At 24, Izzy thinks he has everything figured out: his band, his vices, and most importantly, himself. But on a mundane afternoon, tasked with cleaning the Hell House, he's suddenly thrust into a period of self-discovery that complicates his entire existence. Over the summer of 1986, he struggles with love, identity, and the complexities of masculinity.
Part II
Dirty Laundry
Izzy Stradlin x Duff McKagan
Ao3
Three weeks later, still uncertain with the path he's on, Izzy is once again pushed into a corner. Not only is he still trying to navigate his feelings for Duff, but now he's faced with something worse: bringing him to Lafayette.
Part III
Damage Control
Izzy Stradlin x Duff McKagan
Ao3
Years are like miles on the engine of your soul, but sometimes those miles are real hard and long, and the road stretches farther than your eyes can see.
What do you do when you get everything you've ever wanted and then some?
When you're in the middle of a supernova, and you don't have a choice but to ride it out?
You just gotta keep on drivin'.[1]
1. Trials and tribulations of fame, money, excess, and tough love.
Cruel and Unusual Punishment
Izzy Stradlin x Axl Rose
Ao3
Every day, Axl's staring down the barrel of yet another mental breakdown. The fame, the money, the attention—he can't decide if he loves it or hates it. It's a noose around his neck. A leash. A self-appointed crown for the King of Hollywood. Pressure is at an all-time high; he can feel the knife pressing into his throat harder with every waking moment, so Slash, being the good friend he is, suggests he go to a certain place to let off a little steam. Axl's expecting a whip-cracking dominatrix, but what he gets is something entirely different.
Move to the City
Izzy Stradlin x F!Reader
Ao3
The seventeen-year-old little sister of Duff McKagan is running from her adolescence, her hometown, and her own shadow.
Stuck at the crossroads of adulthood and juvenility, she's desperate to shed her former skin. After landing the internship position of her dreams, she's making the trek to Los Angeles to move in with her budding musician of an older brother.
She's quickly sucked into the vortex of late-eighties LA, meeting eccentric individuals who challenge everything she thought she wanted. As she gets swept away by the neon glow of the Sunset Strip, she's forced to navigate a city where love is cheap, fame is fleeting, and everyone's fighting to be seen.
Rolling back into the city used to mean nothing other than the start of another waiting game. How long until we go back out? How long can I disappear for? How long until I call my dealer? Stepping out into the heavy, hot sigh of smog at the LAX arrival terminal is still a waiting game, but poised in another beastly manner entirely.
How quickly can we escape these fucking cameras?
Late Summer 1988
Izzy didn't allow himself to think about it much. Not in the hallway where Alan corralled them, and time seemed to evaporate. Not sitting alone on the hotel room floor with the glass rim of a bottle clicking his front teeth, and he contemplated what the fuck this meant for the future. Not even with Duff sobbing in his arms, wracked by riptides of tears and dry heaves so violent the muscles in his back spasmed under Izzy's palm.
Allow isn't even the right word. He rejected thinking about it.
Not their faces, caked in wet, suffocating mud. Not their families, vanquished with grief, losing a child in the most cataclysmic way. Especially not the panic they bore in those final few moments, boot soles crushing their skulls, lungs gulping blood and muck, that last short breath of fear before the void greeted them with frigid, atrophied arms.
Izzy didn't think about it because if he did, if he spent more than a slow blink rewinding memories of standing on that stage where people were rushing to see him, he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt the guilt would destroy him beyond recognition. He read in a psychology book once that the brain forces the mind outside of the body when thoughts are too much to digest—a bizarre form of self-preservation. Izzy's been living two feet to the left since the third week of August.
Four days after, they were on a three-night run in Massachusetts. Four fucking days—that's all they got to compose themselves, or however the fuck management worded it to avoid the PR scandal of the decade. Everything since then has been classified in one of two ways: Before and after.
Now, at 25 days after, all of them have equated composing themselves with being so fucked up that their brains can't muster the manpower to recall what happened in explicit detail. No surprises there, self-preservation by degeneration.
The final stretch of the tour feels like it's holding on by gaffer tape and apathy at this point. Ohio, Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh, Nashville, and St. Louis have basically been eradicated from memory—Izzy knows he played the shows; he just doesn't remember being there. For the last week, they've been back in Cali, but not anywhere that really matters; far from where he wants to be. The Bay Area came and went, and now he's breathing in smog blowing down southeast of LA, barely 45 minutes from the apartment. From home.
Three shows left. Two here, in Costa Mesa, then one final stupid fuckin' festival gig in Texas. Ironic, capping off the last two and a half years of their lives with a show they couldn't be more out of place at. Sharing a bill with INXS? Really? Whatever. After that…done. Finito. Untethered from the grind for a whole three months, which sounds like a liberation on paper, until Izzy remembers that downtime means thinking, wallowing, getting restless by day seven, and ending up somewhere he shouldn't be—à la Twister bathroom, high off his fuckin' ass on E with his and Duff's mouth on a stranger's dick. The only peace of mind is knowing Japan and Australia come in December, but even that seems too far away to rationalize.
They've been touring so long that it's hard to remember a time not on the road, but nobody's really found the balance between going supersonic constantly and being so stagnant the walls of your house feel padded.
The vibe's been sorta rancid since England, crew and band alike. Nobody talks about it directly; they've all silently agreed that Donington is a conversational A-bomb. Geffen put out a standard issue, polished statement, a couple of well-placed extending our deepest condolences, shielding the band from any lawsuits. Still, though. Shit's been weird. Not only are they fried from going non-stop since early summer of '87, but now there's this…thing…always hovering amidst a room.
Hello, [insert podunk town they have zero fucking interest in being at for the night]! We're so psyched to be here! Oh, try not to fucking trample each other so we don't have to deal with more shit on our conscience. Anyway, here's a song that makes you want to maim the person next to you—take it away, Slash!
The innocence died somewhere between the Midwest and Appalachia, if it hadn't already soured long before then.
—
Costa Mesa, California
September 15th, 1988
The amphitheater is packed wall-to-wall, which is something that's become customary and something that should incite pride, but Izzy sees everything differently now. Every face in the first five rows looks too young, too eager, too fucking fragile all of a sudden. Every few moments, he lifts his gaze from under the brim of his flat cap, searching for signs of distress. It feels compulsory now, an obligation. Who knew being a rockstar would come with so many fucking responsibilities?
The show went fine. Great, even, but the bar is only set to the height of somebody not leaving in a body bag, so. They all split in five different directions after the encore; Cass is already waiting stage right with a towel and a crisp beer. She passes them to Izzy wordlessly.
He nods, scrubbing the dirt and sweat from his neck and face. The bottom of the Budweiser can immediately hits the ceiling, soothing the burn of adrenaline. He burps, wiping his mouth. "Thanks."
Cassandra nods with a tight-lipped smile and peels off, moving on to breakdown gear. She's gotten good at reading Izzy, maybe even too good. Asking if he's alright or hovering makes it worse, so she's learned to give him what he needs and take a reluctant step back. It's good to stay within arm's reach in case he decides to collapse, but a wide enough berth to let him cut and run if need be.
She's been a machine since England, throwing herself into work with an intensity that silently says I'm doing everything to stop myself from thinking about it too hard. Izzy recognizes it because he's doing the exact same. Keep moving. Keep putting up buffers. Don't pause long enough for the shit to suffocate. He's still keeping an eye on her, yeah, but there's only so much righteous big-brothering you can pull off with a fresh coke drip always at the back of your throat.
In the green room, Izzy slowly chips away at getting undressed, but it feels less like a priority compared to guzzling through two more beers. He sits half-deflated in a folding chair, sweaty shirt in a crumpled pile next to him, boots askew across the carpet.
He tilts his head back, the dip in his skull resting uncomfortably against the plastic. His eyes singe under the fluorescents. Two more days, he keeps repeating to himself.
He can't decide if it's a blessing or a warning.
—
Irving, Texas
September 16th, 1988
They fly into DFW early, which is great for the guys who're taking an off day any chance they can get, but bad for Cassandra when the weight of proximity is nearly oppressive. The hotel is a stone's throw from her neighborhood, only 25 minutes from the Starplex. It's only been two months since that day, a weird juxtaposed stretch of time that's sent Cass halfway around the world and right back to where she started.
She's been quiet since before the plane took off from Orange County, even quieter in the shuttle van to the Marriott. A half-hour from her mother's house, a half-hour from Lake Dallas High School, a half-hour from the park where she and Tammy used to lie in the grass and smoke joints under the leaning oak.
She dips into the hotel lobby almost instantly, like she's expecting someone to recognize her. The rest of the guys aren't far behind, rooms scattered along the tenth-floor hallway. Slash, Duff, and Steven get pulled like magnets to the hotel pool and swim-up tiki bar, drowning themselves in tanning oil, Mai Tais, and bikini-clad babes. Axl and Izzy, true to form, shut themselves away like recluses and hide, stuffing pounding heads under thick pillows.
—
By mid-afternoon, Duff is burnt—in all facets of the term. Pink from the sun, high from the fruity cocktails, tired from holding himself upright for the last few weeks when all he wants to do is fucking keel over.
Head down on the way out of the elevator, he bumps into someone's shoulder. "Sorry, oh—hey, Cassie."
Cass looks up and forces a small smile, head still roiling from being so close to home, or what was once home. "Hey," She says flatly, attempting to ghost into the elevator and avoid small talk.
Duff, tipsy and exceptionally bad at reading a room, tries to engage with her anyway. "You okay?" He asks, holding open the elevator doors. He's aware everyone's been worn thin lately, but Cass in particular seems extra prickly today.
She leans against the back wall, shrugging. "Yeah, just feels a little weird bein' back in Texas, y'know?" It's not exactly a deflection, but only grazing the truth.
Duff nods understandingly, prying open the doors so long that the elevator starts to shriek. He throws out a weak offer, knowing she's closer to some people than others. "I'm gonna hang in Izzy's room. Find us later?"
Cassandra nods politely just as the doors seal.
He gravitates toward Izzy's room, swim trunks still damp, dripping clear beads down his calves. He doesn't bother knocking anymore and pushes his way inside.
Izzy's a portrait of laziness, sprawled out in nothing but baggy sleep pants and maroon socks, the TV playing reruns of Married with Children on low volume. The plate on the bedside table was once a thickly stacked ham and Swiss, now reduced to jagged crust and potato chip crumbs.
"You up?" Duff asks, pat-drying himself before crawling in beside.
Izzy grumbles, already shuffling over to make room.
Duff snatches the abandoned pickle on his plate, plopping down hard enough for the boxspring to squeak. "Pool was nice—you shoulda come." He says through an audible crunch of dill. "Wanna sit at the bar with me and Slash?"
He makes another noncommittal noise, nostrils invaded by chlorine, coconut, and everything adjacent to summertime. He silently encourages Duff to settle, lifting an arm in invitation, needing something tangible to bring him back down to Earth—something he seems to be getting farther away from the longer he spends up in his own head. Duff foregoes any ideas of leaving their little nest at the sight. He presses his sunburnt cheek against Izzy's cool chest, arm twining around his slim waist. They haven't spent quiet time together in ages, too busy getting escorted from bus to show to separate hotel rooms, far too tired to just be present with one another.
Izzy sighs languidly, melting a fraction. "Mm. Kinda sucks not having rooms together." Getting away with doing exactly this—holding, sweet nothings, just watching shitty daytime TV with company—was so much easier when they could barely afford rooms with two beds, let alone a private King.
Duff hums in agreement, thumb tracing absent shapes against the point of Izzy's hip. "One more and we'll be home," he mumbles against smooth skin.
"Speaking of which—" Izzy starts, loosely tugging on a wet strand of blond, "how's our girl Chloe doin'? Heard from Mandy at all?"
Duff tilts up, a wry smile pulling. "Oh, she's our girl now? Thought she annoyed you."
Izzy smirks, caught. "You annoy me, too, and I still kept you."
Duff digs a knuckle into his stomach playfully, tutting his tongue. "My dog is fine," he clarifies, "Mandy said she's like 65 pounds now, still chewin' shit up."
"Great." Izzy groans, knowing his boots won't last more than a few days.
The conversation sputters out, replaced with steady breaths and Izzy finger combing through tangled, pool-water hair. Thoughts of being off-tour start to float in the forefront of Izzy's mind, and more so, how he plans to entertain himself to keep from going fucking stir crazy.
During his last phone call with Alan, he learned they should all finally expect a check once the accountants calculate the earnings. He's not expecting an amount that'll blow his eyebrows off, but anything is better than the fifty bucks he has to his name. Actually—scratch that. $35. He bought himself a shirt from the Grand Ole Opry gift shop when they passed through Tennessee.
Duff starts fidgeting, having had his fill of watching Christina Applegate whine about how unfair her life is. Still pressed up against Izzy's flank, he splays a palm over the expanse of his lower stomach, hand so large his pinky reaches one hip, and his thumb grazes the other. He caresses with the back of his knuckles, fingers barely breaking the waistband.
Izzy makes a noise from low in his throat, groin instinctively warming at the contact. "Babe…" he says knowingly, not exactly having the energy for much.
Duff grins, leaning into the cluelessness, thumb hooking through the drawstring below Izzy's navel and pulling. "What?"
Regardless of mental exhaustion, his dick starts to wake up. He presses into Duff's palm, tugging at the covers to slip lower. "Whatcha tryin' to do?"
Duff shrugs like he's innocent, voice all faux frills and lace. "Touch you."
Well, Izzy's not one to argue with that.
Duff's mouth wanders from his stomach, through the shallow valley of his chest, finally landing on his lips. Izzy's hands latch onto the plush flesh of his hips when Duff hauls himself above, grinding and guiding their waists together in lazy tides.
They groan into each other's mouths, hot torsos pressed tight as fabric drags against fabric. Izzy gets sloppy with it, sliding his tongue against Duff's deep enough to taste the Pina Colada mix clinging to the inside of his cheeks.
Duff licks a long, hot stripe up the column of Izzy's throat, voice pitched rough and needy. "Want you."
Izzy palms his ass greedily. "Then have me."
—
The hotel pool deck thins out by the time Cassandra wanders down there. A few kids in the shallow end with arm floaties while their moms get wasted on frozen slushies with enough rum to kill a pirate. She exiles herself to the deep end, only sticking her feet in far enough for the water to ripple around her bruised knees. The smell of chlorine brings her back a few years. Long, hot, innocent summers when time didn't make all that much sense. Mama used to bring her to the community pool in their neighborhood, even if only as an excuse to gossip with the local hens from her Bridge Club. Stuff like that stopped around age eight or nine, same time Cass took more of an interest in music than anything else.
