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Look at it this way. You’ve already made it through two weeks. In one week you’ll be back here.
Henry:
yeah!! not much longer to go
The idea used to be reassuring. It’s what Luca clung to: Just make it through the tour. But what about after? Already, the others are talking about recording an album, about going back on tour, this time as headliners. Luca thinks she would like to be a part of it, if they’ll have her. She doesn’t know how to do that, though, when she feels like a time bomb ready to go off and implode the band with her messy, tangled-up feelings.
She slips the phone back into her pocket as the light turns green and runs until she can’t feel her legs anymore.
The others are just starting to wake up by the time Luca gets out of the shower. Toni pulls aside the curtains and opens the window, letting in the sunlight and a gentle breeze. Florence is sitting on the edge of her bed, looking on the verge of death.
“Are you all right?” Miray is asking, kneeling in front of her. “Are you going to throw up?”
Florence considers it for a moment before very slowly shaking her head.
“Why am I being punished like this.” Izzy’s voice is muffled into the pillow she pulled over her face roughly around the same time that Toni opened the curtains. “’m only twenty-three years old. Is this my fucking prime? It can’t be.”
Toni gives her leg a mocking pat as she walks by her bed. Compared to the others, she looks downright chipper, already dressed and sipping from her reusable water bottle.
“I think we just need to get a bit of food and water into you,” Miray says, smoothing a hand over Florence’s hair. It looks a bit like something has nested in it.
“Don’t even talk about eating right now,” Izzy mumbles.
Miray just barely stifles a laugh. “Look at Luca. She already went running and had a shower.”
“Yeah,” Izzy says. Lifting the pillow, she peers blearily at Luca. “What the fuck is up with that.”
“I feel better after exercising,” Luca says. Crouching by her bag, she asks, “Has anyone seen my meds?”
“Bathroom,” someone croaks, and the room goes silent.
Slowly, Luca turns to look at Florence. “What?”
“You put them in the bathroom,” says the voice that is not Florence’s. “In the cupboard above the sink.”
“Oh my God,” Izzy says, struggling to sit up. “Why do you sound like that?”
Florence seems to ask herself the same thing. There’s something close to panic in her eyes as she puts a hand to her throat. Her voice sounds like she’s gargled a handful of gravel as she says, “I don’t know.”
“All the karaoke, probably.” Grimacing, Miray wraps a comforting arm around Florence’s shoulders. “And the alcohol. And the cigarettes.”
“I barely even smoked,” Florence rasps. She looks genuinely distressed now. Luca’s own throat closes up in sympathy. “Oh my God. We have a show in two days.”
“Which is why you’re going to shut up right now,” says Toni. She fixes Florence with a stern gaze. “I don’t want another word out of you. You’re going to drink tea and eat honey and not so much as whisper until sound check. Okay?”
For a brief, horrible second, Florence looks like she’s going to cry. She gives a silent nod.
“Okay.” Toni takes a deep breath. “Now. Let’s find something to eat for those of us not on the brink of death. We have to leave in two hours if we want to make it to Vienna at a reasonable time.” She pauses. “Fuck’s sake, Izzy. Just go to the bathroom and throw up.”
“Okay, Mum,” says Izzy, somehow managing to sound condescending even as she drags herself to the bathroom with her blanket still wrapped around her shoulders like a cape.
Luca looks back at Florence. She doesn’t know what to say to make this better, so she settles on, “I’ll go get you some tea.”
Florence gives her a weak thumbs-up before flopping onto her back, defeated.
It’s only been three hours of Florence’s involuntary vocal rest, and Luca misses her voice already. As they fly down the E50 to Austria, the car is unusually quiet. Izzy is napping with her headphones on. Miray and Toni are chatting softly in the front of the car. Florence is chipping off her nail polish and staring out the window while working her way through a bag of lemon cough drops they got at the petrol station.
“Are you all right?” Luca asks her quietly.
