Chapter 5: Pilgrims
Sisky doesn't leave the following day although I expect him to. Instead he stays, and we ignore each other. He pores over his notes in his bedroom, hardly comes out. I look through the open door when he goes downstairs to get a drink, and he has notebooks and bits of paper and newspaper articles spread out everywhere in the guest room, and the chair is pulled back from the desk where a dozen different pens and a few notebooks are. Seems like he's going through everything, making notes on his notes. Rewriting my story.
I hear him coming up the stairs and hide in the bathroom. Take a shower just so that he doesn't think I was hiding from him.
He stays another night, and I don't ask him when he's leaving and he doesn't tell me when he's going. But it's on that second morning as I'm eating beans out of a can for breakfast that he comes downstairs and says, "I'd like to interview you today."
This isn't really a surprise.
"About what?"
He pauses slightly. "Sex."
But he doesn't blush like I expect him to – his tone is defiant. I can't really put my finger on what he's thinking. If he was repulsed by me, he would have gone. I get that he's bitter about his youth, blames me that his own feelings were never returned by female Followers fans, but he didn't act that way before he found out about me. I don't get what my sexuality has to do with an ex-girlfriend dumping him, but he takes it personally anyway. So he's a bit angry, I can tell, but I'm angry too that he thinks he has the right to feel that way.
"Sex. Okay. Well, you have the birds and the bees –"
"You're not funny, you know."
And I suppose I'm not.
"So can I interview you?"
"Sure. We can talk about sex."
And we stare at each other for a while like we're trying to outdo one another.
The entire interview is to be kept strictly off record, not that he could even claim in his book that I'm gay. Nonetheless, he needs this to find out about my life, and then he can censor it accordingly. Make it non-explicit for all those innocent kids out there who will be the first to buy a biography of me.
We're in the kitchen this time, sitting on the opposite sides of the table. He's got new notes now, fresh from the press, and I see dates and arrows and question marks, and I catch a lot of 'B's in there too before he holds the notes up slightly, preventing me from seeing the text.
"How would you describe your sexuality?" he says in a clinically uninterested voice. He looks tired, like he hasn't been sleeping well. Neither have I.
"Flexible."
"What does that mean?"
"I don't know. I sleep with both sexes. Bisexual. Sure, that."
He purses his mouth and writes something down. I look around restlessly, my hands in my lap. Wishing I could be anywhere but. "How old were you the first time you slept with a woman?"
"Nineteen."
He stops at this, and his serious facade cracks slightly as he stares at me, trying not to smile. "Wait, you were a virgin until you were nineteen?"
"Hey, it wasn't from a lack of trying. Girls thought I was too weird." They did, too. A girl I was head over heels for in high school said I was too intense and that she couldn't understand what I was going on about half the time. "What does age matter, anyway? I think the quality is more important."
"I first had sex when I was seventeen."
"You want me to bake you a cake?" I ask, and he huffs, a light blush on his cheeks. He has no problem asking me personal questions, but he's bashful about his own experiences. Oh baby, baby, if he wants to compare our sex lives. Because I will win. Every round. "I've had more sex in my life than you probably ever will," I then say, which isn't to try and make him feel bad, it's just fact. I've had a lot of sex. He just looks at me in a 'yeah right' way, but it's obvious that he's slept with maybe three girls, tops, and with two of those only once.
"How old were you when you first slept with a man?"
"Twenty-three."
"So that's only four years of women exclusively."
"No, it was twenty-three years of women exclusively. Adolescent crushes, high school hormones, LA music scene fucks... All women. Always." For the life of me, I can't remember having had those feelings for men in my youth. I keep scratching under my fingernails with the sharp edge of my thumb, in order to do anything but look at him. "So at first it was all women for me, but then it gradually became split between women and men, kind of depended on my mood, and then it's slowly changed into being more and more about men."
He fidgets in his seat, his brows knitting together. "But... When did you know? I mean."
"When did I know what?"
"Well, if you were sleeping with women, why did you start... men too?" He sounds confused.
"Are you asking why I'm attracted to men or why I fuck men?" It's a ridiculous question. Why is the sun yellow, why is the ocean salty, why does he sleep with women? All obvious things to him. It's just the way things are, the way they're built. And I'm built this way. "Men are great fucks." The blush on his cheeks gets redder so I go on, feeling slightly vindictive. "You think that with a girl you might Fuck with a capital F, but you don't actually know what fucking is until you fuck a guy. Girls are soft and small, you gotta be careful even when they want it hard. Men aren't. And men are so much easier to fuck, too. They don't accidentally get knocked up. They're never on their periods. They're always up for it. And men have great bodies. I guess I'm a sucker for great asses myself, round and pale. Imagine a guy with a – God, with a perfect ass on all fours, offering himself so that you can see his tight, pink hole…" I let my voice fade away, slightly lost in thought. Sisky is bright red, and his eyes are endlessly wide. "Sorry, am I being too graphic for you?"
"Yes."
"The mental image turns me on."
"It does nothing for me." He sounds defensive. "At all." But he clears his throat slightly, and I'm not fully convinced by his disgust. People get curious.
"It probably doesn't turn you on because you're not gay."
"You said you're bi, so which is it?"
"Somewhere between the two."
He doesn't seem put off by this, however. He knows by now that at the end of the day I prefer men, that I prefer cock and ass and balls.
"What about Brendon?"
The feeling of being naughty and sly vanishes. I was thinking of teasing Sisky more, tell him of my homoerotic accomplishments, but now he's not talking about me anymore.
"He always knew he was gay," I say simply. Brendon probably was confused at first, but he seemed to at least know for sure he was the way he was. Sometimes, I almost envy that. At least he knew. All the bullshit and violence and wrongdoing aside, at least they couldn't take that away from him.
Maybe things had been different for us if I had... been less confused about it all.
At least he knew.
"No, I meant you and him," Sisky now clarifies, and I feel defensive all of a sudden. "I asked you why men, and you only told me about sex, but – It depends on who you have sex with, don't you think? Sex can be just physical, sure, but if it's – if it's not someone random, then it matters. That person matters." He clearly has enough sexual experience to have that one sussed out, so I don't say anything. He interprets my silence as a green light. "Was Brendon the first guy you...?"
