Tom enjoyed the familiarity of the club. It was a place he'd decided was best after a few months of scouring the nightlife Chicago. The music was good, the prices of the liquor decent, and it attracted a young, energetic crowd they could easily get lost in.
Everyone agreed it was a good choice, so for the past two years, this was their escape when they wanted to just dance their problems away. He and Harry were regulars, with Angie tagging along most nights. Sam and Christine joined them often, with Jessie and Jimmy coming along when they were in town. Even Kyle and Kay sometimes made an appearance when they weren't burnt out from work and they felt like dancing.
Now, the music was fine, the liquor was still affordable, yet there was no more Harry. No more Angie. Because that had gone to hell with the speed of light.
As much as he tried to focus on Sam and what the betrayal meant to him, Tom couldn't help but wallow in his own pool of self pity. He'd liked Harry, they'd partied together so many times. The fact that Harry was basically a manwhore never bothered Tom because that was who Harry was. There had never been any judging going on between them.
Now there was, because Tom was judging Harry a lot. But not more than Angie.
The papers had totaled him. As much as he put up a brave front around Jerry, the news had crushed on top of him like a title wave, drowning him. Because, just like Sam, he'd always been painfully aware that everyone would realize, sooner or later, that all their heroics were only a result of attacks that were their fault in the first place. He'd been bracing himself for years, but it still came out of nowhere and at the worst possible time.
The only thing he was grateful for was that the girls were left out of this. They didn't need the pressure. They were being hunted down enough anyway just so people could make sure they hadn't put on weight or that their clothes were fashionable enough.
It was hard enough for them to pretend to be normal. Now it would be impossible. School was going to be horrid. Everyone already thought he was buying his grades or faming his way into them. They whispered at corners because they knew he could kick their ass and get away with it. He was sure things had just changed dramatically.
And it hurt. It hurt to always have to prove himself every step of the way. It hurt that people always eventually walked away. Just like Angie had. Because whatever he did, he was never good enough to keep. Hold for a while, sure. But something better always came along and he'd just be thrown away like an old toy.
Alcohol didn't make things better. It made him grumpy and paranoid, not that he wasn't already. But with vodka swirling around his head, it was wavier and somehow easier to stand.
"You sure you don't want to lighten that with some cranberry juice or something?" the bartender, a curvy blonde with a pixie cut, asked.
"Nah, I'm good. Though I should maybe switch it for some tequila?"
She eyed him wearily, though he could tell there was some excitement hidden there as well. "Mixing drinks is never a good idea."
"I'm not sure you understood from my gazillion shots of vodka." He waved the empty glass at her. "I'm planning on cleaning your floor with my shirt. So switch it up."
"Okay, but tequila makes you barf." She grinned at him and served him the amber drink with a trail of salt and a slice of lemon.
"I shall not barf, I swear on my honor." He downed the drink and ate up the lemon. "This is better."
She leaned over the bar, towards him, bringing her cleavage into full view. "Look, I don't know what happened to you. You're usually very happy when you're in here and get fun buzzed. But if whatever happened can be solved by making bad choices..." She grabbed his hand and dug a sharpie into it, scribbling her number. "I'm game."
Tom just stared for a few seconds than started laughing. He wasn't sure why, but this suddenly seemed hilarious. He pushed his glass to her and she got the message and refilled.
"To all my bad choices," he toasted and knocked the shot back.
"I get off at two," she said and headed out to serve another customer.
He didn't give a shit when she got off. He was already drunk enough for his thoughts not to make sense. By two, he'd be so wasted, he'd have trouble getting himself up off the floor, let alone anything else. Which was perfect. He wanted to be on the floor, preferably with people stepping all over him. Because that was his future.
Being a pariah. Unwanted and hunted down. By Snitch Gravel, by everyone.
He shut his eyes, the pain in his chest too real. His throat hurt and he was sure it wasn't from the tequila, but from trying to hold back the hurt and the tears.
Angie. Angie, where are you? I need you so much.
She'd left him. She'd gone off who knew where. He wanted to be with her, wherever she was. Help her, hold her, be there for her. He didn't want to be here, alone and hated by all.
