Fiction
by Steve Loiaconi
by Steve LoiaconiI started drinking because somebody had to.
When my father died, he left behind a lot of things. Golf clubs. Boxes of old paperback crime novels. A stack of p**n he didn’t know I knew about. So much debt. But my point is, 16 unopened bottles of good scotch, a few in the hall closet and the rest in the basement. My mother was always more of a wine woman, so who was going to drink it?
This was when I was 20. People say sometimes, they say you were old enough to handle it. Mature enough. You were supposed to be the strong one. “You’re the man of the family now” and so on. Process of elimination, really. Your sister’s halfway across the country. Your mother’s about to lose her health insurance. Your father died $30,000 in debt. And you’re going to
