Afterglow || Tommy Lee

28. Karma And Effect

Hollywood California, October 12 2002

"Hi Mrs Lee -"

"Gina you know you can call me Andi," I smile at her as I walk in through the doors to the office building in downtown Hollywood. She was the main secretary for the entire building as my office was on the third floor.

"-Sorry... Andi," She smiles.

"It's ok... any mail?" I ask as I approach her desk.

"Oh yes... I have a stack here for you," She says as she turns in her chair then reaches for the stack of envelopes and sets them on the top of the desk for me.

"Yay," I say sarcastically with a giggle and she lets me know if anyone comes in for me today that she will just buzz me and I make my way to the elevator and up to my office on the third floor.

Once I enter my office I set the stack of envelopes down in front of me as I sit with the large bay window behind me. I didn't have much to do here today but I did have one appointment.

Chris was meeting me here today.

Ok, I know. I don't understand why I'm even entertaining the thought of speaking to him, but let me explain. Chris had reached out to me when Tommy was touring for Ozzfest back in August, and I blew him off so many times. I was pretty busy between being on the road and working then planning everything for Tommy's birthday and rehearsing with the dancers, that I really didn't have time.

Now that the craziness has finally died down, Tommy now having some free time to just do whatever, I figured maybe I should see what Chris was wanting to talk to me about. I sent him a text last week and he immediately replied saying that he would be in Los Angeles finishing up some last minute recording on an album with Brad Wilk, Tom Morello and Tim Commorford - which they now call themselves Audioslave - and that he could meet me at my office anytime.

I honestly didn't have a clue as to what he could say to me that would make everything better. It's stupid and I shouldn't even care but, the more I thought about it, I know we are going to cross paths one way or another as much as I try to tell myself that it wont happen.

A short while later, Kat calls me on the phone telling me that there is someone here to see me and I tell her to send them up.

"Well, he was always pretty punctual," I say to myself as I glance up at the clock above the door that reads 2:00pm. Moments later, I hear a knock on my office door and I rise from my office chair, make sure I look presentable enough with my favorite Pantera band shirt and my black ripped leggings with my Doc Martens, pushing a few dark curls out of my eyes, walking to the door.

"Hi," Chris stands in the doorway, his dark hair curly and spiky wearing a plain white t-shirt, leather jacket and ripped jeans.

"Hey," I say with a small smile.

"You um... you look really good," He says sweetly with that smirk he always used to give me.

"Thank you," I say as I look down at myself for a moment.

"I uh, brought you some coffee," He says, holding out a cup for me to take.

"Oh, um, thank you," I say and take the cup from him. "Uh... come in," I step aside and gesture for him to sit down on the chair at my desk. He steps inside and I close the door behind him.

"Have a seat," I say as I walk around him and behind my desk and I sit back down and then he does. I take a sip of the coffee he gave me and set it down in front of me. "It's good coffee,"

"Yea, I uh, think I remember how you like it... just milk right?" He says.

"Yea," I say.

There it was.That horrible awkward silence that immediately fills the room making it feel like it is so much smaller than it is. We hadn't talked to each other since Layne... and Tommy punched him which I don't care to reminisce about.