“Wonderful way to talk to your girlfriend,” she said indignantly. She walked into the bathroom and slammed the door shut. A fit of rage gripped me, and from my back, and for the second time in two hours, I hurled the whole glass of whiskey at the door. Just as it left my hand, but before it shattered against the door, I knew I had messed up. Whiskey and glass went everywhere. The cat leapt from the windowsill and sprinted beneath the bed. The door flung open and Carolyn surveyed the scene.

“What in the hell is the matter with you?” she screamed.

Images of my dad came rushing in, memories of his temper tantrums and sullen moods and the way he’d throw drinks at my mother when she still tended bar. It had been a perfect day thus far, so why not make the comparison? Perhaps we’re more alike than I acknowledge. Or, as one of my ex-girlfriend’s pops used to say, You can’t change the spots on a leopard.

“There is glass and whiskey all over everything! Look at all this!”

“I’m sorry,” I said, sitting up. “I’ll clean it up.”

“No shit, you’ll clean it up. Goddamn it, Stratton! I’m getting sick of this!”

She shook her head and slammed the bathroom door while leaving me to ponder just what she meant by this. Was she sick of just me, or of our overall situation, both of us barely getting by while living in a hole? Well, I was sick of it, too, and now that the book had been universally rejected, I knew my prospects for improving our situation were slim, if not altogether nonexistent, and that depressed the hell out of me.

I could still hear her ranting on the other side of the bathroom door, but her voice was muffled and I wasn’t sure what she was saying. I hopped around on one foot and cleaned up the ice and broken glass, while in my mind I wondered how and when the shift in power had taken place, when Carolyn had shed the shy and somewhat submissive skin for this thicker, more assertive one. Was I to expect this from here on out?

I finished with the big pieces and swept up the rest with a broom. I wiped away the whiskey that ran down the wall onto the floor. Thankfully none of it had reached Carolyn’s clothes.

I lay back on the bed and propped my foot on the pillows. The sock was soaked with blood and I didn’t really care if any was dripping.

“Great, the whole apartment smells like whiskey now,” Carolyn said as she walked out of the bathroom.

I closed my eyes. “I’m sorry.”

She made a sandwich and a drink of her own, taking her time at both tasks. She seemed to relax a bit in the silence.