The Mirror that Stared

Stumbling, James threw himself over the sink, he hung his head then drew it up to the mirror slowly. His reflection revealed a man whose face he could no longer recognise,. Exactly a year ago today he'd made this private promise to stop drinking, that too had slipped from his fingers, like wet soap. Sweating profusely, James began to feel that the bathroom was getting very crowded. In the mirror, he saw the door was open: he did not shut it. Instead, he turned to the tap, and pushed it upwards -- why couldn't taps operate as they always had done? and felt a near-freezing cascade of water hit his limp hands. It woke him. The time was 3:15. He covered his face and let the icy water fall in drops over his cheeks. One leg bent, James rested his left hand on the window sill. Tonight, or rather this early morning would be James' last. He tried to remember all the times he had looked in the mirror as a happy, contented man, to remember that he had three children, a gorgeous wife, real friends, two cars. But as he looked back on himself now, the notion that he only had his addictions, in this state anyway, was overbearing.
James turned the tap off.