Work Text:
1998
Beneath the blue, suspended above unassuming blurs paroling past each other and the lush of green burgeoning with new life in the midst of another new beginning, brought on by the palette of bold pinks and yellows practically sparkling across Los Angeles County with its usual fire, was the day in the midst of a sunny afternoon in the new year. Picturesque paintings of vivid images danced into view immediately, passing by in flashes as the amber sun began to rise a little higher each day. Spring hadn’t arrived just yet this January, but the warmth was announcing an early return with its typical California flare. The world here was a spinning circle of color, Brian almost felt sad to leave it all behind, even if it was just for a while.
Still, he’d come all this way, and while the heart of Los Angeles isn’t far from Culver City– absolutely not, it’s in the county– making his return on his own two feet felt heavy on his very bones, the weight of the quicksand climbing with wide arms over his ankles surely crushing him. He looked up at the array of windows plastered all over the towering building, spotted the dark curtains over a singular rectangle of glass, then twisted the doorknob once the buzz came from the intercom on the entry panel.
The interior was warmer than usual, greener yet even duller all the same as shadows melted like water spilling across loose paper over the dry walls. Standing before the door once time walked past him, the number over it jumbled its letters, spelling out different words he’d practiced saying on the way here. Tone, tunings and triads all figured out on the spot, that’s how improvising here worked.
But how it could be distorted and deconstructed could very well make every dissonance in his voice clear to the ears, altering every perception he’d practiced perfecting on the walk, during the drive and during the morning he’d thought to come check in.
Brian sucked in a breath, sharp as it hit his throat with a stinging. It was inaudible but the bile building up under the circuits was seeping through the barrier of sound, he was sure. A knock came from his own knuckles against the wood and there, when it opened within just a few seconds, with only a crack to let the daylight in, was Rivers.
Brian smiled at the man, who’d quickly looked away and simply let him in with an indifferent yet certainly subtly and simmeringly amused, “..You should just get yourself a key at this point,” as he turned his back to the latter and made a return to his bedroom.
Wretched veils of shadow clawed at the walls, drowning in darkness where not a single light switch had been flipped on, as the faint glow of light behind the curtains over the windows weakly strained its way into the room but with no success. Papers scattered on the cracks of the floorboards spelt out songs with no incorrigible meaning, incurable on the ground where they laid in their misery, unable to be saved even by the most careful hands.
The air was numb, plentiful with an emptiness so palpable in the mist colored by no such thing as sunlight but the barely visible yet lucent slivers of gold from the lightbulbs, perhaps the lamp on Rivers’ bedside table or the weary and withering dazzle of sun from behind the insulation. Static between every corner and crease hummed with no particular feeling, just a sad tune for no one to hear. At least now, Brian was here to hear it, even if Rivers wasn’t planning on letting him listen at all.
Rivers himself was cold, adorned in white long sleeves over one another and button ups that looked worn and strung out, he suited the chill of fall better than the flourishing of flowers outside; or that was the walls’ frigid temperature rubbing off on him. He slithered into his bed as Brian followed slowly, approaching the floor with consideration in each step. He smiled, laughing softly when he replied with an artless, “Aha, maybe– if you’re okay with that.”
It’d do both of them some good, and maybe eventually, it’d help pry him out of this isolation chamber of his. If Rivers wanted, Brian would.
He slipped under his blankets, where winter still remained on his skin, with frost still frozen on every inch of him. Shaggy was the word that came to mind the first time Brian had seen him since he’d locked himself away, either under the guise of finding creativity in liberating yet complicated processes or it was just as it looked, because getting out of bed had proven more difficult since Pinkerton. Everything with Matt and his departure in the last year had only made it worse.
Brian looked around cautiously, taking in the quiet mess of the place. His eyes slowly led him back to his lifeless figure, simply in and out of every sensation, somehow in the middle of life and death all at the same time.
In spite of the answer in front of him, he sat down, leaning on the pillow next to him and asked with a careful smile, “How’re you holding up?”
“Fine,” Rivers replied too quickly, on guard and distant. Short and elusive, as everything he’d say always was most times.
The unreliability etched into his narration always led to more conclusions than it’d expect to, at least when it was just them. When the answer was sure to draw a circle over and over until its infinity could eventually lead most people nowhere, it always pushed them into giving up when it came to Rivers, but of course, Brian was not most people. No, Rivers’ narrative was the easiest to gather an answer from, all it really took was to see him for more than what he would appear as on his mismatched exterior.
It was simple, almost like playing a game, and each time it happened, it allowed him to come back every time.
It was obvious this time though, with no silences or drawn out answers with supposedly nothing to gather anything from, things hadn’t been fine since they’d become three instead of four, Rivers hadn’t been fine since then.
His hair had grown over his eyes, straight and slick with grime. Prickly stubs on his chin had emerged, and the craters under his aimless gaze had darkened since the last time Brian had come over. Skin paler than his sickly plane of snow, with the scent of off brand detergent and unattended to sweat, Rivers was far from what his unreliable narrative would suggest.
Quietly, he muttered, “Have you found anyone?”
They’d all been trying, holding endless and lengthy auditions constantly, at a rate they’d hoped would’ve paid off by now but none had managed to appeal to them or rather, none had appealed to Rivers. Pat Finn suffered the same fate, probably one worse than the others; even so, they were trying their best.
“No, not yet,” Brian was careful to add with just a comfortable rest that only blinked between the phrases, providing at least some semblance of hope for their grim state, even if it wasn’t built on something much stable, “but Mikey Welsh called. ‘Says he wants to try out.”
Rivers looked up at him, meeting Brian’s gentle gaze, skeptical with his narrowed eyes as he registered the name he’d known in ‘97. He smiled down at him, as soft as it could be, still somewhere in the middle, hoping it was enough to let him know he still wanted this to work out. His nose turned back towards the ceiling, silent and captive to his own thoughts, Brian watched his gears shift in his vacant expression, lips not daring to move.
He didn’t say much in response, instead– with a haggard pause between the silence and his words– Rivers chose to ask, “..Have you heard from Matt?”
It was a complicated ordeal, both Brian and Pat had watched it all happen in front of them and while they did intervene every now and then, the issues had remained between Rivers and Matt most of all. The Rentals was kicking off with an energy Weezer didn’t have anymore, one that Rivers didn’t have anymore, not after the backlash from Pinkerton. Distant they’d grown, Matt surely the most, and while he said he’d been fired, Rivers said he simply left; though in this case, Brian couldn’t tell which was it.
Even so, the ending was the same either way. Matt hadn’t called, no one expected him to and it was for certain that he wouldn’t anyway but instead of admitting that, Brian replied with another hopeful, “No, not anything yet.”
They’d fall into quiet eventually every time, it happened sporadically, spontaneous and as unexpected as Rivers was in general, a sort of routine that felt scattered throughout the day, all compressed into a minute then stretched out into a day. It wasn’t tense, instead it was something layered with unspoken harmonies, lyrics they’d rather put onto pages than on their tongues. Tense wasn’t it. Congested? Sure.
All around them were sheets of paper, some ripped at the edges while others remained perfectly neat, some with wildfire disguised as handwriting while a few of them were put together with well behaved letters. Some laid messily on the corner of the bed, and instinctively, Brian slowly reached over and took one in his hand, careful not to bend a single wrinkle into the page.
