Falling and Failing Is All I Know

Kara slowly opened her eyes, the sunlight coming through the windows making her already throbbing headache hurt even more. She slowly got out of her bed and rummaged around in her bag, pulling out a pair of sunglasses and a hoodie. She put both of them on and made her way into the front of the bus. None of the windows were open in that part of the bus so she removed the sunglasses.

“Kara. Wow you’re finally up,” Brian said, laughing slightly. He was standing at the counter fixing himself a bowl of cereal.

She made a sort of grunting noise and went and plopped down on the couch in between Johnny and Zacky.

“You look like you just got hit by a train or something,” Johnny said, giggling slightly at his own joke.

“Fuck you,” Kara said, before leaning over and resting her head on Zacky’s shoulder.

“In a good way, you’re beautiful,” Johnny said, quickly trying to save himself.

“Lying only makes it worse. I know I look like shit.”

“So Matt’s coming back in a few hours,” Zacky said in an attempt to move the conversation away from that particular subject.

“Fuck him,” Kara stated.

Zacky and Johnny exchanged confused looks before looking at Brian. He just shook his head and mouthed “I’ll tell you later.”

“So you seem just a little bit hung over,” Zacky said.

The three guys burst into fits of laughter when Kara clumsily picked up her arm and shot her middle finger in the air in his direction.

“Why are you not as hung over as me, Brian? We drank the same amount.” Kara asked.

“I drink a lot more than you do, I'm kinda used to it by now.”

“Right. You suck for that. You should’ve made me stop.”

“I tried like three times, you wouldn’t have it. Here you go.”

Kara opened her eyes enough to see Brian holding out a cup of water and two Tylenols. She sat up and gratefully took the items from him, popping the pills in her mouth and downing half of the water in one gulp. She then settled back into the couch, putting her feet in Johnny’s lap and her head in Zacky’s lap.

“What if we need to get up for something?” Zacky asked, as soon as Kara lay down.

“Too bad,” she said.

“What if we have to pee?” Johnny asked.

“Do you have to pee now?” Kara asked, raising her head up slightly to look at him.

“No.”

“Okay then.”

“We might later though!”

Kara ignored him and lay back down, closing her eyes once again. Trying to hold off thinking about everything going on in her life, she drifted off into an uneasy sleep.

~x~

Kara was woken up by her head hitting a wall. She could sense that she was being carried in someone’s arms.

“What the hell?” she asked.

“Shit. Sorry.” Brian’s voice said.

“What are you doing?

“Carrying you to your bunk, what else does it look like?”

“Oh. Well you’re not doing a very good job.”

Brian laughed and set her down on her bunk gently. “Better?”

“Much, thanks for bringing me back here. Oh and Brian?”

“What do you need?”

“About last night…”

Brian tensed up as he thought she was going to say something about him confessing that he still loved her. He was still cursing himself for being so stupid. That isn’t something you just say out of nowhere, especially when the person you’re talking to is drunk.

“Thanks for being there for me.”

Brian couldn’t help but smile, happy that Kara was finally warming up to him again. He hoped more than anything that things would continue this way. He wanted her to be his now that they were both free. He wanted that more than anything.

“Anything for you.”

~x~

“Hey guys, what’s up?” Matt asked, as he stepped onto the bus, suitcase in hand. A smile spread across his face and he dropped his suitcase when he spotted Kara sitting on the couch. He rushed over to her quickly.

“Kara, I missed you so much”

Matt leant in for a kiss, but Kara turned her head to the side so that his lips collided with her ear. He was a good actor, because the look of hurt and shock that crossed his face was actually believable, but it didn’t affect her one bit.

“What’s wrong, babe?”

Kara held out her hand and Brian placed his phone in it. Her fingers closed around it and pressed a few buttons. She watched Matt’s face as his own voice played out of the small electronic device. She watched as a string of emotions played across his face. Going from shock to anger, then finally rested on a look of shame. He let his head fall and he stared at the ground.

“Kara, I’m so sorry,” he said.

“Yeah, me too,” Kara said. As much as she wanted to just break down and cry, she kept her face smooth and expressionless as she said her next words.

“Matt, I’m sorry, but I can’t stay with you after this.”

“Kara, please. It will never happen again,” Matt pleaded with her.

“If you did it once, you could very easily do it again. The fact that you did it at all proves that you don’t care about me like you said you did.”

Kara stood and walked back to the bunk room. She crawled into hers and pulled the curtains closed, plunging her in half-darkness. She grabbed her laptop and sat it on her lap as she waited for it to start up.

Once that started up she checked her email. She had a new message from Lacey.

Hey chick, how’s life on the road going for you? Details, please.

Kara clicked reply and sighed before started typing up a detailed account of everything that had happened. She let the tears fall from her eyes as the words appeared on the screen. When was done, she shut down her laptop and closed it. She fell back onto the bed and thought about Brian’s words that night when she pretended to be asleep.

She knew that it would only be right for her to let him know that she heard him, but she couldn’t do that. Not now, at least. She had to see what was going to happen. At this point, she didn’t even know if she wanted to remain on tour with the band. It was all just too confusing.