"I had a drink tonight."
Stefani didn't speak immediately, and he closed his eyes, breathing through the silence, trying to imagine her face. Was she confused? Scared? Angry?
"You...where are you right now?" she asked, and he could tell she was trying to stay steady.
"I'm home, at the Malibu house. I'm okay, I promise. I know it's early and you've got a million things going on, but I needed to tell you, and I..."
"Bradley." He was thankful for the interruption.
"Yeah?"
He hadn't realized until this moment, but he was hanging on her every word. He wished so badly he could be in the same room with her, hated knowing she was on the other side of the world and he was alone with his thoughts in this enormous, empty house.
"I'm coming home," she said.
***
It had been a rough few months for the both of them. Work was pulling them in a million different directions, and his mother's health, precarious for several years now, was slipping. But instead of being at home with her and Lea in New York, or with Stefani, who was in Paris for the week, he was in LA, beginning production on a new film. Of course, Bradley also felt guilty that his heart and head weren't completely focused on the project, so when the director invited a few cast members out for dinner, he swallowed his urge to decline and joined the group.
It was a nice evening, and Bradley enjoyed talking about the project, about travel, and about the books that they were all reading. But the director slipped out early and Bradley found himself at a table with Vanessa and Matthew, his two much younger costars. To his relief, Vanessa - his love interest in the film - was much more interested in Matthew, who played her cousin. But Bradley began to feel like a third wheel almost immediately.
As he watched the two of them flirt, he found it harder and harder to remain in the moment. Instead, he kicked himself for missing his FaceTime with Lea that night. She was having a hard time adjusting to her new school and he felt awful being away. His friendship with Irina, which had been so smooth for the last few years, was having its own issues, mostly due to traveling conflicts and a few poorly chosen words on both of their parts.
Then there was mom. Bradley had stepped out of a meeting that morning to take a phone call from his mother's doctor, and their talk had gnawed at him all day. Gloria's physical problems were cause for concern enough, but her condition was also taking a toll on her mental health. She'd told him more than once that she hated weighing him and his young family down. No amount of reassurance seemed to help, and now the doctor wanted to try antidepressants.
And Stefani. They were only six months past their beautiful wedding, but it felt like they'd barely had a moment to breathe, let alone enjoy the beginning of married life. She'd just finished recording her newest album when he set to work on his next screenplay, and now he was in LA preparing for a role while she headed to Paris. Life was good when they were together and he knew their love was strong, but he worried. He worried that all this time and space apart would threaten the relationship he cherished so deeply, one they'd both fought for and that was more important to him than he could even articulate.
Truth be told, these days he felt very little control over the charmed and privileged life he lived.
So when Matthew took the liberty of surprising them all with a pour of Scotch from a family-owned distillery, Bradley did something he hadn't done almost two decades: he took a sip. The liquid burned on its way down, and the feeling was a blissful, uncomplicated distraction from the buzzing in his head. He took another sip, and then a third. Before he knew what he'd done, he was holding an empty glass, mildly stunned at how anti-climactic it felt to break his sobriety.
