Post by Lance James Renner on Nov 8, 2012 21:48:37 GMT -5
Lance clutched his hand at the top of his hair as he readjusted the sunglasses against his eyes. They felt like shit, and he could tell by the look on people around him that he looked like hell. How many people knew now that he had his sight back? Logan. Blake. Chace. Jake. Dani. The Wizards crew. Except he didn’t feel it was completely back. Going too long without wearing the sunglasses killed his eyesight. He closed his eyes behind the sunglasses, narrowing his eyebrows in frustration as he lowered his hand back down to the freshly emptied glass of scotch. “ Can I get another, please” he said hoarsely, pushing the glass forward so that the bartender could fill his glass again. Most people might think the obvious thing to do was to go to Kiersten, show her that he could see. But he didn’t feel complete yet. He didn’t want to offer her this shell of himself when she had once had all of him. What she still had, she had no idea. Joel was right in saying that he needed to talk to her. But there was more than one reason Lance had done his best to keep her at bay. He reached up, taking off his sunglasses before he set them on the counter and pinched the bridge of his nose.
The first time he had woken up and not known where he was, was at the age of eleven. It seemed like all of his friends in that circle at the time were drinking and smoking cigarettes. Cigarettes had never appealed to him, still didn’t, but eventually his friends older brother came around, smoking pot, handing it out like it was some sort of party favor. Eleven years old and he’d found a new addiction. Not long after and he was mixing it up with prescription pain killers, alcohol, snorting coke, injecting heroin. He could still remember waking up and seeing the needles still in his arms. These people that he thought were his friends had abandoned him, left him to die when they got scared of what the outcomes would be if someone found them with him. They were the same friends that had thrown him onto the steps of his family home, laying there with his own vomit choking him back so he wasn’t breathing by the time Logan had found him; unconscious and completely unaware of how close to dying he actually was. He still didn’t know what Logan had experienced that night, or how it might have effected him. The only thing he actually remembered from it was that he never left the side of his hospital bed, argued with his father about the fact that he was being sent overseas because he wasn’t ‘manageable’ anymore. But that hadn’t helped, not at first. Lance didn’t talk about England much, and there was a pretty good reason for it.
From the moment he set foot on European soil, he felt like his family had abandoned him. He wasn’t worth trying to heal, he was worth shipping off. So with that he had immediately immersed himself in the wrong crowd, all over again. But this time it was far from home and out of the prying eye of his father and brother. So it spiraled from there. Even now he could picture all of it in a quick blur ; drug deals gone bad, his girlfriend who was too far of a bad influence getting him involved in shuffles with knives, more drugs, stomach pump, drinking, cocaine, pass out, wake up, get high, have sex, stick a needle in your arm. And all of it had wound up with him laying at the floor of a jail cell where he had the shit beaten out of him so badly that the blood had thickened against his skin and hair. And just like that, it was everything he decided he needed to get clean. So he’d gone cold turkey. It was the hardest thing he’d ever done in his entire life. The sweating, shaking, stomach aches, headaches, nausea, inability to sit, stand, sleep, focus. It came to the point where he thought he might willing to murder someone for just a taste of some coke. He hated the people around him, and hated the way that they couldn’t let him just have a fix, just one night. Eventually the headaches stopped, the throwing up lessened. His anxiety, that itch to just get a fix slowly began to fade away. And when he returned he thought he had his head on straight. He had broken up with Melissa, was focusing on himself, got a gig acting and using his good looks instead of potentially hindering them with drug use. The most dangerous thing about him on the surface was the fact that he drove a motorcycle. Otherwise he never spoke about his past, what he knew he was capable of. He was someone new, the British ‘twit’ of the group, a member of some of the charming assholes that got away with anything because they had a cute smirk and way with words.
All of that being said one of the biggest demons he still faced was alcohol. It was the one thing he was having a difficulty shaking. Joel had rushed him to the ER during the time that they lived together, Logan had steered drinks away from Lance at parties after he’d had a few too many. The pain killers that they had offered him after the surgery were turned down by both him and Logan. He knew that Logan hated the idea of him being in pain at all – but Lance also figured he probably liked the idea of him living just a little bit more. If he had thought getting shot was painful, he had no idea what recovery from surgery on your eyes would be like. He’d woken up, angry and self destructive. It hadn’t mattered if his sight was back, he never stopped seeing the gun being pointed at Kiersten playing and playing in his mind. She was the only pure thing in his entire life. He thought that had been Dani, and she’d cheated on him. But Kiersten, she had never done anything to hurt him. She had been his best friend, someone that he could goof off with and just actually have fun, without any narcotics being involved. He hadn’t been completely clean since he got back, having smoked a bowl or two …or dozen, since being back. But the drinking, that was back. He hadn’t fully anticipated it. It’s just he couldn’t look in her eyes again. He couldn’t look at them without seeing the fear that he had seen in them the last time. He wouldn’t take any of that decision back, he would do it again in a heartbeat. If anything, he wished that the bullet had gone more to the center of his head, putting Kiersten out of her misery, ridding Logan and Blake of all of the annoyance of having to look after him.
