Maudlin

/ˈmôdlən/

adjective

self-pityingly or tearfully sentimental, often through drunkenness

Maybe it was wrong of me to think such things, but when the entire room erupted into shouts of hatred, I really considered giving Luke an expression as if to say, 'I told you so.' However, as I noticed that the people were rioting against me, making their way toward me in a demeaning fashion, I gave up on that thought and took off down the hall.

Moira was right behind me as I ran toward the dome area which contained all of our rooms. Despite her obvious little information about the colony, Moira seemed to pick up on the people's hatred for outsiders as she herself had been treated as such after being seen with me. The colonists were cruel, but I thought of all of their shouts as just waves coming toward me in a storm.

Instead of regarding their shouts and chaos filled riots, I attempted to only look on the bright side; however, as I was chased down the hallway and forced into my room, I saw no light at the end of the tunnel. Moira appeared to be out of breath as she slouched against the door frame, holding onto herself in an attempt to steady her breathing.

I, on the other hand, was standing on the other side of the room simply taking deep breaths as I considered the entirety of the situation before me. The people hated me and wanted my head upon a silver platter before they would think to allow Luke to take over his father's position, which meant that Luke would never be able to save them from our oppressive government.

So as I stood there, contemplating all of the fucked up things happening in my life, I found myself recalling the way Calum had taught me to deal with these type of things. Despite the tanned boys swearing off of this method of coping, I found myself attracted to it as I stared down into mine and Luke's drawer, searching for a glass and bottle of whiskey to take the edge off of my fears.

"What the hell are you doing?" Moira asked, finally lifting her head to find my frame looming over the drawer with a glass pulled out and whiskey sitting on the table. A sigh made it way from my mouth as I looked back at her and shook my head once again.

She wouldn't understand. Moira was a perfect girl with a bit tough exterior but was very well received even after her first incident. All of the colonists loved her and were practically lining up to meet her while they all made a pact to murder me. And although I claimed not to be jealous of the mixed girl, I knew that I was.

I was jealous of her ability to remain calm in most situations. I was jealous of her perfect world in which she never had to bury her best friend or little sister too soon. I was jealous of her eyes that still shined blue while mine were a lifeless gray due to all the horrid acts that had happened to me. I was jealous.

"What does it look like I'm fucking doing?" I asked her, pouring a glass as I leaned my head back and prepared for the familiar feeling of burning to encompass my throat, and when it did, I fell through the rabbit hole once again and found solace in the bad habit that Calum had taught me.

Moira didn't say another word as I sought after the only type of mind numbing activity that I could think of; however, when she caught on that I was not going to stop without assistance, she stood up and made her way over to me. Her cocoa hands wrapped around the whiskey bottle in my hand as she tried to take it from me, but with one hard glance, she moved her hand away.

"Unless you plan on joining me or leaving me alone, you can escort yourself out," I spat at her, emotions overcoming my brain as I did not realize what I was saying. Moira seemed to catch on to that as she moved her head slightly to the side in an observant nature.

From times before with Calum, I knew I was quite the affectionate and sarcastic drunk, which left me all the more confused as I heard myself cursing wildly as Moira's stare continued to pierce through me. It was as though my mind were settled above my body, watching as I made terrible decision but unable to do anything.

I looked down at the bottle, counting all of sorrows as I observed the liquid staring back at me. My heart ached with a feeling of longing as I found myself falling further into that hole of despair I had been sinking in earlier. Although I wanted to make everyone proud and keep my sobriety, I felt as though I was granted this one open bottle.

However, one bottle quickly turned to two or three as I lost myself in the entirety of the alcohol in an attempt to move on in life. As I downed each shot, I felt my body lift off the ground a bit more and enter my alternate reality where everyone lived in harming and no one died.

Although I knew it wasn't real, I found myself oddly happy to see the familiar faces again and not have to worry about their death or how they would leave me. With each glass I drank, I realized the appeal of getting drunk more and more as my sober thoughts became my drunken laughing stalks. Throughout it all, Moira stayed, probably only wanting to make sure I was alright.

Each shot that I downed represented one person that I had let down in life, which I thought to be too numerous to count. As I progressed in my drinking, I lost count of how many shots I had taken and to whom the shot was supposedly taken for. Moira simply shook her head at me as she observed my odd behavior, knowing that this was not me at all.

But as I noticed her ever present glares, I began to formulate thoughts in my mind to get her sympathetic eyes off of my drunken figure. Thoughts of revealing Calum's former flame with Janice came to mind, quickly followed with the revelation that Cal had also suffered from this same addiction; however, each was knocked down as I found it impossible to tell her any of them.

