Part 7 Music and Lyrics

For the next week I kind of kept my distance on the bus.  I would hang out when forced to by Justin, but if he was napping I would find a quiet place to hide and blend in.  I did my job at guest services with little joy.  The concerts and cities were beginning to blend together.  My writing was getting more depressing.  I could feel myself cycling.  There wasn’t much I could do about it.  I just prayed that it didn’t go out of control.  I pushed myself head long into work, doing a project for Melinda.  I started to get to know the crew.  I interviewed them all, having them explain their job, experiences, and a little about their personal lives.  Then I would take a picture.  The best ones Melinda would post on the website.  

Mike told Chris that this was a good thing.  It allowed me to get to know the people around me in a non threatening way.  Knowing more people made it so more folks would be looking out for me, and I would be more able to notice who in my surroundings were out of place.  I emailed each crew person their write ups.  Alot of those ended up in resumes and later linkedin profiles of the people that worked for us.  I have gotten many thank yous because when the tour was over, they had something substantial to show their next employer.

Joey noticed my withdrawal and he confronted me about it on the bus.  “Hey Hot Lips, what have you been up to?”

“Writing profiles for Melinda.”  I said offhandedly.

He wrinkled his brow.  “You know that’s not really your job.  Not saying that we don’t appreciate it and all, but you are supposed to be having fun on this trip.”

“I have been, Joey.” I protested.

He grabbed and pulled my ponytail.  “Really?  For a girl that is supposed to be having fun, you spend an awful lot of time in your bunk.”

“I play video games with you and Justin, I watch movies with Chris.  I am not always on my bunk.”  I weakly protested.

“Yeah I guess that is something.” He said, not believing me.  “Hey can you help me out with something?  I have this new dip.  Justin loves it, but Chris panned it.  Would you be my tie breaker?”

“Sure Joey.”  I said, eager to help.  Besides over the weeks his creations had been very good.

He smiled and poured out some tortilla chips in front of me and then handed me the bowl of  dip.  Innocently I took a chip and dunk the thing into the bowl slathering it with the dip.  For a moment it was heaven.  But the burn caught me on the backside.

“Oww hot, damn, hot, fuck, hot.  Water.  I ran to the sink in the kitchenette.  Downing what seemed like a gallon of water to alleviate part of the burn.  “Fuck Joey.”

He shook his head laughing.  “You shouldn’t curse so much.  It is unbecoming.”

“Warn a girl next time, will you Joey?”  I gave him the evil eye, still coughing from the burn.

“Now, I know I will.  Let me make you one without the jalapenos.” He went back to the kitchen and remade the dish with me in mind.  A few minutes later he came out with it and a pint of milk.

“Here.  This should help.”  He said smiling, “But you know I wasn’t kidding about the cursing.  It could get you into trouble.”

“You guys all do.”  I pointed out.

“Yeah well we are guys and that’s just how we talk.  As a lady you are held to a higher standard.” He explained, but he really didn’t make sense to me.

“That is bullshit Joey.”  I called him out on the crap he was spewing.

He raised his hands in mock defense, “Hey, don’t shoot the messenger here.  I am just warning you that if you talk that way you might get punished.”

“Chris hasn’t said anything about it.”  Confusion marred my face.

Joey shrugged,  “He wouldn’t.  It is not his job to train you.  That falls to the guy he arranges for you.”

“I don’t think I need to worry about that.”  I said sadly.

“Why do you say that, hotlips?”  Joey asked curiously.

“I have a feeling Chris doesn’t want to pair me with someone any time soon.  He doesn’t even want me looking.” I confessed.

“It’s not your job to look, Amy.  It is his.  You have the ultimate power.  You say yes or no to any arrangement.”  He looked at me seriously, as if he really wanted me to internalize what he was saying.

“He will pressure a yes out of me at some point.”  I let my fear leak out.  It was a deep fear of mine since Chris brought up this new scheme.  I feared that I wouldn’t like who Chris picked, and that the guy in question wouldn’t treat me better than any of the other people in my life had.

“I think it's more the other way around from what I have seen.”  Joey tried to comfort me with the truth, that not once had Chris as much pointed out anyone to me.  I believed that it had a lot to do with my age more than anything.  I had the feeling that once he was rid of the responsibility of looking out for me, he would be free to do as he desired.  What I didn’t understand at this point, and couldn’t predict was that he was much more a prisoner to the situation than I was and in a few short years his freedom from responsibility would be over for the rest of his life.

“What do I do in the meantime?”  I sighed, resting against some pillows on the comfortable couch.

“You get to know those around you, and you let them get to know you.  Speaking of, why haven’t you been avoiding Josh?”  He asked curiously.  I knew he was fishing to figure out my feelings, but I wasn’t ready to really let them show yet.

I clammed up and turned away, “Chris said no.”

