The air feels damp as the dense fog rolls in; Luke buttons his jacket and then pulls at his neck scarf to shield his neck from the cold. Standing alone on the deserted, dark boulevard Luke glances over his shoulders. He takes one last drag from his cigarette inhaling deeply and looks around again making sure nobody is within arms reach. Aware he is alone he quickly darts into the narrow, dark alley and begins looking for number twenty-five.

Luke stumbles over the old cobble stones in the dark lane because the original gas lamps in the historic section no longer work. He fumbles for his cigarette lighter so he has some light while looking for the address. Eventually coming across number twenty-five, Luke stands in front of the door and is hesitant to enter the building. After a few minutes of uncertainty, he knocks at the door several times before realizing nobody answers. He grabs the doorknob and pulls the heavy door ajar and peers into an empty entry way.

Even though he cannot see anybody, he hears muffled voices of men and women in the distance and reluctantly steps inside. The entrance hall is dimly lit and the musty smell overwhelms Luke so he covers his mouth and nose. The flickering light bulb dangling from a long cord above his head sways back and forth as gusts of wind blow through the broken stained glass window above the doorway.

Alone in the foyer, Luke sees two doors in front of him but he is not sure which one he should open. Instead of opening either door, he considers going home and turns around to leave when he sees a sign tacked against the dark wall with an arrow pointing downward. In spite of the unnerving evening, Luke decides to stay and cautiously opens the cellar door standing and listening to the noise below.

Nervously taking the first step down the stairs he instantly holds onto the loose railing, the stairs swaying with each step taken. Carefully walking down the rickety stairs the voices below become more audible and Luke’s heart pounds faster. Reaching the bottom of the stairs, he finds himself in another softly lit room due to only candles working as a source of light. Adjusting to the dimness, Luke remains stationary and observes the crowd of twenty or twenty-five people standing around talking, drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes.

Adding to the smoke filled room, Luke lights a cigarette and anxiously takes several steps away from the crowd and remains aloof, hoping nobody will notice him. Detached from the others he smokes his cigarette and positions himself in a pose of attention as though he were still in the military.

Unapproachable, nobody disrupts Luke while he looks around the small rectangular room. He sees that the once white walls now stained with cigarette smoke need a good scrubbing. Even the slogans encased in glass hanging against the walls have a tinge of yellow and need cleaned as well. Luke notices a rusty metal table across the room with an old Russian samovar sitting on top of it with mugs, sugar and milk randomly piled around the coffee pot. He wants a cup of coffee but is too tense to walk across the room through the mass of people. Instead of going over for a coffee, he steps to a table of books and begins reading one.

When he hears the movement of chairs behind him, Luke turns around staring at the crowd as they begin sitting down in old wooden chairs that form a circle in the middle of the room. Still on edge, Luke tensely walks over to a vacant chair and sits down in between two men without initiating conversation. The chair Luke sits in squeaks every time he shifts his weight to change his position. His hands are clammy and he feels out of place and wishes he were home. He reaches into his pocket and grabs his pack of smokes and lights one when one of the men sitting next to Luke asks for a cigarette. Irritated by the man's request Luke reluctantly gives him one.

Smoking his cigarette, Luke quickly looks at the time, wishing the meeting would start so he can get the hell out of the dingy smelly room. The odor of the room is overpowering and Luke’s head begins to ache; he takes a deep breath to gain some sense of composure. Sweating profusely he unbuttons his jacket and pulls his neck scarf from around his neck. He leans forward with his head hanging down and his arms propped on his legs when he suddenly hears a pounding noise. Luke looks up and sees a frail man around seventy years old hammering on a badly marred table and the aggravating noise does not stop until everybody is completely silent.

Once the assembly is seated and quiet, the man lays the gavel aside, pushes his rimmed glasses over the bridge of his nose and speaks in a raspy voice, “My name is Art and I am an alcoholic.”

With the exception of Luke the others yell, “Hi, Art.”

After his introduction the gray haired leader asks, “Are there any newcomers this evening with less than thirty days of sobriety?

Two men and one woman raise their hand and even though this is Luke’s first meeting he does not acknowledge it as such. Instead, he drops his head and glares intently at the floor, evading the question.

The other members enthusiastically yell to the newcomers, “Keep coming back!"

The short balding man leading the meeting stands, walks around the room and randomly hands out what appears to be blank pages of paper to three of the members. He returns to his seat and asks the first person to read the Preamble of Alcoholics Anonymous followed by an elderly lady reading How it Works and then a man reads The Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous.

The readings complete, Art looks out over the crowd and asks, “Do I have any volunteers that have a burning desire to speak or do I have to point my finger?”

A woman excitedly volunteers and Luke lifts his head and glances at a middle-aged woman that is nicely dressed. She is rather homely looking but her smile radiates happiness and her eyes sparkle with joy. She stands up, grabs her chair and juggles a coffee in her hand while dragging her chair across the floor. The scraping noise from the chair dragging against the cement floor rakes on Luke’s nerves and sends chills up his spine. One leg of the chair gets stuck in a groove of the cement and the woman pulls at the chair until she frees the leg from the crack.

Reaching the center of the circle, the lady sits down and sips her coffee before speaking. The woman is self-assured and confidently says, “My name is Julie and I am an alcoholic.”

The members yell, “Hi, Julie!”

