Time After Time

Gustav released Rose’s wrists slowly. He was chuckling. He knelt in front of sofa where Rose sat. Her wrists were still hanging in the air even though he had release her. The blue-eyed man moved, intending to start tidy up all the things he used to clean Rose’s wound, when Rose stopped him by cupping his face with her hands, that suddenly looked fairly smaller than usual. She didn’t say anything and neither did him. The red-haired girl just stared into Gustav’s sky-coloured eyes. She could see that he was a little surprised, and that he was waiting for whatever Rose would do. Rose moved her face closer to Gustav’s face at a snail’s pace as she watched his dark pupil dilated inside his stunning, pale blue irises.

She chuckled softly.

It was such an amazing feeling to know that she could affect someone so much.

Rose moved her arms to hug his neck. Gustav hugged her in return slowly, trying not to touch her fresh wounds on her back. She could feel him breathing on her hair and she was thinking that she could say something here—she should say something. But Rose couldn’t find any word to say, so she just hugged him, inhaling his pleasant smell. She leaned her head on his shoulder even further, her hair was falling onto his back, past his shoulder, and she could feel that Gustav pulled her closer. Rose wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that, but when they both pulled back, when they both stared at each other’s eyes, she could only think of one thing.

She wanted to kiss him.

Everything else seemed to be fine to be taken aside for a little while—just a little while. Fraser could wait, she thought. It wasn’t like she was going to spend the whole evening kissing Gustav. Rose stared at him, feeling the warmth of Gustav’s body, and she felt a little light-headed; she felt intoxicated. The amount of happiness that she felt when she knew he felt the same way was sending her to heaven. Gustav stared down at her, his right hand was on her chin, and his thumb slowly moved into her lower lip, stroking her softly there. She stared at him, confused, thinking, Why haven’t he kissed me yet? when suddenly the sound of Rose’s iPhone ringing made both of them jumped.

They completely forgot that Rose’s iPhone was on the table, not far from the sofa where Gustav and Rose were currently tangled into each other. Gustav pulled his hand from her face, sighed for a second, and then reached into her iPhone, his sight didn’t leave her face. He peered into the iPhone screen and he suddenly looked slightly annoyed and Rose was halfway wondering who would make Gustav put such expression before he grumbled as he handed her the iPhone.

The caller ID said ‘Michael JA’.

Rose took the call. She could hear her heart beating painfully below her chest as she blinked rapidly to process what was going on; she was ready to drown herself into Gustav’s presence and then the call from Michael sort of interrupted them.

“Rose Julie?” Michael Jones-Andretti said on the other side of the line. Instead of answering, the red-haired girl made weird noises, a combination of choking and mumbling sound. “Not a good time to call, I suppose?” he laughed and added before Rose could say something, “I’ll call you later before you go to bed.” She pulled her phone from the side of her face, stared at it, and then threw it at sofa as if she was holding a large poisonous spider instead of normal electronic device. She looked at Gustav and Rose knew she must be look like she was going to cry, because he put an ‘I forgive you for that’ expression.

“I…” Rose started, muttered.

Gustav raised his right hand and stopped her from continuing.

“It’s okay,” he said rather bitterly before making a forced smile. Rose’s shoulders fell and she stared down only to raise her head again because she heard him laughing. Gustav was only chuckling, but he slowly laughed harder and harder. The half-Norwegian man pulled her into his hug; his whole body was shaking by laughter. “Oh Rose,” he said. “I was so close to be angry or something—I wasn’t sure. But I just can’t… if I want to be with you properly, I should accept you for who you are; that, too, means I’ll accept your past.” He pulled back and threw an uncomfortable look at her iPhone. Rose nodded, feeling her cheeks blushed, ashamed for no reason. Maybe because Gustav Wood was such a grown up and she felt like she wasn’t.

The sound of guitar played from far suddenly let them know that there was still something to take care about.

“Fraser might be waiting for you, you know,” Gustav said gently.

Rose looked up on him.

He smiled and shrugged, “You might not want him to feel bad about himself for too long.” Then Gustav was busying himself with tidying the bloodstained cotton balls as Rose stared at him, smiling.

Gustav really did care about his best friend.

What a wonderful kindness he has. She had lived for twenty-three years and met a lot of people; most of the time, she realised that people are famous and interesting because of their look or their ability, but she realised that her favourite human being quality is kindness. Because you can’t always choose to be good-looking or gifted, but you can always choose to be kind and loving.

Rose stood up, touched and couldn’t stop thinking of how amazing could someone be and how their kindness could give her amazing warm feeling on her belly, while she nodded, “Of course. Yeah. I’m going to see him now. Thank you, Gustav.”

He was still smiling when Rose glanced at him for one last time from outside the room.



Fraser Taylor was sitting on his bed in a bedroom filled that could be describe as ‘tidy’ for him but would be described as ‘messy’ for Rose. She was always surprised on how the guys could mess a room quite easily but she never really questioned why; she guessed that there’s just something behind that and she would just live with it, accepting that part as smaller part of what build Young Guns as a group of persons. She believed that she would take anything that Fraser had to throw at her; his anger, his disappointment, and maybe his ‘no, I’m not going to teach you playing guitar again’.

He sat there, playing his other guitar harshly.

Fraser looked like he was trying to destroy the strings of the guitar as he stared angrily at his favourite guitar. Rose knocked softly on the door and he looked at her. She could see that he didn’t exactly want to see her but he carry out to mumbled politely, “Come in.” Rose sat on Ben’s bed on the other side of the room, winced at the painful sound Fraser made with the guitar. She sighed, “I’m sorry.”

