Carter shook his head. “I’ve had this cast on for six weeks and I’m not postponing my follow-up X-ray for anything short of Armageddon.”
Well, when he put it like that. “Fine.” Jeff tried for levity. “You just don’t want to sit in the car with me for five hours. I see how it is.”
“It wouldn’t be my first choice.” Carter punctuated this statement with a kiss, though not as lingering as Jeff would’ve liked. “Drive safely and call me when you get there.”
“I will.” God damn it. It didn’t feel right to leave like this, but he’d made his bed, and it was at a secret cottage. “I love you.”
At that he got a real smile, if a small one. “I love you too.”Andanother kiss—still not long enough but warmer and sweeter than the last. Their noses were still touching, Carter’s clear blue eyes kind and warm and steady when he added, “Come home soon.”
Jeff inhaled sharply.Home.Carter had used that word on purpose. How was Jeff supposed to leave now?
But he managed it somehow—he put Carter’s house in his rearview and hit the road, furiously hoping this was not a preview of what might become a staple of their lives in the next two years.
One more month. He just had to hold out one more month, get the band to finish an album, record a demo, and he could relax. He could tell Carter everything. He’d be home free.
Sure, no pressure.
He met some traffic on the way to Ottawa, though there was a bit more of it leaving the city, heading out for the holiday weekend to camp or cottage. He stopped once for lunch and a bathroom break and made it to the hotel just before check-in—perfect timing.
He’d just dressed after a shower and was debating texting Trix and Joe to see about dinner when someone knocked on the door. Figuring it must be one of them, he answered, only to find Max standing there instead.
He looked… different. His cheeks were fuller, and the shadows under his eyes that Jeff had come to think of as a part of him had lightened.
He did look a little nervous, standing in the hallway and fidgeting with a paper envelope, avoiding Jeff’s eyes.
“Hey, Max.” Jeff tried not to let on that he was surprised to see him without Trix. “You want to come in?” He stepped aside.
Max’s eyes flashed up to his, and he smiled a little. “Thanks.”
Shit. Jeff hoped the concert wasn’t going to be this awkward. He closed the door. “I was just about to text you guys and see if we had plans for dinner.”
“Trix and Joe found some sushi place they’re dying to try, I think.” Max wiped one hand on his jeans. “So, uh.” He blew out a breath and finally just handed Jeff the envelope. “Here. This is for you.”
Bemused, Jeff took it. It was just a simple paper envelope, not particularly noteworthy… until he looked inside and—“Jesus.” He almost dropped it. There had to be a thousand dollars—
Oh.
“I’m supposed to make amends,” Max said. He rolled his eyes a little, but Jeff thought it was more at his own behavior than a commentary on the gesture. “I can’t do much about all the times I got high and ended up in the paper or went to rehab and it didn’t stick or was a dick to you. I can’t give Carter back the pills I took. But I can pay you back the money I stole from you in February.”
Jeff cleared his throat. “Thanks.” He didn’t exactly want to carry around a thousand bucks in cash when he wasn’t planning to drop it on an old guitar, but never mind. He’d just pick up the tab for dinner. This was mostly a symbolic gesture anyway.
With a sound of frustration, Max flopped into the office chair. “Don’tthankme. God. I’m here to apologize. It wasn’t fair of me to do those things to you. I never should’ve made you feel like you had to cover for me. I shouldn’t have stolen. I made you feel like you and Howl didn’t matter. And I know you worried.” He ran both hands back through his hair in agitation. “Never mind Trix, who blamed herself—” He let out a long, slow breath. “Anyway. I’m so sorry, Jeff. I hope I can earn your forgiveness.”
“Earn?” Jeff couldn’t help think about how much worse it could’ve been. No one had gotten hurt—not irreparably. The whole tour could’ve tanked, Max could’ve died, Trix would’ve been beside herself. They never would have recovered.
But Max made a small noise, looking like a kicked dog, and Jeff realized he’d misunderstood.
“Max, forget it. You don’t have to earn my forgiveness, okay? All you had to do was want it.” Oh God, Max was blinking too rapidly. Jeff took a few deep breaths of his own and scrambled for something to say to lighten the mood. “Rehab is pretty intense, eh?”
Max barked a quick, inappropriate laugh and ran a hand back through his hair, and suddenly he wasn’t a jaded thirty-year-old rock star and recovering addict, he was the teenager Jeff had first met in detention, who’d offered Jeff one of the Twinkies in his pack in exchange for help with his English homework. “This one was totally different from the other times. Apparently the doctors think I’m bipolar? Which kind of explains….” He waved his hand as if to encompass the highs and lows of his erratic behavior over the past ten years. “Anyway. Apparently that lends itself to cocaine use. Surprise.”
So lightening the mood had failed spectacularly. “Oh. Wow.” Jeff forced himself to sit down on the end of the bed, because otherwise he’d pace. “So can they help?”
Max nodded. “Yeah, eventually. Turns out getting the right dosage of the right kind of brain meds is, like, 20 percent science, 80 percent dumb luck. I’m pretty fortunate it only took them two tries to find something that’s working so far.” He scratched at the back of his neck. “Not that I’ve been on them long enough to really test it.”
“I’m glad it’s working. Hopefully it, you know”—God, could he sound like more of an idiot?—“keeps working.”
Meeting his gaze, Max intoned, “Wow, Jeff. Deep, man.”
