I'm Gonna Get Through to You

I'm not sure if it was the fact that the tension between Shaant and me was thickening the air throughout the whole bus and making everyone feel awkward and not just us, or if it was the fact that everyone was resting up for the first show of tour tonight, but no one was speaking.

The bus held a silence that wasn't eerie, but it was irritating. Jeff, Shaant, and Tom sat at the table glaring. I almost hated the tour sponsor for giving them an actual bus. If they were traveling in a van Shaant could be miserable.

But then I'd be miserable too since Cassie put me on this stupid bus.

Dave sat beside Cassie, idly thumbing through AP Magazine and Cassie was texting. I sat beside her with my arms crossed sending Shaant all his stupid little looks right back at him.

And that's exactly how the next four and a half hours went.

***

"Who the fuck is ready to fucking rock?"

All of our heads slowly looked up at the overly hyper boy that burst onto our bus when we parked in the parking lot of the House of Blues.

"Whoa, is this a bad time?" Alex Gaskarth, lead singer of All Time Low - one of the bands on tour with us, asked. I knew him from Cassie talking about how great his lyrics were before we left.

"This entire tour is going to be a bad time until Tom, Shaant, and Annabelle pull their shit together. Overlook it, the rest of us are learning to after four hours," Dave shrugged.

Alex laughed, "Back to important matters than, who the fuck is ready to rock?"

"Who the fuck isn't ready to rock?" Shaant asked with a grin, the first all day. I'm going to pretend seeing him smile didn't lighten my heart a little.

"Who is on this tour?" Cassie asked.

"Us, All Time Low, Hit The Lights, and another small band that I forgot," Alex replied.

"Can we wear name tags for awhile?" I asked after we all got off the bus. Everyone was outside, some were pulling things out of trailers and others were laughing as they joked about things I was clueless to. Looking at them I knew there was no way I'd be able to tell them all apart.

I mean come on, about thirty hot guys with long hair.

"Good idea! Let's go get them! Garret, give me the keys to your van so I can take this girl with me to get name tags," a boy with black hair and a bleached streak demanded excitedly.

"Ugh Cass-"

"It's best not to argue with him hun, he'll either get his way or drive you insane," Alex whispered.

I sighed and just walked towards the guy, unable to ignore the feeling of being watched. I pulled my phone from my pocket and pretended to read a text as I flashed the screen around until I found the eyes on me.

Thegorgeous eyes belonging to Shaant Hacikyan.

"Please make sure he's careful... Jack can be a bit reckless at times."

I laughed, "Ugh, I'll do my best to control him."

I hesitantly followed him into the van and put on my seat belt. Promptly Jack started the car, threw it in reverse, and backed up without looking behind him once.

"So, I'm Jack Barakat and I play guitar in All Time Low."

"I'm Annabelle, I'm not in a band. I'm just here because Cassie dragged me here," I sighed.

"You don't want to be here?" Jack asked, quickly shooting me a glance before focusing on the road again.

"Well..." I paused. Because I don't know if I want to be here. The obvious disdain for Shaant tells me I don't want to but the chance to make new friends and a great experience tell me I do.

"I have mixed feelings."

Jack smiled, "Don't worry, it'll be great! And we'll become best pals!"

I smiled back at Jack and ignored the feeling that I really wanted to be here because of Shaant... because that isn't true.