’s swearing and making peace with God at the same time.
The next hour should be interesting.

I’ll look back on this moment and
wonder if I should have made peace with God then. I wonder if
things would have turned out differently if I’d had a little talk
with God. You know, mortal man to ruler of life. Instead, I strike
up a conversation with the mysterious woman.

“
Archie Briggs,” I say,
holding out my hand.

“
Sloan.” She meets my hand
with her glove.