Her blue eyes continued to burned into my frame as I sighed out again. "What the hell do you want now?!" I asked in a shouting type of voice, not knowing how else to take out my frustration other than through my drunken shouts of anger. She shook her head once again, looking down at her feet before approaching my frame, which was leaning against the table for support.

"This isn't you Lis," she whispered gently, her hand rubbing my back as her other came down to rest upon my hand. "You are not the type of person to drown your sorrows in a whiskey bottle," she continued to murmur into my ear as I found tears to be rolling down my porcelain cheeks despite my obvious pride trying to keep them from flooding my eyes.

I knew that I didn't want this. My heart knew that if I were to continue in my drunken escapades, then Luke would walk in to find that I was no longer sober and would find himself at fault, which we both knew was not the case; however, as I stared down at the bottle before me, nothing seemed more appealing than one more drink.

"You need to stop blaming yourself for all of this," Moira continued on, her mixed arms still encompassing my pale one as I sniffled back the tears threatening to overcome my tough facade. Moira had this way of comforting me that even Luke did not possess, which was odd as he was usually the only one that could calm me down.

Nevertheless, even Moira in all of her glory could not contain the perfect storm swirling within me as I found myself intoxicated for the first time in about a year that day. That day had been the first time since Janice's death that I had allowed myself to truly get drunk, which was saying something about my sobriety as I did make it two months after Riley's death without a failure.

Despite the fact that I could commend myself for the success after Riley's death, I could not take pride in the fact that I was allowing everything to build up as I had before I had stopped drinking. Part of that was my own fault as I had stopped talking to Calum after Janice's, thinking that he needed me more than I needed him.

It wasn't anyone's fault but mine that I had not been seeking help in the hands of a professional within the colony; however, I knew if I ever confided in Luke about my relapse, he would automatically blame Calum for hiding the therapeutic sessions from him, which I had insisted upon doing. All of this was my fault.

Based upon that, I found myself struggling with words as Moira repeated those words consistently in my ear in hopes that I would listen even once; little did she know that I was listening the whole time, just not comprehending. But how could I comprehend the fact that I was not responsible for any of this when I clearly was.

No one within the group had failed me except myself. Luke had been fully supportive, Calum had never denied my ability to confide in him, and Ashton, despite his disappearance, had always been willing to help me until the very end of our time together. Yet here I was, standing against a desk and staring down at the poured glass of whiskey with glazed over eyes.

Moira was slowly trying to grip the glass and bottle from the table without gaining my attention; however, I knew the whole time what she was doing as I had attempted to do the same with Calum all those months ago. Nevertheless, I was trying to contain my muscles and allow her take the bottle away from my raging veins as my brain begged for one more drink.

Some sadistic part of me thought that if I could take one more drink, then maybe I would forget about all the bad things that had happened to me, but as I observed the brown liquid being moved away from me, I knew that the alcoholic beverage's abilities did not extend into the category of memory loss.

Yes, it would give me a short period of relief when I was able to take the edge off, which was all I was really looking for in reality, but when I woke in the morning, I knew I would be greeted with a mind splitting headache caused by dehydration and the memories from before flitting back to my head and causing all of the emotional pain I once had to erupt again.

"I'm going to take these," Moira said as I nodded at her. Despite her carrying the alcohol out of my room in tentative hands, I was oddly at peace, knowing that this would be for the best even though I hated it at that moment. She nodded only once before walking toward the door and exiting quietly as she distracted me as little as she could.

I didn't know whether she thought I was just out of it and did not want to attract my attention in any way or if she thought that she pulled a fast one on me by taking the alcohol out of the room so slowly, but I hoped that she wasn't as naive as she let on in that moment to be.

When I heard the door close, a loud sound erupted within my brain, indicating that I had been a bit more drunk than I had previously thought. With my mind numb, I shook my head and debated opening the drawer that had held that bottle of whiskey or returning to mine and Luke's bed with my head hung low in shame.

Despite the argument being drawn out in my head, I decided to open the draw, being faced with several bottles of the same alcoholic bottles littering the expanse of the deep chest, covered with old tee shirts of Luke's. A sigh came out of my mind as I told myself to not touch them and retreat into my shared bed.

In the end, I listened to the voice in my head and shut the drawer; however, I was quick to cover the bottles with Luke's tee shirts once again, knowing that he would take them if he saw them. After all, I thought I may have needed them for later.