When you open your eyes, it seems to take forever for your vision to swim into focus, almost like you’d never opened them before. You blink a few times in the sudden harsh light before realizing it is coming from one of those obnoxious fluorescent ceiling panels, like the kind that they have in libraries and middle schools and…
And hospitals.
This last thought seems to cause the rest of your body to leap into motion and you jerk upright, only now realizing that the bed you’re sitting in serves as confirmation that you are, in fact, in a hospital room. Forcing yourself to remain calm, you swallow, draw a breath, and then look around the room. The place is nothing to speak of – everything in muted colors, grays and off-whites, just a bed and a counter under the window and a chair.
And nothing seems even remotely familiar.
Just before you are ready to get up and begin frantically looking for someone to explain this, the door to the room opens and a tall doctor with a serious face enters the room. The look he gives you seems to register surprise and concern, and you find this incredibly unsettling. Another quick look around the room, however, soothes you a bit. You reason that if something were seriously wrong, you’d probably be hooked up to machines or something.
“Mr. Michaels,” the doctor begins cautiously.
You look up at him and you’re sure you look completely dumbstruck. “Where am I?”
The doctor enters the room fully and leans against the counter, crossing his arms over his chest. “What’s the last thing you remember?”
It takes you a silent moment of deep thought before realizing that you don’t really remember much of anything. It makes you feel a touch crazy. You don’t like it. “Uhh…” you begin, running a hand through your blond hair. It’s tangled and greasy. You never let your hair get like that. You pull your hand away and rub it on the sheet beneath you, mildly disgusted. “I was on tour with the guys. Everything was fine.” You pause as a disturbing sense of worry hits you straight on. Had there been an accident? Was that why you were here? Where were the other guys? Too many questions. Not enough answers. “Why am I in a hospital?”
The doctor shakes his head and you immediately notice the bit of doubt in his eye. It does nothing to settle your worries. “So the last thing you remember is being on tour? Nothing else?”
“What do you mean, nothing else? What else should I be remembering?” The question has barely left your lips when a flash of old memory passes in front of your eyes. Rikki. Rikki and blood. But that doesn’t make sense. Why would you be seeing that? Had something happened to Rikki? You aren’t sure. You close your eyes and take several deep breaths trying to steady yourself. The image of Rikki on his knees with blood streaming steadily down his face was too real.
“Mr. Michaels, are you alright?” The doctor’s voice is heavy with concern. You can hear it. It’s just another thing to jumble your mind. Why the hell won’t that damn image of Rikki go away? You begin to pull on your hair, thinking maybe the pain will help you to think of other things. But it doesn’t. Only Rikki. You can’t make it stop.
“Rikki,” you finally say, glaring at the doctor and hearing the slightly maniacal edge to your own voice. “Where is Rikki? I need to see Rikki.”
The doctor is frowning at you in a way that you don’t think you’ve ever quite witnessed before. “Rikki,” he repeats uncertainly. “Rikki, the, ah… the drummer for your band, is that right?”
For a moment, you just look at him. You want to get up. You want to climb right out of this fucking bed and tell this chump in no uncertain terms that you want to know what the fuck is going on here and you want to know right now, that you don’t care if it’s the stomach flu or inoperable brain cancer or the first male fucking pregnancy, but he’d better start talking. Instead, you find yourself rooted to the spot, unable to do much of anything but stare. “Yes,” you say finally. “Rikki. The drummer from my band. My best friend. My…” You trail off, see something flash across the inside of your mind, but it’s gone as quickly as it came. “My best friend,” you repeat, clearing your throat. “Is he okay?”
The doctor raises an eyebrow at you. “Yes,” he says after a moment. “Yes, Rikki’s fine.”
You can’t help but let out a little sigh of relief, but then other things come into your mind. “What about the others? Bob? CC?”
“To the best of my knowledge, they’re fine as well.”
“Good,” you say. You swallow. “Then what am I doing here? How long have I been here?”
The doctor takes a breath and looks at you like he’s about to tell you that you’ve contracted some sort of flesh-eating virus that will kill you in twelve hours. “You’ve been here for just over eight months,” he says finally.
Eight months. The words hang heavy on the air. Your throat tightens. Eight months? How is that possible? You don’t understand. Suddenly all the previous power you had to fight and be strong slips from you. You sink back down into the bed, realizing for the first time how very uncomfortable it is. “I’ve lost eight months?” The question is choked. You nearly have to force it over your lips. “I don’t…how…what happened?”
“Your friends were concerned for your well being, Mr. Michaels. They feared that you were a danger to yourself. And to them. They brought you here…”
“What are you talking about?” you interrupt quietly. “What do you mean my friends brought me here? They had me locked up? Why would they do that? Everything was fine.” But part of you knows that isn’t the truth. You’re not sure why, but you can feel it deep down in your gut. It makes you slightly nauseous. You wonder what you must have done to push your bandmates, your brothers, over the edge. It must have been terrible if they were willing to lock you up in some sort of mental institution. Jesus, you’d never even done that to CC. And god only knew how many times he had deserved it.
“Everything wasn’t fine, Mr. Michaels,” the doctor tells you solemnly. “But I don’t want to overwhelm you with too much information too soon. I will be honest, it is a surprise to me that you have awakened at all. I didn’t think it would happen.”
“I’ve been sleeping for eight months?”
“For about six of the eight months, actually.”
You’re not sure why, but the next question seems of utter importance to you. You feel like you should know the answer without asking and yet you doubt yourself. And you hate it. “Has anyone come to see me?”
The doctor’s eyes say more than his words ever could, but he responds all the same. “Not in a while,” he admits.
You close your eyes, open them again. “What’s a while?”
“About five months. But you have to understand,” he goes on quickly, “that you didn’t know that anyone was here. We didn’t think you’d ever be fully cognizant again, Mr. Michaels. It’s certainly not because you aren’t cared for. From what I’ve seen of your friends, they care for you very deeply.”
For a few long moments, you don’t reply. What can you possibly say to that? Somewhere inside, your logical brain is still awake, still ticking, still making you understand in some very basic way what the doctor is saying. If what he is saying is true – and why wouldn’t it be? -- then Rikki and the others had every reason to not bother coming to visit. It would have been like sitting in a room with the corpse of someone you once had been very close to.
“So you’re telling me that I’ve been catatonic for months,” you say flatly.
The doctor shifts his weight uncomfortably. “I’m sorry that I’m not better prepared to answer your questions…” he begins.
“But you weren’t expecting to ever have to,” you finish for him.
He looks at you for a moment. “Well, yes,” he says finally.
You clear your throat. “When can I go home?”
The doctor helplessly runs a hand through his hair. “I’m really not prepared to answer a question like that, Mr. Michaels. You’ve been in a state of complete catatonia for nearly six months now, and even before that you were strongly delusional,” the doctor says. “There are a lot of things that we have to consider before making any definite plans about a course of treatment.”
You slowly pull yourself upright again, suddenly tired right down to your very core. “What if I don’t want a course of treatment?” you ask. “What if I just get up and leave?” You realize that you sound more confrontational than you probably should; you know this doctor is just a messenger and shouldn’t be held accountable for whatever the fuck has happened to you, but all you want in the world is to just get out of here and start looking for some answers.
The doctor straightens up fully and favors you with a solemn look. “Mr. Michaels,” he begins, sounding strained. “You’ve been here for eight months in a state that left you completely out of touch with the real world. I can’t even begin to imagine how it feels to learn something like this, and it pains me to have to add insult to injury, but you haven’t been capable of making decisions regarding personal hygiene, much less personal welfare.” He swallows. “If you make an attempt to leave, legally, our staff has the right to see to it that you don’t.”
Of everything the doctor said to you, the part that sticks out most is ‘completely out of touch with the real world.’ You almost want to laugh at him. Nothing about your life has ever had much to do with the real world. That much you remember. In the real world, the normal world, people just didn’t go around acting like a rockstar. It didn’t work that way. But that wasn’t your world. It never had been. That’s why you had always been able to get away with… Another picture of Rikki flashes in front of your eyes and you have to swallow hard to keep your stomach from turning. In the back of your mind a little voice tells you that you shouldn’t be bothered by the fact that your best friend hasn’t been to see you in five months. Instead, you should be grateful he ever visited you at all. And you know that little voice is right. Things had not been fine the last you could remember. In fact, most of what you could remember was miles away from being fine.
“Don’t worry,” you finally say, looking intently at the doctor. “I won’t try to bust out of here.” You want to add that you aren’t even sure where ‘here’ is or if you have anywhere at all to go. But you don’t. You can’t.
“That’s good to hear, Mr. Michaels. I was hoping you’d say that.” He pauses, looking down at the clipboard in his hands and then back up at you. Something tells you that he wants to say something but isn’t quite sure how to do it. You idly wonder how this man ever became a doctor. Aren’t they supposed to be bossy and take charge of everything? This guy seems utterly hesitant to you. It’s becoming more than just unnerving.
“You’re looking at me like I’m on my death bed or something,” you finally say. “I’m not, right? If you have something to say to me, just say it.”
Again the doctor sighs. It seems to be becoming a habit of his. “Would you like me to try and get ahold of some of your friends, Mr. Michaels?”
You close your eyes tightly for a moment and then open them. “No,” you say. Then, “I don’t know. I have to… think about things.”
“I understand that,” the doctor begins.
Before he can say anything else, before he can make another train wreck out of whatever he’s trying to say, you speak again. “Actually,” you say, sitting up, “I’d like to take a shower. Put on some different clothes. You know?”
The doctor clears his throat. “Yes, yes, of course,” he says. “Everything you need is right in the bathroom off of your room. I’ll have someone bring you some fresh clothes.”
“Thank you,” you say, suddenly aware of how tired you sound. Suddenly you have a thought. “What… what day is it?”
The doctor favors you with a sad smile. “It’s Wednesday,” he says. “June twelfth.”
“Two thousand and two,” you say dismally.
“Yes, Mr. Michaels.” He is quiet for a minute and looks troubled when he begins to speak again. “There’s just one more thing, and then I’ll let you get yourself cleaned up. I understand your hesitancy about wanting to contact anyone just yet, but, given the extreme nature of your condition, someone had to be appointed to make your medical decisions for you.”
You feel as though your lungs have just collapsed. You close your eyes and say, “Rikki,” without opening them.
“Yes. Mr., ah, Mr. Rockett. He’ll have to be notified immediately.”
~*~
The phone rings shrilly just inches from your head. But you don’t reach out to answer it. You’re a bit busy for that. If it’s important, whoever they are, they will call back. After the tenth ring, or maybe the twelfth, you aren’t really counting, Bobby looks up at you through hooded eyes and smirks. He pulls away from you, licking at his lips. “Maybe you should get that, Rikki.”
You sigh, burying your head in the pillow beneath you. Things had just been getting good, dammit. But you know that Bobby is right. Putting on your best happy face you regain control of your heavy breathing and pick up the phone. “Hello?”
“Mr. Rockett?”
“Yeah, this is he. Who is this?” The voice is unfamiliar to you. If it’s some stupid telemarketer you’re going to be highly pissed off.
“Mr. Rockett, this is Dr. McDaniels from Riverview Medical Hospital. I’m calling about…”
Before the doctor can finish you have shot straight up in the bed, pushing Bobby fully away from you. Bobby glances at you, seemingly confused. You don’t look him in the eye. “Has something happened to Bret?”
“Well, technically, yes. Something has happened to Mr. Michaels. He has awakened.”
For a moment you are completely awestruck. You try to think of something, of anything else this man could have possibly said that would rattle you anywhere near this much, but you come up with nothing. He could have told you that you were going to spontaneously morph into a chicken and it wouldn’t be so jarring. “Excuse me?” you manage finally, and you half-notice Bobby’s concerned expression.
“I realize this must come as quite a shock to you,” the doctor goes on. “I admit, it comes as one to me and my colleagues.”
“You said… I mean, we were told that would never happen,” you say, barely noticing the almost strangled tone of your voice.
“Yes, Mr. Rockett, I know. We didn’t believe that it ever would. Something like this happens in only the rarest cases, and this is the first I’ve seen it,” Dr. McDaniels says. “Since you have medical durable power of attorney, we’ll need you in order to create a treatment plan for Mr. Michaels.”
You close your eyes and exhale slowly. What the fuck are you supposed to do with this? A treatment plan? You’re a drummer, not a fucking psychiatrist. “Yes, thank you, I understand,” is all you can think of to say.
“We’ll need you to come into the hospital as soon as possible,” he replies.
“Yes, of course,” you say. “Bob and I can be there today.”
“Er, Mr. Rockett,” the doctor says, sounding troubled. “Mr. Michaels has expressed that he doesn’t wish to see anyone except you just yet.”
Your stomach tightens and does a somersault all at the same time. You can’t help but wonder if Bret honestly believes that things are the same now as when he was committed eight months ago. He must, though. Why else would he refuse to see anyone but you? You don’t need to see Bret to know. Even after all this time he is still trying to cling to the power he had over you. But he can’t do that anymore. You won’t let him. But now is not the time to put up a fight, either. “Okay, Dr. McDaniels. I will be there as soon as I can.” You hang up the phone before saying goodbye.
“What’s going on?” Bobby is sitting on his knees at the end of the bed, still as naked as you are. But his face is pained.
“It’s Bret,” you manage to tell him. No other words come to you right then. You’re still in shock yourself. You’re not sure you can explain it to anyone else. Not even Bobby.
“I gathered that,” Bobby replies. “He’s not…” he pauses, looks away. “He’s not dead, is he?”
“No,” you shake your head, standing up and pulling on the jeans that you had tossed haphazardly on the floor near the bed just minutes earlier. “He woke up. I guess I have to go down there now and…”
“He woke up?” Bobby interrupts you, standing up as well and getting dressed. “I thought they said that wasn’t possible. What happened?”
You shrug. “I don’t know. I just know that I have to go down there and talk to them about…”
“I’ll come with you.”
You look up at him and shake your head slowly. “No, I’m sorry. You won’t.”
The top button of his jeans undone, Bobby sits back down heavily on to the bed. “What do you mean?”
“I mean what I said. You’re not coming. Bret doesn’t want to see anyone but me. I’m sorry.”
“Right,” Bobby mumbles, but you can hear the sarcasm in his voice. “I’m sure you are.” He looks away from you then, staring at some invisible mark on the carpet. “And it begins.”
You know exactly what he’s talking about but that doesn’t make it any easier to hear. “What are you talking about?” you demand.
Bobby sighs, runs a hand through his hair. “You know what I’m talking about,” he says tiredly.
“Bob, look at me,” you say, and he does, his eyes sad. “Think about what you just said. Do you really think he could just suddenly come back into reality all this time later, after everything that’s happened since, and just take over again? Do you really think I’d let that happen?”
He looks at you for a long moment before looking away. “No,” he mumbles, his voice low. “I guess not.”
You button your jeans and grab Bobby’s t-shirt from the floor, putting it on quickly. “Of course I wouldn’t,” you say hurriedly. “Things aren’t like that anymore. They’re not going to be like that again.” It’s easy to say this to Bobby, but you can’t help but wonder if you’ll be able to say it to Bret.
“It’s nearly a two-hour drive out there,” Bobby points out. “You’ll be gone all day.”
You favor him with a pained expression. “I know,” you say quietly. “I’m sorry, Bob, there’s really nothing I can do. I have to—“
“I know,” he interjects. “It’s okay.” His voice tells you plainly that it isn’t.
“Bobby,” you begin earnestly, taking his hand and pulling him to his feet so he’s standing in front of you. “I love you, okay? You know that. I know that. It’s all that matters. A lot has happened since we put Bret in that place. Things are different now. You and me, we’re fine. And we’re going to stay fine. You understand me?”
Bobby nods, biting hesitantly at his bottom lip. You smile at him and shake your head.
“I love you, Bob. I’ll be back tonight.”
“I love you, too,” he replies. And you don’t doubt in the least that he means it. That he has always meant it. You lean in and give him a quick kiss before turning to leave the room.
To be completely honest, you have to admit to yourself that going to see Bret really does worry you. Hell, it more than worries you. It scares the shit out of you. Bret, even before the two of you had become lovers, had always had a certain amount of control over you. It had always been hard, if not damn near impossible, for you to tell him no. And while it is easy to say that things will be different now, you know that there is no real reason why you should believe that. Bret has never been one to change his ways. And you honestly doubt that eight months in a mental institution will have done much to remedy that. Bret Michaels was and is Bret Michaels. It is going to be up to you to make sure that things don’t revert back to their old ways. As you get into your car and start the ignition, you idly wonder if you can be that strong.
It takes only a few minutes of driving to get to the highway that will take you almost all the way to the hospital where Bret has been staying, and already you can feel your heart rate increasing, your thoughts racing. You are completely unprepared for this, because you were told in no uncertain terms that there was no reason to ever prepare for it. Bret was gone. Bret was never coming back.
Except now he is back, and there is going to be an awful lot of explaining to do, and you can’t imagine he’s in a terribly good mood after finding out that he’s been catatonic for months on end.
“How the fuck are you going to handle this one, Rockett,” you mutter to yourself, lighting a cigarette. You take a long drag and exhale slowly, watching the smoke pass in front of your eyes.
“Okay, think,” you say aloud, not particularly caring that talking to yourself is a supposed sign of insanity. “He hasn’t even been really conscious in over a half a year. He’s going to have a lot of confusion to sort through before he tries to be his old self again.”
Only you don’t think you really believe that last bit. Bret’s always been Bret and you’re not sure if even this can change that, and besides, he was always worse when he felt cornered. And how much more cornered could someone feel than this?, you wonder.
And then suddenly another emotion starts creeping in around the edges. Guilt.
The fact of the matter is, Bret’s your best friend, he’s more than that, and he’s been in a bad way – a real bad way – for a long time now, and maybe you could have done more but you didn’t, and now instead of trying to think of how you’re going to help him through this, you’re wondering how you’re going to keep up the tough guy routine.
You realize that for the past several months, you’ve been treating this as though Bret was dead. There had been no practical reason for you to treat the situation any other way. Well, besides the fact that he wasn’t dead. But he had been dead to you. The doctor had assured you of that. And acting as though Bret was dead had been the only way for you to really cope with all of it. Having a dead best friend was a hell of a lot easier than having an insane best friend in a catatonic state in some mental hospital. At least it was for you. You wonder if that makes you a bad person.
Your mind flicks back to how you’re going to put up a good front for Bret. The answer is quite simple. You aren’t. There’s no point in even trying to fool him into thinking that everything is fine and normal and as it always has been. You can’t lie to Bret. You’ve never been able to do that. Except when it comes to Bobby. For months you hid your relationship with Bobby from Bret, afraid of what Bret would do to you if he had found out. He had found out and, as the guilt sweeps back in and surrounds you, you remember how that had really been the last straw. That had been what set Bret off all those months ago. He hadn't been the same since. Bobby may have been the one who made the final decision to check Bret in to the institution, but you had been the one who sent him there.
Your grip on the steering wheel tightens and you take another drag from your cigarette as you feel the moisture begin to pool in the corner of your eyes. You had loved Bret. Part of you probably still did. You had never had any intention of hurting him. But that was what you had done. Your betrayal had sent Bret over the edge. And, at the time, you hadn’t even noticed. Sometimes you still find yourself wondering why you hadn’t seen the signs. Why you hadn’t noticed Bret talking to himself. Why you hadn’t been able to stop him from falling apart.
“Dammit, Rockett,” you say aloud, pounding the steering wheel with one fist. “That doesn’t matter now.” And really, it doesn’t. What matters is that Bret is awake. And you have to face him today. And hope that Bret finding out that you and Bobby are still very much together doesn’t send him right back into his destructive ways. High hopes. You have a sick feeling in your stomach that it simply won’t be that easy.
~*~
The face in the mirror looks unfamiliar, and your next thought is that it probably should. It’s something you haven’t seen in over half a year.
You frown at your reflection, taking in the sight of your pale, gaunt cheeks, your wet hair, your eyes, the blue now dulled and almost grey. The thought passes through your mind that you should actually put effort into this, dry your hair, try to look good, but it’s fleeting. You haven’t the supplies nor the energy.
With a sigh, you exit the bathroom and begin making the bed sloppily, but give up after a minute and sit down heavily. There’s no point in performing mindless tasks; nothing’s going to clear your mind.
The door opens and the doctor comes in timidly. “Mr. Michaels… um, Mr. Rockett has just arrived. I thought maybe you’d like to talk to him alone before I speak with him.”
You stand up quickly, absentmindedly straightening your shirt, and clear your throat. “Yes. Thank you,” you say mechanically, and it feels like your entire digestive system has just collapsed.
The doctor nods and exits the room, and seconds later you see him, you see Rikki and suddenly there’s a sharp pain in the center of your chest and you inhale sharply.
He doesn’t seem to notice. He looks good, you think. Great, even. He’s a sight for sore eyes even if your eyes aren’t the most painful part right now.
“Hey,” Rikki says timidly.
And before you can think of what to say, before you can think anything at all, you are closing the distance between the two of you and wrapping your arms around him. You feel the muscles in his back tense under your hands, almost as if he is trying to pull away. But he doesn’t. He just stands there stiffly, his arms at his side. You take a step back, looking at him with surprise in your eyes.
“I’ve been dead to the world for eight months and I can’t even get a hug from my best friend? Aren’t you happy to see me, Rikki?”
Rikki swallows so hard that you can see it, hear it in the otherwise silence of the room. A dull ache begins in your chest and your stomach knots. “Of course I’m happy, Bret.” Somehow you just don’t believe him. You bite down hard on the inside of your cheek. “Just surprised. All of the doctors said you wouldn’t wake up again.”
Anger courses through you suddenly in waves that you can’t seem to stop. And the look in Rikki’s eyes tells you that he can see it. Rikki has always been able to read you well. “Is that why you just left me here? Easier to forget if you don’t have to see me, right?”
“I came to see you,” Rikki replies, his voice a touch softer, smoother, than when he had spoken before. Submissive, perhaps? “You didn’t know I was here, Bret. There was no point. Besides, it was easier for Bobby and I…” he trails off quickly, staring intently at the floor beneath him.
Unable to look at Rikki without clenching your hands into tight fists, you turn away. You hadn’t expected this anger burning in your veins like good whiskey. Part of you isn’t even sure what you’re angry about. It doesn’t make it any easier to stop. “How is Bobby?”
Behind you, Rikki clears his throat. “Bob’s doing well,” he says, and this time you’re sure you hear the hesitance in his tone. You smile, but only for a moment.
You whirl back around more vehemently than you mean to and look at him. He’s still looking at the floor, glancing up at you every few seconds before looking down again. “That’s good to hear,” you say, and the harshness in your voice sounds foreign. “And CC?”
“We haven’t heard from him in a while,” Rikki replies, relaxing just slightly. “I guess he’s okay.” He shifts his weight uncomfortably, coughs. “And Smoothie’s doing well,” he goes on, talking fast now. “We… I see him, you know, sometimes. And Lori and Janna—“
“What about you?” you interrupt.
“What about me?” he says, looking at you quizzically.
“How are you?”
Rikki bites his lip. “I’m… you know, okay,” he says quietly.
Something about the sound of his voice relaxes you and you can feel your sudden surge of anger ebbing away. “Are you really?” you ask softly.
He looks at you, clearly surprised at the way you’re talking. “Yeah. I mean… it’s been hard, but yeah, Bret, I’m okay.”
“Rikki,” you begin, not sure how to proceed, but you have to know. “You and Bobby… you’re not…”
“Together?” he barely whispers, suddenly unable to look you in the eye. That dull ache in your chest returns.
“Yeah,” you reply, a hint of laughter in your voice. You don’t know why it’s there but you’re also not sure how to stop it. Somehow just the idea of the two of them being together threatens to send you into a fit of giggles. You manage to control yourself. How silly. Of course they aren’t together. Rikki has always been in love with you. He’s proven that time and time again. A flash of him on his knees in front of you invades your mind. You push it away. Not because you want to but because you know it is the right thing to do.
“Bret,” Rikki says softly, walking slowly towards the one window in your room. He sounds utterly tortured. You realize that you’ve missed hearing his voice sound like that. Sad, but true. He is quiet for several long moments, just gazing out the window at the sunny California afternoon. When he does finally speak again he doesn’t turn around to look at you. “How much do you remember of what happened before you ended up here?”
You shrug even though he doesn’t see you. Only a few feet separate the two of you but you somehow don’t have the strength to close the distance. Instead, you take a seat on the bed, running a hand through your hair. “Everything is kind of foggy after the night I found out you were cheating on me with Bobby.”
You see Rikki’s shoulders tighten as he shakes his head, still not looking at you. “You became a different person, Bret. The things you did to me after that night…you made it difficult to differentiate between the pleasure and the pain. I put up with it because I loved you. But you were terrible to me. More than that, you were scary. You started talking to yourself. And to people who weren’t there. That’s why I stopped seeing you after the tour ended. I couldn’t handle you acting like that. And you…the night Bobby and I put you in here…I hadn’t seen you in weeks. You’d really lost it, Bret…”
“Thanks for the recap,” you interrupt him. “You going to answer my question or not?”
Rikki turns and you can see the tears threatening to spill from his eyes. “It’s been a long time, Bret. And a lot has happened. I’ve realized a lot of things. About you and myself and what we were. What I became and what I did to Bobby. I can’t…won’t…go back to that. Yes, Bobby and I together. And we’re happy. And trust me, I’m happy that you’re alive and at least semi-coherent. But you can’t change what has happened. I’m sorry, Bret.”
“Sorry?” you chuckle. “Jesus, some things never change.” You look down at the bedspread in an effort to conceal the pain you’re sure is showing on your face.
“If I may be so bold, Bret, everything has changed,” Rikki says then. “Just because you weren’t a part of the last several months doesn’t mean they didn’t happen.”
“I think I know that better than you do,” you say bitterly, not caring that your tone is plainly more sad than it is angry.
“Look, Bret,” Rikki falters. “Bobby and I…”
“Bobby and you what?” you demand, looking back up at him. “Don’t you feel just the least bit cheap, Rikki?”
The look on his face is one of genuine surprise. “What do you mean?” he asks, his voice barely above a whisper.
“You know damn well what I mean,” you growl, forcing anger where you don’t feel any. “The only reason you’re where you are now is because I lost my fucking mind.”
“Bret,” Rikki says, but you can hear the uncertainty in his voice. “Bobby and I… I mean, we…”
“Stutter, stutter,” you say, waving a hand at him dismissively. “Are you really so naïve?”
“What are you talking about,” he asks flatly.
“Do you really think his dick wasn’t in my mouth the night that I walked in on you two?” you say, your voice dripping with ice. Rikki’s face crumbles.
“What?”
“You honestly didn’t know,” you laugh, feeling a sense of power that you haven’t had in almost a year. “How tragic. Dear, innocent Rikki. Always the last to know.”
“You’re just being vindictive,” he spits out, but the sadness in his eyes betrays him. “I don’t believe a word you’re saying Bret. Jesus, and to think I actually let myself believe that the past eight months would have changed you. You’re the exact same person…”
“That you were in love with when they locked me up in this damn place? Yeah, I’m still that person, Rikki.” You know that it’s a lie, or at least a partial one. You’ve lost too much time to be the same person you were when you arrived here. But Rikki doesn’t have to know that. You stalk over to him quickly and grab hold of his shirt before he can step away. You’re not as strong as you once were but you are still able to hold him in place. You lift the hem of his shirt quickly, revealing a small scar low on his stomach. You trace one finger across the scar. “I’m still the only man that can give you one of those and make you want to come from it.”
Rikki pulls away from you abruptly, shoving you a few inches back from him. “But I’m not the same man anymore, Bret. I’m with Bobby and…” his voice wavers just slightly before he can hide it. “And I love him.”
“His cock does taste good,” you continue to chide him. “But I didn’t think it’d be enough to make you fall in love with him.”
“I don’t believe…”
“I know, I know. Rikki the bitch doesn’t believe me. But it’s the truth. Ask Bobby. Ask him why it took him so long to get back to your room that night, Rikki. You sent him to my room to explain things but that wasn’t what happened in there. Deny it all you want. I can see it in your eyes. Part of you, the rational part, knows that what I’m telling you is right.”
He looks at you dumbly for a moment, obviously completely unsure of himself. “So what,” he says finally, but his tone betrays him. “Even if that is the truth, that was a long time ago, Bret.”
You raise an eyebrow at him, trying on your trademark smirk. “Granted,” you agree. “But if I’m no different, and you certainly don’t seem much different…” You trail off, staring your point into his eyes.
Rikki stares at you for a moment longer before you can see him deflate entirely. His shoulders sag and he exhales. “I don’t know what to say,” he says quietly. “I’ve got nothing.” He chuckles dryly. “I’m not prepared for this. I could never have been prepared for this. You… you were dead.”
“Dead,” you repeat, just to see how the word feels crossing your lips. “Is that what it was like?”
“Yes,” he replies quietly. “I came here to see you and it was like a wax figure, Bret. You just stared into space. You didn’t talk. You didn’t move. The last time I saw you here it might as well have been your funeral.”
Suddenly it feels like a thousand volts of electricity are hammering through your brain all at once, but the sensation is gone as quickly as it started. You must have twitched noticeably, because when you look back up at Rikki, he looks concerned.
“Are you all right?” he asks.
“I… I don’t know,” you reply. Suddenly all of the fury you had been able to produce just moments ago is gone as you try to figure out what the hell has just flashed across your mind. “Funeral,” you mutter to yourself.
“What did you say?” Rikki questions, his voice laced with worry now. You look up at him but he seems very far away. As if you’re looking at him through some sort of warped tunnel.
“Funeral,” you repeat. The image of Rikki’s mother crying over a coffin blinks in an eerie red color behind the back of your eyes. You force yourself to sit back down on the bed. “Your funeral.”
“Bret, what the fuck are you talking about?” Rikki moves to your side, touching your arm hesitantly.
“I see your funeral. I was there. We were all…” you pause and look up at him, eyes wide with fear. “You killed yourself. You killed yourself because me and Bobby…” It all comes rushing back to you. Snippets of everything that happened after that first encounter with Bobby fly into your mind. But how is that possible? How is Rikki sitting here in front of you? Without really realizing it you start to rock back and forth and pull on fistfuls of your hair.
“Bret, no, come on,” Rikki insists, shaking you lightly. “I didn’t kill myself. I’m right here. I’m not dead. Fuck, you are not going to do this to me again, Michaels. You understand me? I won’t let you lose your fucking mind this time.”
You don’t respond. Too many images are coming at you all at once. You just sit there and continue to rock.
~*~
For a moment, you just look down at him, grateful that he doesn’t seem to notice the expression on your face, which you’re sure is one of abject horror. The only thought in your head is that your best friend has just woken up from a six-month virtual coma and all it has taken to send him straight back into his mental hell was one word from your mouth.
And then some higher power takes over and you force yourself into action, squatting down in front of him and taking his face in your hands. The smoothness of his freshly-shaven cheeks is hot against your palms and you close your eyes for just a second, imagining this sensation under very different circumstances, and then open them again. “Bret,” you say, trying to keep your tone gentle but firm. “Come on, man. Come back to me.”
He looks up at you, and for a second you think his eyes have already reverted back to that eerie glazed-over state that they were in the last time you saw him, but you realize he just looks confused and scared. “I don’t understand, Rikki,” he says. “You… I wasn’t the one that died, you were.”
“Bro, neither one of us died,” you say desperately. “I’m telling you, we’re both very much alive. Okay? I promise.”
Before you can say anything else, the door to the room flies open and two orderlies come in. One of them grabs your arm and jerks you away from Bret while the other seems to instantaneously have a hypodermic needle pushed into the singer’s upper arm. It is only seconds after this that Bret visibly relaxes, not protesting as the orderlies gently ease him into a supine position.
It is only when you turn, still stunned, to watch the orderlies leave that you notice the doctor standing behind you, and you jump slightly.
“I’m sorry that you had to see that,” Dr. McDaniels says, and sighs. “However, I can’t say that you won’t see it again.”
You run a hand through your hair. “What’s wrong with him?”
The doctor takes a deep breath. “Well, we haven’t made an official diagnosis yet, seeing as obviously we’ve been unable to speak with Mr. Michaels, but if I was going to make an educated guess, I would say that your friend is suffering from schizophrenia.” He swallows, looking nervous. “There are two types of schizophrenia. The first is the paranoid type, in which the patient suffers from delusions and hallucinations.”
“Which would explain why he thinks…” You bite back ‘I’m dead’. “That things happened that didn’t,” you finish carefully.
The doctor nods. “Yes, precisely. And then there’s the catatonic type, a symptom of which is catalepsy, that is, a state of trance in which a person loses sensation and consciousness.”
You frown. “You mean like Bret’s been all this time?”
“Well, yes,” the doctor says, “although I’ve never seen an episode last nearly so long, and it’s not often that we see the two in conjunction with each other like this.” He pauses. “I know this all must sound terribly confusing, and I have to admit that my colleagues and I are rather baffled by this case ourselves.”
“Well, what are you going to do? I mean, what happens now?” you ask.
Dr. McDaniels looks over your shoulder at Bret lying quietly in his bed. “Well, Mr. Rockett,” he turns his eyes back to your face. “That really has a lot to do with you and what you would like to see done with your friend.”
“Me?” you question. Your voice is meek but you don’t mind. This is not the kind of job you signed up for. “Why do I have anything to do with this?”
“You have power of attorney for him, Mr. Rockett. If I don’t believe Mr. Michaels is of sound enough mind to make medical decisions for himself, the responsibility falls to you to make them. And, as I’m sure you’re aware of, I do not in any way think your friend is of sound mind.”
“But I don’t know anything about this disease. Hell, I don’t know anything about anything,” you lament, running a hand through your hair and wishing for a cigarette. Yep, you were definitely in over your head this time. “How am I supposed to…”
“You won’t be making any decisions on your own,” the doctor assures you. “That’s what I’m here for. But I need your consent before I can do much of anything. Someone should have told you all of this before you agreed to become responsible for your friend’s medical needs.”
Your face goes blank and for the first time in eight months, you think back to the night you signed the papers giving you this kind of power over Bret. It hadn’t been your idea. When the doctors in the emergency room had told you that Bret would need someone to make decisions for him, you had done the first thing that came to mind. You had called his parents.
The phone had just kept ringing, over and
over until you were about to give up, until finally you heard the reassuring
click that meant that someone had picked up on the other end. “Hello?” came the voice of Bret’s
mother. She sounded far away, tired,
nervous.
“Hi, Marjorie. It’s Rikki.
Listen, I’m sorry to call you so late.”
For a moment, she was quiet, and you
felt a horrible surge of anxiety swell up in your chest, but then you heard her
exhale. “Yes, Rikki. What can I do for you?”
You didn’t reply right away. Something about Marjorie’s tone had made
your chest hurt, and more than that, now that you had her on the phone, what
the hell did you think you were going to say?
You closed your eyes, wishing that you were anywhere but there, anywhere
but standing in the admissions area of a mental hospital talking on a cell
phone after midnight.
“Are you still there?” Marjorie
asked then.
“Yes. I am. I’m sorry,” you
said, fumbling for words. “It’s
just…Marjorie, I’m not sure how to tell you this.”
“Is Bret hurt?”
You were surprised at the way she’d
asked the question so bluntly. It
wasn’t like her at all.
“No,” you’d said carefully. “Bret’s not hurt. Not physically, anyway.”
And then you’d just spilled it, as much of the story as you could tell,
as much as you could remember, the words all falling out on top of each other,
careful to avoid any mention of the lurid details.
Bret’s mother had been silent for
what felt like hours after you had finished explaining. It had really been only about a minute. But the harsh pause was terrifying to you
for reasons you hadn’t really been able to put your finger on. And then she had said it. “I’ve been informed about what has been
going on with you and Bret on the tour, Rikki.”
You had quickly tried to interrupt
her, to explain, to say anything. She
hadn’t let you.
“I want you to know that, as much as
I love both of you, I do not approve.
You’ve always been like another son to me, Rikki. We made you a part of this family. But now, I’m sorry, this has just gone too
far. I will not stand by and watch as
you and my son live in sin like this. I
haven’t spoken to Bret in weeks. I do
not intend to start now. If you care so
much about Bret, you can take care of him.
Or call his father. Wally has
always been an asshole. Don’t ever call
me again, Rikki. I want no contact with
either of you.”
She had hung up without you ever getting a word in edgewise. Your world shattered around you as you stared at the phone receiver in your hand and wondered whether or not you should try Bret’s father. You had, eventually. But the outcome had been no different. Wally had been even less receptive to the idea. How had things come to this? Not only had you had the capability to drive Bret literally insane, but you had lost him his family as well. At that point you had known. The least you could do was take care of his medical needs for him. Even if you couldn’t trust yourself around him, he could still use your help.
You sigh and look back up at the doctor, who is staring at you with an expression of concern and expectancy. “I’ll do whatever I need to do,” you say, defeated. “I just… I mean, I really have no idea…”
“It’s okay, Mr. Rockett,” he interrupts. “It’s our job to make the diagnosis and take care of everything from a medical standpoint. All you have to do is keep the best interests of your friend in mind.”
“Right, which you can always trust rock stars to do,” you say dryly.
Dr. McDaniels does not look amused. “For now, all I’ll need you to do is sign a few papers,” he says. “Nothing too detailed, just releases giving us permission to further treat Mr. Michaels, things like that.”
You nod. “All right. Sure.” You pause. “Look, you’re not going to do anything, you know, weird to him, right? All of my information on mental hospitals comes from bad seventies movies.”
Finally the doctor smiles slightly. “If you’re worried about things like electro-convulsive therapy and the like, then relax. That sort of antiquated practice is rarely used, and it’s not appropriate to the condition of your friend,” he says. “And besides, we won’t do anything without your permission.”
You relax slightly. “I just don’t want to see him hurt any more than he already has been.”
“We’re not here to hurt him, Mr. Rockett. We’re here to help Mr. Michaels get better.”
“Will he get better?” you ask then, earnest as you’ve ever been. “Will he ever be the Bret he used to be before all of this happened?”
“I’ll be honest with you,” the doctor says, putting his hand on your shoulder in some gesture you assume is supposed to be comfort. “We aren’t really sure right now. We haven’t been able to see the extent of his mental illness yet. But, if with counseling we can get his hallucinations under control, then Mr. Michaels should be able to live a fairly normal life. He will have to take antipsychotic medication for the rest of his life, and we will most likely recommend that he remain in therapy, but I’d say that’s a small price to pay for getting his life back.”
You want to agree but you can’t help but wonder if Bret would. He’d never been one to take directions. He rarely even listened to his doctor when it came to his diabetes. He liked to be in control. You can only imagine that Bret wouldn’t be very pleased with having a psychiatrist telling him what he should and shouldn’t do to stay healthy. It just wasn’t in Bret’s personality to follow orders. You turn to look at his sedated form. That blank look that had been in his eyes all those months ago has returned. You might as well not even be in the room. You want so badly to help him but part of you is still unsure of what you can really do. None of this is going to be easy. For anyone. And you have a sinking feeling in your stomach that you don’t even have the first idea how bad it really might get. Sighing, you step away from the doctor and towards the door. You don’t want to be in the room with Bret’s pseudo-lifeless form any longer.
“Let’s go to your office,” you say. “I can sign all the papers in there.”
~*~
You’ve been awake for a while now, but the heavy effects of the sedative have kept you lying in bed, staring dismally at the oddly patterned carpet. And besides, it’s not as if you have any particular reason to get up. What are you going to get up and do? You might as well be on a leash chaining you to this one dismal room. And something about finding out you’ve just been time warped months into what should be the future just takes all the energy right out of you.
The door to your room swings open and you watch Rikki’s feet make their way across the room. You still don’t bother to move.
“Are you awake?” Rikki asks timidly.
You roll your head back onto the pillow just enough to look up at him. “Yeah,” you say flatly. “Where were you?”
“I was just in Dr. McDaniels’ office,” he replies.
“Discussing my shock therapy?” you say dryly. It doesn’t come out as the joke you’d meant it to.
“Actually, I specifically made sure that wouldn’t be happening,” Rikki says, and you can see that he’s making an equally sorry attempt at being lighthearted.
“Thoughtful of you, but aren’t you going to be late getting home to the wifey?” As you speak these last words, you look away.
“You don’t have to be so cruel, Bret,” Rikki tells you quietly. He doesn’t step away from the bed but he also doesn’t move any closer. Something inside of you wishes that he would. “Bobby hasn’t done anything to you. I don’t understand why you dislike him so much.”
“He has what I want,” you state simply. And it’s the truth.
“How can you blame me? I already told you, it was like you were dead…”
“He had you long before you ever walked away from me, Rikki. After everything I did for you. Everything I gave you, it still wasn’t enough. You went to Bobby anyway. And he’s the one that put me in this place. I don’t have to like him anymore, Rikki. I don’t think that’s in the rule books.”
You sense movement and look up. You’re surprised to find Rikki moving towards you. He sits down on the edge of your bed, almost painfully careful not to touch you. But his eyes lock with yours. “Bobby didn’t put you in here all by himself, Bret. I helped him make the decision. And as for him having me…” you hear his voice come dangerously close to breaking and he looks away. You can’t help but smile. Even now, so very little has changed. You still hold Rikki in the palm of your hand. You can feel it.
He stands up quickly, not finishing his train of thought. “I need to get home.”
“Will you be back?” you ask him, not really thinking about it. You don’t think the need in your voice is quite as obvious as it should be. You’re glad for that.
Rikki freezes in place, not even turning to look back at you over his shoulder. “Do you want me to come back?”
“If Bobby will let you out of his sight long enough. Or are you under his complete control?”
That angers him. “Fuck you, Bret. It’s not like that. It’s better.” Without another glance in your direction he leaves the room.
For a few long moments, you just lie there, staring at the place where Rikki had just been standing. He has every reason to walk out on you, and yet actually seeing him do it is stupefying. You don’t doubt that he’ll come back, not really, and it doesn’t even have anything to do with your old relationship. Rikki has always been your friend, and that alone would bring him back. He didn’t have the heart not to.
But that didn’t make it feel any better to see him leave. And it doesn’t make it feel any better to know that the situation could have gone a lot better had you just stopped being an asshole for five minutes.
With an exaggerated sigh, you pull yourself out of bed and shuffle towards the door. Idly you wonder if you’ve ever been anywhere in the hospital besides when they’d first brought you in. You doubted it.
Upon opening the door, you see that your room is the last doorway in a long hallway carpeted with the same bizarre pattern that you have just spent an hour staring at. Frowning to yourself, you continue walking slowly down the hallway, past all of the closed grey doors until you find yourself in a large room with couches and plush chairs everywhere. It could almost be a hotel lobby if it weren’t for the long counter along one wall that separates the room from the nurse’s station.
Suddenly you feel a tap on your shoulder and you jump. You turn around and find that the voice belongs to whom, judging from the white uniform pants she’s wearing, you assume is a nurse.
“Nice to see you up and about,” she says brightly. The saccharine quality of her tone makes you cringe.
“Is there a phone somewhere around here that I can use?” you ask.
“Sure,” she says, pointing to a phone hanging on the wall a few feet from where you’re standing. “Local calls only, and there’s a five-minute time limit.”
You almost say something cocky, but you don’t have the energy. You mumble something resembling thanks and make your way over to the phone, picking it up and pressing the buttons mechanically. The feel of the phone against your ears seems foreign, and as an afterthought, you realize that you hadn’t held one in months.
On the third ring, you get an answer. “Hello?”
“Hi, Mom,” you say, leaning against the wall and closing your eyes. You are met with only silence at first. “Mom?” you say again. “Are you there?”
“Yes, Bret.” She clears her throat. “I’m here.” Her voice sounds strained and tired. You automatically wonder if something terrible has happened to your family in the last eight months. Your stomach flips.
“Mom, are you okay? You sound…”
“I told Rikki that I never wanted to speak to either of you again. Why are you calling me, Bret?”
The harshness in her tone is one of the most terrible sounds you have ever heard. You are shocked right down to the tips of your toes. Why on earth wouldn’t your own mother want to talk to you? “What…what do you mean?” you manage to stutter out through the tightness in your throat. You lick your lips, noticing for the first time how very dry they are.
“I made myself very clear to him, Bret. I do not approve of the way you two are living. I will not…”
“Mom,” you cut her off, anger pushing away the overwhelming sadness you feel. “What are you talking about? I’ve been in a fucking mental hospital for eight months. I just wanted to call and tell you that I’m okay and that…”
“I know where you have been, Bret. Maybe staying there will help you get your life straight. I certainly don’t want you here. You or that…that boyfriend…no…I will not say that…he is not…”
You realize quickly what your mother is rambling on about. Your heart shatters. “I’m not with Rikki, mom.” It’s nothing more than a whisper but you know that she hears you. She falls silent and you wait for her to say something. Instead you hear nothing but the dial tone.
