Serge

The minute Tori’s out the door I feel bad about how things just went. Part of me wants to run after her, but the other part — the part in charge of what my feet do, apparently — says good riddance. I’ve always known that Tori spells nothing but trouble for me, and this just cements it. She’s wild and reckless, impulsive and hot-headed. It’s not a good mix for two addicts to get together, and I know it.

But I still can’t stop thinking about her. Maybe she does have an explanation for what happened earlier, for the swarm of paparazzi all clearly there for her and not the kids. She played it so cool when I noticed all the cameras, but I knew something was up. I might have been out of the biz for a while, but I still remember what it’s like. I know what a pre-scheduled media blitz looks like, even from the parking lot. But I suppose I should at least give her the chance to explain what she can — after she cools down. After we both cool down.

Besides, now I’m alone with thirty-five kids. I don’t really have the time to sit and wallow over whatever the hell just happened between us. The kids are having a good time, jumping on beds, watching TV, going to the pool. It’s really not hard to watch them, I just have to be a responsible adult. Someone has to.

Eventually, around midnight, everyone’s back in their rooms, locked up tight for the night. Everyone except Tori. As far as I can tell, she’s never come back, but her luggage is still in her room. That seems super weird, so I head back to my room to call Onyx. Maybe he knows what she’s doing, where she is. I know she’s a big girl and she can handle herself, but I still worry. I don’t know why, because I’m still angry at her, but I do.

When I wake my phone up, a ton of notifications pop up all at once. I left it in the room while I was hanging with the kids, not wanting it to get broken or tossed in the pool or anything like that. But now I see that Tori’s been trying to call me and a fist of panic closes around my chest. What if she needed my help and I wasn’t there?

I feel like an ass.

Then I listen to the voicemails and my heart sinks through the floor.

It’s clear she’s wasted, slurring and crying, a total wreck. It’s hard to listen to, and each one gets more and more unintelligible. I don’t waste any more time calling Onyx.

“Hello?” he answers, clearly suspicious of my name being on the caller ID.

“Hey Onyx, it’s Serge—”

“I can read.”

“Right, well, I was wondering if you’ve heard from Tori?”

“Should I have?” he asks, his voice taking on a rough edge.

I sigh. “I don’t know. We kind of had a fight and I haven’t seen her since. I think she might be drinking.”

“Goddamnit,” he mutters under his breath. “Well, Tori’s going to do what she wants to do. If she’s out getting wasted, it’s probably best to just let it run its course.”

My hands ball into fists, my jaw clenching tight. “She’s all alone, don’t you think that’s just asking for trouble?”

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Tori is always asking for trouble. Alone or not.”

It’s not an answer I like, but it’s the only one I’m likely to get.

“Well… Will you let me know if you hear from her?”

“Sure,” he says, some girl in the background trying to pull him away from his phone. “Don’t sweat it. She’s done worse.”

That doesn’t really make me feel any better. Because that’s the kind of thing people said about me when I went missing before a show and wouldn’t answer my phone. They were so used to Ian and I fucking up, going around doing all the drugs we could get our hands on, that no one found it out of the ordinary when we hadn’t been heard from in hours and we missed curtain call. We’re just lucky that Luke was pissed off enough to track us down with the intention of beating some sense into us. Instead, he found us both pretty much comatose, me nearly dead.

So no, I don’t find comfort in the knowledge she’s ‘done worse.’ It just makes me think this might be the worst she ever does and it’s going to be my fault.

I lay in bed for hours, staring at the ceiling, watching the shadows move from under the curtains, wondering where Tori is and what she’s doing. If she’s okay. If we’re going to be okay.

I don’t know what makes me think there’s still a ‘we.’ She made it pretty clear that she didn’t want to talk to me again, though I kind of did the same.

