Disasterpiece

I guess I hadn't fully grasped the monumental levels of fandom that followed Slipknot. As I walked out onto the shop floor from the back, hand still entwined with Joey's, my ear drums were met with deafening roars and screaming. I let go of Joey's hand to cover my ears and cringe, Joey laughed, patted me quickly on the shoulder and followed the other guys over to the signing table.

"Fuck me," Josie yelled as she popped up at my side. I nodded in awe, staring around the record store; the line weaved its way through five different isles, then out onto the street as far as I could see. It was pretty much a sea of black, chains and long oily hair… and that was just the male fans.

Josie and I sat down in the corner and watched as the guys greeted every single person. Sometimes it was quite amusing to watch, especially when big burly guys were reduced almost to the verge of tears because they were meeting their idols. But at other times my insides flared up dangerously, this mostly occurred when a scantily clad girl leaned over the signing table and asked for her boobs to be signed. I almost couldn't believe the audacity some of the girls had, even asking for kisses or 'meet ups' later. I could tell Josie was starting to internally fire up too.

"Hey are you with the band?" a female voice floated over, breaking my concentration on the latest raunchy signing. I looked over to the barricade that was keeping the fans in order to see two girls hanging over it, looking at Josie and I with eager anticipation.

"I guess you could say that," I responded cautiously, not sure exactly why they wanted to know. The girls looked at each other excitedly and grinned.

"That is just so cool!" one of them gushed.

"How did you meet them? Are you dating?" the other one asked quickly. Josie was now paying attention to the conversation and gave me a knowing, exasperated look.
"More like blood relations," Josie informed them, though technically Corey and I didn't have the same blood. The girls gasped, squealing a little.

"Oh my god, who are you related to?" they asked in unison, a little too loudly and excitedly so that they attracted the interest of a few people around them. Out of nowhere a security guard stepped between us and told them to move on, they looked pretty dejected and sullen until they realised they were only a few people away from meeting the guys.

"Reckon they were after backstage passes?" Josie asked sarcastically, I laughed.
"No doubt!" I replied. "And probably a little more. I've never had people get so excited over meeting me, it's just not normal," I added, laughing.

It took the guys about three hours to get through the line, and I could tell it was taking it out of all of them, even though they loved meeting their fans. Josie and I had gotten bored waiting and walked around the line outside pretending to be just fans as well, which was pretty entertaining in itself. I guess the best thing that could come out of it was that I now knew I wasn't the only person desperately lusting after Joey; in fact my lust seemed quite bland compared to some people. The line: "I will literally curl up into a ball and die if I get to touch him!" was still my favourite. Added to that, Josie's play-along reply of: "Oh my god my life would just be soooo complete, I wouldn't care if someone like, murdered me then and there!" was the cherry on the cake.

It seemed that John had more plans for the guys though, because after the last fan left and they shut the shop doors, he was up in front of them informing them of their next tasks.

"Alright we've got interviews to get to....Kerrang for Chris and Shawn; Rock Sound for Corey and Paul; Ultimate Guitar for Mick and James; Kerrang radio for Sid and Craig and Drummer for Joey," John read from his clipboard. "There's taxi's out back and lunch will be provided."

The guys stood up with a low in-unison groan and proceeded to head out for the taxi's, Corey came over to Josie and I and wrapped his arms around me tiredly.

"You two should go back and chill at the hotel, knowing John he's probably got a lot more interviews lined up than he's letting on," he said to us. I hugged him tightly as a gesture of pity because I could see how tired he was, and nodded.

"Poor little Corey...we'll see you later then, enjoy your interviews," I replied. Corey unwrapped his arms, gave us a sarcastic thumbs up and then followed the others outside.

"You know what? I think my bed is calling my name," Josie said as we walked into our hotel room. John had organised another taxi just for us, which we took to lunch before coming back here. Josie went and flopped down on her bed for effect, I knew once she was down and adamant she was going to sleep, there was no way I'd change her mind. I walked over to my suitcase and hauled it open, searching around inside for my bathers.

"I think I'll go check out the pool," I told her as I pulled out my simple black one-piece. She made a muffled noise into her pillow in reply, to which I rolled my eyes at. I got changed, grabbed a towel and headed down to the pool, throwing my towel over a lounge chair before diving into the cool water. Lucky enough for me there was no one else here, which suited me fine as I felt like a little alone time, something I hadn't had since leaving Des Moines.

I floated around the pool aimlessly just enjoying the pleasant, crystal water lapping up against me. My mind wandered to how Uncle Frank was doing and noted that I should call him with a safety update, and then to Corey with the girl at the restaurant last night and how snug they looked simply devouring each other’s presence...and then to Joey, dear Joey. My stomach churned. The night we made up and watched movies in his den swarm around my head. The feeling of the loss of all that confused hatred towards each other and the replacement with this unabashed urge to lock him in my arms forever, escalated through me. I hoped with time it would go away so our friendship could develop mutually and how it should, everything would just be so much easier.

