All the rest is blank

I’m at Scout camp. I’m only 15. The newsagent doesn’t care. We buy all the beer we can afford. We buy Martini for some reason. Who can drink the fastest? we play. My head is sticking outside the tent. I’m not in the clothes I was last night. The leaders are angry. I have to clear up where I was sick. They don’t tell anyone. I assume they’d be in trouble if they did. They don’t kick me out. I assume they’d need to explain why, if they did.

I’m at a house party. I’m dancing with friends. I’m asleep on a floor. I wake up and go home. Her parents got back Sunday night, I’m told. They went to do the washing. You threw up in their tumble dryer. I sent a card and some flowers and we all have a laugh.

I finished my last First Year Exams. I’m playing pool. The alcoholic Ginger Beer is 8%. I’m falling down the stairs, but I’m not the only one. I’m laying on a bench. My flatmate picks me up. Nick got you this far, he says, but now he’s passed out too. I’m in my room. I go downstairs and answer the door, it’s the girl I’ve been seeing. She came to check up. I had to help you get your contact lenses out, she says. I left when you decided to piss on your radio alarm because it was annoying you, she says. We have dinner one more time, but after that she moves on.

We’re sat in a pub, laughing, joking, singing, friends having fun. I’m home in bed. I made it safely. I don’t remember how, but then again, I never do, and I always make it, so who cares?

We’re out in the sun, sat on the grass. The band is playing, the cider is flowing. The festival is great. I lost my friends. I’m in a ditch, my arm hurts. I’m being carried home. My friends have found me. They always do. I awake, my friend’s Mum looks concerned. Glad you’re back with us. We laugh. I try to eat. I don’t feel great. Always a good night when you come home with an injury you don’t remember getting, I laugh, again. They laugh again too. I think I find it funnier than they do though.

We went to a club. I’m half naked in the rain, I’m crying and no one will fight me. It’s morning. You were a mess last night. Are you OK?. I don’t remember, I say. I’m OK, I lie.

We’re having lunch, the wine tastes great. I’m in the hotel room, there’s a sex toy next to me, two pairs of underwear on the floor, hers and mine. But I’m on my own. I close the curtains to shut out the light. The door opens, I wake up, it’s dark. The show was great, you’d have liked it, she says without rancour, but also without joy. I’m sorry, I say. I know, she replies. I thought I could help you, she tells me. I don’t think I can though. She gets into bed and we don’t speak again that night. She goes home the next day and she never comes back.

We’re all in a group on a Friday night. Strangers and friends, people I know and people I’m meeting for the first time. I’ve had too much beer. I burnt my hand. I can’t stand upright. I got kicked out of the tube station for falling down the escalator. It’s Monday, I look for my coat, I pull out a piece of crumpled carbon paper. The patient refused further medical treatment away from the scene, it says. And there’s my signature, sort of. It tells me I was in Vauxhall. I still don’t remember going to Vauxhall.

I’m in the pub, I’m watching football alone. The lunchtime kick off. I’m eating peanuts for dinner. The quiz has started, I enter alone. I can’t get anything right. It’s the early hours, I awake on a bench, my glasses are gone. I get home blindly. It’s Monday morning. I call in sick to my job.

I decided not to go to the gig tonight, I go to the pub instead. I decided to go to the gig after all. Now I’m on a train, I spilled my beer. No one sits near me. I’m in Camden. I’m watching the band. I get a double vodka. I’m at the top of the stairs. My shoelace is undone. I’m at the bottom of the stairs, people are gathered round. I don’t want to get in the ambulance, I want to go home. I am in a hospital bed, in a room on my own. It’s morning now. I was discharged, I guess. I’m walking a street I don’t know. I am at the station, drinking a beer. I’m home in my bed. It’s Monday, I get beer for breakfast. I realise I can’t call work in case I slur. I’ll call in the morning, it will be OK. I do. They are not happy.

I give her a hug. I get out of the car. The vodka bottle falls out of my hoodie, I swoop it back up, too late to prevent the sound. She pretends not to notice. She drives off and she never comes back.

It’s a Friday. I had vodka in my morning coffee. I went out for a cigarette and drank a miniature before lunch. I’m sick in the toilets. I go home ill. It’s a Tuesday, but not the next one. My boss asks to see me. You can’t be off more than a week without a doctor’s note, he says. I am told I’ve resigned.

I drank for three weeks. Now I’m shaking and I hurt. I’m laying on the sofa. I have no money, no drink, no food, I have nothing except some tobacco and rolling papers but I can’t control my hands long enough to use them. I’m scared I might die. I watch a film. It lasts 8 hours. Or so it seems. I pick up the phone. Help me I say. Of course, my Mum weeps. Three hours later I’m the back of the car, my parents have me. I call my oldest friend, we weren’t really speaking, we haven’t for a year or more. I’m an alcoholic I say. And I cry. I know, he replies. Then he cries too. He’s with me within an hour and stays for two days. He’s never been angry with me since. We don’t talk about the past or why we stopped speaking, not until years later. It’s a hard conversation, but I thought he needed it. It turned out I needed it more.

I live at the house I grew up in for months. I’m loved and I’m safe. I reconnect with old friends, I get a new job, I rebuild my life. Of course, we’re all terrified when I move back to my flat, but this time, it’s OK. And it has been ever since. My memories are no longer fragments, but I think I’m glad the old ones are. I don’t think I want to know more than I already do.