The woman crosses her legs, pulls her skirt over her knees, clears her throat and starts her story. Beginning with her childhood and growing-up with alcoholic parents, Julie talks about drinking at the age of thirteen and consuming alcohol daily at sixteen. Discontent and unhappy at home with her parents, Julie relates to the crowd about dropping out of high school, running away from home and prostituting herself on the streets of downtown Los Angeles. When she speaks about that period in her life, the others can easily hear the pain in her voice.

Listening to her story, Luke cannot believe how candidly she talks about her life as he rubs his beard and scratches his neck. The blonde haired woman takes another sip of her coffee, clears her throat again and talks about physical and sexual abuse from her male clients and several pimps she married. Julie tells the crowd about trying to quit alcohol and drugs numerous times but she could never put down the bottle or stop taking drugs until finding AA. She proceeds to tell her captured audience about accidentally stumbling into Alcoholics Anonymous during her last jail sentence in Sybil Brand Institute for Women in Los Angeles. Julie has since learned there are no accidents in life and everything that happens is for a reason.

Before continuing with her story, she clears her throat and says, “I was in Sybil Brand for the umpteenth time and one evening a matron came through the dormitory yelling something about an AA meeting. In my warped thinking I thought the matron said that American Airlines was hiring stewardesses so I went to the eight o’clock meeting hoping to become an airline stewardess. Needles to say it was not American Airlines conducting interviews. Instead it was a room full of ex-drunks holding an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting."

The crowd laughs and even Luke cracks a smile as he stares at the small framed woman sitting patiently, waiting for the laughter to stop. Once the laughter ceases, Julie continues with her story and relays to her audience that for the first time in her life she felt at home during the meeting. She says, "I finally fit somewhere in this world and it is in AA."

Before finding Alcoholics Anonymous, Julie tells the group how her life was spent in darkness and she always felt alone and far away from the world. Even when she worked the streets or was in large crowds, she felt as though she was a misfit full of insecurities, paranoia and fears. She tells everyone how impressed she was when someone at the meeting told her to keep coming back. Julie smiles and with tears in her eyes says, “Nobody ever told me to come back in fear I might rob them blind.”

The other recovering alcoholics laugh as Julie continues and tells about her fifteen years of living drug and alcohol free. Julie expresses her gratitude to a program that continuously saves her life and the lives of everybody around her. She is content with herself, her marriage and beams when she mentions her two sons. During her fifteen years of sobriety, Julie got her GED and eventually earned a Masters’ of Fine Arts and now teaches painting and drawing at a local college.

Looking somberly at the woman taking center stage, Luke can see that the woman is at peace with herself. Unbeknownst to Luke, Julie and the others in the room understand his turmoil and pain brought on by alcoholism.

Julie clears her throat before saying, “Thank you.” As the members applaud the petite woman, Julie grabs her chair and blends back into her circle of friends.

The applause stops as the leader pushes at his glasses and asks, “Do I have any volunteers?”

Luke quickly looks down at the floor; fortunately, one of the men sitting next to him raises his hand. The leader nods his head and the stocky man next to Luke stands. He lifts his chair, carries it to the middle of the circle and angrily throws his chair against the cement floor. Sitting in the middle of the crowd, he begins his story. However, he is not as confident as Julie and seems unsure what to say—he sounds rehearsed and contrived.

While the man is talking, Luke becomes bored and drifts into his own thoughts. Slumping in his chair with his legs crossed, holding his arms against his chest, Luke reflects on Julie’s story and thinks: How can I be an alcoholic? I’m only twenty-seven! I'm too young to be one of them; besides, they look like drunks and I don‘t. Those people are homely looking and I‘m a tall, nice looking man that’s well educated and they’re not educated. Besides, I’m not a prostitute and jail time for me isn't possible because I rarely drink in bars—I drink at home. I don’t drink twenty-four hours a day like they do since I work twelve to fourteen hours a day. Maybe I drink too much at times but I’m not alcoholic and hearing the word alcoholic makes the hair on the back of my head stand-up.

Luke struggles with acceptance and continues justifying his drinking and broods over the differences between him and Julie. Annoyed with the current speaker, Luke continues in his own world while reading the slogans on the wall: Live and Let Live, Keep Coming Back, First Things First, One Day At A Time. Luke admits to himself that the slogans are nice but he does not understand the meaning behind any of them. Startled by the leader yelling out over the crowd, Luke looks at his watch and sees it is almost nine o‘clock.

The leader says, “We have time for one more speaker if anyone would care to share?”

No one volunteers and the person in charge pushes his glasses over the bridge of his nose before passing the basket around telling the group that AA is self-supporting.  Filled with money, a member hands the basket back to the leader and everybody stands holding hands, including Luke.

Looking over his glasses, the leader glances over at Julie and asks, “Julie, will you please close the meeting with the prayer of your choice?”

Julie nods her head and begins reciting the Serenity Prayer and the other follow with the exception of Luke.  After the prayer ends, without hesitating Luke makes a dash for the stairs when he feels someone tapping on his back.

Luke turns around and sees Julie standing in front of him with her beaming smile as she extends her hand to Luke. Luke ignores her hand and reaches into his coat pocket grabbing at a flask of whiskey, holding it tightly. He desperately needs a drink and does not want to converse with Julie or the others. Rubbing he beard Luke wishes Julie would not block the exit to the stairs so he can return to his world of denial.

Julie accepts Luke’s indifference and asks, “Is this your first time at an AA meeting?”

Luke nods and reluctantly answers, “Yes.”

Julie welcomes him and says, “If you think you have a drinking problem, you probably do.”

Luke abruptly answers, “I don’t have a drinking problem.”

The woman smiles and says, "Keep coming back."