Lively people, likely happy with themselves, all walked along sidewalks, basking under the cherry sun, with soda splintering out of metal cans as average people lounged around, living in the sunny fall with an orange glow. All outside, where the world was kept far, away from the hollow quarters of a man tired of his own melodies.
But his prose betrayed his own beliefs, set upon the page was something good, but every statue carved by the man bore an ugliness back at him, one that only he saw.
Titled with a somber tone, 1,000 years, adorned with bittersweet lines and hopeless questions, it laid dressed on the page with a doleful melody, “You’ve played this one, right?” Brian asked as he read it over.
Rivers briefly glanced at the page, craning his neck just to get a look at it, and affirmed sluggishly, “..Yeah, with Mikey– in Boston.”
“It’s good. I like it,” he smiled, watching the lyrics paint a picture in his mind, building up sketches of starry skies and polished works of water crashing upon empty shores.
He blinked blankly, “..Are you just saying that?”
“No, I mean it,” Brian turned to look at him, with every edge and curve on his face softer than before, brushed over with a gentleness he’d always give to Rivers no matter how far or close they were from being vulnerable, “We could use it, make it.. Weezer-like.”
And while he wouldn’t say anything in response sometimes, merely opting to just look at him with eyes that said more than they meant to in the moment or purse his lips and swallow his tongue, the inconstruable awe on his face would be more than enough when Brian was there for him. So, once more, Rivers kept the lines to himself but gazed towards the latter with a fragility always welcomed by the man by his side.
He set the paper back down by his lap, as Rivers turned to stare at the ceiling once again with squeezed eyes now glued shut. Lying there in his handmade coffin he had no use getting out of, simply disintegrating into the fabrics of the Earth until it took him inside and left him as bones for anyone to collect if they bothered to check on him. While he didn’t look like it was affecting him, the gradual humidity in the air was starting to curdle in the small unit, and still Rivers was wearing bundles of clothing, all wrapped up in his own head in the meantime.
An itch began to pull at his hand, sinking in through his skin to grab onto him but even when Brian denied the urge, he still found his fingers merely inches away from the top of Rivers’ head, yet universes away from caressing the damp and brittle streaks of hair.
Heat radiating off of him pooled slowly onto his hand, now flush against his skin that was just barely touching Rivers, on the cusp of saying more than what he meant to say on the way here but lightyears away from ever finding the words to speak.
His eyes scanned his now much calmer features, the slow rise and fall of his chest and the vanishing of the world around him as the man fell further into his daylit slumber. For the moment then, it came to him in the form of a million questions, all wondering the same thing, if Rivers ever felt better when Brian would come by every so often, even if it was in the sporadic manner it was in.
Surely, his answer was just one, right in front of him.
With a voice just barely above a whisper, Brian asked with a faint chuckle, “Aren’t you warm?”
Rivers’ eyes fluttered open, drifting back into reality with a quiet tightness on his lips, musing a response until he replied wearily with, “..Sweaty, yeah.”
“You could take a bath.”
“Do I smell that bad?” He glanced at the latter who was now sitting with his chin resting on his knuckles, looking back at him with a tenderness in his torpid gaze.
Brian smiled delicately, “No, just.. like sleep.”
His hand crept just barely closer to his head, just enough for the strands that stuck out at the top to spark and burn the aching surface of his skin, purling and igniting across each leaf of every molecule, and planting itself there with marks only Brian would see glow in spirals beneath the heavy blankets of the night.
Rivers furrowed his brows in questioning, “..How do you smell like sleep?”
“It’s like,” Brian paused, laughing faintly as his shivering fingers reached out and pressed the top of Rivers’ head, not enough to leave a stain of his prints on him but its presence was surely felt by the latter who quietly invited his touch, “..like when you have drool all over you.”
“Oh,” he whispered drowsily, drawing it out for the silence between them to simply fade out of existence.
Observing from a distance, whether it be inches away or miles they couldn’t count on their hands, at least from here, where they were sitting, Brian could see the ebb and flow on Rivers’ violent shores become something quieter, with a balmy streak of sun pouring out in dashes on his beach, dazed as the wind gave way to a peace surely temporary, but enough to last him another day. That was enough, Brian hoped, more than enough.
“..Would you like it if I started the bath?” He asked carefully, masking his hesitance, hoping to ease at least a shred of what tormented him every day.
The rush of cars and people outside took form in the shape of sound in the room, muffling their mismatched and synced breathing, hiding behind the painted walls and the covered windows. Rivers didn’t reply right away but just when the moment felt too much like glass, now on the verge of shattering into a thousand pieces, he solemnly nodded with a lethargic yes.
The crease underneath his eyes wrinkled some more as Brian smiled, stood up and made his way to the bathroom. Upon turning on the light, he quickly got to work.
He hadn’t noticed, not until now, but his breathing had become much shallower, now tighter around his chest yet loose around his throat. Gripping him by the neck and hand was the flickering smolder on his skin, embedding itself into his blood just by burrowing inside him. He took a deep breath, and felt it fall out of him as a shaky exhale.
Once he’d started the bath, checked the temperature and all, he appeared by the doorway, signaling to Rivers with a smile. The shorter man pulled himself up with barely any energy but the effort was clearly there, even if it was minor, and passed him with a quiet, “Thanks.”
Brian swallowed a sharp lump in his throat, standing outside the bathroom and staring at the empty bed as Rivers’ undressed just behind the doorway, keeping every noise from his chest locked away in a cage of marrow he hoped would just crumble on top of his heart.
A gentle ripple of water came from the other side, and as Rivers likely settled into the tub, his voice called out with an echo surrounding it, “..Brian?”
“Yeah?” He softly inquired.
Expecting something, he waited for his voice to call out once again, but nothing came forward. Standing in anticipation, apprehensive as time swelled and built up sweat on his burning fingers, the doorway called to him with a rope on his chest and pulled him inside. He carefully walked inside, keeping his eyes down but when he turned to face him across the small room, he found Rivers’ eyes drawing him closer.
The echo below and around them closed in on the edges of the space, bleeding into the air between them, where warmth was either in the middle of a drought or in full bloom, Brian couldn’t tell, as every part of him felt cold with too many things to say or warm with crimson swarming his countenance, coloring him in a light fuzz.
Rivers, seated in the tub with droplets gathering by his lips, dropping down his chin and washing over his long hair now just nervously down to his shoulders, watched him when he said, “Stay here..”
With parted lips and cool air escaping the space between, Brian whispered, “..Okay.”
He stepped forward and pulled the stool by the bath closer to Rivers and sat down. Now face to face with him, with the water clearing the clouds so murky on his visage, wiping away the grey and cleaning the distorted perspective just a little, just enough to make the view much fuller, now a step closer to fitting in with the image of light just outside the windows.
With nothing to say, they fell into silence once again.
The quiet between them was never tense, but it always took more room than they’d mean for it to, brimming with unspoken lyrics, words they couldn’t help but keep to themselves, walking around eggshells, or flowers belonging to the new season. It was part of knowing Rivers, better than anyone else could, someone he knew. Congested, Brian smiled, for sure.
And for the first time since he’d started visiting, Rivers smiled back.
