Just a drop.

At 9.05pm, he tentatively opens the bottle of whisky. It’s fine, he’ll just have a drop or two.

By 11.32pm, the bottle is half empty and he’s started smoking again.

‘Just one more glass before bed,’ he says to himself loudly.

Just gone midnight, he sobs into the cushion on the tattered sofa, missing his dead wife, desperate to have one last embrace.

1.04am, his crystal tumbler is smashed into hundreds of pieces, against the wall. Tears blur his vision. The drink heats his temper. The bottle taunts him, blames him, and chastises him.

1.48am, the whisky has gone, his legs won’t move and he wets his trousers. He stares at the empty bottle, ashamed, but far too drunk to feel it properly. It is the last thing he sees as he drifts into sleep on the living room floor, to dream jumbled dreams of life and death, of wedding days and funerals.