“Chris says a lot of shit he doesn’t mean.  But my advice is the same.  You can get to know people without it being a big thing.  You do it with Justin and Chris.  I like to think we are friends too.  Don’t let Lance’s walls fool you.  He is easier to get to know than you think.  We are here for you.”  He advised.

“And Josh?”  I asked, wanting to get an idea of what he thought was going on.

Joey smiled,  “That’s the nice thing about Chris picking for you.  Your heart doesn’t have to get involved until he brings someone up for your consideration.  You aren’t hindered by thinking about whether the guy loves you or not.   You just have to figure out whether or not you can put up with his shit enough to submit.”  

“Why not love Joey?”  I asked, recognizing a scary pattern.  Josh had voiced how jaded he was as well and looking at the actions of the others I could pretty much assume they all felt the same way.

“Love is a mirage of fluffy feelings.  Don’t trust it.  Think more of do you trust and respect him?  Is he a man of character?  Does he treat you well? If that is true and you are attracted to him, your hormones will create that loving feeling.”  He advised in a way that I hadn’t thought of before.  He certainly brought up some good character traits for sure, but I wasn’t convinced that was all there was.  

I sighed, “I guess.”

“Do you know what is more important?”  He asked, cleaning up his mess.

“What?” Not having a clue where this conversation was going.

“Getting to know yourself. Once you know what lights that fire go after it. Nothing will be able to stop you.”   He encouraged me.

“Now you are talking like Josh.”  I accused, as that sounded like words plagiarized from his letters.

“Good, if you hear it from all of us maybe you will start believing it.  So how’s the mild dip?”  He asked me to change the subject.

“It is very good, Joey.”  I smiled at him.

He smiled,  “Good, so how about we watch a movie til we get to the arena.”  He grabbed the rest of the dip and sat down beside me briefly hugging me close but then letting me go as he chose a comedy for us to watch.  

That night after the show I took the time to journal about the things Joey was talking about.  It seemed as if he was talking out of both sides of his mouth.  On one hand there was freedom to follow my dreams, at least up to the time I was married.  On the other hand, the man that Chris could possibly arrange for me would want to control how I spoke.  I didn’t know if I wanted any part of that.  

The next morning Josh made his way to the front of the bus. He looked exhausted. Last night’s concert had been a bear and the interviews and photo shoot afterwards had obviously left him and the rest of the guys completely drained.  I pitied them a little bit.  I didn’t understand why they had to push so hard.  It was not right that they worked like dogs and had very little to show for it.   

I was busy journaling.  It had been a long couple of days and many thoughts were constipated in my mind.  The action of writing it all out would release it and perhaps I would feel better and be at peace with my situation.  But that wasn’t to be.  

I adjusted my pony tail.  It was such a mess, tendrils had already fallen into my face.   After the adjustment I refocused my efforts into writing.  I thought that if I could write I could tune him out.  It had been easy to do with the intense schedule. As of late I don’t think I could have seen Josh even if I wanted to.  Finally when I recognized he wasn’t going to move on I caught a hold of my tongue that had ever so briefly escaped my lips in its concentration.  Then I unfurled my body from the tight ball it was in on the corner bench. 

  As I did I noticed that Josh was in his boxers.  He was standing in front of the fridge and was pulling out a bottle of water.  Once he got it to slid into the bench opposite me.   He opened the bottle and took a big gulp and let some of it run down his chin. It was like with every insignificant movement he was trying to seduce me.  Then he raised his eyes to me and smiled.  It literally melted me.  I did the only thing I knew at the moment.  I smiled back at him.  His ruffled hair looked boyish and almost innocent from the hours he was asleep.  However the halo was tinged with the pure look of lust in the morning it was as if the last of his wet dream was slowly fading into a distant memory.  

“This is forbidden.”  I had to tell myself.  Chris in his infinite wisdom had deemed it so and going against him at this point was unthinkable.  I wasn’t going to gain Josh by disobedience.  Josh had some unexplained type of attraction to me but I was under the assumption that if I bit on one of his lines he would take what he wanted and I would be left alone. That would be worse than the position I was in right now. I was just going to have to leave it light.  “Sleep well?”

“Very well" Josh got up and moved to my side of the table and settled back down and finished off the water.

Casually he asked.  “What have you been up to, kitten?”

“Um not much.” I continued to write. "I was just thinking about getting myself a sprite. Do you want anything while I am up?"

Josh said nothing.    I went to the fridge and got the Sprite from the fridge.  Josh followed quietly behind me and stopped when I stopped just short of bumping into my back. He leaned over my shoulder and grumbled. 

"I'm hungry." He let the statement linger as I stiffened in front of him. 

"How about some breakfast?"  I offered meekly. I felt the heat of his breath and the hardness of his erection against my ass.  He was hungry alright but it was not for food. "Why don't you go take care of the space alien in your pants while I find where Justin hides his box of cereal.”  I offered as I tried  to pull away from him.

