Even Now

Chapter 44: The Endless Rotation

I hope you guys like this chapter! A lot of inner dialogue in this one... 

Pictured above is Layne on the couch with John Baker-Saunders, and Mike McCready on the right. I believe this is in Layne's condo.
Rip Layne's bedhead in this picture 😅

And then of course the Metallica video... ugh, so depressing, dude...

Welp.
On to the story...

***

Whatever happened to Alice In Chains and their summer tour with Metallica?

They were supposed to set out on May 30... of course, with Layne's reclusion - and drug problem, as everyone would later discover - Alice In Chains had been forced to back out.
Susan had managed to convince Metallica's managers to keep Alice's spot open for a month while Layne was in 'rehab'... Metallica had agreed- but not before heinously making fun of Layne in public during their first show.

James Hetfield got the band to start playing 'Man In The Box', one of Alice In Chains' signature songs, and then he and Lars Ulrich proceeded to start mocking Layne's singing voice while pretending to shoot up.
The audience had gotten so upset that they started booing James's antics, with an audience member even throwing their shoe at him.

Layne had been heartbroken when he found out what Metallica had done, having been a fan of them for years.

Jerry had felt rather betrayed as well, especially since he thought he was friends with the Metallica guys.
He knew James and the band had probably been rather disappointed that Alice In Chains had cancelled on them, and might have harboured some resentment towards Layne- but that didn't justify their actions in any way whatsoever.
Maybe James and Lars had wanted to get a reaction out of Layne, the 'mysterious entity' they had yet to meet- but still, it was incredibly off-putting. And there was no excuse in the world good enough to dismiss what they'd done.

Interestingly enough, Metallica had chosen Candlebox to replace Alice In Chains as their openers. Jerry recognized the irony in that, and when he'd later tell Layne who replaced them, they awkwardly reminisced about that night at The Crocodile, as well as the unfortunate article that had spurred from it.

It was indeed unfortunate that they weren't currently well enough to go on tour... but Jerry didn't care. All that mattered to him was Layne's well-being.

While his drug use hadn't increased or changed in any way since Jerry had been there, Jerry could see that Layne was still withering slowly away... and he was powerless to stop it.

He bit his tongue on the topic of Layne's drug use so much that he felt it was going to fall off. And every time he did bring it up, Layne would become cold and distant for a while, and Jerry would have to wait until Layne let it go to try again.

Jerry discovered more about the virtue of patience a little bit each day. He knew that being patient and understanding worked wonders with Layne... but, God, did it hurt Jerry to be on the sidelines like this.

It felt impossible to love Layne any more than Jerry already did. He couldn't bear to be without him again; the sheer thought of it killed him.
So, even though it hurt like a motherfucker, Jerry just... let Layne exist.

***

June 26, 1994: Seattle, WA, USA

It was currently some odd hour in the morning. Layne had had a hard time falling asleep, knowing that tomorrow was going to be the first time he'd seen or talked to anyone else in the Alice In Chains camp in months.