Devil in Disguise Read Free Page A

second was in order. This had also gone down the hatch
so smoothly and quickly that he had wandered into the kitchen, empty glass in
hand, and was contemplating the third. The shot in the arm that the first drink
had given him had faded. The second had allowed a brief reprise, but had been
annoyingly fleeting. He needed that third, yearned for it and desired it so
strongly that his feet were almost tapping with impatience.
    A dark
recklessness coursed through his veins, and he snatched the bottle from the
counter as if some invisible figure might take it away from him. ‘Fuck it!’ he
said, pulling out the cork he had stuffed back into the neck in the feeble
pretence that he wasn’t going to drink any more. He knew the outcome of this
game because he had played it before. Many times. Why did he pretend he could
enjoy just one drink when one was never enough? And why did he wake each
morning promising to have a wine-free day only to relent mid-afternoon without
so much as a struggle? He would finish this bottle and very probably go to the
off-licence for a second. He could always find a reason to indulge himself, and
once the bottle was open it was game over. He didn’t even bother toying with
the notion of restraint, these days.
    It’s
not my fault, he told himself, as he glugged the ruby liquid into his wine
glass. I need some comfort. I blame Molly. After all, it’s been two and half
months now, and how on earth am I supposed to cope for all that time without
her? It’s no wonder I need the odd drink. I’ve been discarded, and it’s the
only comfort I can lay my hands on.
    For the
last few weeks his drinking had been getting just a little worse and he was
sure it was because, without Molly, he was unravelling. She was his best
friend, his soulmate. She had abandoned him to go cavorting around the country
in some dreadful show and his increasing intake of alcohol was the consequence.
Usually he and Molly spoke at least twice a day and met up almost as often.
When she was between jobs they practically lived together, spending hours in
cafés, endlessly chatting, always able to amuse each other and never bored in
each other’s company. Without her, he was lonely. It was as simple as that.
    He
looked at his watch. Molly was going to call him as soon as she had settled
into her digs in Northampton. It was her custom to ring him during the
afternoon that she settled into a new place so that they could have a giggle
over the latest hole she was staying in — another of the little pleasures they
shared. But if she guessed he’d been drinking, he knew what would happen.
Disapproval would creep into her voice, and she’d very often cut the conversation
short, as if there was no point in talking to him in his inebriated state, and
he would be left feeling more deprived than ever.
    Hopefully,
she’d phone soon. He looked again at the glass of wine in his hand, luscious
and inviting. He was dying to sip and savour it, roll it over his tongue and
swallow it. He could just about hold himself together on three glasses of wine,
as long as he enunciated clearly and didn’t start rambling. Four glasses and he
was liable to start going on about the BBC, the Post Office, the DSS, British
Gas or any other organisation that drink seemed to transform into the enemy du
jour. Both he and Molly knew very well that if he started ranting, he was
most definitely pissed. If she didn’t call soon there would be no point in
answering the phone.
    The
third glass of Sicilian red was risky, therefore. He was still sober enough for
lucid self-recrimination, not drunk enough to be lost and pain-free. It was the
tipping point.
    With
the glass in hand, he wandered into the lounge and sat looking out of the
window across the railway tracks towards Camden High Street.
     
    Simon had met Molly on
their first day at Goldsmiths College in London when they were both freshers,
starting out on their university lives. The welcome meeting had just begun