24. Dill Pickle Spear

You try to massage the hangover out of your temples. It moves to your gut. You double over, clutching where your stomach punches itself for being so stupid. The pain recedes and you drink the water left thoughtfully on coffee table. Beneath it is a note in your handwriting, albeit far from neat.

You follow your instructions towards the bathroom but find no painkillers. You close the medicine cabinet. Your reflection looks like shit. Double checking the note, you read out loud:

'Bloody Mary. Bloody Mary. Bloody Mary.'

Your reflection is now a redheaded woman pouring a glass of the red drink. She reflects your surprise, but hers is milder and more pleasant. She garnishes the drink with dill pickle spear and passes the glass to you. You reach two hands through the mirror and take the drink.

'Um. Thanks. Do I tip you?'

She is now more surprised and definitely pleasantly so. The mirror snaps back to your own reflection, which still looks like shit. You raise the drink to your mouth with two hands.

Music rises. The genre would be called 'easy listening' if the volume was not painful. It begins to squeeze your headache before your hangover frizzles away into pinpricks.

You leave the bathroom. Outside, the guys dance deliberately-lame with left index fingers pointed up and swirling through the air.

Chris drops the music : 'You made a good first impression.'

Frank: 'She's taken, unfortunately.'

James: 'Even I wouldn't move on that.'

'She's not too keen on the rest of us.' Pete demurs. 'We're a bad influence, apparently.'