We're Trouble Bound

June

Seven weeks, almost eight and he was still miserable. But the truth was that it didn’t make a difference if it were eight weeks or eight years; he would be hurting either way. There was something about the situation that he could not move past. Oliver thought about Jaime every day. He thought about her every hour. If he wasn’t busy trying to not think about her, he’d think about her every minute. He’d found the one person on the planet that just got it. She knew everything about him without asking. She understood why he did the ridiculous things he did. She knew all of him.

And at this point, he knew nothing about her. Why she denied him when he admitted his love, why she cried as she did it and why she had made no effort to call him; all these things evaded his grasp. She was as much of a mystery to him as she had been the minute he saw her.

This was very much different from the last time they’d gone without talking. Previously, they’d been on bad terms, an apology had been necessary on his part. But there hadn’t been a fight this time, not really. Just the brick wall of Jaime’s lying. He knew that she’d lied. He was convinced.

Now, with Warped Tour upon him and the prospect of two whole months with Jaime in every city he’d be in, he was aching all over. The three nights before their arrival in LA for the kick off date, he’d made it his mission to get so pissed he forgot her name. His mission had been fairly successful. So as he walked across the parking lot to the catering area, he was still sort of drunk. He wasn’t walking straight and he smelled a little bit like vomit. He didn’t remember getting sick but he didn’t remember a lot of the night before, so anything was possible. He was concerned for the hangover he would have when his inebriation wore off. He was considering starting to drink again already when someone called to him.

“Oli! Dude!” Troy yelled, catching up to the dragging Oliver. They exchanged a brief bro-shake. “What’s going on, man?”

“Nuffin, need some food.”

“Me too.”

“The only fing I’ve ‘ad en a few days is spirits and lager,” he grumbled.

“Sounds like Jaime,” Troy off-handedly said.

“Eh?” At the mention of Jaime, Oliver sobered up quite quickly.

“Oh, uh, she’s on a bit of a bender…” Troy scratched the back of his neck.

“Aye?”

“Uh huh. You guys can be crazy together.” Troy recalled their tendency to party with one another. He was clearly uninformed on the Jaime/Oli situation.

“She o’reight? Jus’ celebratin’?” Oliver wondered if her ‘bender’ was similar to his.

“You’d know better than I would…” Troy was definitely uninformed. “I haven’t seen her much lately.”

“Oh… Where’s she now?” Oliver tried to make it seem non-conspicuous.

“She’s with the tattoo guy…”

Oliver’s throat tightened as they approached the food area. “Tattoo guy?”

“You know, the guy on tour that tattoos… fuck, what’s his name… I don’t know… But she’s getting something done on her arm, or maybe it was her leg, I forget.” Troy shrugged.
Oliver was hit with a wave of old fondness. He loved her tattoos, all of them. From the exposed ink on her wrists to the hidden words along her spine. He even loved the tattoos behind her ears that collectively read “never again”, her unofficial mantra. Though he hated why she had this tattoo, he loved that she could give the world such a big ‘fuck you’, even if it meant giving him one too.

“There she is…” Troy pointed to the back of a girl’s head. Her hair was jet black and shorter than before. But it was her. Her summer uniform of short shorts and a white t-shirt made that clear. She was with Nadine, laughing as they gathered plates of food. He noticed that she had a bandage on her forearm, the sign of a fresh tattoo.

Nadine saw him first. Her mouth dropped a little before she leaned over and whispered something in Jaime’s ear. Jaime didn’t turn around right away but Nadine waved at him awkwardly. He lifted his hand and nodded a greeting. This was the first time he’d seen Nadine looking anything less than enthusiastic and bubbly. She looked a little nervous. Which in turn made him a little nervous.

After she had piled numerous raw veggies onto her plate, Jaime finally turned in his direction. Her eyebrows were already raised and a half smile emerged on her lips. She had prepared herself for this moment. She didn’t look like a hungover bundle of nerves, how he looked. Oliver wanted to know how she looked so fucking great when, according to Troy, she was on a binge. But he supposed what seemed like excess to other people, was perfectly normal for her. Maybe ‘bender’ wasn’t the right word for her.

“Oli fucking Sykes,” she said loudly over the talking people. Some people looked towards her and Nadine grabbed Jaime’s elbow, hissing something in her ear and then smiling suddenly at Oliver.

