New Found Love

Five years later, Amber stood at the side of the stage with her three children, watching her husband and his band performing live for thousands of their fans. Billie Joe ran around the stage, singing the lyrics to East Jesus Nowhere as he strummed his guitar strings rapidly. Mike stood off to the side, playing his bass with pure perfection. He nodded his head to the beat of the music and periodically adjusts the amps with his foot. Tre sat behind his drums, playing them with as much power as he could. He looked over to the side of the stage periodically. He smiled as he laid his eyes on his family. Amber smiled and waved back.

“Daddy!” Sarah screamed as she waved her arms in the air.

Tre smiled at his six-year-old daughter. Tre loved his eldest daughter very much. She clung to him more than his five-year-old twins did. Whenever he was at home, Sarah and Tre were inseparable. Tre would do anything that his daughter wanted him to do. He’d help her with her homework, he’d watch any movie that she wanted, he’d take her out to dinner and he’d play with her and all of her friends. But just because he had a strong relationship with his Sarah, didn’t mean that his twins didn’t get enough Daddy love. Tre made sure to spend just as much time with Aidan and Abigail as he did with Sarah. Sarah didn’t mind this, she found it to be just as much fun as when she had her dad to herself.

“It’s loud in here, Mommy!” Aidan complained, pulling on his mother’s wrist. Amber smiled down at her son.

“Come on then sweetie. We’ll just go play in the play pen in the dressing room,” Amber told him. Aidan smiled at his mother. “Let’s go Abigail. Sarah?”

“What?”

“Are you coming along too?” she asked her daughter.

“Can I stay here?” she asked. Amber winced.

“Well, I’d prefer if you didn’t,” Amber told her.

“Why?”

“It’s safer if you’re with me…”

“I’ll watch her, Amber,” Tate said, approaching Amber and his nieces and nephew.

Tate was still a roadie for Green Day and he loved every second of it. On his first tour as a roadie, he’d met a French girl named Marie and fallen head over heels for her. They’d eloped in Paris and conceived a child within two weeks of knowing each other. Amber and her brother Mark weren’t too fond of the idea of Tate being married so young with a young bride and a baby. But, they quickly adapted to their brother’s newfound happiness and accepted his new life for what it was. Once Tate’s son, Stephan was born in France, he persuaded his wife to move back to California with him. She agreed and ever since then, they’d lived happily in a studio apartment in San Francisco.

As for Mark, he never married. He loved his life as a bachelor too much to commit to any serious, long-term relationship. He still lived in his own apartment and dated as many women as he pleased. Amber never past judgment on either of her brothers’ choices. They only thing that truly mattered was that they were both happy.

“Thank you,” Amber said, as she held her son and daughter’s hand as they walked down the ramp that led back to the dressing room.

“Holy shit, Amber! You’re looking big!” Billie Joe’s son, Joey said as he walked past her.

“Thanks, Joey. Thanks!”

Amber was seven months pregnant with her fourth child, which was going to be another boy. Tre and Amber had decided that they would name him Samuel Henry just in case Amber had another emergency C- section when Tre was on the road. But, so far, everything had gone smoothly in Amber’s latest pregnancy. She had tested negative for gestational diabetes and baby Samuel was growing healthy and strong, just the way Amber liked it.

“Is Sarah at the edge of the stage?” he asked.

“Yup, where else would she be?” Amber said, giving him a wink. Joey laughed.

“I’ll go stand with her,” Joey said, walking over the edge of the stage.

“Come on, guys,” Amber said, nudging her twins towards the dressing room. She walked in and led them to their playpen, which was set up in the corner of the room.

Amber then sat down on the black leather couch and let out a sigh. She kicked off her sandals, and sat still in the cool, air conditioned room. It was the dead of summer and she was heavily pregnant and could feel even the slightest degrees’ difference in the humidity. She wrapped a hand over her belly and closed her eyes. Baby Samuel hit her square in the palm of her hand.

“Hey! Stop that!” she scolded him. He bounced around as if to tell her no. “I hope you’re not going to be too much of a hassle when you’re born, mister! I already have my hands full!” Samuel moved once again before settling down. “Good, at least you’re slightly obedient,” Amber laughed.

“Hey, baby!” Tre said, walking into the room with his empty beer bottle and Sarah trailing behind him. He was drenched in sweat and leaned over his wife to kiss her. Amber immediately got a whiff of that locker room stench.

“Ew, you stink!” she complained. Tre laughed.

“What can I say? You married a stinky rock star drummer!” he told her with a chuckle.
Amber grabbed a hold of his wet shirt collar and pulled his face down near hers. She kissed his lips.

“And I’ve enjoyed all five years of our stinky rock star marriage!” she told him.

“Only five?” he asked.

“Five and counting,” Amber corrected herself. Tre laughed before pressing his sweaty palm against Amber’s stomach and kissing her again.

“Ew! Mommy and Daddy are kissing!” Sarah whined. Tre and Amber withdrew from their kiss and looked at their eldest daughter.

“Oh come here you little…” Tre started before Sarah ran away from him.

Amber watched and laughed as her husband and daughter chased each other around the dressing room, periodically knocking an item or two over. She glanced at her twins who were playing gracefully with their toys in their playpen. She then laughed as Tre stumbled and almost crashed into his dresser before running after Sarah again. Amber looked down as baby Samuel kicked her hard in the ribcage. She flexed her hand over the spot, and felt her son’s foot.

Amber knew that everything she’d faced earlier in her life had just been an obstacle course that brought her to this moment. From her lack of a childhood to her life as a teenager in Los Angeles to her first relationship with Tre to her first marriage to her drug addiction to Tre’s loving rescue to the death of their first child to Tate’s unexpected arrival to their wedding and to the birth of their twins, everything had been worth it. With every ounce of pain, happiness and paranoia that ever crossed their minds, Tre and Amber had gotten through it all. And there wasn’t to say that they wouldn’t be faced with more struggles in their future, but they knew that their strong love would give them the courage and strength to hold their growing family together through any crisis the world threw their way.