Home

I knew it was late when I banged on Brian’s door, but I hoped he’d let it go when I explained what was going on. I’d just put Mycki in the elevator, and I needed someone to talk to.

“Where’s the fire?” Brian asked, stumbling sleepily out into the hallway. I was grateful Leighanne and Baylee weren’t with him for this stop on the tour, otherwise I’d be getting an earful right now. Waking a sleeping four-year-old is never a good idea.

“Nowhere, man,” I said, pushing past him, into the room. “I just needed to talk, that’s all.”

“Nick, it’s after three,” Brian groaned, closing the door and turning on the light. He rubbed his hands over his face and gave me a stern look. “This better be good.”

“Oh, it is,” I said, sitting on his couch and dropping my head into my hands. “I think I just fucked up royally.” A lump was forming in my throat and I tried to swallow it.

“Did you trash your room again?” he asked, throwing a pillow at me. The pillow hit me and landed on the floor at my feet. I stared at it like it was a foreign object. “It’s stuff like this that gives rock stars bad names, you know.”

“No, nothing like that,” I said, shaking my head. I started to bounce my leg up and down, and fidget with the hem of my shirt. I hated sitting still, especially when I was this worked up over something.

“Then what did you do?” Brian asked, concern on his face. He looked confused, too.

“I just had sex with someone,” I started, unable to meet his eyes. I knew what he thought about my ‘indiscretions,’ as he called them, so I tried to get past that part as quickly as possible. “She just went back to her room. But I think I fucked it up royally.”

“How?” I could hear the disapproval in that one word, but he was good at hiding it. He knew this wasn’t the time.

“I pretty much threw her out when we were done,” I said, feeling the heat rise in my face. “Well, I didn’t really tell her to leave, but I shut down on her and she got the message pretty quick.”

“That’s different than normal how?”

I sat back against the couch and covered my face with my hands. As usual, I was fucking up what I wanted to say. Words and I just didn’t get along most of the time, and now was no exception.

“I didn’t want her to leave this time,” I said, not knowing how else to say it. “I didn’t want her to go, but I all but shoved her out the door anyway.”

“Why didn’t you want her to leave?” Brian was used to me wanting to get as far away as possible from the girls I slept with, so I could see how this would shock him.

“Do you think it’s possible to care about someone you don’t even know?” I asked, figuring blunt was best. I didn’t hide things from Brian, hadn’t in a long time, so I knew he wouldn’t judge me, no matter how messed up I was sounding.

“It’s hard to say,” he said slowly, giving me an odd look. “What do you mean ‘care about someone?’”

I jumped up and started pacing, unable to sit still anymore. “There was this girl outside the venue today, waiting for us, right?” I started, staring at the gold flecks in the carpet as I paced. “Pretty thing, but so nervous she barely remembered her own name when I approached her. I thought, whatever, another fan, so what? I took a picture with her, signed her program, and left it at that.” I slammed my hands through my hair and shook my head. “Then doesn’t she show up in the fucking front row during the concert, right there in front of me, smiling, dancing, and I couldn’t look away. You know how many girls we see, man, you know how few we actually notice anymore, but something about this girl just jumped out at me. Like I said, she’s pretty, but we’ve definitely seen better on tour. She’s not my normal type at all, either, she’s dark-haired, and not super thin or super built, you know, she’s just average.”

“Amazing girls can be average-looking, Nick,” Brian cut in, the disapproval still in his voice. He’d given up his superficial side long ago, around the time that the goddess who is his wife entered the picture. He’d never been big on looks, but once he connected with Leighanne, he didn’t even notice the hot girls who threw themselves at us regularly.

“Not the point, Bri,” I said, shooting him a look. “I’m just saying that there wasn’t really a reason for her to stick out. She was smiling at me, so when I jumped down to do my thing in the front row, I picked her. I’m telling you, man, the second I touched her, it was like fucking lightning went off in my skull. She smelled good, kind of sweet, but not like that cheap shit some girls wear. She was so soft I didn’t want to let go. Keep in mind this is while I’m being grabbed at by at least six other girls, and we’re still doing a show. For me to even notice what she smelled like is completely unusual. After that, I kept looking for her, watching her, and this weird feeling was in my stomach. I didn’t know if it was gas, or what, but it was there every time I looked at her. I haven’t had that in awhile.”

Brian was staring at me as though I had a second head growing out of my shoulder.

“Don’t strain yourself to try to help me here,” I said, rolling my eyes at him. “Seriously, Frick, what gives with this? I just about jumped out of my pants when I saw her in the hotel lobby tonight, by herself, just sitting in that little room they have with the fireplace and stuff. I fucking followed her, dude, cornered her in that room. The stupid thing is, I didn’t even think about sleeping with her. I just wanted to be in the same room with her. I wanted to see her eyes light up when she saw me, to see that look girls get with us, the ones who really think we’re hot shit. I needed to see that from her, specifically. How fucked up is that?”

