The Story Left Untold

When we got to the venue, All Time Low’s sound check had started. Meaning, I was left alone and by myself. Luckily, my camera was on the bus. But as I walked towards the bus, I felt a group of girls staring at me. It made me sort of uncomfortable and scared so I took a detour and made my way to the merch tent where Vinny was doing business with some customers. I slid under the tables without him noticing and took a seat on the empty monoblock that was right beside him.

When the other customers cleared the way, I saw the same group of girls eyeing me like I was some piece of meat they wanted to pound. I don’t really know why I got scared easily but for some reason, their glares were sort of frightening. I didn’t want any trouble here and I didn’t know that things would all come boiling down to this. I mean sure I can take one or two down but there were four of them.

“Vinny, why do you think those girls are glaring this way?” I asked, looking at my feet so it wouldn’t be clear that I was talking about them.

“Gee, I don’t know but they don’t look like a perky group of ladies,” Vinny said, sitting down beside me. “What did you do just now?”

“I just went out and got coffee with Alex! What’s so wrong about that?”

“Who knows? Maybe they’re just jealous.”

“Seriously, Vinny?” I couldn’t think of anything more to add up to that. I mean they could be pretty jealous and I’ve heard about cat fights during tours but when you’re actually in the middle of one, now that’s a different story.

A few seconds later, they huddled up and then one of them – the blonde with the fake tan and most probably fake boobs – came over to the booth. My stomach started to get a little queasy as they asked Vinny if they had this shirt she was describing.

“I’m sorry but we’re out of stock for that one,” he told her. “But maybe you can scan the shirts here to see if you’d want something else.”

“Hey, aren’t you that whore who went out with both Jack and Garrett last year? I thought I’d recognize you,” she said in a tone so calm that you’d think she didn’t have bad intentions in her head. But her words were as vile as those thoughts locked up in her tiny brain.

“A. I’m not a whore; and, B. I went out with Garrett after Jack and I broke up,” I explained but she just rolled her eyes.

“You’re still a slut though. Everybody thinks you’re here to get laid. I mean you snagged Jack and Garrett. Zack seemed to like you too and now Alex? Wow, you probably need an award for that.”

I swallowed hard to keep my temper down. I knew where this was going and I knew that she was playing with my head. She wanted something to happen so she can go tell the whole world in a blog or a tweet. She’s trying to bring me down but one thing the world doesn’t know is that I can be a bitch and fuck with other people’s heads too. It’s not like I was born yesterday. If she wanted to play, then I guess I’m going to have to kick her ass. Not literally though; unless of course she asks for it.

“Whoa, do we need to call security here?” Vinny chimed in, getting startled.

“You probably should, Vin. We don’t need trouble here,” I said, keeping my emotions dry. I was good at putting on a poker face. No one ever saw straight through me.

Vinny grabbed his walkie-talkie out of his pocket and channelled it. I watched as the girl’s eyes bulge out of their sockets in fear. She walked – wait no, ran – away from the scene and told her friends about it. One of them sneered at me before walking away with her posse. I swear I can never be safe on these grounds again.

“You better be careful,” Vinny suggested, reading my mind.

“Well, if something happens, I can always sue them,” I laughed. As if I had the money to press charges. I mean we had a lawyer but he was back in Maryland doing only God knows what.

Vinny just shook his head before attending to the wave of customers that were coming at him. I exhaled heavily as I climbed out of the booth and made my way to the bus. Luckily, I felt no more heavy glares on my back.

For the next few hours, I went from tent to tent to meet the bands playing on this tour. The other bands on this tour were The Summer Set, Yellowcard and Hey Monday. I’ve met Cassadee Pope and the rest of their band before but this will be the first time I meet the guys from Yellowcard and The Summer Set. I was pretty pumped to say the least but I knew that fan-girling over the whole thing would get me nowhere near them. So, I did my best to stay put.

“Brittany! You’re here!” Alex Lipshaw called out while I was making my way over to their merch tent.

“Hey Lipshaw,” I greeted him as soon as we were both in hearing range. I gave him a hug and then we started to chat a bit.

“So you’re back here for good?” he asked as he signed a few things for some fans.

“Not really,” I told him. “I’m just here for the summer.”

“That sucks,” he said, saying goodbye to his fans.

We talked about a few more things before Cassadee and Mike came and welcomed me. I felt so appreciated for a few good moments and I thought that tour could never ever as bad as it was back then.

The hours seemed like minutes as they went by. Next thing I knew, all the sets were done and I was beat. I couldn’t wait to climb in my bunk and sleep. Just as I was meeting with the guys – who were busy signing and hanging out with the other fans – the same group of girls came up to me.

“Not feeling so strong or brave now, huh?” their spokesperson asked.

