Chapter Text
Letting go is not the same as pushing someone else away
-Damien Rice
2001
“We flew all the way to fucking New York to see you, we took two weeks off of our own jobs for the last leg of your tour and all you can give me is ‘I can’t do this anymore’?”
“I really…I really don’t know what to say.”
“We’ve been with you for almost three fucking years, Trevor, we gave up everything for you so you’re going to have to do better than I don’t fucking know!”
Ray didn’t flinch as Rose’s voice screeched through the hotel suite, while Trevor reacted like she had actually slapped him. Given Rose’s hands shaking by her side, then grasping at her own curls, burying her face, then lashing out at nothing Trevor’s step back wasn’t uncalled for. Rose was fighting for her life, fighting for their relationship while their luggage remained unpacked by the door. He stood by the window, staring out at the incredible New York City skyline floating around them, thinking…
Shouldn’t it be raining? Isn’t that what happened during epic breakup scenes in movies? Cue the thunderstorm. Instead, it was a crystal-clear mild day; the clouds blinked back at him, teasing. No raindrops were going to afford them the luxury of hiding their tears today.
They had barely made it ten feet before Trevor saw them and absolutely broke down, blurting out that he couldn’t do this anymore. They were experts to the Trevor Wilson Mental Breakdown by now- after all the two had met him on the worst night of his life, spent a year trying to coach him out of an unimaginable trauma and helped him navigate the greed and coldness that was the reality of overnight fame. They’d loved him, more than Ray ever knew he could love someone other than Rose, and they thought Trevor loved them.
“I never asked you to give up everything for me!” Trevor cried. “I don’t want you to do that. This has gotten…this is so much, Rose, it’s too much and I’m so fucking alone when you guys aren’t here.”
“You literally have two people who love you more than life itself!”
Their…ex- is that what Trevor was now? (the word made Ray’s throat closed up in a way that made him unsure if he’d ever be able to breathe easily again)- squeezed his hands against his red-rimmed eyes. He was all cried out of tears already, lucky him.
“It physically hurts not being able to be there, not like Ray can be there for you!” Trevor trembled, running a shaking hand through his hair.
Don’t bring me into this, Ray thought bitterly.
But his voice didn’t seem to be working, not even for Rose’s sake. Rose was tough though: you didn’t come up playing the Hollywood club scene and bartending at those same clubs without knowing how to win a screaming match with some worthless piece of shit.
You’re not worthless Bobby, he corrected his own subconscious silently.
“I haven’t been able to sleep, and…I’m fucking depressed, Rose, is that what you want to hear?” Trevor snapped. “I’ve been miserable, and I don’t want to drag you two down with me anymore. You deserve to be happy and be with someone who can support you and the more I do all of this the more I know that I can’t do that like you deserve and it hurts.”
Ray blinked, the side of him that must protect Bobby at all costs tensed up.
It felt like a knife stabbed in his chest as he realized: that wasn’t going to be his job anymore. Trevor didn’t want his help, he was refusing it. He didn’t want 2am phone calls, playing catchup with everything that Ray found completely mundane and boring about his life but Trevor found beautiful. He didn’t want being held on the sofa as he broke down while Rose and Ray whispered endless murmurings of how amazing and worthy he was. The calls came less and less over the past few weeks, and they had given him benefit of the doubt that Trevor was simply swept up in his massive national tour. They were joining him for the last leg of it, a couple of weeks of shows along the east coast and the south including three blissful nights in New York.
Being broken up with the moment they walked through the door was…not what they were expected.
“If you’re depressed you get help, Trevor,” Rose pleaded. “Let us help you. You don’t push away the people who love and care about you- and for the fucking record, we offered to come along on this tour and you refused.”
Rose was right. It had been a brief conversation, but it had been an attempt, nonetheless. The idea of traveling the U.S. with Trevor Wilson was thrilling, though Ray was certain nothing would ever beat joining him on his first small-scale European tour. Paris, alone…
He bit his lip, trying to not think about it.
That wasn’t their life anymore.
They would fly back home to California with their tails between their legs, back to a life where absolutely no one knew they were anything more than best friends with Trevor Wilson. They would go back to being just Rose and Ray which, granted, there were worst things they could be, but it would always feel like there was something missing. This wasn’t where he thought their lives were going, and he never even got a say in it. Trevor was ending it for all of them.
“Because I know that’s not really what you want!” Trevor cried back to Rose.