“It’s unusual for you,” Brian agreed, nodding. “Normally any girl looking at you like that is good enough.” He waited for me to go on.

“We made small talk for a bit, you know, and she was completely cool,” I said, remembering her face in the fire light. That feeling started in my stomach again and I swallowed a few times. “She just sat there with me, didn’t do anything weird that fans do sometimes when they’re nervous. Wasn’t what I expected at all, that’s for sure. But then, when I went to leave, she bumped up against me, not even on purpose, and there was that fucking lightning again. Jesus, man, I thought I was going to lose my shit right there.”

“What did you do?” Brian was really into my story now, totally dumbfounded, just like I was. Knowing me as well as he did, he knew this wasn’t something that ever happened to me, and definitely wasn’t something I talked about.

“I waited like the dumb fuck I am,” I spat, feeling my eyes start to water. The last thing I needed was to start crying like a whiny bitch, but I was so frustrated I couldn’t help it. Brian would understand. “She had to ask me to kiss her, for shit sakes. I felt like such a knob, but she didn’t mind. Then came the sex.”

“I don’t need all the gory details,” Brian said quickly, raising his hands in front of himself, palms facing me. “Keep that stuff to yourself, man.”

“I’m not giving you details, you perv,” I said huffily. “But I am going to tell you that the wham-bam shit I’m used to wasn’t even considered with this one. I couldn’t take my eyes off her face, you know, how she responded, how amazing she looked when she liked what we were doing. Half the time I keep my eyes closed during sex to avoid looking at whatever I happen to be fucking. This time, I couldn’t have closed them to save my fucking life. And I held her, Bri, actually fucking held her while we did it. I wanted to touch as much of her skin as possible.”

“Isn’t that normally what sex is about, though?” Brian asked, puzzled. “Don’t tell me you don’t touch your partners.”

“Only where absolutely necessary,” I said, shivering at the idea of putting my hands on some of those skanks. They didn’t make full body condoms, you know.

“Never?”

“The one-night ones, never,” I said firmly. “Scratching an itch, Rok, that’s all they are. But I wanted to touch this one, I wanted to run my hands over her and hold her and shit. Scared the fuck out of me.”

I stopped pacing and took a deep breath, waiting for Brian to speak.

“Congratulations, Frack,” he said sarcastically. “You’re becoming a man. It only took you, what, 27 years?”

“Fuck off,” I spat, not in the mood for a ribbing. He hadn’t seen the couple of tears that had leaked over my face yet, and I was good with that. “I need help, not bullshit.”

“What made her leave?”

“After we were finished, she wanted to cuddle, which, at first, I was all for,” I said, pacing away from him and dashing my hand across my face. Fucking tears. “Then I felt like something moved in my gut, and I didn’t know if I was going to puke, or what was going on. She was gorgeous, man, fucking beautiful like that, but I felt so weird, I suddenly couldn’t wait to get away from her. I was scared shitless of what was going on inside me, and I kind of shut myself down so she wouldn’t see it.” I winced at the memory. “She took the hint, got dressed, and pretty much ran from the room. I didn’t exactly help, though. I offered to walk her to her room, and she may as well have told me to fuck off. She didn’t in so many words, but she knew something was up. She got this nasty look on her face, kind of a weird smirk thing, but she wouldn’t tell me what it was. Then she was gone and now here I am. What the fuck is wrong with me?”

“Well, we’ve known for a long time that you’re an idiot,” Brian said, counting his points on his fingers. “And we know that you have the emotional maturity of a retarded mosquito, so that’s working against you, too. You’re attracted to her, genius, but this time it’s more than just her body. What the hell did you think was happening?”

“Food poisoning?” I said, my attempt at a lame joke. It didn’t fly. “It’s been so long since I’ve even thought of a girl that way, I had no idea what to do.” I wiped my face again. “She was the type of girl I could see myself with, and that was totally unexpected.”

“Shit, Nick, are you crying?” He finally saw the damned tears. “Tell me you at least know how to get in touch with her?”

I sighed and shook my head. “Nope, not a fucking clue,” I admitted, knowing I was an idiot for not asking for her last name or her phone number or something. And now she probably wouldn’t even fucking look at me again. Great.

“Then you learned the hard way this time, didn’t you?” Brian said, coming over and patting me on the back. He started to lead me to the door. “There’s nothing you can do but forget it and move on now. You just know that if it happens again, you won’t be such a moron.”

I knew he was trying to get rid of me, but I also knew he was right. I didn’t even know what room was hers in the hotel, so I had no way of tracking her down.

“I don’t think this will happen again, Bri,” I said as I went into the hallway. “Not unless I see her again.”

“You never know, man,” he said as he moved to shut the door. “You never know.”