Party 'til you pass out / When the party's over

[TW: mentions of suicide]

Alison

'Alison.' Tom's hushed voice made me look up from making sandwiches. Carol and Lizzy were preparing the salad while Ian was still outside, enjoying the nice weather with a beer. 'A word?' I frowned at him and wiped my hands, excusing me to the others. I walked up to him and he pulled me into the guest bedroom.

'What the fuck were you thinking?!,' he hissed at me.

'What?,' I asked, seriously no knowing what he was talking about.

'Oliver is back on K, and you did not tell any of us, his family?!' I just stare at him.

'How do you -'

'He was fucking using when I came to ask him something.'

'No, no, no – he can't. He used his last bit yesterday and we made a deal that he is not getting any new –'

'Oh Ali...,' Tom laughed joylessly. 'You really don't know addicted Oliver, do you, love?' I blinked a few times, hating the way he made me feel ignorant.

'I trust him...,' I muttered, looking up at him with pained eyes.

'Alison, for fuck's sake – he is an addict. You can't fucking trust an addict!,' he let out.

'But he promised –'

'No! No! It doesn't matter what he promised you, because he can't keep it. The only thing that is important to him is that fucking ketamine and taking a next bump, and –' Tom inhaled deeply to calm down from his rant. I looked at him in shock, both from him getting so worked up and wondering whether I had really been so stupid for trusting Oliver. 'Okay,' he said after a moment, pursing his lips. 'Here's what we're gonna do; everyone is together now, so we can make this an intervention. When we're sitting down for lunch, we'll tell –'

'No.' I stared at him. 'We're not doing that.' Tom's eyes narrowed.

'Alison, if we don't do this, Oliver will only get worse.'

'I don't think he can get much worse,' I muttered. Tom frowned.

'What do you mean?' I sighed and bit my lip, trying to push back the sadness that came up. Tears flooded my eyes, and I wiped them away.

'Oliver is in a really bad place, Tom. Like, really bad. And I am afraid that if we put him up for something like an unexpected intervention, it will trigger him and make him do stupid things.' Tom's eyes fell, and he looked around for a moment. They landed on my lower arm, which wasn't covered by a sleeve of my shirt because I had put them up when making lunch. I looked too, and quickly pulled the sleeve down as I realized that there were still some faint bruises of when Oliver had held it so tightly two nights ago. Tom shook his head.

'You are too good for him,' he whispered. 'For a while I thought that he was finally going to be the Oliver that you loved and deserved, but he fucked up. Again. And he's taking you down in the process.' He gave me a sad smile and put his hand on my cheek. I closed my eyes and felt another tear roll down. Tom wiped it away with his thumb.

'We're working on it,' I croaked. 'He's gonna kick off like he did last time, and I'll be with him.' Tom huffed a bit, pulling his hand away.

'Just throw his pathetic arse in a clinic and let them do the dirty work, Ali.' I shook my head, opening my eyes at him.

'No. Only if there is no other way.' Tom rolled his eyes.

'Fine...' We stayed quiet for a while. 'Just – let me know when you need my help, okay? It won't be the first time for me.' I nodded and watched him leave the room. I inhaled deeply and dried my eyes, walking into the bathroom to cool my face with some water before I went back to the rest.