The scrap of paper read:

“The water dripped onto the rusted drain standing too close to avoid it. Eventually the water welled-up around it and beneath the dripping onslaught like the cheerios that lay hardened by its side. Between the lose talk and the drunken erratic laughter of my wife, her black horn-rim glasses loose and crooked, I leaned up against the wall between the two paintings and raised up my hands to my cheeks reminiscent of “The Scream” painting which had been a part of our living room while summering in Gibraltar every year. ‘All your great inspirations were an accident; you are single-handedly the dissolution of timeless writing every time you put a sentence down on paper,’ she shrilled with such pristine enlightenment to her voice that I actually saw the haze of the cold, bitter air coming out of her mouth on that warm summer night.

She sold red paintings she’d sketched on a pad while laying next to me in our bed and still I had to take shit from her. ‘Our daughter nearly drowned today, shut-up,’ I shouted at her repeatedly but still she harangued on and on while drinking steadily and getting sloppier in her words and appearance. She always lowered her manners and shrilled her distain for the life she led with me as she used me as her battering-boy. ‘Our daughter almost drowned,’ I reasoned to try to get her to shut-up and lower her voice as my beautiful daughter lay asleep in her bed, luckily, she lay asleep in her bed.

How undeserving of how blessed we were to have noticed she did not return and motor out to the spot where she sank and find her so quickly. I felt her foot buried in the muck amongst floating dirt particles and seaweed. This was one of the most unlucky kids; first of all to be born to me, the man my wife shouted about in reason, I was what she said, a lousy writer and now to have my daughter sit at the bottom of the sea. I should have let her die rather than to let her know that I too was a drunk like her mother and that I had a lot of nerve calling myself a writer.

Never go to war with anyone, especially with yourself. Not in this world. I pulled you by the foot towards the warmer, clearer water not knowing if what I was doing was the right thing for you. A war is just too big to try and stop it and most times you can’t do anything about it. You are just one little minnow on the face of a large earth torn from it too soon. I looked up towards the clearer water and dragged you along with me by the foot, your second chance at being alive rigorously maneuvered behind me, an arousal of prance in my swim swept over me as I got you to safety. My love for you over-took me, although I offer you nothing in this drunken life. –Evan Dresswell”

I stepped out onto the brick walk to clear my head after reading the notes my father had written. I was stunned and in many ways familiar with what he had said. Except him knowing that he was every bit the shadow of my grandfather and that the bourbon had ruined his marriage and his ability to set a course that would lead him out from under that cape-sized shadow. I was frustrated and mostly angry that he thought he saved my life. He had, but the choice he felt he made to take me out of the water knowing that I might well have been better off drowning, frustrated me.

I stood in line at the local deli to get a sandwich and coffee, the only one open this early in the morning. I was behind one other customer while I dragged the tray unconsciously along the stainless steel rail pulling the turkey sandwich, coffee and creamer onto the tray. By chance, I looked up and noticed the man in front of me. He had dark hair and blue eyes and blotchy-looking dried blood all over his hands. At first I glanced, then, I outright looked. He seemed okay with it and continued grabbing a sandwich and slice of pie even though I stared at his motions. I looked again thinking it was eczema, but it wasn’t, it was dried blood.

I sat at a booth in the front window to enjoy the view of Manhattan at night, the neon lights of the closed store fronts across the street. I began to eat the sandwich when the man with the dried blood stopped by my booth, leaned over politely and said, “I have a disease. It causes my skin to bleed, especially around my knuckles.”

I knew that the assortment of emotions mixed with ego that I was experiencing must have penetrated my face to let him know that I was caught in many traps as a result of him seeing me stare at him. I stammered out a lame reply, “Will it eventually kill you?”
“Oh god,” I said as my voice and eyes lowered, “I can’t believe I just said that, I’m so sorry, really.”
He took the hard words in stride and stood back erect as he viewed the room for a seat.
“Should I sit, or should I….” he whispered and his body mimicked a walk-away motion.
“Please sit and I’ll get you a napkin,” his hand’s blood was dried, not too bad looking, “Are you sure you didn’t just kill somebody and haven’t had time to wash?” I said jokingly.
“Yes,” he said as he pulled a wilted lettuce leaf from the sandwich, “the cook.”

He bit in and chewed slowly. He was handsome in a cigar-smoking-type-of-guy way. I stared at him chew; his cheeks bulged out-and-in quickly as he gulped the half-chewed bite down.

“I think I’ll let the cook live, this cod sandwich is so good, it’s good fish,” he said. “This place always has good fish,” he winked and smiled, some of the bread embedded in his teeth. We talked until he was finished, which was not long, his bites getting larger and less chewed. Within five or six bites he was done with his sandwich and pie, and done with me.

He stood to say good-bye. “I’ve seen you here before, maybe we can eat together again then…,” his voice trailed off with his ending words. Then, he did something strange. Leaning forward he used one of his dried-blood hands and with his only two fingers that did not have blood, he slightly curled them and used them to move the hair back from above my brow. I felt the hint of softness his fingers laid along my forehead and sank into a short amount of cruel time that crashed in around my face reminiscent of the moment I chose to let go and drink in the warm Gibraltar sea water. As he stepped away my head stood on the moment, which converged in on my steady weaknesses I try so hard to forget. All I could think was I had no time for relationships or the screaming that came along beside them. Mostly I avoided them over me and the daylight above me too. Choosing rather to spend time sailing amongst the uncomfortable streets of Manhattan at night, possibly the only place in the world where you can lead a complete life, alone, at night.