Something More

“I’m gunna hunt hunt hunt-”

I have never stopped singing during the chorus of a song in a live performance before in my life. But it’s not just that I stopped singing I completely stopped playing. I’m starring out into the crowd. People in the crowd are confused by my abrupt stop in the program. “GUYS, cover me.” I yell at my band mates. I dash off the stage running through the crowds of people until I find the spot where I saw this girl fall downward.

I find the girl laying on the ground curled up in a ball. I rush down to her side, “are you okay?” I ask almost out of breath.

She looks at me with a dazed expression on her face. She say’s “it hurts.” She tries to say something but she stops yelling out in pain instead. I waste no time in pulling out my cell phone dialing 911. I quickly give all the information to the operator. Since we’re at Warped this could be difficult. All of the sudden people around finally notice the clearly pregnant woman laying on the ground.

Yes, pregnant- there was a reason I dashed off stage. From the looks and sounds she’s in labor.

“I’m Maika- what’s your name?”

“Laurel.” She answers before letting out another cry of pain.

“Laurel the ambulance is on it’s way. Do you have friends or family with you here?”

She shakes her head yes in response.

“Do you know where they are?” I ask grabbing her hand to help comfort her.

She responds by shaking her head no.

People keep yelling things down in our direction, people from the tour are by our side, they keep away the people. Letting her have room to breathe. I hear people screaming my name- I ignore them and focus on Laurel.

I’m not completely sure what happens after this- all that I remember is the ambulance comes and a path is cleared. The EMT’s ask me questions that I cannot answer because I know nothing about this woman. Except for her name and that she’s all alone for the time being. I can’t let her go through this alone.

“I don’t know- I’ll get in contact with the people she’s with, just let me come with her.” I ask pleading with the EMT’s who look like they don’t care whether I come or not.

“We need to know you’re full name honey.” One of the EMT’s says to her.

“Laurel Finlayson” she answers taking a deep breath.

“And this gentleman “ they point to me.

“Maika Maile- lead singer, favorite band. I got, separated from my friends. He’s helping me.” Her sentences aren’t complete, it’s hard for her to talk with the contractions she’s having.

“Do they have numbers they can be reached at?”

“Speed dial 5 and 7.” She reaches for her pocket, slowly she pulls out a cell phone.

I take her phone gently from her hand, “I’ll call them. I won’t leave until they find you.” I promise her.

They keep asking her questions, she has a very hard time answering them. I fill in paper work for her, granted i can’t do much. How ever having her cell phone have emergency contacts in it helps me a little bit.

A nurse escorts me to a room where she is a little bit calmer, it seems for the time being the contractions have stopped. “Your water has broken and you are having contractions. Your baby is on the way.” The nurse stops talking as soon as I walk in the room. She looks at me, “I understand you are a friend?”

“Not a direct friend, her friends are somewhere at Warped Tour. I’m going to call them both and try to get a hold of them.” I answer.

“Well it looks like you are her support through this. She’s dilated but she still has a little farther to go before she will have the baby. She’s going to experience contractions- the closer they come together the closer we are to birthing the baby. She’s chosen to do this all natural- no drugs for pain. It will help if you hold her hand, something familiar to help relax her. Between contractions she needs to rest and save her strength.” The nurse belts out all this information at me.

It goes over my head for a second, then I realize that it’s going to be okay. I just have to be her support. “I think I can do that.” I smile politely at her.

“Good, I’m going to go check on things, let us know when the next set of contractions happen.” She leaves the room.

I take this second to call her friends. Neither answer, I leave voicemail’s on both of their cell phones. I look over to find her looking over at me with a strange look on her face.

“Maybe I should explain my self.” I laugh. “I saw you in the crowd from the very beginning of the set. I thought it was amazing that a pregnant woman was at Warped listening and singing along to our set. I also thought I had recognized you from some other shows. I kept my eye on you.”

She smiles “I’ve seen you four times before this, it’s pretty awesome to know that you thought you recognized me. I just can’t believe that you stopped singing and playing running out to me like that.”

“I can’t either- may I ask what you were in such a dangerous place so close to your due date?”

