Juice lit a cigarette, inhaling deeply. He and Ben had arrived early to the meeting, allowing them time to linger out front and smoke with the other attendees. Juice had attempted to keep a low profile, careful to keep the hood of his sweatshirt up, though his efforts had been for naught. Christ, they'd only been there fifteen minutes, max, and already close to a dozen people had approached him, offering affirmative words and sympathetic looks.

"I'm so glad you came out," Elle told him, wrapping an arm around his waist and squeezing tightly. "Where's your… friend?" she asked, shooting him a curious look.

"Thought he could use a little break from all of… this," Juice replied, gesturing around himself.

He turned his attention back to smoking his cigarette, ignoring the worried look the blonde shot towards Ben.

"Give the guy some slack… first meeting after a relapse is hell, you know that."

Juice mumbled in agreement, taking a deep drag off his cigarette. He exhaled, watching the plume of smoke drift into the wind. Why did I come here? I don't want to do this…

"Ready to go inside?" Ben asked, drawing Juice's attention.

"Hm, what?" he asked, frowning.

"You wanna head in? Meeting's gonna start pretty soon… we'll grab a coffee and find a seat?" Ben elaborated, placing a reassuring hand on Juice's shoulder.

"Yeah… sounds… sounds good," Juice affirmed, shooting his friend a grateful look.

He allowed Ben to lead him into the meeting, carefully focusing his gaze on the floor, so as to avoid any unnecessary interaction with anyone he might recognize present. While Ben poured them each a cup of coffee, he stared at his feet, his anxiety levels increasing with each minute that passed. I can't do this. I can't stand up and tell these people that I threw away 3 years sobriety for a shitty drinking binge on crap beer.

"Juice," Ben said gently, carefully shaking his shoulder to get his attention. "You alright, buddy? You want to take a minute, step outside?"

Juice shook his head no, crumpling his hands into fists to stop them from trembling. "Nah. We're here. Let's just do this," he affirmed, hating the vulnerability he could hear in his own voice.

He allowed Ben to hand him a cup of coffee, appreciating having something to focus on rather than his own anxiety. The heat felt good in his hands, the sensation giving him something solid to focus on. He followed Ben to a seat in the middle of the room, grateful that Ben hadn't forced him to sit in the front row.

People who want to get well sit in the front row, John had told him early on when he'd first started sponsoring him. While he knew John meant well, and acknowledged that whatever John was doing had certainly worked for him, Juice couldn't help but resent all of the older man's NA cliches and sayings.

Juice kept quiet as the meeting began, fidgeting in his seat as he struggled to focus on what the speaker was saying. Ben sat on his left, occasionally placing a reassuring hand on his shoulder, in an attempt to help ground him. On his right sat Elle, she and Marya glancing over worriedly at him at regular intervals.

After completing the scheduled reading for the evening, the speaker came to a pause. "Before we hand out chips, is there anyone who would like to share?"

Barely aware that he was doing so, Juice rose to his feet.

The speaker nodded at him, silently motioning for him to proceed.

Juice cleared his throat, his heart pounding in his chest. "My name is JC… I'm an addict."

"Hi, JC."

He nodded, nervously shoving his hands into his pockets. "I uh… this is my first meeting since I relapsed. I was sober close to three and a half years… I have major depressive disorder. I started having an episode and didn't tell anyone. I stopped taking my meds, going to meetings, seeing my shrink and… ha… I found myself on a two day bender drinking Bud Light, alone in my apartment."

He paused, lips quivering slightly as he struggled to find the words to continue. He glanced over at his friends, who offered him encouraging smiles. Again, he cleared his throat. "I'm ashamed. I thought… I thought I had this down and that I was good but… I stopped making my recovery a priority and I picked back up. I…" he trailed off a moment, frowning.

"I know that my life got better when I got sober. The things I'd seen and done before… I don't want to go back there. I'm lucky I have friends who were there to pull me out of my relapse before I did something worse… for making me get my ass back to a meeting when it was the last thing I wanted to do… having to own up to the fact that I fucked up and used again… I guess I just wanted to get that off my chest. Thank you," he concluded, returning to his seat.

Elle squeezed his arm gently, pressing a kiss to his forehead. "You're gonna be okay, sweetheart," she told him.

Juice breathed a sigh of relief as the meeting resumed, half a dozen other people taking their turns to share. He tried his best to listen, fighting back the wave of exhaustion that threatened to consume him.

He allowed himself to be half-pulled to his feet by Ben, grateful to be flanked on either side by both him and Elle as they joined the others present to form a circle to recite the serenity prayer. "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I can not change," Juice recited, the words seared into his brain from the countless meetings he'd attended since getting sober, "the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."

