Title: Crushed

Author: Amy B.

Fandom: HCL with a tiny dash of Da Vinci's Inquest

Pairing: implied Joe/Billy

Rating: R

Date: September 16, 2000

Archive: TBF

Crushed
By Amy B.
***

Billy pushed another pillow behind his head and stretched his legs out on the bed. He flipped through the channels on the hotel television quickly because there weren't all that many to choose from. He finally just left it on a music video channel and picked up his book. He'd been reading a lot lately-- biographies, poetry collections, graphic novels, war stories, paperback mysteries he picked up in airports and drug stores-- just about anything he could get his hands on. It either saved his sanity on the road, or gave him the perfect excuse to become a near recluse. At this point, he didn't care which so long as it kept him out of the bars and liquor stores.

And it did. Reading was also providing a lot of material for writing--not specific subjects, but he was trying to expand his use of language and seeing how other writers used it was proving helpful. He'd only sat down and written two new songs--neither of which he was really happy with yet--but he had ideas for half dozen more. He'd let his guitar--and Joe, always Joe, can't forget that-- speak for him for years. Time and distance from the past and some maturing bouts of introspection had brought him to realize that he had things to say, and that no one else could say them for him.

He turned his attention to the television when he heard one of those confidential/behind the scenes/whatever-happened-to shows coming on. They all ran together and got repetitive after awhile, but his inner gossip enjoyed watching them. The first segment was an urban legend-y piece about a Seventies hard rock band's antics on tour. It was entertaining enough that he waited until a commercial break before going to the bathroom.

He was drying his hands when he heard a knock on the door. He opened it just a crack and looked out. Taylor, Jenifur's drummer, was standing there, so Billy opened the door wider.

"Hey Billy, I was gonna go find something to eat before we have to leave for the in-store and wondered if you wanted to come with?"

As Taylor was speaking, the last commercial ended and the show came back and the announcer said, "Next up, the death of one of punk rock's icons and the unsolved mystery..."

Billy's head whipped around and he forgot about the guy standing there talking to him, and walked back over to the television. He stared at the screen with his guts in a knot until a Sex Pistols song came pumping out of the speaker and the announcer started telling the tragic love story of Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen. He let out the breath he'd been unaware of holding, and sat down on the end of the bed. Weird how his legs got so shaky all of a sudden.

"Oh cool, what's this? Sid and Nancy?" Taylor's voice intruded into Billy's consciousness and he realized the younger man had followed him into the room.

"Oh, uh yeah." Billy felt like his heart had stopped for a moment and why? Why did the thought of hearing about Joe's death on television have such a strong effect after all this time? It just did, and it probably always would. He'd think about it later when he didn't have an audience. In an attempt to cover his reaction, he pointed at the picture of Sid on the screen. "He didn't do it, didn't kill her. Well, I never thought so, anyway. Whoever knows what really happened that night... I guess they're not telling."

"Dude, I haven't even seen the movie. Did you actually *know* them?"

"No. But I know the story." Billy shook his head, and patted his shirt pocket looking for a cigarette. When he didn't find one, he looked at Taylor in his cargo shorts and white tank that showed off the new tattoos on his forearm and chest and felt an old sadness. "They were so young. Younger than you even."

Taylor snorted in disgust and replied, "Fuck, Billy, I know you've been playing longer than I've been alive. Give it a rest already."

"I do that?" Billy smiled slightly and thought about it and realized... "I guess I do. I only like you because you came along and took the tag of 'The New Guy' off me."

"Yeah, and I'm gonna to be the new guy forever, right? Guess I just have to live with it." Taylor sat down on the bed next to Billy and watched the story unfolding on the TV for a moment. Then he nudged Billy's shoulder with his own and said, "It must be weird working and hanging out with a bunch of people who don't have the same level of experience as you. You get to be the fount of serenity and wisdom when we start getting too crazy, right?"

Billy laughed, but there wasn't much amusement in it. He felt the farthest thing from wise right now, and serenity... He'd recently told Bobby that he wasn't unhappy, but where did this image of serenity come from? He was way too fucked up to claim such a thing, although he did feel like he was approaching it at some oblique angle sometimes.

