Story by Brian Caesar
His eyes drifted away from the deepened focus of Eden’s as the drunken man approached from the grass hill just to the right of the Park lake. His demons had obviously made this figure their prey as his trembling limbs stumbled to gather his indented silver flask from the path in front of him. The bourbon spilled to the floor as the sorry excuse for a being collapsed his chest to the ground to catch every drop he could. Eden and Jon watched as the man whimpered and screamed about his life circumstances.
Taking every last ounce of his will power he brought himself to his knees meeting Eden’s gaze from far away. When what seemed to be his shame, drew his glance away he was caught by the gaze of yet another angel present to him that night. The half way consumed bottle of dark red that Eden still had remnants of on her perfectly full lips, laid on the bench next to them drawing his complete attention. He stared at it with a victorious smirk rounding out his dark 5’oclock shadow as if he had finally come across water following days in a desert.
Grabbing his coat from the ground, he stood straight and quickly made his way towards the two of them. “What are you looking at?” the man grumbled to the soon to be wed couple. “I am.. I am still a man.. and.. you.. then.. I have every right to be here. Who do you think you are? This is my lake.. you .. get OUT of it!!”
As the man grew closer, Jon’s typical reluctance to quarrel led him to frantically gather the items that they had brought for their evening out. “What are you doing Jon” Eden stated with complete disregard for the possessed man approaching. “We should go.. this man is obviously not well and there’s no telling what..” Eden interrupted with counter against the stranger “You need to get out of here! Go be drunk somewhere else.. leave us alone!!” As he glanced towards the man approaching, Jon saw a devotion to the drink that resembled that of his father before he had passed, a soulless thirst for a remedy to fill a hollow heart. “Eden stop.. this man doesn’t look quite right.” Jon begged as he grabbed Eden’s hand to haul her towards a rapid departure, but before he could bring her to her feet, there stood the tall shadowy figure blocking the path in front of them.