The Bird and the Worm

I woke up to the touch of smooth lips on my forehead and a velvet voice murmuring my name. I groaned slightly, shifting in warm arms and sighing contentedly, letting my arms slide around the warm body that was beside me. I heard a low chuckle, and then rough fingertips were brushing hair from my forehead. Groggily, my eyes opened, and I blushed ridiculously as I realized I’d just nonchalantly wrapped my arms around Synyster Gates. I nearly immediately released him, and he chuckled again, slipping out of bed and waiting for me to follow him- I stumbled out of the bunk and was only saved from falling by his arm around me steadying me.

“Oh cool Heather’s up. Hey Heather! Do you do breakfast?”

“Yeah,” I replied groggily, and Vengeance chuckled, retreating towards the front of the bus, a place towards which Syn was currently leading me by the hand. “Where’re we at, anyway?”
The guys laughed at my slurred speech, and Jimmy patted my shoulder. “In the eight hours you two were asleep, we made it up the long as hell part of Florida. We’re about ten miles away from the best fuckin pancakes in the state.” I raised an eyebrow. “Seriously. You’ll love ‘em. It’s like they put-“

“Jimmy, they do not put weed in those pancakes,” Shadows sighed.

“Wait what?” Jimmy squeaked. “But all my hopes and dreams relied upon weed being in those pancakes! What the fuck Matt, you just totally killed my buzz. Way to go, asshole.” He tossed a bunched up T-shirt at Shadows, who simply sighed and dodged it. Jimmy glanced over at me. “So there isn’t weed in the pancakes.” He flashed a smile. “But you can still pretend there is.”

“Jimmy you are not even a druggie. Stop making us all out to be druggies in front of Heather.”

“No, he’s okay, I don’t-“

Syn laughed, touching my shoulder so that he could sidle past me in order to fetch a Coke. “Don’t worry about it. Jimmy’s always this dumb in the morning.” Jimmy pouted at the words, but he and Brian exchanged a brotherly sort of smile, and then he shook his head and looked away. Syn leaned in to give me a short kiss on my forehead while everyone else’s attention was averted, but missed and kissed just beside my lips instead.

I only had to turn my head a little for him to reach the real target the next time.

“What time is it?”

“It’s almost ten thirty. Good job, by the way. Brian never sleeps this late. Must have kept him nice and cozy warm.” I blushed, and Syn laughed, playfully punching Shadows on the shoulder.

“Syn doesn’t sleep in?”

Syn rolled his eyes. “Ugh. The freaky stalkerish fan girls call me that. Please. Call me Brian.” He flashed a small smile, returning to my side and leaning against the counter.

“Okay…Brian doesn’t usually sleep in?”

“Usually, no. These guys,” he threw a playful glare in their direction, “are up much earlier than I am, raising hell. The only reason they’re behaving is because you’re here.” I smiled at him, and then I smiled at the guys. “They are capable of being human, no matter what they may make you want to think.” He winked and patted my shoulder, sipping his Coke.
I laughed a little, smiling tiredly. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“So….has he like…jumped you yet?”

My eyes widened, and my skin turned red for the millionth time. I was really going to have to work on that if I was going to be out in public with these guys. “Huh?”

Jimmy snickered. “What the hell, Brian? Are you slackin’ or something?” I raised a moderately interested and very confused eyebrow. Jimmy sighed, returning his attention to me. “He said he’d kiss you at least once, and that he’d-“ he glanced over at Syn- I mean Brian, and he was silenced by an intimidating glare. “Well? Has he?” I blushed. “Ha-ha I guess you can’t lie with all that red in your face. Good boy, Bri, guess you are a man of your word.”

Brian scoffed and shuffled off to his bunk, pulling his shirt back on and then fumbling through the drawers for a moment. When he emerged, he was holding a shirt that looked like it would fit me. “Michelle left this a while ago, before she left me, so see if it fits you. I’d hate for you to go inside smelling like my sweat.” I took the shirt from him, and the guys chuckled. I pretended not to hear them as I found my way to the ‘bathroom’ and switched shirts. As I pulled Michelle’s old shirt on, I found that it fit me perfectly, and I smiled to myself as I glanced in the mirror. I looked decent enough. My hair wasn’t ridiculously messed up, so I figured I was okay. The ponytail was still intact, my bangs were still pinned back, and none of the hairpins had fallen out while I was asleep.

I returned to Brian’s side, and he let me wrap my hands around his arm and lean against him, still not fully awake.

“Ready set go it’s time to run, the sky is changing, we are one, together we can make it while the world is crashing down…ready set go it’s time to run, the sky is changing, we are one, together we can make it.. “

I let go of Brian’s arm and pulled my phone out of my pocket, flipping it open and glancing away from curious stares.

“That’s one hell of a ringtone,” I heard Jimmy comment to Shadows.

“Gotta be Tokio Hotel or something. Bill’s voice is nearly unmistakable,” Shadows said in response.

“Oh my god Heather how is- wait is that the band I hear in the background- oh my god you’re kidding me, you’re on their tour bus, you have to take pictures…”

“Hi Gina,” I said, laughing a little. “What’s up?”

“Just checking in on you, you know, making sure you haven’t done anything I wouldn’t do…wait…scratch that…”

“You do realize that he can probably hear you, right?”

She was silent for a few moments. “So you’re like, right next to him?”

“Yeah, I am.” I glanced up at Brian, and he smiled slightly, holding out his hand for the phone. “Hold on. He wants to talk to you.” She squealed loudly, and I winced as I handed him the phone. He put it to his ear, and we all watched him in stunned silence as he smiled, relaxing against the counter, and greeted Gina like she was a best buddy or something. I could hear her excited babbling in the background.