I suddenly remember kissing Brendon that night, right there in the hotel corridor, so stupid, anyone could have – But the want and the burn and his taste, his taste. "Yes." Desperate hands, clothes off, endless expanses of hot skin, him beneath me, wouldn't turn around, no, he wanted us face to face, and so I saw the look on his face when I pushed in...
I press my thumb into the pulse point of my left wrist, feel the sped up rhythm. Feel ashamed and angry and turned on.
"So why did you sleep with him?"
I want to ask, 'Are you kidding me?' but refrain. "You saw him on stage. Hell, he only had to hover around that Dallon guy to make you question your sexuality –"
"Did not!" he objects, looking scandalised.
"– so imagine him. Okay? Imagine him giving you this look of – of want and desire. Fucking hell. You think he's sexual on stage, imagine him in your bed. He knows what he's doing. He can move those fucking hips of his, and when we fucked, we Fucked, capital fucking F. We might have been a mess, but we had great chemistry. Really great chemistry. Not that it was all him. I think I'm a pretty spectacular fuck too."
Sisky eyes me like he thinks that I'll now bounce on him like some kind of a sneaky sex monster. He looks flushed, and I smirk.
"The, uh... I mean." His fingers card through his hair, and he looks around the kitchen awkwardly. "Um. So you – Er."
"You've done a lot of research. Am I giving myself credit I don't deserve?"
"No. No, uh. You have a reputation of... Um." He glances at me, and I love seeing him squirm. "Although I knew those rumours of it, uh, being ten inches were exaggerated. I saw you so I know you're not actually. Um." He brings a hand to his face like he's not sure why he's still talking. Ten inches? Jesus, I'd probably pass out getting a boner. But thanks, still flattering. Exaggerated but flattering.
"You didn't see me erect," I point out anyway, just to tease him. He turns even more bright red, and there's a tomato out there that's endlessly jealous.
"Anyway! The, uh – You're not answering the..." He clears his throat. He wanted to talk about sex, so he's only getting what he wanted. "So you and – and Brendon had, uh, great sex. Okay. But you didn't know that going in, so –"
"Well, I figured he'd be a great fuck because I knew he was an excellent cocksucker."
"Do you have to?" he asks, looking like he's practically in pain.
"You wanted to talk about sex so I am. You're the one asking personal questions."
"You don't have to be so crude or explicit about it!" He nearly glares at me. "Objectifying it can't fool me into thinking that it didn't matter to you. I know it mattered. He mattered."
"Of course he fucking mattered." I sound as offended as he does.
"But when did you know that? When you first hooked up or later or...?" His eyes are searching, and I go back to staring at my nails. When the silence stretches on, he says, "Okay, well. How long were you together for?"
I frown at this. "We've never been together."
He looks astonished. "But you –"
"No. He and I have never been together." I can see that the admission sparks up a dozen more questions inside him, sex related or not, but I can't. I stand up just as he opens his mouth to start interrogating me. "I've got nothing more to –"
"But why?" he rushes out, choosing it from all the things he wants to ask. "I assumed you'd properly been together at some point, even if it was a secret. But you've never...? I mean, why?"
Because I wasn't a decent human being.
"Well, it wasn't because of the sex, that's for sure. Interview over."
He remains seated as I head upstairs, needing to get space to breathe. Out of everything Sisky's wanted to talk about – the bands, the fame – this causes the biggest sense of turmoil in me. And he's downstairs, stunned that despite the fragments he now knows about Brendon and me, I never managed to secure the deal, make it even a little official. Or as official as it could be when we don't want the public to know.
But though Brendon and I never said it, never formally agreed on anything, we were each other's. At times. In certain moments.
But never for long enough.
God, I need a drink.
Clifton has a high tolerance for alcohol. He can drive me home after a night of drinking when I'm way beyond the condition to drive, and I can handle my alcohol relatively well. He reminds me of Jon in that sense – he can drink and drink and not get drunk. So it doesn't matter that the road is bad, that it's snowy and dark, that pine trees obstruct his view and a moose could easily walk onto the road, and bang, crash, smoke, praise the Lord, we're finally dead. He simply keeps driving.
He's been taciturn all night, and I've been talking, which is unusual for us. Now he turns onto the narrow road that leads to the house, and he slows down as we enter the woods. I don't know how late it is, but Tommy kicked us out eventually.
Clifton doesn't say anything until we're at the house, and the car's stopped by the porch steps. A silence hangs over us that he doesn't fill. Well, okay. Right then.
"You could come in," I offer. "The kid knows, anyway."
"Are you kidding me? No way." He sounds angry. He is angry. Machias is too small for men like us to survive even the tiniest rumour. Hey, I told him Sisky wouldn't tell anyone, but he's got it into his head that he will be included in the biography as one of my conquests.
I sigh – dramatically, I can admit that. The back of my skull leans against the headrest. "Or you could come in," I say again. Why does he have to be so difficult?
He hangs his head and stares at the wheel. "Listen, Ryan –" he starts in this tone, and no, no, I don't want to hear it.
"Yeah, I know. I know."
I can sense it. I know. The days are numbered, all these days. Not in any kind of divine way, but because of me. Because of people. What we do and think. There is a sense of finality that hangs in the air, in the dark clouds, and it's wrapping itself around my blue house by the seashore, the house I wanted because no one else wanted it. Two rejects sticking together.
"Maybe once the kid is gone," Clifton then amends. "I'll call you."
"Sure," I say, opening the door, "however you want it."
I climb up the porch steps as he turns his car around. The door isn't locked, of course it isn't, and in the hallway I hang my winter coat and kick off my boots. The house is eerie at night like this, unwelcoming. It feels different now. Turns out that by leaving for Montreal, I broke a spell. I feel restless once more.
I'm somewhat aware that it's late, and the kid must be asleep, so I try to be quiet as I head upstairs. Once on the landing, however, I'm momentarily blinded by light coming from the bathroom before the door closes after Sisky stepping out. He stares at me, clearly taken aback some. He has bed hair and is in nothing but a pair of grey briefs. The door to his bedroom is open, and he looks towards it and then at me again. "Uhm," he says and awkwardly shifts his weight from one leg to the other.
