Gunner was tired of thinking about Margo and cleaning, which typically was enough to make him chill and forget any bullshit going on in his life, but it wasn’t helping. He’d cleaned the clubhouse from top to bottom and he could definitely say that these fuckers and their mess should be able to keep his mind off his shitty situation. He’d found more than a bucket full of used condoms and cigarette butts, not to mention the bottles from all the booze they went through. Not that it had helped him forget anything about Margo leaving him without any warning.

He just wanted to forget. To leave his worries behind him and forget that she wasn’t with him anymore for just a minute. He looked down at the drugs Tattered had stashed in one of the nightstands in his room. He likely shouldn’t have been cleaning his brother’s nightstand drawers, but when his OCD was kicking—well, it was kicking. He’d found the foil wrapped hit under a bunch of condoms and some gum of all things. Gunner stared at it long and hard, his mind running a mile a minute. He hated thinking about Margo and yet he couldn’t stop, he just wanted it to stop. The acid called to him, seducing him to take it and forget for a minute the pain in his soul because the woman he thought he’d spend the rest of his life with had pushed him away again. He had let her walk away, but only because he couldn’t allow her to keep doing this to him again and again.

She’d already pushed him away once, but at least that time she’d had a reason that made sense to him, but this time he had no idea what had happened. One minute they’d been together and everything had been fine and the next she was breaking up with him. He glanced down at the acid sitting on his dresser. His eyes unfocused as he stared down at it, his stomach was twisting in knots like snakes inside him. He reached out, done with thinking for a while and was unable to resist the siren’s call of the drug’s ability to make him forget.

Gunner dropped the hit and sat back leaning into the pillows waiting for the effects to start. He forgot in his rush to forget about Margo, that acid was the last drug he needed to do when his head wasn’t on straight. He was suddenly thrust into a dark hallway that tugged at his memory. A cold sweat broke out over his skin as he stared towards the door at the end of the hall, thoughts scrambling to figure out where he was and why this dark hallway looked so damned familiar.

Snakes were slithering over the ground at his feet making him kick out trying to get rid of them as he headed towards the door. Hesitation wasn’t something he was known for, but something about this hallway and that door scared him. He didn’t know what to do as he stood a few feet from the door, unease burning in his guts. He stared at the crack in the door seeing the light pouring into the hall. Feelings of dread kept his feet in place. He turned away from the door, not wanting to walk through it. He watched as the floor fell away and left him with only one way to go.

Gunner stared at the door reaching out to pull it open. He heard the creak of the hinges as it swung inward and the bright light blinded him for a moment. That was when he knew where he was and why all of this looked so familiar to him. It was the bathroom of Choke’s sister, Cheri. Even before his vision cleared he knew what day it was and what he’d see when his sight returned. Gunner wanted to block out the memories that were flooding his brain as he blinked trying to bring the room into focus.

He could still remember the call from Choke asking him to go over and check on her after they’d fought about her moving in with her loser boyfriend. Choke didn’t like the guy at all and had threatened him more than once about getting his sister into drugs. Turned out there was a good reason to hate that little fucker. Gunner had arrived to find her door unlocked and opened a little. He’d gone inside her apartment concerned that something was wrong, it had been wrong alright. He’d heard water running in the bathroom and headed down the hall calling out to her but he’d gotten no response. As he neared the door he’d knocked on it, but again she hadn’t responded. He could remember feeling really worried as he stood in that hall and pushed the door open. He would never forget the sound of the creak as it swung open—just like the sound he’d just heard.

Gunner had stepped inside to find the sink running and Cheri’s crumpled form on the floor. He’d dropped to his knees feeling his heart pound inside his chest as he slowly shook her hoping for a response. He’d noticed the needle before he’d seen the tourniquet on her arm. He’d known before he’d even turned her over what must have happened. His hands were gentle as they tugged at her shoulder. Cheri was eighteen—just a fucking kid—and she’d always been protected by her big brother and his club. She’d lived with Choke in a small house built on the ten-acre lot the clubhouse was built on until she’d turned eighteen. She’d wanted to strike out on her own and insisted she was old enough to live on her own. Against his better judgment Choke had gotten her an apartment a block from the clubhouse.

