The world is spinning at more than a thousand miles a fucking hour and so what if I’m a little unsteady on my feet – the surprise is that when I’m sober it’s different. When I’m sober it’s like the world is hardly moving at all. Drunks, it seems to me, have a heightened awareness of reality.
I carry tinned food in my pockets just to stop me falling off, cos there must be a risk, right? Only, you don’t see the risk when you’re sober. I carry tins in my pockets and I wear heavy shoes, metal segs in the heels and the toes, and steel caps. And I hold onto things more, onto traffic signs and lampposts and benches in the park. Makes sense when you’re drunk, so drunk you can see the world spinning like it is.
It’s the same with Lizzy and I’d hold onto her if she’d let me. I tell her that at any moment we could be thrown apart and drifting into nowhere and no way back. I take her hand in mine and I tell her if we are to be together then she can’t let go. Lizzy just laughs and she calls me shit-for-brains and she buys me another drink and when I turn back she’s gone and there’s nothing in my hand.
I drink till they won’t serve me. At The Box and Baggage I drink. The beer’s got more gravity there, and when I’m without Lizzy then at least I’ve got Sue. She walks me home some nights, and I lean on her and she says I’m heavy like a bull, which I say to her is just as well for the both of us cos she’s slight and she don’t weigh more than a good sack of potatoes. I tell her about the world then, and how it’s spinning and how we’ve got to hold onto to each other to save from falling off. Sue laughs and she fiddles in my pocket for my keys and she lets me into my own apartment.
We dance to no music, me and Sue, and we drink a little, or a lot, and she’s soon as drunk as I am, and she can see then, how things are what they are. She can’t walk straight any more than I can and so I tell her she can stay over if she likes. She’s got her own toothbrush here in a glass by the sink and some underwear that she keeps in a drawer on her side of the bed – there’s even a ‘her side of the bed’ which I like.
We don’t fool around. That’s agreed. We just undress and lay next to each other, and I’m holding her hand she’s holding mine. And like that we can’t float away. We kiss sometimes and I make the mistake of thinking she’s Lizzy and she calls me for all the names under the sun when I do. It’s an easy mistake to make I tell her, when the world is spinning so fucking fast that you can’t keep track of your thoughts.
She thinks I talk shit, but she stays over anyway and, like I say, she kisses me and holds my hand and like that we sleep. In the morning she’s gone and she always leaves a note and some coffee in the pot and the windows thrown open to let in the air.
I feel sore in my head when I wake and I feel not right. And I miss Sue straight away, or it’s Lizzy I miss, the kissing and the holding. It’s confusing. I miss ‘em so much it hurts, like I been shot full of bullets, and there’s a deep black hole inside me and I can feel myself falling into it. So, I reach for a bottle I keep by the bed, a bottle of Georgia Moon corn whiskey. A few slugs of that and I’m in touch with reality again, the room tipping and the air rushing by me and everything moving so fast it’s blurry. And I hold onto the end of the bed and like that I feel safe again and everything makes sense or if it don’t well it don’t need to.
Patricia Ann McNair 
The world is spinning at more than a thousand miles a fucking hour and so what if I’m a little unsteady on my feet – the surprise is that when I’m sober it’s different. When I’m sober it’s like the world is hardly moving at all. Drunks, it seems to me, have a heightened awareness of reality.
I carry tinned food in my pockets just to stop me falling off, cos there must be a risk, right? Only, you don’t see the risk when you’re sober. I carry tins in my pockets and I wear heavy shoes, metal segs in the heels and the toes, and steel caps. And I hold onto things more, onto traffic signs and lampposts and benches in the park. Makes sense when you’re drunk, so drunk you can see the world spinning like it is.
It’s the same with Lizzy and I’d hold onto her if she’d let me. I tell her that at any moment we could be thrown apart and drifting into nowhere and no way back. I take her hand in mine and I tell her if we are to be together then she can’t let go. Lizzy just laughs and she calls me shit-for-brains and she buys me another drink and when I turn back she’s gone and there’s nothing in my hand.
I drink till they won’t serve me. At The Box and Baggage I drink. The beer’s got more gravity there, and when I’m without Lizzy then at least I’ve got Sue. She walks me home some nights, and I lean on her and she says I’m heavy like a bull, which I say to her is just as well for the both of us cos she’s slight and she don’t weigh more than a good sack of potatoes. I tell her about the world then, and how it’s spinning and how we’ve got to hold onto to each other to save from falling off. Sue laughs and she fiddles in my pocket for my keys and she lets me into my own apartment.
We dance to no music, me and Sue, and we drink a little, or a lot, and she’s soon as drunk as I am, and she can see then, how things are what they are. She can’t walk straight any more than I can and so I tell her she can stay over if she likes. She’s got her own toothbrush here in a glass by the sink and some underwear that she keeps in a drawer on her side of the bed – there’s even a ‘her side of the bed’ which I like.
We don’t fool around. That’s agreed. We just undress and lay next to each other, and I’m holding her hand she’s holding mine. And like that we can’t float away. We kiss sometimes and I make the mistake of thinking she’s Lizzy and she calls me for all the names under the sun when I do. It’s an easy mistake to make I tell her, when the world is spinning so fucking fast that you can’t keep track of your thoughts.
She thinks I talk shit, but she stays over anyway and, like I say, she kisses me and holds my hand and like that we sleep. In the morning she’s gone and she always leaves a note and some coffee in the pot and the windows thrown open to let in the air.
I feel sore in my head when I wake and I feel not right. And I miss Sue straight away, or it’s Lizzy I miss, the kissing and the holding. It’s confusing. I miss ‘em so much it hurts, like I been shot full of bullets, and there’s a deep black hole inside me and I can feel myself falling into it. So, I reach for a bottle I keep by the bed, a bottle of Georgia Moon corn whiskey. A few slugs of that and I’m in touch with reality again, the room tipping and the air rushing by me and everything moving so fast it’s blurry. And I hold onto the end of the bed and like that I feel safe again and everything makes sense or if it don’t well it don’t need to.