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Travis wakes up thinking he's back home. It takes a second to get acclimated. He's not sure what time it is exactly, but the room is bright and his back and shoulders are cramped up; he's probably been lying down too long.
Gabe is wrapped around him, fingers slack in Travis' hand. His breathing is thick and the veins show blue under his eyelids. He lies in a tangle of skinny limbs, looking peaceful, and Travis doesn't want to wake him but his whole side has gone numb.
Gabe makes a fretful questioning noise when Travis rolls to the edge of the bed. He opens a bleary eye and blinks.
"Hey. It's just me," Travis says. It seems to be the right answer, because Gabe mumbles something and burrows back into the covers. It takes a second for his breathing to even. Travis struggles out of bed and baby-steps it towards the bedroom door, trying to get back the circulation in his leg. He shuts the door quietly after him.
He hates waking up. It doesn't matter what time it is, he always wakes up feeling lousy and brain-damaged. He's not going to be able to do anything of substance for a while. He grabs a hit off his inhaler and goes into the kitchen when his lungs open back up. He doesn't want to deal with heating up anything, so he chugs some cranberry juice out of the carton and his head feels less foggy.
He's just lucid enough to start thinking about what the hell he's going to do about Gabe.
He takes his juice out into the living room. He checks that the door to the bedroom is still closed, because Gabe needs to sleep and he needs to think. He drops into a chair and rubs the gunk out of his eyes.
He waited too long, and he knows it. What he should have done last night, if he'd just kept calm and thought rationally, was let things calm down, wrapped Gabe in a coat and carried him off to St. Luke's. He should have taken him somewhere safe, delivered him into the waiting arms of people with medical degrees who knew what they were doing. But he hadn't. He wants to blame it on last night being too chaotic, but he knows better than that.
The problem is that too much time's passed between now and then, and he doesn't know if Gabe's going to get up and say, "Ha ha, just kidding!" and leave them right back where they started. He's got to be in Miami for recording soon, and he doesn't know if he can convince Gabe to give the booze and pills and whatever the hell else he's been dumping into his body a break all over again.
If he could he'd take Gabe to Miami with him, at least until Gabe's more together; he knows all the shit that goes on when no one else is around. He doesn't think he's got the stamina to deal with a detoxing Gabe Saporta on his own, though. He has a feeling he'd cave in and grind up some Percocet in Gabe's food just to get some peace or, worst case scenario, wind up whacked out on pills his own damn self. Neither of those seem like they'd be particularly helpful.
He remembers meeting someone at the reception for the exhibition, when Pete was whirling Ash around the gallery. He thinks she was a plus one, a date of one of Ash's friends, but he's not sure. Somehow they'd gotten into a discussion about getting clean, and he'd given her the whole story about lying in bed sick and shaking, waiting for everything to bleed out of him. She'd told him she lucked out, mentioned the name of some place in Miami (Zirconia House? Zanzibar Manor? Something with a Z), where she'd been dosed with methadone or some shit every few hours until she was ready to face the world.
When he actually moved to Miami, he heard the name of the place again, some producer he met raving about how easy it all was, and Travis had thought, Damn, maybe I should've looked into that.
Zephyr Place. That was it. Maybe he should look that up. He goes for the iPhone.
He manages to get onto the website and saves the phone number. The website is full of pictures of bright bedrooms, shots of the ocean, big-ass television sets. He has a feeling he's doing this all ass-backwards.
He texts Pete, still at Gabe's. No clue what I'm doin.
He's not sure if Pete's even awake. He doesn't remember the last time they were both up in daylight hours. He misjudged Pete's commitment to his insomnia, because within two minutes, he gets the message, you okay there?
I don't know.
how's gabe?
Sleeping. Rough night.
ned help?
Travis thinks about saying that the whole distance issue kind of negates any help Pete could offer. I'm gonna fly blind for a while.
let me know when to send in the cavalry. his names dave.
Travis wonders if Dave actually exists or if that's just Pete-speak for 'I will strap my wife and son around my waist and walk to Manhattan if I have to.' He starts to ask, but then he hears the bedroom door opening and signs off with a hasty, Talk later.
Gabe looks groggy and hollow-eyed, hair sticking up. Travis says, "Morning, sunshine."
