Conditions

He can be a real dick, I knew that getting into the relationship. I knew that he was more straight-forward than I am used to. I knew that there was potential for arguments but I jumped in head-first anyways because I knew then what I still know: living and having loved Brandan would be much, much better than having lived without loving at all. I knew that loving Brandan would change my entire life and it has. I think of other people now, I think of Brandan.

When I wake up every morning, I check my phone to see if he’s left me any late-night text messages or sent me an email. I check to see if he was thinking of me as much as I was thinking about him before he went to sleep, because I think so much about him while I’m lying awake waiting for sleep that his black eyes are the only things I dream of.

He usually doesn’t, though sometimes he does. Sometimes I get text messages saying that he loves me, rarely how much but more often just that he does and he’s happy with being my boyfriend. That’s enough for me, I don’t need a lot but sometimes I want more than what he gives me in other areas. I’m not unsatisfied or anything but a few changes to our daily lives would be appreciated.

Firstly, I do not deserve the way he’s glaring at me now. He’s on the side of our set burning my skull and I know he is, even though he has sunglasses on. I have white-frames on so other people can’t see that I’m focused on him more than my left-handed guitar but he knows. I can tell, but I can’t tell what he’s trying to communicate through his angry stare. I don’t think I did anything wrong, I haven’t said anything mean lately and I wasn’t drunk last night so I know I didn’t send anything inappropriate.

I kind of wish I did get drunk last night, the other guys had a great time but I stayed in because Brandan asked me to work on my vows since I hadn’t started them yet and we’re getting married at the end of the tour. Maybe that’s why he’s glaring; maybe he’s assuming that I haven’t worked on them still. I did, though. I finished them, I asked Matt to look over them and he thought they sounded sweet.

I think I could have got them done even if I had had a couple of beers. Maybe something more emotionally satisfying since I’m usually more relaxed when not completely sober. I don’t really know how he does the sober life style but to each their own. He doesn’t judge me so I won’t judge him.

Matt’s wasting time so I have enough time to switch guitars and ask what the fuck Brandan’s problem is. He actually probably doesn’t care about the last part, he’s supportive but that doesn’t mean he cares. Matt’s my best friend and I love him but he’s pretty inconsiderate about the sort of thing. He fights with Val, they both get over it. He assumes that’s how everyone works and to some extent, it is how we all work but he can last longer without Val’s approval and happiness with him than I can last without Brandan’s good graces.

“You maxed out my credit card and didn’t tell me so I didn’t pay the bill and now they’ve bumped me up to a higher percentage rate and took it automatically from my checking account so the check I wrote for the down payment bounced and now I have to deal with the lectures my dad will give me for the next three months about being financially irresponsible.” Brandan answers when I ask what’s wrong. He can be a dick but he usually tells me why. I do like that.

One that I don’t necessarily dislike but am not completely used to, though, is how active his parents are in his life. I love my family but I don’t talk to them very much anymore. I told my mom I got engaged and sent her an invitation but Brandan talks to his parents every single day, sometimes multiple times. Mr. Schieppati has friends in acrtiture and construction and they’ve planned and are getting our new house built so even though we’re paying for it, his dad has access to it a lot more than we do since we’re on tour.

Dann’s friend probably told him Brandan’s check bounced and since Dann and the rest of Brandan’s family are so fucking rich, Dann just covered the $450,000 down payment so the construction company would start the foundation and walls.

Matt stops talking and looks at me, a sure indication that he’s going to kick my ass later if I don’t get my head on the matter at hand. He glares at Brandan too, because if I can’t focus with Brandan on stage, he wants Brandan to go away. He doesn’t have to say anything to convey this. We’ve all known each other long enough to know.

I grab the right guitar and go back to pretending not to pay attention to Brandan. Now it’s a little harder because I know what’s wrong, I can’t lie to myself and say he’s over reacting because that is a pretty lame thing to do but I didn’t even know I did it. Ever since Avenged has taken off, I just don’t pay attention to money anymore. When I want something, I just pay for it with one of my cards. Brandan usually deals with the bills with a credit card we share and he usually manages my check book too because I don’t have to anymore so I don’t. I’m not very good with Math but he is.

