Like a Demon

Three months had passed since Ray’s birthday adventure, and he still hadn’t stopped raving about the band. Jayne had gotten a few calls from Shinya the few days after the event, the first asking if she got Ray’s card, and apologizing for the articles. The second started with another apology, seeing more pictures of Ray coming out from people who were showing up at his school, but ended in Toshiya taking the phone and trying to talk to her, while she listened to Shinya arguing with Die in the background. The last call she got from him was making sure she was okay, after checking his phone after a show and finding a voicemail of several screams, and what sounded like crying. She had to explain to him that it was her birthday, and as a surprise her friends threw a party and got her something she’s been wanting for a very long time. She didn’t mean to call him, but she accidentally hit the button when she fell backwards after her brother jumped out of one of the gift boxes. She could practically hear the relief from him as he said his goodbye, and hung up so she could get back to the party after wishing her a happy birthday. Although they hadn’t spoken on the phone since, they had still been texting one another from time to time, and had become friends through that.

Jayne, Drew, Dex, and Ray had just sat down to dinner when Mei came climbing through the fire escape window, grinning like she belonged in an asylum. “I don’t like this. She’s got new hair again too.” Drew frowned as she bounced over to the table and continued to grin ear to ear.

“Boys and girl, we have finally broken into the world of music.” She announced in a surprisingly calm tone.

“What are you talking about?” Dex scoffed, since their “career” had fallen to a standstill after losing the studio for rehearsal.

“I’m talking about a gig. A big one, that pays a lot of money.” She explained, still remaining surprisingly calm.

“Who hired us?” Drew asked, now getting excited.

“I can’t remember his name, and he wouldn’t tell us who we would be opening for. He just said that their opening band had to quit because their singer got mono, and the drummer broke his collarbone. They had just started on the tour, but apparently it wasn’t meant to be.”

“So when is this gig?” Dex giggled.

“Two weeks. They said we can’t bring guests, so we have to find somewhere to put Ray for the night though.” She frowned.

“Of course not. We are not going without Ray.” Drew nodded firmly, “How could we possibly go on, without our manager?” he added before Mei could argue.

“Genius!” Jayne squeaked as Ray looked at them all curiously. “Ray-Ray, you’re gonna be our band manager for a night in a couple of weeks!” she smiled.

“Yey!” he cheered while grinning like Mei, “I get to be Robbie!”

Everyone laughed as he mentioned their Manager, Robert, who was like another uncle to him. None of the guys would allow themselves to be called “father figures” for him, because they were not his fathers. They were, however, brothers to Jayne, which made them uncles.

As the days passed and the time for their first “big” gig grew closer, the band as a whole was suffering mood swings. One moment they were laughing and playing Dir en Grey covers with Ray joining in for a few songs, and the next Drew and Jayne were screaming at each other while Mei and Dex played parents, and Ray played with his cars. Sometimes they were all confident in their musical ability, and looking forward to the show, and the next second something went wrong that made them all want to cancel.

Finally, after two short torture filled weeks, they were walking into the venue with Robert and Ray leading them to meet with the band for the first time. They had just stopped at the doors when Jayne’s phone went off, making her gasp in surprise and text back quickly, since she hadn’t heard from him in a couple of months.

“Who is it?” Mei hissed, noticing that the texts were in Japanese.

“Shinya.” She whispered back, showing her friend their conversation as they started walking again.

“We are back in your city for a few nights before going back to Japan for another three month tour there. Are you coming to our show tonight?”

“We can’t, we’re busy tonight with work. :( I really wish we could though, you guys were amazing live and I know Ray would be more than happy to see you all play again.”

“Maybe we can meet up later and visit, if you aren’t busy. We have two days off before we leave for Japan.”

“Maybe, but what would you have in mind for our visit?”

“Let your beautiful friend take the kid, and I can give it to you all night long!”

Mei snorted as Jayne quickly demanded to know who took the phone from Shinya, only to have Robert take her phone away from her and turn it off before she could hit send.

As they opened the door to the room where they would meet the musicians they were opening for, several familiar voices reached their ears, all yelling in Japanese at one another.

