Jane’s eyes were closed, but Rob still felt intrinsically like it was best to look away. His heart pounded in his chest and his face felt flushed. Between the moment he felt just a few minutes ago and J’s voice—rising, weathered and wise over the soft hum of the A/C—he felt like he could almost die. [i]Now when I sleep, it’s all alone…[/i] Sam had notes—he always had notes—but Rob didn’t bother to listen to them. He set his eyes on Sam and tried not to sweat until Jane slipped out. After her footsteps faded out to nothing, he took a deep breath. Then looked around to see Sam and Austin staring directly at him. Moments felt like minutes now. He wasn’t sure if he should feel embarrassed or honored, or what. But all of the hard-earned confidence with age had slipped away from him the moment he saw Jane this morning. And in its place was the insecurity, terror, and fear of just about everything. The only thing he could do was try in vain to move on. He moved over to the kit and assuaged his shaking hands with a familiar pair of drumsticks. He looked back up at the guys. “So, thoughts? Something arpeggiated over the first verse would make more sense than me starting off on one. Maybe I can do something on pads until the first chorus—” “Are you okay, man?” Austin’s question ripped his hope of moving on from him. “…yeah. Why?” “You’re uh—” Austin started, pointing at Rob’s face. Rob reached up and realized he had been crying. He blinked. “Yeah, I’m good.” A few more second passed in the hot, stuffy room, before Rob continued. “So something arpeggiated, right? …Sam?” -- The guys thankfully moved past the moment, and before long, they had laid out a structure that seemed to make sense underneath what Jane had sung. Sam was fiddling around with a clean tone and a tremolo that was surprisingly vulnerable, given his usual approach to playing. Austin’s bass lines were similarly clean, but full—filling the air in a way you wouldn’t ever notice until the music stopped. It felt like opening up an ephemeral space, in a strange way. Behind the kit, Rob was choking on air. It wasn’t even noon and he had several shots of vodka slipped into him already via a flask he always kept on him. If anything, it made it worse—and his heartbeat seemed to intrude upon the gentle solace the other guys were creating in front of him. Sam and Austin were busy hammering out some pre-chorus melodic pass off when he finally rose and beelined for the bathroom. Once the door was shut and the fan was turned on, he slid his back down the wall and splayed his feet out in front of him. He took out his phone and ferociously looked up some daily news—something, anything to distract his mind from the panic attack that floated in the air around him, threatening to invade. Which, as it turned out, wasn’t particularly helpful, because Mae was in the headlines again. [i][u]MAE is Back—Everything You Missed In Her Shocking IG Story[/u][/i] He didn’t bother to open the article. A few taps later, he was already watching the story for himself. He skipped ahead, desperately looking for the part of the story he didn’t want to hear. “—it is, I just haven’t had this feeling in a while,” Mae continued, after Rob had skipped past her preamble. She was sat cross-legged in a large couch, with her hair shining out past a wall full of sound insulation. It was a studio. “I’ve been busy, you know, I lost the love of my life, and it’s really just been me and my daughter picking up the pieces. But now, you know? I think I want to start living for myself again. So…I don’t know when, but…I think I’m gonna be putting out another LP. See you on the other side, loves.” She blew a kiss to the camera, and the story ended. Immediately, he picked up the phone and called her. It rang three times before it picked up. “Rob?” Came a soft voice. In the background, he could hear the familiar click of a Pro Tools metronome. “Hey, uh…just saw your story.” “Yeah?” she asked. A pause, then: “I dunno, I just thought, what the hell?” “Yeah. What the hell.” Mae either ignored or missed the bite in Rob’s voice, and continued. “Elle’s good, by the way. I bought this super nice studio like, five minutes away, and Jack’s over and cooking her lunch. He was kind enough to stay in town a few extra weeks while I hash out some songs.” “That’s great.” It was terrible. Jack—Mae’s younger brother, who lived on his sister’s fame like a parasitic leech—was insufferable. Being good with kids was one of his only attributes Rob would even consider passably decent. “Yeah—listen, Rob, I gotta go, but tomorrow, around five, are you free? I can set Elle up on FaceTime. She’s been asking to see you already, can you believe it?” “I can absolutely do that, yes,” Rob responded. “Best—uh, best of luck to you Mae. Hope it comes out well. Talk tomorrow.” “Thanks, you too.” The line went dead after that. Rob stood up, exited the bathroom, and slipped past