She sighs, leaning her weight back onto her palms, tilting her head toward the sky, and letting the last blooming rays of sun warm her freckled cheeks. The tight curls that hang by her temples tumble into her eyes when the breeze kicks up. In the last two months, Cass has seen and done more than any other kid from her block probably ever will, and she still hasn't decided if she wants to pinch herself and wake up from this dream. She's eternally grateful for the guys, Izzy in particular. He took a chance when nobody else was stupid enough to. Then again, she's also eternally waiting for the other shoe to drop.
She's been putting the thought off for eight weeks, but maybe being back here, in this humid subtropical purgatory, is pressing the pistol closer and tighter to the back of her head.
Last gig for three months tomorrow…then what?
She has nowhere to go. No apartment, definitely no house, not even a fucking mold-riddled Motel 6 with stained sheets to call home. All the other techs are either lying low until December or picking up side-hustles in place of the steady gig, but Cass has fuck all to her name. California seems like another planet, and Texas…she can't come back to Texas. Won't come back to Texas.
The thing about running away—actually running away, not just skipping town for a weekend when you get into a spat with your folks—it sounds real romantic until you're living in the fallout. The high wears off after the first few hours, feeling like you're the hero in your own story, escaping the villain and riding off into the sunset. They never tell you what the fuck happens after the sun goes down, and the hero is left alone in a dark gas station parking lot ten minutes outside of the neighborhood at two in the morning, a backpack with everything she could fit across her shoulders, forty dollars in her pocket, and no idea where she's going, just knowing that she can't stay here.
Cass left only six hours after her mother found out. She doesn't know who told her, could've been a neighbor, could've been someone from school, could've been the big man upstairs Himself for all she fucking gives a shit. All Cass knows is that when the soft, warm exhale of July started to breathe life into August, and all of her friends were getting ready to start senior year, Mama found out. Wasted no time in confronting her about it either. Standing in the kitchen archway, arms braided like vines over her chest, folded so tight her Walmart nametag warped under the pressure. She'd never seen her face so twisted up before, contorted with disgust or maybe disappointment so cavernous it looked like grief.
I refuse to have a dyke under my roof, Cassandra Lynn.
That's all it took. Eleven words to completely amputate seventeen years of whatever fragile, worn-out string that was holding their non-existent relationship together. Cass didn't sob in that moment, didn't fight back to prolong the already finalized nail in the coffin; she'd already made up her mind. They both did. She just nodded, went to her room, and started packing.
Imagine what your Daddy would say if he knew.
Cassandra might've only left a few hours after, but the seed of escape was planted long before.
She called Tammy that night from the gas station payphone, somewhere between the murky hours of two and three. She cried then, when Tam begged her to stay, said they'd find a way to make it work. Cass knew better, always did, her greatest strength and weakness combined.
Don't leave me here. Don't make me figure this out on my own, Cass.
She drops her head, swallowing hard, watching crystal water slosh around her calves. Memories still sit heavy in her chest like stones, vivid enough to ache. She wonders if Tammy's still living on Daisy Drive, if she's still picking up weekend shifts at her mom's nail salon, if she still tastes like strawberry lip gloss.
She wonders if Tammy still hates her for leaving.
She pulls her feet, rising from the ledge, running away again, this time from thoughts that burn too bright. Cass collects her sneakers in one hand and pads back into the hotel, figuring the best and probably the only way to distract herself is by socializing. Maybe take Duff up on that offer to hang.
She steps off the elevator and shuffles down the hallway, stopping short outside of the room three doors down from her own. From under the crack, she hears the TV and two deep voices going back and forth, assuming it's probably the guys shooting the shit.
Without thinking, she knocks and tries the handle, not pausing long enough to wait for a response.
"You guys awak—" The words die between her throat and teeth.
She doesn't see much other than a flash of skin, blond hair clashing against black. Lips pressed together and limbs tangled, soft sighs puffing into the other's mouth. It's not even obscene, no nudity or staunch depravity, but so decidedly normal. Like they've done this a million times before.
"Shit—oh, my God—sorry!" She slams the door so hard behind her that she nearly takes the tips of her fingers in the process.
Cassandra bolts.
—
For a split second, the world seems to stop spinning. Time slows, sound muffles into white noise, and Izzy floats adrift somewhere near the Tropic of Cancer. From above, Duff lets out a sound, something small, like air trapped in his diaphragm pushing through his mouth.
Slowly, like someone turning a knob down, all the color drains from Izzy's cheeks and evaporates somewhere near his chest. Reality settles, sinking bitterly into his stomach. His next inhale gets caught high in his throat before it breaks off.
Then's the moment he snaps. He shoves Duff off.
He launches himself off the bed, violent and blurred like he's been electrocuted, stumbling backward over heavy feet until his spine hits the wallpaper. His fingers, shaking and numb, weave into his hairline and pull hard enough for his ears to burn. His brain immediately swims with cotton and static, quickly replaced by unbridled terror. His skin prickles with invisible hives, heart hammering so hard he can feel it in his teeth.
"Fuck," Izzy's voice cracks, paper-thin and raised, panic starts to wind up from his gut like someone's gripping his intestines. "Fuck, fuck, fuck—"
"Babe—"
"She saw, Duff." He pants, eyes wild and alight with fear, chest jerking with each ragged inhale. His vision tunnels, blackening around the edges. "She fucking saw us!"
"I know, goddamnit, I know!" Now Duff's vicariously panicking, thoughts trampling over each other. He swings his legs over the side of the bed, both palms dragging roughly over his cheeks. His heart starts to tick up, skipping violently against his ribs, nervous system hitting every alarm bell that makes his hands tremble.
Izzy feels something foreign bubble in his stomach. A pit that begins to recede and widen like a rip current pushing back until it surges upward toward his throat, asphyxiating every short breath. The hotel room warps, the floor dropping low, lower, far enough away that he has to press his weight against the wall to keep from sinking. He buckles at the waist, hands on bony knees, a dreadful, strangled, ughh-urghk escaping his mouth in clipped, ugly gasps. His ribs feel like they're collapsing inward, bone grinding against tender organs. With each choked-off breath, he thinks his lungs will pop and splatter.
Duff crosses over in two short strides, grappling Izzy by the shoulders. He knows the look, that glazed-over stare before dread strangulates. He hooks his chin in his clammy palm, guiding his eyes up.
"Breathe, please." He says, coaxing and soft. "Breathe for me, honey."
"Breathe?" Izzy chokes between a dead laugh and a scoff, words warbled and shredded. "If she says anything—if anyone finds out—" His voice finally breaks, eyes glassy and threatening to burst. He twists his head from Duff's hand, fingers finding their way back to his hair and pulling again until his scalp screams. "We're fucked, Oh, my God, we're so fucked—"
The room tilts again like a carnival ride, bile climbing up his throat in hot, acidic waves. Izzy's entire body feels unzipped from the inside out, exposed, twitching, and raw.
"Izzy," Duff says, firmer now, thumbs hooking under his lower jaw, grip forcing him to look forward. "Stop for a second."
Despite his pulse thrashing in his ears, nausea climbing up his windpipe, Izzy holds eye contact for a suspended moment. He sees the same panic in Duff's gaze, fighting to bubble over even though he won't let it.
His shoulders shudder, posture wilting into Duff's arms, chin quivering. "She—"
"Stop." Duff cuts him off, tugging him close.
Izzy resists for half a second, then collapses, hiding in the crook of his neck.
"Let me figure this out," Duff whispers, even if only as a comfort to himself. One hand gliding long strokes over his back, the other threading through the knotted hair at the back of Izzy's head.
"How—"
"Shh."
Duff feels Izzy's face scrunch against his throat, reluctant wetness rolling down between his collarbones.
"If she tells anyone," Izzy starts, voice serrated with fear, "if this gets out—" he motions frantically between them, insinuating.
Duff nods, not needing him to finish that sentence. He's known for two fucking years, thought about it a million times more in that space. The headlines, the jokes, the rest of the guys looking at them differently, the incinerating of everything they've managed to build—believe me, Duff fucking knows.
"I won't let that happen," And he means that with every atom in his body. "I'll fix it, baby. Let me fix it."
Izzy pulls his face away, cheeks splotchy, throat working around a scorching lump. He searches Duff's eyes for something more, reassurance, possibly a promise he knows Duff can keep. He's told himself since the beginning—since that fateful Spring when their entire world was completely upturned—that he could handle something like this. That when someone eventually caught on, Duff would be the one to crack under the pressure, and he'd be able to pick up the pieces and glue them back together. But this…fuck, man. This is all wrong. This isn't how he wanted shit to go down—if he even wanted it out in the first place.
A horrifying, savagely primordial instinct worms into Izzy's head.
I'm no fag and I never fuckin' was.
The thought arrives like a boxing glove to the nose, and Izzy abhors that he doesn't fight it back as quickly as he should. The immediate reflex of disgust, the self-preservation by any lethal means necessary, the ease with which his brain reaches for the most convenient, conditioned lie when truth is right in front of his face with green eyes, blond hair, and a gentle thumb brushing his cheek.
He hates that he'll unequivocally deny ever entertaining the idea of its dormant existence, even though the smallest nudge disrupted its hibernation. They've come this far, they've done this much, Izzy's let himself fall this hard—and still…he'd lie.
In some backwards way, he feels like this is his fault. Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord, you know. Pastor Ted's voice, sanctimonious as fuck, dredging to the surface from too many Sundays ago spent sweating in a stiff pew. Izzy thought he exorcised this shit so long ago, but here it is, crowning its head when the truth is threatening to set him free, crawling out of the cracks in his mind like mold.
Izzy broke his ribs ages ago, splintered clean in two when he first let himself have a taste of this. But when all he sees in the pits of Duff's irises is love, so unfiltered, real, and terrifyingly devoted, it feels like that old scar tissue snaps right off the fucking bone again.
I don’t have all the answers to this shit either—I’m scared too. But I’ll work through it with you. Promise.
The sob comes from somewhere deep and primal in Izzy's chest. The last month and a half of repressed, frayed nerves finally severed into too many jagged little pieces to count. His shoulders heave, throat gutturally working itself raw with sounds broken, wet, and animal. He's been barely holding it together since England—fuck that, since winter—and this does nothing more than twist the dagger another full rotation.
Duff holds him through it despite Izzy's visible anguish killing him in the way of death by a thousand little cuts. He rocks him gently, rubbing concentrated circles between sharp shoulder blades. He doesn't know how to fix this, or if he even really can. Still, though, it's the only shot he has.
"I'll talk to her, I know what to say." Duff drops a kiss near his flushed hairline, guiding his head back enough to see his face.
Izzy's expression pinches, snot and tears smeared down to his jaw. "I dunno if this is a good idea," he whimpers, already mentally planning what'll be the easiest way to kick it. Gun? Jumping? Maybe a rock of smack so big, just the thought of shooting it makes his heart give.
Duff squeezes his hand tight enough to feel his pulse thumping in thready palpitations like a trapped bird. "Come with me."
Izzy's brows lace. "To where? To find her?"
He nods, bringing Izzy's knuckles to his lips and leaving four little pecks across each. "We can talk to her together. It'll make more sense if it comes from both of us."
Izzy untangles himself from Duff, wiping away the dampness on his face with his forearm. Too many what-ifs cloud his vision, too many worst-case scenarios gnashing his brain to pulp and paste. But Duff's in motion before any of them can claw their way to the forefront.
He tosses a shirt from the floor to Izzy, stealing another for himself and pulling it over his head. Hesitantly, steering his body from a distance, Izzy mirrors him.
"Can we at least get our story straight first?" Izzy mumbles, scrubbing at his wet, spiky lashes until watercolors rupture behind his eyes.
Duff pauses at the door, hand resting on the handle. "There's no story to get straight, Iz," he laughs, though there's not really any humor in it, "she saw what she saw."
Grimly, Izzy nods and swallows down the last tendrils of panic wrapped around his throat. He trails silently behind Duff into the hallway.
Twenty minutes of scouring the hotel prove fruitless in finding Cassandra, no sapphire eyes under tousled brown curls hiding in the bar or conference rooms. They're both silent apart from trudging footsteps scuffing against coarse carpet. Izzy's not so much actively looking as he is following the moving body in front of him, stewing in the irony of watching the last few years of his life, and his possible future, go up in flames right as he's supposed to be ending on a high note. First Donnington, now this. The hits keep on comin'.
In the corridor by the empty, echoing restaurant, closed until dinner service, Izzy stops following entirely. His feet simply won't go forward anymore, more so because he sees no purpose in it. She knows. Only a matter of time before everyone else does.
Duff gets a few paces ahead before doing a double-take over his shoulder, steps skidding to a halt. He sighs, seeing Izzy all but collapse against the wall, and wanders back over. The discrepancy in their urgency is clear.
Izzy's gaze doesn't leave his boots, limbs like lead. "What're we doin', man?" He mumbles, digging a palm into a sallow eye socket.
"Finding her," Duff says flatly. "Let's check the kitchen." He tugs on Izzy's arm, but he bolts his dead weight to the drywall, refusing to move.
"No point. Shit's fucked." Fear and trembling have been replaced by dread and nihilism. Izzy figures this may as well be the end of everything—not just the tour, but the band, his reputation, the exact relationship that caused this mess.
Duff finally lets the frustration bubble, deep-seated wounds between them, only held together by threadbare stitches, start to rip and bleed.
"So, what—that's it?" Duff throws his arms wide in incredulity, falling against his sides with a dull slap. "One person finds out, and you just fuckin' shut down?"
Izzy's eyes dart over under stringy fringe, sharp with agitation and caginess. "Is it not fucking clicking what the fuck just happened?" He volleys back. He vaguely motions in the air, like he's trying to shape thoughts into something that remotely makes sense. He sums up the feeling the only way he knows how.
"My life's fuckin' over."
Very teenage girl.
Despite the theatrics and Izzy's penchant for being innately melancholic, the inflection and meaning behind that thought land in Duff's chest like plumbata, designed to pierce.
Is this how it would've always ended? Is this how he would've always cut the cord?
Fuck that.
Duff straightens, spine coating in rebar, eyes icing over. "You're being a bitch."
"Fuck you."
