Chapter 4
Four
GRAY
Rehabilitation. The word tastes like metal in my mouth, cold and unfamiliar.
It's where addicts go to die.
I just hope I can make it through the next ninety days. Sobriety is my only hope. My hands tremble as I hang up, receiver slipping in my sweaty grasp. My message echoes in my mind.
"Please answer when I call tomorrow, baby."
I hate the desperation in my voice.
My legs give out as I collapse into the metal chair. Reality washes over me, and each wave is worse than the last. Rhea changed her voicemail and obliterated every connection to Case in Point. She’s not just taking a break from me. She’s erasing me.
“Fuck.” I run my hands through my hair.
I want to smash shit and reach for a bottle to let it pull me under until the pain fades. But all I have is this flimsy plastic phone, and even now, I’m not reckless enough to trash rehab property on day one.
Instead, I bury my face in my hands and let the flood of memories crash through me, because there’s nothing else left to hold onto.
Rhea laughs at a joke I told on our first date at this diner outside of Denver, her laughter ringing above the jukebox as she leans her honey-blonde head back.
Her green eyes sparkled, making me feel like I was a person worth loving, instead of just another burned-out musician with an addiction problem.
Her small hands were working on my shoulders after a brutal show, the gentle pressure of her fingers working out the stress knotted in the muscles. The care she puts into every single task she completes, even loving a man as fucked up as me.
I’ll never forget waking up one quiet morning to the smell of coffee and seeing Rhea in my kitchen, wearing an old Case in Point tour shirt and humming as she stirred scrambled eggs in my battered skillet.
When I asked about her song, she blushed and admitted she’d made it up about us and how happy she was with me.
My hand twitches, reaching for the ghost of her, hoping my fingers might still find the warmth she left behind. But there’s only chilly, empty air. That small emptiness aches more than any words ever could.
“You okay in there, brother?” The voice of my peer support specialist, Randy, cuts through my self-loathing.
I look up to find him standing at the entrance to the phone booth, his weathered face creased with concern. “Yeah. Peachy.”
He doesn’t buy my lie. "Do you want to take a walk? The facility features several trails. It might help clear your head."
Relief washes through me. I’m tired of pretending I’m fine. I want to say no, and wallow in my misery, but there’s a familiarity in Randy’s eyes. They’re patient and kind, like Rhea’s, willing to extend grace, even if it’s not deserved.
“Sure.” I finally give in and take the walk to clear my head.
We fall into a comfortable silence for the first few minutes, following a winding path through towering pines.
The needles from the trees above have fallen and crunch beneath my feet.
The air isn’t hot like I thought it’d be in September in Georgia, but it’s uncharacteristically cool all over the South before autumn is officially upon us.
After a while, the Georgia mountains stretch out around us, morning mist covering their peaks.
"Is this your first time in rehab?" Randy’s voice is full of curiosity.
“Fourth. You’d think I’d have figured it out by now.” The weight of this truth lingers in the air between us, a silent testament to my repeated failure.
Randy chuckles. “It took me six tries. Many of us are slower learners than others.”
“What made the difference on the sixth time?” I secretly hope this man has all the answers to help me find a cleaner path.
His voice is rough with emotion, like the words scratch his throat on the way out.
“I lost my daughter. She stopped taking my calls, inviting me to birthdays and school plays, and all those little moments that make up a life. One day, I realized I’d become a stranger to the person I loved most in the world.
That’s when I knew I had to choose the bottle or her.
Couldn’t have both anymore.” He kicks at a pinecone in our path.
The parallel to my own situation isn’t lost on me. Rhea walked away for the same reason Randy’s daughter did. Loving an addict means watching them choose their poison repeatedly, until you finally get tired of coming in second place.
“Did she forgive you? Your daughter?” It’s important to me that Rhea forgives me, whether she still loves me or not. If Randy’s daughter can forgive him, then there might be hope for me.
“It took two years of sobriety and a lot of groveling, but yeah. She forgave me. But I had to forgive myself first. That’s the hardest part.” Randy’s salt and pepper hair begins to blow all over the place as a huge gust of cool wind blows through my cotton t-shirt.