A stupid tear escaped down his cheek and he wiped it away furiously. He hated weakness, his own more than anyone else's. His sunglasses could only hide so much and he had to keep it together. But at that moment, the room was spinning and he felt like he was falling apart.
His hand tightened around the phone in his pocket and he pulled it out and checked it for the millionth time, as if Angie would have suddenly decided to call. She didn't, but maybe it was his turn.
Even if he knew her phone was in their apartment, on the nightstand, turned off, he called her. It went straight to voicemail, like he knew it would.
"Angie," he whispered. "I wish you weren't gone. I wish you were here because... Everything went to hell, just like I told you it would. I wasn't ready. It's harder than I thought and..." His voice cracked as the tears took over. "I need you so much." God, his voice was pathetic and obviously filled with tears, but now that he'd started, he couldn't hang up. "I don't want to do this. I don't want to break up with you. Why... Why did you have to go?"
Pathetic. You're so pathetic. Just hang up.
He totally should hang up. Because the more he spoke, the worse his heart seemed to bleed on the inside, drowning him. It couldn't be healthy to need one person so much, to love one person so much. To hurt so much.
"You should have told me," he whispered into the phone. "I would've done anything for you, but I can't do this. I can't take this when it's tearing me from the inside. I don't want to, but I don't think I can go on. Not like this. I wish... I wish it wasn't over. But it is. Because we're both fucked up." Maybe he shouldn't have said that last bit, but it was true.
And it gave him the strength to end the conversation, shove his phone in his pocket and down two more shots of tequila. His head felt like it was full of wet cotton, his eyes burned and the pain in his chest numbed the slightest bit. Yep, it could be temporarily fixed.
"Aren't you in a bit of a hurry for the after party?"
The voice grated on his nerves and Tom gritted his teeth. He couldn't believe Harry had the nerve to slide in the seat next to him. He was so lucky Tom was half convinced he'd fall on his face if he tried to punch him. So he just threw Harry a halfway glance to make sure he hadn't imagined him.
"Fuck off, Harry."
"Is Sam here?"
"I'd so punch your stupid face in if I wasn't too drunk to move."
"Look, I want to talk to you, too."
Tom made the effort to actually turn to him and he realized he wasn't as drunk as he'd thought. He could still hold his balance and the room stopped swaying only a few seconds after he stopped moving.
"I don't want to talk to you, you traitorous bastard."
"Look, I know you're on Sam's side, and that's normal, but you're my friend, too, and I need to tell someone my side of the story."
Tom let out a hysterical laugh. It was so freeing to laugh at all the shit life kept throwing on him. "Hello! Have you met me? You're trying to justify cheating, breaking a home to me? You have a better chance of Sam actually hearing you out. And we're not friends anymore, you asshat."
"Fine." Harry crossed his arms over his chest, the confusion on his face delightful. "I want to talk to Sam."
"Grovel at his feet maybe?" Tom politely inquired.
"Not exactly. It's a lot more complicated than that."
"Oh, is it now?" Tom put his finger to his chin in thought. "More complicated than 'you screwed your best friend's girlfriend'?"
"It's not like that. Christine was my girlfriend first."
"Who gives a flying fuck? You don't do that behind Sam's back." Tom pushed himself to his feet. He only swayed for a moment and as long as he held on to the bar, he was fine. "You don't come to me, his twin, claiming you have reasons. That it's complicated. On some level I feel what he feels. You know what I felt after what you did? Broken. So unless you want me to feed you your teeth, back the hell off and leave us alone."
"You're not okay." Harry hopped off his stool too, having the audacity to look worried. "Look, I've read the papers, too, I know what's going on..."
"What part of leave us alone is too hard for you to compute?" Tom growled, tightening his hold on the bar. "I swear to God I will punch the shit out of you."
"Is Angie okay with what you're doing right now?"
His words stung so badly, Tom actually shut his eyes and winced. "How the fuck should I know?"
Harry was sober. Harry could properly interpret slurred words and his eyes widened. Damn, Tom hated his soberness.
"You broke up with Angie?" he asked, that annoying worry still in his voice.
"Say it louder, why don't you? The whole world didn't hear you." Standing without punching anything was becoming increasingly difficult so he climbed back on the stool.