Gabe grunts and stumbles into the kitchen. The refrigerator opens and shuts. After a minute Gabe reappears, glass of ice in one hand, bottle of Grey Goose in the other, and says, "Right, so are we doing this fucking thing or what? I'd like to know just when the fuck to get into detox mode."
Travis offers a silent thank you to God, Buddha, Yahweh. He says, not looking up from his phone, "Well, I thought we could look around –"
"Yo, this is what we can do," Gabe says. He comes into the living room and drops onto the couch, pouring vodka over the ice cubes. "I've got all this shit stored around here, I don't even know where half of it is. I'm gonna spend some time trying to dig it up and you can, I don't know, toss it or whatever."
"Yeah, and then what?"
"Then nothing. I'll lock myself in the bathroom for a couple of days. I did the same thing when I got back from Japan that one time. Then it's right back to responsibility."
"That doesn't sound good, Gabe."
"Fuck you, it's awesome. It's like one-stop shopping."
Gabe has a shark-sense about indecision, about any kind of weakness, and Travis wouldn't put it past him to use it to his advantage. Travis can't afford to be insecure now. He says, "Yeah, how long has it been since Japan?"
"It can't be that long." Gabe swigs at his glass. "I've fuckin' done this a million times, Travie."
"Yeah, when Bianca was here," Travis says, fully aware that he's probably dumping salt in the wound, but he can't do anything about that now. "I don't want you to be alone now, you know?"
"Pfft," Gabe says. He pours another drink. "I'm sure the band'll love it when you say you need time off to babysit me. Hey, maybe they'll all come up here, you can fuckin' record in the kitchen."
"Quit being an asshole," Travis says. "Maybe we can work something else out, we'll get you somewhere safe for a while –"
"Fuck rehab," Gabe says. "Fuck you, I'm not fuckin' doing that."
"When did I say rehab?"
"You were thinking it. I'm not going to pay for the privilege of rehashing shit that was over when I was fifteen years old."
"Gabe –"
"The past is dead," Gabe says. "It's dead. I killed it."
He's winding up for another recital of his Oprah's Book Club-inspired rant on living for today and the past is what makes us die, and Travis doesn't have the time for it. He says, "Okay, but you really want to spend a week puking and shitting yourself on your own? Doesn't sound like a lot of laughs."
"Yeah, whatever."
"Come down to Miami with me," Travis says. "Use up some frequent flyer miles. I know this place –"
"No rehab."
"It's not rehab. It's just detox. They give you a fuckin' benzo cocktail or some shit every couple hours so you don't go into seizures and kill yourself. It's way easier than locking yourself in the bathroom and hoping for the best."
"I've done this before," Gabe says. He's huddled up on the couch, twisting the glass in his hands. "I've done this –"
"Yeah," Travis says. "I don't really think it's been working that good."
"It's going to be fucking expensive," Gabe says. "How am I going –"
"You paid out of pocket for throat surgery," Travis says. "Think of this as another thing to put on the Amex."
"I paid for throat surgery when I had a job," Gabe says. "What am I supposed to do now, sell my fucking blood?"
"We'll pass the hat."
"You fucking suck," Gabe says. Travis takes it as a sign that he's running out of excuses. "You suck."
"Think of it as a vacation," Travis says. "Maybe you could spend a couple days at my place afterwards. Lie in the sun and get your head together."
"Yeah, while you're recording. That's a great plan."
"Hey, otherwise it's just me and Stitch. He's bored with me already."
"Yeah, well, what if they don't have a bed for me? You think about that, smart guy?"
"Then we'll think of something else. Can't hurt to call, though."
Gabe looks at his fingernails. He pushes his glass aside and takes a swig from the bottle. "I don't want to tell my dad."
"Gabe."
"Look, I just don't want to tell my dad, okay?"
"Then say you're going out of town for a while."
"Asshole," Gabe says. "You have no idea, you motherfucker –"
Travis sits and lets Gabe spit bile at him for a while. The thing with Gabe is that he always runs out of steam sooner or later, and it's sort of hard to take it personally when Gabe's hunched up in the corner of the couch, all eyes and shaking hands. Finally Gabe's shoulders slump and he says, "You call them, okay? And then help me find my fuckin' percs, I don't want to remember where they are a week from now and feel like an asshole."