It feels stupid now, lying in bed awake, worrying about her. It feels stupid that we fought over some paparazzi. But I keep thinking of the kids asking why everyone’s trying to talk to Tori, getting crowded out of their own competition hall, everyone distracted wondering why she wasn’t there when they should’ve been focused on the performance. It wasn’t fair to them. That’s what made me angriest at her.

But this disappearing act isn’t fair to me either. It’s bullshit and I plan to tell her so as soon as I’m able. She has to know she can’t just treat people like this. She can’t just flit in and out of their lives whenever she feels like it.

I don’t really ever sleep, but the sun’s starting to peek over the horizon when Onyx calls me back.

“I’ve got her, I’m taking her back to LA,” he says curtly.

“Is she okay?”

“More or less. You should hear it from her, though.”

“Okay,” I sigh, the fist finally releasing its grip on my chest. “Thanks for letting me know.”

“Mmhm.”

The line goes dead and I’m left feeling helpless and useless. I don’t know what’s going on with Tori. Onyx sounded like he’s pissed, but I don’t know who he is pissed at and I’m worried it’s me. Not because I give a shit about him hating me — I don’t — but because that would mean whatever’s going on with Tori is definitely because of me, and I’m not sure I really want to shoulder that burden right now.

I know what I do want. I want to go to where ever she is and see that she’s okay for myself. I want to go to her right now and talk about all of this like adults, but I can’t do that because I have the kids to watch. The kids to get home in one piece. Without having slept at all. Great.

There’s still a ton of questions from them about Tori and where she is and what she’s doing the next morning. I just tell them that Tori had some stuff she needed to take care of and couldn’t stay, but that she’s super proud of them all.

Kamala’s not buying it. She’s scowling at me pursed-lipped the whole ride back to LA, her arms crossed in front of her. It’s the last thing I expect, for Kamala to turn against me to Tori’s side, and it cuts deeper than I thought it would.

It’s still pretty early in the morning when we get back, and there’s a bunch of parents and older siblings waiting on the sidewalk to greet us. Ava’s among the crowd too, waiting for Kamala, but I stop her before she can get off the bus.

“Did you have a good trip, Commander?”

Her eyes are stone cold.

“What did you do?” she says, her voice as harsh as her gaze.

“What?”

“To Tori.”

“I didn’t do anything—”

“Yes you did. She was upset because of you.”

I sigh. “Kamala… It’s complicated… you know, grown-up stuff.”

“That’s what they say about cancer too, but I understand it enough.”

I sigh again. This kid’s too damn smart for her own good. “You’re right.”

“Don’t you like her?” she asks, her arms falling.

“What?”

“Don’t you like Tori? I thought you guys liked each other…” She looks like someone stomped her puppy, and I realize that Kamala was probably pretty excited for two of her favorite grown-ups to like each other.

“I do, but it’s not that simple.”

“Yes it is. You’re being dumb.”

“That’s not nice.”

“Well, you are!”

Ava’s head pokes in through the bus door, looking concerned. “Oh, she is here, good,” she says with a relieved smile.

“Yeah, sorry, we were just talking…”

“About complicated grown-up stuff,” Kamala sneers, rolling her eyes. Ava’s eyes go wide and I just shake my head.

“Don’t ask.”

“Oh… okay. Come on, Kamala, your foster parents wanted you to be home in time for church.”

Kamala hefts her backpack to her shoulder and gives me this disappointed look that cuts me all the way to my core.

When I get off the bus, the only person left on the sidewalk is the same guy that dropped it off on Friday, clipboard in hand again.

“Good trip?” he asks, just making small talk even though I really wish he wouldn’t.

“Fucking disaster,” I grumble, scribbling on the clipboard. He opens his mouth to respond, then thinks better of it, shaking his head. Before I leave, I heft Tori’s suitcase out of the undercarriage compartment. At least I have a ready-made excuse to go see her.

I head to Tori’s place, my mind going a million miles a second the whole way over. I don’t know what I’m going to say to her. I don’t know what I want to say. I just want to see her and forget all this happened.

