Adam
The rain outside is still coming down hard and I can't sleep. I've never been a great sleeper, Especially in the early days of Collateral Damage. I'd gotten so used to walking around like a zombie, that I didn't even realize how bad my insomnia had gotten. These days it's a little better, though some nights I still feel restless. Like tonight, or should I say morning, because as I glance at the clock It reads 5:45 am. Shit. I'm laying on my side watching Mia sleep, she's been out for hours, well since the last feeding anyways. She's always been a good sleeper, lucky. My eyes graze over the angles of her face, the softness of her lips, and the tiniest little freckles across the bridge of her nose, you'd never notice them unless you were this close. I still have mornings where I wake up and wonder if this is all still a dream. A fear that seizes me for a second now and then, that it's not real and I'll wake up back in LA in my misery, without Mia, without my son. Then I remember that it's just my anxiety and that this really is my life and I feel so incredibly grateful.
I can't help but reach out and brush a loose strand away from her face as her chest slowly rises and falls with each breath. The faintest smile appears on the edges of her mouth, she must be slightly awake. I pull her to me and bury my head in the crook of her neck, breathing her scent, she smiles wider and softly yawns. I kiss right behind her ear and though she's still half asleep I feel her body shiver and she gives a faint sigh. My whole body is awake to her, as her eyes slowly flutter open, she smiles. I kiss the top of her forehead,
"Good morning" I whisper.
"Mmmmm " she yawns again, "it's still early" she argues with a smile.
"It is" I croon, while playing with her hair.
"Teddy?" She freezes for a second.
"He's still asleep, don't worry"
She relaxes back into my embrace. Finally her eyes focus on mine and we stare at each other for a few seconds.
"Can't sleep?" She asks.
I shake my head. She puts her hand on the side of my face and smiles. The warmth of her touch is making my body temperature rise by the minute. Staring into her laser beam eyes is like falling Straight into the abyss.
"Bad dream?" She asks, again still holding my gaze.
"No. Just the stupid voices in my head don't want to shut up" I laugh sarcastically.
"Mmmmm" she nods.
"I can think of a way to shut them up" and she leans in, and it's the kiss that does it. The spark of a flame. My heart starts to pound. She laughs because she knows the effect she has on me. I slowly roll over on top of her and she happily submits to my every move. Slowly I pull the t-shirt she's wearing, my t-shirt, over her head. She kisses me back this time with more intensity. Since having Teddy we don't really get many moments like these anymore, so I'm just kind of savoring the moment and I want to make it last forever. Our breathes are coming out ragged and my heart is pounding. Skin and touch and the urgency behind Mia's lips. So I'm kind of lost in all of her when the phone on the nightstand starts to ring.
We ignore it.
Mia's hands start moving faster, urgent, and I'm following her lead as she pulls me under her spell again. The phone starts to ring again, pulling us both back to reality. Damn it! I break the kiss, pulling back for just a second. Who the hell is calling me this early in the morning. I look at the screen and see the name Liz. I send it to voicemail.
"Sorry" I mutter. As I crush Mia back into a kiss. She moans softly and I know I'm forgiven. The heat is back and I'm dying to be consumed. Her fingertips work they're way up and down my torso, and it's like little electric frissions at every place they land. I'm ready to go. Pulling me back on top of her, so is she. The phone starts ringing again and this time it's Mia who breaks the kiss, panting breathlessly.
"Maybe you should get that" she frowns.
"It might be important"
I just stare at her for a second while our ragged breathing slows in unison. I roll my eyes.
"Fine" I grumble.
Leaning over to the bedside table I grab my phone hastily and look at the screen. It's Liz again. I'm pissed. What the hell could be so important. I swipe the screen from left to right and answer it
" this better be freaking good" I answer annoyed.
But what comes over the line freezes me in an instant. It's Liz and she crying. Not just crying, sobbing into the phone. My strong, tough, butchy ex-drummer is losing her shit all over the phone. She's sobbing so hard that I can hardly make out what she's trying to tell me. I don't even register all the other things going on at the same time, like the baby who starts crying on the monitor in our room and the fact that Mia has somehow removed herself from underneath me to go get him. Or that she is coming back into the room now with our son in her arms and looking at me like she's frightened.
"Adam" Liz sobs. "Are you there? Did you hear what I said? He's dead.. Mikes dead"
And this is the moment of clarity because everything rushes back like I'm catapulted into the present moment from some far away place. I hear what Liz is telling me, but I can't quite comprehend it. Mikes dead. Mike from shooting star. My old roommate and band mate. Dead. Liz found him. Mikes dead. I'm still processing this. And Liz's voice breaks through the haze again
"Adam!" She asks more annoyed now
"I'm here" I respond quickly.
"I'm sorry, I just... What? How?" I try to form a coherent sentence.
She exhales a tornado, starting with a whole explanation of the night that would irrevocably change all of us forever. I knew mike had been doing bad, but I thought things were getting better for him. I guess I didn't realize how bad. Liz tells me the details and though the instant shock is wearing off a little, I'm still stunned by it. Liz proceeds to tell me there's going to be a funeral on Saturday in our home town outside Portland, she gives me the details and asks me if I'll come, to which I reply of course. I few seconds to write a few things down then Liz tells me her and Sara will pick me up at the airport if I want, but that she has a lot more people to call. I say ok. Then she hangs up. It's like someone handing you a bomb and walking away. I'm still not really sure what just happened, but this time it's Mia's voice that breaks me out of my haze.
"Adam! What's wrong" she asks pacing back and forth with Teddy In her arms.