Looking around, he spotted his cigarettes on the table by the window and got up to get them. He lit a smoke and stared out at the building across the street for a moment before glancing over his shoulder at Taylor. He tried not to think of the drummer as a kid, but he was nearly fifteen years
younger than Billy. There was something about Taylor that unsettled him, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. Maybe it was the way he seemed to watch Billy through dark eyes too old for his almost-pretty face. Maybe it was the hunger...Yeah, Billy recognized that look all right, and he knew what it felt like to want. He wasn't sure--because he didn't much care-- what Taylor wanted, but it was something.

Unable to know the turn Billy's thoughts had taken, Taylor seemed oblivious to the tension that had been growing and was now a pulsing thing in the air between them. "So, do you want to go out with me? I saw a little cafe a couple blocks down that looked interesting."

Billy suppressed a shudder and continued to stare out the window. He really didn't want to go out right now. They had an in-store appearance at the HMV in Harlem this afternoon, and when it was done, Billy would be more than glad to go anywhere, but before the appearance, he liked to stay in. After nearly two years with the band, Taylor should have known about his little quirk. The others did and, accordingly, they left him alone. "No."

Billy focused on Taylor's reflection in the window as he stood up and walked over. He looked nonplussed at Billy's brusqueness, but not entirely put off. Standing close to Billy, he stared out the window and said, "There's so much I wanna do while we're here, and I just know I won't have enough time."

"Never been to New York, huh?" Billy took a slow contemplative drag on his cigarette, and shifted slightly away without actually moving his feet.

"I've been all around it--New Jersey, Suffolk County, Long Island-- but only once in the city. I was just passing through so it hardly counts. I bet you've been here a bunch of times."

Billy nodded. "And some of them I actually remember. Never did much of the tourist stuff." A memory snuck up on him from what felt like a million years ago, of Joe and him. A couple of skinny, angry punks with no money and no sense, but a whole lot of attitude and fire. Oh man, did they have fire. Especially Joe, who was so jazzed at playing CBGB's that he nearly pissed himself just talking about it. And after the show, high on adrenaline and whiskey and *life*, Joe had dragged him all the way up... "I've been to the top of the Empire State Building." Odd that he had no recollection of what Pipe and John had been doing while he and Joe had been narrowly avoiding arrest for various offenses--not that it would have phased either of them all that much at the time.

Billy surprised himself by admitting, "There's a few people I'd like to see while I'm here."

"Friends?" Taylor raised an eyebrow and gave him that old-eyes look again.

Billy crushed out his cigarette in the ashtray on the table and shrugged, "I wouldn't say that. Just guys I've known for a long time, musicians. Old punks like me. Maybe I'll look some of them up tonight. Once the fucking shoot starts I probably won't have time."

"Why the hell do we have to be at the studio at six a.m.? I've never figured out why they have to start these things so damned early."

"My theory is they like to torment us. So, you get some sleep the night before and drink a lot of coffee and act like you're always up at that hour. That drives 'em fuckin' nuts."

Taylor laughed and moved closer as he took a cigarette out of Billy's pack without asking. He flicked the lighter and squinted at Billy through a puff of smoke. "And you just love doing that, don't you, Bill? Fucking with people."

Billy flinched at how very... *Joe* that sounded. Some stupid twenty year old memory resurfaced, and suddenly he was getting spooked by a kid who couldn't possibly know the game. Could he? Just in case, Billy stepped back, reclaimed his cigarettes, and then moved back over to the bed.

Flipping through the channels until he'd gone through the spectrum and landed back where he'd started. By now, the program had changed to videos and some band was playing while a bunch of monkeys in clown costumes danced around them. Billy actually felt embarrassed for them--the band, not the monkeys. He'd met the guitarist at a party in LA at Trevor's and knew the guy felt the same as he did about doing these kinds of things to sell records.

Taylor followed him and sat on the bed, not so close as before, but still too close for Billy's comfort. "Jeremy really wails, doesn't he? I used to think about learning to play guitar, but never got out from behind the kit long enough to try."