-
2000
A bubble gum riff at the end of a verse sounded out, echoing around the studio with the grating signature smile of distortion on a guitar, the scrunch inside the sound just barely visible from the shrill singing of scraped metal strings. The noise filled out the space, flooding it with a catchy and light tune, a simple melody, structured too tightly, with lyrics flowing out with nothing much to say. Perfectly static, like soap, it was just good music.
The drums kicked off into the chorus, while the bass sang its low notes, accompanying the guitars blaring in harmony with a perfect melody meant to be called a ‘hit’. Rehearsal was in session at Cello Studios, 6000 Sunset Boulevard for the next album that was underway; though there was no doubt, when Brian caught a glimpse of Rivers’ disinterested downward gaze spiraling into creases only he could find on the carpet, that there was more on his mind than the song.
Long Way to Rock, a song Brian was increasingly becoming sure fans would never hear the longer he watched the absent gyre so apparent on his muddy visage. Perhaps the rhythm had fallen off tempo already but his focus couldn’t be lifted off of the man in front of the microphone.
Halfway through the next verse, just at the start, before it could say its final goodbyes to the world, his voice broke off of the melody as the lead guitar came to an abrupt halt and before anyone knew it, Rivers had already changed his mind.
Ric had surely already stopped the recording, but Brian didn’t look at the guaranteed exasperation he’d likely grown used to sporting since they’d started recording. Instead, Brian turned away his eyes from the empty expression standing by the mic, tired of his own voice as it seemed.
He held back the sigh lodged in the center of his throat, thorny at the corners as he swallowed awkwardly. Looking back at Pat on the drums, they both shared a knowing look of unease all while vowing not to say a word in their efforts to keep the air undisturbed, until a voice came from his left, hesitant yet mildly irritated all the same time but neither could find it in themselves to interrupt.
“W– What’s wrong?” Mikey stepped forward, no stranger to this routine at this point but the one to actually speak up during it.
Rivers looked down then at the wall away from the bassist by his side, still idly standing silently by the mic with nothing but short words on his mouth, “It’s not good enough.”
His face scrunched up, now sour with a pointed frown, jutting out with a vexation surely now older than the last time they’d come together to rehearse. He drew in his lower lip, holding back his anger, “So what? That’s another song scratched off your list?”
They’d recruited Mikey officially soon after Matt had publicly announced his departure from the band in April, but that was all the way back in 1998 and now, here they were, at the turn of the 21st century yet stuck in repetition, constantly replaying and reworking songs, rewriting and trashing them as if each one were rotten candy, all of which Rivers didn’t wanna eat anymore even though he’d made all of them. Enthusiastic at first, Mikey was a wonderful selection, someone easy to work with and sincerely fun, but even his altruistic shine had been dimmer since the latter half of 1998.
Rivers himself had barely made it any easier to manage, barely any easier to forget about either when it could either mean doom for Weezer or little to limited but needed success that was slowly becoming a dot at the end of the tunnel they were trapped in.
Mikey stood in place, shuffling with his hands in agitation, sharply turning his head at Ric who’d chosen to make his leave already, knowing there was no use in saving something unsalvageable; Brian could only hope that was a temporary notion.
He huffed, halfway through tired laughter and a fuming groan, “Are you gonna scrap every song that just doesn’t sound good to you?”
Rivers kept quiet, adding fire to the tension tethered to the air, though no matter what, whether he chose to speak or keep his silence, the situation would be far from assuaged.
“..It wasn’t good,” he replied with his justification, weak and simple. His subdued glower glaring at the latter standing by his side, in opposition.
“It’s fine–!” Mikey tried to interject, the hemic ire in his voice burning up, practically on the edge of blowing out but before he could go on, Rivers shunned him again in an undertone, quiet again as he cut him off with a curt, “That’s it, just fine. Not good.”
Mikey ran his hand through his hair, tongue in cheek, biting down on his gums like they could calm his nerves but from the wrinkles under his brows and wide eyes, Rivers’ justifications had only made nothing any better, “You’ve been scraping songs left and right–! It’ll end up being five years since the last album if we don’t have it out by September next year! What then?” He’d almost shouted the question out, teetering on the cusp of splitting open his anger.
“It’ll be fine–”
And with that, the thread had snapped in half, “Fuck, Rivers– that’s bullshit!”
Neither Brian or Pat had a word to say, nothing to interrupt them with, only a brief exchange with their eyes that said more than they’d meant for it to with pursed lips and twitchy brows as Mikey let himself go in his rage, rightfully so anyway, not that either of them would say so out loud.
Mikey yelled, “You’ve been saying that since ‘99!” and the sound fearfully but angrily bounced off the walls of the studio, taking up all the space and yet his shouts could barely touch the polar air around Rivers, who stood on his own, cold and distant as if the world was his own to manipulate, as if it circled him alone.
It wasn’t their place, they’d all known what Rivers was dealing with internally since Pinkerton– Brian had gotten a visual himself at least a couple times before Mikey joined in ‘98– but the truth was that it was becoming increasingly more difficult to manage since it was directly sabotaging the whole band like this, and the only one to say anything about it was Mikey. Pat wasn’t ignorant, but he had The Special Goodness, and for the most part, he’d kept to himself regarding the issues surrounding Rivers. Brian himself had Space Twins, but the pull back to Rivers was far from ignorable, even if it meant it was going to be messy.
Mikey only had Weezer, he’d lived with Pat and Rivers in the summer of ‘98, practically getting high everyday and just having fun. He was genuinely excited to join that January.
Brian swallowed the dryness on his lips, barely watching the scene unfolding ahead of him, yet glued to it anyway, well aware that even if it was towards Rivers, Mikey was far from wrong for being angry with him. With all due respect, Mr. Cuomo, Ric must’ve said at one point already, you’ve been infuriatingly inconsistent and intolerable.
In the midst of the clash, all without a word and all too abruptly, Rivers pulled his guitar off of himself, placed it right by the microphone stand and walked out of the recording room, all while Mikey yelled out from behind him, “Asshole– Yeah, lock yourself up– leave like you always do!”
They waited from where they were, Pat checking over the sticks lying in his hands awkwardly while Brian could only shiftily watch the bassist by the microphone stare as Rivers left the studio, leaving the world behind as if it was infamous for chasing after him, then crawling back when he’d start infamously chasing after the world instead, but at that moment, he had locked himself up again.
It felt too personal, that last line, it always was everytime this would happen which was more often than not, and most of the time, Brian knew the internal ostracization felt in his chest was more than just a pounding ache clamoring at the walls of his ribcage telling him truths he ignored, but it was fine– most of the time.
But when he’d catch the quiver on Mikey’s bottom lip, the twitch on his furrowed brows and tremble on his warm hands now a glacial chill from Rivers’ lack of touch, he was sure that on those summer nights they’d spent together in ‘98 and ‘99, high on ecstasy, fucked out of their minds, there were off-color and shivering whispers they’d breathed on each others’ lips. While Mikey saw Rivers, there was no doubt Rivers would often squint to see another bassist instead.
Now, as the days had stretched into weeks then months, Brian was certain that at this point, neither of them were really seeing themselves in their eyes at all.
