Page 139 of Beneath the Stain

Grant closed his eyes. “You got any apple juice, Ms. Sanders? OJ’s a little acidic for my stomach.”

Heather Sanders nodded. “Sure do, Grant. I bought some special. Thank you for coming.”

Grant looked around at the table and smiled slightly. “Thank you for asking me over. I feel bad, though. Mackey and Trav don’t look like they got any sleep at all.”

“Yeah, Mackey,” Blake said, taking the glass of juice from Mackey’s mom and handing it over to Grant. “How’s Briony?”

“She’ll be fine,” Trav said for him. He came up behind Mackey and put a possessive hand on the small of his back. Well, he was entitled, Mackey guessed. “Mostly she just needs to sleep and take the fever meds and not go running the sound board in the middle of a germ storm—or go walking in the rain.”

“Way to go, Mackey,” Stevie chastised. “You finally find a friend and you almost kill her by taking her walking in the rain.”

“Wasn’t like that,” Mackey retorted without heat. He and Briony had taken some shit for this over the past week. Everybody knew why they’d gone, everybody knew he felt bad, but it was going to get chopped up and dragged over until the hash wasn’t tasty anymore. “And I tried to send her home last week, but she was gonna see the damned tour out—let’s all forget that while you try to make me feel like shit.”

“Is she comfortable?” Mom asked.

Mackey looked at Trav to answer.

“She’s sleeping. I don’t know if your house can take one more person, Heather, but I’ve offered her mom a ticket to come take care of her. I’m not sure she’ll take it—she’s got younger kids at home—but I hope that’s okay.”

Mom closed her eyes like she was trying to do math. She opened them and looked uncomfortable. “Are, uhm, Debra and Walter staying here?” she asked delicately.

Trav shook his head. “I think we can book them at a hotel. Will that help?”

“It’ll help me,” Walter mumbled from the sofa down in the front room.

Mackey looked down from the entryway and grinned. “You getting sleepy there, Walter? You go ahead and take mine and Trav’s room, and we’ll visit Grant.”

“If it’s okay with you, Mackey, when Debra gets out of the shower, we’ll go get a hotel room in town.” He grimaced apologetically. “It’s a nice house and all, but seriously? I prefer a one-room apartment.”

Mackey looked around himself at the vaulted ceilings, the expensive wool carpeting, and the ecru and eggshell walls. “Don’t blame you,” he said seriously. By the time they’d left the house in LA, the walls were different colors and the carpets were too. No big white house for the boys, but their mother, God love her, had earned some tranquility in her life. “This place is a little pastel for me. But soon as she gets out, you guys take off and get some rest.” His head hurt and his eyes were swelling shut with exhaustion, but he wasn’t ready to do the same thing.

Suddenly the number of times he would have to see Grant Adams and make sure they were square had diminished to practically none. Mackey didn’t want to miss a nanosecond that would ensure Grant could leave this earth and leave Mackey with his heart whole and ready to go on.

“I don’t know if anyone else wanted to shower, but the hot water’s practically gone!” Kell came out from the hallway presumably leading to the bedroom, wearing only a pair of jeans and drying his hair. His stocky, muscular body had more than one tattoo, but the Outbreak Monkey on his stomach was the biggest. Mackey felt the sudden urge to grab a marker and sketch one on Grant, make him a part of the band again, make it like it was.

Behind Kell came Debra, in what looked like an emergency outfit of black yoga pants and a trim white T-shirt. Mackey wasn’t sure he’d ever seen Trav’s second dressed in anything but black and white. His tired brain tried to loop to Debra in evening wear, but it wasn’t happening—hadn’t, in fact, happened during the whole time in Europe. Wow. Mackeywasan imperialist pig, wasn’t he?

“Dammit,” Mackey muttered, swaying a little on his feet. “I needed that shower.”

“You need to sleep, Mackey,” Trav muttered. “We both do.”

“But—” Mackey gestured with his chin to where Kell had stopped abruptly. They could practically hear him swallow as he took in the scrawny form of the guy who used to be Grant Adams, sitting at his mother’s kitchen table.

“Grant?” Kell’s voice wobbled, and then he firmed it up as he walked into the kitchen. “Grant Adams, you sodomizing fuckhead, you couldn’t keep your hands off my little brother?”

Grant heard his tone and not his words and rolled his eyes. “Kellogg Sanders, you oblivious sonuvabitch, you couldn’t have let the elephant sleep in the fucking corner for another goddamned day?”

“You coulda fuckin’ told me,” Kell muttered, hauling Grant in for a hug that looked too strong for the brittle bone-man in his arms.

“No I couldna,” Grant muttered back. “None of us were the same people then.” They stayed like that, holding close, and Mackey realized that he hadn’t hugged Grant yet either. He swayed on his feet again, and Trav grabbed him by the elbow.

“Go hug him and let’s get to bed,” Trav whispered roughly.

Mackey found himself steered up to the tableau, and Trav tapped Kell on the shoulder.

“We’re about dead on our feet everyone. Grant, if you’re not here when we get up, we’re going to be playing tomorrow night in…. God, Mackey, what’s it called?”

“The Nugget,” Mackey muttered, because the last time they’d played the Nugget had been the last time they’d ended up in jail for fighting. The other guys had asked Trav to book the gig special, since Outbreak Monkey had cut its teeth at the Nugget long before even Kell and Grant were legal to drink.