"For me it was the piano. Never could afford it." Billy rubbed his face and wondered if Taylor was ever going to leave. He was putting Billy on edge, and he didn't like that, not here in his personal space that he'd finally carved out for himself after years of not having much, if anything, to call his own.

"You could do it now." Taylor looked up at him from beneath shaggy blond-streaked brown hair and gave the words some sort of double meaning that Billy was afraid he actually understood.

Billy stared right back at him and spoke firmly. "No, it's too late."

"Ah, come on, Billy. It's never too late for some things." His low voice dropped lower, persuasive and seductive. "If you want 'em bad enough."

"I don't..." Billy closed his eyes and swallowed. How had it come to this? He'd have accepted some hero worship, but the kid actually seemed to be coming on to him. And he couldn't deal with that, not now, not without snapping. He slowly opened his eyes and saw the hunger was back on Taylor's face. "Don't you have to be somewhere else soon?"

"No." Taylor spoke confidently, like he'd never been turned down before but was going to take it in stride if it happened now.

"I think you do." Billy stood up to put some distance between them and walked back over to the table. He felt like a hamster in a wheel, just going back and forth, never getting anywhere. He tilted his head and gave Taylor a perfunctory smile that felt odd and out of place. He had to get
the old charm back before they met the public later. "Hey, can you do me a favor before you go?"

"Sure, anything, Billy." Billy almost cringed at the eager tone, but his body twitched as if it had a more favorable opinion.

"Yeah. Well. A friend back home has got a daughter that's a Jenifur fan and she asked for an autographed picture of you." He picked up a folder and flipped it open, looking around for the marker that should have been close by. "I had Marty get me one earlier, so all you have to do is sign it."

Taylor came over as he found the pen on the chair where it had rolled off. Billy held it out and the younger man took it, touching Billy's fingers more than he had to. He sat down at the table and said, "Okay, what's the kid's name?"

"Gabriella." Billy spelled it out and got a nasty look in return.

But all Taylor said was "That's pretty." He scribbled out a brief message and signed his name with a flourish. "There you go."

"Yeah, thanks." Billy waved the picture a few times to make sure the ink was dry and slipped it back into the folder. "She's gonna love this."

"Anytime. Glad I could be of service." Because Billy was distracted when Taylor pushed the chair back, he didn't move out of the way. Taylor rubbed up against Billy as he stood in one long sinuous move that put them face to face when Billy turned a startled look at the man plastered against his side. He could feel Taylor's warm breath on his cheek. "Are you sure you don't want to go with me?"

Billy shook his head slowly and didn't move. Every nerve ending in his body seemed hyperaware of Taylor's closeness.

Taylor's lips almost brushed Billy's cheek as he asked, "No, you're not sure?"

"I'm sure." Resisting the urge to step away, Billy stared back with coolness born of years of practice. "No."

As a mint-scented sigh drifted over Billy's mouth, he had to force himself not to lick his lips, not to outwardly react at all. He had years of practice at that too, and he must have pulled it off because Taylor stepped back with a rueful shrug and a disappointed tremble in his forced smile.

"I'll see you later then. Marty wants us in the lobby at five o'clock."

"I'll be there." He waited until the door shut behind Taylor and muttered, "Cocksucker." Then he reached down and rearranged his half-hard cock, and thanked the desire for comfort that had made him put on loose pants that morning.

**

After playing three songs and signing so many autographs that his hand started to cramp, Billy was finally able to escape the camera flashes and stupid questions--not one of which was about Joe or Hard Core Logo this time. And it was surprisingly easy to do. He slipped on his sunglasses and faded red baseball cap, went right out the front door, and walked a block and half before catching a cab going in his direction.

Until six a.m., his time was entirely his own and he figured he could either catch up on the past or ignore it. And his words to Taylor to the contrary, ignoring it seemed like a good way to go. He was free of all encumbrances and could do any damn thing he pleased. He asked the cabbie to pull over at the next pay phone they came to, gave him some money to wait, and got out. He rifled through his wallet until he found a ragged list of phone numbers and started dialing. After getting a wrong number and an answering machine, and finding the third woman he called was now married, he gave up and got back in the cab. "Thanks for waiting. Know any good clubs?"

