"Just hold on." I drop into a crouch next to Angelo and slap Chance’s cheek gently. "Hey, man. You hear me?"
Seconds tick by excruciatingly slowly.
"Hey, bro?" I press on.
"We need to get him up," Angelo says, his eyes darting like skittish fireflies in the dusk, checking to see if the coast is clear.
His hand flickers through the air as he signals to two guards.
I rise to my feet. "Listen, he's not in any shape to perform," I tell our manager, my voice serious amid the distant thrill of the crowd filtering through the walls.
Angelo acknowledges with a nod. "I see that."
"Let’s just get him out of here first," Zander suggests, gesticulating wildly.
"Take him to the dressing room," Justice adds.
The security guards hoist Chance between them to guide him away from prying eyes. We move as one shadowed entity down corridors and into the band’s dressing room.
There, we carefully arrange Chance on the couch, and Angelo kicks out everyone but the band and a single guard.
"Anyone know what he took?" our manager asks, his gaze darting between the three of us.
There’s a knock on the door. "Not right now!" he snaps.
"It’s Samantha," a voice shouts from outside, then the door swings open and our PR girl slips in. She moves to the center of the room and stares at Chance for a few seconds. "What’s he on?"
"Probably coke," Zander pipes up, rubbing the back of his neck.
"He did some H earlier," Justice says with a heavy sigh.
"You gotta be kidding me," Angelo mutters under his breath. "What is this dufus thinking?"
"He’s not," I murmur under my breath.
Samantha approaches the couch and shakes Chance’s shoulder. "Hey, you think you can do the show, or do you want to take the night off?"
He offers her a loopy smile. "Hey, Sam…Sammy…"
"Chance?"
"I gotta tell you something, Sam. You’re too cute to be working with a bunch of assholes like us." He reaches up, his fingers inching toward a strand of her hair. But Sam’s too quick. She straightens before he can grasp anything more than air.
"Hey, dude," I cut in smoothly, catching his attention. "You alright?"
"Never better, man." His grin is lopsided but genuine as he then lunges for my hair, his grip firm and unapologetic.
"Seriously, man," I grumble through clenched teeth as I work on freeing myself from his vice-like clutch. "Let go."
Chance chuckles obnoxiously, slurring out a tipsy "snip, snip" while crafting scissors with the fingers of his free hand. The memory bites. Asshole tried to give me a haircut a couple of weeks ago while I was asleep. I’m still pissed at him. If not for Justice and Zander, I’d be a bald motherfucker right now.
"Hey, dude," our drummer steps in. "We’re about to hit the stage. What do you wanna do?"
"Stage?" Chance drawls, looking at us with his glazed eyes like we’ve all just grown extra limbs.
"Lookit, buddy," Angelo says sternly. "If you want to take a night off, you need to tell me right now."
In the corner, Samantha is shaking her head. Her mouth is a thin line, her posture rigid.