Travis calls Zephyr Place while Gabe, Grey Goose in hand, rifles through the apartment looking for pill bottles. Travis has a moment of panic just before the operator picks up, thinking they went about this all wrong, he's going to have to start all over, but then he gets on the line with a guy with a faint Minnesota accent who says that they can reserve a place, at least until Gabe gets assessed by the staff doctor. Travis says thanks and hangs up.
Now the only thing to do is get Gabe there.
Gabe seems to have found the pill stash; he stands over his bedside table, poking at the vials. Travis says, "It's all set."
"This is fuckin' thousands of dollars down the fuckin' shitter," Gabe says, still jabbing at the vials. "I've been stockpiling this crap for years, goddamnit."
"It was all going into the shitter one way or another." The sight of the little plastic caps on the vials makes his fingers itch, but he bites the inside of his cheek and grabs them up before Gabe can stop him. "Pack a bag."
"What the fuck, I've got no time to get ready."
"They're not going to hold that space forever. Just fuckin' pack."
"Don't throw out the Klonopin. Hey, hang onto the Xanax, too. Just for kicks."
"You're bargaining for which pills to keep?"
"I might have a fuckin' panic attack on the plane, and I want you to fuckin' dose me up when I do." Gabe goes over to his dresser. "Where the fuck's my flask?"
Travis isn't sure whether he's going to smack his own head or Gabe's. "Have fun finding it." He goes to dump the pills.
Gabe keeps drinking throughout the cab ride to JFK, and by the time they get to the terminal Travis is picturing all the things that could happen, which range from Gabe informing the Starbucks barista of the exact length and girth of his cock to Gabe deciding he's had enough of this shit and bolting out into the city. He doesn't know how likely any of the options are.
Gabe sits staring at the floor, elbows on his knees. Travis says, "You need anything?"
"You're an asshole, I hope your fuckin' dick gets gangrene, and I'm not talking to you," Gabe says.
"Okay," Travis says. "Want a cinnamon roll?"
"Just sit with me."
"That works too."
He wants to put a hand on Gabe's shoulder, something, but Gabe's radiating don't touch me vibes, so he holds off. They're meant to board in an hour.
Gabe passes out when the plane takes off, slumped over the armrest, his hand in Travis' lap. Travis checks that he's still breathing every so often but otherwise leaves him alone. He thinks about ordering a drink.
Gabe wakes up in Miami, somewhere between drunk and hungover, gray around the gills and shaky. Travis manages to get him off the plane and into the concourse, but before they hit the cab stand, Gabe says, "You still got my Xanax?"
The vial's been burning a hole in Travis' pocket for the last two hours. Gabe looks expectantly at him, swaying on his feet. Travis says, "You've been drinking since you got up today. You want to add Xanax on top of that?"
Gabe's eyes darken. "You know what, fuck this shit and fuck you. You can just do whatever the hell you want, I'm not having any part of it." He's already moving off, arm raising to shove Travis aside.
Travis grabs his arm. Gabe twists and struggles. Travis says, "Where the fuck do you think you're going to go?"
"Get off of me, you fat fuck."
"Don't pussy out on me," Travis says. "We got this far, didn't we?"
Gabe's arm feels like a twig under his fingers, brittle and sharp. Travis thinks, I can't lose someone else, not now, not you.
"Go fuck yourself," Gabe says, but goes limp. Travis sighs.
"Okay. Come on."
The cab driver barely looks at Travis when he gets into the back. Travis gives the address as Gabe jerks the other door open.
"Is he all right?" the driver asks, eyeing Gabe in the rear view mirror.
"I had some bad egg salad," Gabe says. He takes his sunglasses off. "If you've got a plastic bag up there, you better keep it handy."
The driver looks at Travis, having apparently decided that he's in charge. Travis stares back impassively. The driver gives up and starts the engine.
When Gabe says, "Hey, Travie?" he's half-expecting to have to go another round, so he turns his head warily. Gabe is sweating in the heat of the cab. "Yeah?" Travis says.
Gabe says, "I don't think I really want to go in there by myself."
"Dude," Travis says. "You think I'd just kick you out of the car and zoom off? Give me some credit."
