Tom Schreck - TKO

At four o’clock AJ hesitated when I ordered my bourbon. Even as bombed as I was, I knew it took a lot to get AJ to hesitate. The Foursome were back to talking and they were kicking around something about whether cows lay down when it rains because they’re tired or because of the dew point. TC thought the dew point had something to do when the cow had to move its bowels. It faded off after that.

At eight, I awoke in a puddle of my own drool, my face flat on the bar. Kelley had come in to watch the Yankees game, which was being shown on the ESPN Sunday Game of the Week.

“Welcome back,” Kelley said.

“What time is it?” I said.

“Eight.”

“Shit.”

“You all right?”

“Yeah.”

“Sorry how last night turned out.”

“Yeah.”

That was all he said, but I appreciated him saying it. We sat mostly in silence watching the Yankees lose to Boston eight to nothing. The Yankees got just two hits in the whole game. I nursed a few Schlitzes during the game, and I was probably still drunk by some official drunkenness measurement. It wasn’t a fun drunk or even an escapist drunk, but rather it was the shitty part of being drunk without any of the positive aspects of it.

I still couldn’t walk right and I couldn’t think clearly but I felt sick to my stomach, not from the booze but from the fight. It was the type of feeling that drinking will numb a little for about a half an hour while you’re building your drunk. After that there’s no use and you know it, but you keep drinking anyway to avoid feeling that feeling that will now be worsened by the shaky feeling of losing your buzz.

Kelley took me home and I didn’t argue about him giving me a lift. Al kicked me in the nuts when I came through the door and just like the night before with Strife I didn’t move quick enough to defend against it. My drunkenness was probably scarring Al and I was sure it wouldn’t be long until he would soon start attending BOA meetings-that’s Bassets of Alcoholics meetings.

I grabbed another Schlitz to help me be drunk enough to sleep. I spilled some down my face trying to drink it with my head on a pillow. Al jumped into bed with me and walked up the length of my body making sure to stride right on my left testicle on the way up. He licked my face and stuck his tongue in my ears and chewed a little. Then he spun around twice and paused with his ass in my face for effect and finally laid down next to me, his back spooning into my gut.

Apparently, Al didn’t care about me getting knocked out by a fat guy.

Drunk sleep sucks.

I was in and out of it most of the night and somewhere around four in the morning I think enough of the alcohol had left my system that I could get some quality sleep. That gave me four or four and half hours of sleep, if I pushed it, before work.

It wasn’t meant to be.

First there was the yells, then the loud thwack sound going on outside the Moody Blue. Finally, there was Al’s objection.

“WOOF, WOOF”- thwack — “WOOF, WOOF.”

Oh, how I hated life.

I sat up in bed and got a rush of that queasy, not-quite-pukey feeling. I stood up and realized my equilibrium was off and thought for a second that I was going to blow my cookies right there on my bedspread. Al didn’t help by running circles around me and incessantly offering me his opinion on the yelling and the thwacking.

Al did one last circle and stopped directly in front of me.

“WOOF, WOOF, WOOF, WOOF,” Al said, clearly upset that he wasn’t getting the response he wanted from me. Then he jumped up and kicked me in the nuts. I decided that now was as good a time as any to go barf. Al followed me with a steady chorus of WOOFs.

Having heaved through the basset din, I thought I’d go check out the five a.m. commotion in front of my house. There he was, decked out in yet another Karateka Bad-Breath ninja getup. He was yelling about horseradish and throwing something at the tree in front of the Blue. Against my better judgment, I opened the door.

“Sir, good morning, sir,” Billy said.

“Billy, we’ve been over this,” I said.

“Sir?”

“Never mind. What are you throwing against my tree?”

“Sir, permission to demonstrate, sir?”

“Knock yourself out.”

“Sir?”

“Throw the fuckin’ things, will ya!”

“Sir, yes sir.”

Billy reared back, yelled “WASABIIIIII!” and threw a metal object into my tree from about forty feet.

“Nice, kid, what are they?” I said.

“Sir, they’re Karateka-Brand Titanium Throwing Stars. This one is the six-pointed Okinawan Starfire and the one I just threw is the Yomiuri Four-Pointed Annihilator.”

“Kid, that shit is illegal as hell.”

“Actually, sir, as a practicing martial artist, I am allowed to practice with them.”

“If you say so. Look, kid, I’m going back to bed.”

“Sir, when will we train again?”

“Kid, I’ll let you know. I’m taking a bit of a break.”

“A break, sir?”

He looked at me in disbelief and sadness. It was tough to handle, but I didn’t feel up to heading to the gym and going through the motions with this kid. I didn’t feel like facing Smitty, and I certainly wasn’t up to the sensei routine.

“Yes, sir,” he said. He bowed and turned to head home, but today he walked.

I went back to bed and tried to sleep, but it was useless. Hungover and pissed off was not the ideal way to go to any job, but it was definitely not the best way for me to face the Michelin Woman and Abadon. On this particular Monday, we had a treatment team meeting and that meant a double dose of Claudia’s officiousness and Abadon’s patronizing arrogance.

The queasiness didn’t get better as the early morning wore on. In fact, it got worse. I felt carsick driving to the clinic, and I felt carsick walking to my cubicle.

“You all right?” Monique asked when she got a look at me.

“It wasn’t the best weekend I ever had,” I said.

“Didn’t you have a big fight?”

“Yeah, I got knocked out. Suffice to say, it didn’t go well.”

“I’m sorry, Duff,” Monique said.

I tried to round up the files I needed for the meeting, but I just couldn’t muster the energy or work through the apathy. I grabbed a handful of some of the charts and headed in ten minutes late. Claudia was at the head of the table with her ultra-cool clipboard with the calculator built in, and Abadon was at her right hand like some sort of twisted version of that last supper painting. I sat down, trying to minimize any attention, and Michelin flashed me a dirty look for being late.

Monique continued to present the case that I interrupted and updated us on Sabrina Shakala, a woman who was mandated to treatment for beating the shit out of her drug-dealing boyfriend. She was on probation and the boyfriend wound up in jail and frankly, I thought Sabrina was functioning pretty well. Anyone who can knock out a dealer’s front teeth with a portable CD player was all right with me.

I must’ve let my eyes close because I heard Abadon’s voice and it startled me.

“Duffy, are you with us or are you still on the canvas?” he said.

“What did you just say?” I felt my neck twitch.

“Sometimes an individual who has had a concussive episode will have delayed neurological reactions-like narcolepsy.”

Both sides of my neck twitched and my face felt on fire. Monique kicked me twice under the table. When I get angry enough it’s tough for me to speak, and that’s not a good thing because I wind up expressing myself physically.

“C’mon, Duff, or I’ll start counting to ten…,” Abadon said.

That was it.

I threw my hot cup of coffee at Abadon’s head. I missed but it smashed against the wall and splattered all over Claudia. I was on my feet and on my way toward him when Monique got in between me. At five foot four and a sleek 130 pounds, it wasn’t her physical presence but her innate authority that stopped me. Abadon was on his feet, beet red and breathing heavy.