Page 35 of When People Leave

Morgan

M organ hated taking anything to sleep, but after hearing her father’s voice, she knew she would be up all night.

When she woke up the next morning, she gasped, realizing she had slept for ten hours. She got out of bed slowly, her head fuzzy and her eyes taking a moment to focus. The only thing that would completely wake her up was strong coffee.

She left the house without telling Charlie or Abby where she was going. She wanted to surprise them with their favorite vanilla lattes.

Morgan didn’t turn on the radio. She soaked in the silence until thoughts of her father barged in like an uninvited houseguest. Brian seems nice, but for all I know, he could be a serial killer. Mom could have run away so she wouldn’t have to turn him in.

As Morgan’s tears drenched the steering wheel, she fell deeper down a well of despair. She pulled over to the side of the road. “Did he hit you? Did he hit us? What didn’t you tell us and why?” she said, towards the car’s roof.

When Morgan had composed herself, she noticed she was in a dingy part of town, in front of a run-down building with a sign that said, ‘Way Pen.’ She knew it meant ‘Always Open,’ even though the neon letters for A, L, S, and O were out.

Morgan could spot a dive bar from a mile away.

The building’s exterior was black or a very dirty shade of brown.

Whatever the color, it seemed bleak, which matched Morgan’s mood.

As she pulled into the parking lot, she considered what going into a dive bar would mean: that she had sunk to a low she’d never thought she would return to.

A trail of tents lined the sidewalk, and men with scraggly facial hair huddled together. Morgan should have been nervous, but instead, a wave of nostalgia washed over her. A familiar calmness overtook her, and she heard a warm voice beckoning her inside.

If finding out my mother lied to me about my father isn’t a good reason to have a drink, I don’t know what is. She looked up at the sky. “I promise to stop at one,” she said, but another voice told her she might be lying.

Morgan heard a creak when she shoved open the door to the bar.

Before she walked in, she rubbed her palms together to get rid of the lead paint that came off in her hand.

When she was a full-blown alcoholic, Morgan would find little neighborhood dives like this one that would open early in the morning.

She hadn’t wanted to run into anyone she knew, and if she did, she’d pretend she didn’t see them, and they’d do the same in return.

I shouldn’t be here , she thought, yet still moved forward.

It was so dark inside that she couldn’t make out if people were there.

She wanted to wait for her eyes to adjust, but needing a drink outweighed her temporary blindness.

As she moved across the sticky tile floor, she put her hands out like Frankenstein, hoping she wouldn’t crash into anything.

Morgan rested her elbows on the wood and waited for the bartender to notice her.

She didn’t call him over even though she was desperate for alcohol.

When the bartender finally headed toward her, she decided he had been a pirate in a former life or possibly still was one.

He had a bandana wrapped over his shoulder-length shaggy hair and wore one silver medium-sized hoop earring in his left ear.

She expected him to greet her with, ‘Argh matey,’ except he wasn’t that friendly.

“What do you want?” the bartender asked, wiping a small wet spot on the wood in front of her.

“Bourbon on the rocks,” Morgan said.

As the bartender reached for a bottle on the shelf behind him, a man, probably in his late fifties, wobbled up to her. He had a whiskey in one hand and a beer in the other.

“Hey, lady, are you for sale?” he asked.

“What?” Morgan said.

“How much?”

Morgan had no makeup on and couldn’t have looked less sexy in her navy sweats and gray dingy t-shirt. “If you were even half as attractive as a one-eyed toad, I might consider it,” she said.

“That’s not very nice.” The man frowned.

“But accurate.”

He ordered another whiskey, which the bartender poured into a clean glass. The man poured what was left of his first whiskey into the new one and then walked away.

“That’s our councilman you just insulted,” the bartender said, putting a glass of bourbon in front of her.

“You must be so proud,” she said.

Morgan picked up the glass and inhaled the spicy aroma of whiskey, feeling like an old friend had come to visit.

She considered what she was about to do and put the glass back down.

After a moment, she picked it back up, and as she brought it to her lips, her phone rang.

She saw Charlie’s picture come up. She didn’t plan on answering but didn’t want her sisters to worry.

