"I know I fucked up," Michael's foot bounced in the back of the car as Grace shot daggers in his direction, "They're addictive! They gave an alcoholic oxy, it's not like I sought it out to begin with."
"You sought them out when your prescription ran out. You drank. She was right to kick you out because you're a mess! I love you, Michael, but gosh, I'm so disappointed! This isn't even tough love, you fucked up badly. You forgot my niece at pre-school, your own daughter. You want me to start calling you Robert? You're supposed to do better, we're supposed to do better. Gracie's coming around to the age where she's going to start remembering this shit, you want her first true memories of you to be her father strung out on pain pills?"
Grace's lecture was not helpful. He felt bad enough to call for help, but he had also hid it from her for months. He must've been high at the concert months back, must've been high on their birthday when they'd gotten together for dinner. He was good at hiding it and it was so dangerous, it was the very thing she was worried about happening to her which is why she opted for the Tylenol when she left the hospital and suffered through weeks of pain while healing.
She thought he had too, but Michael and Amber both hadn't said a word about the problems they were dealing with.
"I just- I just need a couple days on the couch to get myself together and then when I'm clean, she'll let me go home and everything will be fine."
Grace didn't like that idea, "Every room in my apartment is a cat paradise."
"I'm going to go through withdrawal anyways."
"Okay," she nodded weakly. She didn't know what to do. She was furious but she also didn't want him to feel like he couldn't turn to her. She had already almost lost him when he felt alone once, that had been enough to scare her forever even at twelve.
Michael was in the bathroom when Taylor got home from the concert, absolutely exhausted but also very worried, "Gracie? You didn't answer my call, babe. You okay? Where's Mike?"
"Hi," Grace was digging through Michael's backpack without his knowledge. It would be over her dead body that he snuck pills into their apartment and she was going to go through every inch of that bag to make sure there wasn't any inside of it.
"What's going on?" Taylor came closer, "Is that Michael's bag?"
"Amber kicked him out of the house," Grace sighed, "According to him, after the accident he got addicted to painkillers and today he forgot to get Gracie from pre-school and she lost her shit on him."
"What?" Taylor blinked at her, "And you brought him here? What were you thinking, Grace?"
"He's my brother, Taylor, I shared a uterus with him," Grace mumbled as she unzipped the next pocket and began to ruffle through it.
"He's on drugs! He needs help and he can't stay here."
"Are you going through my bag?" They had both been so caught up in conversation that they'd heard him come out of the bathroom. He looked awful, that was the first thing Taylor thought, he just looked awful.
"Yes," Grace admitted, "I was checking to make sure you didn't bring in anything."
"I can't believe you," he raised his voice defensively, "I told you I want to get clean and this is how you respond to that? By conducting a search of my things without telling me?"
Grace would have felt bad, she would have if her hand hadn't just wrapped around a plastic bag. She pulled it out and saw the little white pills, "This is getting clean?"
"That's none of your business!" Michael tried to snatch the bag away from her but she flinched at the quick movement and ended up stumbling backwards onto the sofa when he ripped it from her hands, looking up at him with fear.
"Get the fuck out," Taylor was quick to tell him, "Go before I call security up."
"Taylor-"
"Grace, let me deal with this. Michael, get the fuck out of my apartment."
"I'm sorry," he said and shook his head with some feeling that Grace couldn't pinpoint. He took his backpack, leaving the pills in Grace's hand as he marched towards the door. It shut behind him and Taylor went to lock it, one after another.
She then rushed back over to her girlfriend and said, "Are you okay?"
"No," Grace willed her eyes to only close instead of tear up. She tightened her grip around the plastic bag, the air in it popped as it began to leak out of the seal.
Taylor gently took it from her hands and took a deep breath. She didn't want to get mad but she could feel it bubbling up in her chest, "You can't just bring someone here to get off drugs, especially without telling me first."
Grace looked up at her with watery eyes, "He is my brother. He helped me get sober, I couldn't just leave him alone with no where to go. They're so tight on money since the medical bills—"
"Since he started buying whatever this is," Taylor gestured to the bag, "I can't believe you went and picked him up and brought him here in the middle of the night. What would've happened if you had found those and I wasn't here? I can't believe you, Grace."
Grace didn't want to apologize for once. She felt she was doing the right thing in trying to help. She used to be so selfish, she didn't want to be selfish anymore. It wasn't a good look on her.
