Page 121 of Retribution

I struggle to swallow but try anyway, slowly relaxing my grip on the door handle. I remove my hand and grip onto his, his hand firm and controlled. My muscles slowly begin to relax, knowing that I’m not alone in this, these people know the exact struggles, the unworthiness we all dwell on in the first few weeks, wondering if we’re even deserving of being helped.

I walk next to him, each step feeling like I’m walking on sand, sinking into the floor beneath me, heavy and slow footsteps until we reach the shore.

“Ah, Devon. I see you’ve brought a friend today.” An elderly man stands up to greet us.

“I’m Tom, welcome to our AA group, I promise we’re all lovely most of the time,” he jokes, and I attempt a smile at him.

We stalk over to the circle in the middle of the hall and take a seat, joining the existing group of eight.

The group commences and I listen to the stories of the others, a woman in her forties who lost her teenage daughter in a car accident who turned to drinking to cope. A man in his early-twenties who has suffered with addiction since he left the foster care system at eighteen. A woman in her thirties who found out her husband was having an affair with her best friend and got her pregnant, despite them going through rounds of IVF.

The stories were endless and if anything, it made me feel safer and more content.

Each person in the room is of different age groups, from different walks of life, different social classes, and yet here we all are. Suffering with the same disease, battling the same demons.

It comforts me in a strange way to hear their struggles and hear the difference in their sobriety lengths, some as short as two weeks, some as long as four years.

Either way, the strongest thing I’ve felt here is the lack of judgment, no one is here to comment on whether you’ve ‘been through enough’ to have turned to alcohol. It’s supportive and reassuring that I can do this, I’ve got this.

It’s my turn to speak, and my mouth has gone dry. I reach down and take a sip of my water bottle, feeling the attention of the room burning into me.

I rub my jaw with my hand and begin.

“My name is Reed.”

The familiar unison of ‘hello Reed’, fills the room.

“I’ve been struggling with alcohol addiction, and I’ve been sober for almost two days now.” I pull my lips tightly as they all applaud.

I glance over at Devon and see him nodding his head to go on.

I explain the story from when I was younger, my first run with sobriety and how I relapsed, detailing everything up to yesterday when I had my revelation to make a change. I make sure to thank Devon within that and all he does is nod, accepting my thanks.

I receive my twenty-four hour chip and place it in my pocket, making sure that it’s secure, knowing I’m going to be needing it a lot in the first few weeks.

* * *

The meeting finishes up and I stay seated in my chair, offering goodbyes to those that are leaving. A hand presses on my shoulder and I glance up, looking into Devon’s deep brown eyes.

“What’d ya think?” He asks.

“I think it went well, as well as it can.” I frown, the gnawing feeling of Willow being hours away plays in my mind.

I have arranged with Rachel to have a face time call with her tomorrow, and I’ve also already mailed out a phone, an iPad, and a sim, to her so she can contact me whenever she wants, instead of going through the devil herself.

“Anything you wanna talk about?” He takes the seat next to me and I slouch back into the chair.

“It’s just a lot.” I sigh.

He nods.

“It just feels like shit, you know? Knowing that I have already done all this hard work before, knowing that I’ve failed again and I’m back to square one. This time feels so much harder than the first, because this time I’m not blind to the struggle of it.”

“Every day that you wake up sober, is a day to be thankful for.”

I turn to him, listening.

“I understand you, probably more than you realize. I mean, Jesus. It took a girl to kill herself before I realized how much it had consumed me.”

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