A pinch on his nose came loose as Mikey turned around, tight air escaping the forlorn gap between his lips like a shudder constricted with a lock around his throat. For a moment, he seemed relieved, the boulders now off his shoulders but when he caught Pat’s eyes looking down and Brian’s pursed lips, the weight came right back.
“..Do neither of you care?”
His voice came out fragile, raspy at the edges with a torn off piece, stone yet achingly soft, prompting Pat to look up, almost distracted as “Mikey–” fell out of his mouth, mellow yet coarse before it was interrupted by the angered man, “No–! Everytime this shit happens, it’s always me standing up for us, neither of you say a fucking word!”
“That– That’s just Rivers, we can’t do much about it–” Brian justified, yet barely making sense.
He scoffed, looking around in disbelief, stranded in the desert where no one could possibly accompany him, “So, you’re just gonna take it from that prick?”
Pat swallowed quietly as his hands squeezed the sticks in his grasp– Brian couldn’t help but notice, “He’ll.. come around, Mikey.”
But instead, he grabbed his case, just briefly hiding his glower as he shouted out, “No–! Fuck this!” and stormed out the building.
The shadow of silence echoed with a thunder once the door slammed shut, where inside the halls no one remained except for the two left behind by the world now on their own. Polished floors too clean, walls too narrow while the corners on each side became creases in the peripheral of Brian’s vision. The air hung heavy in his throat, as he looked at Pat with sorry eyes, as the drummer sat in desolation, as the little detail the big picture left him.
His lips parted, closing and opening slowly with barely a sliver of sound escaping, something to drain the noise on the image of the situation. Brian tried, “..I’ll talk to him.”
-
The wind blew with a thrashing wave, with faucets turned to the maximum while the water gushed out violently, yet between the shattering flash of movement laid the resting tension in the atmosphere, blending in with the fog of the moment just before and the aftermath’s discord. The world seemed bleak in the midst of the winter with December finally nearing the end yet with no closure nearby.
Just beyond the entrance stood Rivers standing idly, barren between the weary flock of snow just at his feet, where the ground had simply froze over due to his icy stature. Ignorant of the world around him, it seemed like all he could do was look down.
Brian tumbled out of the building, meekly silent by the entrance where he could see the back of Rivers’ head, looking away from all that surrounded him and only at whatever had brought him outside this way. He fiddled with dominant hand, his thumb scraping at his forefinger, trying to tack off the skin from the callus, created by the instruments of his own making.
It had been obvious, Rivers was chronically high for the past three years now and everything had just been on the downward spiral to a much darker place since his usage and behavior had started to get worse. Now, the space of living had seemed like it was just rock bottom in a studio unsuitable to Rivers’ music, it hardly belonged anywhere. Surely, the bottom was best for opioids and black rooms where lying in bed was hardly a task worth debating and punishment for dinner was daily.
But that just wasn’t true, Brian thought.
He approached him carefully, just slowly stepping closer, making sure every crunch of ice below his feet would barely have it crack, even if it meant the grueling pace was making his feet hurt. He landed right by his side with a distance that felt painfully gruesome, even if it was obligatory.
“..Hey.” is all he managed.
But it was soft, gentle and it barely insinuated any tone that would mirror the image of a minor key, it was anything but affected. It was almost perfect, he hoped it was, he knew it should be.
But Rivers didn’t glance back at him even once, he kept to the floor, boring a hole with the swirl of a well into the ground. A lump began to form in his throat, but Brian kept it quiet anyway.
He swallowed it down, hoping it’d give him some relief but the iron clotting’s layers never peeled. Brian furrowed his brows, narrowing his gaze as he looked at Rivers and sheepishly tried again, “..He’ll cool off, we’ll work it out.”
But to no avail, Rivers paid him no mind and only stared at the passage of time between his feet and the gyre in the ice.
Brian turned away, with his eyes darting around looking for anything to scrounge for just to give to Rivers. His heart beat against something in the shape of fear or the indescribable doom that came from just always being on the edge of the plate, something akin to the hell that was the very corner of the ice rink where everyone else got to play in the center but all he could do was sit back and watch. It wasn’t Mikey’s fault at all, being in Weezer was the only mistake he ever made.
“The song was good–” He tried again, but instead of silence, Rivers shortly responded with a curt, “No, it wasn’t,” cutting him off with no remorse.
Brian almost flinched, surprised at the sudden response. His voice wasn’t full of anything, half-empty as it was half-full of nothing, he couldn’t tell whether or not anger had come spilling out of his tongue in flames or if he was just that sure of his imaginary faults.
The lump only hardened further in his throat, blocking airways as Brian stammered, “..W– What about it was so bad?”
“Everything.”
With his mouth dry, cold air seeping through the little cracks between his nervous lips, Brian felt his breath hitch just briefly. Rivers responded with little time between Brian’s words, leaving no space for the moment to breathe, bringing the air into a container, painting the distance between them as something truly suffocating.
But his words just weren’t true. Brian quietly began, “Rivers, really, it was a good song–”
“Stop it,” Rivers whispered but it fell on deaf ears. Too desperate to tell him what he knew was true, Brian kept on but his prose only became more dire the second he felt time starting to run out, “you– it- it was really good.”
With a yell, Rivers turned towards the latter, “Stop it!”
Silence screeched with a squeal, almost bloodcurdling as the distance between them became solid, impenetrable and completely void of any connection. Rivers wasn’t one to shout, during shows or when a song were to require it he would but never like this. He yelled out again, “You’re just saying that!”
Kicked in his chest that was now hammering against the cage over his bleeding heart, Brian could only muster a few words to try and heal his failures, “No– I– I mean it–”
But Rivers still looked away, muttering under his breath, “You’re always just saying that..”
Time seemed to come to a grinding halt and not a flurry of snowfall could match the glacial air around them and encapsulating them in a tub of polar purgatory, one Brian was now sure was made by his own mistakes he couldn’t help making.
The shorter man stood on his own, only staring at the hole on the ground while Brian could only stand by his side, somehow always so much smaller than him.
Brian whispered, “..Rivers–”
But he was already walking away, leaving behind the lone standing figure he’d barely glanced at. Brian stood there alone, sick at his mistakes. Maybe he was wrong, he didn’t know him enough. He looked down and felt the weight on his back wring its hands around his neck.
The ice had been crushed.
-
2001
"I'm very optimistic about the future," he says with a wide grin. "Now that I've got my groove back."
They were in the midst of a thousand people, interviews with gigantic microphones, narrow seats and awkward stages all accompanied by the absolutely mortifying ordeal of having Rivers Cuomo, surely brilliant frontman, on par with Brian Wilson’s hallucinations and his heroes and villains, respond with a mic in his expressionless face.
Groove? The truth was Brian really couldn’t tell but at the same time, he knew the truth.
"It's really nerve-wracking to play new songs for people when..you know they just really want to hear the old songs," he says, reflecting on his recent tour experience. "It's weird trying to compete with our past selves. When we're up there playing the old songs, it just feels like we're playing these classic hits that don't even necessarily belong to us. I am cautiously very proud of [our new] record, but I know I'm the only person who thinks that. I'm kind of used to huge disappointments when we put out records. Last time, 90% of our fanbase immediately abandoned us when we put out our second album, so I expect that trend to continue."
