AJ said goodnight  to Howie and left him with his real estate papers. He went to his room and closed the door, closing his eyes and sighing as the lock clicked in place. He had certain misgivings of what this tour would bring. He was wondering if it were just nerves or if he was beginning to tire of the game tours played on him. Sure, here he was now, with Amelia in the proximity after a six month absence in his life, but what about those six months she hadn’t been around? Of course he’d only been substituting one addiction for another, and in her absence, well, he fell off the wagon.

            More like flew off the wagon and slid twenty feet into a brick wall.

            He was trying to act like this wasn’t happening again. Like he wasn’t using a substance to curb his moods and avoid the pain his empty personal life was sticking to him. He would have to be extremely careful, to avoid any detection this time. Unfortunately, once bitten, twice shy, everyone would be on the lookout for odd behavior, even more than five years later.

            He just had to control it. Had to be careful. Could not drink his old stand by, JD, Mr. Daniels, his old friend. He had other tricks up his sleeve. The one good thing about being in rehab, he’d learned lots of tricks about hiding alcohol. The most important one of all, had to be cover up the smell. The best way to do that was to drink Vodka, it had no odor, nothing that would give him away. On the plus side was that it was clear, so even if he spilled it, no stains and he could hide it in nearly anything. He just had to make sure he got rid of the bottles, easiest to do with the minis, which he could buy almost anywhere. Then the trick he’d picked up from a girl who left rehab only to relapse as soon as she got out, was to hide the vodka in an empty hair spray bottle. That way he could keep it in his bag at all times and not worry about someone taking it.

            “Thank god for vain friends that like certain hair products,” AJ mused.

            The hard part would be stopping when he needed to. He had to drink enough to take the edge off and not enough to make him fall over. Stumbling around incoherently was a sure sign to get the antennas up. Just enough to make it easy to be around Amelia without acting like the lovesick moron he was. Just enough to make it that much easier to sleep at night and not dream about her.

            Who was he kidding. He was a wuss, destroying six years of sobriety over a woman. No, he couldn’t blame her. She had done nothing wrong. He was not going to blame Amelia for his problem. If he was going to continue drinking, he’d be a man and at the very least admit it to himself. He was an addict. Always gonna be an addict and he was just too weak to live life without a bit of chemical help.

            The hardest one to fool was going to be Kevin. Kevin, the one that had come into his hotel room and kicked his ass that morning, so many years ago. Kevin would find out, and it would be all the worse. Kevin would be pissed, Brian disappointed, Nick upset and Howie would be downright devastated. Not to mention his mother who he would let down big time. What a way to repay her after she’d written that book about his life and getting sober. What a shitty thing to do to the woman who’d taken care of him his entire life, all the way through the addictions and afterward.

            The only thing he could hope for was that if Kevin did find out, he wouldn’t beat the shit out of him this time. He still had the scar where he’d fallen into the dresser when Kevin threw him across the room. He rubbed the scar absentmindedly, a long thin piece of scar tissue running about three inches from his lower back to his hipbone and thought for a moment.

            “What about Amelia?” What if she found out? She was strictly AR, after rehab, so she didn’t know how bad it was before he’d been to rehab. He might be okay with her, she might forgive him. But if he could do this. If he could be responsible, if he could show them he was okay with alcohol, then it would be all right, wouldn’t it?

            “Listen to yourself!” He started at his reflection in the bathroom mirror and really looked into his own eyes.

            “You are never going to be able to ‘drink responsibly’ you are never going to be okay with booze. You got to have it all the time, or not at all. Admit you’re a fucking pussy and get on with it!” He touched a hand to his reflection in the mirror and ran the other through his hair. God, when did this get easier?

            He looked down at the counter, there was that bottle of “hairspray”. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes and reached for it.