"Fuck you, Izzy!" Duff attempts to whisper harshly to avoid drawing attention, but it only comes out like hissed venom. "You don't get to fuckin' sit and pout and expect everything to work itself out. She knows—so fucking what?"
Izzy only scoffs, arms folding tightly over his chest, not knowing how to pirouette his way around this verbally. Duff continues to loosen the valve, the boundary between heartbreak and anger blurring until there isn't a line running between the two.
"Is that how little this means to you? Really? You'd rather torch us and fuck off than try and figure it out together?" His voice cracks just enough for Izzy to catch the barely restrained hurt. "I'm sorry that this shit isn't convenient enough for you anymore, but grow the fuck up."
Izzy flinches at the sound, jaw working harshly. Thick emotion starts to form a hard lump again in his throat, guilty eyes skittering to the floor. He knows the reaction is warranted, which only makes the penitence more infected and rotten. He always fucking runs when shit gets hairy, a fetid, spineless instinct he doesn't know how to outgrow. He exhales shakily through his nose, raking tremoring fingers through the roots of his hair.
"No," he breathes sheepishly, hardly breaking a whisper. "No—I'm sorry, I don't mean that. I'm fuckin'—" Izzy grunts hard through clenched teeth, purposefully smacking the back of his head harshly against the wall like that'll help restore sanity—if there was ever any left. He finally looks at Duff, both their eyes too misty for his liking.
"I'm just scared."
The admission always costs him something egotistically, never learning how to strip himself deeper than bone and spirit, and still hand someone a scalpel to dig further. Even then, regardless of Izzy's revulsion to being seen, he absolutely won't let Duff think that this doesn't matter.
Duff's shoulders lower with an exhale, never knowing how to stay angry when Izzy shows that brutally truthful hand. The fight drains out of him all at once, like someone pulls a stopper, replaced by exhaustion and aching, blindly faithful love. He takes a single step closer, reaching out two fingers and wrapping them around Izzy's pinky.
"I know, but babe—" clipped, disheartened sighs fill the conversation more than words. "You promised not to run from shit like this, y'know? We both did."
Izzy nods silently, knowing Duff's right, and still not wanting to admit it. His pinky twitches under Duff's warm pressure, a vacillating sign of vitals.
He releases his fingers after a few rhythmic squeezes, jerking his chin to the kitchen entrance saloon doors. "You don't gotta come, but I'm still gonna try and talk to her. Up to you."
With that, Duff disappears down another stretch of endless hallway, heavy doors rattling behind him.
Apprehension and anxiety still coil tight in Izzy's pitted gut, ready to strike like a provoked rattlesnake—and despite that, his morality leans in and presses lips to his ear.
Don't you fucking dare leave him alone in this.
He pushes off the wall.
Past rows of stainless steel appliances, cling-wrapped minced vegetables, and crispers full of raw meat, Izzy finds Cass and Duff sitting on a counter near deep wash basins, legs swinging in tandem. He joins them wordlessly, lifting and perching himself opposite the two with hands threaded between his knees.
Cassandra's lower jaw grinds; she clears her throat too loudly amidst a room humming with refrigerators. "So, um…"
Duff draws in a sharp, short breath, grabbing the reins before this horse hauls ass in the other direction. "Yeah." He scratches the back of his rapidly flushing neck, not knowing what's worse to look at: Cassandra's shell-shocked pallor or Izzy's dead-eyed stare. "Sorry you, uh, saw all that."
Her eyebrows jump a fraction. "Why're you apologizing?" She scoffs, disbelieving. "I should've waited or knocked or fuckin'—" her words taper off, rattling her head so furiously that hair falls out of the clip pinning it back. Her tongue darts out to wet her lips, trying to grasp at least one thought. She sighs heavily, posture deflating, forcing herself into confrontation before they can beat her to it.
"I'm so fired for this, aren't I?"
Izzy's head snaps up, brows laced. "What?"
Duff's eyes flick between them, mouth slightly agape. That isn't his call, nor does he know how Izzy wants to handle it.
Cass wrings her hands together tight enough for her knuckles to glow, bracing herself. "I mean, I get it—"
"Cass, I'm not fucking firing you. Stop being stupid." Izzy cuts her off, scrubbing a hand over his face, the sheer tiredness in his voice nearly materializing. "You just," he shakes his head, hanging heavily between sore shoulders, "you can't tell anyone." He locks his eyes on hers, mustering enough sincerity to push against the borderline of intimidation. "Do you get that?"
Again, she nods so emphatically the hoops in her ears bounce, relief flashing over her expression. "I won't. Swear."
Thick silence invades the space between the three of them, unspoken thoughts whirlpooling.
"How long?" Cassandra eventually asks, swiping a fork from a utensil organizer and cleaning under her fingernails to occupy her hands.
Duff spins his rings, peering at her sidelong. "How long for what?"
"How long have you two been—" She gestures, pressing the prongs into the pad of her thumb hard enough to indent. She lets the quiet stretch and hopes one of them jumps to fill it
Duff sighs with bubbled cheeks, glancing at Izzy.
Are we doing this?
I don't think we have a choice.
"Since like—what, '86?"
Izzy nods, agreeing, memories flashing each time he blinks. Brown shag carpet. The crack in the bathroom tile by the door. Duff's cluttered nightstand.
"Yeah, little over…fuck, two years." Saying it out loud makes it so much more real. Shit, man. Time really does fly.
Cass' eyes widen in Izzy's direction. "That long?"
They both hum.
Somewhere in the grout of the hotel kitchen floor, Izzy and Duff both see the same vision. A West Hollywood commune hovel. A sordid space. A bedroom no bigger than a jail cell with a dirty mattress that smelled of tobacco, sweat, and each other. An apartment where they found out what it meant to feel something that wasn't snorted, shot, or smoked—and what it meant to hurt not on your lonesome anymore.
Realization settles over Cassandra's face; she reads it all in only their eyes. "…Nobody else knows."
They all know it isn't a question, and the weight of it bears down.
"No," Duff says softly, "you're the only one."
A tectonic shift happens under her ribs; painful understanding and anguished empathy tangled in two. Cass ducks her head, rolling her tongue along her teeth like she can chew through the emotion to digest it easier.
"Fuck," she mutters, voice thick, feeling the load of being the gatekeeper of responsibility for something like this. Even in all that confusion, the kismet irony of it all knocks the wind from her lungs. Her own fragile, precarious secret—her truth—claws up her throat, too fast to catch.
"I get it." She says shakily, trying to pull herself together. Even though she accepted this years ago, she still can't say it blatantly. She knows what it means for something to be too real. "I'm…the same."
Izzy's brow twitches. "You mean…you're—"
Cass doesn't let him finish the sentence, nodding in place of honesty. "I knew by the time I was eleven. I just—" she sets the fork to the side with trembling fingers, tempted by the beguiling promise of lifting this burden of solitary secrecy, knowing that she won't be shunned for it but still terrified regardless.
"I get it, guys," her eyes trade places between Duff and Izzy, so much weight behind the simplest words, "seriously."
"That why you left home?" Duff asks, putting two and two together.
She shifts uncomfortably, the cut still stinging despite how many Band-Aids she slaps over it. "Part of it. My mom and I always had issues, but—" Tammy's eyes linger in the recesses, her laugh, like windchimes in a summer breeze, floats up high enough to wrap around her chest in warm, cashmere belts. "She found out I had a thing goin' on with a girl and…I dunno. Shit went bad. I left not long after."
Curiosity erupts in Izzy; this is the most he's gotten out of her about her past without having to press too hard. "Your dad didn't try to stop you?"
Cass lets out a hollow little laugh, more gallows humor than anything. She shakes her head. "He uh, passed when I was ten. Car accident." She's talked about it enough times that it's bereft of sadness, more just a bitter, solemn reality she's had no choice but to learn to live with.
"Christ, Cass," Duff sighs, seeing for the first time truly how young she is and how much she's already had taken from her, "that's so fuckin' heavy. I'm sorry."
She waves him off, "Nah, s'alright. That's why it's so weird bein' back in Texas. I mean…" she attempts a weak smile, shrugging shyly, "you guys are like, kinda the only family I have now. Haven't figured out what the fuck I'm gonna do on break, but…" she peters out, shrugging again to avoid the severity.
She slips it into the conversation like a joke, but that plants itself right in the middle of Izzy's gut, growing out in unbreakable branches of deeply rooted protectiveness. Before he even looks at Duff, before he even thinks—
"You're comin' back to LA with us."
—
Los Angeles, California
September 18th, 1988
Rolling back into the city used to mean nothing other than the start of another waiting game. How long until we go back out? How long can I disappear for? How long until I call my dealer? Stepping out into the heavy, hot sigh of smog at the LAX arrival terminal is still a waiting game, but poised in another beastly manner entirely.
How quickly can we escape these fucking cameras?
It's a grenade of white-hot flash bulbs exploding the second Izzy gets a boot through the automatic doors, dragging his sad, dented little suitcase behind him. Even with sunglasses everlastingly welded to his face, he still has to shield his eyes.
Axl! Over here!
Duff! Do you have any comments on the tragedy in England?
Slash! Is it true you're already planning the release of another album?
According to his calculations, nobody gave a fuck what they said a few weeks ago—now they're being hounded like they're a bunch of goddamn Kennedys. Izzy bobs and weaves as best he can, eyes fixed on the line of yellow taxis waiting at the curb.
Duff tucks his chin to his chest beside him, baseball cap pulled low. "Get. Me. The fuck outta here."
"Workin' on it," Izzy mumbles tiredly, throwing an arm out to the first available cab. Duff and Cass pile into the back as Izzy drops himself up front.
"Where to?" The cabby, an older gentleman who absolutely reeks of cologne, grits out with a sandpaper voice.
"3915 Melrose Ave," Duff says lowly, flinching when a photographer jams his lens against the glass.
The driver flips the meter and tries to pull off without dragging a paparazzo on the hood. Quiet comes. Familiar, strangely comforting sounds of tires on asphalt. Duff, Izzy, and Cassandra all exhale in unison like deflated balloons.
Five minutes up the 405, the cabby shatters the peace. "You all seem popular…"
Izzy snorts, finding grim humor in the absurdity of it all. He pats himself down for smokes, fishing one out from his front pocket and pinching it at the side of his mouth. "News to me."
He flicks his lighter at the end but doesn't even get a chance to inhale.
"Can't smoke in here, son."
—
The walk leading up to the unit is a strange trip, even at only 45 seconds. The plastic ficus outside of Duff's door is still dusty, the floors are still worn down to a shine outside of the elevator, and the cute college girls who live down the hall are still piling their trash right beside the chute instead of in it. Nine months of being gone, and it feels like nothing drastic has changed—apart from the fact that apparently, they're famous now. Funny how the world kept spinning regardless.
"Can we go over the plan again?" Cass asks as Duff hunts for his keys.
Front pockets? No. Back pockets? Nope. "The plan is you can crash here until you find a spot." Inside breast pocket? Still no. Duff sucks his teeth irritably, almost taunted by the feathery couch begging to be lain on right on the other side of the door. "Fuck's sake, Iz—you have your copy?"
He smirks to himself, retrieving the singular key tucked into the folds of his wallet. The door swings open, and the immediate sensation of a gut punch with something warm and dense colliding with Izzy's midsection makes him fold at the waist.
"Oof—"
Bark! Bark! Bark!
Chloe barrels into him like a derailed train, jumping at him on her hind legs, fucking enormous compared to the last time he saw her. Mandy must've dropped her off the first chance she got just to get the nuisance out of her hair, thrilled to be relieved of the responsibility.
"Hi, girl, yes, I know you're excited," Izzy coos at her, trying to duck away from the incessant assault of slobbering licks to his face, but there's really no winning against a sixty-pound, very loyal dog.
Duff doesn't even attempt restraint. He kicks his bags to the side carelessly, throwing himself onto the floor to intercept the attention with arms thrown wide. "There she is, there's my girl."
She abandons Izzy at the sight, rolling onto his chest like she still fits there, smothering Duff in blonde fur. He drags her close, squeezing her so hard she writhes and kicks against him to escape.
Cass leans against the door, grinning as Chloe eventually trots over and nudges at her sneakers with suspicious curiosity. She holds her hand out palm-first, letting the pup do the obligatory sniff-test. "She's huge."
"She's a sweetheart." Duff corrects, peeling himself from the floor and relocating to the sofa he's dreamt of for the past almost year.
From the kitchen, where Izzy is already cataloguing what's gone radioactively rotten in the fridge, mouths, No, she's not to Cass.
—
Well past nine, the jetlag starts to creep up. Izzy sprawls lazily on one end of the couch, one leg kicked on the coffee table littered with Chinese takeout boxes and drained beer cans. Chloe nestles herself between him and Cass, snoring softly in her lap as she massages the downy fur of her ears.
She clears her throat, knowing she's gotta get this part over with sooner rather than later. "I really can't thank you enough. Both of you." Cass tips her chin to the bathroom, the faint sounds of Duff showering traveling under the door.
Izzy waves her off with a tilt of his can. "Ah, don't worry about it. Wasn't gonna let you go homeless again."
Cass hums, gently tracing the ridge of Chloe's snout with the back of her knuckles. "I know, but still…feels like so much shit has gone down lately. I dunno what to make of any of it." She's putting it lightly. Running away with strangers, England, the unsalvageable honesty that happened in Texas. Her entire existence got flipped inside out in a matter of a few months—and apparently, so did Duff and Izzy's.
Izzy nods, drawing in a slow breath. They haven't debriefed anything, not that they really needed to, but there's something that still sits weird under his skin at the thought that his personal life isn't as insular anymore. Unnerving at best, life-shattering at worst.
He rakes back his hair with a loose grip, finishing his last sip and letting the can clatter amongst the debris. "Are you curious about it?"
"'Bout what?" Cass hums.
"Any of it." Izzy shrugs. "What to expect out here, what you need to know…" He pauses, sighing before reluctantly adding, "us." He motions to himself, the apartment, and the general space between him and the bathroom. "You can ask, I don't mind."
Cassandra considers it for a moment, adjusting Chloe's pink collar. "Okay. Like, two and a half years, right?" She jerks her chin to the door.
Izzy nods.
"How the fuck have you hidden it so long? Didn't you all use to live in the same house?"
He snorts, a wry smirk carving across his lips. If those walls could talk. "Yeah. We were just careful, I guess. Had to keep on our toes."
"And you still do that on the road?"