“Give it back, Toshiya! There is a difference between a simple joke, and being disrespectful!” Shinya scorned while trying to pry his phone out of the bassist’s hands.

“What does it matter? She’s not replying anymore.” He smirked and handed it back.

“Because you’ve offended her! She thought I was the one who said that to her!”

“Actually, it’s because Robert took my phone away from me.” Jayne smiled, speaking their native tongue and earning a groan from Drew and Dex.

Shinya’s eyes went wide as the other four members of his band mimicked the expression on his face. “Y-you’re the band that is opening for us?” Die questioned in shock as a smile broke out on Karou and Toshiya’s faces while they watched Ray bounce excitedly grinning ear to ear.

“Looks like it!” Mei beamed, tossing her now shoulder length bright green hair over her shoulder. “So what do you play? We haven’t heard any of your music, only that our manager says that you are good.” Karou asked, getting straight to business as they all sat down on the many couches and chairs that littered the room. Ray of course, taking his place beside Robert to be manager, since Robert had agreed to be their “Assistant Manager” for the night to get Ray into the show.

“Actually, we play kind of like you guys, screaming and such. We’ve even done a few covers of your songs just while messing around during rehearsal… but those usually end either early because one of us mispronounced the lyrics, or because one of us messed up the instrumental work.” Dex laughed after Mei translated for her band.

“Who sings?” Kyo questioned in English, though his accent was so thick Jayne still had to translate it for Dex.

“Jay does, and she also plays guitar.” He answered, letting Mei translate because Jayne obviously refused.

“So you do both at the same time? Impressive.” Toshiya nodded, but Shinya looked a little down compared to the others.

“What’s up, Shinya? You look like a sad puppy.” Jayne texted, only to have Toshiya take the phone again and look at her suggestively.

“He’s right here, and you are texting him? Something we shouldn’t be hearing?” he asked blankly, causing Kyo to smirk as his mind obviously took the same dirty path as his and Die’s.

“Of course not, I just figured he wouldn’t appreciate me announcing to his band that I think he looks like a sad puppy right now.” She shrugged, causing said sad-puppy-look-alike to smile and laugh quietly at the expression on his face.

“I was just wondering why you didn’t say anything about being in a band when it’s obviously such a big part of your life?” he asked shyly, but she could tell that he was trying to hide the fact he was hurt knowing that she hid such a big part of her existence from him.

“I didn’t want you to think of me differently.” She laughed, “I mean, you’re a rock star known around the world! ‘Oh yeah, I’m in a band too!’ … ‘Oh hey, our music is a lot like yours!’ … That just wouldn’t look right. I kept it quiet out of respect for you, and what you do.” She explained, becoming much more serious as Carl ran through the door.

“So sorry I’m late! Someone, though I refuse to speak names… Die, and someone else who shall remain unknown… Toshiya, left me at the hotel locked in a closet.” He frowned. Karou and Shinya both shot glares at the two musicians, as Kyo started laughing at how pissed off their American translator was.

“That’s okay; two of our members speak Japanese, as well as our manager.” Robert nodded. “You’re fluent too?” he smiled happily. “No, actually I can only order a prostitute, and curse in Japanese. But I’m not the manager, he is.” He laughed, nodding to Ray. Carl nodded, knowing exactly why Ray was their manager as Jayne’s loving smile was sent to their “manager”, and sat down beside Shinya.

“Hey, you guys are up.” One of the crew announced as everyone stood up and followed them to the stage.

“Holy fuck me.” Drew gasped as he looked out from the side of the stage to the sea of people waiting for the music to begin.

“L-language, Drew.” Jayne laughed while wobbling where she stood.

“There are over a thousand new fans out there, waiting to discover your music!” Robert encouraged, realizing his mistake when Karou and Kyo caught Jayne as she fell over, almost losing consciousness.

“Mama!” Ray shouted, darting to her side and putting his hands on either side of her face, “You okay Mama?”

“Fine, baby, mama’s fine.” She nodded breathlessly, still leaning her weight on Karou as he held onto her, kneeling beside her on the floor where she had landed.