That was before the album surely, Brian couldn’t recall, maybe it was after but it was sometime in May he’d read the article and could only imagine Rivers’ posture, the way his lower lip would protrude forward and his empty eyed stare, everything the interviewer would catch within seconds but they’d never notice the slight graze of skin between his fingertips when he got quiet.
He’d seen that multiple times when the album came out.
But after some long, uncomfortable silences, Wilson breaks the tension by bursting into Rush's "Free Will," complete with air-drum solo, and slowly the story of the last three-plus years begins to emerge. Bell downplays the long layoff, but it is still clear that the band members never expected that they'd ever be talking about their new record as anything more than a pipe dream.
"First, we had to audition bass players. That took about a year," says Bell, explaining the band activity in 1998, after Sharp's departure. Soon afterward, the infamous ubermerger of Geffen into the Universal Music Group made many bands free agents overnight.
He had just barely glanced at him but he’d caught more on Rivers the interviewer would miss the moment they’d look at him.
"That was a weird time, too," Bell continues. "Everybody was being dropped. People kept asking, 'So, you guys got dropped?' But no, we didn't. I felt kind of guilty. Two bands stayed—us and Beck—from the whole Geffen roster as far as alt-rock. That call could have come any day, but it never did, so I felt pretty secure. I knew we'd eventually do it because all the songs that Rivers was coming up with were great. I knew when he was ready, it would be great."
He believed it, that was why he said it and he meant it. With all his heart, Rivers’ hands could write the words of God, that was something Brian believed was true.
He caught his stare at the ground, elusive and completely devoid of any emotion but he hoped his words had been enough for the moment, even if it was just for the moment. He squeezed the tips of his fingers into his palm, nails digging into skin as a result as Brian hoped it was enough for Rivers, hoping he believed it too.
Seated in his room's kitchenette, Cuomo, killing time several hours before Weezer are set to take the stage, is at a loss to explain his group's comeback. An awkward, introverted guy with an intense distaste for talking about himself, he in fact seems reluctant to explain much of anything, and piecing together events of the past six years is no easy task. His most common response to even innocuous questions is an icy stretch of silence followed by a deliberately cryptic answer. ("I don't answer 'why' questions," he declares at one point. How come? "That's a 'why' question.")
He’d read that and could only look away, stuck between agreement and dissatisfaction.
"[Pinkerton is a] hideous record," Cuomo says. "It was such a hugely painful mistake that happened in front of hundreds of thousands of people and continues to happen on a grander and grander scale and just won't go away. It's like getting really drunk at a party and spilling your guts in front of everyone and feeling incredibly great and cathartic about it, and then waking up the next morning and realizing what a complete fool you made of yourself."
Shame is all he could gather, but Brian knew what a brilliant record it was. Briefly after reading the article, he’d gone back to gaze at the image of himself and Rivers in another one of the articles by his side. He was standing in the back with his guitar while Rivers was leaning forward with his knees bent, holding onto his guitar as he played beautifully.
"Then," says Cuomo, "I was just there by myself. I painted the walls and ceiling black and covered all my windows so that no light came in. And I rested. By the end of any day, I'd start to have some of the darkest thoughts and fears and feelings." Rumors quickly circulated that Cuomo was in bad shape. "When I'd hear things that other people were saying, I'd think, 'Man, maybe I'm never going to get out of this.'”
Concerned friends started calling to check up on him. Cuomo disconnected his phone. Says former Geffen A&R man Todd Sullivan, who signed Weezer in 1993: "I'm not sure how you help someone out of that. You have to let them search through it for a while. It was very dark. But did I think he was suicidal? No. It wasn't that dark." Why did he avoid the people who cared about him? "That's a 'why' question," Cuomo replies, then pauses for several long seconds. "I guess ultimately I just didn't want to talk to anybody."
No kidding. When it's suggested that there was apparently some truth to the rumors of emotional distress that had been circulating at the time—rumors that until now, Cuomo has routinely downplayed—he pauses. "I mean...it's true that I would go for months without talking to another human being, which is a very intense experience. It was f---ed up. And when you [finally] do speak to somebody, it's physically difficult, difficult to form words. But it's not true that that was something negative."
He’d called it cathartic, Brian had to read it over a couple times, cathartic was far from how it looked, from how it sounded especially when Mikey would mention the room being painted in pitch black.
"The most painful thing in my life these days is the cult around Pinkerton," he says when asked of the record's new status. "It's just a sick album, sick in a diseased sort of way. It's such a source of anxiety because all the fans we have right now have stuck around because of that album. But, honestly, I never want to play those songs again; I never want to hear them again."
His band mates disagree.
"I think it's a brilliant record," says Welsh. "But the way it was received was really hard on Rivers. He'll say he doesn't want to play any of it, but I think he was just so hurt by the way people responded to it."
Green was indeed the total opposite, something Brian was sure was only a result of inner turmoil but Rivers described it much differently, but in a way, almost the same.
"This record is purely musical," says Cuomo proudly. "There's no feeling, there's no emotion."
Another interview, he noticed his shoulders, tense and uptight, something the interviewer would see immediately of course, but they didn’t catch a glimpse of how that weight on his back didn’t get any better even when they’d made their light-hearted jokes in an attempt to lighten the dreary mood, but Brian did.
"I think the biggest misconception about me is that I'm sad or depressed," says Cuomo. "I'm living the dream every waking minute."
He caught another glimpse, the pure vacancy in his gaze that spelled out jumbled words with letters from an unknown black hole only Rivers had been to. He was on drugs constantly, so maybe brief euphoria to Rivers felt like forever.
He cuts down a side street and stops in front of his ex-girlfriend's house. The lights are out, and Cuomo pauses for a moment before he continues walking. "I think I'll treat myself to a little cough syrup with codeine when I get home," he says. And with that he's off toward the hills, away from the stars of Hollywood Boulevard, alone, as usual, except for the melodies in his head.
He worried– wondered if he had really done that later.
"The worst that can happen has happened, and we're still alive," he says. "That gives us confidence that we're going to be able to last. If those sorts of things can't sink us, I don't know what can."
He was glad they were still together, albeit with more tension in the air than ever, but nobody would say so, instead they all opted to say what they thought was the case.
Rivers Cuomo is happier now - a lot happier.
Brian knew what was really true.
-
They were on the Midget Tour, a name that came to Rivers as he realized just how short the upcoming line of concerts for them were that September. They were set up in some hotel in Salt Lake City where they were to perform their third show of the tour at the E Center nearby.
Outside the entrance, right where the window in the interior would be put into a frame was the silhouette of Rivers. He stood by the steps out front in silence with his hands resting by his sides. The slither into fall had the pinks and yellows of summer turn to a crisp, wrinkly orange and a marbled red that was colder than they’d initially thought it would be, but everything for the past five years had been unwelcomingly unforeseen anyway.
Brian quietly opened the door, treading through the crunch of leaves below his feet on the steps with care, slowly approaching with gradual motion.
He put his hands in his pockets, smiling at Rivers with a small grin soft at the edges, just bright enough to catch his eye, “Ready for tonight?”
But it barely did a thing, all Rivers replied with was “..Sure.”
