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kmlaney · 3 months

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so, about a month ago, I posted this bit of background material for the @sipofsnips word game. I made a comment to @fallenscintilla that I might post the entire scene, just to show how bad a mental health day Phil had. Here it is, basically not edited at all.

It occurs immediately after this snip, posted last week. CW for language, drinking, alcohol, mention of execution, and detailed description of a person vomiting.

long post

One of my brothers-in-law takes Mama. Whether home or with him I don't recall. Or care, either. All I care about is getting piss drunk and hopefully wiping the last week or so out of my memory. I buy a bottle in low town--the one place around not picky about who they sell to on execution day, provided your coin is good. It burns going down and makes my eyes water. Utter shit but it’s getting the job done.

The main road is too bright and cheery for my mood right now. All these fucking idiots. Laughing. Singing. Alive. Fuck ‘em. I turn down a sidestreet. Maybe an alley. Whatever. Music isn’t so goddamn loud. It’s nice and shadowy. Smells like shit and garbage. Just like this whole damn town. Whole damn world, all of it shit and garbage. I take a hearty swig from my emptying bottle and cough a few times. “TO HELL WITH ALL OF YOU!” I shout to no one in particular. "RATFUCKING BASTARDS!" Damn, that feels good. Just. Get it out there. Yeah.

Something scampers off a barrel and I swivel toward the sound. “YEAH YOU BETTER RUN, SPRINGER! RUN OFF AND HIDE! IN THE TRASH! WHERE YA BELONG, CHICKENSHIT!” Might not be him. Might be a rat. ‘Course he is a rat. “CHICKENSHIT RAT BASTARD! YA LIKE TOADYING FOR WHIDBY? KISS HIS ARSE GOOD?”

A door opens up in one of the buildings and light spills into the alley. A person steps out. I think they notice me. “Shut up, ya drunk,” they call.

“FUCK OFF!” I yell back. “FUCK OFF! FUCK YA'LL OFF!” The glow is too godamn bright in my nice dark alley. “GONNA FUCKING HANG WHIDBY ON HIS OWN GODDAMN GALLOWS AND ALL HIS FRIENDS BESIDES!” They disappear into the building but leave the door open. When I spin around my shadow’s ten feet tall. I take another drink. Barely notice the burn. "SEND 'EM ALL TO HELL! DEVIL'S WAITING ON YA!"

"Philla?" There's a soft touch on my elbow and a voice beside me.

I lurch around. "WHO FUCKING WANTS TO KNOW?"

"A friend."

"AlN'T GOT NO FRIENDS!" Bring up the bottle and some sloshes out. Damn shame, waste. "Cept this right here." Another glug. Nice.

"How about you come inside?"

Do I know this person? I'm not sure. "Fuck the fuck off."

“I was a friend to your father.”

“THEN WHY AIN’T YOU SWINGING WITH HIM?” I scream. Fucking remind me, goddammit. I upend the bottle and guzzle the rest. Toss it away. It breaks against a building. Now I gotta buy another.

“There’s more inside. How about you come with me?”

Oh, lucky me. “More?” I stand, wavering.

“Yes. As much as you’d like. Come in off the street, Philla.” They tug my elbow toward the open doorway.

I let them guide me. “I got coin.” Coin is important. Coin means booze. Booze means oblivion.

“Don’t worry about that.”

The light’s bright. I hear music and conversation but it flows together. Noise. “Too cheery,” I complain.

They help me up the two or three or ten steps to the open door. “I’ll put you up private. Don’t worry.”

I squint against the glare from the lamps in the hallway. Far, far, far in the distance, I think I see a crowd. Tobacco smoke scents the air. Tobacco and whiskey and leather. That’s where the booze is. I take a tottering step that direction but that same soft touch at my elbow redirects me.

“This way, Philla.”

There’s stairs. Oh, fuck me. I grasp for the handrail and miss. Twice.

Behind me, I hear the voice speaking but not to me. “Take her up to one of the empty rooms on the third floor. Don't leave her alone, even for a minute. Keep her lubed if she wants but most of all quiet. There’s been enough death today.”

"Yes, Miss Peaches." Different voice. A strong arm grips me around my chest and there's a shoulder under my armpit, helping me up the stairs. "Come on, Philla. Up we go."

I wake in my own bed and immediately wish I hadn't. Sunlight streams in around the closed curtain, tunnels through my eyeballs, and curdles my brain. My stomach churns and gurgles in a decidedly unfriendly way. Something reeks to high heaven. It might be me. I groan and throw an arm over my eyes. It doesn't help much.

"Well, maybe fourth time's a charm. How are you feeling?"

I move my arm and crack open one eye. A woman sits in Mama's old rocker across the room. Strawberry blonde hair, simple blue dress, and quite frankly that's all I notice before covering my eyes again because they ache so bad. "Like shit." My voice sounds nauseous.

"Answering questions. That's a good sign," she says.

I groan again. Thinking about words is an effort. "Mind telling me who the fuck you are and why you're in my house?"

