Four.

Four was the number of drinks he'd had in him before he'd come up with the plan that had eventually ruined his life. It was after another four drinks that he'd had the balls to share this plan with someone else who also used it to great effect. Eight drinks to ruin his life, two drinks in him to get together the courage to actually implement the plan, stone sober while actually accomplishing the deed.

But it had all started with those first four drinks.


It had been four drinks incidentally that had also saved him. Two drinks before meeting Her children ( he'd never met any one else with such a colorful background) and while it did not in any stretch of the imagination go well, it could have gone much worse than it had. Two drinks afterwards for both of them had led to them confessing to each other which had led to the conception of their eldest and the marriage.

Four to doom him and then four to save him.