Life After You (Falling In Reverse/The Maine)

It’s been six months since Epitaph signed us to the label. It’s been a mixture of fun, boring, exhausting, frustrating and exciting. The first and only thing that they’ve asked us to do so far is to get us in the studio, laying down tracks for an EP. It only took us around four months because we’d already written the songs, all the label wanted to do was polish off a couple of the extra rough edges to them and then we were finished. We had a five track EP and now we were going to be going on a tour across the country with one of the other bands with Epitaph.

“Haley!” Max called out to me, waving her hand in front of my face as she came to a stop at the traffic lights.
“What? Did you say something?” I asked, trying to blink myself out of my daze.

It was a Thursday afternoon in late June (hehe, that rhymes, I apologize for my randomness) and today was the day we were deciding what to call the EP. Lots of names had been thrown in as ideas but the only one I wanted was our producers’ least favorite. Max and I had left the studio to go and grab food for everyone before Matt, Derek and I started eating each other. We were starving!

“Yeah, I asked if you think that maybe we should let the label take over, just for this EP. We can force the name on them next time. It’s just that…” Her words faded away as she watched my eyes narrow to slits and my eyebrows knit together in frustration.
“No! I refuse to back down on this one. This is the only thing I’ve stood up for since we started this.” I argued with her.
“Okay, okay. Well, I’m behind you a hundred percent. Remember, we’re in this together. He was my friend too.” She told me, giving me a small smile before the light finally turned green and we continued on, back to the studio, in silence.
***

“Ooh! You brought the food! You brought the food! Give it to me now!” Derek screamed as soon as Max and I entered the building.

Sometimes I wonder if the boy really is related to me. Then I remember that I’m exactly the same when it comes down to food and other things and I realize that yes, we are indeed related… Dammit!

“Okay everyone, it’s time to go sit in the big fancy chairs cause we’re making a decision… now!” Matt called out to us, poking his head around the door frame.

Now, the fancy chairs? Well to put it simply and keeping it short, I don’t want this taking ages, most of us had been poor or close to poor our entire lives. So seeing these massive chairs covered in leather and proper wood… we really liked those chairs.

***

“So, guys, I think that at this point the best idea is to just go with doing a self-titled because…” Chad, our producer started to tell us before I interrupted him.
“No!” I yelled out before quickly regaining my composure and carrying on. “I’m sorry, but no. I will happily let you take over with anything else, but with this one, no.”

Chad was stunned into silence. I guess I hadn’t let the stubbornness reign free yet since we’d known him. We were all quiet for a moment until I felt someone squeeze my arm and I looked to my right to find Maxx giving me a smile of encouragement.

“So… what did you have in mind?” Chad asked, trying not to get angry.
“The Life and Times of Jake Cooper. Obviously with EP on the end but… look Chad, I know that we haven’t known you very long but seeing as you’re producing the songs here, you should know what they’re about.”

He motioned for me to continue.

“Jake Cooper was one of Derek, Max and mine’s best friends. We’d known him since kindergarten. When we hit high school, he started to change and by the age of sixteen was heavily addicted to heroine. He died during our sophomore year and that is when we finally put the band together. It was his idea and we all felt that it would be silly to not do it. We all got together and over the next few months, although we were all grieving, we managed to keep it under control because all of the songs that we wrote, were for him or about him. That’s why I want us to name it after him and that’s what track number two is all about.”

After my little speech I let out a long sigh I hadn’t realized I had been holding in.

“Do you all feel strongly about this?” Chad asked us.

He got five vigorous nods in response.

“Okay then, that’s fine. I’ll let the label know and we can finally get on to everything else.”

He got up to leave and smiled at all of us, before he had left though he turned back to us once more and gave us another small smile.

“I’m sorry about your friend.”
“Thank you.” Derek told him. “Wait! Chad!”
“Yes?”
“I thought we were finding out who we were touring with today?”
“Oh yeah, sorry I forgot about that. Here…”

He set his papers down on the table in front of us and quickly took out five sheets before handing them to us and leaving.

“Yes!” Matt shouted, doing a little happy dance.

Max and Amelia were both squealing to themselves while my brother sat there looking indifferent. I finally looked down at my own sheet and read the name and logo at the top.

‘Falling In Reverse’