"Sorry, did I wake you?"
"I had to pee." He motions over his shoulder.
"Oh."
He doesn't move and neither do I. "The, uh. Clifton didn't come in, then?" He sounds nervous.
"No."
"Oh. Did you... in the car?"
I genuinely laugh at this as I approach the door of my bedroom. "No. We didn't."
We're not that desperate.
But I stop when Sisky jumps from me moving closer, and he self-consciously wraps his arms around his bare middle. A tension in his stance. This confuses me, and I stare. His state of undress doesn't register with me until then, though clearly it's already registered with him. He's a few inches shorter than me and he's eight years younger so in my eyes he's not a fully developed human being but is just some skinny kid still coming out of a growth spurt. He's somewhere in the middle of complete and a sketch, but his body, however, is fully developed: beneath his clothes he looks surprisingly athletic, his stomach well-toned, his arms skinny but strong looking with veins traceable beneath the skin, and his body reminds me of Brendon's except Brendon is fuller in the middle, he has these hips, these goddamn gorgeous – whereas Sisky's just skinny and boyish and plank-shaped. But that can be attractive too, that boyish look, and right now he looks like he knows it.
He's not really looking at me; it's more like he's letting me look. And then he stands there. Like he's waiting.
"Uh." I sound unintelligent. His arms slowly drop to his sides. Better view. Well, shit. Shit, this is – I see. "So," I say quietly. He looks at me owlishly, blinking slowly, scared-looking. A deer in headlights, how dear it is to be in headlights. "You can't sleep, huh?"
He kind of nods but doesn't say anything. I can feel his nervousness rolling off of him in waves, but he's standing still, and I give him points for that.
I slowly approach him, and I expect him to chicken out but he doesn't. He sticks to his guns, he perseveres. And I have to respect that if nothing else.
"Were you thinking that I might help tire you out?" I ask slowly, stopping within arm's reach of him. It's hard to tell how much he's blushing because of the dark, but I know that he is. "Well, were you?"
It takes him a few seconds to make a sound of any kind. "I, uh..." His voice is trembling. "I was just..."
"Thinking about our conversation earlier, right? Men fucking."
He draws in an uneven breath, his body full of anticipation. "...Yeah." And he looks at me, half-terrified but still standing there. I take another step closer, and he seems to instinctively take one back, but there's nowhere to go. His back hits the wall. He's breathing fast, chest rising and falling.
I close the distance between us, but our bodies don't touch. I place a hand against the wall by his head. His eyes go wide, wider, and I lean in slowly, my gaze dropping from his eyes to his lips. He freezes up, hovering slightly like he thinks he should perhaps meet me halfway. I stop with an inch between our mouths. Wait. Whisper, "You don't wanna go there, kid. You really don't."
"W-What?" He looks severely confused, staring at me, my lips, blinking fast.
"Oh, I could fuck you. Get us both off. I could chew you to tiny pieces and then just spit you out, the way I do with everyone. And you know that." I pull back, then, give us some breathing space. "But I won't. Besides," I let myself chuckle to get rid of the heavy tension, "you're not into guys. Curious as to what the fuss is about, sure, and maybe a little bit in love with the idea of being that intimate with an idol of yours, but you're not actually gay and the thought of me fucking your virginal ass terrifies you. So no. We're not ever doing this. Alright?"
A sputter of air escapes from between his lips, spearmint and innocence. "...Alright," he says quietly, and the second I step back fully, his shoulders slump, he seems to relax, he exhales in relief. He stares at me like he's only now realising what he thought would take place. "Fuck," he swears breathlessly.
I'm not being chivalrous. I could. I've fucked a few fans who had never thought of sleeping with a guy until I had them on all fours, and those guys probably still aren't sure what the hell happened. They weren't gay, they were just star-struck, unable to say no, doing whatever they could sense pleased me. I've used it to my advantage. I could do it to Sisky, but I won't. He matters, and I won't.
"Dude, I'm sorry," he then says, a bit mortified. He rubs his face, the spell thankfully breaking. "I just – Spent all night going over the notes, thinking about – about you and your relationships and... and sex."
"People come onto me all the time," I smirk, but the awkwardness lingers. Leaving the forced humour, I say, "We don't have to mention this in the morning."
"Okay." He looks beyond grateful. "Okay. Thanks."
"Sure."
As I move to leave, maybe even escape, he quickly says, "Ryan?" He's still in the corner, still in his briefs, still looking slightly shocked. I wait for him to spit it out. "I want to go on another trip. I think it's important that you – that you come, too."
"Where to?"
"Seattle."
I stare at him in confusion. The question of 'What the hell is in Seattle?' must be obvious because he says, "Trust me."
Funnily enough, I do.
"Well, we're not going impromptu again and leaving this second, and we're not driving across the damn country either."
"Oh no, I was – hoping you'd, uh, pay for flights." And then he smiles sheepishly, a smile I've seen hundreds of times before. A smile that relaxes me, helps to dissolve the tension.
Yeah, yeah. I guess I'm paying for the fucking flights.
Sisky gushes about the luxury of first class for the entirety of the long flight during which I have plenty of time to wonder what the hell I'm doing. I hide myself in Machias and then Sisky, Jon and whoever else manages to coax me out, and I see Cincinnati and I see New York, and I go back to Maine because I want to, not chased by anyone. Plan to stay for good. Not go anywhere.
And when Sisky asks me to go, not even explaining what for, I couldn't pack faster. Which I actually did this time – toothbrush, books, extra socks. Those are important, socks. I hope London's treating Spencer well because I don't have his number and if he calls Machias now, he'll get no answer. He'll wonder where I am after I told everyone that I was going home for good.
I'm contradicting myself. I know.
The realisation of how uncertain my plans for myself are is worrying.
Sisky gets out a notebook, sipping on complimentary champagne. He keeps eyeing a redhead stewardess, his cheeks blushing, and I push our night-time encounter out of my mind once more. I think he would have let me had I wanted it, but we've both done an excellent job of not mentioning it.
And hopefully it never comes up in conversation ever again.