I knock on her door, suitcase propped on the wall next to me, and wait. And wait. I knock again, and again. And finally, the door opens.

Tori looks like shit. She’s pale and blotchy, her eyes bleary and bloodshot, crusted with sleep and tears. She looks like she’s having the worst hangover of her life. Completely miserable.

“Hi,” she says, wincing at the light behind me.

“I brought your suitcase,” I say, lifting it up to show her.

“Did you bring coffee?”

“’Fraid not,” I answer. She grumbles and walks away from the door, leaving it open, so I follow her in.

She’s slumped over the breakfast bar in her kitchen, trying to bring a cigarette to her lips with shaky hands, flicking the lighter over and over but it’s not sparking. Finally, she scowls at the cigarette and tosses it aside.

“Fuck,” she mutters, slumping forward, her forehead pressed to the bar. “I fucked up, didn’t I?”

I leave the suitcase in the entryway and close the door behind me, stepping up behind her, rubbing her back.

“Seems like you might’ve. Why don’t you tell me what happened?”

She arches into my touch, like a cat being scratched just the right way, and I keep the slow steady pressure up and down her spine. I know her head’s gotta be throbbing, so if I can give her something to distract from the pain, I will. I’m annoyed with her, but I’m not heartless. I know hangovers are a bitch.

“I don’t know… The whole thing with the reporters was weird, and I swear I didn’t set it up. I think my rep did. He wasn’t even supposed to be there, but he just swooped right in… He found me at the bar later… Took me back to his room…” My hand stills on her back, because I know what she’s saying, and if she’s saying what I think she’s saying, I’m going to fucking murder the bastard before he even knows what’s coming.

“I feel so stupid now,” she groans. “He set me up. He set the whole thing up and said he’d keep it out of the papers if I showed him my gratitude.”

I swallow thickly, my whole body numb with shock. I was sitting up in my hotel room annoyed with her while something terrible was happening. I feel like I’m going to be sick.

“Did he…?”

Tori snorts and shakes her head, holding up both arms. “Fucker tried.”

And there, clear as day, are the marks of someone’s fingers on Tori’s arm, black and blue, her forearms puffy and swollen around the bruises. My heart stops and every scrap of annoyance and anger I have for her is gone. I take her arm in my hand and kiss the bruises softly.

“I’m sorry, Tori. I should have heard you out. Fuck, I’m sorry,” I say, kissing the bruises on her other arm.

“I haven’t really given you a reason to hear me out. I wouldn’t have given me the benefit of the doubt either.”

“Come on,” I say, helping her up, leading her to her bedroom. I disappear long enough to find painkillers in her medicine cabinet and get her a glass of water, setting them both on the table next to her on the bed.

“Take these, drink this.”

“Yes, Mom,” she says, her voice still rough and hazy, but some of that spark is back. She takes the pills and leans back into the pillows with a grunt.

“Time to rip off the band-aid,” she says, and I frown, not knowing what she’s talking about until she picks up the TV remote and turns it to TMZ.

I know it’s going to be bad, but I crawl in bed with her anyway, pulling her close to me where no one can hurt her again.

At first, it seems like she might be getting off easy. The story when we first tune in is about the latest Kardashian drama, then the newest royal baby. There’s a new porn star alleging relationships with more politicians, and some snarky comments on Katy Perry’s newest hairstyle, but it seems totally irrelevant to our situation.

Then the story segues, and there’s a screenshot of security camera footage in our hotel, showing a very inebriated Tori stumbling around in the early hours of the morning.

“Looks like Tori Winters is off the wagon again, Jack,” one of the pinched-faced interns says snidely, morbidly amused with Tori’s struggles.

“Do you even think she was really on the wagon? She went straight from the courthouse for her DUI to hanging out with heroin addicts. That doesn’t exactly sound like sobriety to me.”

I stiffen, my jaw clenching. Tori buries her face in my chest.