I might never have said anything but I have this huge anger problem. I tend to get really angry and to keep it short, a lot of shit can go down if you provoke me. I’ve always dealt with my anger by jogging around to clear my head but this was different. The problem was staring at me and was coming at me face first. There was no way out of this unless I gave them what they were looking for.

“What are you trying to prove exactly?” I asked, crossing my clenched fists across my arms so they don’t see how angry I am.

Blondie didn’t answer for a while. That’s when her friend – with wild red hair that was in this crazy do – came in and tried to defend her. “We want the world to know what kind of monster you are.”

“Well, I’m sorry to break it down to you but I’m no monster,” I told them as I exhaled a breath.

“What, did you suddenly turn blind or something?” Blondie asked.

“Well my eyes are working pretty fine so, no.”

“No one likes a smart-ass,” one other girl said. She was sorta pretty. She was the kind of girl who had the perfect brunette curls and the perfect facial features and shit like that. It would be so satisfying to see it all go away with one punch though.

“No one likes bullies either,” I retorted and then everything became even tenser.

“Would you just stop with the bullshit already?” Blondie yapped.

“Dude, I’m not doing anything wrong here.”

I was going to walk past them when suddenly they moved closer. Two of them stepped away though. They were probably scared to get hurt or whatever. If you ever saw Ms. Blondie, you’d probably think she was just an average girl. She had blonde hair which she probably flat-ironed, bulging blue eyes, no piercings and no tattoos. Nothing about her screams bad girl. As for the redhead, maybe you can count her hair as something badass but that was about it. I don’t even know why they were looking for trouble.

The redhead shoved me back. I shrugged it off and swerved to the left to get past them. I was only pulled back by Blondie though and I crashed right on my ass. I was going to make her pay for that.

“You really don’t want to start a fight here,” I said, looking from side to side. People were starting to stare.

“You scared?” Redhead asked.

“Nope, but you both should be,” I told them as I got up from the ground and clenched my jaw. I swear if I got even angrier, I’d probably break all my teeth.

Blondie smirked before trying to hock a loogie which failed quite miserably. I was dying of laughter inside but I didn’t want to cause an even bigger scene. So instead I just scoffed.

“Oh, so you think that’s funny?” she said with the meanest eyes. They were hardly scary though.

“I think this whole thing is downright funny,” I said, smiling a little. “I said it once and I probably have to say it again. You really do not want to do this.”

“Oh please, this is what we call fun at home,” she said before charging forward towards me.

She grabbed my hair and was about to bang my head on the floor but I elbowed her right in the stomach and tripped her on her feet so she fell right on the ground. She hit the ground hard and groaned in pain. Right when I was about to turn away, Redhead made her way to me and threw a punch which I dodged. She kicked my right leg hard but I didn’t take the fall. Instead, I threw a big right hook to her jaw and she landed right on top of her friend.

Blondie pushed Redhead off of her and grabbed my arm and tried to throw me down but she was like the epitome of weak. Her strength was something similar to the lightest feather in the world. I tried not to hit her but she kicked the same leg and something snapped. I fell to the ground as I moaned in pain and she got on top of me. But I rolled over before she could do anything. I gave her a big ground and pound and knocked her lights out. I was going out of control. Her nose was bleeding and I think I cut her lip. I was about to make things worse when suddenly a pair of arms dragged me away from the body.

I was fighting to get that person’s grip off me but when I looked at exactly who was holding me back, I stopped trying. Zack was staring at me with shocked eyes. I didn’t say anything to him. Instead, I looked at her two friends who were videotaping it with a video cam. A lot of people were surrounding us now but luckily, I saw no other device being held up. I limped my way over to the two and they stared at me in fright. They were backing down slowly when I held the one with the video cam by the wrist.

“Hand me the cam,” I said feeling a little out of breath. My heart was pumping hard. My leg hurts like hell and I couldn’t stand on it.

The girl gave it to me and I took the memory card and placed it in my pocket. I gave them back the camera since I had no plans on keeping it. I’m not that mean.

“If I hear about this from anyone, you know what will happen. Tell your friends the same,” I warned. I stared deep into their scared eyes as they trembled in fright. They nodded quickly as they held each other’s hand. I limped away from them and made my way over to where Zack and the rest were. But I couldn’t go that far since my leg was killing me.

I watched as a few paramedics came to the rescue. I was asked a few questions by the officers that came over to me and I told them that they provoked me and I only tried to protect myself by hitting them. They believed me and told me that there were other cases like this. Usually it had something to do with drugs. When the officers searched their pockets, they found a few sticks of weed. They didn’t interrogate me for anything else and said that I was lucky that I actually knew how to deal with people like them.

I was catching my breath when all of a sudden I fell to the ground. My leg hurt like hell and all I wanted to do was close my eyes and be gone forever. The pain in my leg felt like the worst thing in the world. It wasn’t long ‘til I saw Jack coming over to me to try and help me up but before I could say anything, I blacked out.