While he was by no means a spiritual man, Juice couldn't help but find some consolation in the words. He'd been told more times than he could count by dozens of fellow addicts the concept of grace; while he didn't necessarily buy in to the biblical definition of the term, he had come to a sort of understanding of what grace meant for him, mostly due to long conversations he'd had about the subject with his therapist. To him, grace went hand in hand with the serenity prayer. Grace was an abstract concept, the notion of forgiving himself for his past sins, accepting that setbacks are inevitable and moving past them, not allowing bumps in the road to derail his progress. Please, whoever is out there, give me grace to get through this goddamn relapse.

Once the meeting was adjourned, Juice lingered around with his friends, half-heartedly listening to the others make conversation. Ben, noticing he was fading, quickly procured him another cup of coffee, stepping in to keep the conversation directed away from Juice, as he was decidedly not up for speaking at that point. "If you want to head out, we can go," Ben told him, eyeing him seriously. "Don't push yourself. You got yourself to a meeting. And you shared. That's huge. You should be proud of yourself, buddy."

Juice nodded, smiling lightly at his friend's praise. "I'm tryin' man. I don't want to go back to where I've been."

"JC."

JC glanced up, catching sight of his sponsor, John.

"Glad to see you made it out here," John said, nodding approvingly.

"Getting through the first meeting after a relapse is the hardest part, right?" Juice replied, laughing weakly.

"Where's your friend?" John asked.

"I told him to stay home, get some sleep. I doubt he's slept since he got here. Guy doesn't sleep much to begin with…" Juice replied, shrugging.

"Not really his scene, huh?" John asked, seeing right through Juice's bullshit.

Juice shrugged.

"See you're not covering up, with him not here," John noted, nodding at Juice's rolled up sleeves.

Juice shrugged, heat flaming in his cheeks. "He doesn't need to see that crap," he retorted, shaking his head.

"You met JC's boyfriend?" Elle asked, addressing John.

"Elle," Ben snapped, shaking his head. "He's JC's friend. A very close friend who came across the country to give our friend JC a hand while he's getting through a rough patch."

Juice shot him an appreciative look, silently thanking the other man for having his back. The last thing he wanted to discuss with his friends and sponsor was his love life. Or his lack-thereof.

"You doing alright, kid?" John asked, brusquely clapping Juice's shoulder.

"Yeah," he agreed weakly, nodding.

True to his word, Chibs took the opportunity of Juice's absence from the apartment to search for anything Juice may have hidden away. He'd started with the most obvious spot first, the bathroom. Once he'd found that room clean, he'd made his way methodically through the apartment, overwhelmed with relief with each room he cleared. He'd saved Juice's bedroom for last. Though the rest of the apartment had proven to be clean, for the sake of being thorough, he began to inspect that, as well.

After nearly a half hour of sorting through all of Juice's odds and ends, he came across an old shoe box, hidden in the back corner of his closet, on the top shelf. Uneasily, he opened the box, his heart sinking as he saw the contents; three unused syringes, a rubber tourniquet, half a dozen cheap lighters, and a bent, blackened spoon. Chibs rubbed his face vigorously. Shaking his head sadly, he left the open box laying on Juice's bed, deciding to do a more thorough search of Juice's apartment. He paced the room for several minutes, racking his brain trying to think of anywhere else he may have hid anything. Back in the day, he used to hide his stash of pills in his desk at the clubhouse.

Grabbing the box of paraphernalia, he made his way to the room Juice used as a makeshift office/study, carefully inspected the meticulously tidy room. After once again finding nothing in any of the drawers of the desk, he decided to check less obvious places. One by one, he removed the drawers, searching underneath them for anything. To his great disappointment, he found two small plastic baggies taped underneath his top desk drawer. Carefully, he removed them from the surface, throwing them into the shoebox. He recognized the contents immediately, though he was somewhat surprised, and certainly disturbed at the implication of what he'd found. While he wasn't fazed to discover the heroin hidden, he certainly hadn't expected to find the baggie of cocaine, as well. You know damn well why he'd have the two of them hidden away, a nagging voice in the back of his head taunted. Lad wanted a way out, should the occasion arise. The very thought made the Scot feel sick. Heart heavy, he picked up the box of contraband, dragging himself to the kitchen, to wait.

Wearily, Chibs fixed himself a cup of tea, glancing at the time on the stove. Wouldae been nice if they'd given me an idea on when they'd be back. Nervous at the thought of some sort of confrontation, he pulled his phone from his pocket, grateful that he'd had the foresight to save Ben's number. He sat at the kitchen table for a few minutes, considering what to say, sipping at his tea as he struggled to find the right words. At last, he began to type. Stop in with Juice when you bring him home… we need to talk.