You take the phone away from your ear and stare at it like you aren’t quite sure what it is or how you use it. As the first tear slips down your cheek you place the phone back on its base and lean forward until your forehead is touching the wall.
At first your mind is flooded with the barrage of questions that you’d expect at a time like this, not that you’ve ever quite experienced one; questions like, how the fuck did this happen? How did your mother know about this? What the hell do you do now?
But as soon as they enter your mind, they leave it unanswered. It really doesn’t matter how this happened, only that it did happen.
A moment later, you feel a tap on your shoulder and turn around slowly to see the same girl whom you had been speaking to a few minutes ago.
“That didn’t go so well, huh?” she asks, smiling like it’s going out of style.
You swallow. “No, not really,” you reply, not sure what else you’re supposed to say.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
You frown at her. Of course you don’t want to fucking talk about it, not with some perma-happy chick in white uniform pants. “No,” you say tiredly. “There’s really not anything to talk about.”
“Is there someone else you’d like to call?” she offers.
You shake your head. “No one else.”
She glances down at her watch and then looks back up at you, still smiling. “Well, you’ve still got about five minutes before you have to see Dr. Kinsington,” she says. “But why don’t I walk you down to her office now?”
“Who’s Dr. Kinsington?”
“She’s your new psychiatrist. Great lady. I’m sure you’ll like her a lot. She’s probably the most gifted doctor working here, but don’t tell anyone I told you that.” Again with that 100-watt smile. This nurse was pushing the limits of your patience with her happy-go-lucky attitude. And besides, did she just say psychiatrist?
“Psychiatrist? Who decided I needed to see a psychiatrist?” You do very little to hide the bitterness and anger in your voice. Why should you? You have every right at this moment to be angry with the world. At least you think so.
The nurse’s smile falls just slightly. “I’m sorry. I assumed that Dr. McDaniels had already discussed this with you. He and Rik…uhhh…Mr. Rockett, your friend that was here, worked out a treatment plan for you this afternoon. Dr. McDaniels thinks that with some therapy and the right amounts of medication you should be able to get out of here eventually.”
Of course, leave it to Rikki to sic some damn therapist on you. That was just like him. Always trying to be so damn philosophical. Yeah, Rikki Rockett and his psychobabble bullshit. How dare he? Who gave him the right to…you force that train of thought to end. If your mother really never wanted to see you again, that explained perfectly why Rikki was in charge of making decisions for you. You are frowning now and the nurse notices it.
“Mr. Michaels? Are you okay?”
You look away from her, tugging gently on a handful of your hair. “I’m fine.” You bite back the urge to say, psychiatrist or not, you will be getting out of this place. And you will. On that point you are very clear. You have already made up your mind.
~*~
You are lying on your back staring up at ceiling when you hear the front door’s slam telling you that Rikki has come home. You don’t have to look at the clock to guess that it’s probably almost eight o’clock by now, judging from the first shadows creeping up the walls. He has been gone for over six hours now, and although you’ve been waiting impatiently for him to get home all day, you fear what he’ll have to tell you after a day at the hospital.
A few seconds later, the bedroom door opens slowly and Rikki asks from the doorway if you’re awake. “Of course I’m awake,” you reply, still looking at the ceiling. “I’ve been lying here for hours waiting for you to get home.”
You hear him shut the door. “You’ve just been lying in bed all day?” he asks, his voice soft and timid.
“No,” you reply, sighing and turning just your head to look at him. “I had a late lunch and took a shower. Look, is it really my day we should be talking about?”
Rikki sits on the edge of the bed and leans his head back, closing his eyes. “You would not believe how fucking surreal that was,” he says. “It was like seeing someone rise from the dead.”
You pull yourself into a sitting position, leaning against the headboard and drawing your knees up to your chest. “Well, actually, it’s exactly like that,” you agree. For all intents and purposes, Bret had been dead. Something about Rikki’s tone makes the anger you’d felt all day ebb slightly. “Is he all right?” you ask, your voice softer now.
Rikki looks at you and laughs in a way that tells you he knows what he’s about to say isn’t funny. “I have no fucking idea how to answer that,” he replies. “I mean, he seems physically well, if that’s what you mean. I mean, besides the fact that he clearly hasn’t seen the sun in months.”
“That’s not what I mean,” you say quietly.
Rikki sighs. “I know. I don’t know, I mean, at first he seemed okay,” he says. “You know, if by ‘okay’ you mean his usual bitter, egocentric self.”
“But?” you ask him, knowing there is more to this story.
“But then…well…I told him that seeing him again was like seeing someone back from the dead and he just sort of lost it. Started talking about being at my funeral and how he wasn’t dead, I was. He said that I had killed myself. I don’t know what to say, Bob. It was so strange. It was like he had reverted right back to where he was when we put him in that place. Nothing that I said to him could snap him out of it.”
You sigh and sit up slowly, resting your back against the dark wood of the headboard on your bed. You want to reach out to Rikki but something stops you. You aren’t quite sure what. Maybe the fact that you know there is still a large part of Bret’s story that he doesn’t know. And you have always hoped that you wouldn’t have to tell him. But now you know that you have to. “I don’t know why, Rikki, but Bret has always thought you were dead. Well, not always…but…” you trail off, unsure of how to go on.
Rikki turns to you, a look of confusion marring his face. “What do you mean?”
You shake your head, biting nervously on your bottom lip. “About two weeks before we had him committed I went to Bret’s house. Just to, I don’t know…just to see him, I guess. I don’t really remember. But the place was trashed. And he was a mess. He just kept talking nonsense and crying and screaming and saying that it should have been him. All I could really get from him was that he thought you had slit your wrists. He was absolutely certain that you were dead. I couldn’t convince him otherwise.”
You watch as Rikki slowly clenches and unclenches his jaw. You know him well enough to realize that he is trying to push away his anger. His anger at you. You can’t really blame him for being mad. You should have told him all of this sooner. “You went to his house?” His voice is quiet. And the question from him surprises you. You had expected him to be more angry over the fact that you had kept this all to yourself.
“Yes.” You nod your head slowly, trying to gauge his reaction.
“What reason did you have to be there?” The anger is even more obvious now. And more confusing to you.
“I told you, I don’t really remember why I went over there. Maybe I just wanted to check up on him or something. I can’t recall.”
“Or maybe you just wanted to fuck him.”
Rikki’s voice washes over you like ice-cold water. You visibly flinch. “What the hell are you talking about? I didn’t go over there to fuck him. Why would you think that?”
Rikki looks away from you. “Don’t treat me like I’m an idiot, Bob.”
“Rikki, I have absolutely no fucking idea what you’re on about,” you say seriously.
Now he looks back at you, his expression one of icy anger, but you’re sure you can see something else behind his eyes. “And I quote, ‘do you really think his dick wasn’t in my mouth the night that I walked in on you two?’”
For a moment, it feels as though every system in your body has just shut down. Of all the things you expected to discuss upon Rikki’s arrival home, this simply hadn’t been one of them. You almost want to revert back to your old self, the person who would beg and plead and suffer abuse so that he’d be pleased with you, but you know better. Summoning up all the force you have, you climb out of bed and stare down at him. “Yeah,” you say vehemently, “About an inch of it, and for about four seconds before I walked out on him to come back to you.”
Rikki just stares at you for a few long moments, then he looks down at the floor. “Is that really supposed to make it better?” he asks quietly.
You sigh. A simple, honest question like this from him could always deflate even your fiercest anger. “No,” you reply, but you can’t think of anything to follow it with.
He looks back up at you. “You should have told me, Bob,” he says seriously. “You should have told me so that I didn’t have to hear it from Bret, of all people.”
The pure ridiculousness of what Rikki has just said brings back much of the anger you had finally pushed away. “Right. Because back then I could have just come to you and said, ‘hey, I almost let Bret give me head. But I thought better of it. Hope you don’t mind.’ You would have beat the shit out of me so quickly I wouldn’t even have known what hit me, Rikki.”
“I wouldn’t have…”
“Bullshit,” you interrupt. “Don’t you even remember what happened that night? You choked me until I almost passed out and then you pushed me in the fucking pool. And that was just for not coming straight back to the room after I talked to Bret. So don’t sit here and tell me that I could have come to you about this, Rikki. You know as well as I do that I couldn’t have.”
Rikki looks away from you and you can’t help but notice that his fists are clenched. You aren’t afraid of him, though. “How many times am I going to have to apologize for what I’ve done to you, Bobby?” The question is harsh. Heartfelt, but still harsh.
“I’m not asking for any sort of apology. I just want you to understand, Rikki. You would have killed me, literally, even if you hadn’t meant to.”
He turns back to you, his eyes slightly darker than when he had looked away. “You really think that? That I was capable of something like that?”
“I know you were.” You don’t hesitate to answer. And you believe that what you are telling him is one hundred percent truthful.
From the expression on his face, you can tell that he really has no idea how to respond to what you’ve just said. The satisfaction you feel is juxtaposed with your urge to comfort him somehow, and so you don’t speak at all.
“You could have told me,” he says again, and before you can respond, he goes on. “Maybe not back then, but later. You had months…” He trails off helplessly.
You’re more annoyed with him than you think you really should be, but you can’t help it. “Oh, right, Rikki,” you say sarcastically. “And when do you think I should have done that? Did you just want me to look over at you in bed one night and casually tell you about the time I almost got a hummer from Bret?”
It’s only a matter of seconds before Rikki is on his feet, staring at you angrily, as if he doesn’t notice that he’s smaller than you. “What the fuck is your problem?” he demands. “I’m the one who just found something out here, not you. All I did today was go take care of my fucking legal responsibilities to Bret, and I come home to this? Is it me, Bob, or does something seem a little fucking off here?”
“You want to talk about things seeming a little off?” you fire back. “How about leaving me here alone all day while you went to hang out with the only person who has ever been a threat to our relationship? The only person who could ever have possibly inspired you to do the things you’ve done to me?”
“Fuck you,” he growls. “What the fuck do you even mean, ‘went to hang out with’ him? Like we were having tea and scones? Jesus, do you think I wanted to be there instead of here?”
You stand up as well, using the few inches you have on him to your advantage. You stare down at him with little remorse. “You didn’t have much of a problem leaving me here. How the fuck am I supposed to feel about that? I offered to go with you but no, that just wasn’t an option!” You’re yelling now but you don’t try to stop yourself. Why pretend that you aren’t angry when, clearly, you are?
“The doctor said Bret didn’t want to see anyone but me…”
“Why do you give a fuck what Bret wants, Rikki? Why do you even care? How can you care after…” you trail off and look down at the floor, knowing that you’ve probably gone too far now. You struggle to keep your voice level and your emotions in check when you continue. “Bret hurt you, Rikki. And because of that, you hurt me. He hasn’t shown one bit of remorse for any of it. I don’t understand how you can be so understanding.”
“I love him.”
Your head snaps up and you find yourself eye to eye with Rikki. He’s looking up at you with a mixture of sincerity and pain. You can think of nothing at all to say.
“I love you, Bobby. And you know that. But I won’t lie to you and say that I don’t love Bret just as much. Maybe it’s a different kind of love, but it’s still there. It won’t let me just leave him to rot in that place. He’s my best friend. I’ve known him forever. I have to take care of him. I have no choice in this matter.”
“Did you at least tell him that we’re still together?” You hear the defeat in your voice and you hate every second of it. But you hate yourself even more. Why can’t you just get angry enough to forbid Rikki from doing this? Why can’t you make him see that he’s jeopardizing your relationship?
“Of course I did,” Rikki tells you, stepping closer to you and resting his hand on your upper arm. He lets it sit there for a moment before he pulls back again, looking down. “That’s about when he told me what had happened between you two,” he says quietly.
You take two steps backward and chuckle mirthlessly. “That’s our dear Bret,” you say bitterly. “Predictably unpredictable.”
“Bob,” Rikki says helplessly. “Come on. The guy just found out he lost months of his life, and everything’s different now. I can’t imagine that. You’ve got to cut him some slack.”
“Cut him some slack?” you repeat, incredulous. “What, you’re going to defend him now? Rikki—“
“Yes,” he says seriously. “Yes, I am going to defend him. And if you’re too fucking blind to see what’s right in front of your face, that’s not my problem. I fucking came home, didn’t I? I told him we were together and I left him alone to come back to you. What fucking more do you want?”
You think for a minute, trying to decide what the best response to his question would be, even though you’re fairly certain it’s rhetorical. What do you want? You want Bret to go back to sleep. Or you want Rikki to tell the doctors to fuck off, foist the responsibility of Bret’s life on someone else, and just stay here with you where he belongs. You want to go back six or seven hours and take the fucking phone off the hook. But none of these things are even remotely realistic. “Nothing you can give me,” you say finally, not caring how awful it sounds.
“He can only be a threat to what we have if we let him, Bob.” Rikki’s voice sounds insistent. Like what he is saying is the most obvious thing in the world. It makes your stomach tighten.
“You’re wrong.” You leave little room for discussion. Your voice like cold steel. “Bret always has been and always will be a threat. At least to me. And you can’t change that. You’ve just admitted that you still love him. That doesn’t leave me much to work with.”
Rikki’s dark eyes are sad when they meet your own, shimmering with what you want to believe are unfallen tears. Now that’s a new feeling. You’ve never really wanted to see Rikki cry. It unnerves you. But only a little. “You don’t trust me.” It isn’t a question. “How can you be with me if you don’t even trust me? That seems completely pointless.”
“Are you saying you don’t want to be with me?” you ask, almost barking out the question. You take another step back and your legs hit the edge of the bed. You sit down heavily. “I can’t fucking believe…”
“I didn’t say that, Bobby. But you have to understand that Bret is my obligation now. I will have to go and visit him, talk to the doctors, all of that. If you can’t trust me…then…well…you do the math.”
The fullness of your anger crashes down over you. You stand up and push past Rikki, not caring if you do any damage or not when you shove him out of your way and leave the room. “One plus one has never equaled two with us, Rikki. There always ends up being three. And that’s all the math I need to know.” You grab your keys and your wallet off the hallway table before storming out of the house, slamming the backdoor behind you.
~*~
You lean against the front bumper of your car, staring out across the city. From up here, you can see for miles, and this scene, which usually brings you peace, only serves to make you feel even more powerless tonight. There are many nights that you and Bobby had spent up here; making love, having picnics, just talking. You can remember the day that you’d discovered the almost-overgrown road that led back here, where the woods behind your house eventually stopped at a sharp drop-off.
When you had first gotten here, the idea of jumping had crossed your mind. It seemed like such an easy way to die, even if the logical part of your brain knew that it wouldn’t be anything like flying, and that you’d have a heart attack the minute your feet left solid ground. But you hadn’t jumped, and you knew you weren’t going to. Whether it was because you had too much to live for or because you had too many messes to clean up, you weren’t sure.
Suddenly your cell phone jangles shrilly, and even as you consider ignoring it, you are reaching into your pocket to pull it out. You expect to see Bob’s name on the display screen, but instead the number comes up unknown. Frowning to yourself, you press a button and answer the phone, not even trying to keep the tiredness and confusion out of your tone.
“It’s me,” comes Bret’s voice on the other end. He sounds just as tired as you feel.
“Hi,” you say, closing your eyes and leaning your head against the car.
“Make it home okay?” he asks, and he actually sounds like he cares.
“Yeah. It’s all highway,” you reply. “Nice of you to ask, though.”
He is silent for a moment and then you hear him exhale. “Talked to my mom,” he says flatly. “Or, well, she talked at me while I made a failed attempt to talk to her.”
You close your eyes and rub absently at your temples. You hadn’t thought to tell him that he shouldn’t call his mother. Actually, you hadn’t thought that she’d still be holding such a terrible grudge against her own son. “I’m sorry about that, Bret,” you finally say. And you really are sorry.
“How did she find out?” The question isn’t argumentative at all. He still sounds nothing more than tired.
“I have no idea. I honestly don’t. I called her the night we had you committed and she just went off about how we were living in sin and that she never wanted to see either of us ever again. I called your dad after that. His response to hearing from me was even worse.”
“My dad?” His voice is shaky, soft. You’ve never really heard him sound like this. “I didn’t even think about my dad…” he trails off into silence. “So I guess that explains why you’re in charge of making all these decisions for me.”
“Yeah,” you respond, looking up at the millions of stars overhead. “It was either me or Bob. We both thought it would be better if I took over.”
Bret chuckles but it isn’t a happy sound. “Thank God for that. Bobby probably would have just left me here to die.”
You swallow back the lump that has formed in your throat at the thought of so many things. “That’s not all that different from what I did, Bret. Smoothie was the only one who came to see you regularly. I didn’t even come until Bobby asked me to. Maybe Smoothie would have done a better job of…”
“Stop,” he interrupts you. “You said yourself that I didn’t know you were here. There was no reason to come visit me. I wasn’t trying to make you feel bad, Rikki. You sound horrible as it is. Something wrong?”
“I wouldn’t even know where to begin,” you tell him truthfully, moving so that you’re now sitting on the hood of your car, back against the windshield, staring up at the night sky.
“I guess you don’t really have to explain,” Bret replies, and his tone sounds completely honest. “I don’t really know where to begin myself.”
You open your eyes, looking up into the vast sky. “All we’ve got left are beginnings,” you say absentmindedly.
“Look,” Bret says, sounding far away and strained. “I guess I was kind of a dick to you earlier.”
You pull the phone away from your ear for a second and look at it as though it’s just grown teeth. You clear your throat and press it back against your ear, not quite sure how to respond. “Yeah,” you say finally.
“It’s just that—“
“You don’t have to explain,” you say, closing your eyes again. “I guess the wake-up call you had today grants you a bit of snarkiness.”
“Which? The part where I actually woke up, or the part where you told me you’ve been doing Bobby the entire time?” He coughs.
You sigh. Everything he says has to be laced with a certain amount of arsenic. “Both,” you reply honestly.
“Rikki,” Bret says, but he doesn’t follow it with anything.
After a few seconds, you open your eyes. “Yeah? What is it?”
“Why did you ever go to Bob in the first place? Why wasn’t I enough for you?” The sadness in his voice is shockingly thick. You have to clear your throat before you can reply.
“It wasn’t about being enough, Bret. It was about being different. What we had…it was good. And I would be a hypocrite if I said I didn’t like it because I sure as hell never asked you to stop. But I couldn’t live with just that. I love you so much and you never showed any love in return. The kind of love I gave you, Bobby gave me. I needed that.”
“You love me?”
“What?” you ask, chewing on your thumbnail and watching the bright city lights off in the distance.
“You just said that you love me. Not that you loved me. But that you love me. Slip of the tongue?” He sounds almost hopeful.
“Don’t do this, Bret. Please. You know I love you. But Bobby and I…it’s different with us. I don’t want to lose him.” You bite back the thought that you’re afraid that you already have.
“I’ll do my best not to get in the way,” he scoffs. In spite of all these niceties he still manages to be the same old sarcastic Bret. Part of you is glad for that. At least some things don’t change, even if they are the bad things. “Hell, bring him with you the next time you come to visit. I’d like to see the man who locked my ass up.”
You sigh and shake your head, looking intently at the edge of the cliff your car is parked on. You’ve already told Bret several times that it wasn’t just Bobby who put him in the hospital. But for some reason, you don’t correct him this time. “Do you really mean that?” you say instead. “Do you want to see him?”
“I haven’t seen anyone in almost a year. I’m sure a little company wouldn’t hurt.” You sense something in his voice but can’t quite tell what it is.
“Bret, if you really want to see him, I’ll bring him,” you say, careful to avoid saying anything about how you’re not sure Bobby wants to see him. “But if it’s going to be ugly, then…”
Bret sighs audibly. “It’s not going to be,” he says tiredly. “All of this craziness aside…” He pauses there, and you hear muffled talking in the background.
“Bret?”
“Yeah. I gotta go. There’s a time limit on my phone calls. What is this, fucking prison?”
You sigh. “Okay,” you say, because there’s nothing else to say.
“I’ll call you tomorrow,” he promises. “I love you,” and then you hear the click that tells you he’s already hung up.
You turn off your cell phone and set it on the hood next to you, leaning back and closing your eyes again. You almost laugh at the bitter irony of the fact that you’d spent so much time wishing he’d say those words to you, and now that he has, you almost wish he hadn’t.
The phone rings again, and you answer it without bothering to check the screen to see who’s calling. “Talk them into extra phone time?” you say, trying to sound jovial.
“What?” comes Bobby’s voice, sharp and confused.
“Bob?” You sit up straight, pressing the phone more tightly against your ear. “I’m sorry, I thought you were Bret calling back.” You immediately regret your honesty.
“No,” he says, his response clipped. “Sorry to disappoint.”
“I’m not disappointed,” you sigh. “I was just saying…”
“Yeah, I know,” he interrupts. But his tone tells you that he doesn’t know anything about this at all. How could he? “So why did Bret call?”
“He wanted to know if I made it home alright.” Technically, you aren’t lying. Bret had wanted to make sure that you were safe. Right, if you just keep telling yourself that, sooner or later you might believe it.
“Well how nice of him to check up on you.” The sarcasm dripping from Bobby’s tongue is almost painful to hear. You do your best to ignore it. Knowing that, now that you have lied to him, you really probably deserve it.
“I’m more interested in why you’re calling me, Bob. You seemed pretty angry when you left. It usually takes you longer than this to cool down.”
“I’ve just been out driving and I drove by the house and noticed you weren’t there. Just wondering where you are.”
“I’m up at the lookout,” you tell him, calling this place by the name the two of you had given it. “I needed to think. Does it really matter?”
Bobby is quiet for a second before responding. “It matters to me, Rikki. I’m sorry about earlier. Can I come up there? I’d like to talk.”
You don’t even think about it. “No,” you say flatly. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.” You bite your lip, not quite sure why you had just said that, but unable to make any move to take it back.
“What?” Bobby says, clearly stunned.
“Well, I mean… I was just about to come home, anyway,” you say, sighing. “There’s no reason for you to come back here.”
“Oh,” he says, but you can hear the uncertainty. “You okay, Rikki? Did Bret say something?”
You climb off of the car, stretching your legs in attempt to relieve the suddenly overwhelming tension. “No,” you lie. “He didn’t.”
Bobby is quiet for a moment. “Well, what did you two talk about?”
“Not that it matters,” you say stiffly, “but we didn’t talk about very much. We talked about his parents, and about how he’d like to see you.”
“He wants to see me?”
“Yes, Bob,” you say, tired. “You’re still a part of this group, no matter how jealous of Bret you are.” Where is this hostility coming from? a voice in your head asks, but you have no answer.
“This group? I’m going to assume by ‘this group’ you mean the fucked up threesome that we became. Because Poison isn’t a group anymore, Rikki.”
“Why do you sound so bitter?” You can’t help but ask the question. In spite of the fact that you are terrified of the answer.
“Dammit, Rikki, if you’re calling the three of us a group again then this is more fucked up than I imagined. The three of us are not a group. Bret isn’t even my friend. I don’t care how you felt, or still feel, about him. I haven’t liked the guy since the night he walked in on you and I. Do I have a certain loyalty to him? Maybe. But is he my friend? Absolutely not.”
“He didn’t
do anything to you…”
“No,” he shouts, taking away any argument you might have. “But he did something to you. And that’s enough to make me hate him. It might not be enough for you, but I love you too much to stand by and watch you walk right back into the arms of someone who hurt you so badly. This isn’t about jealousy, Rikki. This is about love.”
The fight goes out of you and you collapse against the hood of your car as the weight of Bobby’s words hits you full on. He really does love you that much. “I’m sorry,” you tell him truthfully, struggling to keep your voice even. “This day has gone straight to hell. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen.”
“When Bret’s involved no one ever means for the bad shit to happen. It just does. And that is why I’m worried about this.”
“I understand,” you say. And honestly, you do. Deep inside you know that Bobby is right. “I’ll be home in fifteen minutes. Will you be there?”
“Yeah, I’ll be there.” He hangs up before you can say anything in response.
~*~
When you get home, you take the stairs two at a time up to the bedroom you share with Rikki. He is sitting cross-legged on the bed, his head against the headboard where yours had been a few hours earlier. “Hi,” you say uncertainly.
“Hey,” he responds, not moving.
Without waiting for an invitation, you cross the room to the bed and collapse across the bottom of it with a groan, throwing one arm across your eyes.
“Tough day at the office?” Rikki quips, but he doesn’t sound particularly jovial.
“Are you kidding? You’re a full-time job,” you say, and your tone is as humorless as his.
He is silent for a minute, then sighs. “What do you want me to do, Bob? Seriously. I have no idea what I’m supposed to do.”
You move your arm and turn your head so you are looking at him. The fatigue and worry on his face make him look older than he is, and you feel a pang of sympathy in your chest. You want to hold him, to tell him that the two of you would somehow get through this together, but it somehow doesn’t seem appropriate. “I don’t know,” you say finally. “I know you’re always the one who fixes situations so they work for everybody, but I really don’t think you can do that this time, babe.”
He reaches out and lightly runs his fingers across your palm, then pulls away. “I don’t think so, either,” he says softly. “There isn’t anything I can do that will make all three of us happy.”
“I’m sorry you’re in the middle,” you tell him sincerely, swallowing hard. You hate knowing that you’ve caused him pain. “But do you understand why I’m worried about this?”
“Yeah,” he nods, moving so he is lying on his side, parallel to you. He props his head up on one hand. “And I’m worried too, Bobby. Trust me, I am. Bret is still…well…Bret. And I don’t want things to go back to how they were any more than you do. I can’t live like that again. But that doesn’t mean I can pretend that Bret doesn’t exist.”
Only slightly hesitant, you reach out and run the back of your hand down his cheek. Some of the tension falls from his face. You smile. “I’ll share you if I have to, baby. I just don’t want to lose you. You know I’m no good without you. I need you here with me.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” he tells you, smiling a bit himself now. For the first time since Rikki has returned from visiting Bret the air between the two of you is almost light. “Bret is still sick, Bobby. And even if he wasn’t, I wouldn’t leave you for him. Not after all that we’ve been through. You’re not getting rid of me that easily.”
“Promise?” you question, arching one eyebrow and winking in a manner that would be playful if the underlying tone wasn’t so serious.
Rikki rolls onto his stomach and drapes one arm across your chest. He leans in and kisses you softly on the lips. Reluctantly, he pulls away. “I couldn’t have gotten through the past eight months without you. You’ve kept me sane. I promise I’m not going to leave you.”
You close your eyes. “It just scares me, you know?” you say, your voice barely above a whisper.
“You don’t have to be afraid of me,” he assures you, his voice almost as low as yours.
“Always will be,” you reply honestly.
“Bob, come on. It’s fear that got us into… how it used to be. It’s fear that kept us there for so long. The last thing we need now is more fear.”
His words sound good, and all you want to do right now is listen to him. It doesn’t even matter what he’s saying, you just need the sound of his voice to soothe you and make you think that everything’s going to be okay, whether it’s true or not. You roll over and slide down so that you can press your face into his chest. “Let’s get married,” you say into his shirt.
He chuckles. “California isn’t that liberal,” he replies.
You pull back just far enough that you’ll be able to speak more clearly. “I didn’t say it had to be legal.”
“You’re just asking because you want me to put out,” Rikki says, and you can hear his smile.
“As if you don’t already. Come on. I’m serious. Let’s get married.”
Rikki’s eyebrows crinkle together until he is almost frowning. “You really are serious, aren’t you?”
“Yeah,” you reply, though you’re feeling much less sure of yourself than you were just moments earlier. “Why not? We’ve known each other forever. And we’ve been together for over a year. We love each other. What’s stopping us?”
Now Rikki’s eyebrows are nearly in his hair. He sits up, shaking his head with a slight chuckle. “Do you really want the list of what’s stopping us, Bob?”
The serious smile you’ve been wearing fades from your face. Anger is quickly replacing it. You don’t like that Rikki sounds so incredulous. He clearly isn’t taking this conversation as seriously as you are. “Sure, sweetheart. How about you give me that list.”
“Jesus Christ, Bobby,” he says, exasperated. “Okay, the media, for one. They would have a field day with this. As if Bret going insane wasn’t enough fodder for those hungry bastards. Our parents, for two. They may not be as bad as Bret’s, but god damn, my mother would die on the spot. How about Michelle? Your kids? How do you think they would feel about this?”
“None of that is supposed to matter. But clearly it does to you. I’m sorry I asked, Rikki.” You roll off of the bed and stand up, walking a few steps away. You can’t help but feel like Rikki is holding something back. Maybe the real reason he doesn’t want to take you seriously is Bret. You want to say it, but you don’t.
“Bobby,” Rikki implores, sitting up and holding his hand out to you. “Come back here. Seriously, I’m not trying to be harsh and turn you down. I love you. I just don’t think you’ve thought this through. And honestly, I don’t think we need some marriage ceremony that isn’t even recognized by the state we live in to prove that we’re together. Do you?”
You look down tiredly at Rikki’s hand but you don’t move any closer to him. “Asking you to marry me wasn’t my way of trying to prove anything.” But even as you speak these words you know they are not entirely true. You do love Rikki enough to marry him, that isn’t even a question, but you can’t deny that the entire scene that had gone down today doesn’t make the matter seem a whole lot more urgent. And you can’t deny the fact that Rikki’s points are entirely valid and that it is totally impractical to even think about something like this. But you don’t say anything else.
Rikki sighs deeply. “I don’t know what to say, Bob,” he says, and he sounds so completely defeated that it almost physically hurts you. “Anything I could say would just make me sound worse at this point.”
“You could say that you want to marry me, too,” you say. And you mean it. All he has to do is say that he wants to, and you’d be satisfied; he doesn’t have to actually do anything. But you can’t say that to him. He has to figure it out on his own.
He rises to his feet and looks at you, and for one desperate moment you think that he’s going to come through, that he’s actually going to say what you want him to say, but then he shakes his head and sighs. “I wish I could tell you that I’d marry you tomorrow, Bob, but I can’t. We just can’t.” And then he is walking past you, kissing you softly on the cheek before he passes out of your line of sight. For a long moment you just stand still, looking at the spot where he’d just been standing. You can hear him behind you, rustling around in the dresser, and then you hear the bathroom door close. A moment later the shower starts.
You turn around slowly, staring at the closed bathroom door. Vaguely you wonder when the last time was that you’d actually seen it closed. There wasn’t much you and Rikki wouldn’t do in front of each other at this point. “I wonder what other doors he’s going to close,” you mutter to yourself. And then, without really thinking about it, you move forward and open the bathroom door, stepping inside.
You can see most of Rikki’s naked body in the glass shower door as he washes his hair. His arms are above his head and the way he gently massages the shampoo into his scalp makes you have to fight to remember that you are angry with him. The muscles in his arms work effortlessly and you turn away, unable to watch any longer. Steam fills up the bathroom and leaves a thick fog on the huge lighted mirror that fills almost an entire wall. Sighing, you lean back against the black marble counter and close your eyes.
“Why did you close the door?”
You hear Rikki’s sharp intake of breath and know that you have scared him. Something inside of you is glad about this. You’re not quite sure why. You turn to look back at the shower door. You can see less of Rikki’s body now but you can still make out the outline of him. He is standing quite still, water running over his head, sending the shampoo spiraling into the drain below.
“What?” he asks you. You know him well enough to be able to tell that he is feigning ignorance.
“I asked you why you closed the door,” you repeat, crossing your arms over your chest. “Since when do you not want me to see you naked?”
“Jesus Christ, Bob,” Rikki sighs. “That has nothing to do with anything.” And then, much to your surprise, you watch as he grabs hold of the shower door and flings it open. Your throat constricts as you fight not to look away in embarrassment. You hadn’t expected him to be so forward. “Look, I’m right here, and I’m very naked.” His tone is a bit more condescending now but somehow it doesn’t really bother you. “I don’t have a problem with you seeing me naked. So what do you want? What do I have to do to prove that I love you? You want to fuck me? Come on in.” He holds his arm out towards you as an open invitation.
You want to say no, because it seems as though anything less than that would be oddly counter-productive, but it’s never been easy to refuse him. Hell, it’s never been possible to refuse him. You swallow. “Is that what you want?” you ask, not moving. “You want me to fuck you?” You can feel yourself growing hard against the confines of your jeans as you ask this question.
He looks at you evenly. “Is that what you want?” he asks again.
Part of you hates him for being evasive, but other, more insistent parts are quickly winning the argument. You stare back at him for just a few seconds longer, long enough maybe to make him think that you’re going to resist, but then you can’t help yourself and you’re pulling your shirt over your head. You toss it aside, and as you begin to unbutton your jeans, your eyes meet his again. You raise an eyebrow at him and he smiles just slightly, enough of a sign to make you move faster, kicking off your shoes and sliding out of your jeans.
And then you’re climbing in the shower with him, the wet heat of the shower pulsing down against your skin to mix with a similar pulsing heat inside of you. You’re already painfully hard as you turn him around so his back is to your front and press yourself against him. “Is this what you want?” you ask him, your voice breathy and low.
“Yes,” he says, nothing in his tone now but lust-filled honesty.
As you slide your arms around him, you can feel his chest rising and falling as he begins to breathe more deeply. “Tell me you love me.”
His stomach muscles tense under your palms. “I love you,” he whispers back. And you don’t doubt him. You can’t doubt him. Because you love him too much. Your right hand slides around his already hard cock as your left hand plays in the thin line of hair leading down to it. You stroke him slowly, your tongue lapping at his ear lobe.
“I love you too,” you say breathily into his ear. You can feel the shiver as it runs through him. “I want you.”
He leans his head back until it’s resting on your shoulder, giving you full access to his neck. You nibble at it playfully, still stroking him, smiling against his skin. “You can have me,” he tells you earnestly. “I’m yours, Bob.”
You swallow hard as you move the two of you forward a bit until the hot water is pounding down over the both of you. With one hand you push gently on his back until he is bending enough at the waist for this to work for you. He rests his hands against the slippery shower wall and turns his head so he can look back at you. There is nothing but hardcore desire and undeniable love there. That one gaze is enough to send you to your knees. You have to steady yourself by placing your hands firmly on his hips. And then you push yourself inside him.
Discomfort isn’t a problem with the two of you anymore. You’ve been together so long. You are completely accustomed to each other’s bodies. That’s part of what makes it so good between you. Rikki bends his arm up at an odd angle until his left hand is resting over yours on his hip. He squeezes your fingers with his own. And then he clenches around you, shooting you a look that makes it perfectly clear he knows what he’s doing to you. You close your eyes and bite down hard on your lip, pulling out and pushing into him once more. His tight heat enclosing you perfectly. It’s always like this with Rikki. Like you really are meant to be together. Because you have never fit this way with anyone else.
You start a slow, insistent rhythm, letting your head fall back as the hot water pounds down onto your chest. Rikki’s fingers entwine with yours and he rests his forehead against the tile in front of him. “I love you,” he says again. And it somehow means more because you haven’t asked him to say it.
~*~
“Good afternoon, Mr. Michaels,” Dr. Kinsington says, breezing into your room as though she thinks you might be happy to see her. “Nice to see you up and about.” She smiles. “Well, up, anyway.”
You’re sitting on the counter next to your bed, leaning against the window. For a few minutes, you just look back at her blankly. She’s not so bad, really, but in this place you’d be annoyed with Jesus himself. “Morning, Doc,” you say flatly. “To what do I owe the honor?”
“Well, actually, my colleagues and I have been going over your possible treatment plan,” she replies. “We want to try out a few medications, see which ones will work the best for you.”
“I don’t think I like that idea very much,” you reply automatically. Somewhere in your head a voice protests that maybe you do want to be medicated, maybe this is the right answer, but it wouldn’t be very Bret of you to go down without a fight.
“I know, I know, no one likes to take pills,” Dr. Kinsington says, as though you are a small child refusing to eat his vegetables. “But I promise you, Bret, with the right kind of medication and therapy, you could be out of here and back on your feet before you know it.”
You close your eyes and sigh, leaning your head against the wall. “Okay, so what miracle cure did you have in mind?”
“Well, I’m afraid there’s no miracle cure, but I’d like you to try a medication called Risperdal,” she answers. “It’s not a big deal, and it’s been proven very successful in treating cases such as your own.”
“Do I get to know what it’s going to do to me? Or is that against the rules?” Again that voice in the back of your head telling you that this really probably is for the best. You brush it aside.
“Like I said, it’s not a big deal at all, Bret. It’s just something to help you. We’d like to avoid episodes like the one you had yesterday at all costs. Hopefully, on this medication, we’ll be able to control any…outbreaks of that kind.”
“In other words, it’s supposed to make me less crazy?” you scoff, not really caring if you sound rude. You hate how everyone in here seems to be walking on eggshells when it comes to telling you what is really wrong.
“You aren’t crazy Bret,” she tells you, that bright and sunshiny smile plastered on her painted red lips. If she wasn’t your doctor she might actually be attractive. As it is, she is simply annoying. “You’re just sick. And I’m going to help you get better.”
“And if I don’t want to take this medication you ‘hope’ will help me? Then what?”
Her smile fades slightly. “Well, technically, you don’t have a lot of choice in this. Your friend Rikki is in charge of making medical decisions for you until myself or one of my colleagues deems you of sound enough mind to do it yourself. And if you refuse to take the pill orally, we’ll just have the staff inject you with it. I was hoping we wouldn’t have to take that route, Bret.”
You turn away from her, looking out the small window into the bright sunlight outside. You want to be out there, basking in its glow. Staying in this place isn’t very high up on your to-do list. If you have to take their stupid medication to appease them enough to let you leave, you will. “Fine,” you say begrudgingly, still staring out the window. “I’ll take the medication.”
“I’m very glad to hear you say that,” Dr. Kinsington says sincerely.
You turn to face her. “I’m not being cooperative on purpose,” you tell her. “I just don’t particularly feel like being wrestled to the ground by some beefed-up orderlies who think they’re better than me so you can shoot me full of dope.”
She scribbles something on her clipboard and then looks at you, smiling. “Anyone ever tell you that you have a way with words?”
“Comes in handy when…” You sigh. “When I used to write songs,” you finish.
“Well, Bret,” Dr. Kinsington says seriously. “We’re going to work very hard to get you back to a position in life where you can write songs again.”
You almost laugh. What good is that going to do you? You don’t even want to think about writing songs again. But she sounds so entirely sincere that you can’t bring yourself to be an asshole. “Thanks,” you say dismally.
“Look, I’m not going to pretend to understand what this is like for you,” she goes on. “But I am going to try to make it better.”
You favor her with an exaggerated sigh. “When do I start the medication?”
“Right now,” she says cheerfully. “Just pop out to the nurse’s station and they’ll take care of it. I’ve got some other patients I need to see, but is there anything you need before I go?”
“Actually,” you begin, looking back out the window. “I’d like to go outside. Is that even possible? Or am I too nuts for that?”
She lets out one soft giggle and shakes her head. That smile of hers has returned full force, bringing a sparkle to her eyes. Again you think that in a different time and place you would have been very attracted to her. How things have changed. “After you take your meds just have one of the nurses show you where the courtyard is, Bret. You’re free to go out there whenever you’d like. Except after lights out, of course. The sun will probably do you some good.”
“Thanks,” you say. And really, you mean it. It will be a nice change to get outside after eight months in this little room. You smile at her as she leaves.
A few minutes after the doctor exits your room you head down to the nurse’s station and are met by the same young woman who was working there last night. She greets you with a smile too bright for the long hours you know she must have worked. “Hi there, Mr. Michaels. How are you this morning?”
You just shake your head and smile slightly in return. “Please, stop with the Mr. Michaels bullshit. My name is Bret. And I’m alright. You know, for being crazy and locked up in a loony bin. I’m just here to get the medication Dr. Kinsington says I need. You know, it’ll make me less nuts and all that. Or so she says. What’s your name, by the way?” For some reason you find yourself rambling. And you just can’t seem to stop.
The smile the young nurse flashes you is the most sincere you’ve seen on her face. “I’m Jessica. Most people call me Jess.” She reaches under the counter and pulls out a small white cup with one pill in it and hands it to you. Then she turns around to pour some water.
She’s attractive, too, you notice, in an entirely different way than Dr. Kinsington, but this observation is purely objective. Idly you wonder if your sex drive will ever come back, or if that part of you died when you’d gone to sleep.
A moment later, Jess turns around and hands you the small cup of water, still smiling. “Here you go,” she says.
You take the cup from her and look at the pill warily. It is oblong and peach-colored and it looks pretty inoffensive, but having popped your share of pills, you know that some of the strongest chemicals come in innocent-looking packages. Too late to think about that now, though. You said you’d take the pill. And so you do, swallowing it dry and then drinking the cup of water just because it seems like the thing to do.
“So… what am I supposed to do now?” you ask then, as you realize you have absolutely no idea.
She glances up at the clock and so do you, not because you really care, but because it seems that a normal person would know what time it is. It’s just after two in the afternoon, which means absolutely nothing to you. “Well, you slept through breakfast and lunch,” she says sympathetically, “but if you’re hungry, we can take a walk down to the kitchen and get you something to eat. Dinner’s not for another three and a half hours.”
You shake your head. “I’m fine,” you tell her. “Actually, I’d like to make a phone call.”
She nods. “Sure, go ahead. Dr. Kinsington has approved you for ten-minute calls now.”
Only a few minutes ago you had wanted to go outside and sit in the sun. But now, something inside of you won’t let you walk away from making this phone call. You have all the time in the world to sit in a damn courtyard and contemplate your fate. Right now, this is more important. You walk over to the wall that the phone is located on and pick up the receiver. It takes you a couple of seconds to remember the exact sequence of numbers you need to press. But eventually it comes back to you. You dial the number and wait, hoping that you won’t regret what you’re doing. On the third ring a familiar voice picks up.
“Hello?”
You smile just at the sound of him. Maybe he had never been your best friend, but he had always been damn close. He was as much like a brother as all the guys in your band. Or what had been your band, you remind yourself. Poison is no more. “Hey Smoothie,” you say hesitantly.
He is quiet for a moment and then you hear your old security guard exhale loudly. “Bret? Is that you?”
“Sure is,” you tell him. “Back from the dead and everything. Surprise, surprise.”
“Jesus, bro,” he laughs and it sounds like he’s only laughing because he isn’t quite sure what else he should do. “You’re the last person I expected to hear from.”
“Yeah, people keep telling me that. I guess this means Rikki didn’t call and let you know I was awake.”
“Rikki knows?” He sounds even more shocked than he did before. “How long have you been awake?”
“Two days. And yeah, Rikki knows. He’s already been to visit once. The doctors called him as soon as I woke up. He’s in charge of making all my decisions for me, I guess.”
Smoothie sighs softly. “Yeah, Bret. We had to put someone in charge. I thought maybe I could have done it but…”
“It’s alright, man,” you say. And you mean it. Of all the people you could let yourself be angry with, Smoothie isn’t one of them. “Rikki told me you were the only one that came to visit me after they put me in here.”
“Yeah,” he mumbles and then clears his throat. He says it again. “Yeah.” Not much else to say, you guess.
“I wanted to say thank you for that. It’s good to know that someone stood by me.”
“Not that it means anything, but I think Rikki wanted to. He was just scared to see you like that. Bobby, too. I don’t know what happened with you guys but it must have been…”
“Let’s not go there,” you interrupt him casually. Now is not the time to try and explain all of that to Smoothie. But you can’t help wondering, does he know about Bobby and Rikki? Have they been open about their relationship? You decide it’s probably not a smart question to ask. You clear your throat, suddenly painfully aware of how little you have to say. “How have you been?” It’s not the most intellectual question, but it’ll do.
“Oh, you know,” he says, and you can hear him relax slightly. “It’s been pretty boring, now that I don’t have you kids to chase after anymore.” He pauses. “How are you, Bret?”
You sigh. “I don’t really know how to answer that, bro,” you say seriously. “I mean, I just woke up in a fucking loony bin and they’re pumping me full of god knows what so that I don’t have any more ‘episodes’. I mean, fucking ‘episodes’? But you know. You just have to keep on keepin’ on.”
“Yeah,” he agrees, and you can almost hear him nodding. “Is there anything you need?”
“How about a guitar and a shotgun,” you say humorlessly. “No, seriously, I’m cool. I’m sure Rikki will bring me some new clothes and all that.”
“You two okay?”
You swallow, trying to come up with a safe way to answer his question. “Yeah,” you say finally. “I guess. I mean, it’s a little weird. But yeah.”
Smoothie is quiet for a moment. “Do you want me to come up there and see you?”
At first you aren’t sure what to tell him. It’s been a long time. And you know now that he has seen you at your worse. Seen you at a time when even Rikki, your best friend and ex-lover, hadn’t wanted to see you. Do you really want to be faced with that? You sigh. “If you want to. It’s up to you, man.”