Sam and Austin. “I need air,” he said to them. They mostly ignored him and continued to fiddle around on the song. He slipped upstairs, went into his room, and let out a few full-throated screams into his pillows. After a minute and another few swigs, he had calmed down enough to think. It was noon. So far today, he had realized he was still in love with Jane, and his obnoxiously famous ex-wife was going into the studio at the same time he was. On the first problem, he could either avoid Jane, which he knew wouldn’t work, or he could try to get closer to Jane, which terrified him. The idea of doing so had been unthinkable for years. Even considering it now scared the hell out of him. Even if J was open to the idea, which was a pretty big fucking ‘if,’ she had spent many years fighting to get to where she was now. And if he really admitted it to himself, he wasn’t much more than a so-so father and an alcoholic at this point. Plus, how quickly could that jeopardize what In Bloom was doing? And how soon would Mae jeopardize that? Any news about her sucked up every news outlet. No matter what, MAE news would drown out In Bloom news. Any interview now would be him responding to Mae’s claim that he was the love of her life, and grilling him about it being his fault. Why the [b]fuck[/b] did she say that?? Before he could consider any more, he heard a knock at the door, and through it, Sam: “We’re ready to start tracking.” -- Rob tried his best not to think everything as he started tracking the song. It was a fairly easy task ahead of him, and he figured after two takes, he could get up, and go try to sort it out as best he could. Already, before he started playing, he got a vague ‘Call Me.’ text from Evan. Soon enough, everyone was going to ask him about it. And at this point, he would rather saw off an arm then talk to anyone about Mae. As he finished up, he looked through the window to see J and Austin talking and laughing. He could only wonder as to what they were on about. If they looked this happy, surely that hadn’t heard yet. Once the song finished up, Rob made his way into the sound room and swapped out with J. He sat by Austin and quite literally twiddled his thumbs. Like hell was he going to pull his muted phone out now. “Breathing okay there, sport?” Austin mused. He had likely picked up the existential dread radiating out of Rob this entire morning. “Yeah, fine,” Rob said. “Sorry, just had a bad call with Mae. I’ll be fine.” Austin feigned shock and offense. “Woah, I didn’t know we could say that name here.” Despite everything, Austin was still able to get a laugh out of Rob when he wanted to. “Yeah yeah,” Rob chuckled, “only I can.” Austin gave a thumbs up to Jane and turned back to Rob. “Well speaking of exes, you should probably know J’s heading back out there tonight.” “Oh,” Rob said, flat. “That’s nice.” “It is, isn’t it?” Austin’s question came out very casually, but after a few seconds of silence, he repeated himself far more seriously this time: “It is…isn’t it?” “Yeah, sorry,” Rob said. Without thinking, he stood up and starting walking out. “I need a minute. I’m uh, I’m heading out.” “What?” “Guys, shut up,” Sam called out, utterly oblivious to everything going on behind him. He twisted a few knobs and waved behind him. “Jane’s starting her take.” “Everything’s fine, Austin,” Rob said. He was lying through his teeth and both of them knew it. Rob got one last look at Austin’s almost terrified expression before he slipped behind the soundproof door and made his way up the stairs. As he walked, he quickly ordered an Uber—ignoring the eighteen text messages from Evan and others that were starting to trickle in. He went outside, and waited for the Uber to arrive. “Hey, I know it says the pharmacy on there,” Rob said to the driver, as soon as he got inside, “but ignore that. Take me to Santiago Peak. I’ll tip you for the trouble.” The driver nodded, and he was very quickly taken up the mountain roads. If he was going to have a complete meltdown, at the very least, he would do it alone. About thirty minutes passed in silence in the car, and Rob finally built up the courage to glance down at his phone. He brushed past a message from Austin and moved to his missed calls. There were several, but ten from Evan alone. Rob took a deep breath and called him. Evan answered before the first ring. “I know, I know, you’re probably going through a lot,” he started, before Rob could even get a word out. “Evan—” “I’ll leave you alone, I swear, just tell me you’re okay.” “I’m okay. I’m going on a hike.” “A hike?” Evan repeated. “…okay, whatever. A hike. Don’t do anything stupid.” “I won’t.” “I’m assuming you didn’t know she was going to do that?” “…no.” “Okay.” Rob hung up after that. Another five minutes later, he arrived at the trailhead, tipped his Uber driver generously, and turned off his phone. Everything else would need to fucking wait.