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I bet it wasn’t “When do you tour next?”

He shook his head “There’re none booked Won’t be until we get this new record down, and that hasn’t been going so well until now”

“Okay How does this work? I mean, do you believe what happens on the road, stays on the road?” I asked The boundaries of our relationship had never really been established Exactly what did our ether, but I had school to consider, ood wives just dumped it all and ith the band Or maybe wives weren’t even invited I didn’t have a clue

“You askinghoe fit into each other’s lives”

“Right” He pinched his lips between his thu around on each other would be a good start Let’s just uess we take it as it coreed”

Without a word he stepped back fro over to the stairwell “Mal?”

“What?”

“Close the door down there and lock it,” David yelled “Don’t you come up here under any circumstances Not till I tell you it’s okay Understood?”

There was a pause then Mal yelled back “What if there’s a fire?”

“Burn”

“Fuck you” The door downstairs slammed shut

“Lock it!”

Mal’s reply was muffled but the pissy tone carried just fine These tere ical sibling Jiood reasons we should never return to LA Sadly, hiding out in Monterey wasn’t a viable long-term solution

School, band, family, friends, blah blah blah

David reached for the back of his T-shirt and dragged it off over his head “Rule number two, if I take my shirt off you have to take off yours The shirt-off rule now applies to these sorts of conversations I knoe need to talk about stuff But there’s no reason we can’t hly doubtful All that sers itching to do so Keeping ue inside my mouth while his flat stomach and six-pack were revealed tested my moral fortitude no end All that beautiful inked skin on display, driving any atteht out of my mind Good God, the man had some power over leto do otherwise

“Get it off,” he said, tipping his chin at

The stairwell sat cal up here I proripped the bottom ofht