They were in Las Vegas, at the Cox Pavillion where they played the previous show before booking it to Utah. They had thankfully delivered well with Green and it had become a major success, sure it was far less garnered towards the fans of their sophomore record yet all the more the same in its rhythmic structurization but it was a good record.
It was the fact that they had actually managed to make another album, the aftermath of Pinkerton may have almost ended Weezer as a whole.
But they were here now, though it wasn’t with Mikey anymore. The strain of touring and the fact that they’d almost lost him to an overdose had him officially leave Weezer, something Brian was deeply saddened by yet the freedom from the complete anguish of being in this band was something worth feeling grateful over, even if it wasn’t him and Space Twins. Still, he was glad Mikey had chosen to leave, staying in Weezer was only doing him more harm than good, any good at all. Even so, he was more than happy that Mikey was at least okay.
He’d been checked into a hospital just last month, something Rivers never even said anything about despite the fact that they had literally been living together in ‘98 and ‘99. He hadn’t said anything at all. The silence was more than just cruel.
His smile went away as quick as it came, and the world beyond them seemed just as grey as it was in December of last year. Brian looked back at the shorter man, furrowing his brows just slightly with a quiet desperation on his frown, “..People like the record.”
“Not like before,” Rivers quipped tersely.
It was without a doubt that Green had done well, it had done exactly as they’d expected with its simple structures and melodies, though at least that was the case for Brian and Pat. When it came to Rivers, anything short of the triple platinum in 1998 on Blue was far less than favorable.
The wind blew with a violent shudder and a fast pace, holding onto the decrescendo of time with a stick for a hand, push and pull was their relationship when neither could solidify the essence of unity within one another. Grains spilled through his hands, falling onto the memory of another time they had stood together like this. How far they had come together, but hardly in harmony.
Rivers never once looked at him, while Brian couldn’t help but turn to watch the shape of his nose and the way his lips would spell out nothing for him to hear, almost like he didn’t think he was deserving of it.
Brian gazed towards him, wondering whether or not it mattered at all what of Rivers he was meant to have or not, wondering whether or not what he thought mattered to the man at all but still, he couldn’t help it but say it out loud anyway, “..I like the record.”
He wasn’t sure if he was grateful he’d said that, because when Rivers’ eyes finally were upon him in deafening silence, he felt his heart begin to thrash against a visceral shore deeply etched into his body with a shrill for a cry when Rivers gave him his empty gaze.
“I really do.”
Rivers said nothing in reply, all he did was stare back without a word on his parted lips. He turned away quickly and before Brian could say any more, he turned around and went right back inside.
The crisp of fall was achingly similar to the crackle of ice.
Once again, Rivers left him.
-
2003
“..and how did that make you feel, Brian?”
A gesture from the counselor went unnoticed, furrowed brows and a jutted jaw just blurry in his peripheral vision even when staring straight ahead was advised and abided by. In the forefront was only the occasional glance, darting glimpses with words unsaid, originating somewhere from Rivers himself.
They were packed into a circle, surrounded by the boiling point of tension tumefying in the atmosphere, swollen with a violet bruise throbbing and twisting, on the teetering edge of eruption.
The nadir of never before had simmered down to a quiet thrum, an undertone beneath their sotto voices in the middle of their now weekly sessions together as a group with a counselor, navigating through the murk as if they were all one big broken family trying to piece themselves back together.
Lights flickered burgundy blues, marlboro reds at the frigid end of 2002, grey traveling in bonds of smoke that met each other with intertwining fingers and a streak of fire at each end of their trails.
With his chin resting on his palm, Brian caught Rivers’ eyes from afar. His fingertips brushed the dry skin like plastic over his plush lips, the moment forever in between space and time.
Not a show or audience yelling out say it ain’t so, Weezer in sight, just the reflection of the past years in the limelight, the silver mist of stage lights on every division of their memories. Every mistake had been broadcast in the form of death on a dingy club’s door, since then, Rivers had started meditating.
Rick had suggested to Rivers to meditate but the man was eager not to, against every solution to the madness he was inflicted with, the disease of man that could not be cured. He felt it was necessary, misery produced the best works of an artist, that translation of suffering into music was more than just a harmonic progression and a melody. To Rivers, killing himself was more than just the result of his own self hatred, it was an artistic measure he had to take to aid in his pursuit of excellence.
As much as he’d fought back though, the tail end of 2002 set him straight somehow. He picked up a book on meditation and slowly overtime, these sessions began due to a myriad of suggestions from their producer.
More than anything, they’d all started talking again.
It was awkward, oddly but expectedly uncomfortable and deeply absurd– maladroit even.
Rivers swiftly looked away, breath heavy with an urge to pull fog in between the crease of his mouth. The fog, or something else.
Cold gnawed and laid between his fingers, seeking capture towards each limb on his body, slowing him down, pushing him into slow motion gradually into a deeper sensation of burning. Rivers let his lips part in apology, but the way they settled back let him know there was more on his tongue than just his guilt for the last five years.
It slipped into his hands, with knuckles green and nails blue while his mind brought itself out of the black and white spiral of the last few years. It was becoming increasingly apparent in his eyes, not a magazine’s rabbit stare but the gaze of a man lost and found, seeking what he had pushed away.
Yesterday and the months before all bled through, leaving a stain irreversible. The gloss of rose over glasses had all but faded since the fall and rise of their second record, since Rivers lost his muse, and since Mikey had to go. They’d practically gone through hell and back now.
Yet not a word of their history had ever been spoken face to face.
Lashes blinking against spotted skin, rashes appearing on their cheeks with grainy filters, Brian watched as they both took each other apart with their eyes, stripped one another down till skin could bloom in a burgeoning flash and finally spell everything out.
He put his leg over the other, Rivers leaned his shoulders back. Brian tucked his hair behind his ear, Rivers adjusted his own. They both turned away, and looked back.
The counselor smiled, talking in a language neither of them could comprehend because while the world was in the midst of motion, they were on the rest before the songs could begin.
It all went by in the span of just a few minutes, seconds even but by the time their session ended, they all went home.
But while Brian stood by his door, falling to the floor in his exhaustion of the last hour and a half or the strings in his ears reaching notes higher than he could have ever predicted the moment Rivers looked at him with more than just the void he had given him since the latter half of 1998.
And all too suddenly, when the world seemed to have spun in every wrong and right direction with no end visible on the road, the telephone rang.
He’d picked up in a hurry, or he was standing by the phone with his fingers hovering over it with the spark of his touch driving him closer to bringing it to his ear and eventually muttering with a soft-spoken, gentle akin to a practiced dynamic of pianissimo his mother who had him learn piano before guitar had taught him to be, Brian timidly spoke, “hello?”
“..Could I come by?”
His voice was close to his ear, a sweet yet breathless whisper next to him that Brian let himself savor before he anxiously replied, between monotone and achingly, “y– yeah.”
A knock on his door came soon enough and when he’d opened his door, Rivers stood on his own with his glasses askew, hair a pretty mess and his button up shirt wrinkled and rushed.
The rise and fall of his chest stuttered briefly when his lips parted and his cheeks had crimson swarm his pale skin like watercolor on the blank multicolor horizon of a pearlescent canvas. His breathing hit against Brian’s lips, brimming to the top of their cup with years of unspoken lyrics.
But no, there was no need for history to be said, Brian already knew.