“Mama look,” he frowned, taking out a rock out of his backpack and handing it to her, “Its lucky.”

She smiled as a few tears ran down her face and hugged her son, “You, wear your earplugs, do you understand me?” she demanded.

“Wear yours!” he retorted, throwing his plugs at her. “I have mine, now put them in.”

“Kyo doesn’t wear plugs!” he argued.

“He will when I get done with him, now put them in or sit in the car.” She ordered and stood up to hand another set to the short singer who was scowling at her. “Wear them until he turns around, and then take them out. If he catches you not wearing them act like they fell out and put them back in. Just make sure he wears his plugs, I don’t need him losing his hearing because of this.” She sighed, handing him a neon blue set of plugs before taking her guitar and standing at the center mic.

Ray gave another encouraging thumbs-up to his family and went to pull his earplugs out but was stopped by Shinya grabbing hands and telling him that he needed to keep them in. The lights came on, the crowd clapped a little for the unknown band, and without saying a word Drew started up a drum solo.

As his solo turned to a steady rhythm, Mei joined in on her bass, moving her hips to the beat to keep time as Dex and Jayne nodded to each other and started in on their heavy riffs as she gave a high scream.

The crowd started to cheer, encouraging the band to play harder, head banging more, screaming harder, and playing louder until half way through their third song when Jayne started coughing extremely hard in the middle of one of her screams. So hard that she ended up on her knees, and Drew literally jumped over the drums to get to her.

“Hey, hey breathe okay?” he pleaded, while Dex stood frozen, staring in shock and horror, not knowing what to do. Mei was yelling to the backstage area in Japanese, since once again she forgot how to speak English.

“Mama’s okay?” Ray asked, looking up at Kyo who was watching with eyes just as wide as the worried child’s. “M-Mama’s okay?” he demanded again, tugging on his hand but it was pulled away from him as he walked into another room.

“Mama’s going to be just fine.” Die assured, patting him on the shoulder as tears welled up in his eyes. He wanted more than anything to run up onto the stage and help her, but Mei had yelled at him to stay where he was and not move a single step. If it helped his Mama get better, he would stand in that spot for the rest of his life.

“Come on, let’s get some water. They’ll take care of her, she’s already doing better.” Karou suggested, knowing that this wasn’t really something Ray needed to see, but he refused to move.

“S-sorry, about that!” Jayne coughed into the mic, earning laughs from the audience, “I’m not joking, I swallowed a fly during that scream.” She informed, “I blame Dex.”

Again the crowd burst into laughter as she grinned to Mei, “Now where were we?” she smiled as Drew resumed the drumming pattern, “Ah right,” She smirked, and went back into her scream as the song kicked back into full gear. The rest of the show went flawlessly, and at the end of their song they all said their goodbyes and went backstage where Drew collapsed by the nearest trashcan and vomited everything in his stomach.

Dex sat down and started staring straight ahead of him, Drew looked like he was going to cry, Mei was pacing around muttering in frantic Japanese, and Jayne slumped against the wall and slid down, nearly fainting again.

“You guys are pretty good.” Toshiya announced approvingly, but none of them answered.

Carl translated, but there was still no answer.

“Guys, what happened out there? If you’re stressing out because of the fly issue, it was fine.” Robert assured.

Suddenly Jayne started laughing, soon joined by the rest of her band. “I have, n-never been so piss scared, in my fucking life!” she laughed slowly standing up and wobbling over to Mei, who hugged her tightly. “I know, I thought I was going to shit myself out there!” she agreed, though the guys in their band couldn’t understand her.

“Dude, please fucking speak English! Every time you two are together anymore, it’s Japanese! Fifty percent of our band can’t understand you two!” Dex finally snapped.

“Sorry.” They apologized together, in Japanese.

“Fuck!” he screamed and stormed out of the room, slamming the door and nearly running over Kyo as he left. “This is normal after we lose some stress. He gets angry, he shuts down, I laugh or cry, and Mei just stops speaking English and can’t sit still.” Jayne explained to the curious members of Dir en Grey.

“She also changes her hair.” Drew smirked.

“Wait, which language was I speaking just now?”

“Japanese.”