"Asking questions, even better." She giggles. "My name's Liese. Miss Peaches sent me home to take care of you."

"Nungh," I grunt in reply.

"We'll see if it sticks this time," Liese says.

I slowly, slowly, sort through her answer. "Peaches?" I ask, settling on the most pressing issue.

"Miss Peaches, yes."

"Mama here?" Any loud noises and my head will explode, and if Mother discovers one of Miss Peaches’ ladies here there will be a lot of loud noise.

"No."

Her answer brings it back, all of it, everything I was trying to forget. The arrest, the executions, the…the hanging. The whole thing. Something between a sob and a moan escapes my lips and my stomach rolls. I’m going to be sick. I try to turn on my side and Liese is there, helping. She even has a slop bucket. But it doesn’t matter because all I manage is dry heaves. My nose is running a steady stream. I wipe it away with the back of one hand. Liese cleans off my hand and nose with a dry cloth. Like Mama or---that train of thought leads to another choked sob and more heaving.

I have to know. When the spasms pass I ask, “What day is it?”

"Tuesday."

"Fuck me." Tuesday. Fuck.

Liese places one arm around my shoulders. “How about sitting up?”

I try to lay back down. "How about no?”

It doesn't matter because Liese hauls me up anyway. My head swims with the change of position and I gag a few times. “There. How do you feel?” she asks.

I squint my eyes open against the light. I’m wearing a long shirt I don’t think is mine. I certainly don’t remember changing into it. My legs and feet are bare. "Like shit and also confused."

< stuff happens > < Location: Phil's house later that day >

I think it’ll stay down this time. But I’m wrong, and Liese realizes it a half-second before I do. She shoves the slop pail at me barely in time to catch my spew. I vomit up the food I just ate until there’s nothing left in my stomach. Then I vomit up sour yellow bile until I run out of that, too. I puke until my belly aches from the effort and I can’t anymore. She gives me a mouthful of water to rinse, setting off another round of dry heaves. God, everything hurts.

Liese wipes my face and mouth with a damp cloth like I’m a child. She crouches down beside me and puts my arm over her shoulders. “Let’s get you to the jakes. On three. One, two, three!” She stands and brings me with her despite my groaning protests. I struggle to make my legs work. They don’t want to. My heels slip on the floorboards. Eventually I manage to get them under me but it’s Liese bearing my weight. She leans to grab the slop bucket in her free hand. “Come on, Philla.”

< stuff happens > < New Location: Peach House, Later >

Miss Peaches walks around the end of the bar to stand beside me. "There's a line between drowning your sorrows and drinking yourself to death and you rolled right over it without slowing down. So I cut you off and sent Liese home with you once you dried out enough to stand."

"I don't remember."

"I'm not surprised. I ought to have done sooner,” she says. “My condolences, Philla. He was--"

I hold up a hand to stop her. "Don't. Just don't. I had to go past the square to get here and if I have to think about it I'll be sick. Not today. Not now, please." Christ, I'm begging. I can't look at her. I can't look at anything but the dark polished wood of the bar I’m leaning on. My haggard, distorted reflection stares back at me. There's a black chasm, a cliff, barely beyond my toes and only the thinnest wire keeping me from taking that final step and falling in. "I want a drink."

"I won't serve you," Miss Peaches says.

“I've half a mind to find someone who will.” More than half, if I’m honest. Wouldn’t be hard even this early. Not in low town.

She rests her hand gently on my arm. “Don’t.”

It’s so like my father I feel tears forming hot in the corners of my eyes. They roll down my cheeks. I squeeze my eyelids shut to try to stop them but they creep out anyway. My breath hitches in a sob. Fuck. I can’t lose it now. Not here. Not in public. I blink a lot, snurfle the tears back, then drag out a coin purse and set it on the bar. “I, ah, I owe you…for the, ah, the room and all.” The words come out ragged and hoarse. I almost don’t recognize my own voice.

Miss Peaches folds my fingers back over the bag. “No, you're paid full,” she says. Her other hand brushes my hair behind my ear and ends resting across my shoulders in a gentle embrace.

I choke out another sob and feel her soft pat on my shoulder. It breaks the dam. My eyes squeeze shut again and I start shaking. No sounds. She gathers me in and I cling to her shoulders, curled into her embrace, when the wailing begins in earnest. She holds me while I cry out all the pain I tried to drink away before and then some. At some point she guides me to one of the card tables and eases me down into a chair, then sits with me until I'm all wrung out. It’s ugly. It feels like hours.

When the shakes finally stop and the tears slow she smooths my hair and asks, "Better?"

"Not really." I feel like I did when I stopped puking. Nothing's fixed. I'm not done. I'm just spent. Numb and hurting at the same time. “I ruined your dress,” I say. Snot and tears pucker the shimmering blue material. It looks like someone’s baby spit up and then some.

Her face shows no disapproval. “I have others.”

#kmlaney writes #kmlaney characters #writing #bad luck phil #skyfallen #mistlands #liese #miss peaches #Phil's terrible horrible no good very bad week or so

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