Lance moved his hand away from his face, looking down at the scotch that was in front of him. The cigarettes that he hadn’t enjoyed since his move back to the states burning in his back pocket. What number drink was this? The wardrobe crew had worried about his weight once before, the amount he had lost when him and Dani were over.. surely his frame was looking light now. He stood up, holding onto the back of his chair as he finished his last drink. Last one, he was on his way to see Kiersten. Lance dug his hand into the pocket of his jacket, taking out the keys to his motorcycle as he put his sunglasses back on, turning his head away from the light as he stumbled his way to the bike, gripping onto it tightly as he reached it. Lance kicked off on his back, having to find his balance which took a bit more time than usual seeing as how he was drunk. And his sight wasn’t a hundred percent. But he knew the way to Mackenzie’s place from anywhere in the city like it was the back of his hand. There wasn’t a red light or other car on the road that was going to stop him. Actually, there wasn’t a lot that was going to stop him because as he made it to her place, there was a light that started to shine off of one of the side mirrors of his motorcycle and instantaneously he tilted his body to the side, letting the motorcycle crash to the ground and slide down the sidewalk in front of her building. Lance sat up on his elbows, watching the tires spin as it laid sideways on the ground before he pushed his body up. “ Ah fuckin’ a, mate..” he said looking over at his motorcycle as he stretched his legs out and stood up straight. Lance reached his hand into his back pocket, taking out one of the cigarettes and walked away from the bike, towards the building as he lit it. “ Mr.Renner you can’t smoke that in the building,” the doorman said and Lance waved him off, “ It’s okay, I’m drunk” he said before giving him a thumbs up. “ Sir that’s.. not really a good excuse,” he said and Lance turned and looked at him, closing one eye as he scrunched up his nose and looked at him, ignoring the blood dripping down the side of his face from crashing his motorcycle. “ Okay.. it’s okay because I’m famous,” he said before going to the elevator and getting on. Lance reached up, taking the cigarette away from his lips before he smeared the blood against his skin, making it look more like a blush than the stream of blood coming down. Once the doors opened he made his way out into the hallway, to her door. He slammed his fist roughly against the door. “ KIERSTEN,” he screamed out at the top of his lungs before pounding against the door a few more times. “ Kiersten open up it’s Lance,” he said again, slamming his hand against the door. He shouldn’t have leaned on it, because as soon as she opened it he crashed down into her apartment, hitting the floor. “ Bloody… fuck” he said before wincing slightly and placing his hands against the floor. “ Ah bloody hell mate” he said, looking down at his cigarette that had gotten smushed during the fall. “ Kiersten,” he said, laying flat against the floor as he tried to piece his cigarette together before he tilted his head to look at her, “ God you’ve always looked good in blue,” he said , keeping still against the floor instead of trying to get up.
The first time he had woken up and not known where he was, was at the age of eleven. It seemed like all of his friends in that circle at the time were drinking and smoking cigarettes. Cigarettes had never appealed to him, still didn’t, but eventually his friends older brother came around, smoking pot, handing it out like it was some sort of party favor. Eleven years old and he’d found a new addiction. Not long after and he was mixing it up with prescription pain killers, alcohol, snorting coke, injecting heroin. He could still remember waking up and seeing the needles still in his arms. These people that he thought were his friends had abandoned him, left him to die when they got scared of what the outcomes would be if someone found them with him. They were the same friends that had thrown him onto the steps of his family home, laying there with his own vomit choking him back so he wasn’t breathing by the time Logan had found him; unconscious and completely unaware of how close to dying he actually was. He still didn’t know what Logan had experienced that night, or how it might have effected him. The only thing he actually remembered from it was that he never left the side of his hospital bed, argued with his father about the fact that he was being sent overseas because he wasn’t ‘manageable’ anymore. But that hadn’t helped, not at first. Lance didn’t talk about England much, and there was a pretty good reason for it.
From the moment he set foot on European soil, he felt like his family had abandoned him. He wasn’t worth trying to heal, he was worth shipping off. So with that he had immediately immersed himself in the wrong crowd, all over again. But this time it was far from home and out of the prying eye of his father and brother. So it spiraled from there. Even now he could picture all of it in a quick blur ; drug deals gone bad, his girlfriend who was too far of a bad influence getting him involved in shuffles with knives, more drugs, stomach pump, drinking, cocaine, pass out, wake up, get high, have sex, stick a needle in your arm. And all of it had wound up with him laying at the floor of a jail cell where he had the shit beaten out of him so badly that the blood had thickened against his skin and hair. And just like that, it was everything he decided he needed to get clean. So he’d gone cold turkey. It was the hardest thing he’d ever done in his entire life. The sweating, shaking, stomach aches, headaches, nausea, inability to sit, stand, sleep, focus. It came to the point where he thought he might willing to murder someone for just a taste of some coke. He hated the people around him, and hated the way that they couldn’t let him just have a fix, just one night. Eventually the headaches stopped, the throwing up lessened. His anxiety, that itch to just get a fix slowly began to fade away. And when he returned he thought he had his head on straight. He had broken up with Melissa, was focusing on himself, got a gig acting and using his good looks instead of potentially hindering them with drug use. The most dangerous thing about him on the surface was the fact that he drove a motorcycle. Otherwise he never spoke about his past, what he knew he was capable of. He was someone new, the British ‘twit’ of the group, a member of some of the charming assholes that got away with anything because they had a cute smirk and way with words.
