...for long, but not for good (for no good?)

The door slams shut. John loudly ascend the metal stairwell, puts his coat on the railing at the upper landing and drops his baggage next to it. He enters the enters the kitchen to walk straight to the fridge. On the door, as if untouched, there's still his note that he left a virtually unmeasurably long time ago.

He takes out the plastic bottle of OJ, drinks, realizes that he actually bought it weeks (months?) ago before his departure -- runs to the sink, spits, drinks a lot of water and finally: allows the sentence to end.

On the way to the bathroom he passes Mark's dinner party who are playing Chinese Checkers now (Chinese Checkers of all things!), but with some twist to the game, so that it involves drinking. Mark's friends can't help noticing that John's shirt is heavily stained with blood, as though the fabric had been soaked, sprinkled with it, and now dry-- it had turned into an ugly brown. His hands are dirty too --"but that's not necessarily blood too," sombeone thinks.
John: "I'm back." (pause) "Am I the only one to ever buy groceries in this place?"
Nobody answers. John plods on towards the bathroom.
"I didn't even notice he'd been gone."