[i] “But thanks for hearing me out. Have fun, yeah?”[/i] “Of course! See you tomorrow?” Rob shot out instinctually. He contemplated saying more before it was too late—J was inside, the door slid shut. For a moment, Rob was frozen. Instinctually—almost without thinking—he wanted to go after her. Things slid into place in a funny way, this night. A decade ago he’d be off with J, having a some sort of spur-of-the-moment evening, before waking up the next morning and getting hangover breakfast with Austin and Sam before J was even up the next morning. But he hadn’t done that in years. Truth be told, being here felt like being out of time. It felt like playing pretend at some moments—like he was at a tabletop gaming session with old friends, playing like they used it. Other times, it felt like a lifetime ago. Like he was acting out something a past version of him experienced before reincarnating. He’d think more on it later tonight, he was sure, but a beach ball pelting him in the head snapped him right out of his trance. “Hey dipshit, get in the pool,” Austin called out as Rob bent down, snatched the ball, and chucked it back at him. Both of them were in the pool now—drinks in hand. Rob took one last look at the home, towards J, before pulling his shirt off, tossing his phone and wallet to the side, and jumping in. -- Day turned to night quickly as the three caught up on a myriad of issues. Rob was familiar with Austin’s teaching in Phoenix, but it was nice to hear more from Sam. The two hadn’t been incredibly close during the heyday of In Bloom, but it was nice to hear he was just as he remembered him—still gigging around LA county, making a modest living for himself, floating free as the wind, as he always had. After about thirty minutes, Rob slipped inside to grab a few handles of whiskey, and the night went from there. “You were fucking that bassist, I know it!” Sam slurred out from halfway across the pool. They were illuminated by moonlight at this point, and Rob was swaying near the hot tub, pouring his sixth (eighth?) jack and coke. “I wasn’t, you know that, asshole,” Rob called out. After finishing his pour, he slipped in at the shallow end and re-joined the other two. “I was bitching about J, we were in a park, they took pictures, it was a whole thing.” Austin cut in at this point. “That doesn’t help your case, Pennie.” “I don’t care! I don’t care,” Rob shot back. He took a big swig and continued. “I’d tell you if we fucked, it was forever ago, I don’t have a reason to lie.” “But J and Andy though—” Sam started. “Yes? No? No idea, ask her,” Rob muttered out. [i]God, what time was it?[/i] “Are we 20 again? Who cares if she did?” “You do, obviously,” Sam pressed on. Austin seemed to notice the tonal shift. “Leave it, Sam,” he interjected. “The fuck happened to them, anyways?” “What, Vicarious?” Rob asked. “I think they did a few albums and split after that, same old shit.” He reached over to the Bluetooth speaker and changed it to an old [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBorigq5eL8]Live song[/url] while Austin thought for a moment. “Huh,” he started, “I could have sworn they were touring.” “Not when I was in LA for Mae,” Rob responded, matter-of-factly. Before of course, realizing what he mentioned. “Before you—” “Oh [i]please,[/i] like you had time to check in on Vicarious during your world tour.” Sam moved forward towards Rob. “You didn’t have time to check in on me.” “I was busy,” Rob shot back. “And miserable. I figured you knew about that? Every fucking tabloid had ‘Pennie For Your Thoughts’ sections rambling on about how miserable we were.” Austin started to move towards them. “Guys, maybe let’s not—” “It’s fine, really,” Sam said. “I was scraping together rent money after you and J imploded the band. Probably wouldn’t have had time for a dinner.” Rob downed his drink and leaned towards Sam. “Is this really what you want to go on about? I’m divorced and miserable. This story doesn’t have a happy ending.” “Yeah, sure.” Sam stopped about a foot from Rob and eyed him. “You poor miserable millionaire. It must be demeaning to have to come back to us.” “Sam, [b]cool it.[/b]” Austin interjected himself between Rob and Sam, but at this point in the night, Rob pushed Austin aside and approached Sam. This time, Sam was backing up. “Yeah, Sam. I’m a millionaire. I’m set for life. I get more money from my Mae royalties every month than I ever got from In Bloom. Big [b]fucking[/b] deal. Does that make you hate me?” “I don’t give a shit how much money you have,” Sam replied. He stopped backing up and the two stood too close to one another. “I’m a little annoyed that you two had to fuck up everything we had together to get there.” Rob froze at that comment. Sam and Rob eyed each other for a minute, and the air became very still. From behind Rob, a voice called out: “8 am call time!” After another moment, Rob broke eye contact and looked at Austin, who was standing outside the pool and pointing at his phone. “8 am call time,” he repeated. “Jane