A crash of waves came glimmering with a flood, a blanket of passion served with the white of the sun in the backdrop. They collided into each other, lips meeting in a surge of a requited ardor. Their hands wandered all over one another, wrung around their necks, plastered over their ears, cutting off the rest of the world as they gasped into their mouths. They fell back onto the couch in the living room, with no memory of when they’d reached the ground.
The space closed in on them, pulling them in as they drew each other closer and closer, writhing in the pain of their proximity, they longed to be closer till hot blood could mold into their bodies, tying them together into one. Light purled along their flesh, spitting on the ignition as their solar skin melted into one another. Warmth bloomed across their mouths moving against each other, not a thing in this world made just for them could pull them apart.
Rivers placed his hands over the back of Brian’s head, caressing his hair with a sense of care he’d never felt before, curling his fingers into bunches of silky strands touched now by the hands of heaven themselves in Brian’s eyes. Rivers rocked against his groin on top of him, keeping the other man bound by each stroke of his fingers on him.
Brian moaned, ecstasy rushing through his veins, pumping constantly inside his body, shooting off into the high skies like fireworks bursting with a flavor on his tongue only Rivers would get to taste off of him. If Rivers wanted, Brian would.
His breath stuttered in his mouth, hitched as he whimpered against Rivers. The fervor lit another match, burning every sensation with a cry of adoration, pouring vigor onto them and nothing dared to douse a single rose that blossomed from their kiss.
There was nothing more desperate than them, nothing more drastic than the words they’d never said before but their climax was the sound of music singing it out for every star in the sky that had claimed the spots on their bodies as tears, an inch of blood and a drop of their broken shells.
There was nothing more desperate than the human man kissing the face of his God.
They pulled away, just briefly as they watched the look of love in their eyes, grinding against the rush of blood on their shared bosom. Tense wisps of air traveled between their lips just seconds yet light years away from each other but when they fell back together, no longer could time tear them apart.
He’d delivered the very elixir of worship to him, right when Rivers knocked on his door and brought paradise to his lips.
He pulled him closer, putting an end to their charades, drinking the aroma from his soul, merging them as what the hereafter’s cards would call the lovers.
Forever, only love could ease the pain of history.
-
2005
“I don’t really have any hobbies other than music unfortunately, and I wish I did. I– I’ve thought about.. Maybe taking up tennis or something? But I– I have yet to do that. I’ve thought about uh..”
“I’ll get into tennis with you.”
“That’d be cool, or racketball, yeah.”
In perfect unison, everything had fallen into the spot it was meant to. F major to a G sharp minor, a whole step into a new world where stealing a kiss at the very end of rehearsal was justified, and the brush of hands over one another was more than just a simple graze of skin.
He was looking down when Rivers had said that, but he could feel his eyes on him as he smiled at the latter. Vermillion dusted his cheeks when they’d walked away from the camera, Brian had chuckled softly and Rivers had surely heard it when he stole a glance at him in secret.
“Yeah, that might be my favorite song on the record. I really like the solo Brian came up with too.”
“Ironically, I don’t play any of the guitars on it—but most of all the guitars on it in the studio—and I don’t play them live, which I think is kind of funny. It’s really fun to watch Bobby and Rivers play that song every night. It feels like—”
“You’re the composer and we’re the performers.”
“Yeah, yeah! It’s neat, it’s really cool. I love the notes that Rivers added to the solo. I feel that that song could be—that Weezer migh—things that Weezer can do and go in the future, as far as texture, and the use of clean guitars. I don’t think there’s any distorted guitars on that song.”
Rivers softly moaned against Brian’s neck with his hand cupping his cheek, rubbing circles slowly with his thumb by the dip by his nostril, planting a flowery trail of kisses on his warm skin, growing a garden of love right on the land he’d cultivated.
Brian arched his back, leaning further into Rivers, plunging their bodies into a torrent of hunger, only quenched by the fruitful pulp of desire between their tongues, fingers intertwining into knots, numb from the mess of such an eager appetite being fed till they couldn’t take it anymore but still– they wanted more.
“Yeah, I have to say I’m really grateful to these guys for believing in this song and pushing for it to be on the album. And in so many other ways, just like this, they helped me stay on course while we were making the album, and keep me from going too far in one direction or the other, either with my songwriting, or my singing, or my guitar-playing. This album wouldn’t even exist if it weren’t for the other three guys in this band really keeping me on course, and supporting me, pushing me, encouraging me. So it was a real band effort.”
“Rick said, write a song like Billy Joel or Elton John, so…”
“But no pressure!”
“So, I didn’t really accomplish that at all, but I did write a song on the piano. So that’s about as close as I could come.”
“I think it’s a beautiful chord progression.”
They shed their clothes, attire undone into threads unraveling into strings forgotten when they’d laid their hands back on one another, leaving splatters of paint all over every path and crevice curving on their flesh, the ignition of their longing lighting a gust of sun all over them when they made love all throughout the night.
"At first I was vehemently opposed," says Cuomo. Rick Rubin, who produced Make Believe in off-and-on sessions that lasted more than a year, suggested meditation. "I sent him a very anxious page, saying, "Rick, no. I cannot get into meditation because it will rob me of the angst that's necessary to being an artist. And he said, 'OK, don't worry about it, forget it." I think because he put no pressure on me, I began to get intrigued. Then I did a Tibetan-Buddhist meditation retreat. That wasn't intense enough for me. I knew I wanted something extreme."
Says Rubin, "I'm often associated, or in some cases blamed, for Rivers' meditation practice. It's worked for him - you might see him smile or laugh now, and before you would never see that. I never suggested the particular style of meditation he's doing. Whatever Rivers is interested in, he dives in a thousand percent. He takes things to radical extremes."
“I did this meditation course, and at the very end of it, the teacher leads this guided meditation, which is called Metta, where you say over and over again, these positive statements in your mind. This is at the end of 10 days of just brutal, ruthless self-confrontation. One of the things he said was, "I pardon all those who have harmed me in action speech or thought." And then he says, "I seek pardon from all those who I have hurt in action, speech or thought." After 10 days of working so hard at that course, I had so much pent-up emotion that I started crying, and I was feeling so sorry for being so self-centered in my life.”
Rivers pulled away just for a moment, breathing on every off beat, quickening the tempo when each gentle groan came trickling out his lips onto Brian’s. He watched the swirl of color in his eyes, a hazy spring, submerged in a limpid mist shadowed by the solar energy of the skies. Nowhere on any field of green could the tint of his gaze match a source of nature, Brian was more than just a result of molecules.
Today we boarded a 747 and flew from Los Angeles to Osaka, Japan to start the next round of The Make Believe Tour! Actually Brian and Rivers went over a few days early to acclimate and spend a few vacation days before the tour started.
Rivers pressed down on his lips, pushing into him with a deeper thrust each time, engulfing his heart with the nectar of sweetness, love that could not be replicated by anything but the sound of their harmonies.
The singer, songwriter and guitarist who has already influenced more than a generation of rockers and indies has the reputation of being a madman. Bell begins to define his relationship with Cuomo, a little hesitantly.