“Of course I want to, Bret. But if you don’t feel up to it…” he pauses. “Honestly, I guess I’m not sure what to expect if I do come up there.”
“I look like shit and I’m pale as fuck. Other than that, I’m pretty much still me.” You try to laugh but can’t. You wonder how true what you’ve just told him is. How much of the old Bret is still left after being catatonic for so long? How much do you want to be left?
“I’ll come see you tomorrow,” he says. “Does that sound good?”
You nod your head and then realize that he can’t see you. “Yeah, sure. I look forward to it.” And for some reason, you hang up without saying goodbye. You stare at the phone for a few moments before turning back towards the nurse’s station. You can tell that Jess has been watching you and that she is trying her best not to make it obvious. You figure she’s probably a fan. A normal nurse doing their everyday job wouldn’t be this interested.
~*~
“Look, Bob, I have to, all right?” you say, buttoning your jeans. “It’s not as though I like leaving you here all by yourself, but I’ve got a responsibility to Bret, too.”
“You were just up there yesterday,” he argues. “He can wait another day.”
“Bob, come on,” you say, exasperated. “Knock it off, okay? We’ve been through this. And the sooner you let me get out there, the sooner I can come home to you.”
He sighs, eyeing you reproachfully from the bed. “Why is this your job, anyway? Aren’t the doctors supposed to be the ones making him better?”
You grab your cigarettes off the bedside table and light one, sighing as you exhale. “It’s not just their job,” you reply. “And besides, I need to take him some clothes and stuff, you know? I’m going to stop off at his place to pick some up.”
“You’re going to drive out to Bret’s place?” he asks.
“Yeah. That’s where his clothes are,” you reply tiredly.
“I don’t like the idea of you going up to his place by yourself,” Bobby says seriously.
“Come on, Bob,” you say. “Surely you realize how ridiculous it sounds for you to tell me that you don’t want me going to my best friend’s empty house by myself.”
He sighs. “I don’t know what you’re going to find up there,” he tells you. “The last time I was there…”
“All I’m going to find are some clothes,” you promise him. “And I’m not going to stay at the hospital long, okay? I’ll be home before you know it.”
Bobby rubs at the bridge of his nose. “All right. Fine. I’m not going to argue with you,” he says. “I’ll be here.” He hesitates. “Rikki?”
“Yeah?”
“You don’t have to be so strong, you know,” he says quietly. “If this gets to be too much for you…”
“You’re here, I know. But don’t worry about me. I’m fine. And I’ll be fine.”
He shakes his head sadly but doesn’t try to stop you as you walk towards the bedroom door. “I love you, Rikki. It’s my job to worry about you.”
You stop, turn back around, and walk back to the bed. You smile at him, lean down, and place a quick kiss on his lips. “I love you too. I’ll be back soon.” And without another word, you leave.
The drive to Bret’s house is shorter than you remembered it to be. But other than that, it is completely familiar. As you pull up in front of the expansive home memories flood over you. You have spent so much time inside these walls. Time with all of the guys. Time with Bret, before things had gotten so out of hand. Part of you suddenly wishes you had heeded Bobby’s warning. Maybe you shouldn’t have come here alone. Not because you are afraid of what you will find. But because you aren’t sure you can handle everything that you are suddenly remembering. At least you could have had Bobby to lean on.
Brushing away your nervousness you exit your car and bound up the steps to the front door. The key that has hung on your key ring for so many years still works effortlessly. You push the door open and stop, frozen in your tracks. This must be what Bob had meant when he referred to what he had seen the last time he was here. The house was a disaster. Tables lay smashed, chairs were overturned, Bret’s big wooly touring jacket was rumpled on the floor. None of you had come back here after Bret had been committed. Maybe you should have.
“Jesus,” you breathe to yourself almost without noticing. The thought pops into your head unbidden that the inside of Bret’s house probably looks largely similar, in theory, to the inside of Bret’s head.
You take a breath and cross the threshold into the house and suddenly you are overwhelmed with a wave of guilt. Guilt for not being here when all of this happened. Guilt for not being there when Bret went to sleep and guilt for not being there when he woke up. You have spent so much time feeling guilty because of Bret that the feeling is almost comfortable.
Trying to keep your eyes focused directly in front of you, you make your way through the debris to the foot of the stairs. With a sigh, you begin to climb slowly, running your hand along the dusty banister. When you reach the top of the stairs you can see that the door to the master bedroom is closed, and for one perverse moment you imagine that he’s in there, propped up against pillows in the bed he’d insisted having done in garish dark purple satin, but then you push the idea out of your mind and close the distance between yourself the and the door.
“Stop being such an ass, Rockett,” you mutter to yourself as you twist the knob and pull the door open.
Bret’s room isn’t as much of a mess as the rest of the house; its condition is no worse than it ever had been. Without quite knowing what has gotten into you, you find yourself crossing the room and crawling into the unmade bed, sliding across the sheets and pressing your face into the cool satin pillowcases. Although you know it is impossible, you are certain that you can still smell him on the bedding. It’s been eight months since he has laid upon these sheets but his scent is still heavy in your nose. And it’s still intoxicating as ever.
Without really thinking about it you roll onto your back, twisting yourself up in the silky sheets. And then you start to cry. The guilt, the drama, the love, the fear…everything you have ever felt for Bret wells up and spills out of the corners of your eyes. You don’t even attempt to stop the tears. No one is here to see you anyway. You lie flat on your back, your knees up, your arms spread out at your sides. Slowly, you run your hands up and down the fabric, closing your eyes as the moisture continues to slip down your cheeks.
You hadn’t expected such an onslaught of emotions. But now that it has happened you have little choice but to roll with it. An image of Bret before all of this happened flashes behind your closed eyes. Bret, shirtless, long hair spilling over his shoulders, jeans riding low on his hips. You’d seen him look like that so many times. And yet, in this moment, it does things to your body that you can’t even begin to explain. You feel yourself grow suddenly and painfully hard against the zipper of your jeans.
At first you have to bite down on your bottom lip to keep from crying out in surprise. Your breathing quickens and you lick at the spot on your lip you have just bitten, tasting your own blood. This is getting a little out of hand. But you have no desire at all to stop it. With that image of Bret still in your head you slide your hand up the sheet until it touches your thigh. And then, tantalizingly slow, you bring your fingers to the button on your jeans.
Images of moments you never realized were sexy flood your mind. Bret smirking at you from over his guitar. Bret’s chest rising and falling as he slept. Bret when he was angry.
You free yourself from the tight confines of your pants and gasp at the sensation of your hand wrapping around your hardness. You close your eyes, in as much of an effort to push away the fresh guilt welling up in your chest as one to enhance the feelings. You shouldn’t be doing this, shouldn’t be in here in Bret’s bed thinking about Bret when Bobby is at home by himself, unhappy and worried about you. There are a million good reasons why this is wrong.
But wrong has always felt so good.
And with this thought come other thoughts of Bret. Bret’s smug expression while his hand pumped his cock slowly. The strained noises he’d make when you were sucking him off. The way his abdominal muscles would flex when he’d come.
You can’t help but let out a groan at this last image. Making Bret come is one of the few things you have ever been good at, and you can remember exactly what it is like: the way he moved, the noises he made. You are so deeply absorbed by these memories that you can almost feel the slippery flesh of his cock sliding between your lips.
Your movement begins to get more erratic as your need becomes steadily more urgent. You hear a strangled voice breathing Bret’s name and you’re barely even aware of the fact that it’s your own. You are drowning in this fantasy now, too far gone to think about all the reasons you have to feel guilty. You can almost taste his cock on your mouth. Almost feel his hands on your body. And although you know it isn’t real, you have never in your life wanted a fantasy to become reality more than you do right now. The fist pumping your cock no longer feels like your own. You can see Bret smiling down at you. Telling you to come for him. His tongue on your neck. Then his teeth. Your back arches off the bed and again you hear yourself calling out his name. You spill hot and sticky come all over your hand. Then you collapse back onto the sheets beneath you.
For several minutes you don’t move. Can’t move. You’re too busy trying to catch your breath and make the muscles in your thighs stop twitching. The image of Bret slowly leaves your mind until you are left with nothing but the sunlight pouring into his bedroom window. You open your eyes slowly, wiping your hand on the sheet. And then you curl up into a ball on your side, burying your face in the softness of Bret’s pillow. The intensity with which you want him right now amazes even you. And the fact that he isn’t here is heartbreaking. You want to feel his arms around you again. You want to hear him encouraging you to make him come. But you know that you won’t. And once again, you feel the tears begin to flow.
“I wish you were here,” you whisper into the satin pillowcase, clutching it tightly to your body. And it doesn’t matter that you’ll be seeing Bret in a little less than two hours. Because in that mental hospital is not where you want to see him. You want things to be like they were before all of this happened. You long for Bret to be normal again. The thought that what the two of you had together was never really normal doesn’t cross your mind. It should.
Just as your breathing finally slows to an acceptable level, your cell phone rings. With shaking hands, you pull it out of the pocket on your jeans that are still pushed down around your thighs. You check the caller ID screen. Bobby’s name flashes back at you.
“Jesus fuck,” you mutter to yourself as you press the send button. Then, “Hey, you,” forcing your voice to stay even.
“Still over at Bret’s?” he asks.
You clear your throat and sit up. “Yeah. Just getting ready to leave here, actually,” you lie.
“Just checking on you,” Bobby says with a sigh. “That place was really a disaster the last time I saw it, and I’m sure it’s no different now.”
“It’s not,” you agree. “Everything’s completely trashed.” You hesitate. “Hey, look, Bob, I’m gonna get going. I’ve got to grab a few more things and head out to the hospital.” More than anything else in the world, you just want to hang up the goddamned phone.
“Sorry. Didn’t mean to interrupt,” he mutters.
“Don’t start,” you tell him, your tone harsher than you’d meant for it to be. “Did you just call me to continue nailing my nuts to the floor because I’m taking care of my best friend?”
You can hear him exhale sharply and you know that he’s taken aback by the bitterness in your voice. “Fucking forget it,” he says, and then you hear the click that tells you he’s hung up.
You press the end button and let the phone fall onto the bed. You can feel the first twinges of what you’re sure are going to be a killer headache.
~*~
The sun beating down on your face is probably the best thing you’ve felt in ages. It’s one of those things that you always take for granted until you don’t have it anymore. You close your eyes and lean back against the brick wall surrounding the courtyard. There are benches scattered sporadically throughout the enclosed space but you’d rather just sit on the ground. Even the grass beneath you feels nice. You’ve brought a notebook outside with you, just in case you feel inspired. But right now it’s just haphazardly lying next to you. Your mind is blank. No song lyrics. No inspirational thoughts. Not even anger. Just peace. And for the moment, you want to enjoy it.
Just seconds later you hear a slight scuffing of feet and someone blocks your sunlight. You hope against hope that it isn’t that Jess girl who seems to have taken to following you around. Not really wanting to, you open one eye and squint up at the person standing in front of you. Then you smile.
“You’re blocking my sun.”
Rikki moves out of your way but still stands rather awkwardly off to the side of you. You can’t quite read the look on his face.
“You okay?” you question.
He nods. “I went to your room and you weren’t there. It kinda freaked me out.”
“Sit down, man,” you tell him lightly. “It hurts my neck looking up at you like this.” He does as you ask him to.
“I brought you some clothes and stuff. Thought you might need them.”
“Thanks,” you say automatically, but then you pause to think about what Rikki has just told you. “You went to my house?” you ask, turning over on your side so you can look up at him without the sun blinding you.
He nods and clears his throat. “Yeah.”
“You mean the place is still standing?” you ask. You try to chuckle but the sound dies in your throat.
“Well,” Rikki begins, smiling just a little, “it looks okay from the outside, anyway.”
You sigh. “I’d ask you to have someone take care of that,” you say, “but who knows if I’ll ever even see it again.”
“Don’t say things like that, Bret. Of course you’ll see it again. You’ll be back at home before you know it,” but he doesn’t sound terribly convincing.
You sigh and drop the subject, not really wanting to have this miserable conversation any more than Rikki does. “Where’s Bobby?” you ask, and the words are already out of your mouth before you realize that maybe that’s not a conversation you feel much like having, either.
“Home,” he replies, shrugging.
“I thought you were going to bring him. Does this mean he doesn’t want to see me?”
Rikki looks away from you and you can see now more than ever that something is seriously bothering him. He doesn’t even answer your question.
“Hey,” you say, reaching out and putting your hand lightly around his wrist. “It’s okay. You can tell me if he doesn’t want to see me. I’ll understand. I’m a big boy, Rikki. I can take it.”
“It’s not that he doesn’t want to see you,” Rikki replies, looking at you only through the corner of his eye. “I…umm…well, I forgot to ask him.” His shoulders slump as soon as the words leave his mouth. Is that guilt you see in him? Guilt towards whom?
“Weren’t thinking about me, huh?” And you can’t help but smirk a bit. Why, you aren’t quite sure. “That’s okay. I’m sure you had better things to do when you got home to him.”
Rikki chuckles just slightly and finally looks at you full on. “It’s not that at all, Bret.”
“So you were thinking about me?” The added waggle of your eyebrows is a nice added touch. But you don’t wait for him to respond. You know all you need to know now. And makes you that much more at peace than you had been before he showed up. “Talked to Smoothie today.”
“Really? How’d that go?”
“Good,” you reply, nodding. “He says he’s gonna come visit tomorrow. It feels like forever since I’ve seen that guy. I’m glad he’s coming. I want to thank him for sticking by me.” As soon as the last sentence passes over your lips you see Rikki’s face instantly harden. You hadn’t meant to intentionally hurt him. But it looks as though you have. “Rikki, man, I’m sorry,” you say, the words just coming out on top of each other before you can stop them. Expectations be damned. “That really came out wrong.”
He studies you for a minute, clearly as surprised by what you’ve just said as you are. “It’s okay,” he says finally. “I mean, you’re right. Smoothie did stand by you when no one else did.”
“Look,” you say, sighing. “This might just be the medication talking, but I do understand, you know. Whether I like it or not doesn’t matter. I completely understand why you didn’t come out here to see me more.”
He looks down at the ground and returns your sigh. “Well,” he says after a minute. “I’m here now.”
You smile a little. “Yeah, you’re here now.”
Rikki runs a hand through his hair nervously. “Am I allowed to smoke here or what?”
Suddenly you realize that you haven’t had a cigarette in months. “I don’t know,” you reply honestly. “No one’s told me I couldn’t.”
He shrugs and pulls a pack of Marlboros from his pocket, lighting one and taking a long drag. “You want one?”
Without even thinking about it, you reach out to take the one he’s already lit, your fingertips connecting with his. Rikki visibly tenses at the touch, almost dropping the cigarette. He looks up at you, his eyes locking with yours suddenly. When you smile and take the cigarette from his hand, he flinches. You sigh, not taking the drag you would like.
“What’s wrong with you today?” you ask, your eyebrows arched. Rikki has never been this jumpy.
“Nothing.” His reply is too quick. And the way he looks away from you and down towards the ground is too sudden.
“Hey,” you say, lifting his chin with the hand that isn’t holding the cigarette. “Rikki? Seriously, what’s wrong? You act like you’re afraid of me or something.” Then it occurs to you. Maybe he is afraid. Of all the things you’ve done to him. Of all the things you could still do if only you wanted to. You take your hand away from his chin, not really caring if the hurt shows in your eyes. “Are you afraid of me?” Your voice is soft, strained. And you know that he notices. You take a quick drag from the cigarette.
Rikki runs a shaky hand through his hair and bites on his bottom lip. That has always been one of his nervous habits. “Eight months ago I would have known how you wanted me to answer that question, Bret. Now, I don’t have a clue.”
“I don’t want you to tell me what you think I want to hear. I want you to tell me the truth. Are you afraid of me?” The familiar taste of cigarettes clings to your tongue. You take another drag.
“Yes.” It’s barely a whisper, but you hear it. And it shatters something important inside of you. But before you can respond, Rikki goes on. “And I’m afraid of what I still feel when I’m around you, Bret. I’m afraid of what I want to do.”
You know you probably shouldn’t, but you have to ask. “So… what do you want to do?” and you can’t quite keep the mischievous edge out of your tone.
Rikki laughs and shakes his head. “Uh-uh, Bret,” he says, smiling. “We’re not going to have this conversation.”
You laugh back and it feels good to be this way, for things to at least appear so relaxed and jovial. “Have you no sense of adventure, Rockett?” you say, still laughing.
He raises an eyebrow at you. “I think I’ve demonstrated my sense of adventure to you plenty.” He lights another cigarette and takes a deep drag. “My sense of adventure is at least partially responsible for the fact that I’m sitting here right now.”
“Bah. Your sense of adventure is what used to have you dangling out of the tour bus windows by your knees. It’s what made you agree to do a four-foot-long line of cocaine with me off of a coffee table at the Plaza.”
“I’m pushing forty, Bret,” Rikki says. “My days of hanging out of bus windows are over.”
“So you admit you have no sense of adventure,” you chide him lightly.
“I do too have a sense of adventure, asshole,” he protests, taking another drag on his cigarette.
“Yeah, whatever,” you tease.
“You’d be surprised how much of a sense of adventure I have left,” Rikki replies. “Ask me what I did before I came over here.” And then you can see his face visibly pale, and you know he’s just said something he didn’t really mean to say. That intrigues you.
“What did you do before you came here?” you ask him, chuckling softly.
He shakes his head. “Nevermind. You win. I have no sense of adventure.”
“No way, Rockett. You’re not getting out of this that easily. What did you do before you came here?” You pause. “Unless you’re about to tell me about some freaky shit you did with Bob. If that’s the case, please forgive me, but I’d rather be spared the gory details.”
He catches your eye, shooting a very serious gaze in your direction. “What I did before I came here has absolutely nothing to do with Bob at all. Trust me on that one.”
You roll your eyes. “Come on, Rikki. This game is getting old. Just tell me what you did or stop talking about it.”
“I just…I don’t know…it’s probably not the best idea if I…”
“Forget it,” you spit out, exasperated. You stand up and move to walk away from him but he grabs hold of your hand. You look down at him and he is staring back up at you, raw emotion sparkling in his eyes.
“I got myself off in your bed.” The confession is little more than a hushed whisper. And he says it so quickly that you almost doubt that you’ve heard him right. But the look on his face lets you know that he has in fact said it.
For what feels like hours but is certainly only a few seconds, you just stare down at him, completely unable to compute what he’s just told you. You feel a slight stirring in your jeans that is surprising in its unfamiliarity. “What?” you manage finally, unable to say anything else.
He lets go of your hand, rocking back on his heels and sighing. “You heard me,” he says quietly.
“You got… why?” you stutter. Last year at this time you would have laughed at him. You would have been in complete control of the situation, dominating and aloof, but now you find yourself at a total loss. He could have said anything else and you would have been more prepared for it; he could have told you that your entire relationship had been one big hallucination on your part and you wouldn’t be as shocked as you are right now.
He looks up at you, his eyebrows furrowed. “Why?” he repeats. “What do you mean, why? I don’t know why.”
“Well, there must be a reason,” you say, but you are only stalling, only hoping you will think of something better. There doesn’t have to be a reason why, and if there is, you don’t think you could answer the question if it was posed to you.
“Sure, there’s a reason,” he agrees, looking back down at the ground again. “But I mean, what do you want? Do you want me to quantify it?” He takes a breath. “Do you want some kind of mathematical equation? The feeling of your sheets and the smell of your clothes plus the memories of us together…” He trails off.
“The memories of us together,” you repeat softly, letting the words roll around on your tongue. And the straining in your jeans gets just a bit tighter. You haven’t had the chance to sit down and really remember everything that happened with you and Rikki. At least not in any in depth sort of way. And you had just assumed, because of Bobby, that Rikki hadn’t been thinking about it either. “I didn’t think…”
“What?” Rikki says, his eyes full of something between doubt and fear. “What didn’t you think?” He sounds harsh but it doesn’t really bother you. He’s using the one defense mechanism he has. And you’ve always known how to get past it.
“That you thought about me like that anymore,” you tell him honestly, licking your lips as you do. “I mean…you and Bobby…”
Rikki stands up suddenly, bringing the two of you almost nose to nose. “Yeah, me and Bobby,” he scoffs. “I love him more than you’ve ever loved anyone in your life, Bret. But two seconds with you and I’m such a mess that I’m just ready to give it all up. I hate that you can do this to me. I’ve always hated it.”
You take a step back but reach down and link your hands together. The soft touch of his flesh against your own sends an intense heat spiraling down into your stomach. “I’m not asking you to give anything up. And if you love him even half as much as I’ve always loved you, then I don’t want you to give him up.”
“That’s twice in the past two days that you’ve told me how much you love me,” Rikki says, almost absently. He’s put up that shield. You can’t read his face anymore. “Eight months ago I would have given anything for that. That’s all I ever wanted to hear you say.”
“Well I’m saying it now,” you whisper, moving back in towards him. You leave out the rest of the thought that you hope it’s not too late.
“Yeah, you’re saying it now,” Rikki says wistfully. And then he lets go of your hand, runs his through his hair. “I’ve got to get going, Bret. I have to get home.”
You clear your throat and take a step backwards. “Right, yeah,” you say, trying not to sound as disappointed as you feel. “Sure. Thanks for the clothes, by the way.”
“Not a problem,” he says, already walking towards the door.
You watch him as he walks away. As he reaches out for the door you speak. “Rikki?”
He looks back at you over his shoulder, his eyes sad. “Yeah?”
“When are you coming back?”
He sighs and looks down at the ground. “I’ll be back tomorrow, Bret,” he promises, and then he is gone.
~*~
You hear the front door slam shut, announcing Rikki’s arrival home, but you don’t move. You’ve been sitting out here on the balcony since after you’d hung up on him hours before, just you and your old friend Jack Daniels spending a quiet early summer afternoon together. As you hear his footsteps approaching, you tilt the bottle back and take another deep swallow. A glance at the bottle tells you that you’ve already consumed over half of the rich amber liquid, and with any luck, the rest will be gone soon.
“Bobby?” his voice calls out hesitantly. You don’t answer. Let him come find you for once. You don’t feel up to accommodating him right now. The door to the bedroom opens and you hear Rikki step inside. “Bobby?” he says again. “What are you doing?”
You say nothing, just take another long swig of the JD. You’ve been drinking it for so long that it doesn’t even burn as it goes down anymore. It’s quite comforting, actually. Your arm falls limply to your side over the edge of the chair you are sitting in, the bottle of whiskey hanging precariously in your fingers. You can sense Rikki’s presence and know he is standing behind you but you don’t look back at him. Not even when he puts his hands on the edge of the chair.
“You’re drinking.” It isn’t a question.
“Very perceptive,” you reply, staring over the top of the wrought-iron railing at the bright sun. You wonder, if you stare at it long enough, will its warmth just suck you in and take you away from the debacle that has become your reality? You take another drink.
“Why?”
You lean your head back and roll your eyes up at him, forcing indifference. “Why not?” You’re about to take another sip when he reaches down and steals the bottle right out of your hand. Had you not been so drunk, your reflexes would have been quicker and you would have stopped him. As it is, you just sit dumbly and watch him do it. But you can’t help yourself from saying some scathing remark. “You’re a motherfucker, you know that?”
Rikki crosses the balcony and makes what in your present condition seems like too much of a show out of pouring the remaining whiskey over the side. He remains silent.
“Aren’t you going to say anything?” you demand drunkenly, not particularly noticing nor caring about the fact that you’re slurring.
“You know damn well I won’t get into it with you when you’re smashed,” Rikki replies, his voice serious but somewhat shaky.
“I’m not smashed,” you lie. “And you won’t get into it with me at all anymore.”
Rikki stares out at the trees behind your house, his face out of your line of sight. Not that you can see too terribly well, anyway. “What’s that supposed to mean?” he asks tiredly. “I don’t want to fight with you at all, Bob, drunk or otherwise.”
“You used to fight with me,” you say, and then you frown. What the hell was that? You’re sure that wasn’t what you meant to say, but downing over half a bottle of whiskey after being sober for months had left you a bit muddled.
He turns just his face and looks at you, his expression tired and sad. “I used to slam your face into furniture, Bob.”
“That was a lot more intimate than how we’ve been acting lately,” you say, and almost laugh, despite how inappropriate that would be.
“What we did in the shower last night wasn’t intimate enough for you?” he asks, leaning back against the railing, his elbows resting on either side of him.
You shake your head very slowly, knowing that too much excess movement would be bad for you right now. “You shut me out. I’m the one that came in and pursued you, Rikki.”
“I let you fuck me didn’t I?” He doesn’t sound tired anymore. Just angry. And his words bite sharply at your heart.
You look down at your hands. “I didn’t realize you were letting me do anything. I just assumed that you wanted…”
“Shut the fuck up,” he tells you, turning away from you again. “I can’t fucking believe you. You never stop. And now…now you’re fucking drinking again.”
“I guess we’re all going back to our old ways then, aren’t we?” The words leave your mouth before you have a chance to second-guess yourself. But in your drunken state, they actually sound rather good to you.
Rikki spins around quickly, dizzying you with such a simple movement. “What the hell is that supposed to mean, Bob?”
“If you can go back to Bret, I can go back to booze.” Not the most articulate thing you’ve ever said. But it will do.
Your eyesight blurs as Rikki stalks over to you and grabs a fistful of your shirt, pulling you up to him in one quick motion. His strength is all that keeps you on your feet. “You know I hate it when you drink. Why do you fucking do this?”
You drunkenly raise your hand until it is resting against his cheek. You have to swallow hard before you can say anything. “This all happened because I drank.”
It takes a second but realization slowly swims in to Rikki’s eyes. You figure he’s probably remembering the first night the two of you ever spent together. You had been so drunk. And he had been so good. So dangerously, viciously good. You feel yourself grow hard with the memory of it.
Rikki stares at you for a moment and then pulls away from you in a jerky movement. You almost stumble, but manage to keep your footing.
“What the hell do you want me to say, Bob?” Rikki asks, his voice thick with an emotion you can’t quite put your finger on. “That I’m grateful for the fact that you’re an alcoholic?”
You close your eyes for a few seconds and then open them again, looking out over the yard. “You could just say that you’re grateful for me at all,” you say finally, your voice low.
At first he doesn’t answer, and finally you look over at him. For a few nervous seconds you can see sadness on his face and you think that he is going to say something reassuring, but then his features harden. “I’m not grateful for anything you do when you’re in this condition.” You see his jaw clench and unclench and then suddenly he is on his way back into the house, pushing the sliding door out of his way abruptly.
Without even thinking about it, you stumble after him. “Don’t fucking walk away from me,” you growl at the back of his head.
Rikki visibly stiffens and stays still for a moment before turning around to look at you, his expression icy. “Don’t fucking tell me what to do.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it, Rikki,” you say thinly. “That’s Bret’s job.”
He is on top of you in a second, knocking you backwards onto the bed, pinning your arms and legs down with his own. You’re too shocked by his actions to do anything at first. You hadn’t expected him to really break like this. “Is this what you fucking want, Bobby? Do you want it to be like this again? Will that get you to shut the hell up and stop complaining?”
“I’ll stop complaining when you stop jumping every single fucking time Bret needs something. You don’t have to go there every day. But you will. Because you want to. And that’s bullshit. You’re still his little bitch.”
Rikki’s hand closes down over your throat, pushing your head back into the bed. His thigh presses almost painfully against the bulge that is still shamelessly in the front of your jeans. “Don’t fucking do this, Bobby. Don’t take it here.”
“Get off me,” you growl, trying to get your hand out from under Rikki’s weight to pry his grip off your throat. He doesn’t give an inch.
“What’s wrong?” he asks, glaring down at you icily. “Does little Bobby suddenly not like this? You can talk shit about Bret and I all you want. But don’t you ever fucking forget that I could make you my bitch all over again if I wanted to.”
“Rikki, stop it,” you demand, unable to keep that edge of fear from slipping into your voice. You had thought that you wanted this. You were wrong. You struggle to get free of him but the alcohol has taken much of your strength. So you just lie there, breathing heavily, staring up at him with anger in your eyes. “I’m not your bitch. Let me go.”
Rikki takes his free hand and brushes it harshly against the front of your jeans. You inhale deeply. “Feels to me like your body’s betraying you, Bob.”
“Maybe it is,” you spit out. “But it’s just lust. Not love.”
He releases his grip on your throat and you can see his arm rising and then falling in an arc towards your face, and it is a full five seconds between hearing the sound of the back of his hand connect with your skin and actually feelings its impact. The whiskey has done a good job of dulling the pain, but not the shame you feel.
“What did you just fucking say to me?” he demands bitterly.
“You fucking heard me,” you say. You’re not going to give in to this. You can’t. Not now. Not again.
“Just lust?” he repeats, his tone cruel and cold. “Is that what you said?”
“Just because you can make my body like this doesn’t mean you can make my heart like it,” you say, not caring how ridiculous you sound.
He laughs. “You’re becoming one of those sappy drunks now, I see,” he says. “Pathetic.”
“I may be drunk,” you tell him, “but given the way you run whenever Bret snaps his fingers, I’d say you’re the pathetic one.”
For just a minute, the look on his face plainly tells you that what you’ve just said has hurt him. He looks almost ready to burst into tears. And then the next thing you know, his fist is connecting squarely with the center of your face, a bright flash of pain that even all of that alcohol cannot dull.
And then you can feel him climbing off of you in a hurry. Through the tears in your eyes you can see him backing away from the bed, his fist still half-clenched. “You motherfucker,” he says, his voice choked.
“You’re gonna stand there and call me names?” you spit out, wiping at the blood dripping from your nose. Your head is pounding and you know for certain that it is from more than just the alcohol. It takes all of your effort to sit up on the bed, and even then you have to lean heavily on your arms to stay upright. “You fucking hit me, but I’m the bad guy? Right. That makes so much sense.”
Rikki is breathing heavily, his fist flexing almost involuntarily at his side. It looks to you like something inside of him has finally snapped. Something he’s been fighting off for eight long months. And it makes you sick to your stomach. “I swore I would never do this to you again,” he mumbles, not looking at you at all. “I can’t do this. I won’t do this.” He looks up suddenly and yells, “Why the fuck do you want me to do this?”
“I’m sorry…I didn’t want…”
“For eight fucking months I’ve been fighting off every urge I’ve ever had to become to you what Bret was to me. Can you understand that, Bob? Can you even fucking fathom what that means? I don’t want to be like him. I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want you to end up living in the hell that I live in every day knowing that the person you love only wants to hurt you. Jesus Christ, Bobby! Don’t make me be like him!”
He’s shaking now and you force yourself to your feet, stumbling towards him. You had no idea that he felt like this. None. But how could you have? The two of you don’t really spend a lot of time talking about the abuse in your sordid pasts. It’s been a subject that has been glossed over for as long as you can remember. Neither of you have ever been quite comfortable enough with it to discuss it openly. With no regard for your drunkenness, your pounding head, or your bleeding nose, you take Rikki in your arms and pull him close to you. He was the one to hit you, but it’s clear that you’ve somehow managed to hurt him worse than he has hurt you.
~*~
You roll slowly over onto your back, vaguely wondering how long you’ve been lying in your bed. The medication they’re giving you seems to do little besides making you dizzy and nervous and sick, and so every time you take it, you find yourself crawling onto the bed and trying to ride out the unpleasant part.
You frown at the ceiling. Where is everyone? Both Rikki and Smoothie promised to come visit today, but as of yet neither of them have arrived. Not even the doctor has been in to see you today. You wonder if this is what it feels like to be an orphan.
As if on cue, there is a knock at the door, and you call out to whomever it is to come in. A few seconds later, Smoothie walks into your line of sight.
You force yourself into a sitting position, ignoring the protests from your head and stomach. Smoothie doesn’t look a bit different from the last time you saw him. You ignore the voice in your head that tells you don’t know when that even was. “Hi,” you say finally.
Smoothie smiles nervously. “Hey,” he says. “How are you doing?”
“Medicated,” you tell him, shrugging slightly. “It’s good to see you.”
“Likewise,” he replies. He makes no move to come any closer to you. You can see it in his eyes that he’s not really sure what he’s doing.
“You don’t have to be afraid of me,” you say, trying to keep your voice light. “I don’t bite. I promise. Come sit down.” You point towards the chair that is placed by your bed.
Smoothie walks over towards it slowly, laughing deep in his throat. You’re fairly certain that he’s laughing at himself and you’re not really sure how that makes you feel. Smoothie has never been nervous around you. You don’t want it to start now. “I’m sorry,” he apologizes, sitting down and leaning forward a bit in the chair. “I’m just…this is really fucking surreal, man. I sat here for three months and you never said a fucking word to me. And now I walk in here and you’re just like…well…normal again.”
“Or as normal as I’ve ever been,” you chide him. “And I’ve never been very fucking normal.”
“Right,” Smoothie replies, laughing a bit more freely now. “But seriously, it’s good to see you awake and everything. It’s a nice change from how you were.”
“How was I?” you ask seriously, hoping that the answer doesn’t scare you as much as you think it might. “I mean, Rikki just tells me that I wasn’t responsive at all. Is that true? I didn’t say anything?”
Smoothie shrugs and looks down at his hands. He picks at an imaginary piece of lint on his jeans. “At first you talked a little. But it was all just nonsense. About a diary. And Rikki. And…well…it was kind of hard to make out sometimes. And then one day I came in and you had just stopped talking. That’s when I called Bobby and told him that he and Rikki should come see you. None of us could find CC at the time or I would have tried to get his ass up here too. It scared the shit out of me, man. It was like you were dead.”
“Not the first time I’ve heard that these past few days,” you say quietly. “That’s exactly what Rikki said, too.”
“Yeah, where is that shithead, anyway?” Smoothie asks, obviously desperate for a change of subject.
You look down at the comforter. “I don’t know,” you reply honestly. “He said he’d be here today, but I haven’t heard from him.”
Smoothie waves a hand in the air dismissively. “Eh, I’m sure he’ll show up,” he says reassuringly. “You know how those two are.” As these last words leave his mouth, Smoothie’s expression becomes somber. “Or maybe you don’t know. I’m sorry, Bret, that was stupid of me to—“
“It’s cool,” you interrupt. “Yeah. I know.” You chew on the idea for a few minutes. You’re not really surprised or bothered by the fact that Smoothie knows about Bobby and Rikki, nor by the fact that he seems to consider the situation perfectly normal. Smoothie has always been good with bizarre situations; years of being on the road with the band had taught him that nothing is impossible. He’d been up to his own share of insanity; dimly you can recall some story about a banana.
Smoothie clears his throat in an obvious effort to break the stifling silence in the room. “So… what have the doctors told you?”
You shrug, grateful for the change of topic. “Nothing, really,” you tell him honestly. “They have me on some kind of crazy pills that make me sick and dizzy all the time. I guess they’re supposed to make me… you know, not see shit.” You shake your head at how insane that actually sounds.
“Well, at least they’re doing something to make you better.”
“Yeah, it seems that for the longest time I thought Rikki was dead. I’d like to refrain from that ever happening again.” You trail off and look around the room absently. “I really wonder where Rikki is, though. He said he’d be here. It’s not like him to just not show up.”
“You could call him,” Smoothie offers, shrugging his shoulders. “But I’m sure that he’s fine.”
“Nah,” you reply, shaking your head. “I don’t want Bobby to get pissed off or anything. And besides, they’ve got time limits on the phone calls and shit here. It’s like prison or something, I swear.”
Smoothie looks at you like he wants to ask you something but then he doesn’t. Instead, he says simply, “I could call him if you’d like. Just to make sure everything is okay.”
You smile probably a bit brighter than is necessary. “Would you do that? That would be awesome.”
“Sure.” He pulls out his cell phone and quickly dials the number. He holds the phone up to his ear and waits. It seems like forever before he finally says something. And when he does, it’s the last thing you want to hear. “Hey, Bob. It’s Smoothie.” He flashes you a nervous grin. “Yeah, I’m okay. I was just calling to see what’s going on with Rikki. I’m up here with Bret and…” he trails off like he’s been interrupted. The smile on his face falls abruptly. “Oh, okay. Yeah. Not a problem. Hang on.” And then, before you really know what’s happening, he’s taking the phone away from his ear and handing it to you. “Bobby says he wants to talk to you.”
You don’t like the sound of that, but you don’t really have a choice. You take the phone from him, glancing down at it apprehensively before holding it up to your ear. “Bob?” you say uncertainly.
“Hi, Bret,” comes Bobby’s voice, sounding strained.
What the hell are you supposed to say now? “What’s up?” Not the most intellectual line, but it will do.
“Not much,” he replies thinly. “Listen, I just wanted to let you know, Bret. Rikki won’t be out there today. Maybe not tomorrow, either.”
You feel yourself stiffen and you don’t care that Smoothie can see that. “Oh,” you say. “Why’s that?”
“Well, we have things to do,” he says. “And we both agree that it’s best he doesn’t get in the habit of coming up there every day.”
You raise an eyebrow and Smoothie gives you a questioning look. “Oh, you have,” you say, not quite sure what else to say. The surge of anger you’re expecting just doesn’t seem to be coming.
“Yes,” Bobby says. “So, anyway, you’ll see him tomorrow or the day after that, maybe. All right?” His tone makes it clear that he’s trying his hardest to sound authoritarian about this.
“You sound as though you’ve got a stick up your ass, Bob,” you say then, and you almost laugh when you realize that such a thing isn’t impossible. Smoothie looks at you in something bordering on horror and then he quickly turns his eyes away.
“What did you just say to me?” Bobby questions, clearly angered. And somehow his anger only makes you want to laugh that much harder.
“You heard what I said. What the fuck is your problem? If Rikki doesn’t want to see me he can tell me his damn self. He doesn’t need you to…”
“You don’t have the first clue what Rikki needs, Bret. So don’t even go there. I tried to be nice about this. You didn’t have to take it here. You could have just accepted…”
“The fact that Rikki isn’t man enough to tell me himself?” you interrupt. “What the hell ever, Bob. I’m sorry I fucking asked Smoothie to call. Tell your little wifey that he doesn’t have to come back. I’m fine without him.” The words rush out of your mouth but as soon as you say them you want to take them back. You aren’t fine without Rikki. You’ve never been fine without Rikki. If only your damn pride would let you admit that.
“I’m sure he’ll really appreciate that message, Bret.” Bobby sounds almost triumphant as he replies. And you figure you’ve probably given him exactly what he needs to be able to keep Rikki away from here forever. You hate yourself for it. How could you be so stupid?
“Look, Bobby,” you begin, trying to backtrack through the mess you have made. “Can I talk to him? Please?”
“No,” he says firmly. “Rikki’s sleeping. Goodbye, Bret.” And then you hear nothing but dial tone.
It takes all you have not to send the cell phone careening across the room to shatter against one of the walls. If it were your phone, you would do it. But it belongs to Smoothie so you reluctantly hand it back to him and then look away, wishing for something or someone to take you away from the horrible debacle that your life has become.
“That didn’t seem to go very well,” Smoothie says in his trademark even tone. All of his time spent in close quarters with you and the other guys has taught him how to be everything from a bartender to a psychologist.
You sigh. “Did you ever just stop and think, ‘there is no way this is really my life’?”
“Not so much since I stopped touring with you psychos,” he replies. “But sure, everyone has.”
“I don’t even know what to say, man,” you tell him seriously. “I mean… god. I don’t know what I mean.”
“Well, why don’t you start by telling me what just happened?” Smoothie suggests gently, in that voice that always sounds so understanding and logical that you have to trust it.
You shrug. “I don’t know,” you say. “Bobby says that Rikki won’t be here today. “They, ah… they don’t think it’s a good idea for him to come up here every day, or something.”
“Rikki’s your best friend, Bret,” Smoothie says seriously. “Do you really think he’s going to stop coming to see you?”
“Given that he’s practically in charge of my existence, no, I don’t,” you reply. “But that doesn’t mean it isn’t going to be trouble.”
“Well,” Smoothie pauses, seeming to have some sort of inner debate over what his next words should be. “Why wouldn’t they want Rikki to come up here?”
“I’m sure it’s not Rikki,” you tell him, and you really are confident in this proclamation. “It’s just Bobby being an asshole.”
“But still,” Smoothie goes on, shrugging. “Why wouldn’t Bobby want Rikki to come here? He knows how close you two are. Why would he keep you two apart?”
You just stare at him for several seconds, letting the fact that Smoothie really has no idea what’s going on sink in. You had just assumed that, since he knew about Bobby and Rikki, he would know about you and Rikki. This is a slightly unsettling turn of events.
“What?” Smoothie asks, clearly in the dark to the largest part of this situation. “Why are you looking at me like I’m nuts, Bret?”
“You really don’t know,” you mumble, looking away from him. “Holy shit. I never thought…”
“What don’t I know?”
You look back up at him then, deciding that it is pointless to censor what has happened any longer. Sooner or later it would all end up in the open, anyway. “I was with Rikki long before Bobby and him got together.”
For the first time in as long as you can remember, Smoothie looks utterly shocked. He’s never been one to just end up speechless. But this has done it.
“I think this is the first time I’ve ever seen you at a loss for something to say,” you say then, chuckling nervously.
“I’m out of practice,” he replies, smiling a little. He already seems to be accepting the idea and getting over the initial shock, just like he always has.
“I suppose while we’re on the topic, I should add that my parents know about this, and neither of them want to see or speak to me ever again,” you go on, running a hand through your hair. Suddenly you are infinitely grateful that Smoothie is here; Smoothie might be the only person who has ever been able to take everything you had to dish out and then some.
“This is all very Jerry Springer, Bret,” Smoothie replies. “I wish I could offer you some sort of solution, but… wow.”
“Well,” you say, considering your words carefully, “as far as my parents, I’m not even thinking about that right now. There’s too much other shit to wade through, and besides, if they’re ever going to change their minds, it’s not going to be now.”
“That’s very sensible,” Smoothie agrees. “It’s you you need to be focusing on right now, anyway.”
“Smoothie, ever the patient psychologist,” you joke.
“Just because I’m not working for you anymore doesn’t mean my job is done,” he replies seriously.
~*~
You stare up at Bobby from your spot on the bed. You’ve been lying here almost continuously since you awoke this morning. Bobby hasn’t really given you the option to move. But after the way you broke down in front of him last night, you can’t blame him. Maybe all of this shit with Bret really was too much for you to handle on your own. Maybe you did need to just take a couple of days off. It’s sad, you think. Bret has only been conscious for three days and already his presence has worn you down. You hadn’t thought that he would still have this kind of effect on you.
Bobby sits down next to you on the bed, tossing the phone he has just been using on the nightstand. He smiles at you warmly and bends down to kiss your forehead. You close your eyes and let him. “Thank you for telling him that I was asleep,” you say when he pulls back.
“My pleasure,” he replies, scooting further onto the bed and curling up beside you. His chin rests just inches away from you. And you can’t deny that you feel remarkably safe with him, here like this. You love Bret. But it isn’t at all like the way in which you love Bobby. You don’t stop to let yourself wonder which was is better. There is no better or worse. Just different.
“Did he sound okay, though?” You can’t keep yourself from asking.
Bobby seems surprisingly unphased by the question. “Smoothie’s there with him. And judging by the way he was able to yell at me, I’d say yes, Bret sounded just fine.”
You smile in spite of yourself. “I didn’t figure that he’d take it too well.”
“It doesn’t matter how he takes it, sweetheart. I don’t ever want to see you as tortured as you looked last night. You need to think about yourself. If Bret can’t handle that, it’s his problem.”
You sigh. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Bob,” you say seriously. “But I think we need to cut Bret a little slack in the ‘what he can’t handle’ department. You know? I mean, look what the guy’s been through.” You take a breath. “And before you say anything about what he put me through, yeah, I know. But still, he’s just been told he lost all those months of his life. He’s in a mental hospital. I can’t even imagine what this is like for him.”
Bob sighs back at you. “Yeah, I know,” he says, sounding reluctant. “I think the guy’s a prick, you know that. But I do feel bad for him.”
Somehow, having Bobby say this makes you feel even more terrible than you already do. If Bret’s situation is so horrible that even Bobby is sympathetic, then what the hell are you doing here, curled up all cozy in bed while Bret rots away in a hospital? You close your eyes tightly in an effort to erase the image of him alone in that dismal room. “I just want him to get better, Bob,” you say finally, your voice low.
“I know you do, babe,” he replies gently. “So do I. But you have to be prepared for the very realistic possibility that he might never get better. Bret’s… he’s always been Bret.”
“He hasn’t seemed very Bret lately,” you tell him. “He’s been… I don’t know, Bob, he’s been nice.”
Bobby sighs. “You can never be too careful with him, Rikki.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know what I mean. Just be careful. Bret’s very… clever.”
