Falling Read Online Free Page B

Dalmore 18 year old. Then I think it went down hill.
    Grey Goose vodka, Ron Coba 12
year old rum, Cascade Mountain gin. I remember a couple of bottles of
Harviestoun’s Ola Dubh and you have the makings of a stunning hangover.
    Well at least it was all done in
the best possible taste.
    Can you be done for drunk in
charge of car when you’re not actually in the car? I don’t give a crap at the
moment. All I want to do is curl up and wish the fucking pain away. I think
I’ll flip on my back. Seems like a good idea. Can’t think I’m going to choke on
my own puke. I’m retched out.
    I can see the sky framed between
the buildings and smell the exhaust from my car. If I close my eyes the pain
seems to lessen for a second or two. I’ll keep them closed. Anything to numb
the agony.
    Karen and me. I am in so much
shit from so many directions. Shall I name them? Let’s start with my fiancée,
Susan. She isn’t going to be enamoured when she finds out. And she WILL find
out. Next on the list of trouble. My sister. If Susan finds out then my sister
will find out and then she will phone my mother. Carolyn’s been crying out for
a chance to get one over on me for years. The successful son. Mum’s favourite.
    Then there’s Craig; Karen’s
husband. That will be a tricky one. Ex SAS. Bodyguard. Keep fit freak. Oh and I
think he has a black belt in something. Keep going.
    Robin my best friend, our
Financial Director and, unfortunately Karen’s younger brother. Oh this is so
sweet. Of all the things I could have done on this planet to screw my life up I
would be hard pressed to come up with a better course of action than get into
bed with Karen. Hard to think that things can go south from here.
    ‘Excuse me sir.’
    Wrong. I open my eyes and look
up. Policeman.
    ‘Morning officer.’
    What the hell is that up there?
Above the policeman. Hanging out over the edge of the building. Is that a
person?
    ‘Eh officer…’
     
     
     

Chapter 6
    Charlie’s flight is cut short.
     
    For your information I no longer
retain any physical connection between the building and my person. I have a
mental connection but that doesn’t count for much. As it’s been said in so many
ways ‘Elvis has truly left the building’.
    Flailing does not look like it
has overcome gravity and, much as I might have hoped that I was to be the
exception, it looks like Newton was right. A short downward trajectory followed
by a somewhat ungainly landing is the sum total of my future.
    I’ve never really contemplated
this moment in my life. The end I mean. Sure I’ve talked about it, usually
while drunk or in a state of serious depression, but not really thought about.
You don’t, do you? At least I don’t. I kind of work on the life eternal thing.
I’m now in my mid fifties and everyday I see or hear of plenty of people in
their eighties and nineties. Knock off the first ten years of my life as little
more than a dozen good childhood memories and I could have more good years in
front than behind.
    Makes sense to me.
    At least it did until ten minutes
ago. Now that my end seems so much closer I should probably be giving some
thought to the hereafter or my loved ones or cherished moments in life or some
such thing. Yet all I can do is dance around the ‘thievin’ prick’ thing. No
flash of my life in front of my eyes. No religious conversion on the brink of
death. No regrets that rush forth to be announced. Nothing but a nagging desire
to know why the hell I am being asked to join the bungee-less jump club.
    It could be a case of mistaken
identity. Maybe they have the wrong man. Gorilla number one and two hardly
undertook a formal introduction. For all I know I’m not the man they are
supposed to be teaching to fly. After all I wasn’t sitting at my desk when they
found me. A desk with my name emblazoned on the office door. Well not exactly
emblazoned. Third name down on the brass plaque. Three points smaller than the
top two names and point size