"I'll sleep in the guest room," Grace wiped under her eyes and hoped that if she avoided Taylor's upset gaze it would protect whatever pride she had left. Taylor was mad, Taylor didn't get mad like that anymore. At least, that's what she thought up until then.
Grace could remember Taylor saying she could always come to bed, the exact words they had shared when Grace admitted to thinking she'd want space. Something felt different between them that night, something wasn't right, "I think that's a great idea."
It was three-thirty in the morning and they were both so tired. Grace had no idea where her brother would end up for the night... or if he'd come back. She was worried and Taylor punishing her with silence only made it worse. She needed support but Taylor was blowing things up, making it harder to keep her feet on the ground than it already was.
Taylor didn't say goodnight, she locked the bedroom door once Grace got her toiletries and a change of clothes out. She flushed the pills without a second thought, there was no chance in hell that she was going to let anything like that stay in the penthouse when Grace was there.
Of course she cared that Michael was dealing with something so heavy and frightening but her priority would always be to protect Grace and her sobriety. It was terrifying to think that maybe their entire lives together would be the ups and downs of addiction, it very well could have been Grace that got hooked after the accident.
It scared her deep down in her stomach, right to the bone. So she lashed out, she didn't comfort Grace who had checked out of her own head and walked through the apartment with vacancy behind her eyes.
She shouldn't have blamed Grace for doing the very thing she probably would have done for Austin if it was him. She was attacking her partner instead of the problem they were supposed to be facing together, but all she could do what close her eyes and sleep.
In the morning, there was still no sign of Michael and Grace wore her feelings on her sleeve. The annoyed closing of cupboard doors, the silence between them, everything was suffocating.
Although Taylor hated seeing Grace look so hurt, she wasn't ready to stop living like an island. She couldn't understand why Grace would put so much at risk like that— she could, really, but she didn't want to.
"'I'm going to the stadium," Taylor called out. She wondered if Grace was going to be at the show that night. She missed her in the crowd, she missed the comfort of having someone to ground her when all the faces got a little too much.
There was no response and she knew Grace heard her, she was in the living room staring at the history channel again. That was Grace's biggest tell, the blank stare at the TV while something about ancient civilizations played, it all meant she was fuming.
"Alright, bye!" Taylor huffed. She shut the door behind her and locked it before she got into the elevator and felt her shoulders go up.
When she got to the stadium in New Jersey and met up with her parents, Scott was quick to ask, "Where's my buddy? I got new picks with the gloss like she suggested."
"She's not coming," Taylor shifted her eyes to the ground.
"Again? She had to go last night too, what's going on?" Andrea asked as they walked down the long hallway.
"It's complicated."
Grace got bored of pretending to watch television quickly after Taylor left. She knew the night before that she couldn't follow Michael out, she couldn't leave the apartment without security after dark or if there were fans outside and around shows so close by she knew there would be.
She put on a pair of running shoes and a sweater from Taylor's side of the closet she was apparently never going to get back, it had the words Stone Harbour written on the front of it. A baseball cap and her keys were all she needed to grab before she was locking the door and heading down to the foyer to go look for Michael herself, despite knowing she wasn't supposed to go out alone without telling anyone.
She didn't have to go far, her brother was talking to the doorman who was telling him that he couldn't enter.
"Frank, he may enter. He is my brother."
"I apologize, Miss Kent," Frank was startled by her presence and opened the door right up for him.
He kept his head low as he walked towards her and left a generous amount of space between them. He said, "I didn't know if you'd care if I came back."
"You need help," Grace fiddled with her friendship bracelets nervously, "Unless you're willing to go into a rehab then I can't care. I'm not going to enable you."
"I can't afford a rehab. You know I can't dip into Gracie's trust and—"
"Taylor pays me five times the amount she should and I pretend I don't notice and put it into a college fund for our unconceived children. If you are willing to get clean, I will pay for it. I know you helped me when I needed it," Grace didn't make light of the statement with a smile, she kept serious. She used the same tone she used to give the unruly employees of the estate, "I called a place with some great reviews this morning and they've got an open bed. Minimum three month commitment but you know, if you work the program you could be out by Gracie's birthday."
"Three months," he shifted his weight hesitantly, "I just needed a place to go through withdrawal."
"It won't be here."
"I'll- I'll pay you back," his eyes said more than his words there. He knew he needed help.
"If you get clean and sober, we'll consider it even."
He extended his hand slowly and she shook it, "I might have been born first but you've always been my big sister, you know that?"