Easton

“He’s fucking your friend, you know. Taylor.”

“Good for her.”

He shook his head. “I can’t believe I’m having a conversation like this.” He knew she wasn’t there. There was no way for her to be there, and yet, here he was, still talking to her. He was going fucking crazy. There was no other word for it.

“You know you’ve got to do this, right? The only reason I’m here is because of all of this. Axton’s right, and it’s killing you to know that your best friend may be right about anything. He always is.”

“I’ve got this all under control.”

“Ding-ding, guess what, you haven’t. Someone who has it under control doesn’t drink two bottles of whiskey. Someone who has it under control doesn’t go out and buy drugs, hoping to score the next high. You’re so far from being under control that you can’t even see it.”

“And this is better for me? Imagining and having full-blown conversations with my dead girlfriend?”

“Ex-girlfriend. I’m dead, and we are so not going out.”

Easton gripped the back of his head, rubbing up and down. “Do you ever think about it? What it would have been like?”

“I know you do. I know you think about it at least once every single day. You wonder if you loved me enough to make me happy, for us to be happy. I know more than anything you think about the baby. You want to be a dad more than anything. Axton, he’s living a dream for you. I also know you think about her, and the thought is so fleeting, but it’s there.”

He pressed his hands against his face, trying to calm himself the fuck down, but nothing was happening.

Nothing was … giving him focus.

This was all just too much.

“And because you think about her so much, it makes the pain and guilt you feel just a little harder to bear. She’s alive. I’m not.”

“Stop it.”

“You’re the one controlling this, Easton. Not me. I’m simply voicing to you what you’re thinking. What you don’t want to think about so you drink. So you try to create the oblivion your mind won’t let you have.” She shrugged. “You can hate me all you want, but it’s the truth. You’ve got to let it go and realize what Axton wants for you is what is right.”

“I need a drink.”

He didn’t leave his room. The last thing he wanted to do was to have imaginary Carla following him around.

“If what you’re saying is me, then why do you sound like her? Why does it feel like you’re here?” he asked, collapsing to the bed.

“You know all those answers, Easton. You’ve just got to be willing to listen to them.” Carla lay down beside him, and he turned his head.

He would spend hours on her bed like this, staring at her. She always made him smile and feel calm. There was never any judgment in her eyes.

This was how he remembered her.

Happy. Calm. Sweet. Gentle. Everything he missed about her.

The pregnancy had been a big mistake, but he’d promised to take care of her.

“I miss you.”

“I know, but we also know it’s not enough.” She reached out, and as she put her hand against his face, he didn’t feel anything.

Because she wasn’t there.

This wasn’t real.

He was a drunk who had a whole lot of problems and really needed to figure it out for himself.

Chapter Two

“It’s not that hard to do. You say, ‘Hi, I’m Easton, and I drink way too much,’” Carla said.

Easton’s imaginary friend came and went. Whenever he left his room, she magically disappeared, but when he was alone, it was like he thought her into being. She’d either be standing in a corner, or sitting on a counter. He went to the bathroom yesterday, and there she’d been, sat on the counter near the sink. He hadn’t told anyone he was imagining his dead ex-girlfriend.

She was some company in this place.

He’d stayed by himself for the most part, taking his meals alone and just trying to get through the program.

The sickness, the shaking, and the withdrawal weren’t fun. Not even a little.

Much to his surprise, in order to wean his body off the alcohol, they had to give him just a little, to slowly draw him out of his addiction.

While they were doing that, he was having to train his mind not to drink.

Not to do anything.

Throughout it all, Carla was there.

“Your friends are coming for a visit today,” Carla said.

“I know.”

“You excited?”

“Yes. The prospect of sitting in a room full of my friends as they know how fucking weak I am is thrilling. Not to mention, I’ve spent the best part of a week speaking to a girl from my past that we all know died.”

“You’re not in the best of moods.”

He sat down on the edge of the bed. “No, I’m not.”