She chuckles- “Summer bucket list. Baby wasn’t supposed to come arrive until three weeks from now. We thought we had time. This baby is going to change my life- there are things I wanted to do before I lose the opportunity. Besides- I didn’t know the next time I could see TFT preform live again.”

“You are a remarkable young woman. May I also ask the status on the father?” I’m curious I can’t help it.

She get s the biggest grin on her face, “He’s my current boyfriend we’ve been together for a little over two years. Accident’s happen,” she points to her belly, “but he’s stuck by my side through it all. He’s supposed to check in sometime. We had a plan to call each other to see where each other was through out the day. They were only couple bands we were going to see together. The rest I was seeing with Sara, my bestie.” She stops talking suddenly squeezing my hand. “And here they come.” She sighs.

I have to brace my self for the next set of contractions, her grip on my hand is incredibly strong. Call me a wimp but I don’t think you understand the look of agony on her face right now The birthing process is one of the many reason’s I was born of the male gender.

I’m not sure how long this wave last’s I’m more focussed on not loosing my hand. My hand goes white several times during this period. The moment she loosens her grip I collapse on a chair next to her bed.

Her breathing starts to slow though it’s still heavy, mine would be too if I just went through that and the baby isn’t even here yet.

“Sorry about your hand.” She sighs in between breathes.

“Not a problem, I’ll recover I’m sure.” I smile.

“Of course if it didn’t- what would you tell your fans?”

“That my friend broke it during labor. And that maybe drugs during child birth isn’t such a terrible idea.” I smirk.

“So we’re friends now huh? So now I can tell everyone this story and say ‘my friend Maika’.” She laughs.

“I’d say after this experience if we weren’t friends, the world would be a very sad place. For some reason I think that me being with a complete and total stranger while she’s giving birth would bring the two together in friendship, or something.” It’s true- after this I want to be her friend. It suddenly hits me why I remembered her. “Hey, were you the gal that was my twin at a show? And tweeted the picture at me?”

“Re:presenting I was.” She smiles.

“I knew you looked familier-”

“You also suggested one time we should die together.”

These moments come back to me- “Hey, it was hot, you were cute what else was I supposed to say when I could barely think straight!”

She smiles, her eyes are closed now. I wait a few minutes before trying her friends again. A girl’s voice picks up when I dial the first number. “LAUREL WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?”

“Is this Sara?” I say firmly, she sounds a little worried.

“YES! NOW WHERE IS LAUREL? YOU ARE NOT LAUREL IN FACT YOU SOUND LIKE-”

I cut her off, “Maika Maile- your best friend is currently in labor.” I think getting to the point is best here. I don’t want her to think I kidnapped her best friend or anything.

“OH MY GOD WHERE ARE YOU? I NEED DIRECTIONS, AND SPENCER, HE DROVE! OH MY GOD.” It’s safe to say she’s freaking out.

It also occurs to me that I have no idea where I am, this isn’t my home town, not that I could give you directions to a hospital in Orlando in the first place. I look around for the nurse, “Hold on I’m going to give you to the nurse, she can give better directions than I can.” I hand the phone off to the nurse.

“Maika?” Laurel ask’s.

“Here- anything I can do for you?”

“I have the sudden urge to tweet.” She laughs.

“Here, use my phone, the nurse has yours at the moment.” I smile giving her my phone. “While you’re there, add your number. We can’t be friends if we don’t have numbers!” I laugh.

“You are ridiculous, iPhone loving.” She seems to be excited at the iPhone. Eh, when I first got it I was really excited as well.

The nurse hands me back Laurel’s phone. “They will be on their way shortly. It may be awhile before they get here. With traffic and the distance from the field.”

“Oh dear, I hope they get here soon.” Laurel hands the phone back to me. As soon as it’s in my hands I go look at twitter. “And now you’re going to go look at twitter aren’t you. You’re curious.”

I look up, “guilty as charged.”

“I may have @replied you.” She grins.

“May have? I think that you did.” I read my @replies which happen to be a lot. But Laurel’s is right on top, plus she’s the only one that would say ‘I may have injured @MaikaTFT ‘s hand, at least he’s where he can be fixed up ;).’