“Well... is this going to be printed in Portuguese? If so I guess I can say... It's a good question, but whenever I'm asked that I try to be a little slow to answer, depending on how Rivers has behaved in the last week. If he was I give an answer, if not I change the topic. But most of the time looking on the bright side, I have to say I'm very lucky to work with someone like him. Even though sometimes we can't even rehearse regularly because he lives out of town (from Los Angeles). He is very motivated and intelligent, and whenever he decides to do something, he goes to the extreme. He's an extreme guy. I have learnt a lot by looking at his methods.”
The feeling floated in a series of motions, filling him up to the brim, leaving nothing behind to leave afterwards because all of it was for the moment to take them to new heights, past every juncture of the atmosphere, up to the stars right on the moon in December where their love belonged in love.
“It's all very methodical. Living with him is like doing a sociological study. I wish I had written about that experience over the years. I wouldn't want to exploit him or anything like that, but I think I could make a lot of money about what he's like in private. It's interesting. No matter what I say, it will never do justice to the truth.”
He laughed softly each time he thought of Rivers, a man made of so many things, all which ended up on top of him so many nights, either in the process of declaring devotion or in simple adoration.
“He cannot be summed up in one word. Can he be a cold guy? For sure. But he can also be very easy to work with.”
Brian smiled, showered in aftercare as he basked in the glow of a million love confessions, but when Rivers’ smile faltered just slightly, he felt it all stop in an instant.
“You never know what to expect from Rivers.”
-
Their recent line of shows in Japan till the 23rd went swimmingly well, fans came together just to witness the four of them together after Make Believe had released on the 10th of May earlier that year. December brought on a winter akin to a storming rain, leaving the ground with a polished bed of snow laid over the sleek plates of ice below it, cracking under the pressure every minute.
All in the meantime laid a secret backstage, behind the curtains, in rooms alone, where promises were made with kisses on their fingers and all across the lucent visage of their bones on their hands. Away was the world from the interior of their hearts, hidden away in the corners of the universe where not a soul could travel because the only ones who’d known about it were just the two of them.
It was more than challenging, hiding a dire secret like this from their bandmates and the whole world this way, shunned from cameras and screens alike. With everybody watching, there was nothing they could do but keep it the secret it was born to be.
Kisses lied between sets, underneath the covers no one could see, and down every empty corridor where music would play down the narrow space, filling up the imperceptible hall with every third and fifth they could sing over their shared root note. The United States in particular had come a long way from the kind of state a love like theirs would have to be in, but still, times were never perfect even when progress had been made.
While it was secret, it was beautiful.
But when Rivers would sing every word of longing over the harmonic in each song on the newest album, suffering with a shy demeanor and the struggle with his celibacy only applied to the women he dared not to touch. Brian wondered whether or not the love they’d made was enough to make his abstinence a lie.
As much as it was selfish, he hoped it was.
He’d mentioned it enough to instill that fear in his chest, Rivers’ want for marriage, to settle down with someone he felt a permanence with. Brian thought, surely, even in the period they were in, an oath could be made, they were something with stability.
It was enough, Brian thought, enough for marriage.
Rivers had come by earlier as usual, while it had been a while since he’d last visited since even before Japan, the sudden visit was more than welcome. December had reached its final point, and the beginning of the new year was upon them, bringing them into another year together in love.
Yet his hands were jittery, calm yet never collected. His eyes were averted, freezing over even in the presence of the love that kept them warm in the frost. Most of all, his lips were pale.
He’d asked to sit on the couch, just lounge for the rest of the day till the evening could lull them into a delicate slumber, pursuing the night with some shut eye but Brian could barely feel his shoulders easing into the cushions when Rivers held him close.
But slowly, the sands of time led him into a sleep so comforting in the arms of everything that made life the gift it was, until Rivers quietly spoke up after hours of radio silence.
“Brian.” He’d started calmly, without a hint of emotion present in his voice.
He’d almost jumped at his voice, but Brian quickly replied as if the vibrato in Rivers’ chest against his ears was just a simple hum he wasn’t used to hearing bring comfort to in the middle of the night, “yeah?”
Rivers drew in his bottom lip, but the way it protruded forwards would never be fully swallowed by the teeth that glossed over the plush. Instead, it only pulled Brian closer.
“Is this all you want?”
His gaze darted from side to side in a panic, while Rivers remained almost stoic. Brian laughed weakly, “w– what exactly?”
He looked down, away from the shell shock on the man wrapped in his arm’s expression, “this. You and I..”
Pain flooded his lungs, dissolving every gram of oxygen into an ingenious inferno, chained by prickling fear and the breakage of tears. Brian chuckled, meekly navigating the words tied on his tongue in a cluster, “R– Rivers, this is all I’ve ever wanted.”
He’d mentioned it before, the idea of settling down together, letting the rest of the band know the truth, allowing them the life they’d dreamed of. Rivers would never let the conversation go on.
He held him close, in an anxious attempt to bring their lips together, crash together like destructive panels of craters crashing onto the Earth, leaving a mark on the moon all at the same time, all in the hopes of keeping them tethered together. Rivers tried to look away, almost pushing him off as he turned to stare into an empty oblivion. Brian whispered, “I– I’ve never– I’ve never seen anyone the way I see you–”
But before he can divulge him in his love, Rivers cut him off, “I’ve met someone.”
Nothing could have made the world come to the pause it did but his words, nothing could but anything Rivers would say or do, nothing else but him.
It was never a life they wanted, just the dreams of Hawthorne only Brian wanted to have come true.
A splinter grew thorns over the garden of roses in his heart, Eden lost now somewhere in the lakes drying up as every flower wilted in an instant. His breath was lost and heavy, drifting into the wind without a warning, his voice broke with a violent stammer, “wh– what?”
Regret or shame, ignorance or pride, none of it was visible from the angle he could see Rivers in. Instead, all that could be gathered was a sense of urgency, as if he needed this over with before it even started. He tried to explain, “w– well, you know her.. Since ‘97,” but it did nothing to alleviate the ache now shattering every string in his chest to break out into a sob.
Rivers pulled himself up as Brian sat across him on the couch, with his hands by his sides as if he’d been pushed away but only through Rivers’ merciless sentence had he been thrown away.
He looked at him with a smog covering his eye contacts, the kind that could never be deciphered as he tried once again, “I.. I love her.”
The craters had been dug into fractures, tearing them apart at the seams, letting the cracks deepen into wounds never to be healed. Prose all but nothing, Brian couldn’t find a single song to say what he felt but three simple yet awful words.
“..I love you.”
But it wasn’t enough, it could never be enough.
Rivers only shook his head, got up and left through the door he’d been waiting outside of in 2003.
The thought that a person may know someone, know them truly from every inside and out, in a way cameras and magazines could never capture because they didn’t see the truth the way you did.
You think you know someone, better than anyone else. Under the influence of agony, in the process of change and the culmination of the butterfly they become at the end and beginning of every new chapter.
You think you know, but as it turns out, the whole time you thought you knew, the reality was that none of it was true.
Brian was wrong, he didn’t know Rivers at all.
Somewhere in December, there was a love lost.
-
2006
On June 18th, 2006, Rivers Cuomo was married to his wife, Kyoko Ito Cuomo in Malibu, California.
Later, in the same year, The Relationship, a band with music centered around his personal heartbreaks, was founded by Weezer rhythm guitarist, Brian Bell.