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“Teek?” His heart leapt in his chest as he rounded one of the pilings and found his teammate slumped against it. He was barely upright, holding himself there by one shoulder, as the rest of his lower body was soaked and covered in wet sand.
Hayes knelt down beside him, knees sinking into the damp beach, and hooked an arm under his shoulder. “I’m so fuckin’ glad to see you, man. Come on, let’s stand up.”
TK fought him, refusing to cooperate, so Hayes plopped down next to him. He reached into his friend’s pants pockets and started checking, but there was nothing: no phone, no wallet, no room key for his hotel. “Where’s all your shit, man?”
He shrugged, groaning, and Hayes noticed the front of his shirt was covered in vomit.
“What happened last night?”
“I shot up,” he said quietly. “Was just gonna take a bunch of pills and drink, but I met up with this girl and she wanted to shoot me up while she sucked my dick. I don’t fuckin’ remember a thing after that. Said it was heroin. Probably fentanyl. I don’t ever throw up this much from heroin.
Shit. I didn’t know he fucked with heroin, too.
Hayes was pretty sure he knew where all of TK’s belongings went.
“Listen, Ryan’s up at the boardwalk. Let’s get you back there so we can get somewhere safe, get you comfortable and dry, OK?”
“It hurts,” TK cried, tears streaming down his face. “It hurts so bad. My stomach…I can’t stop fuckin’ puking. I think I’m dying, Ty.”
“Nah, fuck that. You’re a tough son of a bitch, man.” Hayes reached down to the bottom of TK’s shirt, told him to hold his breath, and pulled it as carefully and gently as he could up over his head, tossing it aside. He used his hands to scoop some water and tried to rinse the small amount of vomit that was plastered to one side of TK’s face. “Come on. We really gotta go, Trav. We’ll get you into the car and you can lie down. I gotta let everyone know you’re OK. The boys were worried about you.”
“Oh, shit! I missed the flight, didn’t I? Fuck. They’re so gonna bench me!” He broke down sobbing, and Hayes immediately threw his arms around him.
“No way,” Hayes lied, knowing most likely, both of them would be sitting on their asses for a long time. “They’re just gonna be so happy you’re OK, man.”
“Wait. So, they all…just left without me? They didn’t know where I was and they all fuckin’ left anyway?”
Hayes squeezed him. “Not all of them left, man.”
TK sobbed even harder, the beautiful, broken boy completely falling apart in his teammate’s arms. His teammate who was willing to sit there and let him for as long as he needed to.
Or for as long as the oxy kept doing its thing.
“You’re an angel, Ty Hayes. A real one. You know that?”
Hayes scoffed, tears welling up in his own eyes, thinking about just how screwed up this all was, but how lucky they were to at least have each other to cling to while the world caught fire and burned down around them. “Far from it, man.”
“No, for real you are. You’re the only one of them who gives a shit about me. You…you fuckin’ came for me, baby.”
“Would you have come for me?”
“Damn right I would’ve.”
???
Ryan finished checking his phone for the 20th time, having already waited over a half hour for Hayes to return, but there was no sign of him. He knew he couldn’t just leave him here, and he wouldn’t, but dammit if he didn’t want to.
He recalled the conversation he had with Amara yesterday.
“Rehab. He needs to go to rehab, Ryan.”
Ryan scrunched his nose and shook his head.
Rehab.
Rehab was a place for people with real addictions and problems, not a place for his boyfriend. For God’s sake, it was Hayes.
A confident, cocky son of a bitch.