“Clever or not, he’s seemed very sincere the last couple of days, Bobby. His actions have been pretty out of the ordinary. Kind of confusing. But I can’t help but hope that he’s really trying to change now that all of this has happened.”
“You know, honestly,” he says to you, brushing a stray piece of hair off of your forehead, “I hope that he’s trying to change, too. For his sake and for yours. I don’t want him to be able to hurt you anymore, Rikki. And if he’s putting up a front just for you…well…” he trails off, shaking his head. You can see that he doesn’t want to argue. And really, neither do you. You just aren’t up for it. “I just don’t want to see him ruin anything for us, Rikki. You know what I’m saying?”
You nod slowly, thinking seriously about what Bobby has just said to you. “He can only ruin things if we let him.”
“I think we came awfully close to letting him ruin everything last night.”
Brutally honest, that was Bobby. You had to at least respect him for that. “I really am sorry.” You reach up and touch the dark purple bruise on his face. “I can’t believe I let things get that out of control.”
“It’s okay,” he says softly, leaning into your touch. “I shouldn’t have gotten drunk. It was all really stupid.”
“But what if it happens again?” You have to ask. Even if you aren’t sure that you’ll like his answer. “It was so easy to slip back into that role, Bob. How can we be so sure that we won’t end up back there? I don’t want to lose you but…”
“Why is it even an issue, Rikki?” he asks, tension creeping into his tone. “If you don’t want to lose me, then don’t.”
“It’s not that simple, Bob,” you say tiredly, but you can’t think of anything logical to follow it with.
“It should be,” he says. “Seriously. I don’t see why this is even a topic of discussion. We’ve been together for a long time, and no one should be able to shake that, not Bret or anyone else.”
You sigh. You want to tell him that he’s right, of course he’s right, that the two of you have been together for a long time and that the foundation of your relationship is solid, but no words come out. “I know,” you say finally, and although you know that you should say more – a lot more – you remain quiet.
“You don’t sound very sure of yourself,” Bobby says quietly.
“I’m not very sure of myself,” you reply. “Nothing’s certain right now. Bret was supposed to never wake up, that was supposed to be for sure, but it’s not. Nothing’s sure.”
“I love you,” he says. “That’s for sure.
“I love you, too,” you say with a sigh.
“So then why can’t you promise me that we’re going to be okay?”
“People like us don’t make promises.”
Bobby’s face visibly saddens. “That was one of the most rockstar things I’ve ever heard you say, Rikki. And you know as well as I do that it’s complete bullshit. We’ve been making all the promises in the world for the last eight months. What’s so different now?”
“You really want me to answer that?” You voice comes out more on edge that you had expected. And you immediately want to apologize. But something stops you. If the relationship you have with Bobby is really so strong, if it’s going to stand the test of time like he so obviously wants it to, then he needs to hear these things.
“Right,” he says timidly. “Bret’s awake now. That changes everything.”
“It’s not just that he’s awake,” you reply, sighing. You had been relatively enjoying your day prior to this. Leave it to Bret to fuck everything up with just one phone call. “He keeps saying that he loves me, Bobby.” You can’t look him in the eye when you say it. But you can feel the bed move at the way he automatically recoils.
“What?” Bobby’s voice can’t even be defined as a whisper. It’s less than that. More breathy. More hushed. He sounds devastated.
Still unable to look at him, you fumble absently with a string on one of the pillowcases. “He sounds so sincere when he says it, Bobby. And I’ve waited so long to hear something like this from him. I don’t know if I totally believe him. But you have to see how this complicates things.”
“Yeah,” he mumbles, that devastation still the main emotion you can hear. “It’s all perfectly clear.”
“No, it’s not perfectly clear,” you say, the edge in your voice sharper. “If it was perfectly clear, then I’d know what the hell to do.”
Bobby pulls away from you with an exaggerated sigh and sits cross-legged on the bed, resting his chin in his hands. For some reason you find the sigh comical. “What is it you’re telling me?” he asks. “That Bret comes back from the dead all these months later, says the magic words, and now… and now what? Suddenly you can’t promise me anything? Suddenly our relationship is on the line for reasons that have nothing to do with us?”
You close your eyes for a few seconds and then open them, looking up at the ceiling. You’re not quite sure how to respond, not because you don’t know the answer, but because you do know it. Bobby’s assessment was an accurate one. “I don’t know,” you say finally. “I don’t know anything anymore.”
“Look,” Bobby says. “If you want to take care of your friend Bret, I commend that. He needs a friend right now more than I can possibly imagine. And if you want to go see him and take care of him and try to help him get back on his feet, then I’m behind you. I’m with you every step of the way.” He pauses. “But if you’re telling me that the fate of this relationship is undetermined because like always he just walked in and stole the show, then…”
You look at him, frowning. “Then what, Bob? What? You’re going to leave me? You’re going to walk out? Don’t hold these threats over my head. I’ve got enough stress on me.”
“I didn’t put that stress on you,” he returns shortly. “But you’re more than willing to hold it over my head.”
“That isn’t fair…”
“Nothing about this is fucking fair, Rikki,” he shouts, standing up and walking to one side of the room. He’s as far away from you as he can get without actually leaving. Part of you can’t really blame him for reacting this way. That same part is beginning to wish you had never said anything in the first place. “You think I want to leave you? I don’t think you have any concept of what I’ve given up for you. This isn’t just some stupid relationship to pass the time to me.”
“I didn’t say…”
“I was in this for the long haul,” he continues, not paying any attention to your interruption. You just stare at him mutely from the bed as he paces up and down across the carpet, his eyes never leaving you. “I gave up more than you could ever imagine to be here with you. I don’t have my own fucking house. I never see my kids anymore. I haven’t spoken to the mother of my children, the woman I spent the best years of my life with, since I moved in here. I had a life before all of this. I had things I could have done if Poison ever broke up. And now look at me. My sun fucking rises and sets with you, Rikki. And you are perfectly okay with just tossing me aside because good old Bret woke up. It’d be easy for you to leave this behind, to leave me behind. Because you didn’t give up anything to get here!”
“I gave up Bret,” you spit out, immediately wishing that you hadn’t. Bobby grows very still, his eyes wide with a completely undefinable emotion. For a few seconds you aren’t sure if he’s going to say something scathing or just rip you to shreds. And you know he’d be able to. In spite of your dominance games, physically, he’s always been the stronger one. And then a tiny, unreadable grin spreads across his lips.
“Then go back to him,” he chuckles, knowing that what he’s saying isn’t funny in the least.
You favor him with a look. “Bob, I’m not just going to ‘go back to him’,” you say, your voice sounding thin and old to your ears. “It’s not as simple as all that, and you know it.”
“It sure sounds that simple,” he spits back at you vehemently. “You make it sound as though you did me this big favor by staying with me, Rikki. Like you gave up the best thing you ever had, when in fact I just saved you from the worst thing you ever had. That day at the hospital I probably should have just walked, I should have just left you there to clean up this mess yourself, because this mess was never my fault. It was Bret’s, and it was yours. But I stayed anyway, Rikki, because I loved you, and I’m still here for that reason, and all he has to do is say three words and suddenly everything I’ve given up for you might not be enough? What the fuck do you expect me to say to that?”
“God damn it, Bob, I can’t do this right now,” you tell him. “I just can’t, okay? I can’t be expected to take care of Bret and figure out what to do about the problems between us. It’s all too much. What do I expect? Honestly? I expect you to shut up and be patient and stay by me because if you’re so in love with me, then that’s exactly what you should be doing!”
“Oh,” he says bitterly. “So you want me to play the bitch.”
You look at him sharply. “That’s an awful thing to say.”
“It’s also the truth,” he replies evenly. “With or without physical scars to show for it, you want me to sit here and be your whipping boy.”
“No,” you correct him harshly. “I want you to sit here and be the boyfriend that you say you so badly want to be.”
“And what am I going to get in return?” he asks, turning to look out the sliding glass door that separates the balcony from your room. It sounds like the fight is slowly draining out of him. You’re not sure how you feel about this, how you’re supposed to feel about it. “You say Bret loves you. So that changes everything. Seems to me it only changes things if you love him too. So…what is it, Rikki? Enlighten me. Tell me what you have to say.”
“You know I love him,” is your quick reply. “You know I’ve always loved him. Me loving him is like you loving Michelle. Some things don’t go away, Bob.”
He turns back to you, his eyes dark and weary. “But some things do.”
You can only stare silently at him in response. There aren’t enough words to say what you’re trying to tell him. Or, if there are, you just can’t seem to find the right ones. You don’t want what you and Bobby have together to come to an end. You do love him. And you know that he knows that. But you also don’t want to have to deal with trying to maintain a relationship while you figure out what is going on with Bret. Maybe it’s stupid of you to still love Bret, to still think that there is some chance of you having something normal with him. But you can’t control what your heart has decided to feel.
“I can pack my things tonight,” he says then, walking towards the door. “You’ll be free of me by the morning.” The absolute indifference of his tone breaks your heart in ways that you didn’t think were possible.
“Bobby,” you choke out, not sure what else to say. You don’t want him to leave you. He has kept you steady through all of this. Why can’t he just understand. But then, how can he understand? You don’t even understand what is happening yourself. “Please…I didn’t mean…”
He stops and turns to you slowly, his hand on the frame of the door. “Look at me and tell me that you love me and you won’t leave me to go running back to Bret. Tell me you love me more than you ever loved him. Tell me what I give you is enough.”
You try to hold his gaze but can’t. You end up staring at a spot on the floor somewhere near his feet. You don’t look up when he says goodbye or when he exits the room, softly closing the door behind him.
~*~
You open your eyes and nearly jump out of your skin when you realize that there is someone in the room with you. It takes you a few seconds to figure out that it’s only Rikki, sitting on the chair, one knee up, the other leg hanging to the ground. You frown, sitting up in bed. “What time is it?” you ask, still too shrouded in sleep to say anything else.
“Nearly ten,” he replies. “I know that’s kind of early for you, but I thought maybe they’d be forcing you to get up earlier.”
You shake your head. “Nah, they kind of leave me alone.” You pause, trying to wake up more. “How long have you been here?”
He shrugs. “Almost an hour, I guess.”
“You should have woken me up.”
“You looked peaceful,” he replies. “I can’t remember the last time I saw you looking peaceful. I didn’t want to ruin that.” His voice is soft, almost wistful, and for the first time you notice that he looks terribly sad.
“Hey, you okay?” you ask him uncertainly. He certainly doesn’t look okay.
“Been better,” he responds with a sigh. “How are you?”
“Nevermind me,” you say. “I’m fine. You look like someone just shot your dog, Rikki.” You almost chuckle at how much more this cliché means to someone who loves animals as much as he does. “Come on. What’s wrong?”
“I’m really sorry I didn’t come up here yesterday.” He’s clearly avoiding the question and you don’t like it. Rikki was never good at hiding things from you. You force yourself not to think about how untrue that is. He hid Bobby for a hell of a long time.
“It’s fine,” you tell him, shrugging nonchalantly. “Bobby said you needed a break. He was probably right. And besides, Smoothie was here.”
Rikki looks down, picking at something you can’t quite see on the knee of his jeans. Then he stops, resting his chin on his knee and just barely looking at you. “I’m still sorry. I promised you I’d be here.”
“Rikki, it’s okay, really,” you repeat yourself. His attitude is starting to worry you. It’s not like him to be this forlorn around you. “I survived. No harm done.”
“But I shouldn’t lie to you.” He turns his eyes from you again, rocking back and forth in the chair. It isn’t much of a movement, just barely perceptible. But seeing it makes you wonder which one of you is the crazy one now. “I won’t do it again.”
Without thinking about it you get out of your bed and pad over to Rikki, getting down on your knees in front of him. You take both of his hands in your own and force him to look at you. You choose to ignore how odd it is that you are suddenly the one trying to make sure that he is okay. “You didn’t lie to me. You don’t have to come in here and apologize for something that Bobby made you…”
“He left me,” he whimpers, not seeming to hear anything that you’ve said to him. Even his hands are almost limp in your grasp. “He left me.” And then he starts to cry.
For a few seconds you can only sit there and watch him cry, certain the shock you’re feeling is written all over your face. It’s not so much that you’re surprised that Rikki is capable of breaking down like this – he’d always been emotional. But you’re surprised that he’s doing this in front of you, letting his pretense of strength fall so completely. “What do you mean he left you?” you ask finally, your voice so low that it’s almost a whisper.
Rikki laughs mirthlessly through his tears. “What do you mean, what do I mean? He left me. There’s nothing else to explain,” he says, his voice choked.
“Well… I mean, sure there’s more to explain,” you say, tripping over your words. “What do you mean he left you? Just like that? What the fuck happened?” You find yourself impossibly angry at Bobby, even though you think that this is what you have wanted all along.
Rikki shakes his head. “I don’t know. Everything’s just so fucked up.”
You can’t argue with his statement. “Yeah, it is,” you agree. “But that still doesn’t explain why he just up and left you. I mean…” You trail off.
“He can’t handle this,” Rikki says. “I guess I can’t really blame him. I mean, I’m not so sure I can handle this, either. But I guess I have to.”
“Can’t handle this?” you repeat dumbly.
“Any of this. You waking up. Me coming here to see you.” He draws a shaky breath. “Me still loving you. Me not being able to promise him that I’d stay.”
Again you find yourself staring up at Rikki in something of a shocked silence. You hadn’t expected it to come to this. At least not this soon. You knew that you had a certain amount of control over Rikki. You probably always would. But still, you are surprised by this sudden turn of events.
“Please stop looking at me like I’ve lost my mind,” he tells you. “I feel crazy enough as it is.”
“You’re not crazy,” you assure him, forcing yourself to regain some sense of composure. “But…I don’t know…I’m really surprised by this, Rikki.”
“So am I,” he admits. “Although I guess I shouldn’t be. I should have seen this coming. Maybe I did see it coming. I don’t know. I probably shouldn’t have told him that I still loved you. But I didn’t want to lie to him.”
“You know,” you say, chuckling slightly. “Maybe you should have told me first.”
“What?” he asks, confusion marring the lines in his forehead. His tears are finally beginning to stop.
“The other day in the courtyard. I said I loved you. I would have kissed you. But you all but ran out of there. Why didn’t you say something to me then?”
“I didn’t know what to do, Bret. I didn’t want Bobby to leave. I still don’t want him to be gone. I just…I don’t know anything, anymore.”
You take a breath and arrange yourself so that you are seated cross-legged on the floor. “So,” you say, trying to process everything that has just happened. “You told Bobby that you still love me, and so Bobby left. Only you didn’t really want Bobby to leave and you regret telling him that. Is that right?”
Rikki sighs. “I don’t know. No.” He hesitates. “It’s not that I regret telling him. It’s the truth, and painful or not, I think we all deserve at least that much. I just… I didn’t want to hurt him. He doesn’t deserve it.”
You want to argue with that, but you can’t. He’s right. Out of the three of you, Bobby really is the one who doesn’t deserve it. But that doesn’t make you any less angry at him for hurting Rikki, because Rikki is the one you love. Not Bobby. “I’ve only been awake for a few days,” you say. “If he left you so quickly, didn’t stand by you at all, then maybe it’s for the best that it happened this way.”
“I think it’s safe to assume that nothing that is currently happening is what’s best for any of us,” Rikki says dryly. “Bobby’s… heartbroken, and gone. Despite who did that actual leaving, he’s the one who got left. And me? I’m confused. I’ve been abandoned, whether that’s what I secretly wanted or not.” He draws a breath. “And you, Bret. Jesus. I don’t even know where to begin with how very much your situation is not ‘what’s best’ for you.”
You just stare up at him, not entirely sure how to respond to what he’s just said. It’s still too early in the morning to be having a conversation like this one. You want to be able to help in some way, but you just don’t know how to do that. What you finally settle for saying is, “what are you confused about, Rikki?”
He eyes you warily for a moment and you can’t help but think that he is wondering if you are serious or not. If you really want to talk like this with him. You can’t blame him. As physically close as you and Rikki have always been, talking was never one of your strong points with him. Eventually, he shrugs. “It would be easier to say what I’m not confused about,” he tells you. “That list would be shorter.”
“Okay. So what aren’t you confused about?”
“Nothing,” he says. And you can hear it in his voice and see it in his eyes that he is telling you the truth. “There isn’t a damn thing going on in my life right now that I can honestly say I understand. I don’t understand how, after eight months, you’re just suddenly yourself again. Or at least closer to yourself. I don’t understand how Bobby could just leave me like this, not after all that he and I have been through. I don’t understand why you still have the power to dictate every fucking thing that happens in my life whether you know that you're doing it or not. And I certainly don’t understand why you have chosen to start telling me you love me now, instead of saying it months ago when I needed to hear it.”
You can’t say anything for several minutes. You just sit and stare at Rikki, a million thought spilling through your mind. Comforting words seem pointless. How can you comfort him when you are part of the equation that has caused him so much pain? You would like to be able to take his confusion away. He deserves that. But you can’t do it. You’re too confused yourself.
“Rikki,” you say finally. “Would it make you feel better or worse to know that I’m just as confused as you are?”
He sighs, but smiles slightly. “Well, misery loves company. I just wish there was something we could be sure of.”
“Well,” you say, “at the risk of sounding ridiculous, I’m sure that I meant what I said. I do love you, Rikki.”
“I love you, too,” he says, no hesitance, just raw honesty. The way he says it leaves no doubt in your mind that he is completely serious, and this is as scary as it is reassuring. “But I don’t know what to do with it. I don’t know how to…” He pauses, obviously struggling to find the right words. “I don’t know how to practically apply the fact that I love you.”
You can’t help but smile a little at the way he speaks of emotions as if they were scientific equations. “Saying it is practically applying it,” you say. “What more do you think you need to do?”
“I don’t know,” he says helplessly. “I guess you’re right. I’m just so used to… I mean, I was so used to having to show you…”
“Rikki,” you say seriously. “Listen to me. Really hear me. Things are different now. You don’t have to bleed to prove yourself to me anymore.”
“I hear you,” he replies, his voice audibly strained. “But that doesn’t make it any easier to believe you. Whether I let you do it or not, you’ve left scars on me. And because of it, I’ve left scars on Bobby. And with this many scars, I’m having a hard time digging my way through them to come out clean on the other side.”
Your first reaction is to chuckle. Rikki has always attempted to sound so philosophical. Unfortunately, more often than not, he has failed. It would be easy to laugh at him. But you can’t. Because you’re too busy mulling over in your mind what he meant by one of his comments. After several seconds of just staring at him you finally voice your concern. "What do you mean you’ve left scars on Bobby?”
Rikki immediately pulls back into himself. And it’s so obvious that you can actually watch as his face hardens and he draws away from you. He stands up and starts to pace the room. “I’d forgotten that you didn’t know,” he begins. But then he stops, shaking his head. He says nothing.
“What don’t I know?” you ask, prying. Attempting to be as unobtrusive as you possibly can. The way he has withdrawn makes you worry about his answer. Because if he’s about to tell you what you think he is…well…you’re not sure you can handle it.
With his back to you, Rikki takes a deep breath. “You and I had only been together a couple of weeks when I first hooked up with Bob.”
This confession hurts a bit but you say nothing. You want him to continue. You figure this probably won’t be the worst thing you’re going to hear.
“I’m not even sure how it happened. I found him drunk, dragged him back to the room, and he just started going on and on about Michelle. About how she had been so amazing and how no one could do what she did.” He pauses, turns back to look at you. His eyes are far away but you can see the tears at the corners of them. Another small piece of your heart shatters for him. For the fact that you have somehow done this to him without even realizing it. “It turns out she was all dominatrix-like with him. And he liked it. And the moment he said that, I knew. I knew that I could do to him what you were so easily able to do to me. So I did. And it didn’t stop until you wound up in here. That’s when everything changed. That’s when we became a normal couple. Or as normal as we could be. And now…” he trails off, staring at the floor. He doesn’t need to finish the thought for you to understand.
~*~
You pull into the driveway of the house you have shared with Rikki for months, and you know it is likely the last time you will ever do this again. You were out of the house, with most of your things, before he’d even woken up, but you had only gone into town, wandered around blankly until you were sure enough time had passed that he had woken up and gone running to Bret. And, just as you had known, his car is indeed not parked in front of the house now.
You sigh as you turn off the engine and climb out of the car, standing still for a few long seconds before making any move to go inside. This house had rapidly become a constant that you took for granted, a place where you just assumed you’d always be, or at least a place that if you ever were to leave, it would be with Rikki.
But that is over now. Rikki is gone and this house is no longer your home, just like every other place you’ve ever called home. With another sigh, you force your feet to move and you make your way to the front door. You find that he has left it unlocked, which is unusual, but you don’t doubt that it was an easy oversight in a hurry to get to Bret. This last thought turns your stomach as you enter the house.
It already feels different, even though you know that the house itself has not changed. The air somehow feels thinner; it’s harder to breathe. Part of you is almost surprised by how difficult this all is, by how your reaction to the sudden loss is so immense that it is actually manifesting itself physically. Strong was always among the first adjectives that people would use when asked to describe you, and you’d always taken that for granted, too. But now, here in this house where only a few short days ago there had been so much love, so much potential, so much safety, you find that you are miles away from strength.
As you make your way up the stairwell that leads to your bedroom; his bedroom now, your force yourself to remember; you realize that you aren’t quite sure why you’ve come back here. The few things you left behind this morning are nothing that you really need. Maybe you’ve just come to say a final goodbye to yet another home. How pathetic, you think. When did you let yourself get like this? So soft? So affected by everything that happens around you? It was better to be hardened. At least then it didn’t hurt so much.
You open the door to the bedroom and find the bed messy and unmade. One pillow is on the floor. Rikki really must have been in a hurry to leave this morning. He was always the neat freak of the two of you. You glance around the room slowly, taking everything in. There is a picture of the two of you in a silver frame on the nightstand. Nothing fancy, just Rikki and yourself standing by one of his motorcycles. Lori took it for you a few months back. You wonder how long it will take Rikki to get rid of it. Part of you wants to grab it and hug it to your chest and walk out of the house with it in your arms, a last reminder of the good times you’ve shared with Rikki. But you leave it sit where it is. Who need pictures with a memory like yours? You're not just going to forget all that has happened between you, even if you wish that you could.
As you’re moving towards the balcony to look out one last time over the expansive backyard, the phone rings. Without giving it a second thought you answer it. And you wish immediately that you hadn’t.
“Hello?”
There is a long pause and then, “Bob?”
“Rikki…” you sigh. It’s all you can manage.
“I was just calling to check the messages.” Another long, uncomfortable pause. “Bob, you took all your stuff this morning. Why are you there?”
You close your eyes, suddenly almost too weary to even hold the phone to your ear. “Forgot some stuff,” you say, knowing that it sounds like a lie and knowing that Rikki knows it’s a lie, but not having it in you to come up with anything better.
He is quiet for a few long seconds. “Are there any messages?”
Somehow this meaningless question cuts into you like razors. You glance down at the answering machine, which is flashing ‘0’ in bright red numbers. “No,” you say tiredly. “Expecting someone?”
“No.”
A few more long seconds pass in silence. “You with Bret?” you ask finally, although you know the answer and don’t really want to hear him say it.
“Yeah,” he says, his voice sounding strange.
“Well,” you say, opening your eyes and staring at a random spot in the middle of the bed. “Don’t let me keep you.”
“You’re not,” he says, and you wait for him to say more, but he remains quiet.
“It’s not as if we have anything to talk about,” you say, not even trying to keep the threads of anger out of your voice.
You can almost hear the struggle in his head as he sighs. “No, I guess we don’t,” he says finally, and you can’t ignore the fact that he sounds terribly, impossibly sad.
“Something wrong, Rikki?” You know that you sound snide and trite but you just can’t stop yourself. This had been his decision, not yours. Sure, you had left the house. But Rikki had left you.
Rikki is very, very quiet. So quiet that, for a moment, you almost think he has hung up on you. But you can’t hear the dial tone so you know that he’s still there. Finally, you hear him inhale deeply. “I’m sorry that I’ve hurt you, Bob. I never wanted to hurt you.”
“But you’ve always been so good at it.” The moment you’ve said it you want to take it back. You hadn’t meant to sound so icy, so unaccepting of his apology. Because, deep down, you know he is telling the truth. Rikki doesn’t want you to hurt. He loves you. Just not enough.
“I’m sorry,” he says again. And now you can hear that he is crying. You’d expected him to be angry. Anger would have been easier to deal with. But knowing that Rikki is on the other end of the line, probably within mere feet of Bret, crying because of something you’ve done, it breaks your heart. You sit down heavily on the bed.
“Rikki, look, I’m sorry,” you sigh. “I didn’t mean…”
You stop abruptly when you hear Bret’s voice. “Bob, who the fuck do you think you are?”
You feel your stomach muscles contract involuntarily and you have to bite your lip to keep from inhaling audibly. Although you realize you probably shouldn’t be surprised by this, somehow hearing Bret’s voice is a complete shock. “Bret,” is all you can think of to say.
“Very astute of you, Mr. Dall,” he says snidely. “You want to tell me what the fuck you think you’re doing, upsetting Rikki like that?”
“Didn’t mean to encroach on your territory, Bret,” you say, the retort coming out of your mouth without you having to think about it.
“Nice attempt, Bobby,” Bret spits back coldly. “But I believe you’re the one who just made him cry.”
You sigh and sit down heavily on the edge of the bed. “I see you haven’t changed a bit, Bret,” you reply tiredly.
“Look, Bob,” he says. “As much as I’d love to sit on the phone and catch up on old times, the only reason I got on the phone was because I’m not going to stand for you upsetting Rikki like that. He’s upset enough already, don’t you think?”
This can’t possibly be happening, you think. “Yeah, he sure is,” you agree, anger in your voice. You grab a fistful of the comforter and squeeze. “And who’s fucking fault do you really think that is?”
“Don’t go trying to blame this one on me,” he spits back. “I’m not the one making him cry. I’m not the one leaving him when he needs you the most.”
“Fuck you, Bret,” you yell, not caring how irrational you sound. “Don’t try to play the martyr here and act like you think it would be better if I stayed. I’m sure you’re perfectly happy knowing that I’m out of the picture.”
“Just like you were perfectly happy with locking me up in this place so I would be out of the picture?” he questions sarcastically.
Bret’s words hit you like a strong blow to the stomach. You just sit there for a moment, staring at the phone in your hand, not quite sure what to say. You can hear him breathing heavily on the other of the line, waiting for your reply. Eventually, you manage to piece together a response. When you speak again your voice is low, almost a growl, filled with ice-cold anger and a hint of sadness that you can’t seem to make go away. “I put you in there because you were sick, Bret. You needed help. You were dangerous to yourself and everyone around you. I didn’t do it to try and get closer to Rikki. You were my friend once, Bret. I spent the best years of my life in a band with you. I cannot believe that you would think I could be petty enough to lock you up just so I could have Rikki to myself. And besides,” you conclude, “you were clearly never out of the picture. Because the moment you woke up, he went running back to you.”
“Maybe you just didn’t play the bitch well enough for him.”
The breath catches in your throat as you try to respond. But then you hear a small struggle and eventually Rikki’s voice. “Bob, I’m sorry. He didn’t mean that. You know that isn’t true.”
“Stop trying to defend him,” you choke out, tears stinging at your eyes. You’re surprised you can keep your voice steady at all. “Fuck both of you, Rikki. Fuck both of you.” And then you hang up the phone.
For a few long minutes, you just sit where you are, unable to process a complete thought, much less move. When your heart rate finally slows down, you realize that it’s not so much the fact that things have gotten to this point that surprises you. This had always been a concern, somewhere deep in the recesses of your mind, like a cancer that was just waiting to take over. There had always been that tiny bit of doubt, that lingering spark of fear that Bret would wake up and Rikki would inevitably go running back to him. So, no, this isn’t what surprises you.
What surprises you is that it has all happened so quickly.
In just a few short days, your entire life, a life that the better part of you had believed was stable and secure, has been turned upside down. Everything that matters has been taken away all in one shot. Your relationship, your home, just gone, just like that.
With a sigh, you slowly pull yourself to your feet and exit the bedroom, heading to the front door. There’s only one place for you to go now.
You need to get yourself to a liquor store, and fast.
~*~
“You didn’t have to be quite so mean to him,” you say quietly. It is the first thing that either of you has said in some time, and you expect that he will react badly to it.
But he surprises you. “I know,” he says quietly. “I just can’t stand to see him making you so upset.”
“I brought this upon myself,” you tell him. And you know it’s the truth. “Bob’s hurting. And the only way he knows how to deal with that is to lash out. You know him, he’s always been like that.”
“That doesn’t give him the right to make you cry.”
“Do you know how ironic it is that you of all people are criticizing someone for making me cry?” You do your best at not sounding harsh. You can only hope that you have accomplished that feat.
For a moment Bret looks sullen and you think you have probably hurt or angered him. But eventually he just sighs. “I can’t make up for what I’ve done to you, Rikki. I can’t take it back. But I can start over. That’s what I’m trying to do.”
You lean forward in your chair and take one of his hands in both of yours. Idly, you run your thumb over the back of his hand. Just that small touch brings butterflies to your stomach. How you love him. How you’ve always loved him. “I know, Bret. That’s why I’m here. I want to see what happens with us. I’ve been wanting this for ages. But we need to at least be considerate of Bobby. I don’t want to hurt him any more than I already have.”
“So don’t,” Bret tells you simply. “But I refuse to sit back and watch him hurt you, Rikki. We've all had enough pain. I think it’s about time that we end all of that. If he can’t take this like a man…”
“I think that’s asking a bit much of him,” you interrupt. “What he and I had together, Bret, that was his world. And now it’s gone. He doesn’t even have a place to stay.”
“And that is somehow your fault.” His words aren’t a question. And through the tiredness in his voice you can still hear that twinge of anger.
“Well, yeah, Bret,” you say honestly. “It kind of is.”
“It’s your fault that he didn’t have a backup plan?”
“It’s my fault for always letting him believe that he didn’t need a backup plan.”
Bret pulls his hand away from you and runs it through his mane of hair, sighing. “What exactly do you think we should do, Rikki?” he asks, his voice weary.
You just look at him, uncertain of how to respond. “I don’t know,” you say finally. “I just… you know? I don’t want him to think that I’m trying to hurt him. I’m not.”
“Shouldn’t he know that?” Bret asks seriously. “I mean, I don’t really want to think about it, but the two of you were together for a long time. It was obviously pretty serious. Do you really think that he’d think you were doing all of this with malicious intent?”
You sigh. He has a good point. “No,” you admit. “But there’s no reason to add insult to injury, Bret.”
“Don’t even talk to me about that,” Bret mutters in response. “You’ll have to forgive me for having some residual bitterness towards Bobby.”
“Not as much as he has towards you,” you reply automatically, and almost wish you hadn’t. The look on Bret’s face is enough to make you realize that he is quickly growing tired of this conversation.
“You can’t tell your heart not to love someone just because you already love someone else,” he says, sounding very sure of himself. “Bobby can be as bitter as he wants to be towards me. It won’t change anything, least of all your feelings.”
“My feelings for you now isn’t all that makes him bitter,” you tell him, pulling a cigarette out of the pack in your pocket and lighting it. You take a long drag before continuing. “He’s been living in your shadow from day one, Bret. And he knew that he could never quite live up to what you were to me. And, like it or not, he blames you for the fact that I was so violent with him.”
“I didn’t make you do that to him, Rikki. I had nothing to do with that.”
“Don’t be so naïve,” you sigh, flicking the ash from your cigarette. “You had everything to do with that. I only treated him that way because I wanted someone to look at me the way that I looked at you. I wanted his complete adoration. I wanted to be his world. And that’s what I got. Even if it took violence to get me there.”
“So this all comes back to being my fault?” he spits out, glaring at you with an accusatory air. “If you think I’m such a terrible person and honestly believe that I’ve caused all this trouble, why the hell do you want to be with me?”
“Because I love you,” you tell him simply, bringing your cigarette back to your lips. “I’ve always loved you.”
“But you really do think all of the bad shit that’s happened is my fault, don’t you?”
You draw a breath, choosing your words carefully. “No, I don’t,” you reply honestly. “Of course Bobby and I both have some responsibility to this entire thing. But it started with you, Bret.” You take another drag off of your cigarette. “Certainly you’re familiar with the cycle of abuse. If you’re beaten as a child, you’re that much more likely to beat your own children, shit like that?”
Bret nods slowly. “Go on,” he says, obviously not sure of how to respond further.
“In a situation where my idol – you – taught me that the only way to express love was violence, are you really terribly surprised that I, in turn, behaved the same way towards someone else?”
Bret looks completely stunned. He swallows hard. “You know, Rikki, with everything else that I’ve just been told these past few days, I’m not sure what I need is to have more weight piled on my shoulders right now.”
“I’m sorry. I’m not trying to make you feel worse,” you tell him seriously, absentmindedly flicking ashes onto the carpet. “I’m just trying to make you understand.”
“That I started a cycle of abuse that in the end ruined our band as a unit and as separate people.”
You frown. What he says isn’t exactly untrue. “We had our part in it, Bobby and I,” you say again. “And maybe it didn’t start with you, Bret. Maybe you were just carrying on a cycle, too. I don’t know.”
“Nobody hit me when I was a kid, if that’s what you’re saying,” he tells you, sounding incredulous.
“I’m not saying that at all. But Bret, you’ve always liked to be in charge. Maybe that’s because, as a child, you couldn’t be in charge. I mean, like with your diabetes. You weren’t in control of that situation. I’m sure you wanted to be, but you weren’t. So now, when you can be in control, you go for it full force.”
“Which brings this right back to all being my fault.” He chuckles. But it’s the kind of laugh that says plainly that he doesn’t think what he’s just said is the least bit funny. “I’m sorry. I wish there was something I could do to make it all up to you, Rikki. If I could fix all of this, I would.”
Not giving it much thought, you catch his deep blue gaze and smile. “Just get better, Bret. Get better and get out of this place. That’s all I can ask of you.”
~*~
Your old friend Jack Daniels clouds your mind as you lay listlessly on the raggedy hotel bed. You could have afforded a better room. The best money could buy if you had wanted to. But what was the point? This little hole in the wall with cigarette burns in the carpet and rips in the bedspread suits your mood much better. You have the curtains closed against the afternoon sunlight and the air conditioner running on high. Yet still you feel like you’re on fire. Nearly one whole bottle of straight whiskey can do that to a person.
Exercising the full capacity of your impaired judgement, you pull your cell phone from the pocket of your jeans. You flip it open and dial a number that you probably should have forgotten long ago. After just one ring, your ex-wife answers.
“Michelle,” you sigh, afraid to say more because you don’t want her to know how drunk you really are.
“Yes?”
Your stomach clenches when you realize she’s not sure who you are. “It’s me,” you say, careful to make your voice clear. “Bobby.”
There is a moment of silence and you almost think that she has hung up. “Hi, Bob,” she says uncertainly. You can’t blame her for being unsure. The two of you haven’t spoken in months. “Where are you?”
You shrug even though you know she can’t see you. “Nowhere,” you reply. “How have you been?”
“I’m… fine, Bobby,” she says. “How about you?”
“I’m, well… I’m…”
“You’re drunk,” she interrupts knowingly.
You close your eyes. “I’m homeless.”
“What are you talking about?” Michelle asks, worry creeping into her tone.
“I’m in a shitty motel somewhere off the Strip,” you say, chuckling slightly, noticing your words slurring together. “You should see this place. I think I saw a rat earlier.”
“Bobby, what are you doing there? What’s happened? Where’s Rikki?” Along with her concern you can hear the slightest touch of anger. And you figure it’s probably anger at the fact that you’re calling her after all these months, drunk off your ass, with nothing good to say. You can’t blame her for being a bit upset. You’re frankly surprised that she’s still managing to be concerned.
“Bret woke up,” you tell her. You wonder how many times you’re going to have to tell this story before everyone knows the ending.
“Did he?” A hint of relief in her voice now. As if Bret waking up somehow makes everything right in the world. If she only knew.
“Oh yeah,” you continue, chuckling again. “He’s awake, all right. Awake and once again fucking up my life.” You can hear your words slurring but you can’t bring yourself to care. Michelle has heard and seen you worse than this. Much worse. Of course, she’d also left you.
“Bobby, what’s going on?”
“Rikki left me,” you explain. “Or, rather, I left him. Either way, he’s gone back to Bret and now I don’t have anyplace to live.”
“So you’re staying in some shithole off The Strip? Jesus Christ, Bob. You can do better than that. Get a room at The Hyatt or something.”
“I lived in a hotel before, Missy. I didn’t like it. I’m sorta hoping this isn’t a permanent thing.”
“So what’s your plan, Bob?” she says, her tone almost sarcastic, almost cold. “I mean, unless it’s just to drink yourself to death.”
“I’ve been considering it,” you respond truthfully.
“That isn’t funny.”
“No, it isn’t,” you agree. You are quiet for a few long seconds, trying to pull together a coherent thought from the sea of whiskey and regrets swimming through your head.
“Bobby,” Michelle says, and now her tone is almost entirely soft with concern again. “Why did you call me?”
“Because I love you,” you say, and you didn’t know you were going to say it, and maybe you shouldn’t have said it, but it’s not a lie and you don’t make any effort to take it back.
“I love you, too,” she responds, and you know that she means it. She’s always meant it, even when it was attached to a goodbye.
“I want to come home,” you say, these five words free of slurring, your voice so quiet that it’s almost a whisper.
“Bobby…” she says, and you remember this voice. It is the voice of the woman who was once your wife, the woman who once would have laid down her life for you. “Bobby, this isn’t… I’m not your home anymore.”
“Missy,” you begin, but she cuts you off.
“No, Bobby,” her voice is still soft, not really angry. “I’m not saying this to hurt you. You know that you can come here and see the kids any time you want to. I don’t have a problem with that. I’ve never had a problem with that. But you and me? We’re over, Bob. We were over long before you and Rikki got together. Come visit if you want. Rent an apartment down here. Get yourself sober and I’ll even let you have the kids for a few weeks. But I won’t let you stay here. I can’t do that. I’m sorry.”
“Is there someone else?” you ask, swallowing around the lump in your throat that is making it suddenly hard to breathe. You guess that her response isn’t really unexpected. But that doesn’t make it any easier to hear.
“Yes,” she sighs. “I’m seeing someone. But even if I wasn’t, Bob, I wouldn’t let you stay here. That wouldn’t be good for anyone involved. Zach and Zoe are old enough to understand what’s going on. I don’t want to confuse them by having you here.”
“I’m sorry that I called,” you say softly, feeling the first hot tear slip down the side of your face. “I didn’t mean…”
“Don’t apologize,” Michelle goes on. “I’m not angry with you, Bob. I love you. You know that. A part of me will always love you. If you come down here and get a place to stay I will do everything I can to help you.”
“I don’t need your help.” Your response is immediate. And you can’t help but think about how many times in the past you have said these words to her. How much you’ve put her through. How much you’ve pushed her away when, really, she could have been your saving grace. No wonder she’d left you.
“Some things never change,” you hear her whisper and you think she is probably saying it more to herself than to you. “Take care of yourself, Bobby. I have to go.” Just before she hangs up you can hear your daughter ask if dad is on the phone. You slam your phone shut and throw it across the room before hearing Michelle’s response.
You have to admit to yourself, even through your drunken haze, that you don’t blame her. You hadn’t bothered to call her for so long; you’d been too caught up in things with Rikki. And besides that, you’re blitzed. Not just tipsy or drunk, but completely and totally smashed. Michelle has a heart of gold to even be as nice to you as she was.
You look around the room, but there’s not much to see, and eventually your eyes light on your cell phone, lying haphazardly on the floor in front of the rickety dresser. You think for a moment, or at least your brain does the closest thing to thinking it can do in your current condition. With exaggerated effort you pull yourself to your feet and stumble over to the discarded phone, staring down at it for a moment before reaching down to pick it up.
You stand for a moment, sway, and make your way back over to the bed, which you collapse upon once again. Flipping the phone open you can barely read the display, and you chuckle mirthlessly to yourself. You press a few buttons and go through the list of stored phone numbers until you find the one you want.
It rings six times and just as you are about to give up, you hear the click that tells you someone has answered. “Yeah?” comes the voice from the other end.
“CC?”
“Often imitated, never equaled,” he agrees.
“It’s Bob,” you say into the phone.
“I know,” he replies, not missing a beat. “What’s going on, man? Haven’t heard from you in ages. Glad to see you’re still alive. Rikki taking good care of you?”
You are almost surprised by his nonchalance. But why should you be? You and CC have never had a problem getting along. Years of sharing a tour bus with just the two of you had forced you to become very close. “Rikki and I…he…” and suddenly you feel your stomach turning. The Jack Daniels has caught up with you. “Hang on,” you manage to mumble and then you’re running to the bathroom, falling to your knees, just barely making it to the dingy toilet in time to empty the contents of your stomach. After you’ve finished, you sit there for a moment, resting your head against the cool porcelain. It briefly crosses your mind that the surface is probably covered with germs that you don’t even want to imagine. But you’re too tired and too drunk to move. Eventually, you remember the phone still lying on the bed and crawl back into the main room. You don’t even bother getting to your feet. You grab the phone off the bed and lean back against the mattress, still seated on the floor. Most of you expects that CC has hung up. But you don’t hear dial tone. “You still there?” Even to your own ears you sound terrible.
“Yeah,” he replies, his voice more laced with concern now than you can ever really remember it being. “You still drunk?”
“Yeah.” You don’t bother coming up with an excuse.
“You sound like shit, Bob.”
“I feel like shit. I guess this old man isn’t cut out to drink a bottle of Jack anymore.”
CC sighs, actually sighs, and it makes your chest tighten. When CC has reason to worry for you, you know you’re in trouble. “What’s going on with you, Bobby?”
It is then you realize that no one has called him since all of this began. Great, it once again falls on your shoulders to tell this story you have come to hate. “Bret’s awake,” you begin. “He’s been awake for a few days.”
“Oh?” He doesn’t seem at all phased by the news. Of course, CC was usually hard to phase. “How is he?”
“Same old Bret,” you lament. “Rikki went back to him.” CC had never known the full extent of what went on between you, Bret, and Rikki. But he knew enough to realize there was some sort of sick and twisted love triangle between the three of you. You weren’t in any condition to fill him in on the details.
“I’m sorry,” he says seriously. “I guess that explains the drinking. Where are you?”
“I don’t know, some place,” you say, sighing, trying to think of the name on the gaudy neon sign out front. “Lakeshore Motel,” you remember suddenly, picturing the sign in your head, only half of the letters lit up. “I don’t know what the hell they were thinking. There’s no fucking lake here.”
You hear CC chuckle. “I’ve been there,” he says, his tone somewhere between Joe Pesci and reminiscent. “It’s all cokeheads and junkies. What the fuck are you doing there, Bob? You’re not…” He trails off.
“Nah,” you assure him drunkenly. “Just me and old Jack tonight, Ceece.”
“Bad enough,” he says wisely. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
“What?” you say, sitting up straighter. You really hadn’t called him so that he could be some unlikely savior. “You don’t have to do that.”
“I sure as fuck don’t,” he agrees. “What room are you in?”
“What? I don’t fucking know,” you say, your thoughts the consistency of the watered-down oatmeal you remember eating as a kid. “Um, 14, I think. But CC, you really don’t have to—“
“Shut up, you drunk fuck,” he interrupts. “I said I’d be there in twenty minutes.”
You close your eyes, leaning back against the mattress. “Fine,” you say tiredly. You close your cell phone and lay it on the bed behind you. Your eyes slowly drift shut.
The next thing you know, there is a pounding on the door to your room. You have to force your eyes to open. They feel heavily weighted. The exertion it takes to actually open them is astounding. You know you should recognize the voice at the door, that you should make some effort to get up and answer it, but you can’t. Looking at the clock you realize that you’ve been passed out for nearly thirty minutes. It’s definitely CC at the door. And still, you can’t bring yourself to move.
“Bob! Come on, asshole. Open the fuck up!” He’s trying to sound angry but all you hear is concern. You wonder if you locked the door when you came in. You don’t remember. Might as well find out.
“It’s open,” you shout. Or attempt to shout, anyway. Your eyes drift shut again and your head lolls to one side.
Seconds later CC bursts through the door. His platinum hair is sticking up crazily and he is remarkably thin. Much thinner than the last time you saw him. Somewhere deep within the recesses of your mind you realize that this means he is probably using again. But you don’t comment. Who are you to talk, anyway?
“Number one,” he states seriously slamming the door and locking it. He turns back around towards you and places his hands on his hips. “Never leave the door unlocked in a place like this. Number two, wake your ass up because I’m not about to let you die from alcohol poisoning.”