“You know this whole thing needs to go on the next episode of TMRRWLIFE.” I muse out loud. It would be awesome to put stuff about why I darted off stage and everything.

“Where’s Christian when you need him?” She’s half serious with this.

“They have to finish up signing things and uh, fixing my mess I guess. It’s a good thing it was the last song. It was almost done- I mean no one was cheated out of anything except for the very end.” I feel bad, but I was more concern with Laurel and how no one was helping her. “Eventually they will have to pick me up as well.” I sigh.

“Hey, I’m sure that people got footage of your dash off stage, make part of a video here and then have Christian his sexy camera and you can get more footage after. You should just put a tweet or a tumble about wanting the footage or something. Viola you would have another episode!”

“Not a half bad idea, we’ve been meaning to do another one, but it’s been crazy.” I pull out my phone, might as well. “Ready?”

“Ready!”

“Okay, Hi, it’s Maika here- you may have noticed and/or heard about my dash off stage at Boston’s Warped Tour. And if you also notice this is a hospital. This is my friend Laurel who is currently in labor.”

She waves at the camera. “So he neglected to tell you we’ve new friends. We decided that after this experience that it’d be wrong not to be friends.”

“I know, and she almost broke my hand.”

“He was kind enough to notice my ordeal and call an ambulance, now he’s staying at the hospital with me.” She smiles at my phone.

“Not to mention- neither of us are from around here.”

“My child is going to wonder why her birth certificate will say born in Massachusetts instead of Maine.” She shakes her head and suddenly her expression changes.
I immediately shut the video off and grab her hand. I can tell the next wave is coming.

“So tell me more about Spencer.” She smiled before when talking about him, she needs to be as relaxed as she can be for this. I grab her hand and prepare once again for the squeezing.

“He’s 6’ 2”, he’s the best thing that’s ever been mine. Excuse my use of Tswift quote, but it works.” She moans in pain.

“Why, tell me why Laurel.” I say softly.

“Before we started dating we had just gone through terrible break ups. I didn’t know if I’d see the end of the summer. I was so hurt by everything that had happened- I was a genuine mess. Spencer had started talking to Sara, they hung out for a bit during the summer. I was jealous that she had finally found a good one. They didn’t work out, there wasn’t any spark. It ended terrible- it was her fault she openly owns up to it. I still talked to him because we played frisbee. We ended up talking 24/7 for a month before we ever hung out alone. The first time we ever hung out alone, he just plopped him self on my couch. We just clicked. Officially we started dating a couple days later after an all night on both of our parts. I fell in love with him, everything.” She takes a few big gulps of air and squeezes my hand.

“I said I love you way to early, but it just came out. We were laughing laying around his dorm room and he said something and I responded with ‘I don’t hate you- I love you.’ I always tell my friends I love them. It was so natural. There was a time that my dad flipped several nuts and I ran out the door crying, Spencer was mad him self. But he stayed with me and calmed me down, then took me to get hot chocolate. he said all the right things. I was so scared I’d loose him after that- the incident was so awful. But I didn’t loose him.”

“Sounds like you have a keeper Laurel.” I switch hands.

She smiles, “he took care of me when I was sick and my parents were gone on vacation, he had class himself and he drove down and back a few times and had his mom check in on me. These were early times in the relationship- as in first two months. But then so many things happened after, everything good. And 8 months ago when I found out I was pregnant. He freaked out, I did too. We were always careful, it just happened. He didn’t leave me though, we got through it. OW, OH MY GOD IT HURTS.”

“Alright Laurel I’m gong to need you to push as hard as you can, this child is coming now.” The nurse says."Mr. Maile is going to keep helping you breathe, he'll be holding your hand. Are you ready?" The nurse looks like it's time to get down to business.

"Yes." She says closing her eyes. I feel her squeeze my hand.

"Come on Laurel you got this." This process of pushing, yelling and cheering on goes for about 20 minutes.

The doctor says that the babies head is crowning which is a good sign.

"Laurel big girl pushes!" I cheer.