That was when she’d met her boyfriend. Choke had one of the prospects follow him for a week. He hadn’t liked the things the prospect had told him and he’d threatened the fucker to keep the drugs away from his sister. She’d been in that apartment for a little over a week before Gunner found her on the bathroom floor. He’d slowly rolled her over onto her back praying he was wrong.

He hadn’t been. Gunner remembered the sightless eyes with tiny pupils staring up at the ceiling all glassy and lifeless. Her lips had been blue and her skin had looked grey. It was obvious she’d been dead for hours and from the way the door had been left open he’d known who was responsible. When he’d called Choke, he’d thought the man was going to explode. They’d gone after the little asshole who’d killed his sister by giving her heroin and they’d beat him till he’d spilled the whole story. Then they’d put a bullet between his eyes for leaving her like that. The memory of that night had stuck with him and occasionally, he’d dream about it.

He couldn’t see that look again, he just couldn’t do it. He tried to walk out of the room but suddenly he was kneeling despite not intending to. She was lying there on her side just like before. He noticed something different when he looked down at her this time. His heart almost stopped beating when he saw blonde hair instead of the thick black locks he expected. Gunner couldn’t breathe when he noted the blue streaks in her hair and his hands shook as he reached slowly to her shoulder to pull her onto her back. When he did the world stopped and all he felt was agony splintering through him as he stared down into the face of the woman lying on the floor.

Sightless eyes staring at the ceiling and lips tinged blue were all he saw before he lost it. Tears poured down his cheeks and he couldn’t stop shaking as he bent forward. His chest was tight and his heart didn’t want to beat right as it roared in his ears.

“No, no, no, no,” he choked out, as he reached out, taking Margo into his arms pulling her lifeless body to his chest and rocking back and forth as he roared ‘no’ repeatedly. It might have been minutes or possibly hours that he sat there. That’s when he felt the hands pulling at him jerking him away from Margo. He fought trying to get back to her, but he was dragged further away by those hands that ripped at him. He saw demons coming through the door grabbing at Margo tearing her to pieces as he fought to get to her. Gunner couldn’t get to her no matter how hard he fought.

“Fuck! Would you snap out of it, asshole?” he heard a familiar voice. He didn’t recognize it in his hazy need to get to Margo before they tore her body to shreds.

“What the fuck is he trippin’ on?” Another man’s voice asked. Gunner knew that he should know who was talking but didn’t.

“Acid, it’s got to be, nothing else makes you act like this. It’s a bad trip, poor bastard,” Dice said. Gunner knew his voice and wasn’t surprised to realize that he was slowly beginning to watch the bathroom he’d been in with Margo fading.

“What should we do?”

“Nothing you can do, man. He has to snap out of it on his own. If we try to pull him out he could dig in deeper,” Dice muttered.

“Well, we can’t just let him thrash about screaming. He’s already hoarse from all his yelling,” Joker muttered.

Gunner wasn’t fully aware of his surroundings yet, but he was damned sure about one thing. Seeing Margo like that had torn out a piece of his soul. He couldn’t stand the thought of her like that and he felt a shiver of fear roll over him. As he finally escaped the hell he’d been in, he found himself on the floor in his room with Joker on top of him and Buck holding his arms while Dice stood in the doorway watching them. As reality settled into him slowly, he realized he’d been tripping hard and what he’d seen with Margo and the demons wasn’t real. Only it had felt real and his chest still ached with the need to know for sure if it was real. He had a sudden need to hear Margo’s voice. He just needed to know she was alright, that she was whole and unharmed. Seeing her like that wasn’t something he could handle.

“Get off me,” he demanded, trying to sit up.

Joker took his time, moving slowly as if he were ready to jump back on him if he made a single wrong move. Gunner shoved him back hard into the bed hearing the little grunt as he landed against it. He noticed Joker’s phone hanging from his pocket and reached out trying to grab it. Joker yelped, trying to avoid him.