“I’m not that drunk…”
“The fuck you aren’t, Bob.” He moves further into the room and reaches down for you. Without much help from you, he grabs both of your arms and pulls you to your feet. You sway visibly, his grip on you the only thing that keeps you from tumbling back to the floor. The room spins with the sudden movement and you realize quickly that you need to vomit again.
“Gonna puke,” you manage and you don’t even really notice that you’re being dragged in the direction of the bathroom. In better conditions it might seem like more of a shock that someone as small as CC can throw you around like a rag doll, especially seeing how drunk you are, but you assume that this isn’t the first time he’s been in this situation. Maybe not even the first time that he’s been in this situation with you.
And then he’s holding your head over the toilet and the contents of your stomach are coming up in one hot rush and you don’t have time to even pretend to think anymore.
“Don’t talk to you for more than half a year and this is how you say hello again,” CC mutters from over your head.
A moment later and it’s over. Your stomach is still doing somersaults, but the worst is probably over. You pull your head up, pushing CC’s hands away. “I’m fine,” you tell him, almost laughing at yourself for how ridiculous a lie it is.
“Yeah, sure you are,” he says sarcastically. “Do you think you can walk, motherfucker? Or am I gonna actually have to drag you out of here like you just had your first drink?”
You consider his question for a moment, and somehow manage to pull yourself into an upright position. “Am I standing?” you ask seriously, the words slurring together and falling on top of one another.
He studies you for a minute. “Getting there,” he assesses. “Now can you do that while moving?”
“Not sure,” you tell him honestly. “Guess I can give it a try.”
“Yeah, you do that,” he says, shaking his head. You’re rather surprised he isn’t full out laughing at you.
Wary of the outcome, you venture a tiny step in the direction of the bedroom. The room spins terribly but you manage to stay upright. You take another step. Just as you begin to wobble, CC grabs your arm tightly and keeps you on your feet. With his help, you eventually make it to the bed where, once there, you collapse onto your back and close your eyes, breathing heavily.
“Jack didn’t used to do this to me,” you mumble.
“It did in the beginning,” he reminds you. “You just eventually got drunk enough where nothing ever did anything to you, Bob.”
“Oh yeah.” Lame response, but it’s the best you’ve got right now.
CC is quiet for a moment before he goes on. In his silence you manage to turn your head and look up at him as he sits next to you on the bed. “I’d ask you how you’ve been but it seems pretty obvious,” he states simply. “Rikki, fuck that he is, went back to Bret, even bigger fuck that he is, and now you’re in some shitty motel drinking yourself stupid. Does that about cover it?” He doesn’t give you any time to respond. “You know, the least you could have done was called me before you got to this point. I would have let you stay with me.”
“I was sort of hoping you still would.” You didn’t exactly mean to be that blunt, but it doesn’t matter. CC’s always handled blunt better than anything.
He shrugs. “If you promise not to puke on anything,” he says, then seems to consider this for a moment. “Well, if you promise to replace anything you puke on, at least.”
“Sure,” you agree drunkenly. “Got nothing else to spend my money on.”
CC smiles sadly. “The question is not whether I will let you stay with me,” he says. “The question is, how the fuck are we going to get your drunk, useless ass into my car.”
“Very slowly,” you suggest honestly.
“I mean, unless of course you’ve grown attached to this place,” he says, looking around. “We could order up some room service. I’m thinking maybe Heineken and crack.”
You chuckle mirthlessly. “I don’t need any more to drink,” you reply.
“And I guess I don’t need any crack,” he agrees. “It’s bad for my complexion, anyway. Come on. Let’s get you out of here.”
You groan. “I don’t suppose you could just carry me.”
“Maybe you’ve forgotten our height difference, Bob,” he says, grinning. “I could drag you if you’d like.”
“No, I’ll walk,” you insist. And slowly, steadily, with much help from CC, you get to your feet.
~*~
The sun is just beginning to set when you pull into your long, empty driveway. It’s odd not seeing Bobby’s car anywhere around. Or maybe not odd, just lonely. It’s been a long time since you’ve had this big house all to yourself. You doubt that you will like it any more now than you did then. A house this size was never meant for one.
Shutting off the engine of your car, you get out and make your way slowly to the front door of your home. Part of you doesn’t really want to go inside. Doesn’t want to see the half empty closet, the missing toothbrush in the bathroom, the mat by the backdoor without his shoes on it. But you step inside anyway. And really, why shouldn’t you? Somewhere deep down you have gotten what you wanted. Bobby is gone and you are free to be with Bret. Even better, Bret wants you to be with him. So why do you still feel like shit?
You push open your front door, step inside, and close and lock it behind you. You doubt you’ll be leaving again this evening. You’re in no mood to even attempt being social. Taking a deep breath, you lean back against the door, letting your hands slide down the finished wood. The air in the house feels different somehow. You know that’s ridiculous, but it does. It’s more heavy. Less welcoming. And you hate knowing that you have caused this in your own home.
Bret hadn’t been much help to you today. Sure, he had said some beautiful things. Made some lovely promises about your future together once he got better. But really, when you got right down to it, he hadn’t been helpful. Because he just couldn’t seem to understand why you were so upset by losing Bobby. It pissed him off, but he couldn’t understand it.
With an exaggerated sigh, you pull yourself away from the door, pushing the thoughts of the day out of your mind. Sitting around all night stewing about the situation wasn’t going to help anything. What’s done was done, and there was no planning for the future. Maybe that’s the part that bothers you the most, you think. There’s no way to apply logic and practicality.
You make your way into the kitchen, turning on every light that you pass, trying to infuse the house with some kind of life where you know there isn’t any. The bulbs do their job, but it isn’t enough. No amount of synthetic light is going to make tonight any less dark.
Once in the kitchen, you open the refrigerator and survey its contents, even though food is the last thing on your mind. After a moment of staring blankly, you pull out a jug of water and open it, tilting it back and drinking deeply. The cool liquid is refreshing, but only in a physical sense. You swallow three, four, five times before putting it back in the fridge, not bothering to replace the lid. After all, there’s no one to yell at you for doing it.
You close the fridge and stare down at a random spot on the floor, trying to figure out just what the hell you’re supposed to do next. A week ago, there wouldn’t have been any thought involved. You’d make dinner – separate meals, since one thing Bobby could never get into was your vegan diet – and maybe watch a movie or sit on the balcony for a while before heading to bed. But now there’s no one here with you, and you’re not hungry, and it’s too early to sleep. Besides, the idea of sleeping in that big bed alone isn’t exactly the most thrilling prospect.
You wander back into the living room and your eyes land on the laptop computer sitting on the mahogany coffee table in the center of the room. Maybe some time alone with your little online world is in order. It’s been a long time since you’ve really put any effort into keeping up with your e-mail. You’ve had more important things to do. Funny, there had been a time when almost nothing was more important to you than this computer and your personal piece of cyber space.
Shrugging, knowing you have nothing better to do, you take a seat on the couch, curling your legs up underneath you and placing the computer on your lap. Within minutes you are signed in to your mail program. Over two hundred messages are waiting for you. You sigh. This is something you should have sat down and taken care of ages ago. There is no way that, after the events of the past few days, you will be able to reply back to most, if any, of these people. You randomly delete various pieces of junk mail and open some short notes from Lori informing you of what she’s been up to with your fan club. All of her decisions are fine with you. You don’t even see why you need a fan club anymore, really. You’re not in a band. You haven’t done any artwork in months. Hell, you haven’t even been making the rounds to the various animal rights benefits that you usually attend. You’ve been so caught up in Bobby that everything else has just sort of slid to the wayside. No more, you think. It’s time to get back to being just Rikki. Not Rikki and Bobby. You can do that. You’re sure of it. And part of you knows that you’re lying through your teeth.
After reading and deleting a ton of messages from people both claiming their devotion to you and telling you how much they despise you now that you’re a “fag”, you stumble upon an e-mail from an address that is familiar to you. This girl on the East Coast has been writing you for almost two years now. The two of you have never actually met, but that’s not to say you haven’t tried. But even without seeing her face to face, you feel like you know her. Or at least a piece of her. And she, for what it’s worth, seems to understand a bit about how your mind works. Some of her messages have been humorous, some rather depressing, and some have just managed to make you nothing but horny. You’re not sure which kind you’re hoping for tonight, but you open the e-mail anyway.
You know, I could just assume you’re dead, the e-mail reads, an obnoxious pink font that you can’t really stand but that undeniably fits this girl’s bizarre style. But I assume if you were dead, I’d have heard about it on MTV. So where the fuck are you, you wad? and it’s signed simply “Sugar”, even though you know her real name, when she drops the act, is Julie. She’s signed a few of her more serious e-mails that way and part of you wonders if she even realizes she’s done it.
Your fingers move over the touch pad and the cursor is poised over the delete button, but something inside of you won’t let you execute the command. Maybe it’s because you need a friend right now, someone who isn’t part of this crazy mess, someone who doesn’t even really know there is a crazy mess. Someone, for starters, who isn’t a guy. Or maybe you’re just stressed out and overtired and lonely, but whatever the reason, you move the cursor and hit ‘reply’.
You don’t mind that she’s called you a wad. It’s just the sort of weird, snarky rapport that the two of you have, and in a way you’ve always respected the fact that she talks to you as though you were no one special. Hell, at this point, you really are no one special, if you ever were to begin with.
Not dead yet, you type, watching the cursor blink. “Might as well be,” you mutter to yourself. Actually, I’ve just had an indefinite opening in my social calendar. Perhaps you’d like to come have a slumber party. All expenses paid, of course. You read over what you’ve written and chuckle to yourself, wondering what her reaction to such a ridiculous offer will be. Before you have time to reconsider, you sign the e-mail “Snarky kisses, Rikki” and click ‘send’.
The e-mail all but leaves your mind as you continue checking other messages. And then, once that is done, begin to surf about the web. Nothing new or interesting at any of the sites you stop by. Or maybe it’s just the fact that nothing at all seems that interesting to you anyway. You’re about to sign off and find something new to do with your evening when a message pops up on the screen telling you that you have one new e-mail in your inbox. Your eyebrows furrow together, wondering if maybe… You shake your head and click on your inbox, expecting to see nothing but junk. Instead, you are faced with another message from Sugar, or Julie, or whatever she wants to call herself. The subject line is blank, which is odd for her. She usually comes up with something to catch your attention. Trying not to think about it, you open up the message.
When do I leave?
You stare at the screen for several seconds, half expecting something more to suddenly appear before your eyes. But, of course, nothing does. She has kept her response short and to the point. And you realize now that this probably isn’t a joke to her. And why should it be? You’ve been promising to meet her for well over a year. And now you’ve gone and offered her an all expense paid trip to LA to visit you in all your fucked up glory. Probably not the wisest decision you’ve ever made. But again, something stops you from simply deleting her message. Instead, you hit reply.
Nothing better to do than check e-mail on a Saturday night, I see. What a sad state this world is in. First plane to LA sound good to you? And, against all your better judgement, you sign it, “In need of some Sugar, Rikki”. The e-mail is sent before you can change your mind.
And now, knowing that you have gotten yourself into something that you can’t casually walk out of, and knowing that in a few short minutes she’ll likely write back, you can’t simply turn off the computer and walk away. Not that there’s anything to walk away to, anyway.
You log into your website and briefly toy with the notion of just deleting the entire thing. You haven’t touched it in months and you don’t really see yourself doing anything with it anytime soon, if ever again. But instead you just sigh and discard the idea, knowing that it’s less of an inconvenience to just let the thing sit there and rot.
And then your email is flashing at you again, and you find yourself almost excited at the prospect of this strange girl showing up in LA. The title of the mail is once again left blank, and for a moment you just stare at her email address, and then you double click and the message pops up in front of you.
Thank fuck for high-speed internet access, it reads. There’s a flight out of my local airport in just over an hour. Given that it’s nearly ten over there and nearly one out here, that would put me in LA at sometime around 4:30 in the morning, but hell, I can deal with that if you can. Click the link and be sure to recognize the fact that I’ll be very much offended if you hack me into little bits. And then a link in blue to some airline’s website, and her full name, Julia Langsley.
Without even thinking about it, you click the link, mindlessly go through the red tape to procure the ticket, and when you’re done you hit the ‘reply’ button on the email. See you in a few hours, you type, your fingers out of your own control, some part of your brain reprimanding you for what can only be a terrible idea. I’ll sharpen my knives, and then you sign it, just your name, no catchy closing note needed.
You immediately log off and close your laptop, leaning heavily back against the couch. What have you done? Besides invite a complete stranger to stay in your house right in the middle of one of the most tumultuous times in your life? You shake your head and rub at your eyes with the back of your hand. This is insanity at it’s finest. You can’t help but chuckle to yourself at the thought that you’re the one who really belongs in a mental hospital. And then, with a flash, a picture of Bret invades your mind. He is going to be livid. And what are you going to do with this Sugar girl while you go to visit him? You can’t just take her with you.
“Great job, Rockett,” you mumble, taking the computer off your lap and placing it back on the coffee table. “You’ve just gone ahead and fucked yourself good this time.”
Closing your eyes, you take a few deep breaths and rub your palms across the scratchy denim of your jeans. Maybe you can just leave her at the airport. The moment the idea crossing into your conscious thought, you find yourself pushing it away. Of course you can’t do that. You’ve gotten yourself into this situation. Now you just have to deal with it. And really, how bad can it be? You’ve been in contact with her for quite some time. She’s a very pretty girl. She doesn’t seem all that psychotic. You’ve definitely met worse. Hell, you’ve fucked worse. “Right,” you say aloud. “Keep telling yourself that.”
Just over six hours later you are standing near one of the many baggage claims at LAX airport. The airport isn’t desolate, but not many people are milling around at this time of the night. The screen just above your head tells you that Julie’s plane has landed safely and that she should be arriving here at the baggage claim shortly. It occurs to you quite out of the blue that you aren’t really sure how to address her. Should you call her Sugar or Julie? Should you hug her? Shake her hand? Offer to carry her bag? While still lost in the nervousness of your jumbled thoughts, you hear a female voice calling your name.
You turn, half-slow and expectant, suddenly very aware of the fact that there is officially no way out of this now. It’s not as if you can disappear in the throng of people, just pretend you’re not the person this girl is looking for. And then your eyes light on the source of the voice, and your first thought is, she’s not what I expected. And then you almost laugh, because this thought is absurd. How can you be expecting… well, anything, really? The only pictures you’ve ever seen of this girl were cut off at the neck, single-serving two-dimensional slivers of flesh and breast and thigh, and suddenly you wonder why you’d never asked her to show you a picture of her face.
And then she is standing directly in front of you, looking up at you as though she’s not quite sure whether to be excited or scared or just confused. “Hi,” she says uncertainly, her voice not nervous, exactly; more like wary, more like she’s just keeping her distance until she’s sure that you didn’t mean it when you’d told her you’d be sharpening your knives.
You look down at her, taking in her pale face framed by shocking red curls, the silver hoop in her left eyebrow, the impossible crimson smear of her lips, and you realize you can’t remember the last time you’d found a woman attractive. “Hi,” you manage, your throat impossibly dry, and you clear it, an exercise in futility. “Flight okay?”
She shrugs, some of the tension easing out of her green eyes. “As flights go, I guess,” she replies, her voice firm but undeniably feminine. “No kids on board this time of night, anyway.”
You nod, jam your hands into the pockets of your pants, wondering if she can see how nervous she’s making you, for reasons you can’t even begin to comprehend. “Yeah,” is all you say.
She frowns at you, but her eyes are smiling. “So, are we just going to hang out in the airport all morning, or what?”
Her words bring you out of the hesitance you have let yourself fall headfirst into. “Of course not,” you say, chuckling just slightly. “Let’s get your bags. We can go back to my place.”
“Well that’s a relief,” she replies, and with each word you can almost hear the nervousness slipping out of her and floating away on the air surrounding the two of you. “Because I don’t have the kind of cash to get a hotel room.” She laughs then, and it is one of the most beautiful things you have ever heard. And you know how cliched it is for you to think that. But you think it anyway. You’re suddenly wondering why it has taken you this long to arrange a meeting with her.
You watch as she bends down and picks up a completely inconspicuous black suitcase with ease. “Want me to get that?” you offer. She just smiles and shakes her head, straightening back up and smoothing down the jacket she is wearing. You realize it’s leather. It almost doesn’t bother you.
“I’m fine, thanks. Just lead the way to your car, or SUV, or limo, or whatever. What do rockstars drive these days, anyway?”
“You’re funny, Sugar,” you tell her, laughing. “I’m glad. I could use some comic relief.”
“I don’t get paid enough to be comic relief,” she deadpans, not missing a beat. “But I’ll do my best.”
You fumble for a witty retort, but the only thought in your head is that she’s right, that no amount of money in the world is going to be enough to reimburse her for whatever weird sideshow you’re about to introduce her to. You swallow. “Follow me,” is all you say, and you’re already walking away, getting in front of her so she can’t see your face, because you don’t know what your eyes would say to her if she could.
You lead her out of the airport to where you’re parked and suddenly you’re terribly aware of your 1964 Chevy Impala, cherry red, expensive and probably sleazy and all those things that you just know she’s going to tease you about. And when you stop in front of the car you turn and look at her, apologetic smile and absolutely nothing to say, and she’s grinning at you, beautiful and unsettling all at once and maybe it’s a good thing you don’t do drugs anymore.
“Oh, this is just…” She pauses, still smiling, hunting for what she wants to say. “Fitting, I think is the word I’m looking for.”
“It’s just a car,” you say, pulling open the passenger side door and looking down at the ground, fighting against your own smile.
She slides inside, into the seat with the faux-leather interior that had probably cost more than the real thing would have. “I bet you get a lot of chicks with this thing,” she says, pulling the door shut without waiting for you to do it.
Her suitcase is still sitting on the ground outside of the car, stark black against the Seconal red of the car, and without even thinking about it you pick it up and casually toss into the small backseat before walking around the car and climbing in behind the steering wheel. “You’d think so,” you say in response to her statement.
"You don't sound so sure of yourself, Mr. Rockett," she smiles as you start the car and pull out of the parking spot.
You shake your head, unable to hide a slight smirk pulling at your lips. "First of all, please call me Rikki. Secondly, let's just say it's been a while since I've had a girl in this car that wasn't Intern Lori."
You expect her to laugh, but she doesn't. Instead, she looks down at her hands and chews on her bottom lip. You can see that whatever she is about to say next makes her nervous. You're not sure you want to hear what she is thinking. "I know," she eventually tells you, her voice hushed. "You and Bobby aren't really a secret to anyone. Call me too curious for my own good, but it does make me wonder why you wanted to fly me out here."
"I told you," you try to joke. "I'm all about the occasional slumber party with a pretty girl like yourself." You're hoping that she notices your reluctance to talk about Bobby. While you're sure she, and all the rest of Poison's fans, will find out about the breakup eventually, it isn't something you want to discuss right now.
"So is Bobby joining this party, then?"
Apparently she couldn't take a hint. "No," you sigh, because really, there is nothing else that you can tell her. "I meant what I said about that indefinite opening in my social calendar."
She looks over at you quickly, and something deep inside of you is mesmerized by how large her bright green eyes look. She really is breathtaking in a way that you haven't seen in ages. "You mean...you two..." she stumbles for the right words.
"We broke up," you interrupt, saving her from what could have become a very awkward situation. "Yes."
"I'd ask you why, but it's probably none of my business."
"It's far too long of a story to get into now, Julie," you tell her. You can't help but notice the smile she gives you at the use of her real name. "Maybe later."
“Fine by me,” she says, stretching her legs. “As far as my biological clock is concerned, it’s going on 8 in the morning, and I wouldn’t mind getting some sleep.”
For the first time, you notice how tired you are as well, as if all you needed was for someone to mention sleep. “I second that,” you say. “It’s been a long time since I’ve stayed up this late, as pathetic as that sounds for a rock star.”
“Nah,” she says, and you can hear her smile. “We’ll talk about what makes you so pathetic when we wake up.”
~*~
You yawn, staring across the desk at Dr. Kinsington. It’s far too early for this shit, but they hadn’t given you much of a choice.
“Tired?” she asks in that fake sympathetic voice she’s so good at.
“Usually,” you agree. “I assume it’s from those damn pills.”
Dr. Kinsington nods. “It probably is,” she says. “But you haven’t been taking the medication for very long. The side effects will eventually diminish and probably disappear altogether.”
“Can’t wait,” you reply, unenthused.
“Is something wrong, Bret?” She flashes a bright, painted on smile in your direction. You can’t figure out why this woman seems to have an endless supply of happiness stored away just to aggravate you. “You seem down.”
“Down?” you scoff. “I’m in a loony bin, Doc. I’m on medication that makes me dizzy as fuck and gives me headaches. I want to sleep all day long. I have no desire to even think about music. And I’m ruining my best friend’s life. I’d say that about qualifies me for the ‘down’ category.” You hadn’t meant to have such an outburst. But you have to admit, it feels good to finally have said it.
The doctor writes a few things down on the notepad in front of her and then she looks up at you, the tip of her pen tapping against her bottom lip. “As I said, you’ll adjust to the medication. It shouldn’t be causing you problems for much longer. Now what’s this about your best friend? How are you ruining his life?”
You hate that she sounds so patronizing. And you hope that the glare you shoot in her direction makes her fully aware of that. “I’ve been ruining his life for years,” you spit out, rolling your eyes. “Where would you like me to start?”
She leans back in her chair and cross her arms over her chest. “Wherever you’d like.”
“Look,” you reply quickly. “I’m really not one for hashing over all the shit in my past. So if that’s what you think I need to do, you’re going to be sorely disappointed. Rikki and I have a unique relationship to say the least. And it’s one that I really don’t feel like discussing with you.”
“I can respect that,” she says in that same tone, that ‘anything you say, Mr. Michaels, we’ll just put you in a straitjacket for a little while’ voice. “Unfortunately, I can also tell you that without your cooperation, it’s going to take us even longer for you to get out of this place, and if you really care about your life and your music and Rikki, then perhaps you should think about that.”
You sigh, closing your eyes and then opening them but not looking at her. Instead you pick a spot on the carpet and stare down at it. On one hand, you know she’s right, and you think that maybe just opening your mouth and saying a bunch of shit isn’t so bad a price to pay for getting the fuck out of this place. On the other hand, you’re Bret Michaels, and you’re a stubborn shitwad, and you want to tell her to go soak her head. When you finally look back up at her, she is still favoring you with that mock-sympathetic stare. “What the hell is it you really want to know?” you ask tiredly.
“That’s a rather broad question, Bret,” she says, smiling a little. “Why don’t we start with your goals.”
“My goals?” you repeat blankly. Your goal was always to be a rock star. And you achieved that goal, even if you destroyed everything in the end. You’d never bothered planning past that, never bothered with a Plan B because you’d just assumed you’d never need one.
“Yes,” she says patiently. “We’ll start with your short-term goals. What do you want to accomplish while you’re here at Riverview?”
“Isn’t it your job to come up with that answer?” you say, sarcasm dripping from your voice.
“No,” she replies seriously. “We’re here to help you, not make your choices for you.”
“I don’t have choices in here,” you respond without hesitation. “I take my medication when you tell me to. I make phone calls when you say and for how long you say. I sleep when someone says lights out. I get up when I’m told I have an appointment with a doctor. And, if I’m lucky, someone might show up to see me when I’m allowed to have visitors.”
“You want to get out of here, do you not?” she questions, seeming to simply not have heard your rant about the rules.
“Of course I do,” you shoot back. “What kind of question is that?”
“So that’s one of your goals,” she says, shrugging her shoulders nonchalantly. “You want to get out of here. So let’s work towards that.”
“And when I get out of here,” you continue on. “Then what? Where am I gonna go? What am I gonna do? My band, the one thing in my life that really fucking mattered? Yeah, that’s gone. And I’m the one that ruined it. I trashed my house before they threw me in here. My parents won’t speak to me because they think I’m some sort of fag. And my best friend…”
“You’re ruining his life,” she interjects. “Yes, we established that. And for not wanting to talk about it, you sure do seem to be bringing it up quite a bit.”
“Look, lady,” you spit out, but you have nothing to follow it with. Eight months ago maybe you could have gone off on this woman. You could have screamed and shouted and thrown a temper tantrum and maybe even gotten violent. But now? Now you just can’t seem to find the effort it will take to do any of that. You sigh heavily and close your eyes.
“Look, I know you have a very… shall we say, typical viewpoint on this place and the people who work in it,” Dr. Kinsington says. “And I can’t say that I blame you, nor can I say that I have any idea what it must be like to be you right now. But the truth of the matter is, Bret, that everything is ultimately your choice. You can stagnate and be stuck here indefinitely, or you can work with the system and get yourself out. I can’t tell you what you’ll do once you leave here, but wouldn’t you rather be out there than in here just the same? And forgive me for being so bold, but you must realize how much luckier you are than some of our patients. Whether you’ve ruined his life or not, you have a very good friend in Mr. Rockett. Some people don’t ever get any visitors at all. Besides that, you’re financially sound, so it’s not as if you’ll be homeless when you get discharged, and on that note, Bret, you have every chance in the world of getting out of here. Some people, in fact many of our patients, will never, ever be a functional part of society again.” She leans back in her chair, sighing. “So, at the risk of you getting angry at me for saying it, stop feeling sorry for yourself, Bret. You can change this. And if you do end up here forever, if you do end up with a ruined life, it will be no one’s fault but your own. And deep down, I think you know that.”
For a few long moments, you just look at her, speechless. Everything she has just said has floored you. She’s right. It is the truth, and you do know that, so then why are you so surprised? Maybe it’s because you never thought anyone, let alone some young doctor who’s still wet behind the ears, would ever talk to you like that. Or maybe it’s because hearing it out loud has ruined all chances of you lying to yourself in order to sleep at night.
“Don’t you have anything to say?” Dr. Kinsington asks then.
You can only shake your head. “You’re right. And I do want to get out of here.” You pause for a second, trying to think of something else to say. “What do I have to do?” you eventually ask, not at all enjoying feeling this vulnerable.
“Just work with me,” she assures. “If you do that, I’m certain we’ll have you out of here in no time.”
~*~
The sun beating down through the crack in the dark curtains is what wakes you. Or at least brings you back to consciousness. Your eyelids feel like lead as you attempt to lift them, the miniscule line of light almost too painful to look at. And then you feel your head pounding and your stomach doing flips and brief glimpses of the previous night come back to you. You haven’t had a hangover this bad in years. Then again, you haven’t drank nearly two full bottles of Jack Daniels in years, either. For a moment you are terrified that you’re going to throw up. This only worries you because you are fairly certain that you couldn’t get off of the bed right now even if you tried. But the intense wave of nausea slips away and you manage to swallow around your impossibly dry mouth.
“CC?” you call out, but it sounds like little more than a cracked whisper. You clear your throat and try again. “CC?” Still no answer. Which is odd because you know without asking that you are in his bedroom. Not his guest room, his actual bedroom. And if you slept here then where did he sleep? You can’t remember. You rub at your eyes with the back of your hand and try to think for a moment. That’s when you realize that there isn’t much that you can remember. What the fuck did you and CC do last night? You definitely recall alcohol, but other than that, your memory is fairly blank. And maybe, you think, that’s for the best.
Somehow, slowly, painfully, you manage to pull yourself into a sitting position. Your field of vision sways dizzily. Looking around, you see that the room is surprisingly clean, and you’re not sure if it’s surprising because you’re sure you must have gotten up to some kind of trouble last night or if it’s just because you never had CC pegged for much of a housekeeper.
As if on some weird telepathic cue, CC strolls into the room carrying a glass of water and a bottle of Advil. “Thought you could use these,” he says, extending them.
“Good call,” you croak out, taking the glass. You drink half of it in one swallow before setting it down on the nightstand. “Fucking childproof caps,” you grumble as you struggle to get the top off of the Advil bottle. Finally, it snaps off and slips out of your hand onto the comforter. You pour four of the pills into your palm and swallow them dry. “Thanks,” you say, leaning back against the pillows again.
“I won’t ask how you’re feeling,” CC says then, sitting on the edge of the bed.
“I feel like my head’s been run over by a semi,” you reply, offering the answer to a question he didn’t exactly ask.
“Any response I could give you would sound preachy,” CC says honestly. “So instead I’ll just tell you that you’re free to take a shower if you’d like. I’ll skip the part where I offer to cook you breakfast, because although I’m sure you don’t remember much about last night, you didn’t put out.”
“Well thank God for that,” you try to joke. But the pounding in your head doesn’t let anything seem very funny. “What the fuck did happen last night, CC?”
“You drank yourself into oblivion,” he responds, little emotion playing on his face. "And I let you. I probably shouldn’t have, but hell, it’s been a while since I got to play babysitter to you. Made me miss the good old days.” He manages the laugh you couldn’t quite get to come out.
“Is that all?”
CC shrugs. “You rambled on and on about Rikki and Bret until, thank fuck, you passed out.”
Your head drops and you swallow hard. Timidly, you look back up at your once very close friend. “What did I say?”
“All that I needed to know and more than I feel like repeating. But it’s all good, Bob. I didn’t mind. You kept me entertained to say the very least. I’m glad you called me yesterday.”
“Me too,” you agree, although you still feel a bit uncomfortable not really knowing what you revealed about your relationship with Rikki and Bret last night. “I easily could have died in that motel. And I wouldn’t have even cared.”
“Which is a surefire sign that you’re staying with me for at least a few more days,” CC tells you, not an ounce of leeway in his tone. He stands up from the bed and begins to walk towards the door. “There’re fresh towels in the bathroom. Take a shower, Bobby. And try not to throw up in my tub.”
~*~
You swim into consciousness slowly and then suddenly, your eyes snapping open. You sit up in bed in one jerky motion, glancing around the room, but there’s nothing to see. Nothing looks out of the ordinary until you look at the other side of the bed. It’s empty, like it should be, but you can tell from the way the covers are rumpled and the way there’s a head-shaped dent in the pillow that it has been slept in. And only then does it come back to you, the night before, Julie, the airport. You sigh and lean against the headboard, trying to wake up fully and collect your thoughts, but before you even have the chance, your bedroom door is pushed slowly open.
“Hi,” Julie says tentatively. “I didn’t mean to wake you. I just left my purse in here.”
“You didn’t wake me,” you assure her. You want to say something else, and the only thing you can think of is, “What time is it?”
She glances down at her watch. “Well, this says it’s nearly 3:30,” she replies. “So in your world, I guess that makes it 12:30. I should really set this thing to Pacific Time.”
“How long have you been up?” you ask. The two of you hadn’t gone to sleep until at least six in the morning and you feel as though you could sleep for another day or two.
She shrugs. “An hour or so. I’m something of an insomniac, as I’m sure you guessed by all of my wee-hours-of-the-morning emails.”
“I usually am too,” you reply truthfully, unable to draw your eyes away from her satin pajama pants and little tank top. Even in your sleep-deprived state she looks fabulous. Or maybe you’re just lonely. Right. “But yesterday was a really long day.”
“By all means, go back to sleep,” she tells you. “I just need my cell phone and my purse. I won’t bother you after this. Promise.”
“No,” you shake your head, stretching your arms above you without really thinking about it. When you look back at Julie, you find her staring as inconspicuously as possible at your chest. You try not to smile. “I’m up now. Might as well stay up.”
She smiles and you can see a hint of her nervousness from last night creeping back into her face. And you can’t really blame her. Hell, you’re nervous yourself. You still aren’t sure what you’ve gotten yourself involved in. “Well, in that case,” she says, walking towards the bed, “care to tell me the story of why the hell I’m here.” There is laughter in her tone but her eyes are all seriousness. You swallow hard.
“Would you believe that I needed the company?” you offer lamely. She sits down on the side of the bed that she slept in last night, curling her legs underneath her and pulling the covers up a bit.
“If I was just some old friend from school, maybe. But Rikki, you have to admit this is a little fucked up, even for a rockstar.”
You sigh. “Well, I really did need the company,” you say truthfully.
“Okay,” she replies. “I buy that. But I’m sure that some crazy email stalker chick from the other end of the country wasn’t your only option.”
“Julie,” you say. “In all seriousness, you were my only option.”
“Way to make a girl feel special, Rockett,” she says, laughing. The sound of her laughter is refreshing. “You know, ‘It’s not that I actually wanted to hang with you or anything, but it was either you or buying a dog and I figured you wouldn’t shit on my carpet.’”
You find yourself laughing back and realize how good it feels to sit here in bed with this girl and actually relax for the first time in days. “It’s not like that,” you assure her. “I just needed…” You pause, searching for the right words, and finally settle on, “A new friend.”
“Well, that’s me,” she says. “Julia Langsley, friend for hire.”
“Well, I hope you don’t charge too much,” you quip.
“Like you couldn’t afford it,” she scoffs. “Nah, seriously, all I ask is for a little attention. That’s enough for me.”
“Well,” you tell her truthfully, “you’ll get plenty of that.”
She cocks her head to one side and arches an eyebrow at you. “Oh really?” she grins. “I’m always up for some special attention.”
“Coming from the girl who likes to send me naked pictures, I’m somehow not surprised by that response.”
She playfully slaps you on the arm and without really thinking about it you grab her lightly around the wrist. She inhales sharply when you do so and you know without a doubt that the small noise she makes isn’t from pain. You smile at her, not saying anything, and she licks her bottom lip.
“You’re not really what I expected,” you tell her, your voice hoarse with something you haven’t felt for a woman in a very long time. You don’t let go of her wrist.
Her breathing is a bit shaky and that makes your stomach jump. “Is that a good thing?”
You just nod. “You’re beautiful. I don’t know what I was expecting but,” you raise her hand to your lips and kiss it softly, “it wasn’t this.” You reach out with your free hand and drag a finger along one of her cheekbones. “Pleasant surprise.”
“Is this how you treat all your new friends, Mr. Rockett?” she giggles and you can see her trying to regain some composure. It’s actually quite adorable.
“No,” you state simply. “Just the ones I share my bed with.”
“Oh, are there many of those?” and you can hear her trying to keep her voice steady, can see her trying to maintain the same bold flippancy that she does in her emails, but it’s slipping. You know that she’d never even really considered the possibility that she’d end up in a situation like this one, and thus she’d never prepared for it. You can tell she’s the kind of person that doesn’t like gray area.
“Not recently,” you reply truthfully, keeping your voice low. You lean in closer to her now, not close enough to threaten her personal space, but close enough to let her know that you’re trying to close the distance between the two of you.
“So is that what you brought me here for? To get me in your bed?” and you can’t tell if she’s asking because she wants you to say yes or because she wants you to say no.
“No,” you tell her. And you think you’re being honest, at least mostly; you hadn’t even thought about it, not when you invited her. “But you’re here now.”
“I’m here now,” she agrees quietly.
You want to do more, move closer, but something about this girl demands some sort of respect, some sort of properness, and you’ve never really had to deal with that before. It was always Bret or Bobby, relationships where you were either the black piece or the white one, just following the rules or making them up. And before them, it had been nothing but groupies, one after the other, girls and a few pretty boys who would do anything you wanted to do. You haven’t felt this way since you were a kid, since before Poison was anything more than a pipe dream. And jesus, you think, what bad timing. You look at her, can see expectancy in her green eyes. You swallow. “Can I kiss you?” you ask finally, more timidly than you’d meant to. And you think it’s probably the first time you’ve ever asked that question. The first time you’ve ever been so concerned about the response that you’ll get.
Julie blinks slowly, just once, and then she nods her head. You watch as she swallows and absently licks her lips. You desperately want her to say something, but she doesn’t. Just stares at you silently. The bold, snarky girl from her emails has trickled away. You smile. And then you’re letting go of her wrist, placing both of your hands on the sides of her face, running your fingers up into her long red curls. You move forward and pull her to you all at the same time, demolishing what space was left between you. It seems in slow motion as you watch her eyes flutter shut. Your lips find hers and it’s nothing but soft and chaste and beautiful. Seconds pass before you snake your tongue out and draw it across her bottom lip, asking for something, hoping she will understand exactly what it is. Her hands are still at her sides but her mouth opens to you and, past the lips and the barrier of her straight white teeth, you meet. Tongues mesh and dance and her fingers crawl slowly across your stomach and around your waist until her arms are wrapped around you. One of your hands continues to cradle her face as the other slips down her neck and to her shoulder, toying aimlessly with the strap on her tank top. You are just about to pull her over on top of you and forget everything that has been bothering you for the past five days when your cell phone rings. It takes a moment but you eventually break away from her and pull your phone off of the nightstand.
“Hello?” you mutter, staring at Julie with apologetic eyes. She seems to be having a hard time meeting your gaze.
“Hey,” Bret’s voice comes across the line and your stomach does a triple flip. “You coming up today? Smoothie just got here. We could spend a quiet Sunday afternoon in the walled in courtyard of a loony bin. How’s that sound to you?” He laughs, but you just can’t.
“Um,” you say, desperate for something to follow it with but nothing comes. Your eyes dance around the room, light on Julie’s raised eyebrow.
“Rikki? Is something wrong?” Bret asks.
“No,” you tell him, clearing your throat. “I just woke up, that’s all.”
“Yeah? It’s one in the afternoon,” he says, chuckling. “Isn’t that kind of late for you?”
“Yeah, it is,” you agree, grateful that he’s asking you easy questions now. “Late night.”
He is silent for a minute. “Oh,” he says finally. “Anything to do with Bobby?” and you can hear the unhappiness in his tone.
You look at Julie again and then quickly look away. “No,” you say firmly. “Nothing at all.”
“Well, okay,” he says, and he sounds like he’s smiling again. “When should I expect you?”
“Um… give me two hours,” you answer, even though that will only give you enough time to rush to get ready.
“Right. I’ll see you in a bit then,” he says. Then, “Love you,” and before you can reply you hear the click that tells you he’s already hung up.
“What was that all about?” Julie asks, looking concerned.
You sigh. “You up for a little field trip into the truly bizarre?”
“Could I get a refresher course in what the ‘truly bizarre’ is first?” she says, one eyebrow still arched. “At least let me know what you’re about to drag me into the middle of.”
You stare intently at Julie for a moment, wondering if this is really for the best. Maybe you should just leave her here and go see Bret alone, not telling her anything. Or maybe you should just tell her to go home now. To get out of this craziness while she still can. But her kiss still weighs heavily in your mind and you realize that you can’t do that. You have to tell her the truth. Or as much of the truth as is possible right now. “Do you know why Poison broke up?” you eventually question.
She shrugs. “I think the official statement was something about bowing out gracefully. But rumor has it you were with Bret before you were with Bobby and Bret didn’t like you and Bobby being together. What does this have to do with anything?” She looks genuinely confused.
“That was Bret on the phone.”
“Oh? And this is bizarre, why?”
You take a deep breath and throw caution to the wind. “He’s in a mental hospital, Julie. He’s schizophrenic. Bobby and I put him in there eight months ago because he was a danger to himself and to everyone around him. He’s been comatose for about six months but he woke up five days ago. Bobby broke up with me because, well, because I went running back to Bret. And now Bret is full of ‘I love you’s’ and you’re here and he wants me to come see him and…”
“Stop,” she interrupts quietly, touching your arm softly. “You don’t have to say anymore. At least not right now. You should go see him.”
“I know,” you agree. “And as crazy as it is, I’d like you to come with me.”
She smiles, a nervous, uncertain motion. “I’m not sure this is in my contract, Mr. Rockett.”
“I’ll pay you overtime,” you say, trying to smile back. It doesn’t really work.
“Is Bret going to be okay with it if you show up with some random girl?” she asks. “I mean, I don’t want to make him any more upset than I’m sure he already is at this point.”
“Bret will be fine,” you say, and you really believe it. He’s been so much better these past few days. “As long as I don’t show up there toting Bobby, Bret will be just fine.”
Julie sighs. “If it’s that important to you,” she says, “although I don’t know why exactly it would be, then I’ll go with you.”
“Thanks,” you reply seriously. “I really appreciate it.”
“You know,” she says, climbing off of the bed. “I really didn’t expect this when I came to see you.”
You rise as well. “What did you expect?”
She grins at you and this time she’s really smiling. “I have no fucking idea. But going to see the ex-lead singer of Poison in an asylum never even crossed my mind.”
~*~
You’ve been sitting in the courtyard with Smoothie for just over an hour when Rikki finally arrives. ‘He’s late,’ is your first thought. It’s nearing four in the afternoon, almost three hours since the two of you spoke on the phone. But the thought quickly slips away when you notice that he has someone with him. An attractive girl, probably close to twenty years his junior. She looks completely out of place standing at his side as they walk towards you. Rikki waves in your general direction and you can see that he is nearly as nervous as she is. What’s going on?
Smoothie stands up first. “What’s up, man?” he questions, pulling Rikki into their typical brotherly hug when he is close enough. “I haven’t seen you in ages.”
“Hey,” Rikki replies, chuckling ever so slightly. “It’s good to see you.” Rikki steps out of the hug and turns to you. “Hey, Bret. Sorry I’m a little late. Traffic was a bitch on the way up here.”
“It’s okay,” you tell him, standing up and giving him a hug. A hug that is decidedly different from the one Smoothie has just given him. He seems to tense in your embrace. You pull away. “Who’s your friend?” you ask, trying to keep your voice light. You’re not sure if it works.
“This is Julie,” he says, putting his arm around the younger girl’s shoulders and pushing her an inch or two closer to you. “She’s a friend of my sister. Just visiting for a while.” There’s something in his voice, hesitance maybe, that is unsettling to you. Why would Rikki bring anyone, even a friend of the family, to see you like this? Something doesn’t make sense.
“I’m Bret,” you introduce yourself anyway, holding your hand out for this Julie girl to shake. “So you’re a friend of Vicki’s?”
“Yeah,” she says a bit too quickly. “Hope you don’t mind that Rikki brought me along. I think he was afraid to leave me in that huge house all by myself.”
“You’re staying with Rikki?” you question, furrowing your eyebrows a bit. Something is definitely bizarre about this.
“Yeah,” Rikki pipes up. “I have all that extra space. Vick’s house is pretty crowded. You know.”
“Sure, sure,” you agree. Maybe it’s best to not question things. Not yet. You turn back to Julie. “Well, it’s nice to meet you, even if it’s not under the most ideal circumstances.”
“Likewise,” she says, and she seems to relax a bit. “And trust me, I’ve been in less ideal situations.”
“Less ideal than being in a mental hospital with two ex-members of Poison and their ex-security guard?” you say, and you can’t help but smile at her. There’s something… infectious, about this girl.
“Hey, it could be worse,” she says. “I could be here with ex-members of Dokken or something.”
You look at Rikki. “This one’s got spitfire,” you say, chuckling. “Don’t let her out of your sight too long.”
“Spitfire,” he muses. “Yeah, I’d say she’s definitely got that.” He looks at her for a second and then turns his attention back to you, clearing his throat. “Anyway. How are you?”
You shrug. “Alright, I guess. Talked to Dr. Kinsington this morning. I fucking hate this medication. It makes me dizzy as hell and I’ve got a headache that I don’t even think a line of coke would touch. But other than that…you know…” you trail off. Not much else to say, really. You certainly don’t plan on telling Rikki in front of Smoothie and Julie how sorry you are for ruining his life. “Have you talked to Bob?”
Rikki shifts his weight from one foot to the other and glances at Julie awkwardly. “Not since yesterday when I was here with you,” he says. “I’m not sure where he is. He probably wants it that way.”
“Missy called me,” Smoothie says out of the blue. You turn to look at him but not before seeing the worried expression on Rikki’s face.
“Wh…what?” Rikki stutters.
“Yeah,” Smoothie continues. “She called me to find out what was going on because she said that Bobby called her, drunk off his ass, asking if he could come home.”
“You’re just now deciding to say this?” you ask him sarcastically. “Smoothie, you should have told me earlier.”
“I didn’t think you’d want to talk about it, Bret. I was just gonna tell Rikki later on.”
Rikki sits down heavily on a bench nearby and the way that Julie hurries over to him and puts her hand on his shoulder leaves a bad taste in your mouth. “I don’t even know what to say,” he says to no one in particular.
“I take it she didn’t let him come home, then,” you say, even though you already know the answer. You feel like you have to say something, like you still have to be your old take-control self, even if you can’t remember the last time you’d felt so out of control.
“No,” Smoothie says. “She’s with someone else now, and besides, with him in that condition…” He trails off.
“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised,” Rikki says quietly.
“What do you mean?” Julie asks, and you can see from the expression on her face that she didn’t mean to be so bold.
Rikki sighs. “First she left him, then I did,” he says. “The only friend he’s got in the world is that bottle.” He shakes his head. “I just hope he’s okay.”
“Bob’s a big boy,” you say, your tone not as forceful as you’d like it to be. “I’m sure he’s fine.” But you’re not.
“Where do you suppose he could have gone?” Smoothie asks.
“I have no idea,” Rikki says.