"I'm so sorry," Harry said. More like mouthed because he was wisely keeping his distance and the music made it pretty hard to hear anything. "This explains..." He looked around as if trying to find the object which was explained. "Well, everything."
"It doesn't explain why you're still here and talking," Tom mumbled.
"Look, I'll go, but only because you're in a bad place. I will want to talk to you." Fortunately, he finally shut his damn mouth and scurried away like the rat he was.
Tom smacked his forehead against the bar and groaned. Just what he needed. A showdown with that snake when he was too wasted to give him the scathing answers and beating he deserved. It made him feel even worse. Having someone say he broke up with Angie was even worse. He didn't want to be broken with Angie. But she'd broken him so he just delivered the up.
Funny expression. Why not broken down? What was up about splitting from someone?
As much as he focused on the words themselves, as much as he tried to put out the pain with alcohol, it didn't work. All it did was make the pain very confusing, make him wish he could turn back time and handcuff himself to Angie, which was totally healthy.
He was so desperate even his numbed brain could pick up on it. But he'd do anything to have Angie there. Yell at her, cry with her, have angry sex with her and make up. Except life wasn't easy and she wasn't there. All that was there was yummy tequila that numbed him to the point he wasn't even sure if he was still sitting or floating.
The scent of her perfume had him lifting his head off the bar. His vision swam and his entire body felt as if it were suspended in water, but that simple citrus fragrance seemed to drive the pain out of him.
To his right, one stool away, sat a girl with wavy black hair, wearing a pair of low-rise jeans and an army green shirt. He knew that shirt. He knew those jeans.
"Angie?" he asked, his voice so low and desperate, it was a wonder she heard him and turned her head.
It wasn't Angie, though she looked vaguely familiar. Her face lit up and she moved on the chair next to him. The smell of the perfume he loved joined her, surrounded her, and his mind was sure it was Angie for a second.
"Hi, Tom, how are you?" Even her voice sounded like Angie's when she made it low and sensual.
But she wasn't Angie. He finally realized where he'd seen her before. "Suzanna?" he asked, a little shocked.
"Yes!" Her smile widened and she leaned closer to him. "I can't believe you're here."
"Weren't you blonde?"
She gave a light laugh. "Yes, but I decided for a change of image." She fluffed her hair. "You like?"
He nodded like the drunk moron he was just because she looked so much like Angie at the moment and he approved of anything Angie when he was shitfaced.
"Is Angie here?" she asked. Which was a legitimate question since Angie's existence was the only reason they knew each other's names. But it still made him wince and pull away. "Oh, is everything okay?" Her eyes narrowed and she took his hand where the bartender had scribbled her number. "What are you doing?"
"Making bad decisions?" he answered stupidly.
A part of him was sure he didn't have to justify himself to a random fangirl, but he was also a giant piece of shit so he wasn't so sure about anything actually. Just that he loved her perfume and he wanted to inhale it all, cover himself in it, live in it.
She tilted her head and her hold on his hand turned tender. "Long term bad decisions or short term?"
"I can't even think for the next ten minutes, so I'm thinking short."
"I love long. But if it's short you need, I think I can accommodate you."
"Why do all you women keep throwing yourselves at me?" he asked, exasperated. He was a gross, dumb drunk.
"Because you're hot as hell," Suzanna answered, leaning in. "And because I've been dying to do this from the first moment I saw you." She bridged the gap between them and kissed him on the mouth.
Tom's first impulse was to laugh. This was so stupid. He was so drunk, he could barely feel anything. But the feel of her skin, the way she smelled, the color and texture of her hair... It wasn't Suzanna. It wasn't some random girl in a bar. It was Angie. She was back. Somehow, she'd found him and wanted to save him. And he'd be an idiot not to let her. He kissed her, held her against him.
It felt wrong. The alcohol was making everything wrong. He was never drinking again. He was never numbing himself so much that he couldn't hold her and bask in her like she deserved. But he'd take what he could. He'd love her like he could.
She pulled back, her eyes closed, her body trembling. "Wow," she breathed.
A surge of electricity zapped up Tom's spine as his foggy vision cleared and he realized he'd been kissing someone who was not Angie. Disgust so powerful crashed into him that he laughed. Just knocked his head back and laughed like the mad man he was. This couldn't be happening. It was just a terrible dream and he needed to go and throw up and wake up from it.