Chibs took a swig of scotch straight from the bottle as he stared at the clock on the stove, anxiously waiting for Juice to return home. Distraught over his discovery, he had quickly made a trip to the bodega up the road, buying himself a fifth of Chivas Regal. He'd knocked back a quarter of the bottle on his way back to the apartment. It'd cost him more than he'd like to spend, but he'd decided the purchase well worth it. After findin' that shite, Scotch was called for. Impulsively, he punched a number into his phone, pressing send.

"Hello?"

"Aye lass. How ye been?" Chibs drawled, taking another swig of drink.

"Chibs? What's going on? Everything alright with the club?" Wendy asked, sounding concerned.

"Nah… this abou' club business… needtae talk tae ye abou' somethin' more personal in nature," Chibs retorted, accent thick.

"Such as?"

"Juice."

The line went silent. "Hello?" Chibs asked, unsure if the line had disconnected.

"W-what about Juice?" Wendy asked, hesitantly.

Chibs sighed, rubbing his face with his free hand. "Lad relapsed."

"What happened?" Wendy demanded, her voice overcome with emotion. "Is he okay? What happened to him?"

"Gottae call from one o' his friends here, sayin' he was drunk. They were worried about 'im… worried he'd hurt himself. So I came," Chibs elaborated, reaching for the bottle.

"You went to New York?"

"Aye."

"How's he doing? He didn't…. you know… did he?"

"Not since I've been here."

He heard Wendy sigh over the line. "What happened? He's been doing so good for so long."

"Depressive episode. Lad stopped taking his meds… shite seemed to crumble following that," Chibs offered.

"Fuck."

"That's not what I called ye abou', though."

"It's not?" Wendy asked, warily.

Chibs sighed. "His sponsor told me tae make a sweep of his apartment, make sure he didn't have anythin' salted away…" he trailed off, taking another sip of Scotch.

"He didn't…"

"I found a shoebox with clean needles, a tourniquet, and a rusty spoon."

"His works…" Wendy breathed, clicking her tongue in disappointment.

"I… I also found somethin' else…"

"What?"

"Found coke and heroin hidden in his office. A baggie of each… they were taped to the underside of one of his desk drawers," Chibs continued, shaking his head. "Ye know what that means…"

"Speedball. Guess that was his exit strategy if he ever wanted out," Wendy retorted, following Chibs' train of thought. "Jesus fucking Christ."

"Yeah…"

"Where is he?" Wendy asked.

"At a meeting. His friend Ben… he's the one that called me… he took him. Should be bringin' him home once it's over."

"So Juice doesn't know you-"

"Haven' seen him since I found this shite. That's why I'm callin' you… I'm a bit out of my league, here, lass."

"Fuck. Fuck."

"You're not instilling much confidence in me, lass," Chibs noted, frowning.

"I should be there helping him. I can't believe he didn't tell me," Wendy lamented, clicking her tongue.

"This all transpired in the past forty-eight hours, love. Christ, I've only been here a day. I've got it handled."

"He's in love with you, you know."

Chibs sighed. "That's not why I'm here, lass. The lad's in crisis. The last thing on my mind is his love life."

"Can you just give me a straight answer about something? Juice refuses to."

"About?"

"You two. You guys… you were together… sort of. Right?"

Chibs sighed, took a long swig of drink. "Never put any sort o' label on it. But aye, we had… something."

"So what do I do, lass? I know his sponsor told me tae look, but he didnae tell me wha' tae do if I found anythin'... Christ, I was sure I wouldn't turn up a damn thing," Chibs noted, sighing miserably.

"Have you talked to his sponsor?"

"No," Chibs retorted.

"Get his number and give him a call."

"How?"

"Ask his friend. Ben, right? Ben's in the program, seems pretty tight with Juice… I'm sure he has it."

Chibs nodded. "Alright… I'm gonna get on that I suppose. Ye think he'll expect me tae confront him abou' this?"

Silence.

"I don't know… it varies from sponsor to sponsor. But you have to tell someone. It'd be one thing if you just found a rig… it's not exactly uncommon for ex addicts to keep old paraphernalia lying around, just in case. But finding drugs hidden…" Wendy trailed off.

"I s'pose I should get a move on with this, then. Dunnae when they'll be back."

"Take care of our boy, Chibby."

"Aye lass, I will," Chibs promised.

"And keep me in the loop? Please? If you need me, I can be there."

"You've got the boys, lass-"

"Nero can handle them. Please… if it gets to be too much to handle alone, tell me?"

"Okay, lass."

"You promise?" she pressed.

"I promise."