"We're staying in the Mayflower Park Hotel," he says, studying his notes. I let him and Vicky sort things out over the phone. Vicky asked me what the hell I was doing, if I had suddenly discovered my inner itinerant. Maybe.
I did, however, check where His Side is, made sure they're not in Seattle. That Sisky isn't planning on doing something incredibly stupid.
But His Side is wrapping up their winter tour, having visited Seattle already. They're finishing off in Chicago. Not in Seattle, not in the Mayflower Park Hotel. I'm done with chance encounters that are orchestrated by desperation. I'm done seeking him out. It's like Spencer said, get myself a boyfriend. Accept the death of it and pretend to move on.
"How long are we staying for?" I ask, a gin and tonic in my hand, ice cubes knocking together.
"I don't know. Not long."
He's being mysterious on purpose or, well, a pain in the ass on purpose. But I never asked what our business in Seattle was because I didn't care. My house just felt oppressive. It never used to. I only got a glimpse of the pattern I was about to comfortably fall back into: Machias, silence, old records, good books, seagull cries, telephone calls, sad waves, casual sex. Not wanting anything.
Ryan Ross. Dead at twenty-seven, not realising it until at twenty-eight.
And at the back of my mind, there is a small, persistent part of me that objects to the idea of my death. One tiny part when the rest of me is unwilling to conform. And it's thanks to that part that I sit here now.
A close escape. A damn close call.
The sixth one.
I've refused to die.
Maybe I should start alternating between New York and Machias. A month here, a month there. Why do things have to be so final, anyway? Enjoy the New York high life, hang out with old friends, hang out with Gabe, then go to Machias, read books, enjoy the solitude, fuck Clifton. Then repeat. I should consider doing something like that.
"Does it take days? This thing in Seattle?"
"No," Sisky says, shaking his head, shrugging. Being vaguer than vague.
"Right."
Maybe after I get back to Machias, I can start planning this reintroduction to society. Call Vicky, see what she makes of my plans to live in two places. The thought fills me with a hope I haven't felt in years.
Maybe it's finally time.
There's nothing I can do for this idea now, however, so I restlessly look around the first class cabin, a few business men and us. One of them gives me a thumbs up when I accidentally look his way, and I smile forcedly. I already gave him my autograph and listened to him ramble on about how he played guitar when he was a teenager and how he dreamt of being a rockstar and how his "songs weren't half bad" and how he thinks my music's really changed the world.
That's nice.
When we get to the airport, I want to take a taxi to the hotel, get some rest. It's early afternoon thanks to time zones, but my body thinks it's later than that. Sisky, however, says that we need a car, and as we rent the prettiest one (his request, not mine), I grow increasingly more suspicious.
"Hand me your bag," he requests, trunk open in the airport parking lot. Planes fly overhead. He's put in his small suitcase, and I hand him the battered duffel bag that I bought in 1970 for our first ever tour. "I can drive us to the hotel."
"Why do we need a car?"
"We can get some rest, grab some dinner, check out the sights... Hey, you wanna go whale-watching?"
"Why do we need a car?"
"Or not, you know, we can –"
"Sisky. Why do we – For fuck's sake." I stop in to take a nervous breath. There's not much snow here, maybe they're having a milder winter than us in Maine, but it's drizzling, too watery to be sleet but still thicker than rain. This mysterious enterprise of his is making me nervous and unsettled. "Does it have to do with Brendon?"
I hate how vulnerable I sound, but I stare Sisky down, and he looks away from me. He hasn't been questioning me about Brendon since our talk on sex, and I appreciate that, but he – he looks at me differently now. There's this air of pity when he looks at me, and I hate that.
That he sees right through me.
He closes the trunk. "It doesn't have to do with him."
We get in the car, and he chooses stations like he always does, little goddamn Stalin. He hands me a map. "I marked the hotel with an X." I'm surprised by his organisational skills, but then again, he conducted a study on my life for months before anyone caught on.
But I'm not satisfied with his refusal not to share. "What are we doing here?"
It's not His Side, and it has nothing to do with Brendon. I think it's time I get to know. I have no connections to Seattle or – Fuck, what if my mother's moved here? Was she not about to marry someone from Washington four years back? Or was that Washington, D.C.? Is she even with that guy anymore?
"Are we meeting someone?" I press on worriedly.
"No, okay? We're just checking something out, but we'll do it tomorrow."
"Why not now?"
"Because." He chews on his bottom lip and peers through the windshield. "Because it'll get dark soon. It was a long flight. And because you're – you're getting snappy so maybe now isn't –"
"Enough of this. Spit it out, for god's sake."
He glances at me guiltily. "But... if I tell you, you won't come."
"That bad, huh?" I ask, trying to hide how goddamn confused I am. "I'll tell you what. We either do it now, whatever we're here for, or I'm out of this car and on the first plane home. Alright?"
He looks defeated. "Fine." When I offer him the map, he says, "I don't need it." Even more suspicious.
He puts the car in reverse, backing out from between the other rental cards, and the speakers start to hauntingly sing, Hello darkness, my old friend.
It's nothing. Literally. The side of the road in the middle of nowhere. The sun is setting as Sisky switches the engine off. He looks pale and nervous. "Well," he says. "We're here."
We're nowhere.
"...Okay?"
"Look, I just..." He's squeezing the wheel too hard. "The way you... wouldn't talk about it. I thought maybe it'd just be good for you. I was. I was gonna come out here, anyway. For pictures."
"...Okay...?"
"Okay." He smiles or tries to, and we both get out of the car. It's stopped raining but the black road glistens as headlights reflect on it, and white snow decorates the roadsides. I stuff my hands in my pockets and shiver in the cold.
Sisky opens the trunk, and I wait for him, trying to piece this puzzle together but failing to do so. He gets out a camera and then says, "It's a bit further along, over there."
We continue by foot, leaving the car behind. Cars pass us on the interstate. I don't know what I'm looking for but then see something ahead of us, on the side of the road. A flash of colours in the otherwise greyscale surroundings and a few bright flames, like. Like candles or.
I slow down in my steps, feeling a cold that has nothing to do with the January chill.
I know where we are.
"Well, I'll just," Sisky says, sounding apologetic as we reach our destination.
