by Robert Price
Chapter Fifteen
Julian took the back roads. He thought it best. Because after drinking close to a pint of vodka, not only did his stomach threaten upheaval but the muscles in his arms twitched and pulled unpredictably. He would have drunk more to relax those symptoms, making it easier to drive, but he had finished the bottle and there was nothing left to drink in the apartment. So instead of blasting his beat-up car down Interstate 495 at 80 miles an hour on the outside chance that he could still make the tail end of Tom’s burial ceremony, he slowly maneuvered the back roads like a pokey old man.
He thought of stopping to pick up a fresh bottle of vodka. He would need one to make it through the day. And although he would pass two liquor stores on the way to Newbury and the Hubbard farmhouse, he had had prior bad experiences with each. At the first store, the owner once refused to sell him a pint of vodka and then threatened to call the cops when he stumbled drunkenly back to his car. At the second store, a police cruiser was usually parked adjacent to the front of the building—sort of a permanent, small town speed trap. They had pulled him over twice after leaving that store, and twice, as fortune would have it, they let him go. So Julian passed by the first store. And, afraid his good luck on this road would run out, he straightened his driving posture until he was safely past the second one, too.
It was after two in the afternoon by the time he got to Newbury. He drove past the quiet white church on High Road where the funeral had taken place. Though he realized he had missed the burial ceremony, still, he considered it his duty to go to the gravesite and pay respects to a dead friend. After that, he figured a short drive across town to the memorial reception at the Hubbard farmhouse. Melanie had said it would likely run all afternoon. So it’ll be the gravesite, then the reception. But first things first. He swung a right off High Road and headed toward Charlie’s Package Store for a bottle.