"Just don't want to take any chances." Gabe sounds tired and small.
"I think we've got a while," Travis says. "Want to lie down for a sec? I'll wake you when we get there."
"Oh, that'll work," Gabe says, but he curls up awkwardly across the vinyl, his head on Travis' thigh. The cab driver gives them the hairy eyeball; Travis stares at him over Gabe's head until he looks away. Travis smoothes the sweaty hair away from Gabe's forehead.
Zephyr Place looks like some rich guy's ranch house, set far back in a mass of tamarind trees. Travis tells the driver to keep the meter running and shakes Gabe's shoulder gently. "Hey. Show time."
"Great," Gabe mumbles, but shoves himself out of Travis' lap. "Where's my shit at?"
"Walk of fuckin' shame," Gabe says when they're approaching the door.
"Dude, where's the shame? There's no fuckin' shame."
Gabe shrugs. "It'll look better if I walk in by myself, huh?"
"You don't have to. I've got no plans."
"I think I should."
He knows the determined set of Gabe's mouth when he sees it. He puts a hand on the back of Gabe's neck and presses his forehead against his for a minute. "Call me when you get settled. I'll make the guest room up fancy for you."
"Yeah," Gabe says. He pushes Travis away shakily. "Yeah, fine, whatever." He turns and walks in the door without looking back.
When Travis finally gets home, Stitch greets him at the door, stumpy tail wagging, like Travis just went out for milk. There's a note and a bill from the dog-walker by the door. Travis picks Stitch up, buries his face in just-washed fur. Stitch allows it, happy with simple things, quiet and uncomplicated.
Then Travis puts him down and goes to see if he has any beer left over from the last time he was home, because God knows he needs it.
*****
It's a relief to get into the studio and have whatever shit he's been worrying about shoved aside in favor of worrying about getting the vocals right or if his rhymes are cutting it. The real relief is that he only has to worry about himself.
He mentions inviting Gabe to stay to Matt, and he almost lets him know what's been going on when Matt grins and asks if this means that Gabe and he are going to be non-stop partying while they try to get this record together. Then he checks himself. This is the sort of thing that's not his place to say, even if it's just to Matt. So he just shrugs and says that he's not in the partying mood.
Pete calls as he's getting back from walking Stitch and thinking about whether he wants to go out tonight. They bullshit a little about the album and Pete makes him promise to send up rough mixes when he has them.
Pete says, "So I talked to Gabe."
"Yeah?" Travis says. He's been steadfastly trying to ignore the thought of Gabe, due to some vague sense that just putting the vibes out would fuck everything to hell. "When?"
"Just a little while ago. He sounded okay."
"Good," Travis says. "He wasn't all that great when I last saw him."
"No shit," Pete says. "The place you found sounds like the goddamn Trilogy Spa. There are hydrotherapy pools."
"That's what I'm saying," Travis says. "I should've done that when I was sorting myself out. I'm jealous. He was bitching because he thought it'd be too expensive."
"Sounds like Gabe," Pete says. "How intense was the bitching on a scale of one to ten?"
"I don't have any fucking clue."
"So it was just basic Gabe-bitching. You still planning to shack up with him when this is over?"
"For a while. Just until he gets his head together. You think that's like a super shitty idea?"
Pete's quiet for a minute. "He's not going to tell you this, and he will rip my balls off if he finds out I said this, so keep it kind of close. He really needs someone around right now, Trav."
*****
He finds a missed call from some private number when he comes out of the recording booth. At first he thinks that someone's sneaked past the no-call list, but then he checks his voicemail when he gets home and finds Gabe's message. It's just a quick, "Yo, it's me, hit me back," and a phone number.
The switchboard operator at Zephyr Place puts him through to Gabe's floor, where the technician on duty goes to fetch him. When he comes on, Gabe's "Hey," is crisp and businesslike, and Travis felt the sick knot at the pit of his stomach ease up. He says, "Hey. I thought you were a telemarketer."
"Travie?"
"None other."
"Travie," Gabe says, and he can hear the smile. "You thought I was a telemarketer for real?"
"The number didn't come up. I only figured it out when I checked voicemail."