"Excuse me," he said, pushing himself off the stool. How his legs still held him, he wasn't sure, because he was a giant sponge filled with poison and it was dripping out of his every pore.
This is not happening. This didn't happen. I'm just hallucinating.
The bathroom was blissfully empty so no one gawked at him as he washed his face and started at it in the mirror. If he tried hard enough, he could picture himself as a unicorn. Yep. He was a graceful unicorn and nothing had happened.
But what if it had? What if Angie was really back there and he'd laughed in her face and walked away? A slight panic overwhelmed him. Laughter bubbled up again because he couldn't make sense of anything anymore. Mixing liquors was indeed a terrible idea.
The door screeched open and Angie's intoxicating perfume filled the room again. He shut his eyes and took it in, basking in it while it lasted. A gentle hand turned him around.
"You're not going to leave me like that, are you?" Angie-not-Angie asked.
"This is so fucked up," he mumbled.
She just hummed and pushed him against the door, effectively preventing anyone from coming inside and rescuing him from the madness. A part of him wanted to push her away because this was fucked up beyond belief. Another part of him wanted to just laugh because no matter how hard she tried, how lustfully she touched him, he was way too drunk for what she wanted.
But when she faced him, watching her with tempting green eyes from under black lashes, he lost it. He let her kiss him. Her heat was so familiar and every cell in his body yelled for her. Angie. He needed her. He wanted her. He lifted her off her feet and pressed her against the door. Her moan sent an electric current down his spine and he hadn't felt more alive in days.
She was back, back to save him, to make him happy. She loved him, wanted him, would never leave him again. She adored him and he adored her. He would do anything for her.
It felt wrong, something felt so wrong. Stupid alcohol. He was never drinking again. Her scent was driving him up the wall. All he wanted was more of her, everything.
Everything felt wrong. Something seemed to scream in the back of his head, a desperate warning he didn't care to answer. Angie was back, nothing mattered. She was there, in his arms, moaning against him, biting his shoulder, grinding herself against him.
When she knocked her head back and screamed in ecstasy, a bucket of water seemed to pour on top of his head. He let her go and pulled back. She slid to the floor, her knees shaky, breathing heavily.
She wasn't Angie.
He slid to the floor too, leaning his back against the sink. "What have I done?" The words made no sense. Nothing made sense.
"You are incredible," she breathed.
"You're not Angie."
"I'm not. I'm that short term bad choice you needed." She winked at him. She actually winked. "Didn't you say you broke up with her?"
"Didn't you say she was your friend?"
"It's not like I'm going to tell her about this." She stood and pulled her pants back on. "I should get out of here until someone catches me in the men's bathroom. If you're up for seconds, I'll be right outside. We can go to my place. Much classier."
He waved her away, hoping she'd get the message and never get close to him again. This is not happening. This is something my sick mind came up to torment me. I'm hallucinating. It was nothing but the alcohol. Stupid alcohol. He was never drinking again.
Except as he stood and arranged his clothes properly, his mind seemed to shortcircuit and the little bit of sobriety he thought he had disappeared. Back into the crowd, back to the bar, back into a bottle because it was safer to knock himself out.
Nothing happened. I just hallucinated everything, just like I hallucinated Angie was here.
Angie was not there. He had no idea where she was. And nothing had happened. He'd never left the bar.
Stupid alcohol. He was never drinking again.
♠️♠️♠️
This part was very tricky to write because... Well, I'm guessing you're already guessing why. Why am I doing this? Because people are weak and imperfect and pain makes them do things they later regret.
And because getting that drunk when you're in pain is always such a bad idea. Needless to say, major backlash is in order.
Is this it? Has Tangie gone down for you? Any chance of fixing it? Of fixing this?
Sober Tom is probably going to hate himself as much as everyone probably hates him right now. (I don't. I'm actually really sorry for him. Boy needs help).
Stick around. This chapter will have another part because there are still some interesting things left to happen and some consequences.
And yes, I know, I'm on a roll, but I can't help it. I'm equally excited and scared about posting this chapter. I'm sure you can guess why.
So any thoughts are appreciated and if you enjoyed it (kinda hard with this one) press the star.
Here's hoping to more productivity.