How Dareen defeated alcohol (this is a serious post, folks)

      Another smile from Dareen.  “I don’t eat pork.  My religion.”  Then quickly she said, “I’ll have the pizza burger.”  She knew Billy was feeling awkward, first ordering beer and then recommending ham.  Yet she was liking him more.  They had never hung out like this before.  It made her feel relaxed, less shy.

        As they ate Dareen noticed Billy wasn’t touching his beer.  Finally she said, “I order you to drink that.”

        Billy obliged with a modest sip.  “You don’t seem like the type to get smashed . . .  Was it a long time ago?”

        “You’ll laugh.”

        “Go ahead, tell me.”

        “I grew up in a pretty religious family, or at least they were then.  We never had alcohol in the house.  My father even threw out some floor cleaner because it had ten percent isopropyl alcohol.”  Between munches of her pizza burger, Dareen got into one of her occasional voluble modes, a quiet yet articulate way of talking, that her past boyfriends had found enchanting.  “Then I took driver ed in high school and we had to know blood alcohol levels in drinks, like how much was in beer, or a glass of wine, or a martini.  I didn’t know what they were talking about.  Does wine come in bigger glasses than mixed drinks?  And what’s a ‘mixed drink’, anyway?  Does that include those wine coolers I see on TV?  I kept on getting confused.

        “So anyway I flunked my written test because there were about five questions on that and I got every one of them wrong.  After our graduation party I sneaked out with my girlfriends to a friend’s house where their parents were away, and alcohol was out.  I told them about my flunking the test, and they showed me the difference between a glass of wine and a shot of whiskey.”  On the rare occasions when Dareen told a long story she had a way of squinting in one eye, again, something quite engaging.  “They told me to try a sip of each, to see how much stronger the whiskey was, and showed me the bottles with the ‘proof’ numbers on them.  By that time, though,” Dareen said with a shrug, interrupting with a bite of the burger, “I was enjoying the drinks too much to do much calculating.  I was really messed up that summer and my whole first year in college was a waste.”

        “So you finally passed the exam, right?”

        “Yes, and the road test, but a few close calls and one time the police took me home.  That was my wake-up call.  That was me hitting bottom and, well . . . it was ‘higher power’ time.”  Dareen thought of adding, “One day at a time.  I still get the urge to drink but I aim for bedtime.  Once my head hits the pillow I know I’ve made it another day.  It helps to turn in early.”  But she cut herself short, knowing how recovered alcoholics can go on and on about this.

        “Wow.”  Billy listened thoughtfully.  “Some of those A.A. types really get into Jesus.”

        “I know.”

        Again, Dareen thought of saying, “That’s why I stopped going.  They were helpful at first, but I could only transpose ‘Jesus’ into ‘Allah’ so many times before it was clear that they were simply going down a different path than me.  And I’m sure some of them were, if you pressed them, just anti-Islam.  Which you find a lot of these days.  I wish there was an Islamic A.A. group here in town.  But I seem to be doing all right without going to meetings, fortunately.”  Again, she didn’t say it.  All Billy heard were the first two words, Dareen lapsing into being her typical quiet self again.

        Billy stopped the friendly small talk and got serious.  “You know, this country could use you.”

        Dareen, chewing the last of the burger, looked up in puzzlement.