“Jaime fuckin’ Caldwell,” he mimicked, hoping this meant they were on good terms at the very least. But the fact that she’d called him Oli and not Oliver was off putting. She’d always been staunchly opposed to the nickname, opting instead for his given name, one that one else called him.

Nadine and Jaime were nearly then and he could see her exactly. Her hazel eyes looked strange, more distant and bloodshot than he’d ever seen them. “Did Troy talk to you?” She asked him and looked to Troy, who shrugged again.

“Uh, I dunno… ‘bout wha?”

“The End of the Night… the song… from the album… the song with you. I, uh, we, um,” her speech was erratic, disjointed. “We think—“

Nadine broke in “What she’s trying to say is that they want you to do ‘The End of the Night’ with them during their set. Not today but whenever you want to.”

“Yeah, what she said,” Jaime nodded awkwardly. “Sorry, I’m a little…” She trailed off, trying to come up with an explanation.

“Drunk!” Nadine interjected. “She is drunk.”

Oliver looked from Nadine to Jaime. They were hiding something from him. This agitated him. He’d given them no reason to be evasive or secretive. “’S not even one…” He said slowly.

“She started early,” Nadine explained. “We gotta get back to the tent now. Let’s go, Jai.”

“’Kay,” Jaime agreed. “See you later.”

“Wha the fuck…” Oliver muttered.

Hearing him, Troy slapped his back “If it makes you feel any better, I don’t think it’s anything personal. That’s how she’s been every time I’ve seen her recently.”

This didn’t help Oliver. Because this definitely felt personal.

--

Oliver had decided to continue his bitter drinking binge. The first barbeque of the tour was starting to blur at the edges. He’d all but finished a bottle of Jameson himself in addition to a few various drinks. Once more, he was staggering and loud. But he blended in now, everyone was slightly ridiculous.

He was trying to rezip his trousers. A busty blonde had been the one to unzip them. The things she’d done with her mouth made up for the face that he had to try and fix his trousers in his intoxicated state. The blonde had disappeared shortly after she was finished. “The best kind of bird,” he mumbled under his breath as he approached where everyone was. He was stumbling pretty righteously and Kean caught sight of him.

“O’reight, Oli?” Kean held an arm out to steady Oliver as he approached.

“Aye, ne’er better…”

“Jaime’s mate Nadine were lookin’ for yeh a minute ago. Said it was important.”

“Aye? Where’d she go?”

“Dunno,” he shrugged.

“Well, fanks,” Oliver scowled and moved onto the next stable place to hold onto. Which happened to be a wall twenty yards away. He leaned his head against the brick and closed his eyes. He couldn’t even comprehend why Nadine would want to talk to him. He didn’t really care.

“You’re not looking so hot, Sykes.”

Oliver opened his eyes and blearily they spotted Jaime. She was mimicking his actions, resting her head on the wall as well, about two feet from him. “’S not a very nice fing to say ta sum’un.” He kept staring at her and she continued to lazily look at him. Even in his state of severe intoxication, he could tell something was off about her eyes. They were the same color they’d always been. But they appeared almost dull to him, which seemed impossible. The eyes he remembered were bright, full of bemusing concern.

“I’m not a very nice person,” she said. To this, Oliver said nothing; a few months ago he wouldn’t have believe this but now he was uncertain. “Have I shown you my new tattoo?”

“No… I saw yeh fer all o’ ten seconds earlier…” Oliver opened and closed his eyes slowly a few times. He was pretty sure that the wall was moving.

“Here, look…” She thrust her forearm forward. There was no longer a bandage over the fresh ink. Covering most of her inner arm was a tree, leafless and dead with intricate branching and roots. It was quite good but Oli just grunted his approval rather than voicing it. “I like it a lot,” she solemnly stated and put her arm down. “You’re really drunk, aren’t you?” She laughed slightly.

“Uh huh. Yeh aren’t though… I can’t figure it out. Yeh don’ act this way when yer pissed. But yer not the same,” he finally concluded.

“Nope. Not the same.” She started running her hands through her hair repeatedly. “But not different. No one ever really changes,” she said cryptically.

