The two men quickly found they didn’t really have that much to talk about after all, mostly because the relationship they had in the past had been based around both of them being drunk. While they seemed to have had an unbreakable bond back at the time, it hadn’t really been a relationship with any substance, and the longer the two of them talked, the more uncomfortable, and even embarrassed, they both became. Finally, mercifully, Henry broke the conversation off by saying he needed to get back to the ranch, and the two men parted ways, never to see each other again.

Henry’s chance meeting with Sunny stirred something in him he wasn’t expecting. Seeing him had been like putting Henry right back at that time in his life when the emotional wounds from the accident were still raw and deep and as Henry went through the rest of his day he began experiencing one unstoppable flashback after another. At the beginning, most were pleasant memories: of his days with Annie before Josh came along, then of he and Josh working on the ranch together, or of he and Annie listening to Josh practice his guitar, or of Annie helping Josh with his homework. Later in the day, the memories turned more sinister: of Annie breaking her leg on the step of the tack room, of him waiting at the clinic for it to be set and have a cast put on, and of him sleeping though Josh’s talent show. Finally, near the end of the day and just before the bell rang signaling it was time for dinner, Henry was making his way to the bunkhouse to search out his whiskey bottle when, as if it were happening all over again, a visceral flashback of the accident flooded over him. He heard the screams, he saw the flames, and smelled the burning wood, metal and flesh.

It wasn’t the first time he’d had this flashback. He’d had it many times before. But this time was different. It was so real he actually felt the heat from the fire on his face and hands, and felt the pain on his head where he’d been cut. The smell from the accident followed him no matter where he went, and the screams rang in his ears over and over like the whining of a siren. Henry ran for his footlocker, only to find the bottle he’d been drinking from the last few days was too close to empty. He quickly chugged what remained, then sprinted for his truck and headed for town as fast as he could.

By the time he got to Mona’s bar, his face was ashen white, he was sweating profusely, and his hands were shaking so hard he had trouble pulling the money from his shirt pocket to pay for the first of seventeen rounds of whiskey he would consume during the next five-and-a-half hours. The bar’s regulars, men and women who would usually show up between three and five in the afternoon and have a few drinks before heading for home, had all cleared out by ten o’clock, and by half past, the only ones left in the place were Henry and the bartender. Henry had been drinking all night on an empty stomach. This caused the effects of the alcohol to intensify nearly three times what they normally would have been, and with the amount he had already consumed, would have been enough to put any normal person close to unconscious. Still, it hadn’t been enough. In the past, the memory would have faded long before now, at least to a point where it would have been manageable. But even as drunk as he was, the memory continued unabated to a point where he felt he might actually be going crazy.