I forgot about this place.
It's obvious that no one else did.
I look at the collection of dead flowers killed by the cold, of cemetery candles, soggy notes, empty booze bottles, cheap looking jewellery, guitar picks, pens, all spread out by the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. Sisky takes pictures. I feel sick.
"Fuck."
"You didn't know?" he asks, lowering the camera.
"That this has become a memorial site? No."
Why would anyone? This is – It's between places, inconvenient, a forty minute drive from Seattle. And people. People come here? For what? To mourn something that has died. To repent like pilgrims, be close to something unholy.
"I can't believe this." I back away slightly, shaking my head. The stretch of road looks so innocent, is straight, fuck me, it's straight and flat and there is nothing, nothing dangerous about it. Nothing that would excuse me. "This is not how I remember it."
There is no bus lying on its side, no broken glass, no blood on the pavement, no summer rain washing it away. I keep looking around, replacing the scenery with my own gruesome visions.
"How do you remember it?"
I take a deep breath. "We came from... that lane onto this side. And I remember – the bus. On its side, probably. Probably here. A car passing by drove on to find a place to- to call an ambulance, so we waited. I waited. I. I sat. I sat somewhere over there. And Spencer, he was – I thought he was dead, he was lying over there, head covered in blood, and. Well, he was just fine, just some superficial injuries that we thought looked bad. But I was paralysed. Watching him. Brent was with him, he was practically unscathed. I sat there." I point. My hand shakes. Everything is as vivid as it was that night. "Joe wasn't in his bunk when we crashed, he was in the lounge. He hit his, uh... his lower back against the table we had in there. This small table. It fractured a vertebra. An inch the wrong way, he could have become paralysed. He couldn't. He couldn't move, man. He kept yelling out in pain, lying on the ground over there. He couldn't move. They operated on him that night. He had to learn to walk again. But he was fine too, in the end. Well, obviously," I say because Joe Trohman is probably strutting on stage somewhere right now, thrusting his bulging crotch to the delight of female fans.
"What about the others?" Sisky asks softly, tentatively.
"Zack had some cuts here and there. I mean, we were all bruised somehow. But he broke his index finger." I hold mine up and wiggle it. "He broke that. Almost funny on such a big guy. If. If something funny has to be found, then... It got squashed between him and the bunk wall. William, uh, hit his head, there was a bump. Nothing major but it knocked him out. Mild concussion. Probably the only twenty minutes he's been quiet in his life, and god, when he came to, he helped others, but only made things worse by panicking. Pete, that's our manager –"
"I know," Sisky cuts in, and of course he knows. He's talked to Pete.
"Fractured his jaw. Flew out of his bunk into the corridor, the bus tilted on the wrong side for him. And Andy had very minor injuries, barely anything."
"Really? That's lucky, considering he was driving."
There is nothing but wonder in his tone, and that's when I stop. Remember that Sisky doesn't know.
I say nothing.
"What about Brendon?"
"Bren?" I repeat quietly. My eyes dart to the shrine set up by Followers fans. A newer note hasn't been destroyed by the weather yet. The ink has smudged, but the letters are big and the note is short: 'I love you, Ryan'. A shrine to one of the worst nights of my life. When Brendon didn't... When he didn't show up in Portland. When it became clear that it was all over. "Brendon wasn't on the bus." Sisky seems surprised. It's becoming rare for me to tell him something he doesn't know. "He'd quit. I mean that, uh –" I scratch the side of my head worriedly. Guiltily. "He had to stay in San Francisco, he had something to do. He wasn't on the bus."
"Wow. Now that's lucky. From his perspective, I mean. Imagine if he had been on it, you know? He might've ended up being the one casualty."
I don't entertain this thought or scenario for a second.
"If Brendon had been on the bus, then we wouldn't have crashed."
He stops. "What do you...?" He must see the guilt on me because he pales. "Fuck. What do you mean?"
"I drove." His gasp is timed perfectly. "I was – I was the one."
"No, you – I've seen the police report, Ry, it wasn't –"
"We lied. I was drunk, we couldn't – Couldn't risk me getting charged with a DUI, causing a crash. There were people in the car I hit, and we thought someone might. Might die, and then – Fuck, they could've put me in jail, and I was too famous for that. Too talented for that. We lied. Andy got compensated for taking the blame." Sisky appears to be in complete shock. "I drove. Fuck. I drove that bus, Sisky. And I was drunk because Brendon had left me. I was a mess, so – So had he stayed, I wouldn't have been driving. I wouldn't have..." I wipe my cheeks and look away from him, trying to control my breathing. My eyes land on the shrine again. What a sickening, disgusting glorification of death. Who would commemorate that? I try so hard to forget.
But now I remember why I need to be kept away from people. At that moment, I see it so clearly.
Just when I thought that maybe a semi-return would be appropriate, just when...
"I thought you said you two weren't together," Sisky says quietly, without blame, and that helps some. Eases the pain a little. Because he'd have the right to tell me to go fuck myself, for having been that selfish. I know I was. Spencer's forgiven me. I could have made Suzie fatherless that night, Haley a widow, but Spencer's forgiven me. The other guys – Brent, Joe, Pete – never will. But they would hate me regardless, the crash just adds to it.
Brendon and I never really talked about it either, but he must have thought it only showed what a fuck up I was. Am.
"We weren't together that summer, I didn't lie. We've never been together. It was a summer fling. A tour fling. But fuck," I say almost desperately, "that doesn't mean that I wasn't in love with him. I kept convincing myself that it was just intense sex."
He looks embarrassed by my honesty, but this is what he wanted, wasn't it? The uncensored truth. Me finally telling him all those things that no one should know about a man they adore.
When I think of that summer, a stupid sensation takes over, like butterflies fluttering in my stomach. When I first met him. When things were so good between us. When we could have – If it only had gone differently, if he hadn't been so... And then it all ends here. On cold ground by Interstate 5.
"I was fucking confused, alright?" I say desperately, needing to justify this at least a little. "I mean, the sex – the sex was one thing, that I could categorise if I tried hard enough. Sex with him was amazing sex but, you know, that didn't necessarily mean anything. But the way I felt, the way it felt when I was with him... That part wasn't easy at all."
