Stan wasn’t sure what reaction he was expecting. Jez looked furious. Geordie looked resigned. Summer… Summer looked like she was about to cry.
“I’m coming with you,” Tone said immediately. “When are we leaving?”
Stan glanced at the clock. “Tonight. I’ll see when the next flights are.”
“Stan, we’re in the middle of recording a fucking album,” Jez snapped, his anger bubbling to the surface. Geordie put a hand on his arm.
“Jez.”
“No,” Jez said, shoving Geordie away. “Just because Ben can’t get his shit together does not mean we’re going to flush what we’ve achieved down the fucking drain. He owes us.”
“He can record in London,” Stan said calmly. “Well, not right now, he can’t. He can barely stand. I don’t even want to think about the sort of comedown he’s going through, but it doesn’t look pretty. Look, we might be able to get him to a place where he can finish recording if we get him home. He can’t stay here, Jez. It’s killing him.”
His words hung heavy in the air, too true for comfort.
“I’m coming with you,” Tone said again. “You won’t be able to move him on your own. I can help.”
“Okay,” Stan said, nodding.
“We have work to do,” Summer said. Tears streaked down her cheeks, milky black mascara leaving trails. “But we can maybe come back to visit when we’re a bit closer to being done.”
“There you go. There’s the plan.”
“What are you going to do with him when you get there?” Jez asked, looking slightly more resigned to the idea.
Stan shook his head and gripped his water bottle tighter. “One step at a time. I’ll work that out next.”
Tone booked the last flight out of LA that night, leaving just before midnight. They hustled Ben into clothes and packed a handful of essentials—laptop, phone, chargers, guitar, a change of clothes—leaving toiletries and mostly everything else behind. Stan thought a clean start back home would be good for him. It certainly couldn’t make anything worse.
The plane was quiet, save for the roaring of the engines, and Ben promptly curled up in his first class seat and went back to sleep. He’d barely spoken to anyone in weeks, according to Tone, and didn’t seem to want to change that habit. Stan wrapped himself in a huge knitted cardigan—the plane was cold—and tucked his feet up underneath himself as he turned to talk to Tone.
“There’s a lot I don’t know yet.”
Tone nodded solemnly. “I’m sorry we lost touch.”
“Don’t be,” Stan said. “Life happened. I understand.”
“I’m still sorry.”
Stan smiled softly and set it aside. “I need to know what’s been going on. I get that I’m a last resort here, and I’m okay with that. But if I have any chance of helping him, you have to tell me some stuff.”
Tone sighed heavily, checked his beer, and finding it empty, called for the flight attendant.
“It didn’t happen overnight,” he said. “It must be hard for you to suddenly see him like this, but it wasn’t like one day he was the guy you used to know and the next day he’s….”
They both glanced over to check Ben was okay. He’d curled up, his back to them, but seemed to be breathing steadily.
“He’s a fucking mess,” Stan said candidly.
“Yeah. I had a feeling, you know. Way back when. Ben never handled all of the shit that came with being a musician as well as the others. Summer and Jez revel in it, Geordie tolerates it, but Ben didn’t know how to deal with the fans and the scrutiny.”
Stan nodded. He’d seen a lot of that for himself.
“We’ve been trying to help him for so long.” Tone sighed. “It would seem like he was getting better, he had a handle on things. Then he’d just snap and we’d lose him. He’s been in therapy constantly, in and out of rehab, but no one can get through to him. He disappears for days at a time, sometimes more than a week—”
“Are you serious?”
“I wish I wasn’t,” Tone said, expression grim. “One time he just took off, and we eventually found out he was in fucking Miami. All that time we had no idea where he was, if he was okay, who he was with. Our manager had to send someone down there to pick him up.”
“Shit,” Stan murmured.
“I found him before the fucking press did, this last time. A few days ago. He’s been pretty much silent since I got him back to the house.”
“How are you keeping all of this out of the gossip rags? They report on your ‘party lifestyle,’ but that’s part of the band’s image. It always has been.”
“We have a really good manager,” Tone admitted. “She’s a good person, actually seems to care about us as people as well as the machine that makes money. We’re going to have to call her when we get back to London, let her know what we’re doing.”
“Okay,” Stan said.
“How about you? Tell me about the magazine.”
“It’s good,” Stan nodded. “I didn’t think I’d ever move back to New York, but it’s good. I like the vibe there. I’m a guest lecturer at Parsons—the fashion school—and I’m mentoring three people for Teen Vogue.”
“Wow.”
“I never thought I’d love the teaching as much as I do. They give me a lot of autonomy to design the course. It’s not a compulsory class, but a lot of students take it anyway.”
Classes were out for the summer, so Stan didn’t have any immediate responsibilities. The question still hung between them, wondering what Stan would do come August. He hadn’t planned that far ahead.
“You look good too.”
Stan grinned. “Thanks.”
He’d maintained a healthy weight for a few years now. There were still good days and bad days, and good months and bad months, but he was better at recognising when things were rough and doing something about it. He had learned how to ask for help.
“Are you seeing anyone?”
Stan hesitated before answering. “No. Sort of. No.”
“Well, that was inconclusive.”
He laughed. “I’ve been dating someone on and off, but it’s not serious. I’ve known for a while that we’re not going to have a relationship.”
“Friends with benefits?”
“I guess.” Stan wrinkled his nose. “I’ve never really been into the whole ‘fuck buddy’ thing, but I guess that’s what it is.”
“Hey, I’m not judging,” Tone said, holding up his hands. “If it works, it works.”
“I know. I like to think I’m a fairly monogamous person. But actually, having something casual has been good for me.”
Ben shifted in his little seat-pod, and they both looked over at him. He cracked open an eye and scowled at them both. “Fuck off,” he muttered, and turned his back on them.
“Charming,” Tone said. Then he lowered his voice. “What did you say to him to get him to agree to move? We’ve been trying to get him to go see his mum for months, and he kept saying no.”