I really haven’t drunk very much. It’s just that it’s been so long, the buzz starts fast and spreads through me. There is a rush like a tide in my head every time my foot hits the brake, which manages to wash away whatever I was thinking at that moment.
Which feels awfully good.
I reach for the bottle again, and, to my surprise, there’s nothing in it.
It must have spilled, because there’s no way I drank a fifth of whiskey.
I mean, I couldn’t have, right?
In my rearview mirror is a lit Christmas tree. It takes me by surprise when I happen to glance at it, and then I can’t stop staring, even though I know my eyes should be on the road. Then the tree lets out a siren.
It’s May; there are no Christmas tree lights. The cop raps against my window.
I have to unroll it, because if I don’t he’ll arrest me. I tell myself to get a grip, to be polite and charming. I can convince him I haven’t been drinking. I did that for years, with the rest of the world.
I think I recognize him. I think he may even go to my church. “Don’t tell me,” I say, offering up a gummy, sheepish grin. “I was going forty in a thirty-mile-an-hour zone?”
“Sorry, Max, but I’m gonna have to ask you to step out of the—”
“Max!” We both turn at the sound of another voice, followed by the slam of a car door.
The cop falls back as Liddy leans into my open window. “What were youthinking,driving yourself to the emergency room?” She turns to the policeman. “Oh, Grant, thank goodness you found him—”
“But I didn’t—”
“He fell off a ladder while he was cleaning out the gutters, and conked his head, and I go off to get an ice pack and by the time I get back I see him zooming off in his truck.” She frowns at me. “You could have killed yourself! Or worse—you could have killed someone else! Didn’t you just tell me you were seeing double?”
I honestly don’t know what to say. I’m wondering ifsheconked her head.
Liddy opens the driver’s side door. “Move over, Max,” she says, and I unbuckle and slide across the bench into the truck’s passenger seat. “Grant, I just cannot thank you enough. We are so blessed to have you as a public safety officer, not to mention as a member of our congregation.” She looks up at him and smiles. “Will you be a darling and make sure my car gets back home?”
She gives a little wave as she drives off.
“I didn’t bang my head—”
“Don’t you think I know that?” Liddy snaps. “I was out looking for you. Reid told me you left him at the dock to go help Pastor Clive.”
“I did.”
She glances at me. “That’s funny. BecauseIwas with Pastor Clive all afternoon, and I never saw you.”
“Did you tell Reid?”
Liddy sighs. “No.”
“I can explain—”
She holds up one small hand. “Don’t, Max. Just . . . don’t.” Wrinkling her nose, she says, “Whiskey.”
I close my eyes. Stupid idiot I am, believing I can pull a fast one. I look drunk. I smell drunk. “How would you know, if you’ve never had it?”
“Because my daddy did, every day of my childhood,” Liddy says.
There is something about the way she says it that makes me wonder if her father, the preacher, was trying to drown his own demons, too.
She drives past the turn that would have led to our house. “Lord knows I can’t take you home in this state.”
“You could hit me over the head and take me to the hospital,” I mutter.