“’S not true,” Oli slurred. He could attest that people changed. He was the perfect example. The Party King had been reduced to a drunken shell.

“It is. We all stay the same forever.”

“Wha’ the fuck… Mus’ be more pissed than I thought. Yeh sound like a fortune cookie or summat.”

“I haven’t had Chinese food in awhile… I could totally go for some.” She pushed herself off the wall. “You wanna get some Chinese food with me?”

He stared blankly at her. “Righ’ now?”

“Yeah, sure, right now.”

“Where?”

“I don’t know. Somewhere.” She walked around a little bit, pacing in a small circle. “I just need out of here. It’s so weird everywhere though.”

Through his blurring eyes, he watched her. And he was split in two.

One faction wanted to know why she was acting so strangely. The part was worried and confused. He wanted to understand her. He wanted to play whatever game was happening currently. This section of him needed her to be Jaime again. Jaime before things got all fucked up. This was the part that loved her.

But the second faction, which was beginning a revolution against the first, felt very different about Jaime. This part was so sick of the way Jaime made him act. He was tired of this love; it got him now where. It gave him only trouble. He’d spent a year questioning and longing. And had only received ‘I could never love you’ from it. For this, the winning faction hated Jaime.

Jaime was still flitting around him, hands in her hair and eyes emotionless. There was clearly something wrong; she was on something but he couldn’t place what. And he didn’t want to. He didn’t give a shit. And when she said “I wish you didn’t hate me” it almost didn’t register as actual words. It didn’t seem real because immediately after she said “I need a drink. Come with me to get a drink, Oli.”

“’M fine right here,” he asserted. He would not follow her. He was killing that part of him. Putting cement shoes on it and tossing it. But he was still curious about one thing. “Why are yeh callin’ me Oli?”

“You prefer it.”

“Yeh’ve never considered my preferences before,” he bit. But she didn’t even flinch though it was meant to be harsh. Instead she looked up at the dark sky silently.

After a strangled moment, she said “later,” and started off towards the other people.
Her strange behavior had managed to distort his brain even further while also making him nauseous. Or it might have been the alcohol. No matter the cause of his queasiness, the effect was him leaning over and getting sick all over the wall and a bit down the front of himself. It definitely was not his proudest moment. Not the worst but it was certainly not good.

After the first round of vomit, he leaned back against the wall, avoiding the unpleasantly puke covered part. He was on the verge of passing out standing up when Kean caught up with him again. “Oy! Oli!”

Oliver grunted.

“Oli, mate, yeh don’ look so good…”

Another groan.

“Did yeh have a sick jus’ now?”

Oliver nodded.

“D’yeh know tha’ yeh got it on yer trousers?

“Fuck…” Oli finally spoke.

“Yeh want some help ta the bus?”

“’M fine here… jus’ restin’ my eyes for a bit.”

“Yeh can’t sleep here… Come on, Ol, let’s get yeh to yer bed.” Kean wrapped an arm around Oli’s shoulder and pulled him away from the wall. “Don’ be pukin’ on me now…”

“’M fine.” With help from his friend, Oli started walking. It was a slow process because Matt was almost dragging him. “I’m fine,” he repeated. “I can walk.”

“Yeh can?” Matt was skeptical but let go of Oli anyway. Oliver immediately stumbled over his feet. “Didn’ fink so…” Matt pulled him up again and began walking once more. “Yeh need ta slow down, yeh sod…. Wha’s this, the fourth night in a row tha’ yer piss drunk?”
“I can drink wheneva I want to…”

“Uh huh, yeh can.” Matt wasn’t even going to try and arguing him when he was like this. He didn’t want any trouble. Oli was already killing his buzz. “Where’s yer girl at?”

“My girl? ‘Oos tha?”

“Jaime…”

“’S not my girl!” He quickly jumped. “Hate the fuckin’ sket.”

“Uh huh, o’reight.” They kept moving, still slowly as Oliver staggered and tripped. They were almost at the bus when someone came up to them.

“There you are,” Nadine said with a sigh. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.” She point at Oli.

“Yeh have?”

“I told yeh tha…” Matt said.

“Can I talk to you real quick?” She asked.

“Me?” Oli’s eyes were squinted trying to see her better.

“Uh huh.” She nodded. “It’s sort of important.”

