Clara (Seven of Twenty)

I woke up to the sun trying to drill holes through my eyelids. Felt like every last shot from the night before was trying to pound their way out through my skull.

Stepped into the office. Dara got up from her desk and shoved a chipped mug into my hands. Dark, bitter, lukewarm coffee, breakfast of champions. She reminded me there were 7 days to go.

Took me a minute to remember what happened. Mostly, I had to look down at my right fist, and each bruise and cut filled out the night. Dara shook her head, sipped at what she called coffee, six sugars, half creamer, all fancified [Triple skim mocha latte. I can't help that my tastebuds still work, and that I appreciate quality. You'd think Trace would have realized by now that since I didn't grow up boxing, my sense of smell functions correctly. -Dara]

I drank some coffee out the mug in one swig, then topped it off with bourbon. Hair of the dog, definitely felt like it was growing on my tongue. Told Dara to keep looking up Clara on the internets, see if she could find other leads. Meanwhile, I had to catch a train.

I bought a few smaller flasks of bourbon from the store. Saw a few homeless out there last night, knew that I could probably trade these for info. I should feel bad about giving them bourbon, but if I was homeless again, I'd want it [Trace was homeless? Why doesn't he tell me these things? -Dara].

People turn away from homeless cause they're afraid of seeing what mighta happened to themselves if things turned out a little different. Outta sight, outta mind. Push em under the bridge like trash, don't even gotta think about them. Easy to pretend they're dogs, except not even dogs treat each other as bad as people treat each other. People gotta train dogs first to act like that.

Lot of em were wearing trench coats, some of em nicer than what I got on. I started walking, waiting for someone to come up to me. And she did, wearing a floppy hat, dirty felt bag over her shoulder, a missing eye tooth. I asked her name, and she smiled like a five year old, called herself Mia. I asked her what she saw that Monday night, the brunette getting kicked out of the Mercedes. She said Jimmy was ranting about that, said it was his ex-wife. I gave her a flask, held her hands a second, then stepped towards the guy plucking his hair out of his head.