“How do you even know what we want at this point? You’re not talking to us!” Rose exclaimed. “We’ve got to talk about these things! We love you, Trevor, we haven’t minded making sacrifices for you, and we’ve made a lot of sacrifices. Please…don’t just run away. Give us that much, at least.”
“I can’t,” Trevor whimpered.
“That’s because you’re a coward. Instead of dealing with your pain and letting people help you, you want to hurt those people instead, and I think you push people away to hurt yourself. You always find some kind of way to hurt yourself, Trevor, and I don’t get it because everybody else in the fucking world loves you!”
Trevor let out a cry as he swirled around, tugging at his hair like he might yank it all out right then and there.
“I don’t deserve their love!"
Ray didn’t have a clue what he deserved anymore. He was…well…in shock. He knew he should be fighting too, but his mind was numb. All he wanted to do was grab Rose and get them as far away from New York as possible.
But he knew Rose, and Rose was going to fight. Even if she was so angry it hurt, even if she didn’t want it anymore, she was going to fight.
"I need to let you go, it’s only fair," Trevor mumbled.
“Nothing about this is fair! You’ve let yourself think we don’t want you but we love you. You’ve got to let us talk to you. We just got here, we’re not going all the way back home without talking about this!”
His own instincts were normally to help, to empathize and just be there, however that looked like. But Trevor didn’t even want that, he didn’t want him.
Maybe someday, Ray would have the nerve to talk to Trevor and figure out where things went wrong. Maybe someday, he would have the nerve to ask if any part of him really loved them- but he was beginning to understand.
None of them had those answers today and, if Trevor did, deep down, Ray wasn’t ready to hear it. He tore from the hotel suite, not even sure if either Rose or Trevor noticed he had fled.
Ray Molina was a pro at sneaking out of fancy hotels. It was a skill acquired out of necessity, in the name of having a secret poly relationship with an international rockstar. At one time the sneaking around, the secrecy of it all, was intoxicating. It was nothing like he or Rose had ever known and set his heart pounding in a way he hadn't experienced before. Their relationship pushed the boundaries of romance and love as Ray had known it, in the best way possible- in a way that had tricked him into thinking life would never allow it to end.
But sometimes he forgot their history with Trevor began on a night that proved one thing: life wasn’t fair, at all.
He tore down the back staircase, flight after flight, shaking so hard he wasn’t sure how he didn’t fall until he did, collapsing halfway down, making himself sit on the landing with his back against the wall. Ray’s hands trembled violently as he brought them up to hide his face, to desperately muffle his tears because the worst part of this whole godawful thing was that nobody could know. They wouldn’t be able to go home and have drinks with friends and roast Trevor Wilson until the sun came up. They wouldn’t be able to toss all of his stuff, because they weren’t cruel and Trevor was living out of hotels on the other side of the country for the next few weeks.
The worst part was that Ray had no idea what to say to Rose because they truly hadn’t done anything, not intentionally. His chest hurt from the crying, his whole body was too hot and his head felt weird and fuzzy in a way that made him feel hungover without having a single drink. He felt completely empty and small in a world that worshipped Trevor Wilson. He felt stupid, he felt pathetic, he felt like he had dreamt up the past six years of his life and the past three years of their romantic relationship.
Of course, this was the only way this relationship could ever end. It’s exactly what Victoria would have said if they had ever been brave enough to tell her their best kept secret. It’s what all of Rose’s family would have said, what his family would have said if they bothered to care what was going on in his life in L.A. Well, that and about a hundred ways they were both going to hell for this.
Ray knew he had a good five minutes, tops, until Rose came looking for him. She would be cursing Trevor to the stars and back, trying to get them on the first flight home and spend the next months swearing at their ex and running over lists of all the ways this was absolutely not our fault, right Ray?
He had to be ready to agree with her.
Because already, guilt was sinking in and he didn’t know why. His subconscious mind already wanted to play how could we have seen this coming and how could we have fixed it but thankfully his body was too numb to play along. Ray knew that he had a soft spot for needing to protect and fix Bobby. Anything Ray could do for him, he would do in a heartbeat. He used to feel like he was fighting waves sometimes, trying to keep Bobby’s head above water until he inevitably became Trevor Wilson and tried to run from his past altogether, taking Rose and Ray with him. And Ray had given in, carrying the smallest hope that one day, they would be able to save him. They both truly believed their love for him would be enough.
But he hadn’t been able to save him.
As heartbroken as he was, what hurt the most in his fucked up head was that Trevor breaking up with them equated to one thing:
We failed him.
I've looked at life from both sides now
From win and lose and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all