In the next few minutes the most amazing thing happens- the door opens and two people come rushing in. By the descriptions given to me I assume they are Sara and Spencer. Laurel is so focussed on breathing and pushing she doesn't notice them. The two rush to her side. I give her hand to Spencer. She smiles instantly when she feels the change in people.

"Laurel, big pushes you're almost there!" The nurse says.

"Laurel Ann for crying out loud PUSH GIRL. Spencer and I made it- go ahead and have the baby already!" Sara says loudly.

Laurel's immedate response is a smile followed by a grimmace and more pushing. Spencer doesn't say anything, I think he can't. A few minutes later the most wonderful this happens, a baby gril is brought into this world.

A new tiny life- she's all red and gooey. It's not pretty- but at the same time it's beautiful.

"Good job Laurel- your job is done, get some rest." The Doctor congradulates her.

Spencer starts sputtering out "I'M A DAD!"

"Hey Spencer- congraduations!" I turn to shake his hand.

"Thank you so much- for taking care of my girl when I couldn't be there. I'm glad that even though it wasn't me it was you- she looks up to you so much. I cannot express my gratitude properly.

Personally I'm absoluty speechless.
--

It's been a long day. It started out like any other day at Warped and ended with new friends, a new life, It also has me questioning things in my own life a little bit. A couple hours ago Victoria was born. Laurel has been in and out of sleep for while. I think she has problems sleeping because she doesn't want to miss anything. We've all told her to sleep already. She didn't listen. Both parents are in their own little world as it would seem. Their parents are enroute to Mass.

Sara has complained several times about not having her good camera. She's taking a zillion photo's with the one she brought to Warped. She doesn't know it yet but Christian is bringing his with him when they come pick me up. They should be here any time.

"Hey Maika- come here a minute." Laurel calls me over to closer to her. "Do you want to hold Victoria?" She asks softly. Up till this point I haven't she'd either been in Laurel's arms or Spencer's, Sara has barely even held her. Spencer is grinning from ear to ear, he looks almost fearless- or maybe it's because of all the excitement.

"I would love to." I smile. A few seconds later she is placed in my arms. She is so little, so perfect, so innocent. She starts crying when she's placed in my arms, she senses it's a different person. I start softly singing one of our older songs. She stops crying almost instantly.

"Maile's got a way with the kiddos." Sara laughs. Mom and dad both start laughing as well.

"So if this whole career in a band doesn't work out or you just want some extra cash you can be a baby sitter for us." Laurel chuckles at her statement.

"I've never even set foot in your state!" i exclaim softly as not to startle the baby in my arms. She's so adorable.

They all smile, a knock on the door occurs. Laurel waves in the rest of my band. Christian, Jay and Chris all get the sweetest smile on the faces. It's safe to say we all melt at babies. Before introductions even happen Christian asks if he can take pictures. Laurel agrees and Sara's face lights up at the mention of photography.

Christian takes a few pictures of me with the baby, she's already a good model. I give her back to dad- they are the ones that deserve to have their pictures taken. It's their new born.

I sit back watching them, both are beaming and glowing with happiness. I can't even tell if Laurel is still in pain or not. "This is a rare to chance to ask you what's on your mind Maile."

I raise an eye brow towards Sara, "ask me what's on my mind?"

"Maile- I've been a fan of your band for years. I've seen countless videos, watched so many Ustream chats, read your tweets. Laurel personally has just always wanted to sit down and have a conversation with you. I want that too."

"You really want to know?" I ask, it's not that I try to be vague it's just that people put me on such a high pedestal, like I'm smarter than them. I just think too much.

"I really do."

I sigh, "I want that." I look over to the happy family. "I want to feel the way that they feel about each other. You can tell what they feel when they look at each other. It's real- I've never felt that something real. I want to get married someday and have a family. It's to even have a steady girl friend being in the band. Which reminds me- are they planning on getting married? I don't see a ring on her finger, but I don't see how they can't not get married." I turn back to face Sara after my speech.

