Coldly Paradoxical

By the time Alonzo Del Bono arrived at the border town that morning, he felt, quite literally, that he was but a shadow of his former self. He stepped into a dark, dimly lit bar that stank like the breath of the drunken party the night before. He sat down at the bar alone, and stared down along it at the ashtrays, their contents spilling over onto the counter. He glanced at the ashtray next to him. A shallow bowl of crumpled white cigarette butts, painted with red lipstick.

"What'll it be?" the woman said, flicking an ash from her smoke into the bowl. Her fingernails matched her lipstick.
"I don't know." He said, glancing up at her.
"Of course, you don't, honey. That's why you are here." She walked away, and poured a double scotch, and sat it down in front of him. "Indecision kills, you know."she said, as she dropped a cube of ice into the glass, hesitated, and dropped another one in. Plunk.....Plunk.

"Eat, drink, and be merry, my friend, tomorrow has been cancelled." she said, sliding the glass to his tightly clenched fists which he was trying desperately to open. It seemed a struggle to pry his fingers free. They seemed tangled up into tight knots clinging desperately to each other. He watched as she rested her hands on his, her red nails drawing soothing circles around his fists. "Don't fret, dear," she said. "It's just rigor mortis, setting in." She patted his fists sympathetically. "Here. Maybe this will help." She lifted the glass to his lips and tilted it. He swallowed again and again. "Now, my dear, tell me." she said setting the empty glass down. "What happened to the rest of you? Do you remember?" He stared down at his long, dark, and crooked shadow on the bar room floor.
"You mean about the accident? Or the funeral?" He heard himself say.
"Tell me the whole story. Take your time, darling. We have all the time in the world." she replied.
"We do?" he said, looking up at her.
"Mmm hmmm," she said with a smile.

"Well", he began, "There's not that much to tell, really. But, I was on vacation. I just went away by myself, without much of a plan. I didn't tell anyone where I was going, because I was leaving without knowing. I wound up in a motel room near Padre Island. I had a severe hang-over from the night before. I think there might have been a woman with me during the night, unless it was just a drunken dream. I waded out into the water that morning in hopes of washing away a sickly desperate feeling I had. I didn't know about the rip tide until the undertow dragged me away. That's the last I remember, except for a very vague awareness of being buried, and the muted sounds of people mumbling."

He stared back down at his shadow on the floor, and then over to the large window by the door. The view was an intimidating jagged black profile of steep mountains backlit by a sky of red.
"So, where am I?" He asked. "Am I in hell?"
"No, darlin'," she said, nodding her head toward the window's view. "Hell is over there. On the other side of the mountains." He looked back at her.
"So, where am I, then?"

She smiled, and patted his clenched fists again.
"You are in Limbo, darlin'. Limbo, Texas. Right here with me at the Limbo Lounge. The only lounge in Limbo where a person can still get a good stiff drink, even if they are already dead." She picked up the glass from the counter. "One more for the road?' she said. He nodded, and stared back again to his long shadow on the floor, followed it to the window, and the view of the hot flickering sky beyond the mountains of hell. She plugged the jukebox and walked toward him. "Would you like a last dance, before you disappear?" She asked, as she wrapped her arms around his lifeless shadow.

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