He let his gaze rest on the floor as he calmly waited for her ‘I can’t believe I’m talking on the phone with a hot rock star’ babbling to die down.

When she was done, he said, “So I take it you’re jealous of her, huh?” A pause, and then a short chuckle. “Yeah…well thanks, I’m glad you enjoyed the show…sorry you couldn’t come with us, but she technically is the only one that won…oh yeah, I definitely understand…oh yeah sure.” He turned to me. “How the- how do you put this thing on speakerphone?“ He handed the phone to me, and I pressed a button before handing it back to him. “Say hi, guys.”

“HI!” the band shouted together, and they laughed at me as I jumped slightly.

“Jimmy Sullivan, drummer extraordinaire!”

“M. Shadows, the reason for your…well, yeah.”

“Johnny Christ, the demon between your legs.”

“Zacky Vengeance, guitarist in your dreams.”

I ginned at them, and Brian slipped the hand that wasn’t holding my phone into mine, lacing his fingers into mine, and causing me to blush once again.

The guys talked to Gina for about five minutes before she said that she wanted to talk to me again, and as I took the phone back, I turned the speakerphone off before pressing the phone to my ear. “Hey Gina.”

“I can’t believe you’re within five feet of the biggest rock band in the world…please tell me you’ve taken advantage of the whole ‘I’ll do whatever you want thing’ and have at least kissed the man. If you haven’t I will be sorely disappointed in you, and you won’t like me when I’m disappointed.”

“Gina, you’re not the Hulk, and besides, you didn’t do it right.”

“I’m too far in shock to be angry. So I sided with disappointment. Have you kissed him or not?”

I bit my lip and glanced at Brian, who was watching the way I interacted with Gina, and he squeezed my hand slightly. “I haven’t, exactly, but he has.”

“OH MY GOD. What? Out of his own free will? Oh my…you know what, I’m going to have to call you back when I do not fear for a heart attack, okay?”

“Okay, Gina, bye.”

Her end of the line went dead, and I closed my phone gratefully, leaning against the man that held my hand in exasperation. Jimmy just smiled oddly at me, and M. pretended to gag himself while Johnny pulled the same smile Jimmy was wearing. Zacky simply rose as the bus rolled to a stop, and we all got off the bus. Brian still held on to my hand, which meant he was okay with it if people assumed that I was his girlfriend or something. I had figured out that he pretty much did the things that made me blush but he knew I didn’t mind.

Even as we settled into the booth the hostess had led us to (not without a few autographs from the guys), he kissed my cheek and winked at me. As before, the band really didn’t say much about it, but they gave me awkward, knowing glances. I thought about this whole contest thing- had this really been Brian’s idea, or had the band devised it as a way to get him a girlfriend after his breakup with Michelle? It wasn’t as though I cared or anything, because he seemed more than willing to be this close to me either way, but I also just couldn’t help but wonder if my video had won because I’d put the most emotion into it or if it was simply what he’d said it was in his blog- a contest.

I sipped my Coke and decided that I was over thinking things. I was hanging around Avenged Sevenfold without being written off as a groupie, so I had nothing to complain about or over consider.

“Heather?”

Jimmy’s voice sounded different from the hyperactive babble I’d heard just a few minutes ago. That was enough for me to allow my gaze to rest on him, and he offered a short smile.

“Can we talk for a short second?”

“Uh. Yeah, sure.” Brian released my hand, and I rose as Jimmy did.

Jimmy took my arm, gently, of course, and led me outside. When he turned and looked at me, his face was serene. “Okay, Heather, um. I just wanted to tell you a little bit about this contest. Brian’s oblivious to the reason for the contest, considering his blog post, but I just thought I would let you know.” My heart thumped threateningly. Had my worrisome, over-thinking mind actually been right? “The thing is that Brian’s my best bud, and when Michelle packed up and disappeared, he was pretty broken up. So we talked him into this ‘three days with a fan’ thing, and he jumped on it because he loves hanging out with the fans. But the whole purpose was so that he could be with someone random for three days- constantly- so that he could be exposed to a new personality.”

“Oh,” I breathed, and I understood.

“So when the deadline came around, we all sat down and watched zillions of videos submitted by fans, guys and girls alike, and handpicked the winner.”

“Me.”

“Yeah. When we saw your video, we saw the way you and your friend interacted and listened to the things that you said and we convinced him that you were the winner because it looked like you put a lot of time into it.” I had- Gina and I had basically holed ourselves up for a week making that thing. “But it was really because you seemed to be a perfect match for his personality.” I nodded slightly, not really sure what to say. “So you don’t have to like, I dunno, be his girlfriend or anything, but he’s been spending the last two weeks figuring out the perfect ways to spend time with you, so be careful with him. You look into him, and he seems into you.”

I was silenced. Synyster Gates into me? There was no way that was possible. He’d known me for a few hours, and he’d seen a ten-minute video that I’d submitted so that I could spend a few days with a rock star. “So…”

“So I just wanted you to know that you weren’t picked just because you looked like fun, and I thought you also should know why he’s trying so hard.”

“Thanks Jimmy.”

He flashed a smile, and even though he was halfway lost in thought, his eyes met mine and the sight was breathtaking. “He’s my best friend. What else could I do?” I hugged him, and he laughed, hugging me back for a moment before easing out of my grip. “Now come on. Don’t want him to think I’ve stolen his special friend away from him for a make out session or something.” He winked, and then he offered his arm, chuckling. I took it, and we walked back inside.