I must have just have grabbed the wrong card and paid for something expensive. I don’t remember buying anything too expensive, though. I guess I did pay for the reservations for our honeymoon with the first card I grabbed from my wallet but that wasn’t more than a few thousand dollars, I think.

Matt comes over and puts his arm around me. Maybe to the low observers this would look friendly but it’s a warning to stop fucking up. He isn’t a dictator or anything, he’s my best friend, but he tries to keep us focused when we are on stage because this is our job, he wants to make sure we’re doing it well. He hates disappointing fans. I do too, so I like that he reminds us when we’re off.

I can’t seem to stop fucking up, though, even with Matt right there so we cut the optional songs and don’t come back out when the kids start chanting “one more song” and I feel bad but not enough to go back out.

The rest of the guys are cool about it, they don’t ask any questions and I am able to slip away to Brandan’s bus to talk about the credit card issue. It’s a nice summer day out, so I’m happy. It’s almost cold on the bus though, Brandan’s from Antarctica so he’s always hot.

“Babe, I didn’t realize I used your credit card for anything. What did I use it on?” I ask to give him a chance to just bitch at me for a few minutes about how annoying it is for him when I don’t pay attention to my spending. If I let him vent at first, he’s usually not as pissed throughout the rest of the conversation. That’s something I really do love about him, though, he gets over things once he’s able to vent.

He looks up at me with probably the meanest glare I’ve ever seen from him, at least directed to me. “You spent $300,000 in Vegas, Zack.” He gets the credit card statement and points to the line that has my favorite casino and bar’s tab on it. The dates add up to the tour before this, when it was just my band and Burn Halo.

I was so drunk that night that I didn’t even remember we were in Vegas the next morning when Matt woke me up, I was on the bus. That won’t help my case with Brandan, I’ve tried that before. Even though he’s as cool about me drinking and doing drugs as I could ask of him, he doesn’t let me use that as an excuse, either. I don’t blame him, actually I like being held accountable for my actions because it makes me think twice before I get that wasted.

“I’m sorry. Warner Brothers just put in my quarter check for album sales to my checking account, so I’m sure I have enough to cover it?” I offer because I don’t know what else to say. Yeah, I fucked up and I know that his dad is going to give him a hard time and I don’t like that on my shoulders but I can’t go back in time and fix it. Reminding Brandan of my inability to travel through time never makes him very happy, though.

“The point is that you left for tour early, despite me wanting to spend our anniversary together so you could go to Vegas and you got so drunk that you spent a lot more money than you would have normally and you ruined our plans. Sure, you can cover it, Zack, but I was paying for the foundation and the down payment so that you could pay for the electrical and plumbing then the next time I got paid, I could pay for the rest of it and then we would only have to have a loan for whatever was left. That was going to be a couple hundred thousand dollars but now it’s going to be $750,000 because you were an asshole.”

“Brandan, I don’t know what you want me to say. I’m sorry that I did that and fucked up our plans. Is there anyway I can make it up to you now?”

“Maybe you shouldn’t get so drunk until after the wedding so I don’t have any reason to back out, all right? I am stressed out enough without having to deal with baby-sitting you along with planning the house and wedding.”

“I can do that.” I nod because really, it’s the least I can do. I’d help with the wedding, I actually would really like to but he’s a bit obsessive-compulsive so I’m letting him handle it. He gives me options like if I like suit A or suit B more but he has the majority of it all covered.

“Thanks. My sketch pad isn’t working again. Can you fix it?” He hands me his laptop and the pad that I’ve “fixed” about a hundred times now. He leaves it on and closes his laptop so it gets fucked up, it just has to be reset but it’s easier for me just to do it than to try to explain it to him because he doesn’t want to learn. It’s not that he can’t or wouldn’t be able to but can’t be bothered to pay attention.