The cabbie reeled off the names of half a dozen places and Billy told him to drop him off at whichever was closest to his hotel. Twenty minutes later he was standing at a bar ordering club soda and smiling at a hot looking redhead that was giving him the eye. He walked over and said hello, but as they talked, he found himself staring at the level of beer in her glass more than the amount of cleavage and midriff revealed by her skimpy outfit. While she was flirting with him, he started to wonder what Taylor was doing right then. Was the kid out somewhere getting himself in trouble or was he back at the hotel with a wo-- with *somebody* who didn't turn him down?

Finally, Tyra--yeah, just like the supermodel-- noticed that he really wasn't following the conversation, and asked him if he'd like to dance. As Billy followed her out onto the floor, he had the oddest feeling of sleepwalking through the whole thing. His mind was in a dozen places besides her arms, and the thought taking more and more precedence was how much he was starting to hate club soda. A nice stiff shot of Jack Daniels would go down real good right now. He could vividly imagine--remember-- how it would burn going down his throat and how it would sit all nice and warm in his belly, drowning out all those disturbing thoughts about his bandmate.

He could go order a drink... or he could go find a meeting. Neither really held any appeal at the moment, but then neither did the beautiful Tyra. Being with her was making him more lonely than he was before, and that was just stupid. Leading her off the dance floor, he made his excuses and left the club. The music had been crap anyway, he thought as he walked to his hotel. Too bubblegummy and too heavily produced, as if the 'artists' wouldn't have anything without technology. Didn't anyone know how to play their own damned instruments anymore?

He walked the rest of the way to his hotel with every intention of going straight to his room so he could do his lonely brooding in an appropriately private setting. But when he walked through the big glass doors, he headed straight for the bar. The bar wasn't very busy so he found a booth in a
corner and ordered a whiskey--double, straight up--from a passing waitress. By the time she came back, his hands were trembling and his stomach was in knots.

The waitress slapped down a cocktail napkin and set the drink on it. "Anything else?"

Billy shook his head, signed the receipt to charge it to his room, and waited for her to leave. He flicked his dry tongue over even dryer lips and stared at the drink in front of him. He clenched his hands in his lap to stop the shaking, wiped his palms on his pants, and then brought them up to the tabletop. He still didn't pick up the glass.

He just looked at it, sitting there in all its crystal and amber glory. The sparkles where the light caught on the edge of the glass hurt his eyes and he blinked and reached out to shift the glass around, out of the light. Pulling at the edge of the napkin with the tips of his fingers, he watched
the liquor come closer and closer, until it seemed to fill his vision.

Did he want to do this? He wanted the drink, no question, but did he need it? Was the numbness it offered worth the loss of self-respect? Was he ready to throw away two years, eleven months and twenty-two days of sobriety because he was a little off-kilter? He could always start over tomorrow. Clean slate, fresh start, vowing not to do *that* again. How many times had he done that already? Quite a few, more than he could remember, but what he *did* remember was the sense of defeat and the recriminations that he'd heap on himself every single fucking time. And didn't the self-loathing portion of his subconscious sound familiar?

*Go on Billy, do it, we can beat ourselves up later, and you'll enjoy that too, you twisted little fuck*

He could hear Joe's voice so clearly that he looked up half-expecting to see him sitting across the table. But of course, he was alone. Joe was still in his grave and Billy was sitting in what used to be his native habitat. He had to wonder--idly and without much worry--if he was losing his grip on reality. Maybe he ought to call up John and ask him. If anyone would know the symptoms of insanity... Instead of cheering him up, the mean little joke just made him feel disgusted with himself. The guy couldn't help being sick or unbalanced or whatever the fuck his problem was. But Billy could. He could help himself by pushing the drink away and walking out of here.

And he would...soon. Slumping back against the seat, he rubbed one hand over his face and reached into his pocket for a cigarette with the other. The cigarette was no problem, but he couldn't find his lighter. He hoped he'd left it in his room and it hadn't fallen out somewhere. There was a book of matches bearing the hotel logo in the ashtray, and he pulled them both closer. As he did so, he shifted the glass further away with the back of his hand.