"Try to. Usually works," Izzy directs a playful glare at her, no real scorn behind it, "except when someone doesn't knock."
Cassandra laughs, putting her palms up in surrender. "Sorry, now I know better." She sinks back into the cushions, head lolling against the backrest. "Doesn't that get…I dunno, exhausting? Always having to pretend?"
Izzy pauses. He lets the question hang in the air for a beat, feeling the weight of his own answer on his tongue. "Yeah. Real tired."
The bathroom door swings open, and Duff shuffles out with damp hair trailing steam behind him, pulled toward the bedroom on autopilot. Izzy takes that as his cue, grateful for it, not wanting to sit with the pang that opened in his chest.
He gives Chloe one last scratch on her back, hauling himself up with a grunt. "M'gonna try and sleep. Can maybe show you around town tomorrow if you're up for it."
"Yeah," Cass nods, curling around Chloe, who's quickly assigned herself as a personal heated blanket. "That'd be cool."
The bedroom door clicks softly behind him; Duff's already half-unconscious before his head hits a pillow, stretched diagonally across the bed in a way that leaves roughly a square inch of space for Izzy to faceplant.
He peels off his shirt and jeans, shoving at Duff's side. "Move."
Duff grumbles into fabric, barely shifting over. They do the routine adjustment tango until it works out the way it always does; Izzy flat on his back, Duff halfway on top of him with a weighted arm and leg thrown across his middle. Warm, solid, and feeling like the only thing that's made sense in weeks.
Izzy stares at the ceiling for a minute, refamiliarizing himself with the Rorschach water stains that bloom above him in the dark. The quiet always makes his ears buzz too loudly, a continuous pest of a hum that's become an unwanted companion. Izzy opens his mouth just to drown it.
"I've been thinkin'," He whispers at a low enough volume to not carry through the walls.
Duff makes a deep, drowsy sound. "Uh oh."
Izzy tuts, "m'serious." He shifts slightly, positioning Duff's head under his chin, gliding split fingertips over the ridges in his long spine. "About my place…it's just sittin' empty. Lights and water probably been off for a month or two."
"…Yeah. And?"
"I mean…Cass doesn't know anyone here but us. She can't couch hop if she's alone, y'know? I doubt she'll be able to find a cheap enough place before Japan." Izzy fidgets in his skin, mentally inching himself closer to what he's really meaning to say. "Whatever she banked from teching would cover a few months, easy."
Duff lifts his head an inch, freshly washed tufts of soft blond still visible even in the low light. He peers at Izzy sleepily. "You givin' it to her?"
"Thinkin' about it."
Another beat of quiet. Then, more awake, "What about you?"
Here's the part Izzy's been flip-flopping over for a few weeks now, dithering between following his heart and listening to that hooked-deep instilled sense of flightiness. He exhales through his nose, swallowing hard enough for his throat to bob.
"Thought maybe I'd—" He stops himself, softening the edge, "I mean, if you'd be cool with it—"
Duff feels his chest skip, blinking up with big, hopeful eyes, a small part of him needing to hear Izzy say it just to make sure he isn't dreaming.
Izzy bites the inside of his cheek, shoving himself over the cliff's edge and watching his better judgment plummet alongside him. "Figured I'd stay here with you," he finally whispers roughly. "Properly this time, not just showing up one day and squatting for a week—but actually moving my shit here. Maybe. I dunno, if that's something you want."
The silence inflates for five seconds too long, hesitant like a held breath. Duff smiles wide; Izzy can't see it, but he hears the wet pull of his mouth stretching across his teeth. He settles his head back down, arm winding tighter across his middle.
"Yeah. I want that."
Izzy exhales the breath trapped between his ribs. He finally relaxes, shoulders softening.
Years are like miles on the engine of your soul, but sometimes those miles are real hard and long, and the road stretches farther than your eyes can see.
What do you do when you get everything you've ever wanted and then some?
When you're in the middle of a supernova, and you don't have a choice but to ride it out?
You just gotta keep on drivin'. [1]
1. Trials and tribulations of fame, money, excess, and tough love.
Mmmkay. Genuine question. Do you guys prefer the longer chapters (10k+ words) or the shorter ones (under 10k)? The current chapter I have for DC is around 8k, and will probably go on for a little longer, but there's this whole big section I have planned that could technically be a standalone chapter of itself, and I think that's the move, just so I don't overwhelm everyone. Still, though, I've been yammering A LOT so far in this story, and I wanna know your thoughts ! I will not be offended either way ! :)
whatcha think?
yes please keep yapping (bigger chapters)
omg stop talking so much i have a hard time reading such long chapters (shorter)
Hi hi, I absolutely adore your writing. It's some of my favorite works ever. So here's a question, what inspires you while you write? Does anything help with writers block in your case? Also! Do you think you'll write more Izzy and Axl fics? I love how you write them interacting and it would be cool to see more of it lol. Anyways, ty for writing some of the best fics ever your truly the best xo <33
Hi!! Thank you so much for the kind words. I hope you can feel the love and appreciation I'm sending your way <333
I'm gonna break down my answers as best I can!
I think I get the most inspiration by reading books and fics, actually. Sometimes I'll be reading something, and a certain line will kinda just click into place in my mind, and that'll set me off and push me to start writing down ideas. Some of the fav fics I've drawn inspiration from are Rocket Queen (@duffmckagans) and anything by Adrian! (@ajmvis) Both of them are absolutely drop-dead gorgeous authors, and seeing how well they write literally lights a fire under my ass to get my shit together, lol. (Spring Cleaning was legit made only because of 69 days. Read his story asap if you haven't already!)
For writer's block, it's an uphill battle for me. I still struggle with it more often than not, but what I found works best is to just step away and not force myself so hard to the point where I feel like I'm just not writing anything productive, y'know? Also, I'm so obsessive-compulsive with the work I put out, which is why some chapters take longer to publish (and also work and all those fun adult bullshit responsibilities getting in the way) Even if I think something is ready to go, I'll let it sit and stew on my computer for a few days, just in case I go back and re-read something and feel like it could be different. I think the main thing I fight myself on is getting stuck on a part that I know needs a lot of exposition or boring details before I get to the good stuff. Like, for example, right now, chapter three of DC is 8k words in, and I'm dragging my fucking heels trying to get through a lull in the plot with a bunch of logistics before I can write out a fun scene I've been brainstorming. Aggravating enough, I know the only way out is through, so I try my best to get all the boring stuff done (bc I know if I just skip over it entirely, I'll feel like something's missing), that way it leaves me room to just fuck around and make them do some gay shit LMAO
I've only recently started to actually plan out my chapters before I dive in, which has helped a lot. I used to literally just open a blank document and go fucking balls out crazy, which is fine, but it got to the point where I would have so many rapid-fire ideas of what I wanted to happen in the story that it would become paralyzing, and I couldn't organize my thoughts well enough to put them on paper. Now, though, I've started to break down the plot/actions/exposition/climax/fall, and that's helped me funnel down all my ideas and make things a little more digestible.
For my Izzaxl stuff...UGHHHHH. I really, really want to dive back into Cruel and Unusual, but the thing about writing Axl is that it's a challenge for me. Fun, yeah, but a challenge nonetheless. He's obviously infamous for being explosive and yadda yadda yadda all his antics, but I feel like he's so much more than that one-dimensional characteristic. It's the same with how I write Duzzy. I try to get into their heads and write them how I think they would act, but with Axl, he's such a complex human with all this tragic history, so writing from inside his brain is like trying to solve a puzzle. Admittedly, I've kinda made Ax the villain or antagonist in previous works, which I do feel really bad about, and it kinda makes me a hypocrite. But moving forward, I want to treat him with care and write him as the beautifully complicated human he is.
"Kinda fucked, huh?" Izzy jokes weakly against Duff's lips.
"What—sneaking blow? Or the fact that we're slow dancing next to a urinal?"
"Both."
Summer 1988
Three months have a tendency to feel like three years when you're constantly living at lightspeed. Every hard blink seems to land him in a new city, barely remembering the last one he tore through. Tonight, Izzy stands in the wings at the Poplar Creek Music Theater. Illinois humidity bakes off the concrete, hair uncomfortably sticking to his temples and neck.
He watches the Toxic Twins command the stage, 25,000 people's collective attention rapt and dialed in to one place. The venue is alive, sentient in its energy. Enough voltage to feel in the back of his throat. Joe's fingers dance across the frets, Steven levels the pavilion with a scream that's echoed back ten times louder than the PA system can handle.
Thirty minutes ago, his band got this same endless crowd moving for his idols. This morning, his album hit #3 on the Billboard charts. Tomorrow, they'll move on to play another sold-out 20,000-cap gig. But now, watching the people he grew up fantasizing about becoming, all Izzy can think is—fuck, I wish I could do another bump.
Not now, obviously. But soon. When Aerosmith's crew disperses, and he can stop being paranoid about this dumbass dry-tour rule and the looming threat of being booted off if any of them get caught imbibing around someone sober.
The irritation is still there, though. Crawling under his skin, making his tongue itch, distracting him from the thing he should be losing his shit over:
You're on the same stage as Aerosmith, dude. Because your band is opening for them on a nationwide tour.
Sixteen-year-old Izzy would've given his left nut to even be in the same fucking building as Joe and Steven. And now he's doing just that, still enjoying it, sure, but more concerned about the baggie of coke in his breast pocket, the bottles of wine stashed on the bus, and whether he can make it another forty-five minutes without either.
Which, theoretically, he could—just not comfortably.
"Fuckin' insane, right?" Duff materializes at his side, hair still sweaty from their set earlier, eyes bright and full of the awe that Izzy still refuses to allow himself to feel.
"Yeah," he nods, "pretty bitchin'."
Duff's hand finds the small of Izzy's back for a fraction of a second, the briefest press of warmth before it pulls away and hides in his front pocket. Passing touches go down easier in the dark.
"How you feelin'?" Duff asks close to Izzy's ear, gently nudging his shoulder.
He's been asking it more often than not lately. You good? You still with me? You plan on ODing today?
Izzy nods again, trying not to grow agitated with the constant hovering ever since his little slip-up with the quaaludes. His mistake. He owned up to it when Steven eventually found him and slapped him awake. Fuckin' things decided to unionize and hit all at once.
"Yeah, man," his arm raises to do a sweeping gesture over what's in front of them. "Just takin' it all in still."
Duff catches the edge in his tone, backing off. He offers the crinkled can of Coke sweating in his fist, shoving it in Izzy's direction.
"Nah, m'alright." He waves him off.
Duff grabs his wrist and forces the can into his palm. "There's Jack in it. Drink. You're being pissy."
Izzy smirks, laughing through his nose. "Sneaky little shit," he mouths around the lip, tipping back the aluminium and feeling the burn settle in the middle of his chest. Why didn't he think of doing this sooner?
Onstage, the guys launch into Last Child, the same song Izzy used to wear out the grooves in his vinyl from replaying. He tries to feel something, anything. But the disconnect in his brain continues to widen, a gap between this is so fuckin' awesome, and I dunno if I deserve this, slowly starting to inch its way down the fault line.
He finishes the final slip and crushes the can, pushing the thoughts farther away. If he keeps kicking them further down the road, hopefully, they'll get lost enough to disappear entirely.
"Hey—" he taps the side of Duff's arm, voice lowered conspiratorially, "hit the bathroom with me?"
For a second, confusion flashes over Duff's face. Why, you need me to hold it for you, too? But then the proposition cuts through. His lips curl into a smile. "How much you got?"
"Enough to share with you." Izzy pushes off the road case he was leaning on, and Duff follows him down the dark margins of the hallway.
—
Duff would not call being squished into a sweaty, venue bathroom stall that reeks of old piss and lemon-y bleach the zenith of romance, nor would he call being squished into said sweaty, pissy, venue bathroom stall to do blow with his boyfriend particularly titilating.
But he's here, willingly participating, because any moment alone is considered sacred when the illusion of privacy dwindles a little more each day. The free coke helps too, ya know.
He presses himself between the junction of the door and the plastic divider, watching Izzy dig through his breast pocket. He shakes the baggie, sifting out a decent amount on the top of the toilet tank.
Duff's lip curls slightly. "Classy."
Izzy snorts a laugh, rubbing the excess on his pinky across his gums. "5-star, just for you, babe."
"Are countertops below us now?"
"No." Izzy shrugs, using his tour laminet to chop out a few thin lines. The plastic edge scrapes against the porcelain with a sound that's become almost comforting in its familiarity. "But getting caught with my shit on the countertop is."
He rolls up a wrinkled dollar bill tightly, motioning to Duff with it. "Ladies first?" He smirks, devilishly handsome and smug.
Duff tuts his tongue, declining first dibs on principle alone, from that comment.
Izzy doesn't argue. He leans over the tank, closing one nostril and greedily chasing down two skinny lines in one breath. The fire races up his sinuses and drips down the back of his throat. Immediate, chemical, and bitter.
Lift off. Ahh.
He straightens with a cough, feeling his pulse kick up and his vision sharpen. The irritation finally dissolves, replaced by that happy little rush of man, everything's fuckin' awesome. Dude, we should totally finish a song right now!
"Better?" Duff asks, affection laced through his tone. Happy just to see Izzy happy, even if the methods are questionable.
"Yeah," Izzy exhales, smiling wide, "much." He passes Duff the bill.
The movements are familiar, second nature from the number of times Duff's done this in front of him. But there's something weirdly sexy in the way Izzy watches. Pervertedly proud. Blond waves tumble over his summer-bronzed shoulder, the sharp ridge of his jaw tensing on a big inhale, spine tautening before a wracked shiver weaves through the notches.
When Duff uncoils to his full height, he smiles at Izzy.
He goes thunderstruck for a moment, seeing the brightness return. Seeing Duff look so incredibly fucking alive. Even though the vitality is synthetic, being able to look into the eyes of something that still isn't worn down just from the weight of existing feels ambrosial. Absolutely beautiful, in a fucked kinda way.
Izzy steps in closer, pressing their fronts together and snaking an arm around Duff's waist. He lifts a hand to gently wipe away powder from under his nose, smirking fondly. "Yeah?"
Duff's smile pulls broader. He closes the gap and tilts his head forward. "Yeah."
The kisses land softly despite both of their pulses thrashing, tender swipes against the other's tongue, sighing against one another's lips. Duff rests his forehead against Izzy's, mouth curling upwards on its own accord. They sway together for an extended beat, breathing in the same recycled air, listening to a B-side from Get Your Wings, and the din of thousands of people floating beneath the cracks in the door.