“Sure,” I shrug and put the MacBook on my lap, check my email and reply to a few MySpace messages then push the button and approve more comments before signing out and giving it back to him. “What are you drawing, babe?”

“The same thing I’ve been working on and not telling you about for the last year or so.” He shrugs. It’s probably been almost two years now that he’s been hiding behind scrap paper and his laptop drawing and not letting me know what was up.

Considering how much I’m on his laptop, I could have figured it out but I would never do that to him, he’s obviously working really hard on it and I wouldn’t want to hurt him by discounting his work. I understand how discouraging it is to have something leaked before it’s rightful time. “I think I deserve a preview for my patience,” I push it anyways because that is perfectly acceptable. A band can release a single before the record release to get kids stoked, that isn’t as bad as looking without permission.

“You know what it is, Zack. Isn’t that a preview?” It’s true that I know it’s something he is drawing but that’s all I know. It could be anything. He has a photographic memory so I can’t even to off what he’s been looking at closely.

“Not really. Just because I know a movie is coming out Friday doesn’t mean I know what it’s about.” I stand up and sit next to him when Patrick, Marta and Jona walk in. I really like them but I’m not really sure about Patrick, which is a little weird since he’s the only one kind of like me. He isn’t straight edge like the others.

I’m not a vegetarian like Marta or Jona, though I get why they are and don’t hassle them about it. I think that maybe the residual feelings of abandonment of Leppke walking out on them, so to speak, that Brandan harbors overflows into me and makes me bitter towards Patrick. Which isn’t really fair but whatever.

He reaches around my head to cover my eyes as he’s fucking with his laptop, his hand is warm against my skin but it normally is. “I love you,” He kisses my jaw. “Sorry I ruined your show for you. I wasn’t trying to make you uncomfortable. I just told you I’d come and watch.” He hugs me, which means he’s not getting the laptop ready so I don’t know why I still have a hand over my eyes.

“I love you too, why is your hand over my face if you’re not showing me what you’ve been working on?” I smile when I can almost hear him telling me to be patient because he’s learned how to be and has sense forgotten not being. He used to be such a fucking asshole about everything and now he’s only partially an asshole, I guess, but his refusal to admit when other people have weaknesses like impatience is definitely one of redeeming qualities that proves he still is a dick.

He uncovers my eyes and I can feel them widen when I look at the screen and a sketch he drew and probably has been editing with Adobe is full screen. It’s him and me kissing for the first time, it was in a hotel room our first tour when Bleeding Through let us open for them. He could see us in a mirror that was on a wardrobe and my arm is around his neck. The lines are so awesome and the overall picture is great. He can draw so well, my tattoos look a lot crisper than they actually are but everything else looks realistic.

It’s black and white, the background is a bit blurry so it looks like it’s an actual photo or something with the focus just on us. It’s fucking amazing and it must have taken a while for him, even though he can sketch well because the graphic editing with Adobe is hard for him, it means that much more that he took so much time to work on it. Even in the sketch, my eyes are a lot brighter than his as he’s looking at the mirror a bit from under me.

I was a little excited to be kissing him, I took the lead then and he let me. He quickly revoked the privilege when we started getting into other things but I remember the kiss like it was yesterday because it was when I knew that regardless of the obstacles, no matter how much was in my way- I needed him and I had to have him.

There would be obstacles because he didn’t like to be ‘tied down’ at the time and we have some fundamental differences but I just knew I had to make it work. Failure wasn’t even an option, success was my only way and I’m glad I did. I regret some of the things I’ve done in my life but if I’m proud of anything, it would be how honest I let myself be with him because if I had wandered for just one second whether or not I actually wanted him, he would have been gone and I would have lost the best thing that ever happened to me.

“It’s amazing, Brandan!” I kiss him again because I’d never find the right words to say how brilliant I think it is. I’m not gifted with words like him or Matt. I can’t say the right things but I can let him know that the intention is there, I can show him how much I love things.