“Has anyone thought to call CC?” Julie asks then. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to stick my nose in, but…” She trails off, making a helpless gesture with her hands.
“I haven’t talked to CC in months,” Rikki confesses. “And neither has Bob. I don’t think he would go there.”
“And even if he did,” you add, “what kind of help would CC really be? He’s not the most together guy we know.” You think that you have absolutely no business criticizing anyone at this point, but hell, it’s the truth.
“Maybe that’s all the more reason for one of us to call him,” Smoothie speaks up. “If Bobby is with him, and CC isn’t clean, someone should get Bobby out of there.”
“I’d like to repeat that Bobby is a big boy and he can take care of himself.” Your voice sounds more harsh this time around. But you can’t deny that everyone’s concern for Bobby is more than a bit annoying to you.
“He can take care of himself if he’s sober,” Rikki snaps, glaring at you. “But he isn’t sober…”
“And that’s somehow my fault, right?” you throw back at him. “I gave Bobby a fucking bottle of whiskey and told him to get smashed. Yeah, that’s what happened.”
“Don’t be an asshole, Bret. I told you this would happen. He can’t handle this situation. And I don’t blame him. This is all so fucked up.”
You stalk over to where Rikki is seated and stare down at him. Julie edges away slightly, looking clearly uncomfortable with all that is happening. “He left you,” you remind him coldly. “He could have stayed. I didn’t make him leave. You didn’t make him leave. That decision was his own.”
“Guys,” Smoothie interjects calmly. “Come on, don’t do this now. You’re not solving anything.”
“There’s nothing to solve,” you yell, your voice carrying throughout the courtyard. Your head is beginning to spin but you attempt to ward off the ensuing dizziness. “Bobby has made up his fucking mind. Even if he is with CC, no one is going to be able to just go in there and drag him out.”
“We should try,” Rikki says softly. “I have to try.”
“Why the fuck do you care so much? Yesterday you were in here crying like a bitch because he left you. And now this? Let him drink himself to death, Rikki. It’d serve him right.” Your surroundings are starting to blur around the edges. You think it would probably be a good idea to sit down soon. But that wouldn’t go well with your attempt at control
Rikki glares up at you angrily but it’s Julie who says something first. Her voice is even, calm. Much like Smoothie always sounds. But to your ears you hear nothing but patronization. “You know, I don’t know anything about any of this, really,” she says. “But no matter what has happened, that was a terrible thing to say, Bret. Smoothie’s right. Talking like this isn’t going to help anyone.”
You turn to look at her, incredulous, unable to remember the last time anyone at all had had the audacity to butt into an argument that you were half of. Snide replies well up in your throat but die on your lips. “What?” you say, but instead of the vicious tone you’d been aiming for, you sound only shocked.
Rikki is on his feet in seconds, moving to stand protectively behind Julie, his hand on her shoulder, and now you really need to sit down. You close the distance between yourself and the bench and sit down heavily, finding yourself very dizzy.
“You all right?” Smoothie asks from where he’s standing.
“I’m fine,” you reply, not looking at him. But you’re not, really.
“I’m sorry if I said something I shouldn’t have,” Julie says then, sounding nervous. “I just—“
“It’s okay,” Rikki cuts in. “You were right. So was Smoothie. You didn’t do anything wrong.” He’s talking fast, like he’s on coke or like he’s afraid of something. “Bret? Seriously? Are you okay? You look a little pale.”
You look up at him, and for just a second your vision blurs. “I’m okay,” you tell him, but your voice sounds strange. “It’s just the pills.”
“Maybe I should get a nurse or something,” Julie suggests weakly, but she doesn’t move from where she’s standing. “Rikki, do you want me to…”
“No,” you manage, holding your hand up in protest. The last thing you want is this girl you don’t even know and are beginning to really dislike coming to your rescue.
“No, Bret. Something’s wrong,” Rikki shakes his head at you. Then he turns to look back at Julie. “Can you go get someone? Please?”
“Of course,” she says hurriedly. She quickly begins to walk away.
“No,” you speak up again. “I’m fine. Just give me a second and I’ll be fine. I don’t need any help.”
“Go,” you hear Smoothie tell her.
“Dammit,” you growl. And then the world rushes by you in a series of flashes and you find yourself falling forward into Rikki’s arms. So much for staying in control.
The next thing you know you are waking up back in your bed in the hospital. Rikki is sitting in the chair near your bedside. His hand clinging tightly to yours. He is the only one around. He smiles down at you when you open your eyes. “Welcome back to the world of the living,” he quips, though the smile on his lips doesn’t match the look in his eyes.
“What the fuck happened?” you grumble, your voice scratchy and your throat dry. “Where did everybody go?”
“You passed out,” Rikki informs you softly. “The doctor said it was just a bad reaction to the medication. But you scared the shit out of me. And as for everyone else, I sent Smoothie home and Julie is in the waiting room.”
The memories from this afternoon creep slowly back into your head. You glance up at Rikki with an arched eyebrow. “You gonna tell me who this Julie chick really is?”
“What do you mean?” he says, and you can see the shadow going over his eyes, the wall he puts up between himself and you.
“You know damn well what I mean,” you say, and you know that the medication has taken all of the aggressiveness out of your tone. But it has taken away your ability to really care, too.
“I told you,” he says. “She’s a—“
“I know what you told me,” you interrupt tiredly. “But I also know that what you told me isn’t the truth.” He just looks at you for a minute and you sigh. “Rikki, come on. I’ve known you for a million and two years. Do you really think you can just lie right to my face without me knowing it?”
He sighs and lets go of your hand. “I’m sorry,” he says. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have lied to you.” And then he falls silent.
“Well, are you going to tell me the truth, or are you just going to apologize for lying?” you say, your tone exhausted. This is almost like talking to a small child.
“Well, the truth is…” He hesitates. “The truth is that I don’t really know who she is.”
“What, like you just… what? Picked her up on the side of the road somewhere?”
“No, of course not… I met her, well, I mean I know her online. We’ve been emailing back and forth for a long time now.”
For a moment you just look at him, completely dumbfounded. Rikki has always been something of an internet junkie, but this is taking it to new highs, or lows, depending on how you choose to look at it. Either way, you aren’t happy with his answer. “Do you know how crazy that sounds?” you finally say, incredulous. “Rick, what the fuck are you thinking? You can’t just invite some random chick to stay with you. She could be a psycho killer for all you know.” You still don’t sound angry or aggressive, but you hope that Rikki notes your displeasure nonetheless.
“If she wanted to kill me she could have done it last night,” Rikki replies, sighing deeply.
“What did you do last night?” you spit out before giving it enough thought to realize that you probably don’t want to hear the answer to your question.
Rikki shakes his head and stands up, turning his back to you. He shoots a hand through his dyed-red locks and then lets it fall limply to his side. “It wasn’t like what you’re thinking,” he tells you. “We just slept together. As in, actually slept. Nothing happened. But whatever, she was close enough to kill me if she had wanted to.”
“I don’t understand you,” you say, staring tiredly out the lone window in your room. “Why would you even invite her here? Like there isn’t enough going on in your life right now.”
“That’s exactly why I did invite her. I need an out from this, Bret. She’s a new face. She’s refreshing. And, before I made the stupid decision of dragging her up here today, she was completely unaware of all of this shit. She’s an escape for me. And really, she’s a nice girl. I’m glad I invited her.”
“So how long before you fuck her?”
He favors you with a tired, sad expression. “Bret, it’s really not like that.”
“Maybe it isn’t now,” you reply. “But come on, man. She’s gorgeous and she’s sleeping in your bed.” You pause. “And whether the band is dead or not, you are still technically a rock star, and more than that you’re still Rikki Rockett, so don’t give me this saint shit.”
He sighs. “I can’t answer that, Bret. All I can say is that I have no intention of sleeping with her.”
“You had no intention of sleeping with me,” you answer simply.
“Well, Bret, I don’t think she’s going to call me a faggot and then beat the shit out of me, so I’d say you’re in apples and oranges territory with that last statement.”
You close your eyes and wait for a surge of anger that doesn’t come. Idly you wonder if it’s the medication or just the long months that you’d been out of practice. And besides, he has a point. “Does it really make you feel better to have her here?” you ask finally.
“Yeah, it does,” he says quietly. “Not in a way that I think I could explain, but yeah. It really does.”
“I want you to be happy,” you tell him honestly, opening your eyes. “I just think your timing is a little off.”
“Everything about this is a little off, Bret. Maybe my timing is fucked up, but so is yours. What a time to finally say you love me, right? When you’re in a fucking institution and the two of us can’t really be anything to each other even if we wanted to.”
“Why can’t we be?” you find yourself asking, sounding more tired than ever. “What’s stopping us from being together, Rikki?”
“You’re sick Bret,” he nearly barks, looking at you critically. “Take all the medication, talk to all the doctors, play like you’re just fine…go ahead. None of that changes the fact that you have a serious problem. And until you get yourself together and actually get out of here, there isn’t anything that you and I can be for each other.”
For the first time in all the years you have known him, Rikki has managed to bring you inches from tears. It’s one thing to insult your old relationship or argue about differences the two of you have. But to talk shit because of a mental illness that you have no control over, that crosses some sort of invisible line that is clearly drawn in the recesses of your mind. “I’m trying to get better,” you manage to respond, swallowing around the tight knot in your throat. “I’m sorry that I’m fucking everything up for you. I really am ruining your life.”
“You’re not ruining anything, Bret,” Rikki says hurriedly, but you don’t want to hear it.
“I think you should leave now, Rikki,” you tell him in all seriousness.
“Bret…”
“No, Rikki.. Go. Now.”
“Bret don’t be…”
“Goodbye, Rikki.” You roll onto your side and face away from him, doing your best to ignore his presence as the tears well up at the corners of your eyes. He says nothing else, all you hear is the soft click of the door closing. Only then do you allow yourself to really cry.
~*~
The simple action of getting dressed has left you completely exhausted, and you collapse back onto CC’s bed, your legs hanging over the side. The Advil has only made you feel better enough to function at the dark side of the human spectrum.
“Going back to bed, then?” comes CC’s voice from the doorway.
You turn your head and look at him without really moving much. “No,” you say. “I just can’t really seem to do anything else.”
“Having a little trouble waking up,” he notes, and you think his tone sounds mischievous.
“I guess that’s one way of putting it. It kind of feels like my throat is… glued to itself.”
“I’ve got something for that, you know,” he says, finally entering the room.
You raise an eyebrow at him, or at least you think that’s what you’re doing with your face. Hard to tell through this hangover. You know, somewhere in your head, that the thing to do now would be to say no thank you, but given your current condition, you just keep looking at him expectantly.
CC pulls open one of the dresser drawers and when he turns to face you again, he is holding what appears to be a pane of glass. It is not until he comes back over to the bed and puts the object down that you realize it’s a mirror. A mirror with a pile of white powder in the center of it.
“Whaddaya say, Bob? It’d be like old times.”
With great effort, you pull yourself upright and stare down at the coke for a few long moments. “Why not,” you say finally. “It’s not like I have anything better to do.”
“That’s the spirit,” CC chuckles, sounding more much jovial than you can even pretend to be right now. “This is the good shit, too. You can thank me later. Trust me.”
“You’ve always had the good shit,” you comment, your eyes having a hard time straying from the pile in front of them.
“Don’t start drooling on it,” he laughs again. “Go ahead,” he pushes the mirror a few inches closer to you. “Have some.”
Your mind is a jumbled mess so it doesn’t really take a lot of convincing for you to think this is a good idea. Without a word you slip your wallet out of the back pocket of your jeans and remove a fifty-dollar bill. You roll it tightly and lean over the mirror that CC is still holding for you. You quickly rail one line of the cocaine in each nostril. Then you sit up, sniff deeply, and glance at CC with a glazed over look in your eyes. “Jesus it’s been a long time.”
“You’ve been missing out, then,” CC tells you plainly. “You shoulda called me months ago.”
“Obviously,” you laugh, taking the mirror from his hands and handing him your still rolled fifty. “Your turn.”
CC smiles at you; a large, bright smile that has ‘crazy’ written all over it. You have seen this look on his face countless times before. CC has never really been able to beat his addiction. And that look solidifies it for you. Surprisingly, you’re not upset. Not even concerned, really. Coke can do things for you that alcohol can never compete with. So if CC is providing, you aren’t going to complain about his habit.
You watch as he cuts two lines, much larger than the two you did. He does them like he’s a professional and you almost laugh when you realize that a professional drug addict is pretty much exactly what CC is. Just throw a guitar in there somewhere.
Already you can feel the first icy tendrils of the drug creeping into your system. The inside of your nose has gone numb, and a moment later you can taste the bitter drip in the back of your throat, but this, too, is soon replaced with the numbing sensation that is the trademark sign of good coke. It’s been a long time, and the drug spreads through you like blue lightning, or at least what you’d imagine blue lightning would feel like. “This is really good shit,” you say.
“I fucking told you,” CC says, grinning at you devilishly. “And there’s plenty more where that came from.”
Now that you’re on coke, you’re thrilled with the prospect that there’s more coke to be had. That’s the way of this drug. It’s not something that can be done socially, or at least not something that you had ever been able to do socially. Coke is a drug that you do until it’s gone, and sometimes you don’t even stop there. Sometimes you just get more. And coke justifies itself; the part of your brain that knows better is too high to care.
“Feeling better now?” CC asks.
“Much,” you tell him, and you almost don’t notice that you’re grinning. “Thanks.”
“What are friends for,” he says, and it’s not a question. “Help yourself. Like I said, there’s plenty to go around. Kinda nice, having someone to party with.”
You quickly do two more lines, loving the sense of power that is sweeping over your body. “I’m sorry I didn’t call you before this,” you tell him, meaning it but not really caring if he believes you or not. You’ve said it. That’s enough.
“No worries,” he replies, shrugging. He stays silent as he does another line. When he looks back up at you there is a sense of total peace across his face. “I didn’t really want to see you and Rikki together, anyway.”
“What?” You feel like you should probably add something to that question, but you can’t think of what it should be.
“What you do with your life is your business, Bob. But I could have told you from the start that it would have ended up this way. Rikki’s like a brother to me, but the way he falls all over himself trying to get to Bret is nothing new. You deserve better than that.”
“Didn’t know you cared so much,” you laugh, lying back on the bed and letting the pillows swallow you. “CC the softie.”
“I’m not soft,” he assures you. “But you’ve always been my best friend in the band. You’re here now and I’ll do my best to keep you in the happiest mood I possibly can. I just wish it hadn’t come to this. Rikki is an ass for fucking with what the two of you had.”
Coming from CC, this may be one of the strangest things you’ve ever heard. Or maybe it’s just the cocaine. Probably it’s just the cocaine, actually, but that’s fine with you. Everything right now is just the cocaine.
“Yeah,” you say then. “An ass is exactly what Rikki is.” And you mean it. You’re not sure if you actually mean it, or if the coke is just telling you that you mean it, but either way, it feels true right now and little else matters.
“I’ll drink to that,” he says and chuckles. “Actually, I’ll snort to that.” And that’s exactly what he does.
~*~
You’re nearly halfway home before Julie finally speaks, and even now it is just to timidly ask if you’re okay. You’re not, of course, but when you shoot a glance over at her expression of genuine worry, you nod. “I’ll be fine,” you tell her.
“Well, if you’ll be fine, then that means you aren’t fine now,” she replies.
You almost smile, but can’t quite do it. “Don’t worry about me. Bret and I…” You sigh. “We’re just… things are a little tense, you know?”
“Saying that you and Bret are a little tense is like saying that Hitler was kind of elitist,” she says, looking at you with one eyebrow up and her lips pulled into what you can only think to call half of a smirk.
“That was pretty good,” you respond, then clear your throat. “Seriously, I’m okay. That back there? That was nothing.”
“I’d ask you what’s happened between the two of you that’s worse than that but,” she pauses, shaking her head with that smirk still on her lips. “I probably don’t want to know.”
You can’t help but chuckle a bit. Maybe calling her your comic relief wasn’t so far from the truth. “You’ve probably heard tons of rumors and shit about Poison, right?”
She shrugs. “I’ve heard my share, yeah.”
“Well, multiply all of that by about a million and you might get close to the shit Bret and I have been through, the shit we’ve done to each other.”
“I was right,” she said. “I don’t want to know. But I’m still sorry that you’re not fine. I wish there was something I could do. I feel responsible. I probably shouldn’t have gone up there with you.”
“This isn’t your fault,” you tell her. And you mean it. You really, truly mean it. “I asked you to come with me. I should have known Bret wouldn’t be happy about it. So don’t feel responsible, okay? Really, everything will be cool with me and Bret. The two of us always manage to work something out in the end.”
She’s silent for a while, staring out the passenger side window. You try to concentrate on the road but you can’t help but glance at her from time to time. If anyone asked you, you still wouldn’t be able to explain how this pretty girl has ended up in the seat next to you. But you can’t deny that you are amazingly happy that she’s here. “Does he really think you’re fucking me?” she asks suddenly, turning to look at you.
“I’m really glad you’re here,” you say at the exact same time.
She giggles. “Thanks,” and she turns her head to look at the scenery going by.
You pull your sunglasses, which had been holding your hair back, down onto your eyes, and sigh. “Yeah,” you reply. “Well. No. But he thinks that I’m going to.”
For a few minutes, neither of you say anything, and then she says your name. You glance at her and she is favoring you with that same half-smirk that she was giving you before. “What?” you ask her, turning your eyes back to the road.
“Are you going to?”
“Am I going to what?”
“You know what,” she says, and you can hear her smiling even though you’re not looking at her. “Are you going to fuck me?”
You laugh, hoping that it sounds natural to her, even though it doesn’t to you. “What the hell kind of question is that?”
“A valid one,” she replies, not missing a beat.
“Are you always this blunt?”
“You’ve been emailing back and forth with me for two years,” she says. “I think you can answer that for yourself.” She pauses. “Stop stalling and answer the question, Rockett.”
“I’m not stalling,” you tell her, even though you know that you are. “That’s just not the kind of question you ask a person., Julie. I mean, Christ.”
“Yeah?” she shoots back, and you know that she is perfectly happy with this kind of banter. “Well it’s not exactly normal to ask a person you’ve never met to fly across the country at four in the fucking morning, either. So let’s just throw this ideal of normalcy right out the window, okay? Are you planning on fucking me or not?”
“You are so not like any person I have ever met,” you chuckle, turning to stare at her with a look of amazement on your face. Who is this person sitting next to you and how in the hell did you get lucky enough to meet her? It’s rare for you to find anyone that can hold their own in a snarky argument with you.
“I’m not like anyone at all, Rikki,” she says, smiling at you widely. “Get used to it or send me home. So come on, Mr. Rockett. Stop being a rock star and answer me.”
“You’re only here because I’m a rock star,” you chuckle. “Don’t kid yourself.”
“Fuck off,” she laughs. And you’re glad that she isn’t upset by your comment. “I’m here because you’re a lunatic and I’m an even bigger one.”
“But a cute lunatic,” you compliment her.
She arches an eyebrow at you before you turn your head back to watch the traffic. “Cute enough to want to fuck me?”
“Multi-faceted question, that,” you say, smiling wide.
“You are such a prick,” she admonishes, lightly slapping you on the arm.
“You wouldn’t love me any other way,” and you can’t quite comprehend how fluidly this conversation is going, how comfortable the two of you already are.
“You’re fucking right I wouldn’t,” Julie said, and out of the corner of your eye you can see that she is taking off her seatbelt.
The next thing you know, her head is in your lap, her face grinning up at you. “Come on,” she says, giggling. “Tell me.”
You take your hand off of the stick shift and run it absentmindedly through her hair. “Do you really think,” you begin finally, “that if I had no intentions of sleeping with you, I really would have bothered?”
“God, you really are that shallow,” she says, swatting at you playfully.
“You love it.”
“Answer the question!” she says more insistently, reaching up to touch your face.
“You already know the answer.”
“Say it.”
Something about the way she is looking up at you now, mischief mixed with obvious lust in her eyes, you don’t feel the need to continue this banter any longer. “Yes, I want to fuck you.” Your voice is low and you have to swallow around the dryness of your mouth. It’s been well over a year since you’ve been with a woman. The mere thought of it does things to your body that you know Julie notices. “Happy now?”
“More than you realize,” is her quiet reply, her eyes narrowing and her smile growing wider. “Thanks for making me a happy girl, Mr. Rockett.” Then she turns her head so she is looking away from you and you can feel the warmness of her mouth press against the denim covering your now obviously hardened cock.
“Julie,” you say, one hand on the wheel and one hand toying with a strand of her red curls. You feel like you should say more but aren’t sure if you can get the words to come out.
“Just drive,” she says, her voice muffled as she doesn’t look up at you. “And know that I will be very upset if you get us killed.”
“If we die this will be all your fault,” you tell her, laughter somewhere in the back of your throat.
She looks up at you briefly, her hand now resting on your upper thigh. “Then enjoy this, it might be the last blowjob you get.”
It takes just about everything you have to keep your eyes open and on the road after she says that. Your hand that is on the steering wheel clenches it tightly, trying to keep yourself and your car on the road. But her mouth against you feels so good. So warm. And then you feel her fingers playing with your zipper and you’re pretty sure that you should pull over but you’re a rock star and you’ve done worse than this while driving before so you… just… keep… going.
“I’m not even going to ask if you’ve done this before,” she says as she tugs your zipper down, freeing your hardness from the confines of your jeans.
“I think you know the answer,” you say, your breath catching in your throat. “What about you? Have you done this before?”
“What do you think?” she asks, and laughs, and then her mouth is closing around the head of your cock and it feels like there’s cold blue electricity shooting up the back of your spine.
“Jesus,” you breathe, tangling your hand further into her hair as she begins to slowly move up and down. You had entirely forgotten what it felt like to have a woman’s face between your thighs and the difference is overwhelming. Her lips are like wet satin, smooth and soothing against your aching hardness.
She pulls off of you then and you glance down long enough to see her looking up at you questioningly. “Tell me how you like it,” she says softly, and then her mouth is around you again.
“I like it,” is all you can manage. This isn’t going to take long, you think. Not long at all.
She increases her efforts and it feels as though she’s going to suck all of you right out through the head of your cock. You swallow hard around the lump in your throat, gripping the steering wheel so tightly that your knuckles are white. You notice your foot pressing down harder on the gas pedal and have to force yourself to pull back. The speedometer already reads well over the speed limit and the last thing you need is to get pulled over by the cops right now. Wouldn’t that just make a wonderful headline for the LA Times?
The muscles in the tops of your legs begin to spasm and you know that your release is coming soon. Julie must notice, you think, because she speeds up her motions and digs her fingers into your upper thighs. Your eyes drift shut for only a few seconds and the car swerves. “Jesus Christ,” you spit out, regaining control of the car. Julie laughs, your cock still in her mouth, and the sensation makes you crazy. You pull gently at her hair and she moans, sending vibrations through all of your extremities. “Julie,” you choke out, licking your lips. “Julie I’m gonna…” you raise your hips up off the seat, not able to say more.
For one brief second Julie takes her mouth off of you and looks up into your eyes. “Come for me,” she says, and it almost sounds like she’s pleading. You bite down hard on your bottom lip, almost to the point of drawing blood. Her mouth closes around you again and just a few seconds later you feel yourself tumble over the edge.
“Fuck,” you manage. And then you are spilling hotly into her mouth, pulling her hair, and doing all you can to not drive the both of you off the road. Julie takes all that you have to give her, not pulling away until you are completely spent. When she is done, she rearranges you in your jeans and zips them up. You take a deep breath and venture a glance down at her, her head still lying peacefully in your lap. You run your fingers through her hair and down her cheek, playing momentarily with the neckline of her top. “Jesus, Julie. That was amazing.”
“I’ll just put it on your tab,” she says, pulling herself off of your lap. You’re surprised at what a noticeable difference it is to not have her head there anymore; it feels colder.
“I don’t doubt that,” you say quietly, staring at the road, trying to get yourself together enough to drive the rest of the way home. Just a few more miles, you tell yourself. Just a few more miles.
~*~
You listen to the phone ring for at least the eleventh time before hanging it up with a sigh. A glance at the clock on the wall tells you that it is after nine thirty already, inching towards the time of night where they send you all off to your rooms like you’re children at sleepaway camp.
Before anyone gets a chance to tell you what to do, you make your way to the nurse’s station and offer the nurse on duty a small smile.
“Hello, Mr. Michaels,” she says cheerfully, handing you your medication in a little paper cup. “How are you feeling tonight?”
“Fine,” you tell her, taking the pills and swallowing them dry. To appease her you take the cup of water she’s holding out and take a small sip.
“You look tired,” she says.
“Tired,” you repeat. “Yeah. That’s one word for it.” Another small, meaningless smile and you begin shuffling off in the direction of your room. Today has probably been the worst day you’ve had since you’ve woken up. Too much happened in too short a time. And the damn medication hasn’t helped you one bit. Sure, you aren’t hallucinating anymore, but you feel like shit all of the time.
You reach your room and enter it, closing the door quietly behind you. For a few moments you stand and stare at the light switch, trying to decide if you really want to turn it on. In the end, you don’t. Instead, you grab the chair by your bed, pull it over directly in front of the window, and sit down. You have the perfect angle to see the moon shining bright in the darkness of the night. It looks so peaceful outside, and you bet it’s probably still warm. And then you wonder where Rikki is.
You hadn’t really meant to throw him out of your room earlier. But the events of the afternoon had just been too much. And besides, you know him. The idea of him fucking this stranger that he has randomly invited to stay with him for a while isn’t that far off base. And that drives you absolutely nuts. Despite your actions in the past, all you have told Rikki in the past few days has been the truth. You do love him. You probably always have. And right now you’re hating yourself for saying it too late. For saying it under the wrong circumstances.
What Rikki said to you earlier still rings clearly in your mind. As long as you’re in this place nothing can happen with the two of you. And you know, no matter how hard you try to get better, it’s going to be a long time before the doctors let you out. It already feels too late. How much longer can you really wait? You can’t. You need to get out of this place now. You need to fix things with Rikki.
Sighing, you stand up and put your hands against the glass of the window. It’s cool and reassuring against your palms and you almost don’t notice as you slide it open, but then you feel the air against your face. It smells clean, warm, and you realize how long it’s been since you’ve been outside beyond the confines of the small courtyard in the hospital.
It would be so easy, you think, just to climb out the window and walk off into the night. But where would you go? You can’t go home. That’s the first place they’d look, and you almost laugh. It’s like you’re a convicted murderer or something, having to worry about being hunted down and captured just for wanting to exist outside of the claustrophobia of this little room.
You lean forward, sticking your head out of the window and inhaling the night air. You’re Bret Michaels, you tell yourself. You’ve got money and you’ve got brains. You don’t need anything else. You swallow hard.
You don’t realize that you’re not wearing shoes until your bare feet hit the dewy grass, but you know that if you climb back inside, you’ll just give in to the sleepy pull of the medication and crawl into the bed where you’ve been spending so much of your time lately. And so instead you just put one bare foot in front of the other and make your way across the lawn.
It’s surprisingly dark outside, and you’re grateful that this isn’t the stealth mission you thought it would be. In the back of your mind there are images of fierce attack dogs and security guards with guns, but the grounds outside of the hospital are quiet and still. Of course, this doesn’t seem the kind of place where they keep the really dangerous nutballs, anyway. If it were, there probably would have been bars on the windows or something.
You continue to walk quietly through the wet grass, painfully aware of every light you see coming from the building behind you. You don’t really want to think about what will happen to you if anyone finds you out here. Whatever the punishment would be, you can only believe that it would be terrible. The edge of the property that the hospital sits on is inching up closer to you. And here you see the first major complication in your plan. There is a chain-link fence surrounding the grounds. There doesn’t seem to be any barbed wire across the top or anything drastic like that. But still, the idea of climbing a fence in your bare feet and cotton pajamas isn’t exactly inviting.
“You can do this, Michaels,” you say to yourself, fighting off the drowsiness of the medicine you have taken. But really, you’re not sure. You’ve done a lot of crazy shit in your time, but breaking out of a mental institution probably takes the cake. Looking around you one last time, you see no one. Slowly, you reach up and curl your fingers through one of the openings in the fence. With a bit of effort you pull yourself upwards. Being catatonic for so many months has clearly taken much of your strength away. The muscles of your upper body aren’t what they used to be. By the time you reach the top of the fence you are surprisingly winded.
You hold yourself there for a few excruciating moments, trying to decide how exactly you’re going to get down to the sidewalk on the other side. Jumping doesn’t seem pleasant as, from this angle, the ground looks quite far away. Taking a deep breath, you hurl yourself over the top of the fence and manage to grab on again once you are on the other side. Your fingers clench around the chain-link. You’ve made it, you think. You’re actually going to do this. And that’s when, somewhere down the street, you hear a car door being slammed shut. Panicking, you release your hold on the fence and tumble onto the sidewalk below.
Your back connects with the pavement and you let out a surprised, wounded noise, quickly biting down on the inside of your cheek to keep from drawing any attention to yourself. Only when a few minutes have passed without any other sounds do you slowly pull yourself to your feet. Your back groans in protest but you know that you haven’t really injured yourself. Dimly, you promise yourself that someday you’ll actually get your physique back.
Now that you actually have the chance to look around, you begin to second-guess yourself. This place is in the middle of nowhere, high up in the hills of southern California, probably miles away from any sort of real civilization. You can hear nothing now but crickets and suddenly the dark seems almost as scary as it did when you were five years old and you woke up in the middle of the night only to find that your mother had shut your bedroom door all the way.
Your hand is halfway in your pocket before you remember that you don’t have a cell phone anymore, haven’t had one since… You shake your head, realizing you’re not quite able to differentiate between which of your memories are real and which are imagined.
But now isn’t the time to think about that, you tell yourself, and without really having the first clue what you’re doing or where you’re going, you begin to walk. Just one foot in front of the other, you remind yourself again as you cross the street. Once you’re safely on the sidewalk on the other side, you stop, turning one way and then the other, but all you can see is dark. With a sigh, you pick a direction and start to walk, quickly but lightly. The last thing you need is to step on something sharp. You’re not sure how far you’re going to be able to walk as it is.
As you walk, you vaguely remember Rikki saying that it was about a two-hour drive from his house to the hospital. Roughly one hundred and twenty miles if your rudimentary math skills haven’t left you. No way you’re going to walk that length. The idea of stealing a car pops into your head, but you wouldn’t have any idea how to go about doing that. Being a rock star, you’ve never really had to worry about transportation. Your best bet seems to be walking until you find a gas station and then calling someone. But who? You can’t call Rikki. You want to surprise him. Smoothie would probably send you right back to the hospital. Your parents aren’t speaking to you. And Bobby and CC…well…just no. That doesn’t leave you many options. If only you had some money. That would help. Money always helps. But you’re not exactly crazy enough to try to rob a bank or a convenience store or anything.
A car passes by you, headlights illuminating the area around you. And out of nowhere you realize what you need to do. You need to hitchhike. That decided, you continue to walk down the street, more determined now that you have a pseudo-plan.
Several minutes pass before you see another car. Your feet are really starting to hurt now and your back has a dull ache that won’t go away. Hoping for some sort of miracle, you stick your thumb out. The car speeds by you, the driver not even giving you a second glance.
“Fuck,” you mumble, pushing a stray strand of hair out of your face. You can’t really blame the driver for not stopping. You wouldn’t have stopped. But somewhere in this world there has to be someone who is kinder than you when it comes to picking up strangers off the street. It must be fifteen minutes or more before you finally see another car. You hold your thumb out again, not expecting much. The car flies by you but then you hear it slam on its brakes. You turn around slowly as the driver puts the car into reverse.
“Well,” you say softly, not giving a thought to what the driver of the car might do if they see you talking to yourself. “Here’s to hoping he’s not a serial killer.”
The window on the car is rolled down and, much to your surprise, a young female sticks her head out into the night air. “Do you need a ride somewhere?”
You raise an eyebrow as you give her a cursory once-over. She’s Asian, with a black bob haircut and little glasses with black frames. Cute, in a geeky sort of way. And probably not a serial killer. “Yep,” you say, and before she can change her mind you make your way around the front of the car and climb in.
“Where you headed?” she asks, beginning to drive.
“Woodland Hills,” you answer, not giving yourself time to talk yourself out of turning up at Rikki’s house.
“I can get you about halfway there,” she tells you matter-of-factly.
“Thanks.” And then you drive in silence for a while.
Eventually she reaches down and turns on the radio, pushing a tape into the player. A few seconds later music begins playing, a voice you don’t recognize singing something about the black of the blackest ocean.
“Name’s Niki,” she says then. “Not that you asked.”
“Sorry,” you tell her. “It’s been… something of a weird day.” You clear your throat. “Anyway, I’m—“
“I know who you are,” she interrupts. “And I’m not going to ask. I’m just going to take you as far as I’m going and then go to my boyfriend’s house and open with, ‘You are not going to believe what just happened to me’.”
“Thanks,” you say tiredly, sinking down into the seat a bit. “I appreciate it.”
“Not a problem,” she tells you, shrugging. “You look pretty tired. Feel free to get some sleep if you’d like.”
You nod, unable to deny how sleepy the medication you took back at the hospital has made you. “Maybe I’ll do that.” You turn your head so it’s facing towards the passenger side window and close your eyes. You’re asleep within minutes.
~*~
Staring at CC across the table in the middle of his dining room is a bit surreal at the moment. You’re really not sure how much cocaine you’ve done throughout the day. You just know that it was a lot. And it was all amazing. And now, a twelve pack of Heineken that you split with CC later, you’re not feeling much of anything at all. And from the look on CC’s face, he’s right there with you. Everything feels like it’s in fast forward. And you suddenly can’t remember why you ever stopped doing this.
“What the fuck should we do now?” CC asks, a huge grin on his face. “I don’t think I have anything that can top this shit.”
“I don’t think I could live through anything that can top this shit,” you laugh, sniffling and wiping at your nose.
“We could get some hookers,” CC suggests, waggling his eyebrows.
You just shake your head. “Probably not the best idea.”
“Strip club?” he says.
You’re about to veto the idea, but instead you pause to consider it. Of course, after all of that coke, ‘considering it’ just means repeating the phrases ‘strip club’ and ‘naked chicks’ in your head, over and over and very quickly, until it doesn’t even sound like English anymore. You feel yourself smile. “Now that’s not such a bad idea,” you say, although really you’re not exactly sure where the line between good and bad should be drawn at this point.
“Well, all right then!” he says excitedly, rising to his feet. “I’ll go find my car keys. You grab the bag of coke that’s in the shoebox on my dresser. And then we’ll go ogle some tits and ass.” And before you have the chance to respond, he’s out of the room.
Shrugging to yourself, you stand up and make your way into CC’s room. Just as he said, there’s a black shoebox at one side of the dresser, and when you open it, you see a baggie filled with white powder. Picking it up, you estimate that there’s probably a little over an eightball. You smile to yourself. That and the beer will delay the crash for at least a few more hours.
CC is standing by the front door by the time you get back to the living room. “Ready?”
“Aim, fire,” you agree, and then the two of you are out the door and climbing into CC’s car.
“It’s been too long, my good man,” CC says, grinning as he peels out of the driveway. “It’s been too fucking long.”
“Fuck yeah it has,” you agree. “We shoulda got together a hell of a long time ago to do this shit, Ceece. You’re the man.”
“Nah,” he laughs. “You’re just too fucked up to realize that I’m not.”
“Bro, I’m too fucked up to realize much of anything. I don’t even remember how I got to the car.”
“Very carefully,” he reminds you. “But don’t worry, if you had fallen, you wouldn’t have felt it.”
“True enough,” you say. “You’re brilliant.”
“Nope,” he corrects you again. “Just on cocaine.”
“And what a great thing that is,” you chuckle, shaking your head. “What a great thing that is.”
“Yes,” he says, his voice easily revealing how fucked up he is. “And there will be much rejoicing.”
“Much rejoicing,” you agree. “As soon as we get to the strip club.”
“Bro?” he says.
“Yeah?”
“We’re at the strip club,” he says, grinning, and then you look out through the windshield and you can see the tacky neon sign that says ‘The Foxx’, and underneath that, flashing, ‘Live Nude XXX’.
“Fabulous,” you say, already climbing out of the car. “And now we can get to the rejoicing part.”
“Right,” CC says, and somehow the two of you are already at the door and he’s pulling it open. It seems as though it’s only another second later before the two of you are sitting in the plush leather chairs surrounding the stage.
“Can I get you boys a drink?”
You look up at the woman who has just spoken to you. She has impossibly long, impossibly platinum hair, and she’s not wearing anything besides a sheer jacket-like garment, buttoned once in between her enormous tits. You swallow. “I’ll have a Manhattan,” you tell her.
CC laughs. “Yeah. A fucking Manhattan,” he says. “I’ll have one, too. And put an extra cherry in mine.”
“Will do, love,” the waitress says, winking at CC before she leaves. That’s okay with you. She’s hot, in a very stripper sort of way, but she isn’t really your type at all. Not that you’re sure what your type is anymore. You’ve spent so much time with Rikki that it’s difficult to remember what you liked before him. You quickly shake that thought from your head. Tonight is a night about you and CC and having fun. Rikki has no place here.
“Earth to Bob,” CC says, waving his hand in front of your face.
“Huh?” you say, refocusing your eyes on him. “Oh, sorry.”
“Thought I lost you for a minute there, Bro. Thinking about something important?”
At this point, not much at all seems important to you. Importance is insignificant. “No,” you tell him, shaking your head. “Nothing worth talking about.”
“Bob,” CC says in a brief moment of seriousness, putting his hand on your wrist. “I’m glad you called me. Seriously, you’ll be fine, okay? I’ll make sure that you’re fine.”
All you can do is smile and nod. CC being serious while you’re both on cocaine isn’t something you’re equipped to handle right now. Not that you really need to, because a few seconds later the waitress is back with your drinks and a dancer is making her entrance on the stage.
You polish off half of your drink in one swallow, not able to fully comprehend how much you hate the taste of Manhattans. Under normal circumstances this might make you wonder why the hell you ordered one, but these aren’t normal circumstances. Normal for 1987, maybe, but not for now.
The girl on stage isn’t any more your type than the one who’d served your drink. She’s got short black hair and a serious face, and there’s something decidedly not sexy enough about the way she moves. You glance over at CC, who’s grinning up at her like a fool, and you smile to yourself. “Ceece,” you whisper, elbowing him in the arm.
“What?” he says without looking away from the stage.
“I’ll be right back,” you tell him, fingering the bag of coke in your pocket. “I’m gonna go powder my nose.”
“Yeah, yeah, sure,” he says, waving an arm dismissively.
You chuckle to yourself and rise to your feet, quickly making your way across the club towards the bathrooms. Although it’s been years since you’ve set foot in one of these places, you know that you have to keep your eyes straight ahead and move quickly in order to avoid the scantily clad women trying to make some money. Thankfully, the cocaine makes it very easy to do that.
Once inside of the bathroom, you quickly head into the last stall. You close and latch the door, already pulling the baggie out of your pocket. With a dexterity you’re quite surprised by, you untie the knot holding the bag closed and pour a small pile of the white powder onto the top of the toilet paper dispenser. A few seconds later and you’ve already retied the knot and you’re pulling out your wallet. Doesn’t seem like any time at all passes before you’ve inhaled the entire pile and then you’re shoving your wallet back into your pants.
You wipe at your face with the back of your hand and then push the stall door open.
And there’s a uniformed police officer standing in front of you.
“Why don’t you empty your pockets for me, sir,” he says flatly.
Something inside your mind snaps and you know that you’re in trouble. A lot of trouble. And you’re not about to just walk up to this cop and do what he’s telling you to. You’ve been arrested before. You didn’t like it. You don’t plan on it happening again. “Why don’t you give me a reason to do that, sir?” you reply, letting the sarcasm take over your tone.
The cop stares at you, nothing but seriousness showing on his face. “Are we gonna have a problem here?”
“No problem,” you spit back, shrugging arrogantly. “I’m just not about to empty my pockets for you. You’ve got no reason to search me. I haven’t done anything wrong. So if you’ll excuse me…” you make a move to walk past him and part of you thinks that you might actually succeed. But then his hand is on your shoulder and he’s spinning you back around towards him.
“You’re not going anywhere, sir. Not until you show me what’s in your pockets.”
“Don’t fucking touch me,” you say, pushing his hand away from you. The cocaine has numbed most of your senses. The only thing on your mind at this point is getting our of the bathroom and then out of this damn club. How quickly a good idea has turned bad.
The cop grabs your arm and begins to twist it behind you. Without really thinking you spin out of the move, something inside of you deciding that you should thank Rikki at some point for teaching you the basics of martial arts. You shove the cop with both of your hands and he stumbles backward into the cold tile wall. And before you can do anything at all, he’s mumbling something into his walkie-talkie.
“Fuck this noise,” you say to no one in particular, and turn to leave.
And that’s exactly when the bathroom door swings open and two more cops walk in, looking very unhappy. You sigh. Coke or no coke, you don’t stand a chance against three cops, although dimly you realize you probably wouldn’t have ended up getting away from even just the first one.
“What seems to be the problem here, sir?” one of the new cops asks, in that patronizing cop voice that makes you want to gouge your own eyes out.
“The problem,” you say tiredly, the lines of coke you’ve just done taking over any trace of good judgment you may have had left, “is that for no apparent reason, you guys won’t let me go back out there to my friend and my drink.”
“So what you’re saying is that you haven’t committed any crimes, then,” the other new cop says.
“Of course I haven’t,” you lie. “Unless it’s illegal to take a piss in a strip club.”
“No, it isn’t,” the original cop speaks up. “But if you haven’t done anything wrong, then you shouldn’t be concerned about emptying your pockets.”
“I’m not concerned about anything,” you tell him.
“Then please just empty your pockets, sir, and we can all be on our way,” he replies. “You can make this as easy or hard on yourself as you want.”
“Whatever,” you say flippantly and in a move that even through the coke seems like a horrible idea, you begin to walk towards the door, even though two armed police officers are blocking it.
And the next thing you know, your face is against the linoleum and you can feel a hand in your pocket, fishing out the baggie. “Fuck,” you mutter, and close your eyes. The bathroom floor is oddly comforting against your face.
“This doesn’t look like nothing to be concerned about, sir,” one of the cops says. And then you feel the cold metal of a pair of handcuffs being put on your wrists.
The cop hauls you to your feet and begins to read you your rights, telling you that you are being arrested for possession and the intent to sell narcotics. You tune him out. Having been in this sort of position before, you are fully aware of what he is saying. You don’t need to listen. Although you are a bit pissed off that he assumes you’re intending to sell the cocaine. Why the fuck would you sell it when you and CC could just do it all yourself? You figure it’s probably for the best that you don’t say that out loud.
“Do you understand these rights?” you head the cop ask you.
“Yeah, asshole,” you mumble. “I fucking understand.”
“Watch your mouth,” a cop standing by the doorway to the bathroom tells you seriously.
“Kiss my ass,” you spit back. Clearly, all of your reason has left you. And it’s a bit too late to try to get it back. Nothing that you do or say now is going to change anything. You’re going to jail. No two ways about it. What a terribly sad way to end a perfectly good evening.
Two of the cops grab each of your arms and begin to pull you out of the bathroom. The third cop leads the way. The darkness of the strip club compared to the brightness of the bathroom plays tricks on your eyes. Or maybe it’s just the cocaine fucking with your head. Either way, it takes several seconds for you to adjust to the stark contrast. By the time you can see clearly again, you’re very near the exit. And that’s bad. There’s just no way in fuck you’re leaving here without CC knowing what’s going on.
You draw a breath and in one quick motion, you jerk yourself free of the officers’ grasp and whirl around. “Yo, Ceece!” you say, raising your voice so that he’ll hear you over the throbbing techno music.
He turns around in his chair, his face registering surprise. Once he realizes what he’s looking at, his expression turns into a questioning one.
And then the cops are whirling you around and shoving you out the door.
~*~
You make your way quickly to the front door with Julie close behind you, fumbling to get the key in the lock. You’d done the gentlemanly thing; you’d taken her to an expensive dinner – candlelight, wine, the whole nine.
But now you’re home and you’re more than a little tipsy and you’ve got a hard-on that could shatter concrete and you just can’t do this whole politeness routine anymore.
You push the door open and step into the darkened foyer, reaching behind you to take Julie’s hand and tug her in behind you. And then before you have the time to second-guess yourself, you push her back against the wall and press your lips against hers, your tongue desperately seeking entrance to her mouth. She resists for only a second before you feel her lips part and your tongue finds hers.
You nudge the door shut with your foot and you’re grabbing at the waist of her jeans, practically pulling the button off in your frantic effort to undo it. “I want to fuck you now,” you whisper urgently. “Here.” And you slide her pants down a few inches with one hand, unzipping your own jeans with the other.
