Writing Prompt Wednesday #38

Complete the sentence "If you look back far enough, you can see ..." and write a scene or short story that contains the line. https://www.writersdigest.com/prompts. 

NOTE: I know that there hasn’t been any new Ashera chapters or poems up on the blog in a while, and I’m so sorry for that. These past few weeks have been super busy for me and I haven’t had a lot of time to write (I have an Ashera chapter ready, but I haven’t even had time to type it up). Anyways, after this weekend things should calm down a bit, and I can get back to writing at my usual pace. So, in the meantime, enjoy this WPW!

TW: Drinking

    Rafael sat at the counter, his fifth glass of whiskey in his hand. Well, sat is being nice. He more slumped pitifully in his chair, like a corpse. You could only tell he was alive by the gentle rise and fall of his shoulders.
    An old man walked into the bar, taking a seat beside Rafael. “One scotch, neat,” he said to the bartender, who nodded and shuffled away.
    The old man smiled pleasantly at Rafael, who was looking up at him with mild interest. “It’s a fine evening we have today,” he said.
    Rafael snorted. “Maybe for you,” he slurred.
    “Well why not for you?” the man asked, gratefully accepting his drink from the bartender.
    “I’ve hit rock bottom my friend,” Rafael said. “I got fired from my job a few days ago when I had almost enough saved up to get a proper house. Then my wife left with my kids because ‘I wasn't trying hard enough’. I have nowhere to go and nowhere to go to.”
    “I wouldn’t say that’s true,” the old man said. “You know, some people say ‘If you look back far enough, you can see everywhere you’ve been and everywhere you’re going.’”
    “What do you mean?”
    The old man smiled. “Things don’t really make sense yet. When something bad happens to someone, they have a tendency to only focus on that. They can’t see how they’ve been helped out of tough situations in the past, and they can’t see why they were brought into this one. But, the thing is, everything happens for a reason. You may not realize it at the time, but years from now, when you look back, you may be able to see all of the good that came from your hardships.”
    “Well, that’s easy to say,” Rafael said, looking out the window. “But how am I supposed to get through this now? How can I be sure that good will come out of it?”
    He awaited an answer, but none came. He looked back at where the old man was sitting, only to find that he had disappeared. Rafael’s head slumped back onto the counter. He must’ve only imagined it.