“Hey,” Charlie said. “Where are you?”

“I’m just driving around,” Morgan said.

A woman sauntered up next to her. “Hey, bartender,” the woman yelled. “My glass is empty. How did that happen?”

“Morgan, are you in a bar?” Charlie asked so loudly that the woman turned toward the phone.

“Yep, she is in a fine establishment,” the woman called out, although she slurred the word, so it came out as ‘estabullshit.’

“Abby!” Morgan heard Charlie yell out. “Come quick.”

Morgan could tell Charlie had put the phone on speaker. “You need to leave that bar right now,” Charlie said.

“Don’t drink!” Abby said. “Where are you? We’re coming!”

“I’m fine,” Morgan said.

“No, you’re not; you’re in a bar,” Charlie said.

“Give us the name,” Abby said.

Morgan looked at the glass of bourbon for a long moment. She could still drink it before they got there.

“It’s someplace in Van Nuys called ‘Always Open,’” she said.

“Sounds lovely,” Abby said. “Stay there, we’re on our way.”

They hung up, and Morgan pushed her glass toward the tipsy woman. “Here, it’s yours,” Morgan said.

The woman downed it in one swallow. “Thank you so much. You’re an angel from heaven,” the woman said.

“If I were, I would’ve dumped it out,” Morgan said.

Morgan went outside and stood next to her car. The air was scented with vomit and urine. Next time I decide to throw away four years of sobriety, I’m doing it at a high-class hotel.

Ten minutes later, Charlie’s car skidded into the parking lot. Charlie, still in her pajamas, rolled down the window. “Did you drink?” she asked.

“No, but I would have if I hadn’t answered the phone.”

Charlie and Abby jumped out of the car, leaving the engine running. They hugged Morgan, relief written all over them.

“You need to go to a meeting right now,” Abby said, putting her hand firmly on Morgan’s shoulder as if she were going to drag her there.

“We’ll go with you,” Charlie said.

“It’s okay, I’ll go,” Morgan said.

“You promise?” Abby said.

“Yes.”

“Right now?” Charlie said.

“Yes. You did your job. You can go home,” Morgan said.

Morgan got in her car. She noticed that Abby and Charlie didn’t move until she had pulled out of the parking lot.

An hour and a half later, Morgan walked into the house. Charlie and Abby jumped up and ran to the door like greyhounds in a dog race.

“Are you okay?” Charlie asked.

“Is any of us?” Morgan asked.

“If anyone should be drinking, it should be me,” Abby said. “You guys found your father. I’m still an orphan.”

“You aren’t an orphan,” Charlie said. “Just because he didn’t know Mom might’ve been pregnant when she left doesn’t mean you aren’t his. Besides, you can’t be an orphan when you have us.”

Abby smiled, but the smile didn’t reach her eyes.

“We’re all messed up right now,” Charlie said. “But, Morgan, you can’t run away by self-medicating again.”

“I know, but I feel like I’ve slipped off the edge of a mountain, and I can’t hold on much longer,” Morgan said, shaking her head back and forth.

“How are you guys okay? We have a mother who killed herself, a father who rose from the dead, and until recently, we didn’t even know our actual last names or birthdays. I’m not sure who I am anymore.”

“You’re the same person you’ve always been,” Charlie said, putting her arm around Morgan’s shoulder. “When it gets hard, you need to lean on Abby and me.”

Abby nodded in agreement.

“Thank you both for rescuing me today,” Morgan said.

“You’d be there for us if the situation was reversed,” Abby said.

“Yes, but as the oldest, I’m supposed to be taking care of you guys. Instead, I’m selfishly wallowing in my own stress,” Morgan said.

“We all handle things differently. I work through my stress with strawberry ice cream,” Abby said. “It’s not as much fun as alcohol, but at least I’d remember if I slept with a stranger.”

“That only happened once that I can remember… but you made your point,” Morgan said. She looked at her sisters, and her hands stopped clenching, and her features softened.

Morgan pulled out her phone and called her sponsor. Then, she looked for another AA meeting to go to that afternoon. She needed to double up for a while. Besides her sisters, it would be the only thing that could save her from herself.