She looks like a deer in the headlights, afraid of what she's going to hear. I look at her and sigh, was it just moments ago we were naked and trying to make love. Life's a bitch. I think. I find some resolve and respond
"It's Mike. He's dead"
The last time I saw mike was over a year ago. Prepare for landing was already out. There was a lot of press coverage after it started winning some awards. There was a big festival out in LA and I was invited to play. It wasn't anything major, I wasn't headlining like back in the shooting star days, but still I was happy just be out there playing music again. After the show there was a lot of people hanging out at the hotel bar, some swanky downtown Art Deco building that had been turned into the musicians Mecca that weekend. All the bands were booked there for the long festival. We never really hung out at those types of places, but I was kind of wired after the show and Mia had suggested that we should go and hang out with the other musicians. So we did.
At this point Mia was only a few months Into her pregnancy and she had finally started feeling better and not being so sick, and I think she wanted to capitalize on every ounce of energy she had. We ate dinner and hung out with a few of the other singer/songwriters I'd become good friends with through the gig circuit. I was definitely a little buzzed at that point. There were a lot of people there and it was a pretty dim-lit place so imagine my surprise when in walks mike. We were actually getting ready to head back to our room, when he strolled up high as a kite reeking of booze and two groupies, one under each arm.
"Holy shit! Adam Wilde, back from the dead" he slurred. Mia shot me look that I still can't really describe, it was of the Oh shit! Variety.
"Mike" I nodded. "How's it going man" I asked, not really caring but trying to make small talk.
"Why do you care?" He shot back. " aren't you a big rock star now? To big for us small town folk" then he leaned in and whispered.
"But I know who you really are" and then sat down with his groupies flanking him on both shoulders.
I cocked my head to the side and looked at Mia, as if to say ready to go. She nodded.
"Actually I have a proposition for you" mike spit out, oblivious that we were now getting up.
I couldn't help it, I laughed, he was propositioning me?
"Oh yeah?" I answered back.
"Yeah" he looked dead at me.
"See once your solo thing runs out of steam, you'll come running back to us, so I'm giving you the option now. We should get shooting star back together" and it's the way he said it, that got me, like he was doing me a favor. Maybe it was the few drinks I'd had, but My blood started to boil. Mia saw what was happening, and grabbed my hand to pull me out of the room.
"When was the last time you even held a guitar, let alone played?" I spit back.
"I tell you what, when you dry out.. If that ever happens... You give me a call" I smirked, and turned my back to walk away.
Hell hath no furry like a junkie scorned.
"Oh fuck you Adam! You self righteous little shit! Everyone knows you're a sell out! You and your fucking snobby bitch ass girl friend!"he shouted.
And that was the comment that did it, I turned around so fast to knock his ass out and it was Mia's hand that stopped me. She yanked me hard into the other room. And pushed me against the wall with both hands on my shoulders
"Don't!" She commanded.
To late, the rage was consuming me. She probably sensed it cause then she grabbed my hand at put it on her tiny bump that was still hide-able, it froze me there and she held me there with her gaze.
"He's just lost. He doesn't know what he's saying. He probably doesn't even know where he is right now... This is the only thing that matters" as she said,THIS, she held my hand a little tighter over her belly. I slowly felt the urge to annihilate mike dissipate. And I nodded. I grabbed her by the neck and kissed her hard. All the adrenaline still coursing through me had to go somewhere. At this point people in the other room were staring and mike was still blabbing on and talking shit, but I didn't care anymore. I didn't even glance back. I grabbed Mia's hand and headed towards our room.
The next morning while I was down in the lobby getting us some snacks for the road, mike approached me again. He looked like shit, like he hadn't slept and can you believe that he actually had the balls to ask me for money. The realization hit me like a ton of bricks, mike wasn't staying at the hotel, he probably wasn't staying anywhere. All my anger dissipated and I just felt pity for him, for what his life had become. I told him to fuck off and walked away. I never told Mia that, but That was the last time I ever saw him.
I'd heard through various people or friends from back home, that he'd been in and out of rehab for years. After shooting star broke up he tried to jump-start a few different bands, but nothing really panned out. Mike had always struggled with addiction issues, even in our early days, he was always the wild card. Well, until I took that spot for a few years. The last I'd heard he'd moved back home to Oregon and was trying to clean up his act. Liz told me they'd even jammed a few times and he was working a normal job at some factory while working a twelve step program. We didn't always get along he and I, but I never really hated him. I was honestly happy when I found out he'd gone back to Oregon, to make something better of his life. I honestly hoped he'd find the kind of happiness I have some day, I guess it wasn't in the cards. Since this morning, all I kept thinking about was the last time I saw him, with the cold finality of telling him to fuck off. This news saddens me in a way that I haven't felt in a long time. This little voice inside my head keeps saying did I do enough? What could I have done? I could have tried.
Mia hands me our son, who is smiling and thank god has no comprehension of what just went down. I kiss the top of his head.
"I have to go back to Portland" I say.
She nods.
"I'm coming with you" I look up. A little shocked.
Mia hasn't been back to Oregon in almost 8 years. Since the day I put her on that plane, and watched her fly away from me into another life, another world. I think she's still afraid to go back. Afraid of the memories and the ghosts there. So I'm shocked she's volunteering to come. Instinctively I decline her offer.
"You don't have to" I say.
She looks far away for a moment finding some resolve. She lets out a deep sigh.
"Yes I do. It's time, Adam. We're coming with you" she states with finality. she takes Teddy into her arms again, and hands me a cup of coffee.
"Here, you need this" I nod.
She walks out of the room, and I'm starting to get ready. I need to book some plane tickets. We're going back home, to bury a friend.