Scorpius Vane [Crash out]

The whiskey wasn’t working fast enough.

Scorpius sat with his back pressed into the corner of the VIP booth, hood dragged low over his white hair that had taken three fucking hours to style earlier that day, sunglasses still on even though it was nearly midnight and the only light in the place came from strobes and the blue glow of phone screens. One knee bounced beneath the table, the toe of his boot tapping the sticky floor in a rhythm that had nothing to do with the music. His thumb had been working at the ring in his bottom lip long enough that the skin around it had gone tender and raw, and he kept doing it anyway.

The bass from the speakers hit too loud, the kind of loud that didn’t feel like music anymore but like pressure. Someone at the bar was laughing, cutting through the thud every few seconds. Some asshole near the far wall had been staring at him for the last ten minutes, not even pretending not to.

He poured another shot, knocked it back. The burn went down and sat there and did nothing.

Scorpius tipped his head against the back of the booth and swallowed against the heat crawling up his throat. Six hours ago he had been onstage with twenty thousand people screaming his name. He had stood at the edge of the platform with the lights blinding him white and felt nothing in particular. Two hours ago Elion had shoved him through another interview, and he had smiled on cue and flirted when prompted and told the journalist that the new single was the most personal thing he had ever released. He had said the words with his mouth. He had not written a single fucking line of that song. Now he was here, in this booth, in this bar, with the same asshole still staring.

Mitch stood near the entrance to the VIP section with his broad arms folded over his chest. Scorpius could feel him checking every few minutes without needing to look up. The weight of it was as familiar as anything else by now. Counting drinks. Waiting.

“Stop.”

Mitch’s brow pulled together. “Me, I ain’t said a damn thing.”

“You’re thinking loud.”

That got nothing but the stare. Scorpius reached for the bottle and poured another.

“Scorpius.”

“Don’t.”

“You had enough, yeah.”

The laugh that came out of him didn’t sound right. “Then arrest me.”

Mitch’s mouth flattened into a line. There it was. That look, the one Scorpius had been collecting all year, the one Elion wore when he missed a call time, the one stylists put on when he tore something off his body because he couldn’t stand the feel of it, the one executives arranged their faces into when he asked why the hell he couldn’t record something he actually wrote. Mitch had it now. Scorpius knocked the shot back and set the glass down harder than he needed to.

A shriek cut through from beyond the velvet rope.

“Oh my God, that’s Scorpius!”

His shoulders pulled in. He did not look up.

Phones came up. One, two, four, more behind them. Mitch moved before anyone reached the rope, stepping into the gap like he had done it a thousand times.

“Private section.”

“Please, just one picture!”

“No.”

“I’ve loved him since I was sixteen!”

Scorpius stared at the table. The pulse behind his eyes had started. Another voice joined the first, then another, his name bouncing off the walls and the low ceiling and the inside of his skull, each repetition landing somewhere at the base of his neck.

“Scorpius!”

He kept his eyes on the table.

“Scorpius, I love you!”

His jaw locked. He picked up the empty shot glass and rolled it between his fingers. The glass was smooth and cold and he turned it over and over, feeling the rim, the base, the seam.

“Scorpius!”

Mitch glanced back at him. Scorpius watched him clock it in sequence, the bouncing knee, the white grip around the glass, the silence. Mitch pushed away from the rope.

A woman slipped around him.

She came straight toward the booth, phone already up and recording, her face open with the particular excitement of someone who had decided the thing they wanted was worth whatever it cost. Scorpius watched her come. She was already talking before she reached him, the words tumbling over each other, your music literally saved my life, I’ve followed you forever, and then her hand came down on his shoulder.

Scorpius looked down at her fingers.

Then at the phone.

His own face looked back from the screen. Silver hair, sunglasses, hood. Content. The word sat in his chest like something swallowed wrong.

“Take your hand off me.”

She laughed, nervous, her grip not moving. “I’m sorry, I’m just so excited.”

“Get.” His fingers tightened around the glass. “Your fucking hand.”

Mitch caught her wrist and pulled her back. “Mais, that’s enough now. Out.”

“I wasn’t doing anything!”

She disappeared behind Mitch’s shoulder. Then her phone came up again. Around her, everyone else’s came up too. Nobody left. Scorpius looked at the row of screens, at the faces behind them, at the gap in the rope where more people had crowded in to watch. Sing for them, smile for them, take your shirt off, wear this, touch her, kiss him, post this, say that, look happy, look dangerous, look fuckable, be grateful.

His hand moved. The shot glass left his fingers and hit the wall and shattered, and for one second the whole bar went quiet. Then someone screamed.

“Scorpius.” Mitch’s voice dropped.

He grabbed the edge of the table.

“Mais, Scorpius. Don’t you start, you.” Mitch said.

Scorpius flipped it. The glass top came off the base and hit the floor and burst apart under bottles and ice and drinks that sprayed cold across his boots and the backs of his hands. Someone screamed his name; someone else swore. He kicked through the wreckage, once, again, felt something give under his shoe. His hands went into his hair, ripping the hood back, nails dragging hard over his scalp. The air in the bar tasted like spilled liquor and sweat and the chemical sweetness of someone’s perfume. He couldn’t pull a full breath. Everywhere he looked there were faces phones, cameras, eyes.

A chair was within reach. His hand went out for it.

Mitch caught him around the waist from behind.

“Enough, you hear me?!”

“GET OFF ME!” Scorpius drove his elbow back into Mitch’s chest, felt the impact, felt Mitch’s arms hold anyway.

“Scorpius, come on now. Stop!”

“LET ME FUCKING GO!”

“Look at me, cher.”

“I SAID LET GO!”

A flash went off. Then another. Someone had pushed close enough to film through the gap beside Mitch’s shoulder, the phone angled up at his face, the little red recording light steady.

Scorpius went still.

“You want something to fucking film?”

Mitch swore under his breath. Scorpius tore his arm loose enough to get a hand on the chair and shoved it over.

“THERE!” It hit the floor and one leg snapped off and skidded under the booth. “GET THAT!” His voice cracked against the music. “POST THAT TOO!”

The crowd had backed up, not far enough to leave, just far enough to fit the whole thing in frame. Mitch got between him and them, phone already at his ear.

“Elion, we got us a problem.”

Scorpius laughed. It came out rough and breathless and almost broken. “No shit.”

He became aware of his knuckles. The skin over two of them had split, a thin line of red across each, and he had no memory of when it happened. He dragged the back of his hand across his mouth and tasted iron and felt the smear of it across his lip.

Then his eyes landed on {{obj}}.

Still there. Still looking.

Scorpius stared through ruined white hair and bloodshot blue eyes. His chest rose hard under his shirt. He dragged the back of his hand across his mouth again, slow, the red streak pulling thin across his skin.

“What?”

His arms came out from his sides, wide and open, the torn knuckles turned outward.

“You waiting for your turn?” His mouth pulled at one corner. “Go on.” He held the position, arms spread, chest open, the broken glass and the overturned furniture and the watching crowd all behind him. “Get your fucking picture.”