Page 6 of Begin Again Again

“I’ll try.”

And she intended to try. Unless her handsome stranger turned out to be a COVID denier or obsessed with the gym or something. This was the best part of meeting someone. The part where you had no idea what the other person was actually like and you were free to imagine they were as charming, funny, and sexually proficient as your dream lover.

She sidestepped a pair of giggling teens and a warm breeze lifted her skirt. Beth shoved it down, glancing around for witnesses. An older couple scowled. They’d definitely seen her upskirt. Not a great night to be wearing a thong. Beth shot them a weak smile and kept walking. She’d never worn anything so short sober. She’d considered wearing a more conservative outfit, but she’d bought the pale pink sundress mid-lockdown, telling herself that by the time she could go outside and wear it, she’d be as bold sober as she’d ever been drunk. It was the kind of thinking it was easy to fall into at the time—pie in the sky ‘when everything’s back to normal’ fantasies. But now itwasthe beginning of the end for COVID, hopefully, and Beth wasn’t any more comfortable flashing her ass at strangers than she had been in late 2019.

She glanced at herself in the window of the derelict Franco Cozzo warehouse. She was standing awkwardly. Hunched and tense. She uncrossed her legs. It was strange to be so self-conscious when she looked objectively better than she had two years ago, when dresses like this were her personal uniform. Boozing made her skin blotchy and kept a persistent pudge around her chin and middle. Both melted away after six months of sobriety. Then her arms toned up, her skin cleared, and she started to see ab lines in the mirror. But being in good shape wasn’t a neurotoxin. It didn’t switch off her brain and let her sashay down streets with her body on show, defying anyone and everyone not to stare.

The pedestrian crossing beep-ticked and Beth strode forward, hem swirling. She made eye contact with all the waiting drivers, making sure they weren’t disapproving—though what she’d have done if they disapproved was anyone’s guess. Throw them the finger? Beg forgiveness because she wanted to have sex with a random and the dress seemed like the best avenue to success?

She suspected this would be easier if she didn’t have memories of BETH! following her around like a hotter younger sister. Beth, who won the mechanical bull-riding challenge, who took her top off in spas. Beth, who once danced on bars, pouring tequila into waiting mouths and showed off her body because it was hot and because covering her huge tits was what her mother had done, to no fucking avail, all her life.

Beth walked faster, angry now. She didn’t want to hide, but how was she supposed to know that when the wine stopped, BETH! would vanish? That she was a booze mirage, and behind her was the same shy, Bethany Myers, fifteen years old and scared of everything.

Sober Beth had listened, she’d journaled, she’d therapised and meditated. She’d taken care of baby Beth instead of kicking her in the chest and pouring tequila on her. But tonight, she was in no mood to babysit. Tonight she really wanted the old Beth back.

A car drove past, honking loudly. Beth raised a middle finger on autopilot. The driver and his mate—always in groups, always passing it off as a joke—scowled at her. She made eye contact until they vanished, her heart pounding. Not the rush she wanted, but a chemical boost all the same. She thought of Dolly. Dolly never wore a bra. She rocked hairy legs and wore midriff tops that showed off her gently rounded belly. Beth could just imagine the look on her face if she told her about the old couple or the honking idiots. Her chest ached, and she longed to hear Dolly’s voice. But she wouldn’t be calling the Dolly she loved, her best friend and co-host. She’d be speaking to New Dolly. Married Dolly. Teacher Dolly. The Dolly who didn’t give a shit she was sober.

Beth knew that wasn’t entirely fair, but it felt that way. Especially now that she was alone and freaked out. She spotted The Vic in the distance, glowing like a friendly beacon in the dark.

You could have a tequila.

Beth could see it standing on the bar. The alcohol glowing like pale sunshine. It would be so easy. Practically harmless.

Her inner monologue got nastier when she was tempted to drink. Sure enough, she mentally watched herself fall over, tuck her skirt into her G-string, tell terrible joke after terrible joke. She watched The Guy scowl, check his phone and leave the pub after twenty minutes. She imagined him telling faceless friends he almost fucked some old lady, but it was just too tragic.