"Kinda fucked, huh?" Izzy jokes weakly against Duff's lips.
"What—sneaking blow? Or the fact that we're slow dancing next to a urinal?"
"Both."
Duff laughs, soft, but a little sad. "Kinda."
"You wanna stop?" The question hangs heavily despite how casually Izzy tries to throw it out.
"Not really."
"Me either."
And that's a bit of a problem, eh? Because stopping anything—the secrecy, the sneaking around, the dependency of so many fucking things, it's hard to keep track—means acknowledging there's a rift between them. And acknowledging a rift would mean doing something about it, which neither of them can afford the time or attention span to fulfill.
Currently, riding a high they both know will fizzle out and come back with a tenfold vengeance, with arms wrapped around each other's waist, existing in these stolen liminal spaces that run on a timer, Duff and Izzy don't want to stop a goddamn thing.
"C'mon," Izzy finally steps back, swatting Duff's ass with both palms playfully. "Let's watch the rest of the show."
Duff follows him to the sink, watching Izzy splash cold water on his face and check his reflection. Pupils blown, jaw tight, shadows under his eyes starting to grow. Otherwise fine. Functional, in an Izzy fashion.
He catches Duff's gaze in the smudged glass, holding the contact for a heartbeat. "Love you," Izzy tells himself to say. Partly because it's true, and it softens the edge on a lot of things, but partly because he knows Duff likes hearing it.
Duff gives him a tender look, shoulders lowering. "Love you too."
They slip back into the hallway separately. Izzy first, Duff ten seconds after. Aerosmith closes the gig with Walk This Way.
—
"How do you feel about that claim, Izzy?"
His ears tune back in when his name is called, vision refocusing from where it was blurring into the wood grains of the hotel bar's table. They're the only ones down here at eleven in the morning, besides the barkeep polishing the same glass and unsubtly eyeing the boys like he thinks they might swipe something. Izzy blinks back into the present, straightening his posture against the creaky vinyl booth seat. His eyes dart over to Slash beneath the protection of his dark shades, hoping for backup. He's only met with an expectant stare, waiting for him to answer.
He clears his throat, tapping ash into a crystal tray situated in the middle between them and the interviewer. "Sorry, what was the question?"
The rep from Metal Hammer, Alex, smiles, pushing thick-lensed glasses up the bridge of his acne-spotted nose. "That a lot of your songs have a heavy meaning behind them?"
Izzy rolls his eyes on reflex. He's exhausted himself of explaining the motive or reasoning behind songs that were written almost three years ago. He's exhausted in general, actually.
He shifts again, shrugging. "I mean, I guess, yeah. They're just stories about shit we've been through. Some of it's heavy."
"Not all of it, though, right?" Alex presses, fishing for a good headline. "Like Sweet Child, that's a pretty straightforward love song."
Both Slash and Izzy share a passing smile. With how Axl likes to treat Erin occasionally, it could be considered a horror soundtrack.
"Yeah," Izzy says dryly, avoiding the bait.
Alex scribbles something on his little legal pad, one hand nudging the tape recorder closer. "Do you see yourselves doing more songs like that? Ballads, slow stuff—softer than the usual Guns sound?"
Izzy's tongue curls around a no, but it fades halfway. Because…actually, yeah. There is a song. Slash worked out the chord progressions ages ago; all it needs is lyrics that match the gentleness. The verses have been done for months, scrawled and hidden towards the back of his journal that's been living dormant in his duffel for weeks now. He hasn't shown it to anyone—Izzy barely looks at it himself. Too raw, too close to the bone, and too tender to ever see the light of day. Most of all, too obvious about someone specific that he can't exactly dodge the questions it'll raise.
"Maybe," he finally answers, stubbing out the filter. "If it fits."
Alex nods, jotting down more shorthand. "What about the groupie scene? You guys have a reputation for being pretty wild with the ladies—"
Izzy checks out again, bored. He lets Slash take care of that one, nodding at the appropriate times, laughing when something's supposed to be funny. Hovering in the back of his mind, though, he thinks about whether Duff would even want to hear something like that, and what it would mean to share something that personal with the guys…and the rest of the world.
The interview drags; questions about touring with Aerosmith, about Appetite creeping closer to #2 on Billboard, about their very rock 'n roll lifestyle that Alex seems juvenilely obsessed with. Blah, blah, blah. It's all bullshit. So many rumors are circling, it's hard to keep track of what's true anymore. Mercifully, it ends by early afternoon—early enough to start day drinking without any comments from the peanut gallery, at least.
"Thanks, guys," Alex says as he gathers his notepad and tape. "This'll run in the August issue. I'll make sure the office sends everyone a copy."
"Cool," Slash says, already shuffling out of the booth. "We gotta run—soundcheck in an hour." Which is an outright lie; it's not until three, but it's a decent enough excuse to stop being pressed with the same recycled gotcha questions from some wide-eyed desk jockey.
They trade handshakes and half-assed goodbyes before Slash and Izzy escape to the elevators.
Between floors four and five, Slash turns to him. "You alright, man? You were zoning out hard." Which is fixed behavior coming from Izzy, but it seems more catatonic lately.
Izzy reflexively shrugs, watching the floor numbers rise in time with the beeps. "Yeah. Just weird doin' all this press." They've gone from little side blurbs in Music Connection to being slapped on the front cover of RIP. Every day, Alan seems to call with a new journalist penciled in, eating up the so-called free time he still has left.
Slash nods solemnly, commiserating in this ambiguous state of reality the five of them seem to be permanently existing in. The rickety elevator stops on floor ten, and they both shuffle out into the ugly pastel-wallpapered hotel corridor. They've got a platinum fuckin' record under their belts, and still somehow manage to get put up in the worst places. Come to mention it, Izzy hasn't really seen a dime from the sales yet. Thank you, Geffen.
"You wanna grab a bite before we go to the venue?" Slash asks over his shoulder as he slots their shared room key into the lock.
Izzy hits his usual meh on cue, chucking his sunglasses on the side table, dropping onto his bed with an arm slung over his eyes. No interest in anything besides the coldest beer imaginable. Maybe a nap.
Slash rummages through his suitcase at the foot of his bed, leather pants and band shirts overflowing across the dark carpet. Izzy hears him pause after the crinkling of a bag.
"Oh, fuck yeah."
"Hm?" Izzy lifts his arm, curious.
Slash is elbow deep into a wrinkled shopping bag with holes at the bottom. He retrieves a little plastic baggie, a familiar friend. "Thought I ran out in Missouri—"
Izzy doesn't even give him the opportunity to finish before he's on his feet.
—
Post-soundcheck finds Izzy huddled in by a group of wide-eyed teenagers at the back of the amphitheater, all shoving pens and crumpled loose-leaf paper under his nose. A part of him wanted to duck them; he really did. The small dose he snarfed with Slash earlier already peaked and plateaued, so now he's just agitated, itchy, and wanting to hide in an air-conditioned sanctuary with a lock on the door.
But when a gaggle of sweaty high schoolers is all shouting Izzy, yo, Izzy!—turning pink from the unrelenting Texas sun, probably delirious from dehydration, he stopped just short of the hotel shuttle van and resigned himself to the attention. Duff and Steven are doing the exact same thing a few paces down.
"I don't have a paper—can you sign my arm?"
"Dude, can you get Axl to come out here?"
"Is it true you guys got kicked off the Alice tour for partying too much?"
Izzy scrawls his name sloppily across every surface that gets thrust his way: notebooks, ticket stubs, the back of a denim jacket, and a nice rack belonging to a blonde with big, starry eyes. He keeps his answers short, but tries to avoid sounding too clipped despite the social anxiety starting to press on his chest. Yeah, maybe, I dunno. The usual deflections.
After about fifteen minutes, kids start thinning out, back to holding their place in line at the front of the venue. The guys are almost clear of the onslaught, already turning back toward the van—
A pair of sneakers slaps against hot concrete, approaching quickly. "Hey, wait up!"
Izzy pauses, glancing over his shoulder. A girl jogs toward him, grey flannel overshirt rolled around bony elbows, fabric whipping behind her in the warm breeze. He sighs, uncapping his marker again and assuming the position. When she meets him at arm's length, catching her breath, she never produces paper.
"Where do you want me to sign?" He motions vaguely at her body, insinuating, words landing awkwardly. She's young, maybe eighteen at most, clear by the babyish cheeks and slim build—never stopped him before, though.
She shifts her weight from one foot to another, dirt-splattered sneakers crunching over loose gravel. "Oh, I'm not looking for an autograph." She chuckles dryly, pushing frizzy, flyaway brown curls stuck to the back of her damp neck.
One of Izzy's eyebrows raises over the rim of his sunglasses. His eyes flick to Steven and Duff for a moment, deep in conversation with two fanboys sporting homemade GNR tees. He recognizes this as another complex moment of saving face, having to say yes to eager girls when he couldn't have less of an interest in deflowering.
"Ah, sorry. Can't take you back to the hotel with us," he thinks quickly on his feet, trying to shake her off, "security and all that shit. Can maybe get you a pass for later, though."
Izzy's expecting the par for the course puppy-dog look, pouted lips, and twinkling bedroom eyes—what she gives him instead is a cobalt blue bemused gaze, pinched between dark brows. Like she almost finds the proposition comical.
"Oh, no—no, man," she laughs, scratching the side of her soft jaw in embarrassment. "I—uh," she clears her throat, mustering the courage, straightening her posture to a meager 5'4, "I wanted to ask if you're looking for a guitar tech, actually."
The whiplash nearly makes Izzy triple-take. Then, his own humbling sets in. He blinks. "…What?"
"A guitar tech." She repeats, shoving chipped black nails into the front pocket of her shredded, ill-fitting jeans. "Do you have a personal one?" She drawls, North Texas twang dripping.
Despite the absurdity of the question, Izzy chuckles. Since when do girls know what guitar techs are? "Um, kinda. I share a guy with Slash."
Rodney. Hometown drifter from Hollywood. He assimilated into the band's tribe of freaks around '86 and kinda just…didn't leave. He's a decent enough tech; Izzy's shit makes noise when he plugs in, so that's all that really matters, right? But it would be kinda cool to have his own personal one. Very official.
Izzy pushes his sunglasses into his hairline, intrigued by the divergence from normal small talk. "Why?"
She hooks a thumb through a belt loop, cocking one hip to the side. Nervous, but trying not to show it. "'Cuz I want the job." She says point-blank, completely deadpan.
Now's the moment he actually guffaws. The balls on this chick! "You're joking."
She shakes her head, tight coils of chesnut rustling against her shoulders. "I'm not." She straightens again to meet his eyes. "I've been playing for almost a decade. Self-taught. I know how to string and tune and fix shit on the fly." She buckles down, hoping all her bold-faced cockiness sells this. "I wanna work in the business—on the road, specifically."
Izzy sizes her up and down, still expecting the moment she reveals this is a ploy to become a tour girlfriend. She holds his stare, unvacillating. Two headstrong egos pushing against one another, waiting for the other to crack first.
"How old are you?"
"Eighteen." She replies too quickly, a practiced lie cocked and loaded.
He levels her with flattened brows, voice dropping. "How old are you, really?"
Her eyes flick down to the pavement for the first time, tongue nervously working around the inside of her cheek. "…Seventeen." She mumbles sheepishly.
Izzy pushes a long sigh through his nostrils, shaking his head. No-go. "Don't you got school or somethin' tomorrow?"
Her eyes immediately snap back up to lock onto his, steelier than before, jaw tight. "No. I don't."
Izzy picks up the weight in that single word, something solidified with finality. That particular no means I don't have school tomorrow because I'm looking for any means necessary to get the fuck out of this place. He clocks her situation with an almost eerily recognizable feeling. This was him not too long ago, grasping at straws and hoping someone would take pity.
He takes a small step closer, lowering his voice even though nobody's around to really eavesdrop. "Runaway?" He knows the look firsthand. Desi had the same one.
She bristles further, eyes avoiding his, not out of exposure, but defiance. "Does that matter?"
"It matters if people come lookin' for you."
Her gaze flicks up, a small smirk pulling on thin lips. "That mean you'll let me tech for you?"
Izzy snorts. Clever girl.
"No. Nobody'll come looking." She says quietly. Sensing his hesitation, she doubles down again. "Look—you don't even have to pay me, I'm in it for the experience. I really want to work and learn. If I suck, you can drop me in whatever city you're at next, no questions asked."
Izzy takes a step back again, rubbing a hand over his mouth in consideration. He should absolutely say no. He should tell her to take a hike, go back to school, go back home, and do literally anything else but attach herself to some fucking rock band at the cusp of her adulthood. But he knows what she's thinking. He's felt that same fire under his feet, being that age, and willing to do just about anything to escape whatever shithole town you were spat out in.
"Duff!" Izzy calls over to him, separating himself for breathing room.
His head swivels, eyebrows raised in expectancy. Izzy waves him over.
He sidles up slowly. "'Sup?"
"The girl behind us. Don't look now—"
Duff's neck is already turned toward her.
Izzy sighs. "She's askin' to be my fuckin' tech, man." He pats himself down in search of cigarettes, needing a distractor.
Duff makes a noise, half a confused grumble, half a scoff. "Her? Like…her? Not her boyfriend or brother?"
"Yes, her," Izzy whispers harshly around the filter, trying to avoid causing a scene. "Said she's been playing for a while and wants to work—" He glances over his shoulder again, seeing her standing a few feet away, unflappable despite gambling her future on a whim. "What do I even say?"
Duff puffs out a long breath. "I mean…you could give her a shot tonight and see how it goes. What's the harm?" Spoken like a true man who's been on and off the road since he was even younger than her.
He nods, humming. "Think you can ask Doug for an extra pass? Give her clearance onto the stage?"
Duff nods with a shrug, a simple request compared to making their tour manager fetch blow, twenty pizzas, or green tea that Axl needs at a specific temperature, or the fuckin' world might as well explode.
Izzy swats his shoulder in gentle, silent thanks and walks back over. She braces herself as he approaches, expecting a decline.
This is objectively a terrible, undeniably bad fucking idea. Which, of course, means Izzy's all for it.
"What's your name?"
Her lips twitch upward. "Cassandra. Cass is easier, though."
