FiveNinety

The band did talk to their management about Jessica doing merch for them and they said if she thinks she could do it then she could do it. Of course Jessica wasn't going to pass that opportunity up. She found out how long they would be gone and paid in advance on her apartment. 

On the very last band meeting/practice they had the girls were off work together so they surprised the guys by cleaning the van and trailer inside and out. One of the reasons they did it was cause they were bored but the main reason was because the van and trailer needed it but the outside had needed it way more than the inside did.

After they were doing that they packed the merch into the trailer, which Jessica was thankful for their help on that. Luckily they didn't need to count it up or anything cause that already had been done a month before the tour would be staring. 

Finally it was time for the band and Jessica to leave so they said their good byes and once they were done they had left for the first city of the tour which was New York City. 

"Man have to drive all the way across the states. This will be a long drive." Jessica laughed.

"Yeah it will but it's worth it when we see the fans faces." Mike said as he texted on his phone. 

Jessica giggled seeing what he was doing, she shook her head also then said, "Hopefully we don't get lost."

"Nah we won't because we got good ole Bertha here to help us." Beau grinned motioning to the GPS system with his right hand while keeping his left hand on the steering wheel since he was driving. 

"Well that's good." She laughed, "Man I haven't been to New York in years. Last time I was there was in.... 2001, with my brother for my 18th birthday." 

"I bet that was fun." Jared stated. 

Jessica nodded, "It started out fun but ended badly."

The guys gave her confused and questioning looks wondering what she meant and Matt was the first one to ask why it ended badly. Jessica had told Eric so she figured she would tell them too. 

"Well at the time it was just my brother,Josh, and me, since he was my guardian, anyways he planned a trip to New York city for us for my birthday. We had went to see Grease in broadway and a lot of other stuff. Well a few days before we were scheduled to leave I had a wild idea, to go up in the world trade centers so we did. We got up really early so we could have all day, anyways, we waved down a cab, which isn't as easy as they show on television." She laughed softly at that, then continued, "We didn't know which one to go into first so we flipped a coin for it and going into the south tower first won so we went. We went to each floor but some of them we didn't stay long, then when we got to the." She stopped for a few seconds then continued, "Fourth floor and felt a rumble, it wasn't that big, we didn't think anything of it so we kept on going. Josh and me got to the fifth floor looked around then as we were getting ready to get onto the elevator again to go up we were told they were evacuating people which made us bummed, we weren't worried, we went up another floor still but as soon as we got off the elevator we felt a huge rumble then screaming. We figured now was the time to leave but the elevators weren't working so we had to take the stairs but people were rushing so that was hard. So we stood off in a corner. I don't know how long it was before we decided to start heading down with everyone. Josh and me made an agreement that we would meet at across the street if we got separated which both of us had phones so we figured if anything we could call the other one.  I stuck the camera in my front pocket so I wouldn't drop it and went down with him. It took so long because the stairwell was so packed, and sadly we did get separated." She sighed and took a drink. "After a few minutes I heard this boom sound over and over, I just thought it was someone hitting the wall as they walked down or the uhm." She motioned with her hand.

"Railing?" Jared questioned hiding a laugh back and it was evident in his voice. 

"Yeah that." She laughed, "Had a blonde moment." She smirked looking at Mike, "No offense Mike."

"Ha...ha." He said flipping her off and chuckled. 

"No thank you, not into you." They all laughed.

She said seriously, "Back to that day. I thought someone could have been hitting the wall or the railing as they were going down. Then I heard that the building is collapsing and people really freak out. I barely made it to the street when I looked and seen it all coming down and I screamed for Josh figuring maybe he did make it out. I went across the street but it was hard to see from all the smoke and ashes. I tried my phone but wasn't working. A fire fighter told me I need to get as far as I could away but I didn't want to until I found Josh. I had seen people running away and just started looking around as I walked away. That day was horrible, I never wanted to go through that I wouldn't wish that on my worse enemy either." She shook her head. 

"Did you ever find him?" Matt asked her softly. 

"I stayed around there searching him, someone, a paramedic, grabbed me softly and said I was bleeding. I looked and sure enough I was on my upper arm. I don't even know how it happened cause I didn't feel anything hit me." She shrugged, "The paramedic cleaned my arm off gently and wrapped it up. I insisted I didn't want to go to the hospital. I stayed for hours after the second tower collapsed and wasn't able to find him. Late that night I found a way to the hotel to see if just maybe he was there. I got there and seen he wasn't there, I used the phone and called his phone but it went straight to voicemail so I left a message saying I was there at the hotel. I didn't get any sleep, of course, but as the days went on I still looked for him. Showing his picture to people and I even posted a picture of him on a wall the had for missing people. A month after they let planes fly again I went home to do the legal things so they wouldn't think we abandoned the place but neighbors who we were close to knew where we were going."

"So you never found him?" Eric asked in a sad tone. 

"Nope I didn't." She frowned shaking her head, "I stayed in the house for as long as I could but I had to move. I kept some of his stuff but the stuff I had no use for, like most of his clothes and things I donated to charity cause we had always talked about doing that if we died. This was all a year later though. Every other month, before doing all that, I had went back to New York to search for him though. Even went straight to the same hotel, to see if they had seen him. I had put up a flyer about him too."

"Damn." Beau stated. 

They all sat in silence for what seemed like hours not knowing what to say to everything she had told him. They had actually figured she would had just told them Josh died on September 11th 2001. They weren't expecting the whole story but they hadn't minded cause they knew it helped a person to talk about things like that. 

"So anyways, since it's going to take a couple of days or so to get to New York we could stay in a hotel a night on the way there?" Matt stated. 

"Why? We have enough people to drive there. All we need to do is at least stop every now and then to change drivers and stretch." Mike spoke up. 

"He's right, why waste money for a hotel room until we at least get there." Jessica agreed. 

They found out how long it would be to drive there so then they figured how long each person would drive before changing drivers. Since Eric and Jessica were in a seat bench themselves Eric scoot away from Jessica which she gave him a confused look but stopped when he laid down with his head on her leg. She smiled down at him and started rubbing her hands through his hair. 

"You like doing that huh?" Eric chuckles quietly. 

"Mhm." She nods, "You not like it? I can stop."

"No, no I like it."

"Okay good." 

She continued rubbing her hands through his hair while him Jared and Matt linked their DS' together and played a racing game.