Author's Note: This was inspired by the prompt, 'write a story about an empty glass.'
Disclaimer: I don't own Final Fantasy VII, or any of the characters. They belong to Square-Enix.
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An empty glass. A beer mug, to be precise.
It was one of many. It wasn't the first, and it wouldn't be the last. It definitely wouldn't be the last. That was obvious as he poured himself some more, his ninth glass that night (he was on his fourth bottle, too.). Reno had no intention of kicking the habit.
He'd actually forgotten why he'd started drinking in the first place, years ago, when he was nineteen (even though the legal age in Midgar was twenty-one), and he didn't care to remember. He was good at blocking things out, even if he did have help from the glasses he emptied.
It was probably some painful memory of the past. It was with most people. The alcohol was merely a tangible form, an avatar, of the self-pity they drowned themselves in.
And what did the empty glass represent?
Reno looked down at it, then gazed around the apartment, his blurred vision swimming in the pool of drunken stupor he'd dug and filled himself. He was alone, of course. It wasn't as though there was anyone holding a special place in his heart. Just as well. He did have people's respect, being a Turk and all, but it was the sort of respect that triggered fear, not love.
He decisively returned his focus to the glass.
The empty glass represented the hollow life he lived.