“Maybe if I suck your dick later, you’ll sleep better.”
He glanced down at me, smirked, then looked back up. “If only we weren’t sharing a bus with six other people.”
“I can be quiet if you can,” I said, waggling my eyebrows.
His chuckle loosened something in my chest, a tight knot I hadn’t noticed until it started to unwind. And that’s when it hit me.
I’d been worrying about him.
Worrying that he was burning the candle at both ends. That the tour was chewing him up faster than he wanted to admit. We didn’t have another real break until after Vienna, and I couldn’t help wondering how much more he could take before he went out like a flame starved of oxygen. Nothing left but warmth fading into smoke.
How long before it all became too much.
Before old habits started whispering again.
He’d said it himself. He had the money, the access. Being in a foreign country wouldn’t stop him. Everyone knew he was in recovery, sure, but NDAs didn’t stop temptation. All it took was the wrong person and the right incentive.
“How’s your hip?”
I looked up to find him watching me now—really watching—his expression neutral, but his eyes searched my face, stormy and intent, hunting for cracks.
He wouldn’t find any.
I was very good at hiding pain.
“It’s fine,” I replied.
My response came automatically. Reflexive. One old habit I still hadn’t managed to kill. And even though Bodhi didn’t call me out on it, didn’t change his expression or push, I knew he could hear the bullshit in my voice as clearly as if I’d spoken it through a megaphone.
“Do you want me to ask for more Tylenol?”
I sighed and reached for the tube of foundation, using it as a convenient excuse to look away. “Nah. I’ll be okay.”
“Iggy—”
“I’ll let you know if it gets too much,” I cut in, pasting on a smile that felt well-practised. “I promise.”
He didn’t look convinced, but he let it drop. For now. Just like I worried about him, he worried about me. That was the deal we’d made, the quiet agreement we never had to say out loud. We looked out for each other.
The problem was, he was already carrying so much. The tour. The pressure. His own recovery. I didn’t want to add my pain to the pile, didn’t want to be another thing he had to manage.
I’d handled this injury on my own for long enough. A little longer wouldn’t hurt. We had three days off after Vienna. I could rest then. Ice it. Be sensible.
Everything would be fine.
I convinced myself it was true and tried to ignore the doubt lurking beneath.
The show was amazing, as always. I watched in awe as Bodhi slipped into his godlike persona like it was a costume tailored precisely to him. This was the version of himself he wanted the world to see. The version the label wanted to sell, and the audience wanted to drool over.
And while I enjoyed this side of him, it wasn’t the Bodhi I’d come to know.
I liked the emo man in leather who stalked the stage with the charm of a cult leader, conducting the crowd’s emotions with every movement. But I preferred what lived underneath. The Bodhi I got in quiet moments, away from the lights.
The man who was a nerd for Japanese cartoons and built queer ships in his head for the main characters.
The man who loved his bandmates fiercely, even as he ripped the shit out of them with ruthless affection.
The man who was painfully soft where his mum was concerned, who wanted to give her a better life after everything she’d sacrificed for him.
