Cross My Heart

We had to call off the rest of the tour. Keith felt bad, because he felt like he was the cause of the tour being cancelled. It was not his fault at all. You can't plan things like death. Especially accidental death. When we called our manager Stephen, he didn't sound amused that we were cancelling the tour, but when we told him our reasons, he went ahead and called all the venues. I made a YouTube video explaining what had happened, and for our fans to not be mad at the band, especially Keith, because it would just hurt us a lot more than what it already did. We were going to tour again, we just didn't know when that was going to happen. Maybe the summer, maybe in a year. All I knew was that Ellaries Dollhouse would never break up. Go on hiatus maybe, but never break up.

It was about 4 o'clock in the morning in Toronto, and we were all packing our equipment and luggage into the trailer and van. My phone started ringing, and that was the only thing that broke the silence between the 4 of us, aside from the banging of equipment. I looked at the screen of my phone, the sudden bright light making me squint.

“Josh? It's 4 in the morning.” I said groggily.

“It's only 1 here.” Josh said. 'Right, he's still in B.C.' I thought.

“Oh...right. What do you want?” I asked. I didn't mean to come off as grumpy, but it was early. I had every right to be.

“I just wanted to see how you were.” Josh said. Chatter among the other three boys started. I walked away from them for a few minutes. “So, how are you?” he put emphasis on 'are'. He obviously wanted to know how I was dealing with the sudden news.

“I've seen better days. I've seen worse.” I sighed.

“How's Keith doing?” I looked back at my cousin. His once happy face was now ashen and heartbroken.

“He's barely talked to either of us in the past few hours.” I said. A sudden realization came over me. We had only received news of Brandon and Olivia's deaths about 2 hours ago.

“Just remember, to be there for him.” Josh said. He sounded like a mix of tired and sorrow.

“I will. How are you Josh? How's Finley?” I asked.

“I'm fine. Still in a tiny bit of shock, but it's wearing off. Finley is sleeping right now. But he's okay. He has a little bit of a cold though.”

“My baby is sick?” I exclaimed.

“Yes, but I took him to the doctor, and he's on some weird baby medicine right now.” Josh said. “I wasn't going to let my son be in pain, or be sick.” Josh said. I could actually hear the smile on his face. Josh had really come a long way in maturity. I was proud of him. I looked back at my band mates, and they were getting into the van.

“I need to get going Josh.” I said.

“Alright. I love you Josline.” Josh said.

“I love you Josh.”

“Drive safely. See you in approximately 4 days.” Josh and I hung up our phones, and I got into the van. Airin was sitting in the drivers seat, Marque was in the back with Keith, who was untangling his headphones. I got into the passengers seat and Airin asked if we had everything. Everybody seemed to, so we started driving. Marque almost fell asleep instantly. Keith put his headphones in his ears, but he didn't sleep. He didn't even go to sleep for an hour. I could tell that the drive home was going to be a long and boring one. Usually when we were driving back to Vancouver, it was an exciting trip. This time around, it was full of dread and despair.

I had fallen asleep a few minutes after we had started driving. We didn't plug in anyone's iPod, we just listened to the radio. The only times that we would stop was if we had to refuel the van, if someone needed the washroom (even then, the guys just peed on the side of the road. I held it until we found a gas station. And sometimes, that wouldn't be for 2 hours, so I manned up and peed in a bush at one point.

We had gotten into the 15th hour of our trip back home. We had to stop in Thunder Bay, because Airin was getting super tired, and felt that if he drove any more, he would possibly kill us all. We stopped in an over-night truck stop, because we couldn't find a motel with a vacancy. It felt really out of place for us to be there, because there were all this big hauling trucks, and then our tiny van. Airin was sitting on the pavement outside the van, Marque was sitting in the van, his legs dangling out of the open door way. Keith was leaned against the inside, opposite of Marque, of the van against the door. I was walking around, stretching out my legs. Airin was eating a cup of cranberry apple sauce. For some odd reason, he was eating the apple sauce, even though he hated it. I often questioned the sanity of my brother. Airin made a really sour face as he put the last spoonful of apple sauce in his mouth.

“Ugh! Cranberry apple sauce is pure evil in a cup!” Airin said, getting up and throwing the plastic cup in a nearby garbage can. He walked back and sat down. Marque had a childish grin on his face.

“Are you sure it's not 'puree' evil in a cup?” Marque was trying to contain a mass giggle fit. Airin stared at Marque, an extremely confused look on his face. Keith started to chuckle, then it formed into a laugh. Then, I caught on, and I joined in the laughter. Marque laughed, and Airin still looked entirely confused. After a good solid 5 minutes of laughing had ended, we all decided we needed sleep. The van didn't provide a comfortable place to sleep, but it was something. Airin and I leaned back the chairs, but Keith sat in the drivers seat, so Airin and Marque could sleep in the back seat. Because when the front seats when down, the middle seat was covered.

I was just about to drift off into dream land, then, Airin started laughing. “Ha! Apple sauce and puree...” He was actually laughing pretty hard, which, in turn made everyone else laugh at how slow Airin was. “Oh...that was good Marque. You're funny.”

It was great to see we could keep our sense of humour in tough times. We were going to need it.