Page 82 of Beneath the Stain

“Hey, guys—what’d Mackey say toyou?”

Stevie looked over his shoulder and grinned, and for just a minute, he looked like any other young man in love. “He said congratulations,” Stevie said, shining with absolute joy. “He said he was happy that we were happy. He said we were all okay.”

Kell squinted at them. “And this was important to you?” he asked, not like he was being shitty but like he was trying to understand.

“Sure it is,” Trav said, realizing it as he said it. “It’s why there’s all the fuss about legalizing gay marriage. When you’re happy, you want the world to acknowledge that your happiness is valid.”

“That’s a lot of big words,” Kell said, looking at him levelly. A month ago Trav might have missed the faint quirk to his lip.

“Don’t be a fucker,” Trav said amicably, and Kell burst out laughing.

“Yeah, yeah—Mackey’s right. Congratulations, the three of you, on whatever the hell you are. Man, you’re better adjusted than the rest of us fucktards, that’s for sure.”

There was general laughter, and Trav’s pocket buzzed insistently. He knew who it was.

They get them?Mackey asked, and Trav could imagine him lying on his back and texting, hands shaking, that fuck-off-and-love-me expression on his face because he didn’t want anyone to know this was important.

They’re fine. They still love you. Kell’s going to get a hobby, and I just saw Stevie’s teeth.

He has teeth?

See—it’s going to be okay.

There was a pause, and even Trav’s hands started sweating.

Anything from my mom?

I don’t think she has my number.He pushed Send and then thought to ask,Maybe if you give it to me I can call and check. Wouldn’t she ask you?

I haven’t called her in a year, Mackey confessed.I begged Gerry to schedule us a concert last year during Christmas so she didn’t have to see me be a waste of skin.

What’s Cambridge say about that?Because Jesus—a year?

He says to wait to see what she says about the letter, dumbass! Why do you think I’m freaking out?

Trav looked away from the phone and up at Mackey’s brothers for a minute. “Hey, guys, anyone hear from—”

Kell reached into his pocket at that exact time. “Hey, look, it’s my mom!”

“God bless the USPS,” Trav muttered.

A confused moment of Kell talking to his mom and Trav calming Mackey down via text followed. Finally, after Trav’s impassioned all caps-message ofLET ME TALK TO HER AND CALM THE FUCK DOWN, he turned to Kell, who was holding the phone and backing up like he could somehow get away from the voice on the other end.

“Mom, I swear, it wasn’t like that. We didn’t set out to fuck him, I mean get him hooked—it was just everywhere. I was—Mom, I was looking out—no, I swear, I never called him that to his face.He just told me, Mom! I swear! I had no id—”

Trav grabbed the phone from him and spoke crisply.

“Ms. Sanders? Yeah. I’m Trav Ford, the band’s manager. I’m the one who dragged your son to rehab.”Three goddamned times.But he kept that part to himself.

“Oh,” she said. His first thought was that she seemed sort of soft-spoken to have raised four boys. “You’re not the guy they signed on with.”

“I work for the same company, ma’am. Their first manager passed away a couple of months ago.” Trav looked around the room—at Kell, who was having his late-adolescent epiphany without his other guitar player, and at Stevie, Jefferson, and Shelia, who gathered together in their own private tribe. “It was rough on everybody, but Mackey especially.”

She sighed sadly, but her words were surprisingly perceptive. “Mackey’s sensitive,” she said, “but he’s also his own worst enemy. I imagine this whole last year has been something of an adjustment.”

Trav wanted to laugh bitterly, but he didn’t. He was just so relieved not to hear any judgment, just so happy that Mackey’s hopes for his mother’s love were founded in truth. “Ma’am, I think you have that about right. Did you want to come up and see him? I could get you a plane and have you here in time for Sunday’s visiting hours.”

He heard the quiet catch of breath. “Could you?” she asked. “When the older boys were in school, it was all about keeping them fed, you know? And I wasn’t there—because, you know—”