“I’m sorry they’re dragging you into this.”

“It’s fine.”

“It’s not. It’s—” Her phone rings and the room goes deathly silent except for the TV still spewing snippy comments about the two of us. I take the remote from her and mute it, still glaring daggers at the people on the screen spewing their venom and their judgment without any repercussions.

Tori takes a big, deep, shaky breath and answers the phone. “Hello?” Her lips press together in a thin line. “Mmhm.” Her entire body is tense and rigid and I try to pull her closer to me, but it’s like she’s made of granite and can’t be moved. “Okay. Yep. Thanks for calling.”

She drops the phone and lets out another shaky breath, her head buried in her hands, bright orange hair tangled around her fingers, gripping and releasing at her scalp like she’s going to pull her own hair out.

“Tori?” I ask softly, afraid speaking too loud might just be the thing that breaks her. I don’t know what that call was, but it wasn’t good. I know that much.

“It’s over,” she says, her voice far away and broken.

“What is?” Is she talking about us? She’s suddenly so closed off from me, so guarded, I don’t know what else it could be.

“That was my manager,” she says.

“Shit.”

“Yeah.”

“How bad is it?” I’m not even sure I want to know, but I need to be here for her. I have to be. I know too well what it feels like to be at this terrible shitty place. Except when I found myself here, I was in the hospital recovering from nearly dying. If I can, I’d like to save Tori that trauma.

“Fucking bad,” she says, sounding angry. I don’t know who she’s angry at, but I can feel it rolling off of her in hot waves. “The label’s dropping me, my manager’s dropping me… It’s fucking bad, Serge.”

“Shit, Tori, I’m sorry,” I say, drawing her back into my arms. This time she lets me and I just keep her there while she stares off at the blank screen of the TV like some old war vet having flashbacks.

I should have had that talk with her before, when I saw the signs of how bad it might get. But I didn’t. I wanted to have fun with her instead and now she’s paying the price for me being so fucking sackless.

“You know, the rehab place I went to is pretty great. Ian went there too. They normally have a waiting list, but we could probably get you in—”

She pulls back from me, her eyes flashing dangerously. “Get out. Get the fuck out.”

“No,” I say, crossing my arms. “I know what you’re going through Tori. I’ve been there, remember? I nearly died and had my whole career ripped out from under me. I don’t want you to get to that point. If you’re having trouble coping with shit, the time to get help is sooner, not later. I’ll be there, every time you have phone time, every visiting day.”

She’s just glaring at me like she hopes I’ll burst into flames and burn to ash just from the intensity of her gaze.

“I can’t believe you’d suggest something like that to me.”

“Tori, just think about it for a minute. You know you can’t keep going on like this. This isn’t the way you want to live.”

“What the hell do you know about the way I want to live? You turned to drugs because your mommy pushed you too hard? Boo fucking hoo. My mom was working three fucking jobs and left me to raise myself in a roach-filled trailer with an empty fridge. So why don’t you just let me decide how I want to live my life.”

I let out a slow even breath, trying not to let her get to me. I know that’s what she wants. I know she just wants a reaction from me.

“Are you through?” I ask, calmly as possible.

“No, I’m not fucking through. I want you to get the hell out of my house. Now.”

I scratch the side of my face absently and finally shrug. “Fine. You want me to leave, I’ll leave. But think about it.”

She holds up her middle finger.

As I’m leaving her apartment, I call Onyx.

“What’s up?” he answers.

“Tori got a call from your manager—”

“Yeah, I got one too. Said they’re already looking for her replacement, the bastard. But the label’s dropped the whole band, so I don’t know what he’s after.”

“Well, I’m just leaving her place and—”

“How’d that go?” he asks, incredulous.

“About as well as you’d expect,” I grumble. “She kicked me out. I think she could use a supportive friend right now.”