"And you were dating Jac."
"Until I wasn't," I say dismissively, and Sisky knows about Jac and Brent, I have informed him of it since in his interviews both parties conveniently left out their affair to make themselves look good. Fuckers. "She cheated on me with a lot of people, and I cheated on her with a lot of people. Brendon was one of them. But he wasn't just... He was so much..."
"More."
Yeah.
Cars pass us by, all driving along with ease. Passing the crash site where candles burn. People come here daily, they must do.
"The band was dying and Spencer was leaving and Brendon was gone. Is that excuse enough?" I ask quietly, a rhetorical question that doesn't need an answer. I don't want it to be answered because I couldn't bare it.
"I'm sorry," he then says quietly. He sounds genuinely sorry. "You didn't mean it, Ryan. Accidents... Accidents happen. It was bad visibility, it was raining hard. The police report said..." The words are difficult for him to say. He sounds sad and disappointed even as he's trying to release me from culpability. That's alright. I'm sad and disappointed too. I am to blame. "Why did he stay in San Francisco?"
"Because I fucked it up. He told me how he felt, and I laughed in his face." God, I fucked it up. My throat feels dry. It's not because I'm telling Sisky, however. There isn't much more I can confess, no further disappointments I could offer.
"But you were confused, you didn't know that –"
"I knew. Deep down, I knew, and it fucking scared me. I even... I even remember when I realised that him and I... We'd fought, I don't – I don't even remember what about, but he was angry with me, and I was all cut up about it. But we made up and he – Or we… We. We slept in the back of the bus from Omaha to Denver. There was a bed back there, for me. We'd never – been together like that before. I didn't sleep, but he did. In my arms. And I think that's when I first… But I just couldn't admit it."
Five years later, here I am. Finally admitting it. I didn't fall in love with him in New York. It was before that, long before that.
He says, "From Omaha to Denver. That's a long drive."
"It was." An awkward silence lands on us. I think of Brendon curling up into me, breathing steadily. How I kept him close but was so aware of the door, worried about someone just coming in and exposing us. Only a matter of time before they'd find us. Holding him closer. Confused, fucking confused, but so caught up in it. I didn't really understand what I was feeling for him. "I think that ride was the first time a tiny part of my brain acknowledged that something had changed. Because there he was. Just walking into my life. Wrecking it in his wake." I take in an unsteady breath. "Like a car crash."
And with one last look at the roadside shrine, I turn my back on the crime scene. Start heading back to the car. I feel shaken up and useless, ripped open. Sisky follows me, and I wipe my cheeks as inconspicuously as possible.
When we get back in the car, we both just sit there. Watch the distant, weak orange spots of candles ahead of us. It starts to rain again, a steady drumming on the car roof. It's cold and our breaths rise like smoke. But we don't move.
"Did you ever see him again until New York?"
"No."
"So how did you find him again?"
"Bumped into each other at a party."
"Small world."
"Miniscule."
He says, "Fate."
I don't fully believe that.
He puts the camera in the backseat before he offers me a cigarette. We both light one and smoke. The last rays of weak sunshine get sucked out, and the dark of the night slowly swallows us, but we're not in a hurry.
"Well, this is what I've got," he says at length. "My theory, my version. You and him, well, clearly it didn't work out that summer. But then in New York, you meet again. 708? Him. A room number. The Chelsea Hotel, right? I know you lived there. And the song's about an affair, everyone knows that. It's... it's obvious now that it's about him. And the Auden poem you quote in the lyrics, that poem's about a guy. Auden was gay. It makes sense now, you must have – related, I guess. You were with Keltie, though. He was with Shane. But you two still..." We still. I say nothing to his version because we both know it's accurate. "You cheated on Keltie with him or a lot of people?"
"A few people," I say honestly. Don't think of her red eyes when I made her cry. "Mostly, uh. Mostly it was men." It justified it somehow, that I cheated on her with men and not other women. "I tried to be what she deserved, you know, but I couldn't. She wanted a good man. I wasn't. And then I met him again. And then it was just him."
It was always just him.
"What about him and Shane? Did Brendon... with other guys or just you?"
"Just me." It feels validating even after all this time. Just me. I was the only one who could wreck their pretence of a home. Only me he gave into. "Shane was the rebound guy who didn't know when to leave."
The mention of him helps the visual of the bus crash disappear, makes me feel more composed. As long as I remember selectively, choose which bits of history to cling to. Remember that Shane stole him. Refused to let go. It was so obvious that he should have been mine. He got what he deserved.
Both of them.
"Fuck, why the hell did you hire Shane to begin with?"
"To be closer to Brendon."
He looks at me like I'm messed up. Thanks for the insight. Thanks.
"It fucking worked," I say in my defence. I blow out cigarette smoke. "For a while, it worked."
"And when it stopped working?"
"I fired Shane." As simple as that. "Things have expiration dates. Affairs have expiration dates. You have to evolve or die, and he wouldn't evolve, so we... so we died. Same with The Followers. We couldn't evolve, were unwilling to, so we died."
"Brendon ended it?" he clarifies.
"It was mutual," I lie. None of it was mutual. I was down on both knees, begging. "Brendon fucked me over in the end. He kept changing his mind, ending the affair, rekindling it, ending it, rekindling it... Maybe he did it as payback for that," I say and motion at the crash site ahead. "I don't know, but I didn't deserve it. I swear to god I didn't deserve what he put me through. He really..." The anger in my tone keeps growing as dark, hot flames swirl in my guts. "And now he's got his band and rising fame. He's dusted me off."
"I don't think that's true," he says quietly, apologetically.
Sure it's true.
"I can't be here anymore," I tell him, and he dutifully starts up the car.
We wait by the side of the road for a quiet gap, and then he does a U-turn.
I keep my eyes on the rear-view mirror long after the crash site's disappeared.
The hotel is one of the most expensive in town, and Sisky and I stand out in the lobby, me with my small duffel bag, him by existing, but the hotel manager escorts us, shakes my hand, tells me that if I need anything, anything at all, Mr. Ross, and guests turn their heads and mumble and gasp, and I keep my head low the best that I can.