"I guess they don't want the name getting out. Don't know why. Listen, they took my phone away when they checked me in. Wanted to keep me away from the company I'd been keeping or some shit. I felt like I'd lost a limb."
"Got caught up in bureaucracy, huh?"
"You know it."
"How're you feeling otherwise?"
"Okay, I think. Yo –" Gabe starts laughing. "Yo, when they did, like, the initial assessment? I don't know, I guess I either forgot about or kind of soft-pedaled all the shit I'd been doing, so the shit they gave me so I wouldn't get sick was all wacky. Took a little while to get the levels right. I was like, lying in bed sweating, going, 'Help, help…'"
"Dude," Travis says, horrified.
"They say it happens all the time, right, Drenda? Drenda's on babysitting duty this afternoon." Travis hears a soft southern voice saying, "That's right." Gabe says, "So I was lying there going, 'Help, help…' and along the corridors outside I could hear all these other poor sons of bitches going, 'Help, help…' right along with me. It was like a communion."
"Dude."
"But I'm feeling better now. I really am. I'm like the most popular one here now, right, Drenda? She's ignoring me now."
"Sounds like she's got the right idea."
"Fuck you. I talked to Pete a little while ago, I told him the place is like a goddamn spa. Hydrotherapy pools and acupuncture and everything. The only difference is the round-the-clock AA meetings."
"So it's okay?"
"It's a lot nicer than my place. There's this guy who always gets stuck with the night shift, Jimmy, and I go out and pick his brain when I can't sleep. I get war stories every night. Junkies never shut up."
"They know you're a celebrity yet?"
"Pfft. There's one girl here who was Miss Teen Hay Bale of '06 or something. I can't compare to that."
"At least your ego's okay. You'll hit the ground running when this is over."
"Of course," Gabe says. He doesn't say anything for a minute. "Hey, Travie, you still feel up to letting me stay at your place when I get out? Because if you're not I'm totally good with just going home, I've got stuff I should take care of anyway."
"Hey, I offered, right?"
"Look, I know I said a lot of awful shit to you before. I was feeling pretty crazy. I wouldn't blame you for being pissed at me."
"You weren't really making a lot of sense," Travis says. "Kind of hard to get mad about that."
"So did I really call you a fat fuck?"
"Yeah," Travis says. "I've got maybe a pound and a half on your skinny ass. I don't know why you thought that one would work."
"I don't either. I really am sorry, Travie. I wasn't trying to be an asshole, I swear."
"Something else was talking for you," Travis says. "The room's not going anywhere."
Gabe lets his breath out. "Thank you."
"Let me know when you're getting out. I'm recording and shit, but that usually doesn't start until five. I'll pick you up."
"They'll probably kick my ass out at ten in the morning, I know it," Gabe says. "What? C'mon, two more minutes. It hasn't been that long."
"She giving you the time's up sign?"
"She's looking at me like she wants to rip my face off." The soft southern voice says, "Gabriel," in the background.
"I'll let you go. Call me when you can."
"Okay," Gabe says. "Okay, yeah." He hangs up.
*****
In some twisted way, it's the first chance he's had to be hospitable in the new place. He makes up the spare room, piles up the Xbox games in an easily accessible stack, stocks the fridge with Red Bull and water and Amy's Kitchen frozen food. He figures better safe than sorry and pours out whatever booze he can find.
He hires a car to go pick up Gabe. When he gets to Zephyr Place, Gabe is sitting out front on his suitcase, fiddling with his Sidekick. He looks pale and worn but clear-eyed, and Travis gets out and promptly grabs him in a bear hug. Gabe leans into it, kissing Travis' cheek before he remembers that he's a tough guy and pulls away. Travis keeps a hand on the back of his neck.
"How're you feeling?"
"Okay. A little…" Gabe wags his fingers back and forth.
"Tired and achy?"
"Yeah, that."
"I remember that," Travis says. "We'll go back to the house and you can lie around to your heart's content."
"I've got a lot of fuckin' texting to catch up on," Gabe says. "They finally gave me back my phone. I almost started blubbering, I was so damn happy. Baby needs his bottle."
"Did you hug it and kiss it and tell it you'd never leave again?"
"Of course."
Travis puts the suitcase in the car. When they're actually on the road, Gabe glances at the driver and says, "How's recording?"