“Yeah, all right,” he says with a sigh. I wonder if he ever gets sick of babysitting her all the time. Maybe he’ll help me convince her rehab’s a good thing. I know she doesn’t want to admit she’s got a problem, but when your whole career blows up in your face, it’s kind of hard to deny it anymore.

Besides, admitting you have a problem is the first step. The first step is normally the hardest. I still have hope for Tori. As much as I know she’s bad for me, as much as I know she threatens everything I’ve worked for, somehow, I still think she’s worth it. I still think that she deserves better than what the world’s given her and I want to be the one to right those wrongs.

I know it’s foolish, and I know I’m probably asking for trouble, but I have to hope for the best. I care about her too damn much to do anything else.

With Tori giving me the cold shoulder and the competition over, I don’t really have anything to do. I know Ian’s busy with Chelsea, and even though I’ve got a missed call from my mother, she’s the last person I want to talk to right now. She’ll only make things worse.

So I do something I haven’t done in ages. Something I wasn’t sure I’d ever do again. I call Luke.

“Sergeant Pepper!” he answers brightly. I look outside and frown.

“What’re you so chipper about at this hour of the day?” It can’t be earlier than noon, and Luke still lives the lifestyle we gave up — or I thought he did — with late nights and sleeping ‘til the afternoon.

He’s breathing a little heavily and my frown deepens. “Dude, are you jerking it right now?”

“No, dipshit, I’m running,” he says.

“Running from what? Cops?”

“No. Just running.”

“Like… for fun? Since when do you do that?”

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me these days, man. Why don’t you head down to Santa Monica and join me?”

“Running?” I ask, still confused.

“Yes, moving your legs quickly for propulsion. Is this really such a foreign concept to you?” He’s not breathing as hard now, and by the sounds and voices around him he’s stopped on a busy part of the boardwalk or beach.

“I just don’t know who the hell you are, apparently.”

“Well, let’s go for a run and catch up!”

I really don’t have anything better to do, and I really don’t want to sit in my apartment feeling sorry for myself. “What the hell. Let’s run.”

“I’ll see you in half an hour?”

“Give me some time to get changed… What do you wear running?”

“Nothin’ but my birthday suit,” he says and I can hear the grin on the other end of the phone.

“Guess public indecency laws don’t apply when they need a microscope to see your dick,” I joke.

“Bullshit, they just can’t even think to ticket me when faced with the magnificence of my glorious cock.” He coughs and then his voice is lower. “I’m getting dirty looks from some grannies in spandex now. I’ll catch you later, bro.”

“See you,” I say, a little lost from that conversation I just had. Luke’s always been kind of strange, but I guess I can’t say for sure that I’ve ever seen him sober. Maybe this is what he’s really like without a gallon of Jack in him.

I don’t know why I believed this asshole. There’s nothing good about running. And there’s no ‘catching up’ when I can’t even talk because I’m trying to catch my breath. I might be in better shape to do this if I wasn’t running on zero sleep and a night of intense stress, but as it is, I’m in no shape to be running up and down the beach.

Luke on the other hand is in great shape, running circles around me.

“Used to be,” I say, stopping to chug water from my bottle, lungs burning almost as much as the bright California sun, “Sunday morning you’d be hungover as fuck.”

Luke grins. “Gotta sweat it out. You guys did all that dumbass rehab shit, I just made a rule with myself: no drinking when the sun’s up. Works great.”

“What happens when you’re still going as the sun’s coming up?”

“I stop,” he says.

“See, that was the trick I never learned.”

He grins, his fingers pressed to the side of his neck as he jogs in place. “Come on, gotta keep that heart rate up!”

I’m pretty sure he’s trying to kill me.

I don’t know how many miles we’ve run when he finally stops at a juice shack shaded by a big umbrella.

“Two Greenies please,” he says. The girl dips behind the counter and a blender whirs. I make a face at Luke, but he’s still got that same shit-eating grin plastered on his face. “This juice is so good. Really helps clean out all that shit from the night before. Rehydrates, replenishes, everything.”