"I want that too. All through our friendship we've talked about what we want in life. We both come from two different worlds, people always wondered why the hell we were friends in the first place. We are the flaming liberal and the passionate conservative. I went to a 40,000 a year college, she went to a college for maybe a quarter of the price? She never judged me one. She just turned around with a smile on her face an introduced her self one day. The only thing she was ever jealous of was opportunities that I had because of how I grew up and where I go to college.Every time there was something new she was cheering me on- and then we'd count the days until we could see each other again. She's always had the perfect body, nearly perfect skin her height she's been my model for years now. But the only thing that I've ever been jealous of is that she found something real. So far I can't seem to find that either. Can you keep a secret?"

"Of course!" I really am a good secret keeper.

"Part of the original plan for today was that Spencer would propose at the end of the day. He had every thing planned out." She starts to get a little teary eyed.

"Hey, some day the two of us will find that something real."

"Mhm and right now I'm crying."

I put my arm around her, "put of joy?"

"Joy, pride, happiness I'm so proud of my best friend. She often bragged that I attend George Washington University, but I get to brag to every one that she graduated KVCC, passed her boards and got a job in the field she went to college for and now have a beautiful baby girl with her boyfriend."

"Wait, what? I'm confused." I'm lost, college is 4 years, she is way younger than 25.

"I just finished my junior year of college. Laurel got a job last summer after she graduated a two year program with an associates degree in applied arts sciences. She was attending the occupational therapy assistant program. She got a job pretty much as soon as she could after getting her license. She did this and a short while later she found out she was pregnant. She is so strong she keeps me grounded. And yes I'm aware I'm making this out to sound like lesbian couple. It happens." She fiddles with fabric on her pants.

"I wouldn't care if you were ever a lesbian couple Sara, may I ask how old she is?"

"She's 22. She'll be 23 in November."

"Hey Sara, come take some pictures, and come get in some your self." Christian calls to Sara.

I start laughing, she gets really excited over this. "Got take pictures." I point.

She smiles and darts over instantly. She's quite shy when she goes over to Christian. They share some sort of a moment when they look at each other. It's sweet. As time goes on Sara forgets Christian is even there. She's absorbed in the camera.
--

If it wasn't for that day I wouldn't be where I am today. Laurel became my best female friend. They next time I saw her she had lost all her baby weight, she was gorgeous. I'd never had that I want to date you feeling about her- except before I knew her way back when we were twins. I had a mini crush- but the next time I saw her she was pregnant. That same time I saw her she had a rock on her finger.

I was there for her wedding, I ended up baby sitting a few times when they were down in Florida visiting. I honestly turned into Ted from How I Met Your Mother- you know how he was always single or had random relationships why Lilly and Marshal were married? Yeah I was Ted always wanting to find the "one."

It's 10 years later and we're all on a Disney Cruise. By all I mean Spencer, Laurel and Victoria. Christian, Sara and Ann their baby girl.

Yes- after that day in the hospital they did end up getting together. They got married a year later. This coming from the girl who didn't want to rush into marriage- they had Ann about a year after that. Even though Sara was against rushing into marriage, she said yes in a heart beat.

My best friends were happily married and I was still looking. It wasn't until I was having coffee with Laurel that I found my something special. Her name is Kathrine, she thought the baby on my lap was cute. We started dating, eventually got married and had a set of twins. Two boys and let me tell you they are a handful. Laurel joked asking if she had to hold my hand while Kat was in labor. That will always be a joke in this family.

We're on a Disney cruise because this is something on Sara and Laurel's bucket list. Go on a Disney cruise with their kids, really it's for our inner child, not for our literal kids. The kids are having a blast though, it's also a really nice vacation.

I cannot be more grateful for the way all of our lives have turned out. Laurel went back to school got her Masters and is now a Therapist, Sara finished her undergrad and her grad school and has a stable job, Spencer who went to school for something completely different took over his parents family camp. Christian made his way into photography/directing. I'm a producer well known around Orlando. Kathrine runs her own day care.

There For Tomorrow still plays gigs some times- we made the best of our run at the music industry and to this day there are still fans out there. The fan base we made never ceases to amaze me. But in the end we all got what we wanted, we rode the wave until she stopped. Chris and Jay are still some of my best friends. They have their own families now as well.

There's no rush to find that something real- it finds you eventually even by accident.