There's complimentary champagne in the suite, and Sisky and I both instinctively head for it, soon sitting by the window showing us Seattle, sipping on the champagne. We see the lights of the city competing with the dark, the Space Needle and then the darkness of the sound and the way the water reflects the city lights.
Sisky's got his own room, a suite smaller than mine, but I didn't object when he followed me in. We say nothing but enjoy the expensive drink and the stunning view in a luxurious hotel room. Our clothes are wrinkled and our souls are tired. I feel like a mismatch puzzle piece forced into a slot.
Long neglected guilt swirls in my guts, useless what ifs like what if Spencer had died? or What if I had just waited longer? Because Shane had realised that Brendon had been unfaithful. I still remember that anguished realisation of his: "I think he's cheated on me." Shane had figured it out. Maybe if... if I had just sent him away or even told him that Brendon had been with me, maybe then – The two would have split up. And Brendon would have come to me. He said that Shane might leave him, but surely I wouldn't.
So if I had just waited. Had the patience of a saint.
If I hadn't been such an emotional wreck, so desperate, so vengeful.
Maybe.
What if.
Possibly.
Too late.
"Do you think a person can ever redeem himself for all the wrong he's done?" I ask quietly.
"Why not? Do you think God's keeping score?" he counters, though he knows I don't believe in that. He's said that he thinks we can't rule it out entirely. "I don't think He is. I'd like to think that... if He exists, then He is too great, too amazing to give a rat's ass about what humans do. What an individual does. I don't think God gives a damn if, I don't know, a Mrs. Smith in Des Moines, Iowa lies to her neighbour. God is too divine to care about petty humans. God is too great to talk to us."
"And we're all too small to talk to God."
"I think we really are."
"So redemption is up to us, then?" This doesn't sound good to me because I've been trying. Leaving New York, losing touch with friends, hiding in my forlorn house... It's been equally about preservation and punishment. If I was able to forgive myself, surely I would have by now. If I could give myself absolution.
"It is up to us. But people can change. I believe that people can change."
I gather my courage before asking, "Do you think I need to change?"
He laughs slightly. "I, uh. I can't answer that."
That's probably a yes. But the guilt I feel mixes with anger. I did wrong. I can recognise that. But Brendon had it coming, I swear. For treating me the way he did. When I tried so hard, and he gave me nothing in return.
"It's because of his childhood," I then reason, and Sisky looks mildly confused. "Brendon. He rejects the people who love him. That's what it is, you know. He thinks he should get them before they get him."
"If that's true then it's a flaw in him that he needs to deal with," he says, sounding all reasonable and sensible. But when you're the one suffering from this 'flaw in him', there is nothing sensible about it. "Look, I know it's not my place, but..." he then begins softly. "It sounds like he was a bit wishy-washy about you two ending... And he covers that Followers song. He sings your words. Maybe he still –"
"I've been down that road myself. It's a dead end."
"But –"
"No. I made damn sure that things between us got wrecked beyond recognition, so no."
"But –"
"Sisky," I snap impatiently. "No." I can't deal with any more false hope. "I'm angry with him, and maybe he's persistently ambivalent, but trust me, I think it's safe to say he's equally angry with me."
"For firing Shane," he says, nodding, and I can't help but let out a short, humoured laugh. If only. He looks at me, then, but I'm embarrassed by my outburst and can't look back. Instead I look at our Seattle view, hoping that he drops the topic. "Ryan..." he starts slowly, in a slightly suspicious and worried tone.
"What?" I manage, and the single word sounds guilty beyond belief. And there's something in the way I say it or in the way I look, there must be something there, because right then he seems to get it.
"You didn't," he gasps, eyes wide. "You did not!" When I say nothing, his fears get confirmed. "You slept with Shane?!" He sounds horrified like the act in question took place recently. "But I – All the things you've said about how he screwed you over, how he was the one who's to blame, and then you slept with his boyfriend?!"
"Don't play my fucking conscience, alright? I only gave him a taste of his own medicine. That's all." My hand has started to sweat holding the champagne glass. Fuck. "You don't know what it was like," I then whisper in my defence.
"No, I don't. But you loved him." He sounds so disappointed. I don't want to think about it. I don't like him stirring shit up and bringing back all these memories and feelings I've tried to suppress. Like that look on Brendon's face, asking me what the hell I did. And his eyes meeting Shane's. And Shane standing there, guilt-ridden, so obvious. That look on Brendon's face. The last one I ever saw.
"I loved him," I admit, "and he knew it. And he kept stringing me along. Well, I – I just won't let anyone do that to me. Not even him."
Sisky looks inconsolably hurt, but I can't keep apologising for that. I've been doing penance. When will it be enough?
"But –"
"But what?!" I bark angrily. "What do you want me to say?! That I fucked up? I know that! That it was the biggest mistake of my life and I've been wishing I could take it back since it happened? It doesn't matter what I say because it doesn't change anything. I wanted revenge. Well, I got it. I sure showed him." My words drip sarcasm.
Sisky looks pale, and he tries to come to my rescue once more. "You didn't mean it."
I meant what I told Gabe back in New York: the great thing about this kid is the way he excuses everything I do. This one, however, even he can't make right.
"Oh yeah, he fell on my dick, Sisky." I shake my head disbelievingly. "I didn't mean to crash the bus, and I didn't mean to fuck Shane. Funny how I'm so full of these good intentions, but all of my actions just show what a shitty human being I am." I shake my head in disbelief of myself, and he doesn't have anything to say to me. What could he say? This time, we're both out of excuses. "The bottom line is... The bottom line is that I wanted to protect Brendon from anything that might hurt him. And then I turned around and stabbed him right in the back. Who does that?"
He has no reply to that either.
"I can't change the past. I have to live with it. I didn't deserve what he did to me, and he didn't deserve what I put him through, so maybe we're both better off this way. Never to see each other again. It's... It's got to be better this way." I stand up, dangle the glass in a loose fist. Feel the weight of the world on my shoulders. Realise that the likes of me are best kept in Machias, away from the world.
"Loving someone like that isn't right," I say quietly. "When you do it for all the wrong reasons."
He lets out a barely audible sigh.