"Pretty good. I can just walk over to the studio when I feel like it. They've set up a bed for me in the corner."
"You think Pain'll come in and do a track with you guys?"
"We've talked about it. I don't know, I'm not sure I want to cross the streams. Like, Pain was there when I was doing my own thing, I don't know if it'll fuck things up for the band."
"Yeah," Gabe says. "You don't want to fuck up your band."
Travis puts hot water on while Gabe stows his stuff in the guest room. It's been kind of a damp gray morning that seems to call for tea, despite the heat. He'll put the fan on later. Stitch wanders in and looks curiously at him.
"I had this idea," Gabe says behind him. "Hey, can I have some of that?"
"What do you think?" Travis says, and takes two mugs down. "What idea?"
"I had some time to think once I stopped freaking out. I don't think I'm supposed to just walk away from music right now," Gabe says. "Okay, maybe the band thing is passed, but…you know how many kids in bands get started today and wind up getting chewed alive by the beast? Plus everything's fuckin' digital now, it's not just about making a great album. Someone's got to be looking out for them."
"Looking out like –"
"Dude, name any shitty venue in any city and I've probably played it. Name every shithead promoter or label boss or club owner and I've probably had to deal with them. You think some twenty year old from Idaho has that experience?"
Travis isn't entirely sure what Gabe's getting at. It sometimes takes him a while to come to the point. "I don't think so," he says, along for the ride.
"I put in a call to Rob," Gabe says. "McLynn too, but I figure he's got his girl and stuff, and I'm not exactly his responsibility anymore so I don't think he'll be getting back to me anytime soon. I figured Rob and I could sit down when I get back to New York and I'd pick his brain about artist management and transitioning and shit."
"Dude," Travis says. "Dude, that's fuckin' great. You could run your own label and everything."
Gabe makes a face. "I don't want to go that way, man. Can you picture me being the boss? I think I'd be a pretty awesome manager, though. Pass on some of my wisdom and let them know what kind of shit they'll have to go through. Plus I'm probably better at taking shit than they are."
"Gabe, I'm so fuckin' happy," Travis says. "You can't just turn your back on music, you know? It's like a part of you."
"Thought I'd give Suarez or Ryland a call too," Gabe says, shrugging off the praise. "I don't think Ivy League's got anyone on their side right now. Ryland's burning CDs off his computer or some shit. Plus it couldn't hurt to just say how you doing. They both tried to call me like five hundred times but I always put them straight to voicemail. Hopefully they'll still take the call. I was kind of an asshole."
"You were wasted," Travis points out.
"Yeah, but I was wasted for like the last two years of the band and I still managed to chat with them. I don't know. I just want to know how bad the damage is."
Travis hands him a mug. He figures he might as well get the question over with. "So you've been thinking about what's next. You thought about where you're going to go after this?"
Gabe sees it coming before he even gets there. "I'm not going anywhere except back to my apartment. I don't have a lot of time to waste."
"Waste, like how?"
"Time to waste talking about how my mommy didn't love me," Gabe said. "I figure I've got to deal with this on my own."
"So you think you'll keep on with this?"
"I don't know. I mean, I can't exactly start up with the partying right now. This is the kind of shit I need to be sober to deal with, not the kind of shit I need to be fucked up for. Who knows what'll happen after I sort it out?"
*****
Travis staggers home from the studio at five in the morning, hoping to just fall into bed, but there's something about the chorus about the last song that's bothering him. He tosses and turns and sends Stitch jumping off the bed with an annoyed look (as much as dogs can look annoyed) and then gives up and opens up Pro Tools on his laptop.
He fucks around with a couple of things, fiddling with the tempo and adding reverb for the hell of it, but it's still not getting near the sound in his head. He rubs his hands over his face and irritably flings his headphones off.
Someone knocks on the door.
"Yeah," Travis says.
Gabe pokes his head around the frame. "Hey."
"Hey. Did I wake you up? I had the headphones on."
"Haven't gone to sleep," Gabe says. His laptop is tucked under his arm; he taps absently against it with his nails. "It sounds like the bugs are having a fuckin' disco outside the window. I thought you'd be asleep."