“Yeh don’ wanna talk to ‘im now, love,” Kean said. “He’s right plastered. Don’ yeh see the puke down the front of ‘im.” He laughed.

“Ew…” Nadine cringed. “Sick.”

“Least yeh not standin’ wiff ‘im…”

“Damn…” Nadine’s nose wrinkled in thought. “First thing in the morning, I’m coming to find you, Oli. We need to talk.”

“O’reight,” he groggily nodded but he hadn’t really heard what she said.

--

When Oliver woke, with an excruciating headache, two people were trying to whisper outside of his bunk. They weren’t being very successful at it.

“You heard him last night, he said I could talk to him.”

“Aye, so jus’ wake ‘im up,” Kean said.

“You wake him up.”

“Fuck no. He’ll knock my teef out.”

“I don’t want my teeth knocked out either.”

“’E’s less likely to knock yers out.”

“That’s not very reassuring.”

“Yeh’ll be o’reight.”

“Ugh, fine.” She groaned and pulled back the curtain. To her surprise, Oli was already awake. “Oh… morning,” Nadine waved.

“Whadyehwant” he grumbled

“You said we could talk.”

“I did?”

“You were drunk.”

“Aye.”

“Do you still have vomit all over you?”

“I don’ remember even gettin’ sick.” Oliver began sitting up. “Wha time is it?”

“Talking time… Time for Matt to leave.” She flashed a smile at Kean and batted her spidery eyelashes at him. He obliged easily. Oli wondered what it was about these Pittsburgh girls that made the blokes turn into twats.

“Wha’ are we talkin’ about?”

“Jaime.”

Oliver groaned and rubbed his face. Though he didn’t remember much of the previous night, he still felt quite strong feelings of hate towards Jaime.

“Just hear me out, buddy… I know you’re not happy with her lately.”

“Hmph.”

“I get that. Totally man… She fucked up saying what she did. But I need your help.”

“Help?”

“Yeah…”

“Wiff wha?”

“Jaime,” she repeated.

“Wha about her?”

“I need you to talk to her about the stuff she’s doing.”

“The stuff she’s doin’? And wha’s tha?”

“Drugs.”

Oliver laughed abruptly. “Yeh want me to talk to her ‘bout drugs?”

“She’s been popping her Xanax and Klonopin like it’s fucking champagne.”

“Wha?”

“Those were her words not mine… I’d say it was a fucking suicide cocktail. She’s been taking a bunch at once… of both.”

“Good fer her?”

“Oli, you don’t get it… There’s a lota shit you don’t know about Jaime. None of it is my place to tell but just know that this has to stop. I let her do it for a couple days because she was all fucked up about seeing you again. But she can’t keep doing it. It’s dangerous for her.”

“An’ yer tellin’ me because?”

“I need your help.”

“Why me?”

“Because you get under her skin. She’ll listen to you.”

He laughed harshly once more. “Right.”

“She will. I know she will. If you tell her to knock it off, she will.” Nadine was full of intense concern for her best friend.

“Wha’ ef I don’ care?”

This time Nadine was the one to laugh. “Yeah, right, okay.”

Oliver climbed out of his bunk; Nadine stepped out of his way while he put on a pair of non-puke-covered shorts. After he’d done that he looked at Nadine. “I jus’ don’t care anymore…”

She rolled her eyes. He thought oddly that it was cuter when Jaime did it.

“Why does it even matter ef she’s doin drugs. It’s wha’ she does. ‘Oo gives a fuck ef she’s shootin’ heroin into her eyeballs? Jus’ so long as she’s ‘aving fun like she likes…”

“You really don’t understand,” Nadine groaned, struggling with how to explain things without telling him certain things about Jaime.

“Then fuckin’ explain or let me alone.” He started walking to the front of the bus, stopping only to put on his shoes, which still had puke stained across the tops.

“It doesn’t bother you that she could really hurt herself by doing this?”

“Not really. ‘S not my place to be bothered.” He said this to ensure that he didn’t tell his own truth. “Besides, she’s a tough bird,” he spoke over his shoulder exiting the bus. “She’ll be fine without my help.”

Nadine was shocked at his disregard for Jaime. She hoped it was just his still wounded pride talking and that there was some hope that he’d help. She needed to persuade him before something really went wrong.