“He’s a stranger,” she told herself. “The date could be shit even if you do drink. That happens, remember?”

But the image of the tequila persisted. A friendly soldier in a shot glass. Beth remembered the night she went out with Hamish. Tall handsome Hamish—the closest she’d come looks-wise to the guy she was meeting tonight. They’d sipped white wine out of a drink bottle while they played mini-golf. They drank canned beer by the river. They had amazing sex in the backseat of his car. Could that date have gone as well as it did if she was sober? If she wasn’t BETH!?

She stood motionless in the middle of the footpath. What about the times she’d drunk with Xavier? With Morgan? With Georgia, Kyle, Brendan and Stephen? Everyone she’d dated. Everyone she’d slept with, she’d drunk with. That couldn’t be a coincidence. She needed to have a drink. Just to make it all make sense. Besides, she wasn’t a prohibitionist committed to ensuring everyone was stone cold sober forever. She just wanted to not puke in nightclub toilets and feel like death all week long. And she could do that and still have one little tequila. Couldn’t she?

And there Beth was, walking into Dolly’s kitchen to get another diet ginger ale.

‘You know what she’s like,’Dolly was telling Michael and Jenny.‘Paleo and fucking bullet journaling and now she’s ‘sober.’She can’t sit still and deal with her feelings; she always has to be making some massive change. You watch, she’ll be drinking again by the end of the month.’

Michael said something and Dolly shook her head. ‘It’s got nothing to do with Stephen. She’s always doing shit like this—you just don’t have to listen to it. The annoying thing is this is gonna change the whole podcast right when it’s about to get big. We’re called ‘Wine Wives’ and now Little Miss is convinced she’s never going to drink again, and now we have to change the name. It’s going to completely fuck our brand.’

Beth became aware she was standing in the small alleyway beside the pub. She leaned against the red-brick wall and pressed her hands to her face. Lockdown had tricked her. The bad thoughts couldn’t get a foothold in her isolated life, but now that she was back in the world, they were alive and kicking again. Dolly calling her a flake. The fight they had a week later. The podcast crashing and burning into a million flaming pieces…

And she’d never get the chance to barge into the kitchen and tell Dolly she was being an a-hole. She was doomed to forever slink away alone, clutching her sobriety like an unwelcome gift bag. And all these months she’d told herself she was over it. Ready to move on. Hardy fucking ha.

Beth stared at her shins. It had to be almost eight. She’d need to go inside soon but instead she was playing whack-a-mole with her bad thoughts. She needed to unplug the machine. She inhaledone, two, three, four, five. She held her breath for five and exhaled,five, four, three, two, one. Then she closed her eyes and imagined the date going perfectly. Fun conversation, flirting, The Guy kissing her, a slow delicious kiss that melted. She did it quickly, scared of pushing her luck, but she did it.

“I am beautiful, brave, funny and nice,” she whispered. “I’m going to have an amazing evening. I have a wonderful life.”

She repeated the mantra three times, and, to her credit, she barely cringed. No revelation came, but when she thought of drinking a shot of tequila, the idea held no magical power. It was a drink. It tasted bitter. Downing it would probably give her a headache and ruin her sleep. Beth exhaled, slipping her pink sequinned mask over her face. She headed for the pub’s entrance.

She’d suggested The Vic on instinct. She and Lara had gone there a few times since lockdown ended and they did decent food. They also served Carlton Zero, and Martha, Beth’s favourite bartender, always poured it into a glass for her, making it indistinguishable from regular beer. Bartenders were protective of non-drinkers, she learned. Maybe because they knew how hard it was to be sober in places where everyone else was pissed. Maybe because she was at no risk of chucking all over the bathroom.

Beth stepped inside the pub and was instantly waved over by Martha. “Table for two plus bub?”

“Just me tonight.” Beth caught herself. “I mean, a table for two, actually.”

Martha didn’t blink. “No worries. Out back?”

“That would be great.”

“Scan the QR code, sanitise, and you’re in. Carlton Zero with ice?”

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