“And you understood it?”

“Hai.”

“Drew, is there something we should know about you?” Mei demanded.

“I understand the language fluently. I just can’t speak it worth a damn.”

Mei and Jayne both started laughing as Jay picked her son up and moved out of the way so Dir en Grey could go on stage. Once again he sang every song they played, and screamed right along with Kyo.

From where he was standing near the side of the stage, Karou could hear Ray nearly perfectly as the band quit playing, leaving Kyo to scream on his own the last lines of the song. Toshiya could hear him too, and was sure that if he looked up he could see the same light bulb he saw above Karou’s head when their eyes met.

“They said he can play chords to Saku now, we should play that one. I think he would be able to keep up with us if we don’t let him get too stressed.” Karou announced after ordering a quick band huddle on stage.

“We haven’t played that one in a while, I think it would be fun!” Shinya agreed, leaning over his drums so he could better hear his band mates.

“Let’s do it. He could probably take my place for a few songs if we let him.” Kyo smirked, glancing over to see the little boy watching them curiously, trying to figure out what was wrong.

Die waved their translator out to address the fans, since their English sucked, and watched carefully to see how Ray and his family reacted.

“Hi, I’m Carl, the translator for these guys.”

“Hi Carl!” Several people in the audience shouted.

“Hi!” he laughed, “Anyway, they wanted me to announce that there will be a guest musician for their next song or two. Or three with the look I just got from Karou. He’s a very young fan, and talented guitarist according to Die and Karou. Come on out, Ray!”

As soon as his name reached his ears, Ray’s face went white while his eyes widened as far as they could go. Die started laughing as the kid looked up at his mother, who laughed and nodded after putting the rock in his pocket.

After being handed the smallest guitar the crew could find, which was still a little too large for him, he slowly walked out to stand behind Karou.

Instantly the crowd cheered, as well as gave several “Aww” noises, especially when Die and Karou both helped him get set up, and placed his fingers where they should be for the song.

“It’s too big!” he explained, unable to reach the proper fret.

“Calm down little man, we’ve got you covered!” Mei beamed, handing him his own little guitar, which looked just like the one Die was playing.

“You remember how to play Saku, don’t you?” Karou asked, receiving a firm nod from their little guitarist.

“Alright, go stand with Die and follow him if you mess up. You’ll do fine, I promise.” He smiled before letting Die guide him to his mark.

Looking into the audience, Ray’s eyes went even bigger as his nerves kicked into full gear. Toshiya gave him a thumbs-up before they counted off the song for him.

The entire time they played, Die stayed beside Ray, smiling ear to ear as he played nearly perfectly, until his finger slipped and he hit a note that clashed so horribly, Kyo stopped singing and cursed into the microphone. The entire room went silent as Ray started shaking, not knowing what to do as he looked up at Die with the most frantic, panicking expression the rocker had ever seen from another human being.

“It’s okay, I do that too. Go back to the chord we were on before that happened, and Shinya will count us all back in. Pick up where we left off, okay? Remember, if you get lost just follow me.” He smiled, helping Ray find the right chord, but he was already panicking, and had tears in his eyes. The fact he messed up a second time was his breaking point as he started to cry, apologizing over and over for messing up their song.

Jayne was crying too, wanting with every part of her soul to run out there and hug her baby, but Mei was physically holding her back. “He’s okay, they’ll get him through.” She promised.

“He’s so scared right now, I know he is. I was terrified up there, and I’m a grown woman; he’s four!”

“I know, but look, Die’s hugging him, Shinya’s already on his way to help out, Kyo’s giving words of support… at least he better be, or I’ll kick his adorably short ass, and Karou and Toshiya are helping him too. He’s got the whole band backing him up right now.”

“I need to be out there, I have to be there for him Mei.”

“I know. Come on.” She sighed, and pulled her to stand in front of the stage right in front of where Die and Ray were standing.

“Hi Mama!” Ray waved excitedly, not knowing that the mic Kyo still held in his hand picked up his greeting until the whole room started laughing.

