AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Come help me numb this pain
I can’t take one more day
Reliving all my mistakes
Flynn gives his bass drum one last pound when I finish and at the exact same time, the light shining on me goes out, darkness consuming the entire stadium as the fans scream at the tops of their lungs and I ride out the high. The darkness swallows me whole, my pulse beating out of control.
This moment right here makes all the bullshit worth it. It’s as if every single one of us in this building are connected, and it’s all because of us, because of our music and our passion. I finally feel like, on stage, I have a home. And I fucking love being home.
Thirty-Seven
Bordeaux
Onism (n.) the frustration of being stuck in just one body,
that inhabits only one place at a time.
___________
“Not fucking bad for our first show of the tour!” Miller yells over the shouting fans that wait outside the back door of the stadium.
We always do meet and greets prior to the show, but there are a lot of fans who end up staying after the show, too. They always find our tour bus or the back doors of the stadiums and wait. It doesn’t matter if it’s hours after a show ends, three or four in the morning, they wait until they see us one final time. I can’t even explain the feeling of being that important to someone—it doesn’t feel real. Hell, I wasn’t even important enough to my parents. It feels surreal that people who don’t even know me wait hours just to have me sign a vinyl or their body parts.
Security from the stadium here in Columbus, Ohio, along with our own security team, work together to back the fans away from us so we can get out the door.
“I don’t care where the hell you all go, but you can’t stay here!” a tall security guard who works for the stadium shouts over the fans. His muscles look like they’re about to rip the cuffs of his short sleeve shirt, and he’s wearing dark sunglasses despite the fact that it’s after one in the morning and pitch-black outside.
“Hey, yeah they fucking can!” Declan shouts at him, causing the fans to roar even louder. “Come on, guys.” She motions them closer to the four of us, holding a sharpie in the air. “I bought this marker just for you, Columbus!”
Leave it to Declan to cause an uproar. I laugh as both the security teams try to hold back the fans as they rush back toward us.
“Line up!” a few of the security team members shout, but it’s no good. Chaos erupts and fans swarm us, exactly how we like it.
* * *
Declan, Miller, Flynn, and I are sitting in our bus eating Taco Bell. I can’t shake the feeling Flynn is giving me, and I’m silently wondering if Miller or Dec are picking up on it. He’s here, but he’s not. It’s almost like his body is here, but his mind is somewhere else. He shoves part of his burrito into his mouth, looking around at us, but not engaging in our conversation at all. There’s a definitive sadness in his eyes that I can’t help feel nervous about. If he were Miller or Declan, I’d just assume he’s tired. But he’s Flynn, and anytime Flynn gets this way, I worry. His dad passed away four months ago, and his girlfriend broke up with him not long after, so it isn’t like he’s had much time to heal from the shitstorm that’s taken over his life. I do my best to check in on him, but he’s a man of few words and I know he doesn’t like talking about what’s on his mind.
“Hey.” I look over at Flynn, who sits on the couch next to me as Declan and Miller get into a heated battle about who did Hurt better, Johnny Cash or Nine Inch Nails. I already know the answer to this, but they’ve argued about it a hundred times, and no one ever wins. Flynn looks at me, wiping his mouth. “You okay tonight? That was an incredible show, wasn’t it?”
He nods, a lazy smile creeping onto his face. It doesn’t reach his eyes and I take notice of it. “Great show, man. Ohio is always so full of life. They love us here,” he says, picking up another burrito and not looking at me.
“You want to talk about what’s on your mind or are you going to just keep that shit locked away until it eats you alive?” I decide to try the blunt approach since he blatantly ignored my first question.
He sets his burrito back down and I watch as his chest rises and falls sharply.
“Just me and my demons in here, man. Nothing to talk about,” he says before picking up a beer and popping the top.
“Yeah, you’re a real hard-ass, man, I get it,” I tell him, lightly punching his shoulder. “I’m always here if you wanna talk about it, okay?”
He turns toward me and shrugs. “I’m good.”
But nothing in his words or body language convinces me that he really is good.
“Hey, B,” Miller calls, apparently done with the endless battle he and Declan are fighting. “You ready to really give us all the details on your newest woman?”
I sip my beer, letting the liquid slide slowly down my throat before I clear it and scratch the back of my neck. I pick up my cell phone and check it, knowing she probably hasn’t replied. She sent me a text just before I went on, wishing me good luck, but I didn’t get back to her until well after midnight, and I know she’s sleeping by now.
“Words don’t compare,” I say, looking around the bus at them. How do I put Isla into words? I can’t. No words will ever adequately describe how I feel about that woman. You can’t put perfection into words, and Isla is absolutely perfect.