"This fuckin' thing won't sound right," Travis says, knowing he sounds a little pathetic.
"You busy? I can just go fuck around on Xbox until I pass out if you're trying to fix it."
"No, come in. Maybe having an audience will make it work. Just don't expect me to get chatty."
"Okay," Gabe says. He folds himself onto Travis' bed and opens the laptop. "Let me know if you need help."
"What are you doing anyhow?"
"Budgeting," Gabe says. "If I'm actually going to try to do this career change shit I need to know how much I'm going to have invest in getting started. I think I can maybe swing it. Check this spreadsheet out."
"You know if I look at that I'm not going to understand a damn thing."
"Hey, we can't all be awesome," Gabe says. Travis rolls his eyes and goes back to the song.
Somehow having Gabe quietly working away behind him feels reassuring in a weird way. It's a chance to get out of his own head for a minute and stop obsessing. Travis puts the headphones back on and resumes fucking around, but he's still not getting it. He should probably go talk to Disashi tomorrow and see if he can work some magic on this. Disashi can fix anything.
Figuring he's about done, he takes the headphones off and turns around. Gabe is asleep against his headboard, laptop still propped open on his legs and his hands on the keys. His head is lolling back and his mouth is hanging open.
Travis can't resist. He whips out the iPhone and snaps a shot very quickly and then logs onto Twitpic to upload before Gabe can wake up and kick his ass. The picture is a little blurry but recognizable enough — Travismtv @GabrielSaporta hard at work – "everyone's asleep when we play…" stressed Miami morning http://twitpic.com/jrty7.
"You son of a bitch," Gabe says when he sees the picture, but then he logs on to his account and retweets it.
*****
Gabe makes this sort of mushroom-tomato chili thing in Travis' crockpot. Travis comes home to the house smelling like cumin and chopped cilantro and Gabe playing Halo while Stitch sniffs around him.
"Dude, you hate cooking," Travis says.
"More than ever," Gabe says, busily shooting somebody's face off. "Nah. I really just threw everything in the crock pot. I was getting sick of fuckin' microwave tofu scramble. You want a bowl? Grab something. I'm busy killing this dude."
"Will eating it kill me, is what I'm asking."
"Hey, I can only cook one thing, but I'm awesome at it."
"Okay," Travis says. "Any reason you wanted to –"
"Because I talked to the munchkin and it made me want to chop up something," Gabe says. "I figured onions and tomatoes were the safest bet."
"Oh," Travis says. Gabe stares at the screen fixedly. "You want a bowl too?"
"Yeah," Gabe says. "Give me a minute."
Gabe says in the kitchen, "I had to tell her. What happened. She deserves to know."
"What'd she say?"
"She got upset. Wanted to take time off work and come down here. I said I'd be fine."
"That's good," Travis says. "She –"
"I wasn't all that good for her in general," Gabe says. "I don't want to start up where we left off and fuck up all over again. Not now. I said we'd talk later. When I have a handle on things."
"Talking's good," Travis says. He and Katy had spent days just talking the last time they tried to make it work again, the both of them pacing the room and chainsmoking. In the end it was just too easy for them to stop talking and start arguing.
"Elisa was a mistake," Gabe says. "I would have never have gotten myself into that if I'd been thinking right. Here's this bangin' girl, right, telling me how she loves my band and she's a musician too and all this shit, and I thought I could handle it."
"Mm," Travis says noncommittally. His major memory of Elisa is of her dragging this empty-eyed freak onto the bus and giggling while the kid talked about dry pale bones and how Travis should carve his name into someone's flesh as a monument. He never wanted to be in the same room with Elisa again.
"She called Bianca, you know," Gabe says. "Left her messages about how we used to fuck. And then when the shit happened with Victoria, you know –" He shrugs. "I thought we were just having fun. Killing tour boredom. Her boyfriend still wants to chop my nuts off."
"Just couldn't stop yourself, huh?" Travis says. Gabe gives him a look, checking if he's judging, but Gabe should know he's the last person who should judge about this kind of thing. It seems to take a second for Gabe to realize that.
"I don't know, Travie," Gabe says. "I got a lot of second chances when I didn't deserve them. I had this thought that it was going to end anyway, so it didn't really matter how much I fucked up. I thought she knew that. No, she knew it, she just didn't believe it, I guess."