"Alright, Cass, here's the deal," he drops his smoke and grinds it out with the toe of his boot, "You can tech for me tonight—just tonight," he emphasizes, not wanting to inflate her hopes, "you know your way around hollowbodies and Fender heads?"
Cass nods emphatically, poorly-concealed shock etching onto her face. "Yeah, yeah—I use Bassman heads, too."
His brow ticks. "135 or 70?"
Cass smiles smugly. "Silverface 50. Better tone."
Izzy smirks. Cocky little shit. "If you're good—and I mean actually good, not I've changed strings in my bedroom good—we'll talk after the gig. Sound fair?"
Her face lights up with genuine, unguarded excitement, making her look even younger. "Seriously?"
"Seriously." Izzy nods, "But if you fuck up gear or slow people down, it's off the table. Got it?" He knows he sounds harsh—that's the point. Shit ain't roses on the road, pun intended.
"Got it." Cass beams, sticking out her hand. "Deal."
Izzy shakes it, both their grips firm and calloused. Guitar-player hands. "I'll meet you out here at six with a pass," he says reticently, already second-guessing this entire thing.
"Thank you," she says earnestly. "I won't let you down, man, I swear." She grins, girlish and bright, then turns and jogs off across the parking lot before he can snuff this out.
What the fuck did he just agree to?
—
He winds up back in his and Slash's hotel room, way too comfortable for someone who needs to be stage-ready in less than three hours. But again, any moment alone is equal to divinity, so Izzy happily sprawls himself across Duff's front, enjoying the long fingers currently combing through his hair.
"You think that chick will actually show tonight?" Duff asks, attention more focused on the Seattle Mariners game playing in the background.
Izzy murmurs against Duff's sternum, half-asleep. "Cass."
Duff's chest rumbles with a confused humming noise.
"Cassandra. Cass, is her name—and yeah, I think she'll show."
Duff's fingers keep working against his scalp in slow, rhythmic arcs. Every so often, his hand drops to the nape of Izzy's neck, digging the pad of his thumb into that tight knot of stressed muscles he carries. "Seemed pretty determined about wanting to help."
"Mm. Reminded me of someone." Izzy presses his face deeper into the worn cotton of Duff's shirt, breathing in smoke, cedarwood cologne, and everything else that his brain registers in the safety index of his mind.
"Yourself?" Duff asks.
Izzy nods against him. "Yeah. Des, too. Met her not long after she split from home." Sweet thing. He misses her more often than not. Even if the relationship aspect was bad business, she was still a good friend.
Duff's hand skates down the length of his spine, rubbing little circles above his hips. Gentle, familiar touch. "Is that why you said yes?"
"Probably." He mumbles, closing his eyes, feeling the cadenced rise and fall of Duff's lungs beneath him. "Figured if anyone gave me the same opportunity back then, I wouldn't have had to do half the scummy shit I ended up doing." Dealing, stealing, sleeping in cars, the whole burnout spiel.
Duff smiles beneath him, tutting his tongue affectionately. "Aww, such a softie."
Izzy lands a knuckle in his flank. "Fuck off."
They both fall into silence again, Izzy melting quicker with every rub to his back, and Duff ever-hopeful that Balboni hits another homer.
Seemingly out of the blue, Duff asks a question that rouses Izzy from the near-nap he was about to fall into. "How'd that interview go earlier, by the way?"
He shrugs. "Normal. Same questions about girls and songs." Before Izzy can even catch the repercussions of his next words, he mumbles, "asked if we'd write more ballads."
Duff snorts. "Have you?"
Izzy's eyes fully open. "Uh, nah. Not recently."
Duff quirks an eyebrow even though Izzy's not looking at him. Will he ever learn how shitty of a liar he is? "Oooh…" Duff coos, thick with intrigue. "Somebody's got a love song," he teases.
Izzy rolls off his chest, plopping down beside him like he's trying to physically squirm away from the topic. "Shut up. No, I don't."
Duff, now intensively absorbed in wringing this out of Iz, hauls a leg over his torso to hover above him. He pins his wrists, smiling. "Show me."
"No."
"Pretty please?" Duff juts out his bottom lip.
Izzy tries to break free, but Duff only holds his wrists down tighter. "No. There's nothing to show."
Being the occasionally sadistic fucker he is, Duff releases one wrist, only to start fluttering his fingers against Izzy's ribs. "C'mon, show me! You scared? Chicken—bock-bock-bock!"
Izzy writhes, reflexive giggles, and short breaths escaping his mouth. "S-stop, fuck's sake!"
Duff continues the torture, his other fingers wiggling the sensitive strip of flesh exposed under the hem of Izzy's shirt. "I'll stop when you show me."
Izzy grinds his back molars together, arms shooting up to wrap around Duff's wrists. He pants, stomach muscles tense. He'll do this only for the sake of not pissing himself from getting tickled. Ugh, how gay! "Fine." He grunts, throwing Duff off his waist, "fucking fine."
He pads over to his duffel in the corner of the room, fishing around for his notebook. It's still in the same place, nestled between jeans and toothpaste. A fleeting intrusive thought tells Izzy to lie even harder and say he lost it, but he knows Duff, and that means he'll just make him play it on the acoustic propped against the wall. One option seems worse than the other. He forefits, taking the path of least resistance.
Pulling the book free, he sits on the lip of the mattress, flipping through coffee-stained pages of hysterical scribbles. Half of it unfinished verses, half of it bitching and moaning about things that don't really matter. He lands on the ballad, an ink-smudged title at the heading.
Patience.
With a heavy, reluctant sigh, Izzy passes the journal over, quick enough for Duff to ignore the slight tremor in his hand. "If you laugh, I'll castrate you."
Duff snorts, sharp canines glinting through his parted lips. "Not gonna laugh. Promise."
Duff starts reading. Izzy starts dissociating.
One line turns into two, two turns into four, and before Duff even registers what's on the cream-colored page, his heart starts galloping. The lyrics spill everything Izzy's never had the courage to say aloud. About waiting, about needing time, about stolen, private moments of peace in a Melrose apartment too soft and raw to share with anyone else. About how the word woman isn't even a woman at all.
Izzy keeps his eyes pinned to the bedspread, too afraid to look up and watch the realization settle over Duff's features. Halfway through the second verse, Izzy feels the springs creak under the movement of Duff shifting closer. His chest stutters as he risks a glance up, and like another kick in the dick from the universe, he sees Duff's eyes do that wet, glossy thing that always shatters his apathy.
"Iz—" Duff says softly, lowering the notebook.
He swallows a dry lump, picking at the dead skin around his nails until he draws blood. "I, uh—started writing it after Christmas."
Duff's eyes widen a fraction. "You've hid this for that long?"
He shrugs automatically. Izzy's skittish enough as it is when sharing unfinished music, let alone a song inspired by a muse that's almost too beautiful to look at for too long, or his eyes start feeling like he's staring into the sun. "Didn't know if you'd like it…or think it was, I dunno. Weird."
"Weird?" Duff laughs disbelievingly. He scoots closer, shrinking his frame to wrap his arms around Izzy's torso, tucking his head in the dip of his neck. "I fuckin' love it."
Izzy stiffens at the display of sudden affection, nervous system at the crossroads of flight and freeze. Instinctively, he smirks, patting the crown of Duff's head. "Alright, alright, enough. Stop being a fuckin' sap."
Big talk for someone who wrote the line there is no doubt you're in my heart now. Schmaltzy fuck.
Duff removes his head, looking up at Izzy with two big eyes full of awe. He wrote this about him. For them. He kisses Izzy slowly, only breaking away to lean his forehead against his. He sighs against his lips, "You gonna show it to the guys?"
Izzy's stomach does a complicated little flip. "Dunno. Haven't 'cuz they might start askin' too many questions."
Duff nods. He gets it. As beautiful as it is, and as much as it deserves to be shared, sometimes there's nothing wrong with keeping something to yourself when everything else you do is broadcast to the world. He smiles softly, "I love you, you know."
Izzy ducks his head, feeling the heat creeping up the back of his neck spread to his face. "I know. Love you too."
Duff rereads the lyrics two more times, smiling to himself, even letting out sporadic, immature giggles when he sees Izzy's misspelled patience in one of the choruses.
"God, you are so fucking gay sometimes." Duff laughs, rolling his eyes in cartoonish incredulity.
Izzy grabs a pillow by its corner and slams it down on Duff's head with enough g-force to shake the bedframe.
—
Izzy heads for the back entrance of the Starplex at 5:45, backstage pass in hand, expecting to take a smoke break or three while he waits for Cassandra to show—if she ever does. When he pushes open the big metal door, an unlit cigarette dangling from the side of his dry lips, he makes immediate eye contact with a tiny thing trying her best to be big at the end of the ramp.
Leaning against the wall in the same large flannel and ripped jeans, Cass waits anxiously. Natural curls pulled back into a fresh ponytail, an old backpack at her feet, everything she owns in the world, probably. She straightens when Izzy approaches.
"You're early," Izzy says, cupping a flame at the end of his smoke.
"Didn't want to miss anything," Cass says through a smile, pushing off the wall, wiping her clammy palms on her pants.
Izzy exhales ribbons through his nose, examining. "You eat yet?"
She nods, not wanting to impose. "Not really hungry."
Izzy gives her a deadpan glare, knowing exactly what a down-and-out teenager looks like. "Bull. When's the last time you actually ate?" She's lean by nature, but he can tell hot meals are few and far between for this one.
She shifts her weight, slinging her backpack over one shoulder. "…Yesterday morning, I think."
Izzy exhales heavily, flicking ash off his cigarette. He hands over her pass. "There's catering inside. Let's grab something before we start."
Cass takes the pass like it's made out of diamonds, gently cradling it in her fist. "Seriously, I'm okay. You don't have to—"
He cuts her off with a raised palm. "Eat. Passed-out guitar techs don't really get anything done." Rodney has blacked out on complementary liquor one too many times to teach Izzy that lesson.
She gives him a ducked nod, falling in line with his steps into the venue.
Their first stop is the dressing room, a large plastic folding table holding a mountain of sandwiches, sodas, and quick snacks. Cassandra's stomach growls loud enough for Izzy to hear at her side.
He snorts, snatching a Coke can dripping with condensation. "Take extras, they'll just get thrown out if nobody eats 'em."
She chomps quickly through a turkey sub, picking the tomatoes off, face growing less pale with each bite. From his spot at the far end of the room, thumping away on his practice kit, Steven perks up.
"Who's your friend, Iz?"
Izzy goes to open his mouth, but Cassandra beats him to it.
"Cass." She says, words muffled by bread and cheese.
Steven's eyes flick between the two of them, then he smirks sleazily. "Cool. Hey—you ever been on a tour bus before?"
Izzy intercepts the proposition. "She's teching for me tonight. Wants to learn."
Stevie's mouth forms in a shocked little o. Cass just smiles wider. Izzy has a feeling this won't be the only time he'll have to shield her from bullshit like that.
He leads her deeper into the venue, past more dressing rooms and dead road case storage. She keeps close on his heels, one ear tuned into Izzy's mumbled instructions, the other listening to roadies barking through walkie-talkies, the continuous clatter of heavy equipment being shuffled around. The normal pre-gig chaos in full swing.
They end up stage right, where the guitar vaults are stashed. Izzy's main selection of axes on display, the others tucked away safely in their slots, shining faintly under harsh arena lights: his once arctic but now off-white ES 175-D, his black LP Custom, and his backup ESP Eclipse Custom
"These are mine," he says, gesturing in front of him. "Those are Duff's, we walk out on the same side of the stage," he points to the lineup of white Fender PBasses, and Duff's personal tech McBob, tinkering with a stubborn pickup. The three of them share passing head nods of greeting. "The hollowbody is my main, the custom is a backup if something goes wrong during the set, and the Eclipse stays in the vault unless somethin' really catastrophic happens."
Cass nods, setting down her backpack and approaching the open vault like it's a museum exhibit. She looks, but doesn't touch. Instead, she points at the 175, eyes glimmering with wonder that she tries, and fails, to conceal. "This is the one you used to record Appetite, right?"
A small smile pulls at the corner of Izzy's lips. He nods. "Yeah, actually—look at you, Ms.Know-it-all."
Cassandra shoots a look over her shoulder, an equally sarcastic grin on her face.
"You know how to change strings on an archtop?" Izzy asks.
"Yeah. Gotta be careful 'cuz of the floating bridge, right?"
"Right. Only do one at a time or it'll fall off."
She nods again. "I can do that."
Izzy swipes a can of beer sitting atop a road case, cracking the tab and taking a long sip. He never thought he'd be grateful for the show dates they weren't opening for Aerosmith, but it makes indulging a hell of a lot easier. He gestures vaguely at the six-pack, offering. "Want one?"
Cass looks at them for a moment, considering, then shakes her head politely. "Nah. Not when I'm working. I'll wait 'til later."
Izzy's can pauses halfway to his mouth with genuine surprise. He wasn't testing her, just being friendly—or his attempt at it. "Smart," he mumbles, tipping the lip her way in regard, "most of our crew guys are three sheets by the encore."
Cassandra chuckles, finally raising a slim finger to ghost over the neck of the black Les Paul. "Well, I'm not most crew guys, I guess."
"No. Definitely not."
—
The show itself is the usual blur of noise and rabid energy; the weather pushing ninety doesn't help. Izzy doesn't see much of Cass during the set, still parked stage left with Rodney and McBob exactly where he left her; watching, learning, trying her hardest to stay out of the way and absorb.
¾ of the show goes smoothly—well, as smoothly as the guys can pull off—but halfway through Nightrain comes the first trial of Cassandra's abilities.
Izzy's thin band of leather he likes to call a guitar strap, finally gives. The hide ultimately surrenders to the years of mistreatment it's suffered through, the frayed edge already modified with a piece of threadbare string Izzy tied on when it originally broke. Suddenly, his guitar is sliding down his chest in front of 20,000 people, only supported by the strength of his knee, fingers fumbling and distorting the notes he should be playing flawlessly.
Izzy looks to Cass. Cass looks to Rodney. Rodney looks to McBob. The guys don't spring into action like they're supposed to, preoccupied with drinks and chatting up sidestage girls, but Cassandra's in motion before Izzy can even blink or mouth fuckin' help me!
Replacement strap in hand, fingers working fast and efficiently. The roaring sea of thousands of people doesn't even faze her, eyes intently focused on securing the sturdy strip of fabric around Izzy's shoulders, adjusting the length, and disappearing back into her hiding spot in the wings. Took her barely even 45 seconds.
