Hope

Switches POV

Ryan’s POV:

                “No, the heroin Rob- where is it?” I whispered. He handed me the glasses case, and I shot up, not giving it a second thought. I knocked back another shot of Jack Daniels and headed over to where Pete was tuning his guitar. After I had gotten back to the hotel, I hadn’t seen him at all during the day. When we were all driving back over to the Metro, he drove in the other car, and avoided me. I wanted to ask him what was wrong.
                “Hey,” I said.
                No answer. I was starting to feel the effects of the heroin and alcohol now.
                “Pete, baby-“
                “No. No ‘baby’. I am your band member now, nothing else,” he tried to look at me, but pain spread across his face, and he looked away. “Nothing, okay?”
                “What are you talking about?” I asked.
                “You ruined it. That’s what I’m talking about. You need help, Ryan, serious help. I’m done with you. It’s over,”
                Somewhere in the background, a guy introduced us on stage. As Pete was getting up to walk on stage, he glanced at Rob and then back to me, looking completely shattered.
                He knew.
                The crowd cheered, but everything was slipping out of my grasp. Everything was messy and falling apart.
                He knew.
                I tried to sing the songs, but I couldn’t find them in my brain. My life was sliding away- I could physically feel it.
                He knew.
                The crowd was booing. Pete walked off stage. How long had we been playing? Where was Benny? I couldn’t hear music anymore. They were still booing. Someone grabbed my arm and pulled me off stage. I was outside. My arm hurt. Someone punched me- I focused enough to see that it was Rob. He was laughing. He was evil. I wanted to run away, but I couldn’t move. He had me pinned to a wall. It was so dark. Nothing made sense.
                “So you ruined it, Casanova. He doesn’t want you anymore… But I still do. Right now, anyway,” he slammed me back against the brick wall. I shook my head- that was about as much as I could move. I looked to my left and saw the street- we were in an alleyway next to the venue. Rob grabbed my jaw and forced my head towards his face. His tongue was suddenly in my mouth. I tried to say no, and push him away, but I couldn’t even tell if the words were coming out.
                “You’re pathetic,” he snickered at me. I looked down and nodded in agreement.
                I was on the ground, face down. It was so dirty. He pulled my pants off.
                “W-why? Why are you… d-doing this?” I managed to say.
                “Because it’s too easy,” he smirked. He lowered himself onto me and forced his way inside, pounding against me, unprotected, back and forth. I was choking and sobbing and trying so hard to breathe- the pain was so intense, I couldn’t compare it to anything else I’d ever felt in my life.
                When he was finished, he got up and spat on me.
                “Thanks,” he said, laughing as he walked away.
                Everything went black after that.
 
Pete’s POV:
               
                I loved him. I loved him so much… it was so easy to see the things that I’d just brushed off as “nothing” because of how much I just wanted him to feel the same way.
                I sat on a swing in the park we had visited the first day we got to Chicago. It was the only place I could think of to get away from everyone. I was so embarrassed and completely heartbroken, I didn’t know what to do with myself.
                I put Ryan before the one thing in my life that I always knew I wanted, and it turned around and slapped me in the face.
                I never wanted to go on the road trip. I just wanted a straight shot 3 day drive with just the band. We would have made it and done amazing and got a record deal. But we fucked up. Ryan fucked us over. He ruined the show, he ruined me… and he let Rob ruin him.
                I hated Rob with my entire being. I couldn’t believe I had ever thought he was a decent person. He disgusted me. He set me up so that I would walk in and see them together. I wondered how long they had been doing things behind my back. Since before the trip? Kalin had told me that there were rumors a long time ago of Ryan and Rob being more than friends… It scared me to think about that. What if my relationship with Ryan had just been a lie from the start? I felt sick to my stomach, and everything inside of me ached. It couldn’t have all been a lie. Rob was a sick and twisted person, but Ryan wasn’t. I had seen a glimpse of his mind. He was sweet and charismatic and clever and mysterious- he was the boy I had fell in love with so easily. The boy I had made plans to spend the rest of my life with. Was that Ryan still inside of him somewhere?
                He couldn’t drag me down with him. He would get help, and I would make sure of it, but…
                But then what?
                “Pete, come back to the hotel,” Madison said, approaching me.
                “No… g-go away,” I said, wiping the tears off of my face.
                “You listened to me, now you have to let me be there for you. Trust me, come back,” she said.
                “W-why? I c-can’t go… I can’t look at him,” I struggled to breathe evenly.
                “He’s not there. You can stay in my room. You can’t stay out here all night,” she said. I knew she was right, but I was being stubborn. I wasn’t ready to leave yet.
                “Why did this h-happen?” I asked. She sat next to me and held my hand.
                “Rob does this to people. People like me, people like Ryan… Ryan was just stupid enough to get so deep into it,” she explained.
                “He had to have known that this couldn’t go on forever- that it would all blow up in his face,” I said.
                “Maybe- he probably did, but he was screwed. Rob locked him in a cell with no key. He thought he could handle it, but obviously he couldn’t and that’s exactly how Rob set it up to be. It’s his game- that’s what he does with people,” she said.
                “I’m just… s-so angry. I’m so… stupid,” I said.
                “No you’re not, Pete. You have every right to be angry and upset, but you’re not stupid. Don’t think that, and don’t blame yourself. This was Rob’s manipulation and Ryan’s… willingness. You have to know that sometimes, things are going to happen to you that you can’t control… but you just have to see it for what it is and try to deal with it. Once you come to terms with what’s going on, it’ll be easier. I promise,”
                I nodded and squeezed her hand. After a few moments, I turned to her.
                “Thank you,” I said.
                “Your welcome,” she smiled.
                I felt very lucky to have her and her unorthodox wisdom in my life. In a few aspects, Madison reminded me of my mother. I had never noticed it before, but she had a very maternal aura to her. She was helping me and comforting me, while simultaneously telling me the harsh reality of everything. She and my mother had also both lost a child in their lives, but while my mom let that one thing ruin her outlook on the rest of her life, Madison didn’t. Sure, she handled it the wrong way, and she still had moments when she felt completely broken inside, but she had hope. She knew that her future was going to do whatever it wanted to do, because of how many times things ended up completely different from what she ever expected for her, but she liked that about life. And that’s what ultimately gave me the hope I was looking for in the end. I couldn’t be like my mom and let one thing make the rest of my life grey and miserable. I had to be like Madison. I had to keep going.
                I had to have hope.