“What’s that?” Zac asks suspiciously.
Cal looks at the bag in fake surprise, as if shocked by its presence. “I don’t know. It’s a mystery. We should check.” He glances inside, frowns, and then says to Zac, “It looks like it’s a bag full of none of your business.”
Anya busts up laughing, maybe as much because of Zac’s stunned face as Cal’s joke, and Cal can’t help laughing too.
“I see how it is.” Zac slings an arm around Cal’s shoulders and drives him outside, where it’s safe to wrestle without breaking something that’ll cost them a few thousand dollars. Cal only barely manages to shove the box at Anya before Zac’s climbing on him like a monkey. PJ laughs too, in great whooping burbles, and Anya says, “Aren’t these boys silly, PJ? Aren’t they silly?” Zac smells like autumn and warmth and his arms are strong around Cal, his breath puffing against Cal’s throat as they pretend to fight, and Cal thinks, This, I want this, I want to keep this, please.
* * *
That’s when Cal starts noticing that Anya and Zac are getting restless.
Zac impulsively cancels a burgeoning marketing deal that Cal has to plead with their agent to set up again. Anya joins a yoga guru’s gym-club-thing and then promptly quits two sessions later because the tinkling sound of the water fountain in the back of the room makes her need to pee all the time. Zac signs up for a Cheese-of-the-Month club despite none of them being people who like anything more exotic than parmesan; the boxes of San Joaquin Gold and Devonshire Cream pile up in the fridge and front hallway until Zac and Cal are forced to start passing them out to studio execs at label meetings. Anya starts talking about tattoos and piercings.
They’re both half-wild by nature. They’re not tamed by having a child, nor by having Cal here, and he would probably be more concerned about it if his long friendship with Zac didn’t prove it’s a feature, not a bug. He’s unsurprised to find that Anya’s similar in this respect.
He doesn’t think too hard about why he feels the need to take action before it tips over into actual reckless behavior; instead he just concentrates on finding an outlet. Cal considers the various small rebellions he could arrange, weighs which one will be most likely to provide a maximum of relief with the least amount of pain or consequences.
Then, with a heavy sigh, he resigns himself to going clubbing with them.
* * *
The suggestion alone gets Anya to make a rare girly squeal. Zac grins and gives Cal a grope on the ass. They pepper him with kisses and Anya rushes off to find a babysitter for Saturday, and for all his reluctance to participate in this sort of date, the knowledge that he’s making them so happy compensates for a lot of it.
He lets Anya dress him and do his hair, because apparently baggy jeans and a flannel stopped being rock star cool in the ’90s, a charge he disagrees with but isn’t willing to bicker about. He doesn’t have a problem with the designer white T-shirt she chooses. It’s one of Zac’s, and it strains at every seam over Cal’s bigger frame, although not as much as it would’ve if he hadn’t dropped a few pounds over the last couple of months. He hasn’t been using his weights since he started staying with them. Hell, he hasn’t been by his own place for more than his mail since this whole thing started. He wishes he had his weight set, but that’s not a subject he feels comfortable broaching. It’s not like he lives here.
At her direction he slides into tight denim and his battered old Docs, then buckles one of Zac’s worn leather cuffs around his wrist. He kind of wants to whine, but the urge disappears when he sees Zac in skintight, low-slung leather and smudged eyeliner. Cal feels a little silly in his own getup, regardless of the gleam of desire in Anya’s gaze when she looked at him, but he wants to bite Zac.
Not a new feeling, but one he’s not used to thinking he might be allowed to indulge, if he were only brave enough.
And that’s nothing compared to the punch in the gut he gets when Anya comes out of the bathroom in something short and slinky and red and glittery that barely contains her hips or the curve of her breasts, and if she’s wearing a bra under that, God knows Cal can’t tell.
“Holy fuck, woman,” Zac says hoarsely, and Cal pats him on the arm for being smart enough to find words. His own brain is still very much stuck on stupid.
“This old thing?” Anya plucks at the skirt, her tone innocent, her eyes wide enough that Bambi would look butch in contrast. She breaks the illusion then by grinning wolfishly, pleased by their gaping, and they all troop downstairs to let Marina know they’re leaving and to kiss PJ good-bye.
“You’re sure being around so much booze won’t be a problem?” Anya asks, for probably the dozenth time, straightening Cal’s sleeve as they pause to let Zac run back in for his ID. “We don’t have to drink.”
Oh, yes you do, Cal thinks. You two are getting this out of your systems if I have to throw a temper tantrum in public. I want both of you drunk enough that the hangover chills you the hell out for the next six months.
All he says is “It won’t be a problem. And I have my backup plan if it gets tight.” The backup plan, as they all agreed, is that he’ll take the car alone if he needs to escape quickly and Zac and Anya will get a taxi. He’s not worried about it, though. It’s been weeks since his near-slip—he’s back on the kind of keel that means he doesn’t think about it that much outside of his routine in the morning. This was the rationale behind his tequila ritual back in the beginning, after all. His career in the music industry meant he would be around substances frequently. If he couldn’t control his environment, he would have to control himself.
By the time they get out the door, it’s ten p.m., and Cal thinks it’s pretty noble of him not to point out wistfully that they’re usually all in bed by this time.
The club is one of Zac and Anya’s favorites, a big two-story revamped warehouse that plays a blend of industrial and hard rock. The music is good enough and loud enough that Cal can feel some of the tension leak from his spine. He wants to close his eyes and soak it in, just exist in the throbbing beat, but Zac’s hauling him forward by the hand, and they’re working their way through a crush of people. He feels mildly claustrophobic until they reach a long, steep staircase, where Cal is motioned past a red velvet rope by a huge man in a suit.
The VIP area is blocked off into several small, high-walled booths. Not quite rooms, but shadowy and deep enough that there’s an illusion of privacy from the other VIPs. Cal hasn’t gone clubbing with Zac since they were still in their early twenties and there was no danger that they’d be recognized back then. He’s never known the joy of a VIP area before, and the knowledge that he has a refuge from fans if he needs it makes the rest of his discomfort evaporate. They even have their own waiter so they don’t have to brave the clusterfuck that is the bar.