He could see that as he grew older he was drinking far too much. He could see that his drinking was beginning to impact the way people saw him. He could see that the fact of his own nothingness in the eyes of everyone around him was beginning to diminish. He could see that his teenage children were becoming increasingly embarrassed by his parlor tricks of ghostly shoes and wet footprints parading through the house. He could see that strangers were beginning to get spooked by the sound of booze sloshing in his belly as he approached them a little less stealthily than just a few months before. He could see that nothing could hide the bourbon fumes that oozed from between his lips as he lay beside the women and men who pleasured themselves during those moments when they believed they were most alone. He could see that he was becoming more and more like a stone thrown into a calm lake and that the ripples spreading out from one center were giving him away. He could see that it was just a matter of time before the flickering light of burning torches would have something to illuminate. He could see all of this just as he could see that nothing could stop him from taking another drink. And worst still, he could see that his wife—for years his greatest champion who turned a love-blind eye to all of his whims and impulses—was beginning to see him for who he really was, a hollow man who needed fulfillment any way he could find it.

Kip Knott