“What the hell, man? Stop. What are you doing?” Joker demanded, as he tried like hell to hold onto his cell phone. Joker managed to get it away from Gunner’s hand and he’d had enough. He needed to hear her voice right this very second or he was going to go insane. He grabbed his spare gun from under his mattress pressing it to Joker’s temple. Everyone in the room froze as he sat there with his finger on the trigger and his entire soul demanding to talk to Margo right now to assure himself she was alright.

“Give me your phone,” Gunner commanded, done with the fighting and the games.

“Fuck! Everyone just calm the hell down, nobody needs to get hurt. Just give him the phone, Joker,” Buck ordered. Joker complied, as Gunner took the phone and dialed, holding his breath as it rang. He counted the rings as he waited impatiently for her to answer.

“Hello?” Margo’s sweet voice sent spikes of hot relief flooding through him as he gripped the phone tightly. Margo said hello a few more times, each one reassuring him that she was alright. It was like a balm to his soul that she was okay. He didn’t respond to her because he couldn’t think of what he’d say.

He didn’t think she’d appreciate him saying something like ‘Hey, had a bad trip on some acid and thought you were dead. Glad you’re okay’ before he hung up on her. Fuck, that would not be a good idea. When she hung up, he closed his eyes trying to hold onto those hellos because they soothed him. Gunner let Joker’s phone fall from his hand as he laid his weapon down and fell back onto the floor. He just wanted to sleep and forget that lifeless look on dream Margo’s face. He never wanted to see anything like that again. Damn, he couldn’t think, it was so fucking messed up.

“Fuck man, don’t break my damned phone because you’re on some massive trip and have lost your mind,” Joker bitched, earning a glare from Gunner’s one eye, because it took too much effort to open both and his energy had escaped him.

“Shut up, Joker or you might end up with another gun to your temple,” Buck growled, smacking Joker in the back of the head earning a yelp of pain. “You good, man?” Buck questioned moving to grab Gunner’s spare Glock off the floor.

“I’m good, but leave my damned gun on the nightstand, asshole. No taking it. It’s not even loaded,” he grunted before he used the side of the bed to push up and stand before collapsing on top of the bed instead of the floor.

“Thank, fuck. I thought you’d lost your shit for real, man. You pressed that gun against Joker’s head like it didn’t matter and even if he is annoying as fuck, we would like to keep him around,” Buck said shaking his head.

“I’m not annoying, asshole,” Joker growled, earning another box to the ears.

“How many times a day do you talk about chicks you want to fuck?” he asked, waiting on Joker to defend himself again.

“It’s not that bad, I just like pussy. Why is that so wrong?” Joker asked looking confused.

“It’s not wrong to want pussy dumbass, but it is annoying as fuck when you can’t stop talking about it,” Dice muttered from the doorway. “Look, he seems alright for now, but we should let him sleep it off. Bad trips aren’t fun and he seems like he might have some lingering sensations that are still fucking with his head. He’s likely been up for ten hours or more, tripping. He needs to rest and get his head on straight. If I’d known he was planning on dropping a hit I would have reminded him not to do it when he was fucked up mentally.” 

“Yeah, that warning would have been nice last night, asshole.” Gunner growled, peeking at Dice from under his arm which he’d thrown over his eyes while he’d been wishing them away as they’d argued.

“Not my fault you’re an idiot,” Dice grunted shooting him the bird.

“Just get out, I’m fine,” Gunner lied, because after seeing Margo lying on the floor with sightless eyes and grey skin he wasn’t going to be okay for a long damned time.

“Alright, let’s clear out now that he’s calm and ready for sleep,” Buck muttered as he helped Joker up off the floor. The three men left his room shutting the door behind them. Gunner lay there staring at the ceiling wondering if he’d ever be able to forget what he’d just went through. He wouldn’t be dropping acid anytime soon—if ever—that was for damned sure.