see-through

the perfect roundness of the rim of the wine glass was like an edge of a bottomless well in front of him. the way the light flickered on the glass was too bright, too playful; it was almost as if it had been mocking him. he stared down to the dark red liquid and wondered if the anxiety that ate him from the inside could be drowned into it so that it wouldn't wake him up anymore in the middle of the night or force him to clutch his fists until the small muscles of his hand seized. he certainly had tried; but so far it had not been what you could call a success and he had been rewarded only with an increasing amount of disappointment with himself.


 he sat there, holding the leg of the glass between his fingers, and at that moment the thin, translucent object in all its frailty was the only steady thing in his existence.