"Gabe –" He's not sure what he's going to say.
"I don't know. Who knows," Gabe says. He looks at the table. "Travie, I don't know how much longer I can just keep fucking up."
*****
He doesn't want to leave Gabe by himself, so he makes him come watch eighties action movies in his room. Gabe spends most of Big Trouble in Little China staring off into space. Finally he says, "This movie's ending sucks."
"They were looking for the opening to a sequel or some shit," Travis says. "Want to watch something else?"
Gabe shakes his head. "You know what one of the staff at that place told me?"
"What?"
"She was trying to talk me into going to rehab. I was like, 'I don't have any feelings to talk about, it's a waste of time,' and she was like, 'Yeah, because you've been on pills and booze for years and years, it makes it easy not to have feelings.'" Gabe looks at the TV. "You know what she meant, right?"
"Hell yeah," Travis says. "That was awesome, not having feelings. I fuckin' loved it."
"I don't know," Gabe says. "I guess she had a point. She told me that it would start coming back once I stopped shoving shit in my mouth. That it'd hit me like a Mack truck. I thought she was nuts."
"It always comes through the cracks, you know," Travis says.
"It didn't with me," Gabe says. "I've had that buffer since I was nineteen. No matter what I did, I knew it was going to be there. And then I got up a little while ago and I said, 'Oh yeah. It's not there anymore.'"
"It's something to get used to," Travis says. "It's going to be bad at first. You've got years of bottled shit to get to."
"This sucks," Gabe says.
"Yeah," Travis says quietly.
"You know, you don't need to do this," Gabe tells him. "I mean, it's really sweet of you to let me lie here and piss and moan but I can get through it. It was just I wasn't expecting to talk to Bianca right now and it brought shit up. I'm okay."
"I know you're okay, dumbass. I just don't want you to be sad by yourself."
"Dude, I'm not sad," Gabe says.
Travis looks at him. Gabe scrubs at his nose and says, "Well, I'm not."
"What are you then?"
"I just don't want you to think that you need to help me. I know you want to, but -"
"Dude, it doesn't work like that," Travis says. "I can only help you as much as you let me, you know?"
Gabe doesn't say anything. He puffs his cheeks out and exhales slowly. He looks at the TV again.
"Did that hit home?" Travis says quietly.
"Yeah," Gabe says. "Yeah, isn't that something."
Travis puts an arm around his shoulders. Gabe sighs and leans into him.
"I think we should watch Action Jackson next," Gabe says muffledly against his shirt.
"Good idea."
*****
It might just be from the white noise of the TV, but Gabe falls asleep before he does, head pressed somewhere under his chin. Travis would sort of like to keep the TV on himself but the sun's coming up and he always feels sort of like a bum to wake up with the lights on and the TV going. He reaches for the remote.
Gabe stirs when Travis moves. He opens an eye and says, "Travie?"
"Just turning the lights and shit off," Travis says.
"Did you go to sleep?"
"Not yet." Travis turns off the TV. "It might take a while. Staying up watching movies and shit. A brother needs sleep." He lies back down.
"Poor baby," Gabe says. He leans over and kisses Travis' forehead. "That better?"
"Mm," Travis says. Gabe touches his face. "Gabe -"
Gabe stops. His eyes are heavy-lidded and very dark. "Yeah?"
Travis doesn't know what to say. He doesn't know if he should say, If this is just out of gratitude you don't need to, or I don't know how to fix you by myself, or I don't want you to ever go away. He doesn't say any of that.
"It's all right, sweetheart," Gabe says and kisses him softly.
He holds onto Gabe in early morning light, and he can hear the bugs and birds chattering outside the house. Gabe's skin is soft and his bones are sharp. Afterwards, Gabe smoothes his hair and says, "C'mon, we'll go to sleep together."
*****
He wakes up with sun in his eyes. Stitch managed to find his way into the room. He's asleep on the bed by Travis' feet; Gabe is asleep on Travis' shoulder. Both of them are snoring.
Travis smiles and stretches his toes out.
Gabe stirs and looks up at him. "G'morning," he says. "You sticking around for a while?"
Travis puts an arm around him. "I think I was planning on it."