“That is not what I want though." Josh whined. "Don't worry about the space alien, he will calm down as soon as he figures out he isn't getting any." He excused himself, grabbed the toasted bread and butter and another bottle of water and moved back to the table

.

I rolled my eyes and went about getting my sprite. I had every intention of going back to my bunk since he obviously was making his own breakfast. I wasn't very hungry. There was one problem though. I had foolishly left my journal on the table. I wasn't about to leave it there for him to page through. He was most likely going to give me a hard time about it too, the mood he was in.  

I sighed and walked back over to the table. "Can you hand me my journal?"

Josh looked up from arranging his breakfast when I reached the table. He turned to look at my journal leaning on the seat and then slowly back at me. "Anything about me in there?"

I smiled wickedly. "Wouldn't you like to know." I wasn't about to confirm or deny anything. He could keep guessing for all I cared he was going to think what he wanted anyway. "Now give it here."

He reached over and clutched the notebook and started sliding it toward him. He looked back up at me. "Can't you stay and keep me company while I eat. I promise to behave, stay quiet and let you write." He turned on his pouty face but extended the book to me in order to let me know I had a choice.

I nodded, but  I was going to put some distance between him. Why didn't I run, while I had the chance I didn't know.  I moved decisively across the table from him and sipped on my Sprite as I fiddled with the rhyme scheme of the poem I was writing.  If I knew Josh at all I probably would only have a couple minutes because he was a notoriously quick eater.

Josh looked at his bread and changed his mind. He went and fetched some lunch meat and cheese to add to his buttered bread then snatched up a ripe banana as an afterthought. He plopped back into his seat, arranged his sandwich and tried to string out his inhaling of it. I think we could sense that we were watching each other. He however started feigning like he wasn’t and started to focus on the scenery driving by.  A tune invaded and dribbled from his lips, I don’t think he knew what he was doing.  It was an earworm of the worst kind.  For it to be buried, I knew I would have to put in the time to write.  

I noticed the hook and the bridge he was doing quickly.  Before I realized we were syncing on the creative process the words of the request formed on my lips.  "Go back to the bridge Josh, I need to hear it again."

Josh was jostled out of the creative trance he had fallen into. "What? huh? Oh" He pulled the notes back into his memory, and collected the scattered notes.  Softly he sang back the refrain I requested.

I smiled and mentally counted syllables in my poem. It was getting frustrating because the words weren't flowing as quickly as I thought they might. I had him repeat the same refrain about five times before I was down to one word. I  sighed. "I need a three syllable word that rhymes with ate and nothing is coming to me." 

I felt humiliated every word I tried either didn't fit the form or the emotion I was trying to convey.

Josh let out a sigh. He leaned across the table and laid his hand on my tense fingers that were threatening to snap the pencil held within them. "Let it go. Don't force it. The word will come if you give it time to find you. Let it come in its own time." He was slow moving away as if he wanted to caress my hands but thought better of it and let me go.  I was almost sad about it.  His hand felt warm and tender, it was a different side of him. But I got up anyway.   It was going to annoy me until I completed the puzzle and it was done. I walked back to my bag and dug around, finally finding a thesaurus and a rhyming dictionary.  I  began to look for what irked me. After flipping through it  I audibly groaned at the word I saw that fit all too well. Well since this wasn't going on the top forty I shrugged and scribbled it down before  I  lost my nerve. I looked up at him. "Done."

Josh's smile grew from one that was barely there, to one that lit up his whole face and touched his eyes. Pride radiated in waves from him. I tore it out and folded it before handing it to him. I didn't want to see his face when he read it, there were some pretty crazy lyrics there, some that were embarrassing to me. They were the forerunners of the lyrics to Come to Me, including the masturbation line.

Josh carefully took the paper and turned away before unfolding it.  Time rolled on as he weighed the lines.   I was nervous about his reaction.  It was me really trusting him on my own  or the first time.  I was vulnerable and everything hinged on his  reaction as stupid as that was.  He straightened the creased paper and read the words I had penned upon it.  He was speechless.  He suddenly realized with a start that he hadn't said anything yet.  I was pacing on the other side of the table waiting anxiously for his judgment. He looked up with awe. "This is amazing, Amy."

I shook my head not believing him. Nobody liked what I had written before. It wasn't meant to be shared. It was just to unburden my soul. This was probably the roughest piece of shit I had done for awhile. I couldn't believe it. "No, it really isn't that good Josh. You don't have to patronize me. Though you can keep it if you want."

Josh was genuinely shocked by my words, but I didn’t realize it at the time. He carefully folded the paper and tucked it in his jeans pocket.  He quietly thanked me and went back to his bunk.

I  couldn’t believe how condescending and hurtful he could be.  I had to get it out of my mind, now that it was in his hands the melody of it wouldn't haunt me as much.