The very last thing that Christine Hill expected was the exponential success of Mötley Crüe-the band she loved to hate.
And she never would've surmised that she'd be dragged-kicking and fucking screaming, by the nape of her neck-along for the wilde...
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He wasn't supposed to be here until later...Oh my god, I think I'm going to be fucking sick.
Christine didn't know how to verbalize a response to Nikki's question--if she could've verbalized a response.
An aching protrusion in her throat seemed to restrict the flow of air, causing her to quietly choke on her own breath as Tommy's left hand took residency against the back of his neck.
"This--uh--this isn't what it looks like, man." He spoke through an uneasy laugh. "I'm just--uh--just in here to make sure she's awake--Heather made me come up about five minutes ago."
Unconvinced, Nikki's eyebrows pinched together. He folded his arms over angrily, too, hardly aiding the dissipation of that painfully fraught tension brought on by his unexpected arrival.
Between Tommy stuttering out each syllable--unable to orate his greeting in an at all coherent manner--and Christine's dishevelled, seemingly dissolute state, Nikki wasn't thoroughly convinced that his drummer was telling the truth.
An unavoidable chill deluged the trio from that point onward, the temperature of that entire room dropping below freezing the moment Christine's line of sight finally satisfied her husband's.
"Tommy," Nikki rasped--voice strained--as he glared at her.
His irritation was palpable--she could almost taste just how bitter he was. And, she was surprised that he hadn't lashed out already.
She thought that her presence might've provoked him a lot more than what it did, that she might've rattled him and incited one of his infamous outbursts.
But Nikki had changed.
He'd spent months working on himself, learning different ways with which to quell his anger instead of taking it out on the closest person, and how to talk about whatever the main driving force behind his incorrigible sadness was--she just happened to be standing before him now. Which was a shock.
There was no denying that his heart felt as if it'd burst into flames at the sight of his wife, but he was able to subsume those same coping mechanisms with the dilemma he had found himself accidentally thrust into.
Nikki was able to hold himself together. For how long, though, he was unsure.
Of course, sadness and anxiety seemed to prevail--but he was suddenly able to stamp out any irrational behavior before he had even felt the need to act out, and he was proud of himself for that.
He knew that Chris probably would've felt that same way, too. If she wasn't so damn startled--unable to decipher whether he was actually there or if he was simply a figment of her imagination--she would've been proud of him for that.
"Tommy," came more stern when the drummer didn't respond, chagrin slowly overtaking his features.
An audible gulp from the tallest of the duo--indicating just how highly-strung he was--caused Christine to roll her fucking eyes. Why he was so scared was a mystery to her, actually.