Forgiving myself. The idea feels empty. How do I find absolution after destroying the only good thing I had? Still, maybe seeing my flaws clearly is a step toward repairing what’s left. “I don’t know how to do that.”
“It takes practice, time, and a shit ton of therapy. You’re in the right place for all three.” Randy reminds me in a gentle way.
We reach a clearing with a wooden bench by a small pond. Randy sits with a sigh, and I join him. I’m grateful to rest. My ribs still ache, and the walk has left me winded.
“Tell me about your girl.” He makes it easy to talk to him. Hell, he makes it easy to want to share.
Being in a band doesn’t often afford me the opportunity to confide in others.
My circle is small and doesn’t extend beyond the band very much or often.
“Her name’s Rhea. She was the band’s assistant.
Rhea’s smart as hell, funny, and beautiful with this thick head of blonde hair.
She’s gorgeous in this way that just gets under your skin.
She’s got this laugh that sounds like music, and she makes these little humming noises when she’s concentrating that drives me crazy in the best way.
” I find myself smiling despite knowing I tainted every single memory we ever made.
“You’re in love with her.” It’s not hard for Randy to deduce after my description of her.
“Pathetically in love with her. She saved my life, man. Not in some dramatic, pull-me-from-a-burning-building way, but in all the small ways that matter. She made me want to be better.” The admission comes more easily than I expect.
“What happened?” His question is loaded with the weight of three years of my fuck-ups.
The question hangs between us for a long moment.
What happened? Everything and nothing. You know, it’s a thousand small betrayals, broken promises, and hungover mornings when I’d always swear it would be the last time.
"I kept choosing the bottle over her, disappointing her, breaking promises I meant to keep. She held on longer than anyone should’ve.
I kept giving her reasons to leave until she finally did. "
When I was a child, I hid under the dining table while my mom and Richard shouted. Their voices were a storm. But the opening of a bottle always brought quiet. Alcohol promised refuge and a silence I understood.
The night Rhea left flashes through my mind in a succession of blurred images, fractured by my constant intoxication. I piece together the hazy, frightening, sharp pieces of memory that still cut like glass.
Rhea’s suitcase is by the door. The look on her face isn’t angry, just tired.
So fucking tired. I was screaming at her to leave, throwing her things like a spoiled child having a tantrum.
My brother and bandmates should’ve whooped my ass for treating her that way because her pain-filled green eyes haunt me with every passing second.
Andrew and the guys showed up, probably called by Rhea because she knew I’d lose my shit when she left me. I want to crawl under a rock just thinking about her not being able to leave without the backup of my own brother and band.
The sound of the door closing behind her was so final it might as well have been a gunshot.
“I don’t even remember all of her leaving,” I admit, my voice cracking. Shame threatens, but the truth pushes through. “I was too drunk for the moment that mattered. She walked out, and I was too wasted to properly ask her to stay.”
Randy doesn’t say anything, just lets me sit with the weight of the truth. It’s one thing to know you messed up, but it’s another thing entirely to voice it out loud, hearing your own voice admit the depth of your failures.
“I threw her suitcase across the room. The woman I love is leaving me, and instead of begging her to stay or promising to change, I throw her things. What kind of man does that?” I scoff. I hate who I’ve become.
“An addict.” Randy’s right, but it doesn’t make it any easier to hear.
His words should feel like absolution, but they don’t. They feel like an explanation, not an excuse, and I’m not sure I deserve even that much grace.
“I called her a bitch. When she said she was leaving, when she tried to explain why, I called her a fucking bitch and told her to get out.” Tears well in my blue eyes, and the more I think about how I treated her the last night we shared a life together, the quicker they are to fall.
The admission hangs between us, ugly and unforgivable. I’ve never spoken those words aloud. Here, surrounded by peaceful beauty, I can’t hide from what I did.
I double over as it hits me, gasping for air for a few seconds before I push the words out in an emotional dump on Randy. “She loved me with everything, and I called her a bitch for trying to save herself from me.” My tears come hot and fast.
Randy’s hand lands on my shoulder. He doesn’t placate me or minimize what I’ve done to make me feel better. He just sits with me while I fall apart, offering the kind of silent support I never gave Rhea when she needed it.
“I have to get her back and find a way to make this right.” I don’t want to live any more of this life without her.