28

Michael Wills

Nancy Bridget

Mike had a devastating hangover, the kind that felt like a

weasel had woken up warm and cozy inside his skull

then panicked at its confinement and tried to scratch and bite

its way out through his eyes.

The evening had begun benignly enough. On his way

home he stopped at his local dive, a yeasty smelling cave

called Dunigan's, and downed a couple of pops on an empty

stomach. Next up, the Pantheon Diner, where he grunted at

the heavily stubbled waiter who grunted back at him and

without exchanging any fully formed phrases brought him

the same dish he ate two to three days a weeklamb kebabs

and rice, washed down, of course, with a couple of beers.

Then before decamping to his place for the night he paid

his wobbly respects to his friendly package store and picked

up a fresh half gallon of Black Label, pretty much the only

luxury item to adorn his life.

The apartment was small and spartan, and stripped of

Jennifer's feminizing touches, a truly bleak uninterest