“Who are you, seriously?” I ask, eying the weird green drink he hands me. I’m not from Southern California like Luke. This is where he’s always lived. Maybe he’s just more into all this new age shit than I thought. But hey, if it works for him.

“What, have you forgotten my name already, old man? Been too long since you’ve been in the next hotel room hearing my name screamed through the walls.”

I roll my eyes at him. “Thankfully, I’ve done enough drugs to mostly erase those memories.”

He chuckles and chugs his juice.

I take a small drink of mine and make a face. “The fuck is this?”

“Parsley, spinach, kale, celery, cucumber, lemon, and apple. Really good for flushing out toxins.”

“You want another?” I say, offering him mine.

“I’d rather know why you called me.”

“I can’t just want to catch up with my old bandmate?”

“Did you?”

I sigh, drinking more of the green juice to stall. The stuff’s actually not that bad. Just takes some getting used to.

“I didn’t want to go home. I’m just… I’m going through some shit and don’t really trust myself right now.”

“So you called me?” he asks, incredulous.

“Crazy idea, right?”

“This about that girl?”

“What girl?”

“The hot redhead you’re playing with these days.”

My grip on the cup tightens, jealousy spiking up in me, but I shove it down, swallowing it with the juice I squeezed up through the straw. I know he didn’t mean anything by it.

“I guess she’s got something to do with it, yeah.”

He clucks his tongue and shakes his head. “How many times did you fuck her?”

“What? I don’t know. A few?”

Luke takes a deep breath and looks up to the sky like he’s saying a prayer. “More than twice?”

“Why does it matter?”

“This is serious, bro. Did you fuck her more than twice?”

Luke’s gotten loud enough at this point that the girl behind the juice shack counter drops the blinds, slinking away behind the counter with her lip curled. He doesn’t seem to notice that anyone’s bothered.

“Calm down, dude. Yeah. Why?”

“Fuuuuuuuuck. You can’t do that man.”

Oh boy. This is gonna be good. “Why not?”

“Come on, don’t you know the rules?”

“What rules?” I’ve got no idea what he’s talking about, but he’s pacing now, his juice gone, the cup crumpled and tossed in the recycling bin. He’s scratching at his jaw, in need of a shave, looking totally panicked.

“The rules that say if you fuck a girl more than two times, she ends up fucking you. I thought you were smarter than that.” He throws his hands up in the air and grunts to the sky on my behalf. I shrug.

“Guess not.”

“Well, what’d she do to you?”

“It’s not really that simple,” I say. Tori definitely made some mistakes, but it’s not all her fault and I’m not blaming her for it all.

“Okay. What’d you do to her?”

“It’s not like that Luke.” He narrows his eyes at me, brow furrowed. Clearly, he thinks I’m full of shit.

“So what’s it like?”

“It’s… complicated,” I say, repeating the same excuse I used with Kamala. It’s not a lie, but it is a crutch, and it’s keeping me from thinking about the full magnitude of everything that’s happened between Tori and me. It’s keeping me from really thinking about anything too hard or from having to face how much I’m hurting right now knowing she hates me, knowing she needs help, and knowing she’s not going to take it. Being on the other side is a bitch, and I could probably be handling it better.

“Dude. Girls are complicated. Fuck ’em.”

“But only twice,” I say.

He doesn’t get the sarcasm and sends me finger guns. “You got it, amigo.”

“Thanks for the pep talk, but I haven’t slept yet so…”

“Thanks for running with me, man, we should do it again sometime.”

“May—” Before I even manage to say a whole word, he’s turning away from me, running down the sandy beach, stripping. And it’s not an empty beach. People are having to dodge him left and right as he goes charging into the water stark fucking naked.

I just turn and walk away like I’ve never seen the man before in my life. I need to go home, get some sleep and figure out what the fuck I’m doing next.