Never Again

The next morning I woke up alone, with a headache and nausea to greet me as my six-thirty alarm rang. I cursed my luck, and my alarm clock, with the worst words I knew, before falling out of bed and stumbling down to the kitchen.

Flicking the kettle on, I glanced into the lounge room to see if Frankie had stayed the night, although if he had he probably would have stayed with me. Nobody was there, so I set about making coffee for myself, and a Panadol for my headache.

I put it off for as long as I could, but eventually I had to check my calendar. Then I groaned, for two reasons: one, because there was only a week until the guys had to go on tour, and two, because I was supposed to go to work today.

That was obviously not going to happen.

Sighing, I pulled out my phone and dialed the number I knew so well.

“Hey, Amber!” The guy who answered the phone was Nick, a fellow Australian whom I had taken on to help me manage my business, Blackmist Studios, which catered for young bands - especially Australian bands - who wanted to make it big in the US.

“Hi Nick,” I replied, sensing the change in his mood as he heard my voice. “I don’t think I can come to work today.”

“Neither do I - you’d better stay at home and get some rest if you feel anything like you sound!” Nick exclaimed, and I winced at the loud noise, silently agreeing with him.

Nick was a very extroverted and talkative person - the perfect employee for dealing with interviews, and talking to people whom I didn’t want to talk to.

“Will you be okay looking after things? I know the guys from Underground were supposed to come in for an interview today...” I was starting to worry myself.

“Don’t worry about a thing, Amber. You know I can handle it, and you need your rest - call me back when you feel better and I’ll tell you everything you need to know, okay?”

“Okay. But if you nee-”

“-I said everything is gonna be fine. Now, you go find your coffee - which I know you would have already had about five of by now - and relax for the day.”

“Fine. I’ll relax.”

“Good.” And then in a lighter tone, “I’ll talk to you later on.”

“Okay. Bye.”

“Bye.”

At least that was sorted, I thought.

I sighed and went to sit on the couch, turning on the TV and flicking through channel after channel of absolutely nothing worth watching. I tried to amuse myself for as long as possible, but gave up after half an hour of watching senseless morning television.

Leaving it on a random music channel, I reached for my phone, dialing Frankie’s number. Too late, I hoped he was awake already, and not at any important meeting.

“Hey, Amber! What’s up?” He sounded so happy that I almost felt bad complaining to him... almost.

“I'm sick.” I sighed, figuring straight to the point is always best.

“Well... that sucks.” Frank’s mood changed immediately, I could tell.

“Yup.” I sighed again, “And now I'm all alone, I can’t go to work and there’s nothing on TV. What about you?”

“Amber, look, I know you’re trying to get me to keep you company - and trust me, I would honestly love to - but we’re on our way to the last meeting before touring… I really can’t get out of it…” Frankie sighed.

“Oh.”

“Sorry...”

“It’s okay, I know you’ve got lots to do...” I did understand, but that didn’t make it any easier. “…but fine, then. I’ll just have to find somebody who loves me enough to stay with me and stop me from getting bored.” Hiding my real disappointment, I pretended to be in a sulk, making Frank laugh.

“…Hang on a sec, I’ve got an idea-” Frank put his phone down for a moment, and I could hear him talking with someone else in the car. In a moment he was back. “You there?”

“Well, I can’t exactly go anywhere, can I, dear?” I smirked.

“Anyway, dear, forgetting being smart for the moment, I think I just found an answer to your boredom problem.”

“You’re gonna skip work to come back and save me?” I grinned.

“You wish. But no, I'm not that lucky. What I had in mind was actually Alicia.”

“Alicia?”

“Yeah, she’s at home doing nothing as well, and Mikey says she’d love to come over and keep you company.”

“Oh, okay - that sounds good. Not as good as you, of course, but I guess we can find something to do until you get back.”

“Aww, thank you! I know I'm the best.”

“Get over yourself.” I rolled my eyes at the phone, even though I knew he couldn’t see me.

“So, anyway, I’ll get Alicia to come over soon. Until then, you’ll have to put up with music channel one through, like, a hundred and twenty to keep you company.” I knew he was rolling his eyes at the phone as well.

“Okay. I’ll see you this afternoon.”

“Okay. Bye.”

“Bye.”

Lounging around on the couch, I felt better after talking to someone who, at least partly, sympathized with me - but I still felt worse than I had for days - not so much because of the virus, or whatever it was I had, but because I was all alone.

For many years, I had always had company - whether it was the guys when they were in town, or my workmates. The only times I was alone was in the mornings and evenings, but I was always busy - no sitting around doing nothing.