“I don’t know many people who would come all the way to London and go for a swim,” a familiar voice came. I spluttered as I accidently engulfed some water, flipping myself into an upright position I stood on the pool floor and looked over to the edge to find Joey standing there in board shorts. Yeah, just board shorts, no shirt…he was just standing there in half naked glory grinning at me.

“I thought you had interviews to do?” I asked casually, trying to regain myself after almost swallowing the whole pool in shock. He shrugged and dripped his toes in the water before sitting on the concrete edge, letting his legs dangle.

“I only had the one to do luckily, most of the guys aren’t back yet,” he replied. I walked over to him and leant my arms over the concrete, resting my chin upon them.

“Was it a good interview?” I asked in interest; imagining that if I were famous it would be pretty awesome, if not a little invading, to have people want to ask you questions and get to know you. Joey shrugged again and leant back on his hands.

“It’s cool talking about music, you know with drumming magazines they don’t get too personal and just ask about the technical stuff…but it gets repetitive,” he said. I bit my lip uneasily, unsure if I should ask my next question, but deciding to go ahead anyways.
“Do you share pretty personal stuff sometimes?” I questioned apprehensively. He stopped moving his legs around in the water and pondered for a moment.

“Er…” he paused, glancing down at me quickly. “I guess sometimes…but very rarely. There’s some stuff that should stay only, you know, between the people it involves,” he answered. I nodded, understanding as he slid carefully down into the water next; mimicking the same lean on the edge I was doing.

“Hey I just thought, the last time we were in a pool together was the first time we met,” Joey said suddenly, eyes bright. I pursed my lips for a second feeling that something was off (besides the fact that we had a massive fight just after being in the pool), before I remembered that it wasn’t our first encounter.

“Actually, second time,” I corrected him. He looked confused until it seemed to click in his head, then he looked really awkward.

“Oh…oh yeah,” he mumbled, embarrassed. “Sorry,” he added sheepishly, avoiding eye contact with me and looking quite uncomfortable. I frowned sadly at him, knowing that that reminder must’ve brought up all the reason for him being at the cemetery for our first encounter. I moved a little closer to him and placed my hand gently and cautiously on his arm.

“How are you doing anyway?” I worded carefully. He sighed, forcing a weak smile in my direction.

“I’m ok I guess,” he replied quietly, I raised my eyebrow at him to which he laughed. “Ok, I’m a little less than ok, but I’m doing better,” he amended.

From out of nowhere there was suddenly a massive splash that sprayed water up at both off us. We jumped together in surprise and looked over to the middle of the pool to find a ball of clothes all tied up together. It took me a few seconds to realise that they weren’t just any clothes, but they were my clothes…namely a few intimates.
I gasped loudly as a cackling laugh came from above, looking up I saw Josie and Sid hanging out of our hotel window in fits of laughter.

“Josie!” I screamed, diving for the embarrassing bundle. It seemed Joey had realised what was going on around the same time and also dove for the bundle. “No!” I screeched as we raced towards them, Joey pushed off as hard as he could from the bottom of the pool and propelled himself past me; grabbing the bundle.

“Joey!” I yelled desperately, splashing like a lunatic as I tried to swim quickly to him. He put the bundle under his arm and swam to the other end of the pool. I tried my best but there was no way I could catch up. He jumped up the pool steps and threw the sopping bundle to the ground, laughing and panting. I gave up chasing him and stopped to give him my best pouting face. He just laughed harder and bent down to pick up one of my bras, of course it had to be the red lacy one. He held it up to his chest and grinned cheekily at me.

“Think this is my size?” he joked, pushing his chest out to make it seem like he had boobs. Even though I was totally dying of humiliation, I couldn’t help but laugh a little, he was such an idiot.

“I think it’s too small actually,” I grinned back. He faked a look of shock and dove back into the pile of clothes, pulling out a g-string that was definitely not mine, fucking Josie. He wriggled his eyebrows at me as I turned bright red.

“Oooo what about this?” he winked.

“That is not mine!” I exclaimed indignantly, running through the water at him. He cackled and pulled the g-string up over his board shorts, dancing around. I leaped out of the pool and crash tackled him to the ground, doing my best to wrestle my bra out of his hands.

After realising I wasn’t getting anywhere and only getting more tired and exhausted, I collapsed on the ground next to him panting. He put his arm out and drew me into a hug, still grinning from ear to ear.

“If it makes you feel better, you can try on my underwear sometime,” he joked. I laughed, slapping his chest lightly before relaxing into his grasp.