just texted us. We need a song demoed tomorrow. You two want to drop this?” Without looking back, Rob hopped out of the pool. “Then I’m going to bed,” he called out, and grabbed a towel to try himself off. Austin again stepped forward. “Look, we’ve had a bit to drink, maybe we just forget this—” “Way ahead of you, teach,” Rob interrupted, his voice searingly dry. “See you boys tomorrow. Can’t wait to rock and roll!” With that, the sliding glass door opened and slammed behind him before Sam and Austin could say another word. -- Rob didn’t remember much after that. His next clearest memory was the buzzing iPhone at this nightstand and the raging headache pounding at his head. “Godfuckingdammit,” he muttered to himself. Sometime last night, he set his alarm for 6—not 8. He quickly opened up Uber and threw on sweatpants and a T-Shirt. Within ten minutes, he was seated in the backseat of a Prius, nursing his head, watching Chino Hills fade into suburbia as his driver took him down to the nearest Rite Aid. “Fun night?” his driver asked; her voice almost quivering. Rob looked up into the rearview mirror to get a better look at his driver. She was young; looking no older than 20. If he had to bet, she was Ubering before classes at some local college. He tried to hide his disappointment as she made brief eye contact with him. She recognized him, and he knew it. “Oh yeah,” he said, using what little remained of his energy to sound excited. “I haven’t been in town in a while so I’ve been catching up with old friends.” She seemed to nearly vibrate at the statement. “Y-you wouldn’t happen to be the In Bloom drummer, right?” Rob smiled, and the next ten minutes were filled with the usual question-and-answer portion of this sort of conversation. He quickly informed her he wouldn’t do a photograph, which she seemed saddened by, but he tried to answer every question he could. Soon enough, she ran him through the Rite Aid drive thru, then the McDonalds drive thru next door, and they had returned back to the hillside mansion. “..I can’t wait to hear what you guys make,” she continued, as she put the car in park. Rob gathered his Pedialyte and burgers and opened the door. “I think it’s some of our best stuff yet, so far.” He said a quick goodbye and slipped back into the house. As soon as the door closed, he slipped back into his room and locked the door behind him. He took the next hour to inhale his food, chug the Pedialyte, and shower off everything from the night before. But he couldn’t help but feel a tinge of happiness at the experience. She called him ‘the In Bloom dummer,’ not ‘Mae’s Ex.’ -- Heading down into the basement and finally feeling sober, he heard J’s voice, muffled, in the walls. [i]Is that what song I think it is?[/i] As he started taking the steps, however, the music faded, and by the time he opened the door, there was no one at a guitar. Just J, in the side room, reading. Funny. He could have sworn he heard… … …nevermind. “Hey hey,” he called out to her, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “You look like you got way better sleep than I did.” He started to walk away, but as soon as J looked up and the two made eye contact, he froze. She gave him that look. [i]That look.[/i] The look she’d give him when he got home from the grocery story, and she turned to face him through the balcony window, cigarette between her lips. Or when she’d wake up, and he’d be at their doorframe, brushing his teeth, watching her wake. The look he got when they had movie night—her head on the arm of the couch on one side, her feet spilled into his lap under a blanket on the other, their eyes on one another and not the screen. The look she gave him when he slipped past her in the kitchen, his hand gently cupping the small of her back as he moved past the narrow spaces. It was impossible to explain. Truly, it was. For Christ’s sake—all she did was look up. But something…burned in him in this split-second moment. It wasn’t how she was yesterday. Was it? Something in the way she was, right now, in this exact moment, was different. Something in her eyes flickered in just the way they did when she was [i]his.[/i] For the first time, in a really, really long time…he felt loved again. … From his chest, he could feel a rush of blood. He turned quickly, heading for his rubber practice pad, not entirely sure if he was blushing yet or not. He plopped down on the ground and started up a few rudiments. He tried to angle his head down as his face radiated bright heat towards the carpet. [i]What was happening?[/i] Sam popped in a moment later and Rob almost gasped at the sound of it. He said ‘hey’ to Jane and moved to his guitar. Reality snapped back into focus. Rob waited for he and Sam to be out of sight of J, before giving Sam a thumbs up sign and a questioning look. [i]Truce?[/i] Sam hesitated for a moment, before nodding quickly and grabbing his Gibson. That would have to do for now in terms of a truce. But his mind was elsewhere, and his heart was beating again.