All of that being said one of the biggest demons he still faced was alcohol. It was the one thing he was having a difficulty shaking. Joel had rushed him to the ER during the time that they lived together, Logan had steered drinks away from Lance at parties after he’d had a few too many. The pain killers that they had offered him after the surgery were turned down by both him and Logan. He knew that Logan hated the idea of him being in pain at all – but Lance also figured he probably liked the idea of him living just a little bit more. If he had thought getting shot was painful, he had no idea what recovery from surgery on your eyes would be like. He’d woken up, angry and self destructive. It hadn’t mattered if his sight was back, he never stopped seeing the gun being pointed at Kiersten playing and playing in his mind. She was the only pure thing in his entire life. He thought that had been Dani, and she’d cheated on him. But Kiersten, she had never done anything to hurt him. She had been his best friend, someone that he could goof off with and just actually have fun, without any narcotics being involved. He hadn’t been completely clean since he got back, having smoked a bowl or two …or dozen, since being back. But the drinking, that was back. He hadn’t fully anticipated it. It’s just he couldn’t look in her eyes again. He couldn’t look at them without seeing the fear that he had seen in them the last time. He wouldn’t take any of that decision back, he would do it again in a heartbeat. If anything, he wished that the bullet had gone more to the center of his head, putting Kiersten out of her misery, ridding Logan and Blake of all of the annoyance of having to look after him.
Lance moved his hand away from his face, looking down at the scotch that was in front of him. The cigarettes that he hadn’t enjoyed since his move back to the states burning in his back pocket. What number drink was this? The wardrobe crew had worried about his weight once before, the amount he had lost when him and Dani were over.. surely his frame was looking light now. He stood up, holding onto the back of his chair as he finished his last drink. Last one, he was on his way to see Kiersten. Lance dug his hand into the pocket of his jacket, taking out the keys to his motorcycle as he put his sunglasses back on, turning his head away from the light as he stumbled his way to the bike, gripping onto it tightly as he reached it. Lance kicked off on his back, having to find his balance which took a bit more time than usual seeing as how he was drunk. And his sight wasn’t a hundred percent. But he knew the way to Mackenzie’s place from anywhere in the city like it was the back of his hand. There wasn’t a red light or other car on the road that was going to stop him. Actually, there wasn’t a lot that was going to stop him because as he made it to her place, there was a light that started to shine off of one of the side mirrors of his motorcycle and instantaneously he tilted his body to the side, letting the motorcycle crash to the ground and slide down the sidewalk in front of her building. Lance sat up on his elbows, watching the tires spin as it laid sideways on the ground before he pushed his body up. “ Ah fuckin’ a, mate..” he said looking over at his motorcycle as he stretched his legs out and stood up straight. Lance reached his hand into his back pocket, taking out one of the cigarettes and walked away from the bike, towards the building as he lit it. “ Mr.Renner you can’t smoke that in the building,” the doorman said and Lance waved him off, “ It’s okay, I’m drunk” he said before giving him a thumbs up. “ Sir that’s.. not really a good excuse,” he said and Lance turned and looked at him, closing one eye as he scrunched up his nose and looked at him, ignoring the blood dripping down the side of his face from crashing his motorcycle. “ Okay.. it’s okay because I’m famous,” he said before going to the elevator and getting on. Lance reached up, taking the cigarette away from his lips before he smeared the blood against his skin, making it look more like a blush than the stream of blood coming down. Once the doors opened he made his way out into the hallway, to her door. He slammed his fist roughly against the door. “ KIERSTEN,” he screamed out at the top of his lungs before pounding against the door a few more times. “ Kiersten open up it’s Lance,” he said again, slamming his hand against the door. He shouldn’t have leaned on it, because as soon as she opened it he crashed down into her apartment, hitting the floor. “ Bloody… fuck” he said before wincing slightly and placing his hands against the floor. “ Ah bloody hell mate” he said, looking down at his cigarette that had gotten smushed during the fall. “ Kiersten,” he said, laying flat against the floor as he tried to piece his cigarette together before he tilted his head to look at her, “ God you’ve always looked good in blue,” he said , keeping still against the floor instead of trying to get up.