Yeah, well it's over now. "It's all over."
Sisky remains seated as I head to the bedroom, where I proceed to sit in the dark for a while, waiting for the noise in me to quiet down.
When I walk out again, Sisky is gone.
By morning, I have calmed down. I had nightmares again, except sometimes they're dreams. They only take on a nightmare form when I wake.
The guilt and the anger have balanced themselves out, leaving me resolute, leaving me with a sense of distance from it all. Like it happened to some other version of me.
Sisky knows now that Brendon turned me into a mess, a wounded creature. He knows what we did to hurt one another. He knows that he and I went to Montreal, but I couldn't bring myself to talk to Brendon. He knows that Brendon doesn't need me and that I am struggling trying to teach myself to do the same.
It feels like a new type of dawn, like the day after a funeral. It was good that I came here. Good that I finally laid it to rest.
I call room service, get myself the 'royal breakfast', whatever that may be, and look around the suite. Maybe I could stay here. Why the hell not? Go whale-watching. Write a few songs. Seattle is bound to offer more variety in casual sex than Machias, anyway. And it'll give me rain.
I'm halfway through my breakfast, reading the morning newspaper that came with it, when Sisky arrives. I open the door with a slice of toast in my hand, munching on it, and say, "Help yourself." I motion at the table that's now been catered for a king.
He seems like he's holding back excitement, though I don't know what he could possibly be excited about. He joins me at the table, though, takes some toast and pours himself some coffee. I read the paper, and he stares at me from across the table. He's got a newspaper himself. I don't know what's changed from last night, when I finally managed to corner him enough for him to run out of things to say.
"Are you flying out to New York now?" I ask, assuming that he's done in the city. "I was thinking I might stay here for a few weeks. Check out the sights."
"I was thinking Chicago."
"Going home?" I ask because New York was supposed to be his next destination for more interviews.
"Not really." And as if he had been waiting for a cue, he opens his newspaper, finds a page and says, "Read this."
I take the paper from him and lay it on top of mine. It's the entertainment section: Hamlet apparently was butchered by a local theatre company, and oh. Again he bombards me with one of these.
"It's an interview with Brendon from when His Side played here last week," he rushes out.
"Sisky, I –"
"Okay, just. Would you just please read it?" He eyes the page, upside down to him, and he reaches over and points. "Just read the end."
My eyes look to where his finger is and read 'Ryan Ross'. As usual. Fine.
After Ryan Ross attended a His Side show in December, fans have been eager to see the music legend make a second appearance. His Side, however, claims not to know Ross's whereabouts. "We were surprised when we heard that Ryan had come to the show," Roscoe says. "We haven't been in contact with him, but we hope he enjoyed it." Roscoe has been dubbed as the protégée of Ryan Ross. Does he think this is fair? "Ryan and I often talked about music, what we liked, what we thought made good music. In that sense he's influenced me. He retired shortly after I got signed, and we lost touch. The music you hear is my own." So has their close relationship been exaggerated? Roscoe shrugs and doesn't comment, but after a few more incentives concludes, "Ryan gave my career a kick-start. I don't know if I would've ever succeeded without his support, and I will always owe him for that. He's welcome to as many His Side shows as he feels like, and I hope that if he does, he'll come tell us what he made of it. It'd be nice to catch up."
Wandering Lips, the debut album by His Side, is available in record stores now.
Sisky is staring at me expectantly when I look up. "Well?" he demands.
"Well, what?"
"Are you kidding? He said he wants to see you!" He grabs the paper and reads, "Look, right here! 'It'd be nice to catch up'! He said that he wants to catch up! And look here, he says he wants you to come to a show and hang out!"
"Sisky, you've obviously never done PR in your life. Of course he says that. He can't start slacking me off in interviews, can he? Not when I'm so goddamn glorified."
He glares at me, but when I'm right, I'm right. "I think it's his way of saying he wants to see you," he persists.
"Because I read The Seattle Times, clearly."
"No, because –" He seems frustrated. "Because what is he supposed to do? You vanished on everyone, including him. And okay, he gets asked about you plenty, but sometimes he brings you up in interviews all on his own! That means something, doesn't it? And then you go to Montreal, but you don't even go talk to him, so what is he supposed to make of that? Maybe that you hated the show or the music or – Or maybe that you don't want to talk to him, you just wanted to check out the music. That you don't care about him on a personal level."
"He knows better than that."
"Does he?" he questions. "He can't read your thoughts, and you can't read his. And he's on tour. He can't seek you out, so he has to –"
"I stayed in Machias for seven months! One call to Vicky, and he would've had my address, alright?"
"God, you're so stubborn," he mutters. "Do you want to see him? I'm not saying get back together. You two – you've got some severe issues, so I'm not. I'm not saying that. But you weren't just a dysfunctional quasi-couple, you were friends too. You guys connected. So have you ever... thought about the fact that you need to at least talk to him about what happened? That it will always haunt you if you don't?" When I don't reply, he sighs. "Ryan. You're not moving on. You're just finding new places to hide."
I won't tell him he's right. And there's truth to his words, that my silence and Brendon's silence or, on the other hand, him speaking out and me making appearances... It can be interpreted in so many ways. How do I know if Brendon and I are in sync at all?
Sisky now digs into his pocket and hands me a wrinkled paper napkin. "Here. I got you this."
I stare at it. It's got a Chicago address on it. "What is this?"
"It's where he lives now."
Something heavy settles in me from the knowledge, followed by a silent buzz. Chicago. He's moved to Chicago? I thought that... I don't know. Maybe he moved to LA.
I quickly look away, but the address is already burned into my memory, some part of me desperate to know. Have a way of locating him.
I don't ask Sisky how he's got it. He has ways.
"What do you want me to do with this?" I ask, my voice suddenly rough.
"Get rid of a few ghosts."
"But I'm not the one who has to make amends. He –"
"You both fucked up. I'd imagine you both have baggage." He leans back in his chair. Shrugs. "His Side is finishing off the tour in Chicago."
And he says it like it's final. That's that.
Checkmate.
I look at the address again. A gateway to Brendon. Some peace. A bit of closure.
Getting rid of a few ghosts.
