Band-aids.
Flynn staggered home very late after another evening with his drinking
buddy, Paddy.. He took off his shoes to avoid waking his wife, Mary.
He tiptoed as quietly as he could toward the stairs leading to their
upstairs bedroom, but misjudged the bottom step.
As he caught himself by grabbing the banister, his body swung around
and he landed heavily on his rump. A whiskey bottle in each back
pocket broke and made the landing especially painful.
Managing not to yell, Flynn sprung up, pulled down his pants, and
looked in the hall mirror to see that his butt cheeks were cut and
bleeding. He managed to quietly find a full box of Band-Aids and
began putting a Band-Aid as best he could on each place he saw blood.
He then hid the now almost empty Band-Aid box and shuffled and
stumbled his way to bed.
In the morning, Flynn woke up with searing pain in both his head and
butt...and Mary staring at him from across the room.
She said, 'You were drunk again last night weren't you?'
Flynn said, 'Why you say such a mean thing?'
'Well,' Mary said, 'it could be the open front door, it could be the broken
glass at the bottom of the stairs, it could be the drops of blood trailing
through the house, it could be your bloodshot eyes, but mostly.....it's
all those Band-Aids stuck on the hall mirror.