When Cass and Izzy lock eyes again a few moments later, a silent conversation passes.
Good?
I'm good.
Izzy's more than halfway sold on her.
—
After the set ends and the crowd starts disappating, the real test starts: load out. Cue foreboding tubular bells.
The venue stagehands and even some of the Guns roadies are already eyeing Cassandra like fresh meat. Either to sink their teeth in and rip apart with chauvinism, or more likely, lust. Poorly hidden skepticism; this tiny chick trying to break down an arena rig? Oh, this should be good.
Cass makes quick work of coiling cables and securing Izzy's guitar vault, even finding spare time to help Stevie's tech collapse drum hardware. One of the local guys, balding, middle-aged, and wearing a faded Harley shirt that's strained by his gut, is the first to cast a stone.
"You sure you can lift that on your own, sweetheart?" He leers, gesturing at the kick drum. Far from the heaviest piece of gear on the stage, but clearly a test.
Cassandra, stone-faced, wipes a bead of sweat trickling down her temple with her shirt sleeve. Without hesitation, she hauls the kick up and slides it right into the hardshell casing. Before the fucking guy can even say, huh, wow, she's headed toward the semi-truck to help pack.
—
The truck doors get locked by midnight, every piece of equipment accounted for. Cass hops off the loading ramp, hands caked in dirt down to the lines in her palms, hair damp with sweat, muscles aching with fatigue. The crew thins out, too, all headed back to the hotel or bar, but Cassandra drops herself onto the concrete steps at the back of the Starplex, fucking exhausted, but proud of herself nonetheless.
Izzy finds her there, tiny beads of water still stuck to the tips of his hair from a quick post-gig shower inside the amphitheater. He plops down beside her with a sigh, two fresh beers in hand. He thrusts the bottle in front of her face. "Off the clock—you earned it."
Cass pushes a weak laugh through her nose, accepting the drink. She tips back a long swig, cool bubbles sliding down her narrow throat. She suppresses a burp, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. "Thanks."
"Did good tonight, dude. Seriously." Izzy knocks her knee with his own, attempting genuine gratitude.
She looks over at him, hopeful. "Yeah?"
Izzy nods, trying out the words he's been rehearsing in his head for the better part of an hour and a half. Fuck, please don't let this come back to bite me. "So—I'm thinkin' a trial period…"
Cass nearly chokes on her next sip. "A—cough—a what?"
"A trial period." Izzy repeats. "For a few weeks, maybe. Long enough until we have to go to England—speaking of which, do you have a passport?"
She shakes her head no. Izzy frowns.
"Alright, well, I'm getting ahead of myself anyway. But we're in the States for the next two and a half weeks. If you can keep up and do the shit you did tonight, we can make it a permanent thing. If it ain't for you, though," Izzy looks at her profile, intense blue eyes darting all over his face like she's cataloguing every detail of this moment to look back on, completely indebted to this absolute stranger "—we'll cross that bridge when we get there."
Cassandra doesn't say anything for a long moment, grip on the neck of her beer bottle so tight her knuckles are going pale. "You're serious…?"
Izzy laughs despite the slight horror he feels inside. A physical manifestation of a fuckton of responsibility sitting right next to him. "Yeah, dead serious. But, Cass, man—" he sighs, scrubbing a hand over his face, "it ain't always a party on tour. There's a lotta shit you gotta look out for. Especially 'cuz—" his words start failing, not knowing how to put it delicately, making a wide circling gesture at her body.
"What? 'Cuz I'm a girl?"
"Yeah. A fuckin' young girl." Izzy says, voice softer now. He knows he doesn't have much high ground here; he isn't exactly a pillar of chivalry, but still, he's agreeing to bring her along. By proxy, he's kinda responsible for whatever shit she gets into or causes. He doesn't know how to say: keep your fucking nose clean and don't let anyone get you pregnant without sounding like a total and complete hypocrite.
"Just—" Izzy sighs, lips pulling thin, and tries again, "be smart. I have a feelin' you are. And if any of the guys give you shit—the band included—you come tell me. Okay? I gotta talk to Doug about squaring away a little per diem every week if we can manage. Gotta find you a bunk on the bus, too. You cool about crashing with a bunch of dudes?"
Cass nods so hard her ponytail bounces. She'd sleep in the undercarriage storage if he asked. They both go quiet for a beat after his lecture ends.
"Izzy," Cassandra starts, setting her drink down with a soft clink. "I don't really know what to say."
"Don't have to say anything, just be good at your job."
"No, I know, but—" for the first time since she's met him, a look of insecurity flashes over her face. She wrings her hands together tightly in her lap, nervously picking at the polish on her nails. "You know I'm a runaway, yeah?"
He nods. Hard not to. They all have the same MO.
"Nobody'll come lookin', I already told you that, but I should probably explain…"
Izzy leans back on his palms. settling in for what he feels is about to be a heavy conversation.
Cassandra takes in a big inhale, head hanging between sharp shoulder blades. "My Mom, she never liked that I was into music, threw a total fuckin' fit when I said I wanted to play guitar and not do ballet or join the church choir or whatever other shit she suggested. From then on, it was always a fuckin' war in the house, man."
Izzy nods solemnly. He gets it more than she even realizes.
Cass continues, rolling gravel under her tattered Converse. "It got real bad by the time I started high school. Always a fight, always doin' shit to stop me from being who I am." She laughs, short and humorless as a vision arises, "One time she poured bleach all down the neck of my Strat just so I couldn't practice. Said I was getting too close to the 'devil's music.'" Cass shakes her head like she's wiping sore memories away. "Worked two fuckin' part-time jobs to get that thing, and she just—" her words taper off, landing softly somewhere in the ether.
Izzy leans up, elbows resting on his knees. He drops his voice to almost a whisper, "When I was fifteen, Axl and I started playing in my Mom's garage. Nothin' good, just makin' noise. My dad hated it, said the same shit. It's a waste of time, never gonna make any money, fuckin' blah, blah, blah."
Somewhere in the back of Izzy's mind, he can still see Rich standing in front of him, red in the face from screaming back and forth over whether music would amount to anything. Sonja supported him, but Izzy was always too intuitive for his own good. She never really wanted him to become a musician, or at the very least, just let it become a hobby and not a lifestyle. She wants grandbabies to take to church and Sunday dinners, not a son who barely calls.
Izzy blinks back into the present, finishing the thought. "I get it, though. Why you wanna leave."
Cassandra peers at him through wisps of brown, a silent understanding settling between them. "Last conversation I had with her, she told me to leave if I wanted to so badly…so, I am."
Izzy jerks his chin at her backpack sitting limply by her feet. "That all you have?"
Cassandra smiles shyly, nodding once. "Extra pair of jeans and some cash. Been crashing at friends' houses." When she goes to tuck loose threads of hair behind her ear, she smears dirt across her cheek.
Another hot spike of guilty conscience pierces through Izzy's forehead. She has virtually nothing. "Bus pulls out for Kansas at seven tomorrow morning," he rises, brushing dirt from the back of his jeans, nodding to the hotel shuttle, "you can crash on the couch in my room. Shower too."
A smile splits so wide on Cassandra's face that it makes her eyes crinkle. This is her shot, a once-in-a-lifetime chance thrown right in front of her face. "You sayin' I stink?" She jokes weakly, already falling into an established repartee with him.
Izzy laughs lowly, offering an outstretched hand to pull her up. "Road rule #1—never pass up a shower opportunity."
—
August rode in on a tidal wave of humidity and heat. Long, sunburnt days with peeling shoulders, and even longer, stickier nights, tangled between sweat-damp sheets and gangly limbs.
The first Saturday of the month finds them all in Saratoga Springs, playing at a shed with a big open pavilion. Izzy and Slash bumble off the bus around noon, being the last two stragglers who didn't immediately sprint to the private dressing room showers the minute they rolled into the parking lot.
In the ten seconds it takes to walk from the bus to the backstage door, Slash decides it's a lovely opportunity to watch Izzy squirm. "We gonna talk about it?" He says pointedly, waggling dark brows.
Izzy's face twists with confusion. "'Bout what?"
Slash's lips curve upward, knowing he's poking the bear. "Her." He gestures vaguely inside. "The teenage hanger-on you're totally banging."
"The teen—what the fuck are you talking about? Cass?" Izzy's voice shifts an octave, dumbfounded with more than a shred of offense. He waves a hand rapidly. "Nah, nah, man. You got it all twisted."
Slash hums, not convinced. "Uh-huh."
Izzy doubles down, now thoroughly determined on setting the record straight. It doesn't take a genius to know you gotta squash a rumor like that before it snowballs. "Seriously." His steps halt abruptly, making Slash stutter in his gait. "She's my tech," he emphasizes this next part, trying to bore it into his head, "that's it. Don't have any fuckin' interest in much else."
He tuts. "Man, since when do you not have interest in jailbait muff?" Izzy doesn't exactly have the best track record when it comes to babes on the younger side.
"First off, fuck you," Izzy starts with a raised pointer finger, "second, I got enough shit to worry about—chasin' barely legal skirt ain't one of 'em." Which is kinda thinly veiled code for: I have more of an interest in penis now, thank you very much.
Slash relents with a raised palm, spinning on his heels and heading inside the venue.
Izzy's not far behind, wandering into the backstage area with no particular destination, just roaming to see where he lands. He weaves past cases and crew, down the maze of closets and storage spaces. When he rounds a sharp corner down the corridor of green rooms, he nearly trips over something.
Correction: someone. His teenage hanger-on.
Tucked in a makeshift fortress of guitar vaults and drum cases, shoved into what's basically a forgotten corner of the venue, Cass sits cross-legged on the floor. A half-nibbled slice of pizza on a napkin beside her, the newest issue of Guitar World spread across her lap.
She looks up when Izzy's shadow falls over the page. "Oh, hey."
"Hey," he slides down the concrete wall, dropping down beside her, sighing like an old man with stiff bones as he pulls his knees to his chest. "Everything lookin' good for soundcheck?"
Cass nods, taking a bite of gooey cheese and sucking red sauce from her thumb. "Yeah. But stop beating the fuck out of the Black Beauty, by the way. You got it barely a week ago, and it's already scratched to shit."
He laughs. "It's supposed to get scratched."
"Not like that, it's not. Like you put it through a goddamn wood chipper." She scolds through a mouthful. "Fucker gets brand endorsement gifts all of a sudden and thinks he can treat his girls like they're disposable." The nerve!
Izzy snorts, genuinely amused by how seriously she takes her job. He leans over without asking and rips off a piece of crust. Cassandra doesn't even flinch, nudging over the slice closer so he can grab it easier if he wants, tearing the pizza into two uneven rips they can share. They chow in comfortable quiet for a moment, listening to the din of metal barricades clanging into position.
Eventually, Cass taps the magazine she was skimming. "You're in here by the way."
Izzy watches her flip to the page with his and Slash's mug in full color, a subheading in big blocky letters waxing poetic. Raw Authenticity. The Return of Real Rock 'N Roll. He curls a lip and waves it off.
Cass snorts a laugh, bumping Izzy's shoulder with her own. "They're sayin' you're the next big thing, dude," she peers at him playfully over the glossy edge, smiling in that girlish way that still catches Izzy off guard despite her constantly being around him for the past two weeks. "You believe that?"
He laughs dryly, chucking back the last bite of tough, burnt crust and crumpling up the napkin. "Fuck if I know. Everything in the mags is usually just a crock."
She sucks her teeth with faux disapproval. "Tch. Such a cynic, Jeffrey." She emphasizes the name, a new weaponized tidbit of information she gained from a tipsy, loose-lipped bassist. She plans to use it to her disposal.
Izzy levels her with a glare. "Duff shouldn't have told you that shit." The smirk Cassandra hits him back with makes the facade waver. He smiles, ribbing. "Don't get fuckin' cocky, you're still on your trial period."
Cass rolls her eyes, throwing the magazine to the side and stretching her legs out. "Oh, yeah, right. I think we passed trial period when I did your fuckin' laundry the other day. Do you know how gross it is to touch your socks?!"
Which, to Cassandra's credit, she's picked up a lot of slack around tour. From laundry mat runs to MacGyver-ing a broken headstock, to even sitting through a half-hour unintelligible tangent from Axl because she's the only one that'll really listen, Cass has found her role and fit into it quite naturally. Izzy sees a lot of his younger self in her; all piss and vinegar, hellbent on holding your own. Maybe that's why he's considering keeping her around—wouldn't be the first stray he's taken in.
Izzy puts his palms up in surrender, trying to evade committing to the topic lest something goes horribly wrong and he has to boot her from the rest of the leg. With a groan, he pushes himself up from the knees. "Gonna find the guys, see if they're ready to run through some stuff." Aka, I'm missing Duff, and I wanna sniff him out.
She nods, watching him go.
A little further down the hallway, he finds Duff exactly where he expected: stretched out on the couch in the band's shared green room, one arm slung over his eyes, sweaty Budweiser can dangling from his fingertips over the edge of the cushion.
"You dead?" Izzy jokes, flipping the lock on the door behind him out of instinct. "Or should I do mouth-to-mouth?"
Duff lifts his arm just enough to peek out, a small, lazy smile tugging. "Wouldn't hurt…"
Izzy crosses the room and sinks in beside him. Duff shifts, maneuvering himself so his head is in Izzy's lap, long denim-wrapped legs hanging over the armrest. His hands find Duff's hair immediately, deft fingers carding through soft blond waves, scratching lightly at the spots that make him purr.
"You didn't sleep much last night," Izzy murmurs lowly, gently untangling hair caught in Duff's earrings. "Heard you tossing and turning."
"Mm. Feel like the bunks are getting worse. Got up around four and talked to Cass for a while in the lounge."
Izzy hums. "Yeah, I heard you—oh, and thanks for telling her my name, jackass. She's already wearing it out." He tugs playfully on a loose lock, feeling Duff's cheek cinch with a smile against his thigh.
Duff's shoulders quake with a laugh, one palm squeezing Izzy's calf. "She asked…wasn't gonna lie."
Izzy rolls his eyes with faux annoyance, letting the comfortable, insulated quiet settle and breathe before the unstoppable noise comes bulldozing over it. He traces idle patterns on Duff's temple with his thumb, periodically stealing sips from his beer.
Duff goes to ask something, chin tilted toward Izzy, "Hey, when this leg ends, and we go on break, we should—" whatever thought he's about to say is clipped short by a loud knock on the door.
