Three

Krist was sobbing so much his face hurt. He’d never cried like this before in his life, ever. In front of him stood his two friends. His bandmates, his companions. He was shocked at what he had done – especially to Dave. Dave’s face was bruised and swollen. Kurt had a few bruises on his neck.

Standing in front of him, Dave and Kurt remained almost expressionless. Krist finally looked to them both, from his sofa where he had remained sitting since they first confronted him.

“I have a problem… with, with drink,” he muttered, more so to himself than his friends. “But I drank vodka – you can’t smell it and I mixed it with coke.” He said, softly.

Dave glanced to Kurt. “Cocaine?” he asked, his voice rising a little. Krist shook his head. “No, the drink. I mixed my vodka with coke to hide it from you.”

Kurt still had not spoken, which daunted Krist the most. Sitting back a little, his face was flushed and tear-stained. His hair was unkempt and tangled.

Clearing his throat, Kurt took a sigh and stared at Krist. “What caused it to start again?” He asked, softly.

The way in which he spoke surprised both Dave and Krist – his expression and posture seemed to be saying the complete opposite.

Krist looked back down to his hands – his knuckles were grazed and bruised from the fights.

“I was trying to get away from…” he paused and took another breath. “From, the allegations.” He said, very quietly.

Dave slowly lowered himself to the floor, bringing his knees up to his chest; he waited quietly for Krist to continue.

Kurt remained standing, his arms slack to his sides. Krist sucked in the silence around him but then looked directly to Kurt.

“I’ve had two allegations of rape.” He said very softly. “But I can’t say I didn’t do it, because I don’t remember.”

Kurt closed his eyes for a moment as he digested the information. His jaw locked slightly and he opened his mouth and looked again to Krist.

“When?” he asked, simply. Dave remained silent. Kurt was in charge of this conversation and Dave was happy with that.

Krist didn’t answer for a while, but broke down as the words fell, exhausted from his lips. “I don’t know, Kurt. I can’t remember.” He sobbed.

***

Kurt had been on the phone for most of the morning. It was a rare occurrence for Kurt to even be on the phone. He never spent more than two minutes on the phone, for any reason.

Even if talking to Dave or Krist, the response would be one-worded or simply ‘yes’ or ‘no’. Dave watched from the kitchen as Kurt spoke and then wrote furiously on paper, scribbling things out and then writing them again.

Krist sat opposite Dave, a glass of cold water in front of him was the only choice of drink he would be having. Kurt was more than aware of Krist’s drinking problems. It was something he battled on and off with for years.

Out of respect, Kurt avoided drinking around him when he was sober, but realised now, that drinking at all, around Krist, was strictly off-limits.

“As much as I want him to help you…” Dave said softly, looking at Krist, “I wish he would put this much effort into helping himself.”

He looked to Krist and quickly concluded, “of course, I want to help you too, I just -”

Krist smiled, the usual familiar smile that Dave and Kurt were used to. “I knew what you meant – and I agree. He was living rough in Seattle for a few months and whenever he came to rehearsals, he was asking me if I was okay. I was thinking to myself, ‘this guy is living in a fucking box and hardly eating, and he wants to know how I’m doing’. He’s always been like that, Dave. It doesn’t matter what you say or do, I doubt that will ever change.”

The phone slammed down and Kurt kicked something over. Another sound of something breaking could be heard before Kurt picked up the phone and dialled the number again.

“Listen to me, mother fucker, I don’t care what it takes. Retract the story and the statement. You ever hear of the saying: ‘innocent until proven guilty’? You have no right to make those fucking claims – no right to even comment on them!”

Kurt’s voice grew louder and Dave was about to go to him before Krist stood and stopped him. “I caused this, Dave.” He said, softly, before going to Kurt.

Kurt slammed the phone down again before shouting obscenities to Krist, shouting how unfair it was, and how stupid it was and how he wasn’t going to let it get worse. “I swear, Krist, you’re not going down for anything. You’re not going to be charged with anything, because I don’t believe it! I don’t fucking believe you did it, Krist, I don’t fucking believe you did it!”

Dave joined them, now, as Kurt ranted and shouted but then, he fell silent and Krist sighed, agreeing with every single thing Kurt had proclaimed.

Dave looked at both the men he had grown so accustomed to and smiled. “Let’s go to the press.” He said, grinning.

Kurt looked at him, his eyes tired and blood-shot. Krist looked drained and pale. “What?” Krist asked.

Dave nodded. “We’ll take it to the papers – do interviews, radio, articles, whatever. The usual way isn’t working. Let’s do this our way – let’s prove to everyone that Krist never did it, the way we would do it.”

Krist looked to Kurt who looked like he was in two minds about the whole idea.

“But this is serious, Dave… I could go to jail and -” Krist started.

Kurt sniggered. “Yeah, you could. And so could I for possessing drugs, and so could Dave for theft. They won’t touch us. We’ve got the money to buy them out if we need to. Krist, Dave’s right – we should do it our way. The Nirvana way. Fuck the statements, fuck the retraction. We’ll do it this way.”