“Rikki,” she mumbles, her voice lower than usual. Her tongue plays at the curve of your neck as you reach down to lift her up a bit. You easily slide your knee in between her thighs, pushing her legs apart as you do so. When you feel her heat even through the denim of your jeans, your stomach does a flip. You have a brief, horrifying moment of wondering if you even remember how to do this with a woman. But the thought vanishes immediately when her tongue snakes up to your earlobe and she whispers, “fuck me.”
And then she’s pulling away just slightly, reaching down and quickly removing her shirt. She tosses it to the floor behind you. You look down at her for a second, staring at all the flesh that has just been revealed to you. Nothing about her disappoints. Then she draws you back down to her lips and your hand snakes your way down the front of her body until it reaches the spot you are looking for between her legs. She bucks against your hand and it becomes very clear to you that she isn’t going to need much coaxing. You pull your fingers away from her and bring them to your lips, staring at her as you lick her juices from them. “You’re wet,” you tell her, your voice husky. “Is that all for me?”
She barely gets out a hushed ‘yes’ before you pick her up so your bodies are almost level. She opens easily for you and you enter her in one quick stroke. She moans something completely incoherent as her head falls back against the wall.
You smile down at her, pulling out and pushing in again, harder this time. This feeling, the feeling of a woman that you have been without for so long, is not quite like anything else in the world. You’ve missed it. You wonder how you ever left it behind. “That’s right,” you encourage her, loving the sound of her voice as you fuck her. “Tell me that you like it, Julie.”
Her hands come up around you, snaking up into your shirt, hot against the flesh of your back. “You’re incredible,” she breathes and your stomach twists at the sound of her words. She quickly pulls the shirt over your head and drops it to the floor where her own is lying.
“I’ve wanted you since the first time I saw your picture,” you tell her as the two of you move together. You push into her harder, wanting to be deeper inside of her, so deep that it’s impossible.
“I’ve wanted you longer than that,” she whispers back, grinding her hips into you, squeezing your cock like a vice.
And then she is pushing you back, pushing you away and out of her, and you groan but let her do it. You’re not about to argue with her, not when she’s all fingertips and wet heat and red hair spilling over her perfect breasts that you can just make out in the dark room.
“The wall,” she says, and you don’t know what she means but then she’s tugging at your arms and you realize, somehow, that she wants you against the wall. You turn around, fall against it, not sure what she’s got in mind but you’re pretty sure you’ll be more than fine with whatever it is.
You reach out and put your hands on either side of her waist just in time to feel her muscles sliding underneath your palms as she turns around, grinding her ass against your stomach. You take the hint and slide down the wall a bit, bending your legs just slightly so that you can slip yourself back into her wet heat, which seems so much tighter, impossibly so from this angle and you groan. “So tight,” you utter without even fully realizing you’re speaking it instead of just thinking it.
Her hands slip up to yours and your fingers entwine at her waist. You grip her hand tightly, pushing into her again. You slow things up a bit now, wanting to make this last for as long as you can. You’ve been talking to this amazing woman in front of you for nearly two years. Waiting. Silently anticipating. Always wondering what it would be like. And now that you’ve got her here, you need to take your time. She seems much too intense to be wasted on a quick five-minute fuck.
Your cock twitches as Julie easily slips in to a rhythm of her own. Rocking her hips against you. Trying to quicken your pace. But you’re not ready to give this up yet. You keep your grip on her waist with one hand and slip your other up into her hair, pulling enough to arch her neck and have her look back at you. The look on her face tells you plainly that she is enjoying this. “Do you want to come?” you ask her, pulling out slowly.
She whimpers something you can’t hear and then sighs. “Yes…Rikki…please, yes.” You slam back into her with surprising force and she cries out.
“Then be patient for me, baby. Let me do this for you.”
She mumbles something that signifies her ascent to that idea and you loosen your grip on her hair. You run your hand across the side of her face and down her neck. Your fingers play at her neck for a moment before trailing lower. Taking one of her nipples between your thumb and forefinger, you squeeze gently, sheathing yourself in her wetness at the same time.
“Fuck me,” she moans, tightening her muscles around your cock.
“There’s nothing I’d rather be doing,” you tell her, and you mean it. And then you grab her hips and pull her against you, over and over, pounding into her so hard that you’re surprised she doesn’t cry out in pain.
“It feels so good,” she breathes, moving erratically, bucking against you. “You’re gonna make me come.”
“Yes,” you say. “Come for me.” And she does. You can feel the rhythmic contractions of her muscles around your cock and you have to bite the inside of your cheek hard to keep from going over the edge right along with her.
When her orgasm finally subsides, Julie practically collapses against you and you slip out of her. And then she is standing against you, her back against your front, slippery with sweat and she’s reaching up into your hair. She turns around and you can just make out her face in the darkness. “I want to make you come,” she tells you breathily, and then she’s kissing you, her tongue sliding in between your lips teasingly and you groan into her mouth.
She pulls away and slides slowly down, leaving a trail of kisses down your neck, your chest, your stomach, and then your cock is in her mouth again and you lean just your head against the wall, closing your eyes. “You’re amazing,” you tell her, and you can’t quite remember the last time you felt something even close to this good.
Her free hand snakes up, grabbing at your thigh, and then reaching around behind you and you can feel her finger gently seeking entrance. “Yes,” you tell her, biting down on your lip hard enough that you can taste hot coppery blood on your tongue. Her finger slips in deeper, twisting to the left. The suction of her mouth increases around your cock. Bright white stars come to life behind your eyelids. Nothing has ever…ever…felt this good. “Jesus, Julie…”
She moans around your cock, like she had earlier in the car, and it produces the exact same reaction. Shivers burst up your spine and you grab her hair with both of your hands, loving the silky feeling of her curls slipping around your fingers. Her finger pushes in further, and you cry out loudly as she hits your prostate. She smiles around you, her tongue doing things that you hadn’t previously thought possible. She quickens the movement of her finger, pushing in and out of your ass insistently, every time hitting against that spot that makes you absolutely insane.
The muscles in your stomach tighten and your knees grow weak. It’s a good thing the wall is behind you. Without it there would be no way for you to remain upright. You open your eyes and look down at her, her mouth pumping your cock. She stares back up at you, raw heat in those beautiful green eyes. And then she adds another finger. Something like a million volts of electricity goes off inside your brain. Breathing no longer seems necessary, let alone possible. You could die here in this hot, wet embrace and you would be just fine with that. Because this has to be heaven.
“Sugar,” you find yourself moaning, your voice scratchy. It’s taking all you have to not just simply scream. “Baby, I’m gonna…” and then her fingers curl inside you and anything you were going to say is lost in the sounds of your orgasm. You spill your hot seed into her mouth for what seems like an impossibly long time, your ass clenching around her fingers as she moves them a bit slower now. You think you might be pulling on her hair harder than is necessary, but you don’t seem to have any control over your muscles anymore.
And then you actually are sliding down the wall, all the way down until you’re sitting on the floor, trying to catch your breath, and she is kneeling in front of you with a satisfied half-smile on her face.
“That was…” you begin when you finally feel as though you can breathe again, but you can think of nothing to follow it with.
“Yes, it was,” she agrees, and she pulls your legs apart and climbs in between them, her face close to yours.
You lean in to kiss her, softly, not urgent like before, and when the kiss breaks, you whisper, “I don’t want you to leave.”
~*~
You jerk awake when Niki taps your shoulder. “We’re here,” she says. “Well, sort of. We’re at a diner.”
You yawn and stretch, trying to pull yourself out of the dopey state that the Risperdal has left you in. “Thanks for the ride,” you tell her, not quite sure what else there really is to say.
“Not a problem,” she says, smiling a little. “Um… do you want something to eat? Some coffee, maybe?”
You glance out the window at the diner and consider her offer. Some coffee might wake you up a bit, but on the other hand, Bret Michaels has never been a charity case. “No, thanks,” you say. “I’m just going to go inside and use the phone and get a ride out of here.” Although you know that’s not actually what you’re going to do.
“Okay then,” she says, shrugging. “It was nice to meet you I suppose.”
“Yeah,” you reply, chuckling just a bit. “Same here.” You open the car door and move to get out. But something stops you. You turn back to her, trying to convey seriousness with your face. “Look, Niki, I’d really appreciate it if you…”
“Don’t worry about it,” she interrupts. “I didn’t pick you up. I didn’t drop you off. I never even saw you.”
“Thanks,” you say again, really meaning it.
You are halfway out the door when you feel her hand on your back. “Bret?”
You stop one more time and turn around. “Yes?”
“Just be careful, okay?” She looks completely sincere. “I don’t know what’s going on with you, but not everyone that picks up hitchhikers is as non-threatening as I am.”
“All right,” you say, smirking. “Don’t worry about me, Niki. I’ll be fine.” And then you get out of the car and close the door without saying goodbye. You watch as the car pulls out of the parking lot of this all-night diner, staring after it until all you can make it out is two small red taillights. Then you sigh and turn towards the door of the diner. The first thing you need to do is find out exactly where you are. Then you can figure out what to do next.
A cursory look in all directions reveals practically nothing. There is the diner, and several darkened houses lining the street. You hadn’t even realized that any part of California looked as dull as this.
“Well, fuck,” you say to yourself. Your options seem awfully limited, if there are any options at all. You have no phone, no money, hell, you don’t even have any shoes. You turn around and glance at the diner, considering just going inside and calling Rikki collect, but you’re not sure how he’d react, and besides, you can see the ‘no shoes, no shirt, no service’ sign from where you’re standing. Walking in there in just a pair of pajamas probably wouldn’t be your wisest move, and idly you wonder which would be worse: if they didn’t recognize you in there, or if they did.
A loud noise from the other end of the parking lot makes you jump, and when you turn to investigate you see a large truck. You cock your head in its direction, considering the idea. Hitching a ride with a trucker, you think, just reeks of bad horror movies, but then, you’re not a pretty, dumb sorority girl in heels. Sighing to yourself, you make your way across the parking lot to the truck and rap twice on the window.
The driver rolls down the window and looks down at you with one eyebrow raised. “The shit I see driving this route,” he mutters. Then, more loudly, “What can I do for you?”
“I’m trying to get to Woodland Hills,” you tell him, feeling your face flush hot red with embarrassment.
He looks you over. “Well,” he says finally. “I guess you couldn’t possibly be dangerous.”
“I promise I’m not,” you tell him, hoping you sound as sincere as you feel. “I just really need to get to Woodland Hills.”
He arches an eyebrow at you again and shakes his head. “In just your pajamas. Yeah, I bet. Get in, kid. And just pray that whatever it is you’re doing doesn’t get me arrested, because that would piss me off to no end. And you don’t want me pissed at you.”
Your first instinct is to correct him on calling you a kid. You’re forty years old and you feel much older. This guy can’t be more than ten years your senior. But you say nothing, just hurry around to the other side of the big rig and pull open the door, climbing up on the step and then jumping in. “I really appreciate this.”
“Whatever,” he says. “Woodland Hills is about an hour away, right? One of those upper class, rich-bitch neighborhoods?”
“Yeah,” you tell him, laughing inside at the perfect description of Rikki’s neighborhood. You never really understood why he wanted to move up there in the mountains. It’s far from being the haven of a rock star. LA was much more suited to the lifestyle the two of you had always lived. But you suppose that’s just like Rikki, trying to deny what he really is. Even at the pinnacle of your career in The Eighties, he had always shied away from admitting how fucked up he really was. He always wanted to appear more together than everyone else. So a sprawling mansion surrounded by bankers and lawyers and doctors did make a certain amount of sense.
“Is this some kind of bizarre pajama party that I don’t really want to know about?”
“Something like that,” you reply. Even a small sliver of the truth would be too much for this guy to handle.
He snorts. “Right. Well, then I won’t ask. Anyway, I’m Harley,” he says.
“Bret,” you return, looking out the window as what little scenery there is goes by.
“You look like you could use a cigarette, Bret,” he tells you, motioning to a pack of Camels on the dashboard.
“Yeah,” you agree, picking it up and retrieving one. “Thanks.” You light the cigarette and take a deep drag, rolling the window down halfway.
“You know,” Harley says a moment later. “When we go out on these runs, they tell us never to pick up hitchhikers. They could be, you know, escaped mental patients or something.”
You swallow hard to keep from laughing out loud. “Could be,” is all you say.
“Eh, I don’t think that sort of thing really happens,” he goes on. “You know? It’s all urban legends and shit. I’ve picked up more than my share of hitchhikers. Even got laid a time or two. But none of them were ever psychotics or nothing.” He pauses. “Although I must say I’ve never picked up anyone wearing just a pair of pajamas before.”
“I’m one in a million,” you chuckle, not turning to look at him.
“Right,” he says. “And I guess we’ll just leave it at that.”
“Probably for the best.”
The two of you drive on in silence as you smoke your cigarette, wondering just what you’re going to do when you end up at Rikki’s house. Having a semi-truck drop you off in his driveway isn’t exactly in inconspicuous, surprise entrance you had been hoping for. Maybe you can just have this Harley guy drop you off at the end of his street. The thought of seeing Rikki in only an hour makes you smile as you flick the cigarette out the window. You have to apologize for what you did this afternoon. And you don’t doubt that he will accept your apology. He has never been able to resist you. And you don’t plan on letting him start now.
“Mind if I play some music?” Harley asks, his deep voice matching his large body and greasy hair quite well.
“Your truck,” you shrug, mildly upset that he has pulled you from the thoughts of your ex-lover. Your soon to be lover once more. God, how you want to see Rikki. To feel him touch you like he used to. To have his mouth on your cock. You swallow hard and ward off the hardness that is trying to form in your thin cotton pants. The last thing you need is this trucker thinking you’re turned on by him. The mere thought of it makes your skin crawl.
You snap suddenly, almost painfully, back to the reality of the truck when you hear Motley Crue’s “Girls, Girls, Girls” blast through the speakers of the radio. Harley begins to sing along, his voice more grating than even Vince Neil’s. And that’s saying quite a lot as you’ve never been a Vince fan. But the idea that this man is playing Motley Crue makes you wonder if he recognized you but isn’t saying anything about it. You’re not sure if it’s a good question to ask.
“I used to think I’d be a rock star someday,” Harley says, his tone almost wistful. “I think every teenage boy dreams about that at some point.”
“Yeah,” you say, rolling your eyes so that he can’t see you.
“And then there are the ones who become rock stars and piss it all away,” he goes on.
You turn and look at him, surprised, but he is staring intently at the road in front of him, and you turn to look out the window again. “Yeah,” you say again. You’re too tired to get mad, and besides, it’s best not to look a gift horse in the mouth.
The drive continues in silence and you lean your head against the seat, feeling drowsy again. Fucking medication. Oh, well. It’s not as if you’ll ever have to take the shit again.
It seems like only a moment later that Harley is roughly shaking you awake. “We’re in Woodland Hills,” he tells you. “What now?”
You yawn and look out the window, trying to get your bearings and figure out where the fuck you are. Once you wake up a bit you can see that you are only a few miles from Rikki’s house. “There’s a development about two miles up the road,” you say. “You can just drop me off there. I can walk the rest of the way.” Suddenly you feel a surge of nervousness, like everything that’s going on has just become far too real. You almost want to tell this guy forget it, just to turn around and drive you all the way back to Riverview, but you keep your mouth shut. Anything that Rikki will have to say couldn’t possibly be as bad as that place.
In no time you’re at the entrance to Rikki’s subdivision. You give Harley a kind enough nod and get out of the truck, thankful to be rid of him. He certainly hadn’t been a serial killer but he wasn’t the type of guy you wanted to hang out with for extended periods of time. Right now there was no one you wanted to hang out with except for Rikki.
As the truck pulls away you begin to walk down the cool sidewalk, trying to figure out approximately how late it is. You figure it’s probably a bit after midnight. You hope that Rikki is still awake. More than that, you hope this Julie girl is asleep. Because, without a doubt, she will only get in the way of what you want to do tonight. If things go well, by tomorrow she’ll be on a plane back to wherever the hell she came from.
It doesn’t take long for you to reach the end of Rikki’s long driveway. His large house looms in front of you. You don’t see many lights on inside. Only a couple coming from the second floor. His bedroom, you think. Good, that means he’s probably awake. And then something low and disturbing spreads throughout the muscles near your stomach. What if he and Julie are both awake? What if they’re fucking? What if the way you threw him out of your room earlier was the last straw needed to push him over the edge and into her arms? You can’t even handle the thought of it. Rikki shouldn’t be with anyone other than you. At one time you thought he realized that. But now you’re not so sure that he does.
Drawing a deep breath, you walk up Rikki’s driveway and make your way towards the front door of his home. Your hands are shaking and your mind is clouded by visions of what you hope to find, what you are afraid you might find, and what you want to do once inside the large wooden door in front of you. You reach out and test the doorknob. Not surprisingly, it doesn’t budge. So, with all other options left, you take one lone finger and press it gently against the doorbell. Now all you can do is wait.
~*~
It’s got to be after midnight by now, but sleep isn’t even on the horizon. You’ve been sitting in this cell for a while already, and you’re crashing like a motherfucker. The horrible hour of trying to devise some kind of makeshift escape tool in an effort to get the hell out of here and get more cocaine has passed, and now you’re cursing the person who first decided it would be a good idea to turn the leaves of the coca plant into powder and then sniff it. You knew when you had done the first line that it was a bad idea, and now that there are no more lines, you’re completely sure that it was not just a bad idea, but possibly the single worst idea you’d ever had.
But none of this matters. All that matters is that you’d gotten arrested – again – and now you’re stuck here in this cell crashing like there’s no tomorrow. At least you had a cell to yourself, since for the first three days of being incarcerated they always put you in Medical Isolation to make sure you don’t have anything nasty that the other inmates can catch. With any luck, you won’t be here long enough to get tossed into the cesspool that they call General Population.
Just then the door to your cell begins to slide open, operated by some mechanical system run from the inside of the guard’s booth. You turn only your eyes towards the door and a moment later an officer is standing there, looking tired and unhappy. “You want to make your phone call?” he asks.
You consider this for a moment, wondering if CC’s gone home yet. CC’s a good guy, even a good friend sometimes, but by now he could have restocked his supply and gone home with a stripper or four. “Yeah,” you say finally, figuring you might as well at least give it a shot. You climb off of the bed and the guard points in the direction of the four phones hanging on the wall across the room.
“Collect calls only,” he says.
“Yeah, I know the drill,” you mutter, moving past him. You grab the receiver to the first phone you come to and dial CC’s number. You hear him say hello and give a sigh that is close to relief. And then you hear the operator telling him that he has a phone call from an inmate in the LA County Jail and asking him if he will accept the charges. You hear him say yes and then all is quiet.
“CC?” you question tiredly.
“Yeah, it’s me,” he answers you. And you can tell that he is still high. “What the fuck is going on, Bob?”
“You and your fucking coke got my ass arrested, dickwad. And now it’s on you to get your lame ass down here and bail me the fuck out of this place.”
“You’re a bit testy,” he laughs, the humor he’s finding in the situation grating on your last nerve.
“Fuck you, man,” you spit out. “I’m in prison. And you know how much I fucking hate being locked up. Get me out of here.”
“You’re crashing, aren’t you?” he asks, still laughing a bit.
“What the fuck do you think? It’s been two hours since I had any coke. And I swear on my life I’m never doing that shit again.”
“Right, just like you’re never gonna drink again.”
“Alcohol has never got me tossed in a fucking cell before, CC. Come on, I’m serious. Leave whatever stripper you managed to take home and come down here and bail me the fuck out.” You put extra emphasis on the last five words, making sure that he understands just how serious you are.
“Calm down,” he says dismissively. “Fawn and Missy aren’t strippers, they’re exotic entertainers. And the three of us will be over there before you know it. Okay?”
You close your eyes and open them again, sighing inwardly. “Fine. Bail’s twenty g’s, dude. Hit up one of those 24-hour bondsmen on the Strip.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he says. “This isn’t the first time I’ve bailed someone out of the clink,” and then you hear the click telling you he’s hung up.
You hang up and slowly make your way back to your cell, collapsing onto the bed as the door begins to slide shut. You figure you’ll probably be here for another hour at the most, but any hour spent in prison feels like days. But this is the first time you’ve ever had to deal with prison during a coke crash, and it’s an experience you hope never to repeat.
Lying alone in the dark of your cell, your thoughts inevitably turn to Rikki. You wonder what he’s doing right now and figure that maybe he’s sleeping, or at least that’s the lesser of all the evils you can think of. At least you don’t have to worry about him being with Bret at this hour. Part of you wishes you would have called him to help you out instead of CC. You know him well enough to know that he’d have absolutely come down here and bailed you out, and you also know that he’s carrying around a lot of guilt. He’d probably be a lot more sympathetic than a coked-up CC is going to be, and you can’t deny that you’d get some small satisfaction out of making him feel like his decision to go back to Bret had ultimately landed you on coke and in prison.
Of course, deep down, you know that isn’t the truth. Rikki and his terrible decision didn’t land you here. No, you’ve managed to do this all on your own. CC’s cocaine helped a great deal, but you had known better than to carry it around with you. Sighing, you close your eyes and try to make sense of the outrageous events of the past six days. Ever since Bret awoke everything has gone straight to shit. It amazes you that one small event has had such catastrophic consequences. What a terrible chain reaction this has all become.
The next thing you know you hear the door to your cell being opened. You open your eyes, blinking against the harsh artificial light shining in your eyes. You must have fallen asleep because now a guard is yelling for you to get up. “You made bail, Dall,” he says to you as you stand up and stretch. You’ve never, ever managed to sleep while crashing from coke before. Of course, you haven’t gotten any sort of proper sleep in at least two days, so maybe that explains it.
You bite back the urge to spit out some sort of snarky comment about making bail because you’re a rock star. Actually, what you’d really like to do is just tell the guy to go to hell. But you don’t. You just nod and walk past him, out into the main area of the jail. He steps in front of you and leads you down a hallway that eventually opens out on to the lobby area. You see immediately who has come to your rescue. A tall, leggy, busty, bleached-blonde is leaning against the front desk. She smiles when you enter the room.
“Hey Bobby, baby,” she says, her voice so soft and sweet that it turns your stomach. What the hell does CC see in these kind of girls? Doesn’t he realize that beauty can be natural, too.
“Hey, love,” you reply, playing along because there isn’t anything else for you to do. And besides, you have to admit that sending this sober girl in to bail you out was a better idea than CC coming in here himself all hopped up on coke.
The cop behind the desk hands you a manila envelope containing your wallet. “Hope we don’t see you in here again any time soon,” he says, and it sounds like he’s said it too many times tonight already.
“With any luck,” you agree, but you’re already on your way out the door.
Once outside, you see CC’s car. He and another busty blond are in the front seat, so you tug open the back door and climb in.
“Scoot over,” the first busty blond says, smiling at you. You sigh and do as you’re asked.
“Thanks,” you mutter in CC’s direction.
“What are fiends for,” CC says, chuckling. “Fawn, give him his prize.”
Fawn turns around, flashing a three thousand dollar smile through her collagen-implanted lips. She holds out her hand, in which rests a CD case, and on top of it are two lines of coke and a rolled-up fifty. Not quite sure what you’re doing, you take the CD case from her. “Um, thanks,” you say uncertainly, then, “Ceece, isn’t this kind of counterproductive?”
“Counterproductive, my ass,” CC says, starting the engine. “The only place we’re going tonight is back to my place, and we’re not going to sleep, so you might as well wake your grumpy ass up.” He pauses. “Besides, it’s either sniff it or ride all the way home at a hundred miles an hour with coke on your lap. Which do you think is more likely to get you re-arrested?”
You sigh. “Point,” you say tiredly, and do the two lines quickly. A few minutes later you feel the crash ebbing away, and you feel good enough to smile at the blond you assume is Missy.
“Feeling better?” she asks, her voice almost a giggle.
“You could say that,” you respond. “I fucking hate being in jail.”
She flashes another bright smile in your direction and shifts her body so she is leaning closer to you, her ample amount of cleavage just barely staying inside the top of her tight, short red dress. “Anything I can do to help?”
Your mind stops for one moment, unable to fully process what she is suggesting. But then it speeds back up again and you are quite aware of what you want and what you’re sure she’s willing to give. “Come here,” you tell her, curling your finger in her direction.
She really does giggle this time and, while you hate yourself for it, the sound is almost arousing. Almost. When she is close enough, you pull her onto your lap, one of her knees on each side of your legs. She presses her body close to yours, rubbing her obviously fake breasts against your chest. You pull on her hairspray-riddled hair much harder than is necessary but you don’t really care when her lips come crashing down on yours. Her mouth opens to you immediately and you kiss her strongly, not looking for emotion from this woman, simply release.
Her hands come up to your shoulders and you pull away from her mouth. “Suck my cock,” you say, not attempting to make it a request.
And then she’s on her knees in the little floor space that the backseat of this car offers. Her hands are on your zipper, pulling it down and slipping your now hardened cock out of its confines. You look up and see CC glancing at you in the rearview mirror. All you can do is smile.
~*~
You’ve got your face between Julie’s thighs and she keeps saying, “Close, so close,” and that’s when the doorbell rings.
You pull your head up. “Who the fucking hell…” you mutter.
Julie looks down at you, frowning. “Do you really have to get that?” she asks. “It’s after midnight.”
“That’s exactly why I need to get it,” you tell her, sighing and climbing off of the bed. You grab your jeans off of the floor and pull them on quickly and when you look up you see that Julie has grabbed one of your tee shirts. It hangs almost to her knees. “Adorable,” you tell her, and then you grab her hand and she grabs the bottle of red wine the two of you have been nursing all evening and then you hurry out of the room and downstairs.
Your first thought before you get to the door is that it could be Bobby. You don’t really think that he’d just turn up unannounced at midnight, but if he’s been drinking again, anything’s possible.
“Wait, wait,” Julie says, and she’s laughing.
You turn and look at her and you can’t help but grin back at her. Something about her is infectious. “What?” you say, and you almost giggle yourself. And then she stands on her toes and plants a wine-flavored kiss on your lips. “You’re nuts,” you tell her, laughing, and then you turn, unlock the door and pull it open.
It takes you a full five seconds before you can say anything at all. Your mind is a jumble of wine and sex and the fact that Bret is standing in front of you in his pajamas when, clearly, he shouldn’t be. You hear Julie give a small gasp from behind you and that when you’re finally able to choke out one word. “Bret.”
“Rikki,” he says, glancing over your shoulder and seeing Julie standing there in just your t-shirt. Part of you wants to tell him that this isn’t what it looks like but really, it is what it looks like. And why do you need to defend yourself to him anyway?
“Bret, what are you doing here?” you ask, holding the door open a bit wider but not inviting him inside. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“Obviously not,” he spits out. “It seems I’ve interrupted something.”
You turn your head to look at Julie, shooting her an apologetic glance. Then you look back at Bret. “Interrupting or not, how the hell did you get out of the hospital and end up here?”
“Hitchhiking is an amazing thing,” he tells you and something in your stomach does a somersault. He sounds like the old Bret. And that isn’t the least bit comforting. You’re not sure if you should invite him in, tie him to a chair, and call the hospital, or just leave him standing on your doorstep in the middle of the night. Neither of the options seem very appealing right now. “Too bad it looks like I’ve wasted it on someone completely unworthy.”
“Bret…”
“Fuck you, Rikki,” he yells and you actually take a step back. So much for the mental hospital doing anything to change his violent temper.
“Don’t talk to him like that,” Julie says, and you’re taken aback by the harshness in her tone.
You let go of her hand and use your now-free hand to motion for her to just be quiet. The last thing you need is for Bret to go off on her.
And then Bret is coming through the door, his eyes all blue fire, and he’s looking right at Julie. “Who the fuck do you think you’re talking to?” he demands, and then he’s closing the distance between the two of them and before you can do anything, he shoves her roughly. She stumbles a few steps backwards and falls, landing heavily on the floor, her face surprised and more than a little scared.
“What the fuck are you doing?” you demand, rushing to her side. “Jules, are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” she says, and she pulls your shirt over her knees but makes no move to stand up.
“Who the hell are you, Prince Charming?” Bret growls. “Are you really going to let this little whore talk to me like that?” He seems genuinely surprised.
“She’s not a whore,” you tell him, shocked by the firmness in your tone. “And your problem isn’t with her, anyway, Bret. It’s with me.”
He looks down at her. “You’re right,” he says. “It is. But she’s a part of it.” And then he kicks her, his foot connecting with her stomach.
Without even really thinking about it you find yourself grabbing Bret by a fistful of his hair and pulling him away from Julie. Your right fist connects with his jaw in one sudden punch but you don’t let him go. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” you scream. “You fucking lunatic. You can’t just come in here and start beating the shit out of my…”
“Your what?” Bret interrupts you, struggling against the hold you have on him. “You little fuck. She’s not your girlfriend. She’s not even your friend. You don’t know this bitch at all. To think I came all the way here just to fucking apologize and this is how you repay me.”
“This has nothing at all to do with you, Bret,” you yell back, taking your eyes off of him for the briefest moment to look down and make sure that Julie is okay. She doesn’t say anything, just stares up at you with shocked eyes, her mouth open slightly. That one moment is long enough. Before you can turn back to Bret you feel his fist connect with the soft part of your neck and then your hand is letting go of his hair and he is shoving you to the ground. He slams the door shut behind him and stares down at you as you scramble to get back to your feet.
He kicks you now as he kicked Julie just seconds earlier and you realize that, without his shoes, it doesn’t hurt nearly as much as you had been expecting. “Stay the fuck where you are, bitch,” he commands you. And you do as he says. You know that’s the only way to at least temporarily ebb his anger. This is Bret in his truest form. Having a fistfight with him right now is nothing but dangerous.
“Bret,” you say, on your hands and knees, looking up at him in the calmest manner you can manage. “We need to talk about this, okay? Everyone needs to calm down and then we need to talk. Sound good to you?”
“Don’t patronize me, Rikki,” he spits back. “You’ve already called me a lunatic once. I know what you think of me now. The truth always comes out in the end. And I know all you’re going to do is call that fucking hospital. Well I’ve got news for you, man. I’m not going back there. And nothing you say or do is going to change that.”
“I’m not going to call the hospital,” you say, although you can think of nothing else you’d rather do at the moment. Actually, all things considered, you’d rather go back about twenty minutes and make Julie come and then drink some more wine and pass out in a tangle of limbs, but that’s not any more realistic than just picking up the phone and calling Riverview.
“Do you really think I’m going to believe that?” Bret growls. “Crazy or not, I’m not stupid.”
“You’re not crazy, either,” you lie, pulling yourself into a kneeling position. “You’re just sick and… Bret, you need your medication.”
“Those fucking pills are the last thing I need,” he tells you. “Maybe you’re okay with me being a member of the walking dead, but I’m not.”
“Bret,” you say, desperate to keep this conversation going even if just to keep him from hitting either you or Julie again. “You barely gave it a week. The doctor said that the side effects—“
“Shut up, Rockett,” he says. “You’re no fucking doctor. Don’t feed me this fucking psychobabble bullshit.”
“It isn’t bullshit, Bret,” Julie says. You look over at her, completely shocked by the fact that she’s speaking at all, let alone to counter the man who’d just kicked her in the stomach. And more amazing is the fact that you know beyond the shadow of a doubt whose side you’re on this time, and it’s not Bret’s. “When you’re sick, you need medicine. This is no different.”
“Who the fuck are you talking to, whore?” he growls at her. “This is no concern of yours.”
“Obviously it is,” she says, despite the look of clear protest on your face. “You don’t like me or the fact that Rikki invited me here. So you kick him out of your room and then, crazy fuck that you are, you break out of a god damn mental institution, hitchhike all the way to his house, and proceed to try and beat the shit not just out of him, but of me as well. How can I possibly not fit into that equation?”
Bret laughs then, actually laughs. And it’s one of the scariest sounds you think you’ve heard in quite a while. “I told you this one had spitfire,” he says to you. “And it’s just gotten her in a shit load of trouble.”
And then Bret is kicking you out of the way and grabbing at Julie’s hair and pulling her to her feet. You watch as he backhands her once across the face. When her head snaps back to look at him he slaps her again. She cries out softly but doesn’t struggle to get out of his grip. “Do you feel better?” she screams instead. “Feel more like a man hitting a helpless little woman? You fucker!” You watch in complete awe as Julie brings her knee up in one swift motion, connecting harshly with Bret’s groin. He doubles over and when he does, she knees him again, this time in the stomach.
You pull yourself to your feet, grabbing hold of Bret while he’s still bent at the waist and dragging him into your living room. You throw a shocked smile in Julie’s direction as you do so. She’s just full of surprises, it seems.
“Fucking whore,” Bret shouts, struggling to get out of your grasp. “Who the fuck does she think she is?” And then he’s pulling away from you, and at first you think maybe he’s stronger than you remember, but the fact is really that you haven’t had to be violent in a long time and you’re probably just out of shape.
“Julie, go upstairs,” you say, but you can tell by the look on her face that she has every intention of riding this crazy mess out until it’s over. And although that’s obviously not in her best interests, you find that you’re simultaneously proud and grateful.
And before you can think or say anything else, Bret has her down on the ground and his fist is coming up and before you can even open your mouth he’s bringing it down. You close your eyes for just a second as you hear the sound of fist connecting with face.
It takes you a few seconds to fully comprehend what has just happened, and when your vision stops swimming you can see that Julie has scooted against the wall and is holding her face in her hands. Bret is pulling himself to his feet, but before he can stand up fully you are on top of him, jumping on his back and grabbing a fistful of his hair.
But he’s stronger than you, has always been stronger than you, and with what seems like little effort he simply jerks upright and you fall to the ground, only a small clump of his hair in your hand to prove that you ever had a hold on him in the first place. And when he turns to look down on you, the look on his face is a mixture of anger, surprise and satisfaction. “You are not actually trying to hit me again because of this girl,” he says. It’s not a question.
“At the moment, Bret, this girl is worth a lot more to me than you are,” you snarl, unable to believe you’ve actually gathered up the nerve to say something so awful to him.
And then Bret is picking you up off the floor just to hit you again and you fall back down to your knees not sure how this all got so out of control or how you can even begin to go about stopping it. Julie looks at you from where she is sitting against the wall. She moves her hands away from her face long enough for you to see the blood pouring out of her nose. You want to tell her to go upstairs again but you figure it is probably futile. You’re torn between going to help her and trying to fight with Bret. Not that fighting with Bret seems to be going in your favor at all. And for one brief second you’re afraid that you’re just going to burst into tears right there at the madness of it all. But you can’t let yourself do that so you stand back up and bring yourself toe to toe with Bret. He is not going to do this to you again. He is not going to come between you and someone you care about.
“Are we done yet?” he asks you flippantly. “Because obviously you have to see that I can still beat the shit out of you with very little effort.”
“What are you gaining from this?” you question him, glancing back over your shoulder at Julie one more time. “What are you really accomplishing.”
“I fucking love you,” he shouts. “Why the fuck can’t you see that, Rikki? Why the fuck do you insist on running away from me into the arms of other people? You always do this to me.”
“I haven’t done anything to you. And this isn’t love,” you yell back, shoving him away from you. “Look at you, Bret. Look at what you’re doing. I don’t even think you know what love means anymore. Not that you ever fucking did.”
For a minute, he just looks at you, and although it’s hard to believe, he looks completely devastated. “Do you really think that?” he asks, and it sounds as if the fight has gone right out of him.
You stare at him and you almost feel bad. Almost. “Bret,” you begin, sighing. “You busted out of a mental hospital and hitchhiked to my house where you proceeded to physically assault not only me, but Julie. What, exactly, about that do you equate with love?”
And then before he can say anything, you hear a loud noise and suddenly Bret crumbles to the floor at your feet. Now that he’s not standing there you can see Julie standing there, blood all over her face, holding the cutting board from your kitchen. You hadn’t even noticed that she’d left the room.
For a moment she just stands there, holding the cutting board so tightly that her knuckles are white, and then she lets it fall to the carpet where it lands with a dull thud. And then she sinks to the floor, where for the first time since this entire mess began she begins to cry. Really cry, long, racking sobs that make your chest hurt to hear.
You look from Julie to Bret’s unconscious form and back again, still totally unprepared to mentally process everything that has just taken place. And then, slowly, you step around Bret and crouch down next to Julie, tentatively putting a hand on her shoulder. “Are you okay?” you ask, because there’s nothing else to say. But she just continues to sob, her shoulders shaking under your hand, and you can’t remember the last time you felt so horribly guilty. You never should have invited her here, not in the middle of this entire mess, but now that she’s here, you really don’t want her to leave.
“I’m sorry,” you tell her, pulling her into your arms. She rests her head against your shoulder but still says nothing through her tears. You stroke her hair softly, kissing her forehead. “It’s all right,” you murmur, not sure if you really mean it or not. “Everything will be okay.”
“I…I…did I…” she stutters as she sobs. Then she takes a deep breath and says hurriedly, “is he dead?”
You shake your head, smiling down at her. “No, baby. He’s not dead.” And then, not really realizing that it’s happening, you begin to cry yourself. You pull Julie closer to you, fully in your lap now, and wrap your arms tightly around her. You rock the two of your bodies back and forth slowly, kissing the top of her head over and over. “I’m sorry I brought you into this,” you tell her again. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay,” she replies, reaching up with one hand and stroking your face. “I wanted to be here with you.” She laughs sadly. “I don’t think this was in the contract, but I still wanted to be here.”
You chuckle yourself now, though the hot tears are still slipping down your cheeks. “Are you hurt too badly?”
“No,” she says, taking her hand from your face and pressing it against her still bleeding nose. “A few bruises, I’m sure. But I don’t think anything’s broken.”
“You’re amazing,” you tell her, truly in awe of all that she has just been though and how strong she has managed to stay. You lean down slowly, not caring about the blood on her face or your own, and kiss her gently. A few seconds later you pull away, the tears stopping as you begin to feel more sure of yourself. “We should probably call the cops.”
“Yeah,” she agrees, making no move to untangle herself from your embrace. “Probably.”
“Let’s get you cleaned up first,” you tell her. “Come on.”
Julie carefully pulls away from you and climbs to her feet. Again she tentatively touches her nose. “That’s only the second time in my life that anyone’s ever really hit me,” she says.
“Well, if I have anything to say about it, it will be the last,” you promise her, then take her hand and lead her into the kitchen.
~*~
It’s the throbbing pain in the back of your head that pulls you into consciousness, and for a few minutes you just lay still, eyes closed, not quite sure where you are or what’s going on. At first you think you’re back in your bed in the hospital, but soon enough you realize that what you’re laying on is a floor, and then everything comes back to you in a sudden rush and you jerk upright, opening your eyes.
You’re still in Rikki’s living room, but Rikki and Julie aren’t here now. Slowly, quietly, you pull yourself to your feet, groaning inwardly at the pain in your skull. And then you hear the hushed voice in the kitchen. It takes you a minute to realize that what you hear is Rikki’s voice telling someone his address, and after that it’s only a few seconds before you figure out that he’s on the phone. And somehow you doubt he’s calling for an ambulance, but even if he is, it will only eventually land you back in Riverview. And like you’d already told Rikki, you have no intention of allowing that to happen.
Quietly, you head back towards the front door, hoping that Rikki’s floor doesn’t creak and give away what you are about to do. You can’t stay here any longer. You’re not sure where you’re going to go, but anywhere that isn’t here is fine with you. Because really, you’re fairly certain that in just a few minutes there will be police cars speeding up to Rikki’s house and you just can’t be around when that happens. The mere thought that he would have the audacity to actually call the cops on you is maddening, but you can’t do anything about that right now.
You make it to the front door, swaying slightly and feeling incredibly dizzy, with no interruption. The door opens without a noise and then you are back outside again, running to the best of your ability. You stumble several times and then stop, realizing that you still don’t have any money. Hitching in this neighborhood, especially in the condition you’re in right now, just isn’t going to happen. “Fuck,” you mumble to yourself. Knowing exactly what you have to do, you turn back around and make your way back to the house.
Slipping back in through the front door is one of the most nerve-wracking things you’ve ever experienced. If Rikki sees you know you’re pretty sure that everything will be fucked. But Rikki and Julie seem to still be in the kitchen. So, as silently as possible, you make a beeline for the stairs that lead up to the second floor of Rikki’s home. You climb the steps silently and make your way down the hallway to his bedroom. The satin sheets on his bed are in complete disarray and various articles of clothing lie about the floor. Your stomach turns at the thought of what has happened in this room. But you force yourself to keep going, to not think about it. Rikki’s wallet is lying on the nightstand and that is all that matters to you at the moment. Well, that and the fact that his cell phone is sitting there next to it.
You quickly pull out all of the cash in his wallet, not bothering to count how much is actually there. Then you make a hushed phone call to a cab company asking for a driver to meet you at a gas station that you know is just a few blocks away. As you set the phone back down you look up at yourself in the mirror. You look like hell, and that’s being nice about it. Bruises are already forming up and down your right cheek and your left eye is an interesting shade of purple. Your noise and lip are bleeding and your hair is completely fucked. You shrug. No time to do anything about that now.
You make your way out of the room and to the head of the stairs, listening carefully to see if there’s any sound coming from below. When you hear nothing, you quickly descend the staircase and before you give yourself the chance to be nervous you’re out the front door.
Once the door is shut safely behind you, you waste no time in rushing off of Rikki’s property. It is not until you are all the way on the other side of the street that you pause to look back at the house. The large structure is still and silent in the night and only now do you allow yourself to feel the small surge of sadness over the thought that you will likely never set foot in it again, if you ever even see Rikki again. Then, sighing to yourself, you turn away and begin to walk.
You’ve spent a lot of time in Rikki’s neighborhood, and so you know all the shortcuts through peoples’ yards and it takes only a few minutes before you find yourself behind the gas station. You make your way around to the front and at this hour, the place is practically deserted and the cab you called for hasn’t arrived yet. You run a hand through your hair in a half-assed attempt to make yourself look somewhat presentable and then pull open the door and go inside.
The clerk behind the counter can’t be more than twenty-two and he looks stoned. When he sees you he breaks into a cocky grin. “What the hell happened to you?” he asks. “You look like you got into a bar brawl.”
“Something like that,” you agree tiredly, coming up to the counter. “I need a pack of Marlboros. And maybe some Tylenol.”
“No problem, bro,” the young guy says, tossing a pack of cigarettes on the counter. “The Tylenol’s over there.” He motions to one of the small aisles just behind you. You turn around, retrieve the medication, and come back to the counter, paying for all of it with a twenty-dollar bill from the wad of cash you took from Rikki.
“Rock on, Bret,” the clerk says when he hands you your change, making the metal sign with his free hand. You had hoped that he hadn’t recognized you. In your current situation, the last thing you need is a lot of public attention. Without saying anything in return, you quickly leave the store.
Standing outside underneath the neon lights of the gas station, you open the bottle of Tylenol and swallow six of the pills dry. Your hands are shaking again and your actions over the past few hours are finally sinking in. You wish you had put on some of Rikki’s shoes. “Come on, man,” you mutter to yourself. “Get your shit together.” You’re starting to feel less and less sane as each minute passes. And you can’t let yourself lose control at this point. Not now. Too much is riding on you getting the hell out of this neighborhood without being spotted.
You pull out your fresh pack of cigarettes and light one, inhaling deeply and letting the smoke fill your lungs. And just as you are closing your eyes and leaning your head back against the brick of the building, the cab pulls up in front of you. You jump in without question and nod in the driver’s direction.
“What the hell happened to you?” the Middle Eastern man asks in a heavily accented voice.
“Nothing to worry about,” you reply. “I’ll try not to bleed on your seats. Just get me to LA.” You proceed to give him the exact directions to CC’s house, not sure why you want to go there or what will happen when you show up.
~*~
When you come back from the bathroom, Fawn and Missy are lying on their backs on the dining room table. They’re completely naked and each one has a line of white powder starting between their tits and trailing down all the way to their belly buttons. CC is standing on one side of the table with a devilish grin on his face.
“You really haven’t forgotten how to party, have you, Ceece,” you say, chuckling. By this point you’re not sure how much coke you’ve actually consumed, although you’re relatively sure that between you and CC, you’re now on the third bottle of Jack Daniels. And from what appears to be about to happen, it doesn’t look like you’ll be stopping any time soon.
“What is life for if not for experiencing pleasure?” he says, still grinning. “You ready to do this?” He motions to the girls.
“As I’ll ever be,” you agree, already pulling your wallet out of your pocket and retrieving a bill, which you roll into a cylinder. When you look up again you see that CC is already poised at the beginning of the line on Fawn’s chest, looking at you expectantly. You situate yourself over Missy’s tits. “All right,” you say. “Let’s do this.”
