Was.
He needed to hurry or the bus would leave without him.
No, he was getting on a plane. To L.A. To bury his mom.
He was on the floor clutching his deodorant when a door flew open, slamming into the wall and making him jump. Loud voices. Skyler yelling at someone to fuck off. Skyler never told people to fuck off. That was Trevor’s job.
“What’s going on?” he asked, his voice hoarse from crying. Had he been crying?
“Tell them I’m going with you,” Skyler demanded. He had his duffle bag slung over one shoulder, and he was fully dressed in his leather jacket and a pair of his fancy boots with tiny heels. Christian and Maggie stood behind him.
Trevor blinked a few times, trying to focus. “What?”
“They’re saying I can’t go with you, but they’re out of their fucking minds if they think I’m letting you do this alone.” Skyler turned to glare at Maggie. “I’m going with him.”
“I’m afraid that’s simply not possible,” Maggie said through clenched teeth, as if they’d already been through this more than once. “It’s going to be hard enough reassigning Trevor’s parts to the rest of you for tonight. If you leave too, we’d have to cancel the show and issue refunds.”
“Then do that!” Skyler shouted. When Maggie didn’t respond, he turned back to Trevor and said, softer, “I’m coming with you.”
He shook his head. “You can’t. They won’t let you.”
“Then I’ll quit!”
There was a sharp stabbing pain between Trevor’s eyeballs. He closed his eyes for a few seconds. When he opened them, he told Skyler, “If you quit, it falls apart for everyone. You’re not quitting. I’m not quitting. No one’s quitting.”
Skyler opened his mouth like he was going to argue, but then he shut it again, pressing his lips together tightly.
Trevor was still holding his deodorant. He put it in his bag and zipped the bag up. He couldn’t figure out what else he needed, and he didn’t care.
He heard a frustrated scream and turned around in time to see Skyler shoving two hands into Christian’s chest. But Christian was much bigger than him and his body didn’t budge an inch. Instead, he spun Skyler around and restrained him with one arm across his chest while the other pinned his wrists behind his back. Skyler struggled to get out of the hold, kicking a leg backward at Christian’s shins, arguing as Christian urged him to calm down.
“Stop, please!” Trevor yelled. When everyone turned to look at him, he wished he’d kept his mouth shut.
He needed to get out of here. He needed everyone to shut up because his head was going to explode. He wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep standing. So he didn’t.
The next thing he knew, he was alone in the backseat of a car being driven to the airport. He couldn’t remember walking out of the hotel. He couldn’t remember saying goodbye to Skyler.
As Trevor stood inhis mom’s kitchen, staring at a bowl of rotting fruit and debating if he should throw it out, he wondered how he got here. Time was moving funny. He didn’t know if he’d crossed a time zone because he couldn’t remember where he’d been yesterday.
He had flashes.
The plane. The hospital.
There’d been so many questions. Did his mom have a will? (How the fuck would he know?) Did she want to be buried or cremated? (As if that topic came up every day over dinner conversation.) Did he know which funeral home he’d like the body sent to?
The body.
He couldn’t remember the last thing he’d said to her, and that felt more important than all these questions people expected him to answer.
He grabbed a brown-spotted banana, peeled it, and bit into it, letting the mush rest on his tongue before he remembered to swallow. His mom had a habit of buying fruit with the best intentions and then forgetting to eat it before it went bad.
The doorbell rang. He dropped the banana onto the counter and his feet moved him to the door on autopilot. As he pulled it open, it occurred to him that it could be paparazzi, but he didn’t have the energy to care.
It wasn’t.
Skyler’s mom stood on the front stoop, looking tired and wearing a jacket that was far too warm for L.A. A tiny suitcase stood beside her.
“What—What are you doing here?”