I managed to entertain myself by sitting around doing nothing for about ten more minutes, before deciding that I had to find something to do - even if it was only surf the net and update my blogs.

For about seven years now, I had been blogging. I used to write a little before I met the guys, but after I started hanging around with them, I started writing more often.
At first it was because I wanted to write about my sheer luck, in meeting my favourite band - and then because I liked to write about the things we were all doing together as friends.

After I started writing regularly, I had to keep going - almost overnight, my little blog that had had hardly any followers, now had a massive fan base - mostly fans of the guys’ band, who wanted to talk to me.

I didn’t know why anyone would want to talk to me about anything - especially to do with the guys - when I didn’t even know much about what they were doing when they went to work; well, apart from making music, of course. It was a mystery to me, even now - but I seemed to be making people happy when I wrote about my everyday life, and when I had talked to Gerard about it - for Gerard and Frank were who people asked me about most often - he had told me that he didn’t really care what I wrote (within reason, of course). He was one of the best band members I had ever met, even in my line of work, for dealing with fame - he honestly just wanted to make the fans happy.

So, I tapped away at my laptop keyboard for a while, trying hard not to think of the incredibly important interview I was missing at work each time I saw my home screen with the Blackmist logo. That worked for a little while, but soon the glare of the screen made my eyes sore, and I reluctantly gave up on my computer.

I was about to switch the TV back on, and try to adjust to a day of couch-potatoing, when I was saved by the bell. The doorbell, that is.

Shuffling down the hallway, wrapped in my favourite blanket, I wasn’t surprised to see Alicia standing on my front porch. I pulled open the door, shuffling my feet to keep my blanket out of the way.

“Hey, Ash.” I managed to phrase without sniffling, “Thanks for coming over.”

“It’s okay - I heard you needed some TLC. Plus, I brought chocolate.” She smiled widely as she held up an extra large block of caramel malt - my favourite.

“Okay... maybe I should get sick more often,” I joked, silently thanking Frank for not turning up. He would have been caring and helpful, but probably wouldn’t have brought chocolate.

Suddenly I realized that Alicia was still standing out on the porch.

“Here, come in.” I ushered her down the hall and dropped my blanket on the couch, on the way past, realizing I was preoccupied enough that I didn’t need it.

“Well, do you want a coffee? It’s the next best thing to chocolate.” I grabbed out two mugs as she nodded, making them strong and sugary, with plenty of milk - almost a hot coffee milkshake by the time I was done.

We walked out into the lounge, curling up on the couches for warmth, as I tended to use my heater as little as possible. There was silence for a moment, as we sipped our drinks, but soon Alicia started to talk.

“So... what happened last night with Gerard? I saw him run off.” She asked, curiosity obvious in her eyes.

“Well… how do I put it?” I was trying to figure out a way to tell Alicia what had happened, so she would understand. “I’ll try to explain it as simply as possible - Frank accidentally mentioned a subject which is out of bounds between us, and usually Gerard goes nuts when we try to talk about he- it. This time he just cried. Does that make sense?”

‘That isn’t really very simple’, I thought to myself as I finished explaining.

“Her?”

Now I had done it; it wasn’t a rule between us, that no one talked about Bandit’s mother to anyone, but it was just assumed that it wasn’t mentioned. I would have to tell her now, though.

“Uh… Bandit’s mother. She died a few years back - you might’ve heard about it. Gerard never got over it.”

“Oh, yeah.” She looked down, and I could tell she was afraid she had said the wrong thing.

“Don’t worry about it, Ash. There’s nothing wrong with being curious.”

“Okay.” She still looked doubtful, though, and quickly changed the subject.

“I like the photos.” She motioned to the pictures sitting up on the mantelpiece. There were photos of me with random friends, at concerts and at home, pictures of Bandit with Gerard or the guys, and lots of pictures of us all together. “You must have had some awesome times together.” Alicia seemed a little awestruck, as she thought of the implications of dating a famous person.

“Yeah,” I smiled remembering the good times, and the bad, “We’ve had some great times… but, the first time I met them, it was definitely not one of those great times.”

“Yeah?” Alicia looked interested.

“Yeah…” I suddenly sat up straight as I had an idea. “Why don’t I tell you about it? If you want to sit here and listen to me prattle on, that is.”

Alicia smiled, and there was a gleam of excitement in her eyes as she nodded yes, and settled down to listen.

“Now, I’m an Aussie girl to the bone - not that you’d know it now…”
“Wow, really? I had no idea - you actually sound just like Gerard and the guys, you know, the East Coast accent? Anyway, keep going…”