And then the doorbell rings. You look up at CC. “Is there any possibility that that’s the cops?”
He stands up straight and shrugs. “There’s always the chance,” he says. “Life wouldn’t be any fun without such possibilities.”
“Right. You’re not the one who crashed in jail earlier tonight, dickwad,” you remind him.
“So we’ll just not answer that,” he replies, leaning back down over Fawn.
“Good plan,” you agree, bringing the bill back to the line of cocaine on your entertainment for the night. One thing you can say about Missy so far, she does give really good head. And then in one quick movement you sniff the entire line from between her tits and down to her navel. You lick a circle around her bellybutton and then look over at CC, who has dropped his bill and is now enjoying himself between Fawn’s thighs. You’re about to say something to him when the doorbell rings again, three quick times in a row.
Missy reaches her hand out to grab you as you move away. “Don’t go far, baby.”
“I’ll be back,” you assure her. “Just gonna check the door.”
You stumble your way to CC’s front door, no longer really caring who is standing on the other side. You figure if it was the cops and they were truly upset about something, they would have broken the door in by now. But what you find when you do swing the door open is the most unexpected thing. Bret is standing there, bloodied face and messed up hair, in a pair of pajamas, looking just as shocked at seeing you. For a moment you almost think you’re hallucinating, too much JD and coke can do that to you. But then he says your name, questions in his tone, and you know that he must be real. You’re not sure how you really feel about that.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” you ask him, not trying to hide your surprise. “And what the hell happened to you?”
“I’m here to see CC,” he tells you, and surprisingly, he doesn’t sound hostile, just tired. “And I got in a little fight.” He shrugs.
“What, at a slumber party?” and you want to be angry, but the coke and the whiskey are swirling in your head and you find yourself stepping back to let him inside.
“Yep,” he says, smiling slightly. “They beat me up because I wouldn’t play Girl Talk.” He steps into the house. “Ceece around?”
“In the other room with some strippers,” you say, nodding in the direction of the dining room. At this point, the only emotion you are capable of feeling is high. “Um… do you want to take a shower, maybe? I’ve got some clothes upstairs…” you say as you swing the door shut.
He raises an eyebrow at you and is silent for a moment, as if he’s waiting for the punch line. “Um, yeah,” he says finally. “That’d be great.”
You clear your throat and shift your weight from one foot to the other and back again, too hopped up on coke to really stop moving. “Well, you know where CC’s room is,” you reply, not sure what else to say.
“Thanks. Tell him I’m here. I’ll be down in a little.”
You watch him until he disappears up the stairs and then shake your head. “The fuck?” you say to yourself as you make your way back into the dining room. The scene there has escalated since you left. CC’s head is still nestled comfortably between Fawn’s thighs. But now Missy is on her knees in front of him, his cock in her mouth. It looks like you’ve been missing out. Your cock grows instantly hard in the confines of your jeans. But you close your eyes and take a deep breath, trying to compose yourself enough to tell CC the surprising news of Bret’s arrival.
Missy looks up from what she is doing, taking her mouth off of CC long enough to wink at you and say, “come here.”
You do what she says but instead of letting her hands go to the zipper on your jeans, you grab her wrists with one hand and hit CC in the shoulder with the other. He looks up at you, clearly fucked up and not at all happy that you have distracted him. “What the fuck, Bob?”
“Sorry,” you say, holding tight to Missy and she struggles playfully against your hold on her. “But we’ve got company.”
“Huh? What?”
“Bret’s upstairs taking a shower, man. Just thought you might like to know.”
“Jesus,” he laughs. “You’re more fucked up than I thought. Seeing things now, are you?”
“I wish,” you chuckle in return. “Because fuck if I want this little party to be interrupted. But he really was just on your front porch in his pajamas looking like he got the shit beat out of him and I really did just tell him to go take a shower and put on some of my clothes.”
For a few seconds CC just looks up at you, and then he shrugs. “Well, whatever. Cut him a line when he comes back downstairs.”
A voice in the back of your head says something about how giving Bret cocaine might not be the wisest idea, but whoever’s saying it is rapidly drowning in a sea of Jack Daniels. “Okay,” you say, smiling a little.
“Now, is there anyone else here that I should know about, or can I go back to what I was doing?”
“Go right ahead, man,” and now the smile is a grin because you remember that all you’re supposed to be doing tonight is having fun.
“Thank you,” CC says, and buries his face in Fawn’s crotch again.
By this point, Missy is sitting on the table, her legs crossed and hanging over the side, and she’s got a seductive smile on her face that looks like something they taught her at stripper school. “Now are you going to pay some attention to me, babe?” she simpers, favoring you with a sultry pout.
You look at her and decide this girl has become significantly more your type since you’ve drowned your standards in whiskey and dusted them in cocaine. “’Course,” you tell her, smiling. “What did you have in mind, sweet thing?”
“Anything you want, sugar,” she replies, uncrossing her legs, and you know she really means it.
Your typical response would be to tell her to suck your cock. But you’ve already done that once tonight so you suppose it’s probably about time you take this a little further. You walk over to the edge of the table, close enough to let her wrap her legs around your waist. Her hands come up to your bare chest, acrylic nails scratching just slightly. Pain is never a completely bad thing. You smirk at her before dipping down to kiss her neck. Your tongue works it way up to her ear where you whisper, “unzip my pants.”
She does what you tell her to, taking your cock in her hand and pumping it like she’s done this many times before. You figure she probably has. Her small hand feels good around you, different from anything that you’ve felt in months. Maybe not better, but definitely different. And different is good enough for you right now. Without hesitation you push her hands away and easily slip inside of her. She lies back on the table, giving you a perfect view to watch yourself fuck her. She isn’t very tight, but she’s hot and wet and that’s all that really matters.
You fuck her hard, not thinking much about what she’s feeling. Your mind is too consumed with other things. But from the not so soft sounds coming from her, you figure she must be enjoying it at least a little. Either that or she fakes it well. You don’t really care which. You look over briefly and see Fawn writhing under CC’s ministrations, his hands squeezing her breasts. It really has been far too long since you’ve hung out with CC and partied like this. Occasions like these used to happen at least twice a week with the two of you.
You grip Missy’s thighs tightly, lifting her hips slightly for a more enjoyable angle. Her hands claw at the table beneath her, urging you on, telling you to fuck her and make her come. And then she’s spasming around you, arching up off the table, screaming something you don’t really care to understand. And the way she is milking your cock makes it impossible for you not to fall over the edge as well. When your orgasm subsides you hear clapping from behind you. Pulling out of Missy, you don’t bother to rearrange yourself before turning around. Bret is standing there, all wet hair and too-big jeans that you know belong to you hanging low on his hips and you suddenly remember why you let him suck your cock all that time ago.
“Nicely done,” he says, one eyebrow perfectly arched. “Do I get to play?”
As you slide your cock back into your pants, Missy answers for you. “Of course you do,” she says, using the same valley-girl come-hither tone she’d used on you.
“Sounds like fun,” he says in response, but his blue eyes aren’t looking at her, they’re looking at you.
You clear your throat. “Care to indulge in some party favors first?” you ask, cocking a head in the direction of the kitchen.
“Lead the way,” he agrees.
You head into the kitchen with Bret close at your heels, then step aside to reveal the collection of alcohol and the rather large pile of cocaine on a mirror in the center of the kitchen table. “Take your pick,” you tell him.
He raises an eyebrow at you and smiles. “Well, isn’t this a fabulous little welcome home party,” he says, crossing the room to the table. Like an expert, he cuts a line of coke that’s at least a foot long and then he pulls a bill out of the pocket of your pants that he’s wearing. “Join me?”
“Thought you’d never ask,” you say, already rolling a bill of your own. And then, like you have so many times in the now-distant past, each of you starts at one end of the mammoth line of white powder and do it all in one shot.
When the line is gone, your faces are only inches apart, and for a moment, neither of you moves. And then you find yourself being pulled towards him, not by his touch but by his pure magnetism. Your lips meet his in a gentle kiss that quickly becomes so much more. You both stand up fully, not breaking the kiss. His fingers hook through the belt loops on your jeans and pull you as close to him as you can get. Your own semi-hard cock meeting his through the material. He pushes himself against you and his mouth opens, your tongues meeting in a frenzied heat. Your fingers snake up into his hair, pulling hard enough that you know it hurts. But he doesn’t protest.
“Oh jesus fuck,” comes CC’s voice from behind you and you are both pulling away and turning to look at CC with wide eyes.
“Hey, man,” Bret says, smiling ever so slightly. “What’s up?”
CC eyes him warily. “You, apparently. What the fuck are you two doing? We’ve got strippers and coke and you’re in here kissing each other? Sorry, not in my house guys. Not that kind of party. Now get the hell back out here and fuck the people you’re supposed to be fucking.” He turns away before either of you can say anything in your defense. Not that there is much to say.
Bret looks at you for a moment before breaking into laughter. “Guess he told us.”
“Sure did,” you agree, laughing as well. Glad that the amount of coke you’ve done makes this moment not at all awkward. You’re quiet for a second before asking, “does Rikki know you’re out of the hospital?”
He arches an eyebrow at you again, something he’s always been so good at. “Does Rikki know you’re drinking and doing coke again?”
“Point taken. Back to the party?” you question, pointing in the direction of the dining room.
“Lead the way, my friend.”
~*~
You are sitting at the kitchen table nursing a cup of coffee that you’d poured forty minutes ago, and now it’s cold, but you don’t really care. You can’t really taste it, anyway. Julie is upstairs taking a shower and all you’re really doing is trying to hold yourself together and figure out what the hell you’re supposed to do next.
The cops had only left about fifteen minutes earlier, seeming mostly annoyed at being called away from their late-night coffee and doughnuts for a call that turned out to be mostly nothing. You have to admit to yourself that, for reasons you’re not entirely sure of, you really did downplay the entire situation, refusing to press charges for what he’d done to you, and Julie had stayed upstairs the entire time. Maybe you care too much for Bret to really want the police to hunt him down like an animal. Or maybe at this point you just don’t care enough.
Julie pads into the kitchen barefoot, wearing a pair of your boxers and a black sports bra. Her face is a bit swollen but she’s cleaned up nicely, and you can’t deny how sexy she looks with her hair wet and hanging around her face. She comes to stand next to your chair and you move it back a few feet so she can climb onto your lap. Her weight is comforting and she leans her head on your shoulder, nuzzling against your neck. “You okay?” she asks softly.
You sigh. “Better now that you’re here,” you tell her, bringing your arm up around her back. It sounds ridiculous, to be saying such things to a girl you’d only really met less than twenty-four hours ago, but you mean it. “What about you? Are you all right?”
“Yeah,” she says, but she sounds shaken up. “I’ll get over it.”
“I’m sorry I got you involved in all of this mess,” you tell her once again. You seem to be apologizing a lot tonight.
Julie leans forward and kisses your cheek gently. “Seriously, Rikki. Stop saying you’re sorry. I’m glad I’m here. There’s nowhere I’d rather be.”
“Nowhere?” you ask her skeptically. “You sure about that?” You hadn’t meant to sound like you were insinuating anything, but that is clearly how she takes it.
“Well,” she says hesitantly, pausing as if to think over her answer. “I guess your bed would be a better place than right here.” She smirks at you and something inside of your mind is completely amazed that she can still be so flirty after all that has happened. Before you can respond she is putting her hand on your cheek and bringing your lips to hers, kissing you softly at first and then more insistently as she goes on.
Reluctantly, you pull away. “Julie,” you begin seriously, your voice low with a need that surprises even you. Shouldn’t you be more affected by the events of the last few hours? “Are you sure. We don’t have to do anything else if…”
“Shut up,” she interrupts you, her green eyes darker than you’ve seen them all night. “I’m the damsel in distress, remember? I’ve just been beaten up by the bad guy. Now you get to be my prince in shining armor and comfort me.”
“I’m not a prince,” you laugh.
“That’s good,” she giggles, running her fingers through your hair. “I rather like rock stars.”
“And this rock star rather likes you,” you tell her. “And I live to serve. So, if you really want to go upstairs…” You trail off, smiling.
“I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t mean it,” she replies, climbing off of your lap. She extends her hand. “Come on.”
You smile and take her hand. “Can’t refuse an offer like that,” you say, rising to your feet and allowing her to lead you out of the room and upstairs.
Once in your room, Julie climbs onto the bed and lies down on her back, and without waiting for further invitation you crawl on top of her, leaning in to kiss her. Her mouth tastes like something familiar, but it seems like something you’ve never experienced at the same time. When the kiss breaks, you look down at her and smile.
“Admit it,” she says. “You brought me here just to take advantage of me.”
“As I recall,” you reply, moving down to relieve her of the boxers she’s wearing, “you took advantage of me first.”
“Oh, please,” she says, giggling. “You lost the ability to be taken advantage of a long time ago, Rikki.”
“You’d be surprised,” you tell her, and then you lean down and flick your tongue across her thigh. “Now, where did we leave off?”
She only moans in response. You smile against her smooth skin and let your tongue work it’s way further upwards, parting her thighs with one of your hands. You close your mouth down over her clit and suck gently until her hips raise up off the bed, letting you know that she approves of what you’re doing. She tastes good on your tongue as you flick it against her, slowly at first but eventually picking up speed.
“Rikki,” she moans, reaching down and threading her fingers through your hair. Her hips once again raise up off the bed to meet your mouth. “Rikki…please…so good…”
The sound of her voice is like golden music notes dancing in your head. Everything about her turns you on and you wonder how you ever existed without her in your life. You pull her clit all the way into your mouth and hum just slightly, a trick you learned years ago that all of the girls seem to like. Julie is no different. One of her hands pulls tightly on your hair and she whimpers something that you don’t need to comprehend to know what it means.
With your tongue still working insistently, you slide one finger easily inside of her. She is wet and willing and it all feels so good. You want your cock in her now, feeling the heat that surrounds your finger. But it isn’t time for that yet. You want to taste her come on your mouth, feel her muscles clenching around your tongue. And you know it won’t take much to get her to that point.
She moans again and now you look up at her from between her legs, her eyes staring down at you showing nothing but pleasure. You add a second finger. “Do you like that, baby?”
“Yes,” she says, almost hissing the response. “God yes.”
“You’re so beautiful,” you tell her, and then you go back to work. From the way she immediately bucks against you, you know that this won’t take very much longer at all.
Sure enough, it’s less than a minute later before she’s writhing around on the bed, her hand wrapped in your hair and it hurts, but you don’t mind. “I’m about to come,” she breathes. And you tongue her all the more insistently, fuck her with your fingers, and then she’s crying out and bucking and you can feel the hot rush of liquid on your fingers and the rhythmic tensing and relaxing of her muscles.
When her orgasm finally subsides, you pull back and look up at her face, which is a picture of satisfaction. “That was amazing,” she tells you, breathing heavily. “It’s never been like that.”
You smile and climb on top of her, press your lips against hers and her tongue darts out to meet yours. The kiss is long, insistent, hungry, and right now you can’t imagine ever having had a preference for any man over this incredible creature. When the kiss breaks, you say, “I want to be inside of you,” your voice barely above a whisper.
“I want to be on top,” she tells you, and you think that perhaps this is the best thing that you’ve ever heard.
You roll off of her and lie down on your back, and she climbs up onto her knees. “I want to make you come,” she says seductively as she pulls your jeans off. And then she is straddling you, reaching up to take off the bra she’s wearing. You can’t remember the last time you ever felt this enchanted, if you ever have at all.
And then she’s sliding her wet heat onto you, impaling herself on your cock, and you groan. Because this really must be what heaven feels like, all hot and wet and tight. “Jesus, Julie,” you say, reaching up to cup her breasts as she begins to ride you, sliding herself up and down on your hardness. Her body is beautiful above you like this, her hair falling down into her face, complete abandonment coursing through her and into you. She throws her head back, closes her eyes, whimpers.
“So good,” she says, bouncing on you. “You feel so good.”
“So do you, baby,” you reply, smiling up at her, rolling her nipples between your thumb and forefinger. And then, in one sudden movement she is leaning over you, her hips still moving against you but her face just inches from yours. Her eyes are almost glowing in this moment, everything she is feeling reflecting in those deep green orbs. Your hand snakes down between your bodies, finding her clit and rubbing it slowly. She closes her eyes and moans again, contracting her muscles around you.
“Kiss me,” she whispers, and you’re happy to oblige. Your tongues meet, dueling for supremacy. Your free hand slips down to one of her hips, clutching her to you. Guiding her body as she moves off your cock and lowers herself back down. She’s going slower now, trying to make it last, and you appreciate that. Because as much as you want to come, you want her to be right there with you when you do.
Her kisses move from your mouth down to your neck, she nibbles there for a second before moving up to your ear. “You’re so hot,” she whimpers. “So fucking hot.” And the tone of her voice brings you that much closer to exactly where you want to be. You feel the muscles in your legs begin to tighten and you know it won’t be much longer before you can’t hold back anymore.
“You make me crazy,” you tell her, and you mean it, you mean it more than you think either of you could possibly know. “I’m not going to last much longer.”
“Neither am I,” she says, beginning to move more quickly now. “I want you to come with me.”
She pulls herself upright again and you put your hands on her hips, feeling her hips roll under your palms as she pumps up and down. She throws her head back, her mouth open, and as you watch her ride you, you think that you could absolutely see yourself falling in love with this girl. You want her barefoot and pregnant in your kitchen.
And then suddenly you can feel every muscle in your body tensing, and she’s moving faster and her stomach muscles are clenching and relaxing. “I’m gonna come,” you tell her, your breath coming in short bursts.
“Me, too,” she moans, looking down at you, her eyes half-closed, stoned with lust. Then, “Now, I’m coming now,” and as you feel her muscles begin to contract around you, you explode, shooting white hot into her, squeezing her hips so tightly that your knuckles are white.
When your orgasms finally end, Julie collapses on top of you, her still-damp hair against your chest and you can feel her heart beating quickly through her skin. You bring your arms up around her, one hand on the back of her head, the other further down. “You’re so good,” you whisper, kissing the top of her head.
“You’re not so bad yourself,” she says lightly, placing a tiny kiss on your chest.
The words ‘I love you’ are right there on the tip of your tongue. But you don’t say them. Can’t say them. Something inside of you won’t allow it, telling you that it’s too soon and that you don’t really mean it yet anyway. So instead you settle for, “I’m so glad you’re here. I’m sorry it took me so long to invite you out to stay.”
“It’s alright,” she says against your chest, and you can feel her smiling. “You were a bit preoccupied, I think. Bobby probably wouldn’t have liked adding me to your relationship.”
It surprises you when the sound of Bobby’s name does relatively little to your heart. Of course you loved him when you were together, and part of you still does and always will, but with Julie here now everything else seems so far away. So unimportant. She’s almost been able to make you forget that Bret was at your house just an hour ago, fighting with the both of you.
“What are you thinking?” Julie asks now, propping herself up on her elbows so she can look at you. Her skin is absolutely glowing. Sex looks good on her. That thought makes you smile.
“I really
don’t want you to go,” you admit without hesitation.
”I can’t imagine…”
“Shhh,” she whispers, placing a finger against your lips. “Don’t, Rikki. Don’t worry about it. I’ll stay as long as you want me to.” She grins at you cheekily, winking, making you laugh yourself. “I’m having a damn good time. Why would I want to go home?”
“You’ll get sick of me, I’m sure,” you say, trying to sound lighthearted but you can’t ignore how much you want to tell her that you don’t want her to leave, ever.
“Oh, shush,” she says, playfully slapping your chest. Then she puts her head down, curls up against you, one of her legs over both of yours. “I have an incredible capacity for bullshit. And besides, I can be a pretty terrible roommate yourself.”
“Sweetheart, if you do what you just did every day, I don’t care what else you do,” you tell her, chuckling.
“Well, in that case,” she says, and kisses your chest lightly, “I might be here for quite some time.”
~*~
You take a long swallow out of the bottle of JD and then glance down at it. It’s barely a quarter full now, and you’ve consumed almost all of it by yourself. You’re not even sure how much coke you’ve gone through by this point. All you know is that you’re high as a kite and you’ve had sex with two women and kissed your ex-bassist and that at the moment, CC is hanging from the chandelier by his knees and you’re pretty sure that if he doesn’t get down soon, he’s going to break the chandelier. And probably his head.
As if on cue, CC stretches out, his hands barely reaching the dining room table beneath him, and in a move worthy of some kind of very Special Olympics, he flips himself over and lands, somehow, in a squatting position on the table. And in just another second he’s turned around and he’s standing in front of you. “Want another line?” he asks, grinning devilishly.
You take another swig from the bottle and look at him. “I’m relatively sure I just had one,” you tell him.
He waves a hand at you dismissively. “If there’s more, then you do more,” he replies.
“Some things never change,” you laugh, shaking your head at him.
“And why the hell should they?” Bobby asks loudly from the corner where he is currently getting his dick sucked by one of the two strippers. You can’t really tell the two women apart so you’re not sure which one is on her knees in front of him. But he doesn’t seem to care one way or another.
“Bring on the coke,” you say, shrugging in a non-committal way in CC’s direction. And it seems that simply out of nowhere he produces a mirror with a pile of cocaine that is much smaller than it was when you first got here.
You cut one line for yourself and one for CC and you take turns sniffing them up for the umpteenth time this evening. Or morning. You’re not sure what it is anymore. And you’re glad. All of this cocaine has completely numbed you to all that has happened since you left Riverview. Hell, right now, even that memory is a bit fuzzy. Being here with Bobby and CC and drugs and alcohol and women is like home. It’s like you never left at all. You only wish Rikki could be here to enjoy it.
“You all right, man?” CC asks you after you’ve been standing silently, your eyes unfocused, for what you think is probably a couple of minutes.
You snap back to attention, not wanting thoughts of Rikki to invade the fun that you’re having. Besides, he’s probably having so much of his version of fun with Julie that he wouldn’t even be able to enjoy this. That pisses you off. Only one sure way to curb that emotion. “I’m fine,” you tell him, taking another long swig from the bottle in your hand. “Cut me a couple more lines.”
“That’s what I like to hear!” CC says appreciatively. A moment later and he’s holding the mirror up for you, this time with four decently-sized lines lined up in front of the dwindling pile of powder.
“You’re a peach,” you tell him, and take the bill from his other hand. After practicing all night, you are now able to do all four lines without taking another breath. Once they’re gone, you drop the bill on the mirror and stand up straight, inhaling deeply to make sure you didn’t miss any. “How much have we done tonight?”
“Since you got here?” CC asks, putting the mirror down on the table. “Eh, I don’t know. I’d say about half an ounce.”
“Jesus,” you say, but your voice has no real emotion to it. Cocaine is its own emotion, or lack thereof. No matter what happens, no matter what you might think of something, everything just comes out in bursts of sound, words a mile a minute and you’d sound exactly the same if someone told you it was going to rain as if someone told you that you were going to die in three minutes.
“He’s got nothing to do with this,” CC says, laughing, and then he’s gone in a flurry of scraggly blond hair.
You briefly turn your attention back to Bobby and the blond in the corner, but your vision dances back and forth and you take a step backwards, putting a hand on the wall for support. “Shit,” you mutter to yourself. “I need to calm down.” And you bring the bottle to your lips and swallow the remainder of the amber liquid before letting the empty bottle fall to the ground. It hits the carpet with a dull thud that sounds impossibly far away.
You stumble backwards and land in the only chair left at the table. You’re not really certain of where all the rest of them went. You bring your elbow up to the table, leaning your entire face into your hand. You take a few deep breaths and when you bring your hand away you see blood. Not a lot, but enough to freak you the hell out. There’s only one reason why your nose could be bleeding. And it isn’t a good one.
“Fuck,” you say, a little louder this time, trying to calm your breathing. But you can’t. Your heart is pounding too damn fast. And it doesn’t even feel like it’s in your chest anymore. No, it’s right there in your throat, pulsing, making it terribly hard to swallow. And with every beat your head pounds as well.
“Bret?” you hear Bobby call to you from the corner. You look up at him, eyes wide, not sure what to say at a moment like this. A moment when you know you’re overdosing and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it. This is not how you imagined you would die.
“Bob,” you manage, showing him the blood on your hand. And then your vision blurs again and Bobby dances right in front of your eyes and you feel yourself slumping forward against the table. If only you could make your heart calm down. That would make everything feel a hell of a lot better.
“Oh Christ,” comes Bobby’s voice again. And then he is at your side, kneeling down on the floor, shaking you. And you wonder how he dislodged himself from that stripper so quickly. “Come on, Bret. What the fuck is wrong with you?” He slaps you once, sharply, right on the cheek. “Look at me, bro.”
You try to get your eyes to focus on Bobby’s face so close to yours but it just isn’t working. You know he’s there, can feel him shaking you violently now, but you just can’t see to bring him into clear view. And then suddenly his presence is gone, and you notice how high your body temperature seems to be. “Bob,” you manage to croak out, but your voice is just barely above a whisper.
You can hear him in the next room barking orders. He calls out for CC and then nothing but mumbles until you can hear CC’s voice screaming at the girls to get the fuck out of the house. A few more yells and door slams later and again you can feel someone in front of you, hands closing around your shoulders, and you can just barely make out Bobby kneeling on the floor.
“Bret,” he says urgently. “Come on, man. You’re fine. You’re gonna be fine. Just calm down.”
“…chest hurts,” you manage somehow, but as hard as you try you can’t get any other words out.
“What the fuck are we gonna do?” you hear Bobby demanding, his voice panicked and for a moment you think about how amazing it is that he can bring himself to sound concerned on all that coke.
“We can’t call anybody,” CC’s voice comes then. “They’ll lock us up.”
“Goddamnit… fuck,” and Bobby’s shaking your shoulders again. “Bret, come on. Don’t fucking do this. Okay? You’re fine. You’ve done a lot more than this, man.”
But you’re not fine. You’re not fine and you can’t even get out the words to tell them you’re not fine. You can’t remember having ever been so scared.
“Fuck me,” you hear CC again. “Just fuck me. This is bad. This is so fucking bad.”
“Shut the fuck up, Ceece,” Bobby yells. “He’s gonna be fine. We just gotta take him somewhere.”
A hospital sounds like a pretty good idea right about now but you can’t say that and you know they wouldn’t listen to you anyway.
“Rikki,” there’s Bobby’s voice, sounding like he suddenly has a plan. “We’ll take him to Rikki’s.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” CC argues. “What the hell is he gonna…”
You grab hold of whoever’s hand is on you at this point, you’re not really sure who, and manage to choke out, “Rikki.” What you had meant to say was, ‘no, not Rikki,’ but that isn’t what comes out and you hate yourself for it. It’s not that you necessarily think that Rikki won’t care. You’re not worried about that at all. Because somewhere in the back of your mind you’re still coherent enough to realize that Rikki will care. He’ll probably care too much. And then, on top of everything else you’ve managed to ruin for him, he’ll have to stay by you and watch you die and that just isn’t how you want to go out.
“Help me pick him up,” Bobby says, and then your being lifted up out of the chair and carried across the room.
Everything goes black and the next thing you know you’re in the backseat of a car that is going far too fast. Bobby is beside you, shaking you, staring down at you with an unreadable look on his face. “Bret, come on,” he’s saying, repeating the same tired litany that he’d been saying since this ordeal started, not that you have any concept of how long ago that was. “Come on. Just snap out of it.” As if it could possibly be that simple. And then everything goes black again.
~*~
You have just managed to doze off when you hear a dull pounding coming from downstairs. At first you almost begin to drift off again, but the sound doesn’t stop. A glance at the clock on your bedside table tells you that it’s nearly quarter to five in the morning. Biting your lip, you look down at the sleeping form of Julie, curled up by your side with her head and one arm on your chest. For a few seconds you allow yourself to just watch her sleep, this perfect package of peace and beauty that fits so well in the crook of your arm, but then the banging starts anew and you know you have to pay attention to it.
You carefully slide yourself out from under Julie, checking once you’ve gotten out of bed to make sure she didn’t wake up. But she just murmurs in her sleep and rolls over on to her back, her perfect milky breasts gorgeous in the tiny bit of moonlight coming in through the curtains.
Pulling on a pair of jeans, you exit the room and quickly make your way downstairs, certain now that the noise you’re hearing is someone pounding on the front door. You assume it’s Bret, and you think that maybe you should grab the phone and call for the police before even answering the door, but you don’t. Some part of you still believes that you can diffuse this situation all by yourself, that you can somehow talk sense and reason into him, and that maybe this time you can do it without Julie having to be involved.
Stretching your neck from side to side, you turn on the light in your foyer, reach the front door, and open it. And suddenly standing before you is Bobby, wearing only a pair of jeans with Bret hanging limply in his arms. CC is standing next to him looking rather sheepish. Never a good look coming from CC DeVille. Your stomach plummets.
“What’s wrong with him?” you ask, ushering them all inside. You don’t stop to question how the three of them all ended up together. You just need to know why Bret looks so pale, certainly paler than he did a few hours ago, lying in Bobby’s arms.
“Cocaine,” Bobby tells you, stepping past you and into the living room. “Ceece and I didn’t know what to do. We thought you might.”
Your eyes grow wide with what you are being made to comprehend. “What do you mean cocaine?” you bark. “How fucking much cocaine?”
“At least a bottle of Jack and more than two eightballs,” CC replies, looking around nervously.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” you rush to Bret’s side and smack him harshly. He doesn’t respond, his head just lolls limply. “Why the hell didn’t you two call an ambulance?” But as soon as the question leaves your mouth you know the answer. “You’re both coked up out of your mind,” you say, not expecting a response.
“Yeah,” Bobby tells you, barely a hint of regret in his tone. “But not coked up enough to not wonder what the hell happened to your face.”
“The guy in your arms happened to my face,” you spit out. “I can’t fucking believe this. He breaks out of a mental hospital and you two dipshits give him coke. What the fuck is wrong with you guys? Get him in the god damn bathroom.”
Bobby’s brushing past you then, on the way to the bathroom that’s down the hall on the other side of the living room, and you look at CC, who is looking back at you with an expression that you suppose is probably the closest thing to concern that he can muster. “Broke out…?” he begins, but doesn’t follow it with anything.
“What, do you think they just sent him on a vacation from the loony bin?” you say, your tone harsh. You know deep down that whether he facilitated it or not, what’s happening right now is not really CC’s fault. CC can’t even take care of himself. It’s not fair to expect him to take care of anyone else.
“I don’t fucking know,” CC says, but instead of his usual volatile personality he sounds only scared and ashamed. “I didn’t think… I mean…” He trails off.
“Whatever,” you say, and then you’re off in the direction of the bathroom and you can hear CC’s footsteps behind you. In the bathroom, Bobby’s got Bret on his back in the shower and he’s got the water turned on, but Bret is still unconscious and you think his lips might be starting to turn blue. “How the fuck did this happen?” you demand, feeling completely helpless.
“I don’t know,” Bobby barks, still shaking Bret, occasionally slapping his face but eliciting no response. “We… we were just having a good time.”
“A good fucking time,” you repeat, and you can’t stand to see Bret like this, can’t stand to see him so helpless and frail-looking, can’t stand to see Bobby being so rough even if you know he’s just trying to save Bret’s life. “Get the fuck out of here. Both of you. Leave me alone with him,” and you feel like you’re about to burst into tears.
“Rikki,” Bobby begins, looking reluctant to leave Bret’s side. But you don’t care. The mere sight of Bobby is grating on your nerves right now. Misplaced anger at it’s finest.
“Just go,” you insist. “Now. Get out.”
“I’m sorry,” he offers pathetically and then he and CC are gone and you are kneeling beside Bret’s limp form, pulling him up into your arms, not caring in the least if you get wet or not.
“Come on, Bret,” you say, kissing his forehead and smoothing his now wet hair away from his face. “Wake up, you asshole. Don’t fucking do this to me.”
But his body is so cold, and he’s shaking. At least that means he’s still alive, you think. You smack him a few times, praying silently to whoever is willing to listen that he opens his eyes for you just once. And then, as if on cue, his eyes flutter open and they roll around as if trying to focus on something. They eventually come to rest on your face and Bret offers you a sad smile.
“Rikki,” he whispers, his voice hoarse. And now you’re sure you really are going to cry. But you can’t. If you break down you won’t be able to help him. Not that you’re all that certain on whether or not you can help him anyway. With much effort he raises one of his hands, bringing it to rest on yours. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t,” you shout, unable to keep your emotions in check. “Don’t fucking apologize for anything. Just stay with me, Bret. Stay awake with me and we’ll get you out of this all right, okay man?”
And then you feel a hand on your shoulder and you’re turning to look up at Julie standing behind you in your boxers and t-shirt. She looks terrified, and horribly, horribly saddened. “Do you want me to call an ambulance?”
“I don’t know,” you choke out, beginning to shake yourself. “I don’t fucking know, Julie.”
She nods, trying to appear like she is in control of this you suppose. It doesn’t work. “I’ll call. Stay with him, talk to him, I’ll be right back.” And then she’s gone and you want to cry out to her to come back because you just really don’t think that you can get through this one by yourself, but you don’t.
You look back down at Bret, and he’s still sort of conscious, his eyelids fluttering. “I… I love you,” he says, and you don’t think you’ve ever heard his voice sound even half this week.
“I love you, too,” you say, and now you are crying, silently, the hot tears coursing down your cheeks so quickly that you can do nothing to stop them. And you do love him. You love him still, even after everything that’s happened, you love him and you forgive him and you hate yourself because you really did want him to go away but you didn’t mean it like this and now everything’s going too fast, as fast as the salty tears are sliding down your face.
“I didn’t… think I’d die like this,” he says, short, gasping breaths between every word.
“You’re not going to die,” you tell him, and you try to sound firm but you know that you don’t. And worse than that you know that he’s right, that he is going to die and he’s going to die here in your bathtub and that he’s going to die never believing that you forgive him, not after everything else that has transpired. “You’re not going to die, Bret,” you say again, but you don’t sound any more convincing than you did the first time.
He opens his mouth as if to speak but instead his eyes roll into the back of his head as he begins to shake, convulsing in your arms. You curse to yourself, not sure what to do, your medical training a blur of meaningless words in your head. “Bret, come on, Bret, no,” you say, repeating the words over and over until they don’t sound real anymore.
But he isn’t moving, isn’t even shaking anymore, he’s just lying here like a rag doll in your arms. A rag doll that you’ll never get to play with again. And now the tears can’t possibly stay silent. You’re sobbing, your shoulders shaking, your lips pressing against Bret’s cool forehead over and over again. You think you hear someone screaming ‘no’ and then you realize that it’s you and you can’t make the screaming stop. Don’t want to make it stop. Because it feels almost good to get all of this emotion out of you.
The next thing you know someone is turning the water off and you look up to find Bobby standing there, staring down at you in shock and pain. The cocaine hasn’t allowed him tears. “You fucking bastard,” you scream. “You did this to him. You fucking did this to him. Was it not enough to take him away from me and lock him up? You had to kill him too?” And you know you’re being completely irrational but you just don’t care anymore. You don’t care about anything. Because your best friend, your ex-lover, the man that you always loved even more than yourself is lying dead in your arms and you can’t do anything about it. It had felt like Bret was dead for all those months that he was locked up in that hospital, but now he really is dead and you realize this feeling is like nothing you’ve ever imagined.
“I’m so sorry,” Bobby whispers, dropping to his knees and pulling both Bret’s body and your own into a tight hug. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for it to happen. I swear to everything, Rikki. I’m sorry.”
“He’s gone,” you sob, not removing your hands from Bret’s body to push Bobby away when he starts to run his fingers through your hair. “He’s gone, Bob. He’s really gone.”
“I know,” Bobby replies, his voice shaking as his fingers touch your cheek. “And I’m so sorry.” Then the tears do start to fall down Bobby’s cheeks and you understand that he is feeling this pain with you. Because in his own way he had always been completely enamored with Bret as well.
“Oh my god.” The voice belongs to Julie and you turn to look at her, standing in the doorway, looking impossibly small in your clothes, her hands coming up to her mouth. “Is he…”
You nod and look away, unable to look at her. “I couldn’t save him,” you say quietly. “I didn’t know how.”
A moment later you can feel her small, warm hands on your shoulders and you close your eyes. “No one could have saved him, Rikki,” she says quietly. In the background you can hear CC cursing and further than that, sirens.
~*~
It’s unseasonably chilly, especially for June in California, or maybe it’s just the atmosphere that is making you shiver. Things had gone quickly after Bret had died. The ambulance had arrived and you and CC had stayed upstairs, out of sight, too coked up to deal with the police while an ashen-faced Rikki explained to the police that Bret had just shown up out of his mind on cocaine. No, officers, you could picture Rikki saying. I had no idea he had even left the hospital. And you were grateful, grateful that he’d covered for you when he just as easily could have turned you in, when he probably should have turned you in. But mostly you were just guilty. Guilty and exhausted and sad and afraid.
It had only been a few short days between then and now, standing around the casket while a priest talked about things that didn’t make sense to you. Bret’s parents had quickly and quietly made arrangements for the funeral, and although they were visibly distraught, they were distant and quiet, not talking to any of you more than they had to. You couldn’t blame them.
On your left stands CC, pale-faced and quiet. He has barely spoken at all since this all happened, and you know that he’s just incapable of dealing with the emotions you’re certain he’s feeling. And on the other side of you stands Rikki. It’s obvious that he’s barely even able to hold himself upright, and although to the untrained eye it looks like he has his arm around Julie to support her, you know it’s really the other way around. You had been angry at first, finding out that Rikki had left you for Bret and then a split-second later hooked up with Julie. But now you just can’t blame him. She has been strong through all of this. Strong for him when he couldn’t be strong on his own. And you have to admit that you respect her for that.
The priest continues to drone on, saying nice things about Bret even though you’re sure the man never actually met him. It’s all a bit too surreal, to be standing here at the funeral of a man who had played such a huge role in your life. Whether anyone else in the band wanted to admit it or not, Bret had made you famous. And more personally for you, Bret had inadvertently provided you with one of the best relationships of your life. You still love Rikki. You’re sure that you always will. But if he is happy with Julie, you’ll just have to deal with it. None of that is important now anyway.
And now the priest is asking if anyone would like to say a few words about Bret and much to your surprise, CC is stepping forward. Your eyes catch Rikki’s and, through his obvious grief, he looks just as dumbfounded as you. CC walks towards the priest, his head down and his hands shoved deep in his pockets. When he stands at the head of the casket, he places his hands on the top of it and looks up at the crowd.
“I’ve never been good at things like this,” CC begins, his voice more mellow than you’ve ever heard it. “But I can’t not say something. Bret Michaels was an amazing musician, an amazing person, an amazing friend. We didn’t always agree, in fact, we rarely did. But he was still one of the best friends I’ll ever have and…” he pauses, shaking his head, swallowing hard. “I’m sorry.” Anyone standing in the crowd would think he was simply apologizing for breaking down, but you know better. You can see in his face that he means so much more. And you’re proud of him for it. He takes his hands off of the casket then, walks back to his place beside you and stares intently at the ground.
But then you realize with a sickening dread that you have to go up there next, because CC did, and because you know beyond the shadow of a doubt that Rikki will. It’s not that you don’t want to, not that you don’t think that Bret deserves it, but that you’re not sure if you can hold yourself together, not sure if you can offer even a fraction of what Bret deserves. But all the same, one foot in front of the other, you make your way to the place where CC had been standing a moment before. The sea of faces surrounding the casket is dizzying. Even years of performing in front of thousands of people hasn’t prepared you for this.
“I have to admit that I’m not really sure what to say,” you begin, looking down, twisting one of your rings around your finger. “I never thought that I’d be in this position. Frankly, I never thought that Bret would die.” You clear your throat, scan the crowd of people again before looking back down, staring at the deep cherry-colored wood of the casket. Your eyes are starting to burn and you blink furiously, trying hard to stay in control. “He wasn’t like anyone else in the world, and even during all the times that I wasn’t sure whether that was a good thing or a bad one, I always believed…” The first hot tears are beginning to spill down your cheeks now, despite your best efforts to hold them back, and you give up on trying to keep your emotions in check and look back at the crowd. Your eyes dance over CC, Rikki, Bret’s parents. “I always believed that he would outlive us all. That he would outlive everyone. He didn’t… he didn’t deserve…” And you stumble over the words, can’t get another sound out of your mouth, and you can feel Rikki coming up next to you, putting his hand on your arm.
~*~
The moment you see Bobby falling apart up there by the casket you know you have to go to him. Even if you’re no stronger yourself, you have to be by him. Julie lets you go without question. You make your way to Bobby’s side, standing as close as possible and placing your hand on his arm. “It’s okay,” you tell him, swallowing around the lump in your throat.
He shakes his head. You can see that he wants to say more but the words just aren’t coming. No longer caring if it’s appropriate or not, you kiss Bobby gently on the cheek. “Go back and stand with Julie,” you whisper. “It’s okay, Bob. It’s okay.” And you’re not sure how you sound so together but you’re glad that you do. You glance at Julie and she seems to read your mind. Her and Smoothie are almost immediately at Bobby’s side, helping him walk back to where he had been standing. And now everyone is staring at you, waiting for you to say what Bobby and CC never could. You’re not sure that you’re ready to do this. But you guess that you have to be.
Taking a deep breath, you look up at the sky, trying to remember all the events that have led to this moment. Even at the worst of times a piece of your heart had belonged to Bret. But how can you possibly convey that to the people standing here now. Sighing, you bring your eyes back down and begin to speak.
“Everything that CC and Bobby have said here today is true. Bret Michaels is, was, and always will be one in a million. Even at his lowest moments he had the ability to amaze me again and again. He was so much more than my best friend. So much more than my lover, even.” You venture a glance at Bret’s mother and, while she doesn’t seem all that pleased, she also doesn’t look like she’s going to come running at you over the coffin. Thank God for small blessings.
“Bret really did change my life,” you continue, tugging at your hair nervously, trying to stay numb enough to get through this. “He was the world to me. I would never be who I am if he hadn’t been in my life. There aren’t enough words in the world to do him justice. What died a few days ago was a lot more than just a man.” And you want to say more, but there’s nothing in your head but fire and pain and regret. You look around at everyone once more before stepping away from the casket and returning to your place in between Bobby and Julie.
The rest of the service goes by in a blur. Everyone steps forward one by one to toss flowers as the casket is lowered into the ground and you are the last one to step forward, dropping a single red rose into the hole in the earth. It comes to rest directly in the center of the casket, obscuring several of the other flowers from view.
You stand perfectly still for a very long time, long enough so that almost everyone, even the priest, has left. When you turn away from the casket and the flowers, the only people still left behind are Bobby, CC, Smoothie, and Julie, all looking at you with more sadness on their faces than you can bear to see. Swallowing hard, you walk over to them, grabbing Julie’s hand and squeezing it tightly. She squeezes back and steps closer to you, so close that there is no space between the two of you at all, and you are surprised by how grateful you are to have her tiny form pressed against you.
“What now,” Bobby says flatly, looking off into the distance. His eyes are bleary and red from crying and he seems unable to look at you.
“His parents didn’t want to have a reception,” you answer quietly. “I’m having one at my place.” Before anyone can say anything about this, you go on. “I’ll see you guys there, okay? We’ll be there in a few minutes.”
“Are you sure you’re all right to drive?” Smoothie asks, ever the concerned father figure.
“I’m driving,” Julie puts in quietly.
“I’ll be fine,” you say. “I just need a few minutes.”
Smoothie nods. “All right. We’ll see you in a bit, then.” He and CC turn and begin to walk toward the long line of cars.
Bobby looks at you for a long moment before he speaks. “I’m sorry, Rikki,” he says, and his voice has never sounded so utterly apologetic and sincere.
“So am I,” you tell him. “We’ll talk more later, Bob.” And you mean it. Although your relationship with him is definitely over, there’s an awful lot that still needs to be said.
“I’d like that,” he says. He shifts his weight uncomfortably and turns to Julie. “Take good care of him, all right?”
Julie smiles sadly. “Promise.”
Bobby looks back at you for a few seconds before turning and following CC and Smoothie. You watch until they have all climbed into their cars before turning to Julie and taking her small hands in yours. “I can’t imagine what this must be like for you,” you say.
She favors you with a tiny, sad smile. “Don’t worry about me, sweetheart. This is more your tragedy than mine, much more.”
You look down at her for a long moment. She is the embodiment of truth and beauty, the strange life force that has kept you standing through this entire crazy debacle. She is precious in ways you don’t understand, but want to explore. “Stay with me,” you say then, the words coming out before you can think about them. “Stay with me. Don’t ever leave.”
Her green eyes shine with the ghost of tears. “Of course I won’t,” she says softly. “I’ll never leave.” And she stands on her toes to kiss you, a chaste, gentle act. And as you begin to walk with her towards your car, you think that just maybe, there might be some hope left after all.