49. Chapter 34 #3
By the time I extricate myself from the disaster, Cohen is nowhere to be found. I can’t even see what route he would have taken. If the crowd parted for him at all, it filled back in instantly.
No one, not a single one of the party-goers, seems to be aware of what happened. To have even noticed the mess. Too drunk, too high, too busy with their own selfishness to care or help me, as I haul the table upright again.
I’m not even really sure why I do it. I just can’t stop myself from cleaning up the mess.
I should chase after Co. Should try to make things right.
Instead, I re-draw the curtains. I use my bare hands to wipe vodka from pleather.
I right half-empty bottles and use my sneaker-clad feet to kick the shards of glass out of the way of other people.
Only when I’m done, when the mess is as tidy as I can make it and Cohen Brady is long gone, do I allow myself to slump back into the booth. I’m not even much of a drinker; it was never my vice of choice, but my hands are on autopilot. The rum burns the back of my throat, and I relish it.
There’s a rustle as the curtains part, and a recognizable figure waves at me. “Hey, kid.”
I ignore Bruce Cooper in favour of taking another swig.
“You look pretty miserable.”
No shit. However, I don’t say that. But nobody sits alone in a VIP booth drinking straight liquor because they’re having a good day.
“Where’s the rest of your band?”
I suppose his curiosity is understandable. After all, this booth was booked for The Preaching Pistols, plural.
“Gone.”
He nods as if I’ve confessed to some big secret.
“Sounds like you’ve had a helluva night.”
Uninvited, he sidles up beside me in the booth. From the corner of my eye, I clock each micro-movement. Not because Bruce creeps me out. He does. The way he always looked at Rain, even when she was a minor, was enough to secure him elite-creep status in my books.
No. What my eyes track like heat-seeking missiles are the drugs.
The drugs I know this man has on him somewhere.
This club, all of Bruce’s clubs, are hot spots for it.
He bribes the Calder police, which is easy to do, so that the party set can continue to indulge in the first-class gear he offers.
Well, those who can afford to pay. Which is definitely not me. Or anyone else from The Neck.
Even though I can’t afford whatever Bruce is selling tonight, that doesn’t stop my mouth from watering for it. Doesn’t stop the jealous twitch in my fingers. Phantom motions mimed easily from years of practice.
Pour. Cut. Roll. Snort.
Which is exactly what Bruce does with the baggie of off-white powder he produces from his pocket. Mephedrone. Or at least partially. I would recognize the colour anywhere. But knowing Bruce, it’s probably also cut with something better. Something special.
It’s a good guess, because when his head rises from the table, his pupils are already blown so wide I can’t tell the colour of his irises, and there’s a new, lazy smile crawling across his sweaty face.
“You want a hit, kid?” he offers, even though this man already knows the answer.
The first time I’d ever used anything stronger than weed was in this damn club.
When The Pistols first hit it big, Cohen would drag us here to party every time we were between shows, or after shows, or really anytime he wanted to.
We’d get high, coke, Meph, whatever party pill was on offer that night, and then party until dawn, or until he and Rain were ready to fuck.
Later, after the band’s split, it was this same man who threw me out of here night after night when I’d come looking for the past and find drugs instead.
Inevitably, I kept showing up until I couldn’t pay.
After that, I stopped coming; I found other, cheaper places to get my fix or places like the Clubhouse where they’d take payment in whatever ways I could offer.
So do I want a hit. Yes. More than almost anything.
I have so many wants. I want Cohen. I want to take back the questions I asked tonight. I want him to love me back the way I love him. I want to be worthy of Rain’s faith in me, even though tonight has proved that I’m not. I want to be worthy of my brother’s hugs, even though I’m such a fuck-up.
But I can’t have any of those things.
So I want to forget them.
And three white lines, I think, as my hand trades the bottle of rum for the rolled-up bill Bruce’s holding out, will help me do just that.
Just for tonight. Just to take the edge off the loneliness.
“Just for tonight,” I mumble, three lines later. Or was it six? Or more?
I sound happy. Far away and happy.
The happy’s not real, though. It never lasts. The demons always show up and ruin everything. Usually, they’re shaped like her, but tonight they’re different. They ask a lot more questions. About Cohen and me. About Dutch and Rain. They offer me more Meph when I answer.
Just for tonight, I promise myself, because tomorrow, I’ll go home and ask Rainy to sing the demons away instead. Her magic voice will scare them off. But she’s not here, so even if the happy’s not real, the Meph is all I have to chase the demons away.