Jayne just waved and waited for them to start again. After starting the song over from the beginning, Ray played it through with very few mistakes. To give him a break from playing, Kyo pulled him over to sing one of their newer songs as a duet, impressing everyone in the audience, and making Kyo grin so much at some points he couldn’t put as much anger into the song, making it sound a lot happier than he meant it to; especially during the two points where he ended up laughing.

“Well if he wasn’t famous before, he is now.” Shinya sighed as they all walked to the bus to say goodbye, watching Toshiya pick Ray up and stand him on Kyo’s shoulders.

“Hey look! Together they make one whole person!” he shouted, earning a growl from Kyo, laughter from Die, and slap on the shoulder from Karou, who was trying very hard not to let Kyo see him struggling to hide his amusement.

“Yeah.” Jayne laughed sadly. She really didn’t want to part with her friends, and she knew Ray wouldn’t want to either.

“Kyo is not little!” Ray defended firmly as the singer put him on the ground, smirking at his band as they stared at the kid.

“To you, maybe not. But standing beside us, he is very cute, and small.” Die explained with a grin to Kyo.

“He could beat you in a fight I think.”

“Is Ray challenging Die and Kyo to fight each other?” Shinya asked worriedly.

“He is, but I don’t think they’ll… I spoke too soon.” She sighed as Die tackled Kyo, only for their match to be pulled apart by Karou.

“Okay, they said it’s time to go!” Carl announced, earning several sighs as the two bands said their last goodbyes. “Take care of yourself, Jayne-chan. You work too much for your son and band, and not enough for yourself.” Shinya sighed as they hugged each other. “I know, Shinya, but I just don’t have the time or money for that.” She laughed. “You’re all getting paid for tonight, use some of that on yourself.” He smiled as Die came over and picked her up over his shoulders.

“Put me down! DIE!” she squealed as he carried her to their bus.

“No, you’re coming with us. We are kidnapping you to Japan!” he announced as everyone watched confusedly. “As much as I’d love to, I can’t. I have a son to take care of, remember?” she laughed after being set on his bunk. “Oh, we already thought of that.” He beamed as Toshiya came running in with Ray giggling in his arms.

“Guys, we really have to be going. Carl is getting yelled at already for us not leaving.” Karou announced as he followed them onto the bus with Kyo and Shinya behind him.

“Goodbye, Jayne.” Die sighed, hugging her as tightly as he could.

“Bye Ray!” he grinned, picking him up again after letting her go and squeezing him enough to make him squeak.

While Toshiya hugged Ray, again, Kyo grabbed Jayne. “Take care of him, and yourself. There was someone in the audience tonight I didn’t like. He looked a little too interested in you and Ray.” He informed.

“I saw him too, we’ll be okay. He shouldn’t do anything.” She sighed, hugging him tighter.

“Who was he?” he demanded.

“His name is Thomas. He’s Ray’s father.” She explained, hugging Karou and Toshiya together before taking her son off the bus and piling into her band’s minivan.

“Don’t be sad Mama.” Ray yawned, “We will see them again.”

Before she could answer he was asleep, and her phone was going off.

“Moshi Moshi,” she yawned.

“We have to meet up tomorrow for at least a few minutes.” Die laughed.

“Why?”

“Look at the caller ID on the phone you’re holding, and then at the sticker you put on it.”

She looked for the sticker but it was missing, but the caller ID read “Jayne-chan.”

“Whose phone is this?”

“Shinya’s. We’re calling you on your phone.” He laughed.

“What are you doing tomorrow?”

“Nothing, we have two days off. What are you doing tomorrow?”

“We have a… a show to go to for Ray. His class is doing a musical play for Heritage Week at his school.” She yawned

“How much are tickets?” Toshiya demanded quickly, alerting her that the phone must be on speaker.

“They’re free. Meet us at the music store Sound; we’ll take you if you want to go. If not, we’ll meet you for dinner and trade phones?”

“Perfect, what time should we meet you at Sound?”

“About three.”

“We’ll be there. Goodnight, Jayne-chan!” Shinya smiled.

“Goodnight Shinya! Goodnight Toshiya, Die, Karou, and Kyo.” She yawned and hung up, falling asleep and staying there for the rest of the night.