Paddy staggered home very late after another evening with his drinking
pal, Mick. He took off his shoes to avoid waking his wife Mary.
He tiptoed quietly toward the stairs leading to their bedroom, but
misjudged the bottom step. He caught himself by grabbing the banister,
his body swung around and he landed heavily on his rump. A whiskey bottle
in each back pocket broke and made the landing especially painful.
Managing not to yell, Paddy sprung up, pulled down his pants, and looked
in the hall mirror to see that his butt cheeks were cut and bleeding. He
managed to quietly find a full box of Band-Aids and began putting a
Band-Aid as best he could on each place he saw blood. He then hid The now
almost empty box and shuffled and stumbled his way to bed.
In the morning, Paddy woke up with a searing pain in his head and butt and
Mary staring at him from across the room.
She said, “You were drunk again last night weren’t you Paddy?”
Paddy asked, “Why do you say such a mean thing?”
“Well,” Mary said, “it could be the open front door, it could be the
broken glass at the bottom of the stairs, it could be the drops of blood
trailing through the house, it could be your bloodshot eyes, but mostly
……………………………………………………………………………………………… it’s all those Band-Aids stuck on the downstairs mirror.”