"Yeah?" Izzy calls, not moving.
"It's me," Doug says back, jiggling the handle, "open up. I got news!"
They both deflate with a sigh. Duff reluctantly sits up, scrubbing his face, the inside seam of Izzy's jeans imprinted on his jaw. Izzy hauls himself up and unlocks the door, letting in a bursting Doug balancing a giant sheet cake on the flat of his palm, thick white frosting, and big, bold blue icing that says GNR #1.
Doug's face is nearly crimson, filled to the brim with enthusiasm. "Guess what?" He asks, barely containing his excitement and subtlety.
Izzy drops back down onto the sofa with a huff. "You're pregnant?" He mumbles weakly, sticking a cigarette in the corner of his mouth.
Doug frowns when neither of the guys bites. He sets the sheet cake on the coffee table in front of them with a decisive thunk. "Billboard just called," he pauses for drama, dragging it out to reel the attention, "Appetite is officially number one."
Izzy's lighter sputters. The words land, but they don't quite click. They kinda just hang in the stale, warm air, waiting for someone—at the very least—to crack a smile.
Duff's jaw hinges open, then closes. His eyes flick to the cake, then to Doug. The silence stretches so long it starts to bubble up awkward and thick. Finally, he manages, "…Seriously?"
"Dead serious." Doug urges, trying to hype the guys up and hoping his joy rubs off with a contact high. "Congratulations, gentlemen, you guys are the biggest band in the fuckin' world! Insane, right!?"
Izzy hasn't moved, lighter still hovering midair by the tip of his unlit smoke, staring holes into the cake that's beginning to liquefy under the harsh fluorescents.
"Iz?" Doug probes, clearly expecting a little more of a lively reaction. Maybe champagne and screaming. "This is good news. You guys should be really proud."
Eventually, Izzy blinks, clearing his throat. "Yeah. No. I know, I am…" he exhales, finally managing to light his cigarette and take a deep drag. A big cloud blooms from his nostrils, floating toward the ceiling. Words try to climb up his throat, but they get lost halfway.
In a moment of shellshock, he does the first thing that feels natural. He looks at Duff.
"This is weird."
Duff nods, swallowing, forcing a smile that he knows Izzy knows is fake, but trying to soften the impact anyway. "Yeah, really fuckin' weird." He scoffs dryly, more bewilderment than revulsion, looking back up to Doug. "Fucking number one?" Duff repeats, like the news is truly starting to sink into his bones.
Doug nods as he speaks, a grin forming around his mouth again. "Number one, man. Rolling Stone is already blowing up Geffen's phone for a front-cover issue."
Izzy's stomach does a complicated, nauseous little gurgle. He still sits stonefaced.
When the fanfare doesn't exceed the quickest flash of a disbelieving smirk, Doug claps his hands together. "Well. Congrats, again, boys—" he pauses at the door, one foot into the hallway, "oh, soundcheck in 45, by the way."
The door hinges ring far too loud in the stillness of the room, and then Doug's gone, replaced with nothing but quiet and an empty chasm of too-bright reality.
Duff's tongue darts out to wet his dry bottom lip, eyes not straying very far from the glossy, vanilla, sugary award.
A cake.
Four years of grinding. Four years of fucking hell. And poverty. And close calls. And love. And hate. And confusion. And new friends. And sex. And pain. And blood. And tears. And doubt. And death. And drugs. And booze. And overdoses. And laughter. And music. And brotherhood. And community. And smashed guitars. And mics being thrown. And drums being lost. And family. And forgiveness. And new beginnings. And traveling. And fighting. And broken hearts. And guilt. And loss. And surrendering personal space. And drowning so deep you can't see the surface anymore. And learning how to survive. And failure. And finding God. And losing God. And wanting to give up. And somehow finding hope again despite it all. And everything else that has made up their five collective lives since the spring of 1985.
And they get a cake for it.
—
The fucked thing about it—apart from the obvious—was that it wasn't really that much different from any other gig. Another sweat-soaked, heart-racing, pour-your-fucking-guts-out-in-front-of-a-crowd notch in all their bedposts.
The guys thought they knew loud. They thought they knew what it felt like to have your ears ringing so intensely that it borders on unbearable; the gift that keeps on giving from high-pitched monitor feedback and the unanimous wash of thousands of screaming faces.
Nah. They didn't know loud until this. Until 107,000 people are all rushing toward them at once, pressing against barricades meant to hold a crowd half the size.
They truly didn't know the meaning of the word consequence until this, either.
Donington Park, August 20th, 1988.
They touched down at Heathrow the prior morning, more flexibility to adjust to the time change, more flexibility to get some fucking decent sleep. Izzy's never been a fan of the whole festival slot thing. Can anyone say LA Street Scene? They all always end up being a clusterfuck in some regard. Still, it's the biggest crowd they've ever played to, and when we're talkin' dollar signs, the check ain't gonna be too bad either.
Shit's been suspicious ever since Appetite came out on top. And not like, good suspicious, not oh this is weird, but I'm secretly enjoying it. More like, Izzy's always on high fucking alert, waiting for the other shoe to drop, never allowing himself to access the enjoyment of the fruits of labor. In the two weeks since Billboard called, things have already switched gears. They got first-class tickets to England, bye-bye economy. They got put up in the Four Seasons, like that makes any fuckin' sense when they barely get enough time to shut their eyes for more than a blink. And worst of all, they can budget separate rooms now. No more needing to share two queens in a stuffy little box, which, funny enough, really upset two other queens when they learned they don't have an excuse to shack up together for the night.
Between being ferried from hotel to shuttle van to outside trailer serving as their dressing room, it's barely ten thirty in the goddamn morning, and Izzy's ready for a stiff one. The festival grounds are crawling with entourages and crews for all the acts on the bill, every giant parade of idiots marching to their trailers bigger than the last. Security is doing its best to manage the sheer volume of bodies flooding through the gates, but it's clear they're outnumbered and outmanned. Energy feels off today. More volatile.
Izzy's yanked out of his own head when a body plops down on the couch beside him, scissoring open the blinds with two fingers and peering out the tinted trailer window.
She whistles low at the size of the crowd that's quickly absorbing the field. "Fuckin' A," Cassandra murmurs lowly, stupefied, "how many people did Doug say?"
"Over a hundred thousand," Izzy replies, no inflection or lilt to his voice, just flat and removed.
Cass tucks her sneakers beneath her thighs, propping an elbow on the backrest of the sofa and studying him with a concentrated look.
"Stop." Izzy mumbles, hiding in his paper cup of Irish Coffee.
"Stop what?" Defensiveness creeps in at the edges.
"Trying to get into my head. I can tell." Cass has an awful poker face.
"You just—" she shrugs, toying with her new, official tour laminate, complete with a picture and signature, "seem kinda bummed to be here, that's all."
Izzy sighs, deflating against the cushions with his head tilted toward the ceiling, eyes burning when his lids close. "Not bummed," Izzy clarifies, rubbing the bridge of his nose harshly, "just tired, Cass. Been a long run."
It's a complicated song and dance every touring musician goes through. When they're stagnant for too long, they get antsy, but by mid-tour, they're homesick again and miss their bed. It's a mindfuck, to say the least, and it doesn't really ever get easier or go away.
Cassandra fidgets, mirroring Izzy's posture with her head thrown back, arms folded over her stomach. Her tone goes sheepish for a moment. "It's not…is it me?" She peeps, unusually timid.
Izzy cracks an eye, peering at her sidelong. "Huh?"
"Like—" she huffs a sigh, squirming under her own awkwardness and insecurity, "am I doing good? Are you still happy with it all?"
Izzy lifts his head, looking at her fully now. "Of course I am, man. You fuckin' kill it. I mean, you helped set up our entire rig this morning in like a half hour."
Cassandra shrugs, olive-toned face flushing with embarrassment. "I guess," she mumbles weakly.
"Nah, don't do that—" He sits up, posture straightened, trying to funnel whatever little energy he has into instilling some confidence. "I wouldn't have jumped through all the hoops and shit to bring you to England if I wanted you gone, yeah?" Izzy looks at her, deep blue eyes hidden under dark curls, fingernails split and jagged from restringing guitars.
"Hey." He drops his voice softly, coaxing her back.
Cass looks at him, spiky black lashes fluttering gently.
"Fuck all that trial period shit. You're my tech." Izzy says with certainty, like placing a final brick in a wall. He playfully knocks Cassandra's knee with his knuckle, trying to rip the film of tension slowly encasing her. "Proud of you, kiddo. Learned a lot the last month."
Finally, Cassandra smiles, the apples of her cheeks burning bright pink with praise and pride. "You're a sissy."
Izzy knocks back the rest of his drink. "And you're a fuckin' reject—says a lot about me as a person, huh?"
—
From the wings of the stage, it looks like a living, breathing, swaying organism. A mass of flesh moving as one, surging, pushing, crushing forward against the small strip of metal separating the stage from a hive of humans. When the guys finally saunter out, adrenaline hits like a syringe straight to the chest. A wall of sound smashes like a shockwave, a roar so loud the sonic boom from a fighter jet pales into insignificance.
Steven counts them in, clicking his sticks together. Duff's bassline starts rumbling. They launch into It's So Easy.
By the middle of Brownstone, the scales start tipping. Izzy sees it. People in the back try to push forward, which only pinches the kids by the barricade between bodies and metal. Faces start to contort, less excitement, more panic.
In between Brownstone and You're Crazy, Axl has to stop the set to wrangle everyone. "You people alright down here?" He asks over the mic, breathless and concerned despite the residual energy of commanding the stage. The crowd cheers back automatically, sticking up thumbs, but the enthusiasm seems one-sided.
The show continues.
You're Crazy cranks the dial, doing little to help the crush. Axl hops the line of monitors to linger by the edge of the stage, pointing into the crowd and hoping to catch the already overwhelmed security guard's attention. "We got a pile up down here."
The crowd continues to surge anyway, unstoppable momentum, too eager to watch the band that just hit number one on the charts play. The vibe starts to drag on stage, energy stunted by the pause in music to help the kids currently bloody and faint.
Axl starts getting impatient, not knowing any better. "C'mon, we're slowin' down, man." He saves face by introducing the band, but it feels hollow and forced.
In the midst of security wading into the pit, flashes of trapped limbs and frightened faces, Izzy turns to his right.
Duff looks over, feeling the eyes.
This doesn't feel good.
I know. I dunno what to do.
Me either.
Keep playing?
Keep playing.
—
It takes hours for them to find out. Right when they're sitting at the hotel bar with most of the guys who played the show, to be exact. Izzy was a little rattled after the gig, yeah, but they've had unruly crowds before. They've had to stop mid-song before. This just feels different 'cuz the number of people, right? 'Cuz apparently, overnight, they've become the biggest thing on the face of the fucking planet, and it feels like everything they do is under a microscope now?
It's fine. Relax. Have a drink, and you'll shake the feeling.
He parks himself between Duff and Slash, nursing a glass, feeling the leftover energy from the chaos simmering low in his gut. Apart from that, everything else is normal. Routine.
Until Alan wanders in from the lobby, face an ungodly shade of pallor. He flew in just for this special show and to check on the guys—his prized ponies, respectively.
Izzy notices him first, seeing his shadow linger in his peripheral. He turns his chin over his shoulder slightly, brows pinched in worry, booze pivoting him into friendliness. "You good, Niv?"
"Can I pull you guys for a minute?" He sweeps a hand over them, motioning to a quiet hallway.
Reluctant to abandon their cocktails and conversations, but seeing the glazed-over look beneath Alan's aviator glasses, the three of them shuffle over. Away from prying eyes and ears, he presses himself into wallpaper, cheeks expanded with a heavy exhale.
After a beat, "Two people—" Alan stops, correcting himself, "two boys, got trampled in the crowd during the set."
Duff shifts his weight, arms crossed tightly over his chest. "Shit…they okay?"
Alan shakes his head, removing his glasses and scrubbing his eyes harshly. "Pronounced dead at the hospital. I'd rather tell you now than you hearing it on the telly."
All the air gets sucked out of the hallway. Izzy watches his vision stretch like a dolly zoom, words pushing him further back until he can barely see anything besides the endless crowd that was in front of his nose only a few hours ago—a death march, unbeknownst to him. Questions follow from a rushed, disembodied voice, probably Duff, but Izzy can't really make it all out through the fog, like he's listening through six feet of concrete.
He peels himself away from the conversation wordlessly. Alan calls after him, but Izzy heads straight for the elevators.
—
He sits on the plush, carpeted floor, back pressed to a down comforter, thick linen drapes pulled tight over the windows. Strange how Izzy almost misses the dirty, cheap motels for as much as he bitched about the scratchy sheets and tinkling water pressure. Here, though, it feels too sterile. Too antiseptic. Like if he touches anything, it's immediately soiled—as are most things.
He isn't counting the minutes, or maybe hours, he's been holed up like this. Long enough to make it halfway through a bottle of Jameson, a quarter through his pack of smokes, and nearly all the way into psychosis.
A knock comes eventually. Izzy doesn't answer, hoping they'll just go away, even knowing it's most likely Duff.
"…Please." Comes from the other side, fragile, watery, and wavering. One little nudge and he'll shatter entirely.
Izzy sighs, feeling the whites of his eyes sizzle just from that sound alone. "S'open." He slurs.
Duff staggers in, drunk, eyes red-rimmed. He collapses next to Izzy on the floor, close enough that their thighs brush.
Neither speaks. Izzy passes the bottle over like it's understanding epitomized into 26 oz.
Duff drinks, wincing, then passes it back.
Izzy does the same.
They go back and forth in silence until there's no more brown and only foggy, dark green glass.
Finally, Duff looks over. He opens his mouth, drawing in a deep breath.
Izzy only shakes his head, brows laced with the force of holding back an emotion that's so radioactive he can't put a name to it. Please, baby. Not now. Don't wanna talk.
The breath gets caught midway in Duff's throat before it erupts. His waterline bubbles with thick, salty tears. Izzy's pulling him into the dip of his neck before the sob gets the chance to burst.
They cradle each other, rocking slowly through uneven, hiccuped cries. Duff grips Izzy's hand so hard the bones bleach, fighting himself through the fit. Izzy looks down at their intertwined fingers, shushing him softly despite his own stout lump in the middle of his windpipe. He brings Duff's scarred knuckles to his lips, pressing delicately.
Here’s the smell of the blood still. All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand.
