Under the Influence

“I’m falling asleep. I’m stopping for cigarettes,” I told her as though I was a doctor giving a prescription. 

“You’re just drunk.” She said in a way that stung. 



“You asked me to drive.” 

“I’m drunk too.” She giggled. The sound relaxed my shoulders. 


I pulled into the gas station and made a note that I was parked at pump four because the attendants always get angry with me when I forget.  This particular attendant had stocky shoulders and a square shaped head that I assumed he shaved himself.  He looked down on me literally and figuratively, but did not look me in the eyes as he took my twenty-dollar bill.



“Pack of yellows. Change for twenty, pump four.” I was a doctor again.



“Yeah.” He said in a way that stung.



I was filling the gas tank, but my mind was focused, listening intently to the lyrics of a bad pop song blaring over the cheap outdoor speakers.  If I could remember the progression of bad clichés the conversation might carry us all the way home through the sleepy night.  The last fifty cents worth of gas came out particularly slow and I wanted to ask her about that too, but when I opened the driver side door the passenger seat was empty.

I moved my car away from the gasoline pumps into a parking space around back so I could smoke while I waited for her.  My mind started racing before I even finished unwrapping the plastic. I never have to wait for her. I went back inside and the attendant was looking at naked women in a magazine. He did not look up as I approached him.



“My wife, I think she is using your restroom. Where are they? I’ll probably wait right near them because I moved my car you know and yeah she’d probably see where I’m at now but just to avoid confusion you know…” I rambled until he finally acknowledged me. 

“We don’t have a bathroom.”



I stood silent for a long moment. “I’m looking for my wife,” I said.



“Me too,” he replied without looking up.

“I mean, I was here with my wife.  And she’s not in the car now.  I think she’s using your bathroom.”



“You came in here alone, man. Pack of yellows, change for twenty on four.  And I already fucking told you we don’t have a bathroom.”



“Do you have a security camera on the premises?” I asked him in the serious tone that a doctor might use. 



“No, but you need to get the fuck out of here before I call the cops. You’re drunk.”


I was drunk.  It was the middle of the night.  The cops were the last people I wanted to talk to right now but my wife was missing.  I stepped outside to smoke a cigarette.