His fingers shook so much as he pulled a paper match free and tried to strike it that it broke almost immediately. He dropped it into the ashtray and pulled another out and tried it again with greater concentration. A voice calling his name made his hand jerk as he touched flame to cigarette, but he didn't drop the match. He shook it out and tossed it in the ashtray as he took a deep drag. He let the smoke out slowly as he looked up to see who'd spoken.

Taylor slid onto bench across from him and Billy found himself feeling relieved that it wasn't Joe again--or rather a figment of his imagination again. It was strange that he could sometimes go for weeks without thinking about Joe at all, but when his memory intruded, it did so with a vengeance.

Billy wouldn't be able to get him completely out of his mind for days. It could be exhausting, and now he had this fuckin' *kid* to deal with too.

"You gonna drink that?" There was no judgement in his voice, but his eyes looked a little disappointed, and that made Billy feel defensive on top of everything else.

"I'm thinking about it. What's it to you?" Billy tried to sneer with the old defiance, but he just felt...old. He sighed and pushed the glass across the table. "You can have it."

"I don't want it." Taylor waved the waitress over, gave the glass to her with a flirtatious smile. "Take this away and bring two cups of coffee, would you, darlin'?"

The waitress gave him a big smile in return, and practically bubbled, as she said, "No problem at all. Is there anything else I can get you?"

"That'll do it. Thanks." When Taylor turned back to Billy, the smile was gone. "So...what's up?"

Billy shrugged and continued to smoke and Taylor let him, until after the waitress came back and then left again. He drank a bit of his coffee, and pinned Billy with a look of determination. "What happened, Billy?"

"Nothing." Billy took a cautious sip of his coffee to see how hot it was. It was perfect, so he took a longer swallow before setting it down again and lighting a fresh cigarette. He was pleased to note that his hands were steadier this time.

"How long has it been?"

Billy looked at him blankly even though he knew exactly what he meant.

Taylor stared back and clarified, "How long since you've had a drink?"

Billy tilted his head and looked at him intently for a moment. Why should he tell this guy anything? Jenifur was not and didn't pretend to be a so-called 'family'. The members all got along just fine, but it was mostly just a job to them. A contracted job that might last or might not, and if it didn't, another one would be along. He didn't feel any responsibility to any of them outside the bounds of work or casual friendship--emphasis on 'casual', of course. He should just smile and change the subject, but for some reason, he heard himself say, "Two years, eleven months and twenty-two days."

"Very precise."

"Most people would have stopped counting by now. I figured I'd quit in eight more days."

"And yet, you almost threw it away. Did you have a good reason?"

Billy laughed silently. "There's always a good reason to drink if you want it. Hell, *wanting it* is good enough."

"Hey, isn't that what I tried to tell you earlier?" Taylor gave him the exact same flirtatious smile that he'd given the waitress earlier.

Billy wasn't in the mood to be coy and talk around it, so he said, "Fucking and drinking are not the same, although I guess one can lead to the other easily enough."

"Yeah, but fucking's much better sober." He lifted one eyebrow rakishly. "Don't you think?"

"I don't do guys." The 'anymore' was so implicit that he might as well have said it out loud. And Billy knew that Taylor heard it and saw the mixed emotions that went along with it because he looked away quickly before replying.

When he did look back at Billy, it was with old-eyed understanding and a soft smile. "Too bad. If you ever change your mind..."

Billy bowed his head and looked up from beneath his lashes, giving a slow, lazy smile as he said, "You'll be the first to know."

"Mm hmm. Well..." Taylor cleared his throat and suddenly looked his age--or even younger. And Billy felt some weird satisfaction out of that, as he watched him scoot out of the booth and stand beside the table. "Since we have to be up insanely early, I guess I'll head on up to my room. Are you going up or...staying?"

"I'm going. Being here's not really a good idea right now." Billy slipped his cigarettes in his pocket and stood up. He'd go up, read a little bit, and then get some sleep. And if it made the kid feel better to walk him to his room, he'd allow it.

The End.