Broken glass, broken glass, broken glass.  A shoe.

I have been drunk inside the bar behind me a hundred times.  Turning my hands over, I can find a few scars on my palms, in a state of healing further progressed than at the time of my last inspection.

I'm sober now.  I have a Red Bull nearby.  It is 3am.  Everyone is yelling.  Not in sight, but I can tell where it is.  This is to Saturday as birdsong is to Tuesday.

I had come to Trotsky's with Jim, Jerry, Alice, Jen, and Sarah.  They're still in there.  Tonight was the night I didn't drink.  Somehow, no one noticed.  They didn't hear me order a ginger ale at the bar.  Or a Coke.  Or a water.  I was an astronaut.  Surrounded by life forms, going about their business, barely noticing that I, and my silver shell, was not one of them.

Sarah had kept hugging me.  I was fine with it.  Never once during our normal lives had she ever shown any affection, or even attention of any kind, toward me.  This time, as a clear-minded visitor to a hazy world, I was able to see her repressed feelings for me.  Obvious.  But I didn't care: I couldn't.  Would it be fair to use knowledge like this?  Knowledge learned so illegitimately?

A Tom Petty song comes on the radio.  Everyone in the bar cheers.  Really?  Tom Petty?

A couple is stumbling out.  Making out.  I don't know either of them.  Did they come here together?  Are they leaving together?  I have no idea.  All you can tell from this perspective is that they are happy now.  Some kind of happy.  One of the kinds of happy that you can be jealous of.

Fuck this.

I throw my Red Bull to the blacktop.  Clatter.  The remainder splashes, drips.  Fuck this.  Into the bar.  A blast of heat, so different from the cold New England evening, fogging up my glasses.  The lights are on, searing my eyes.  Last call.  People are pouring out around me as I stand above them, taller, searching the crowd with desperate glances.

There they are.  Sarah is with them.  I shoulder my way against the oncoming crowd.  I'm too focused: the remainder of a  beer is spilled on me.  Fuck it.

The song changes.  Rush.  Another throwback.  That is probably it.  It is bright.  This is my world.  The denizens of this place, though, they are confused.  Dazed.

Someone starts to fall on me.  I help him up.

“Fuck, Mike, I can get up... fuck... oh.  You're not Mike.  Uh.”

I am familiar with their language.  He is thankful.

My friends aren't here anymore.  A waitress approaches me.

“Do you have a tab open?”

“Er, no.”

“Then you need to leave.”

“I'm leaving.”

This is another subtlety of their language.  My response meant “I have no such intention, but I am grateful for your thoughts.”

There.  A booth.  All four of them.  Four?  They accordion together to make room for me, and I sit down.

I am greeted.  “Hey man.”

“Hey.”

I know why I came here.  I feel, as a visitor with no involvement in this world, that I can say whatever I want.  Do whatever I want.  They'll accept me as one of their own, or they won't.  It barely matters.

“Sarah.”

“Yeah?”

“Let's get breakfast at Schmitt's.”

“They're closed.”

“Tomorrow.”

“Oh, OK.”

“Are you blacked out?  Is she?”

“No.”

“Alright, see you there.”

No one else said anything.  Had I outed myself as an impostor?  Doesn't really matter.  I take my cellphone from the table.  Did I just put it there?  And walk out.

The frigid air bites into my face with newfound vigor.  My Red Bull is still there.  Cigarette smoke rises from those sitting on the sidewalk around me.  That was so simple.  But now—all it did was create uncertainty.

That is novel.  I wasn't uncertain of anything today.  Or yesterday.

I take a step around the corner, then start asking around for a cigarette.