He stopped playing the guitar.

“You must be joking,” Fraser sighed back and Rose could see that he seemed tired and unhappy. “Just… God, Rose, sometimes I don’t know you’re too kind or what… I mean, what you just done… that’s really nice… and dumb, as well! Do you think you would be happy if I save your favourite frying pan or something but I hurt myself in the process?”

Rose nodded. She knew she was guilty in one side, but on the other side, she really wanted to laugh at Fraser saying ‘your favourite frying pan’. She was glad that he thought it was funny too because he couldn’t contain his giggle. “Listen, I’m perfectly okay with all the kindness that you do or something…” Fraser sighed once more at now he stared at her, looking tired but relieved. “Just don’t… promise me you won’t hurt yourself in order to save other people’s belongings, okay?”

Rose smiled and thought that maybe this is how does it feels like to have older brother.

“I’ll try,” she said.

Fraser pouted.

Rose quickly corrected, “Alright, I promise.”

And now Fraser Taylor smiled a very familiar smile. Rose blinked and stared at him, realising that a couple of minutes ago, Gustav smiled a similar smile. Fraser stared back at her, mumbling, “What?” awkwardly, because he realised that Rose was staring at him and noticing something. “Nothing,” she said in hurry, shaking her head, “I’m just thinking that you just smile a smile like Gustav’s… and how you guys laugh in almost the same way… it must be really fun to have a bunch of best friend and spend a lot of time with them.”

Fraser raised his eyebrows. He seemed a little surprised.

“I’ve always heard that we always notice things about someone else, but not realising ours at all,” he sat closer to Rose. “It appears that you don’t see it, but we are drawn into each other; you smile like us too, and now Si has your way of opening and checking fridge, Ben talked to Lestat in the way you do it, and Gustav is seriously become more like you; the way he talk, the way he nicely remind us about stuff instead of shouting and joking like he used to… he even swear less.”

She could only stare at Fraser in amazement.

“I’m pretty sure I adapt something from you and I know you have my attitude in playing guitar—and God, now I’m kind of nervous thinking whether we’re going to be fine without you when we back to our track later,” Fraser finished his sentence, moved further as he put his guitar down and sighed heavily, looking insecure. His tone was tinted with sadness and Rose hated to see him unhappy. She spoke, as assuring as she could, “You guys are going to be fine.” Fraser stared at her, making sarcastic ‘yeah, of course’ attitude. He pouted like a little child and Rose giggled.

“Fraser,” she said, moved next to him, and touching his left arm. “It is impossible to go through this life without meeting and parting with people—just like it’s impossible to live without hurting and getting hurt. Sometimes we’ll be happy, sometimes we’ll be sad. Sometimes we say hello, other times we say goodbye. But everything is there for reason—and even though our ways may part later, what’s important is that we’re here now. We met. We were together. And when you need to go, don’t be sad because it’s over…

“But be thankful that it happened.”

Rose didn’t even know why she said all that, but as she gazed into Fraser’s eyes, she could see that he was struggling, thinking about something. Maybe he was thinking of a thousand ways on how Rose would be still be with them, even after Gustav’s voice was finally recovered, but he finally managed to smile, as he was ready to let go. “You’re right,” he exhaled. “I hope I’m going to be fine. I hope we’re going to be fine. I hope Gustav is going to be fine...”

She took her hand from his arm as she said, “He’s going to be fine. I believe he is. You know, I think we’re all a lot stronger than we think we are—have a little faith to yourself and people you love. Believe that you’re enough.”

Fraser smiled again before he laughed, loud and long before he eventually stopped and said.

“Fuck, Rose, you always know what to say, don’t you?”



They had dinner at home after a series of interesting yet dangerous making of a couple portions of chicken fricassee because Si and Ben almost burned the kitchen when they poured white wine to the pan. The meal was delicious and the only thing left from the fire was slight smell of smoke in the kitchen and the burn mark on Si’s left eyebrows. After eating, Rose had observed that Young Guns was always had this extra energy to do something weird, this time they were singing some weird song that she didn’t recognise at all. At moments like that, Rose usually left the room silently, because she felt like she didn’t belong there as they gathered what stupid-but-fun things that they had done before, usually on tours.

That night, she chose to stay outside, watching the faint glitter of the stars on the dark blue sky next to Lestat who kept sleeping lately whenever he got chance. She mumbled, “So it’s me and you again, just like before, Les.” Rose planted a kiss on the canine’s forehead and she stared at the sky, thinking about how long the dog would stay with her because pet just doesn’t live as long as human.

Her phone suddenly rang and she almost dropped it as she took it without really looking at the caller ID.

“H-hello?”

“Rose Julie?”

“Michael?”

Rose could hear the guys’ singing were getting louder and louder and Si was screaming at one point while John was laughing really loud and she felt really awkward. “What is it, Michael?” she said, proud because her voice sounded calm and confident enough in her opinion despite what she currently felt.

“Oh, it’s nothing—I just want to check that you’re okay.”

“Michael,” Rose scolded.

“Right. I’m sorry, okay? It’s just… well… I’m sorry that I’m worried. Listen, I know they’re grown up as well, I’m just a little… well, okay, a lot worried. But hey, I might get the research group already, but they’re in England—of course, they won’t mind that, to be obvious, but…” Michael groaned and Rose chuckled. He only did that when he was really frustrated and the frustrated Michael Jones-Andretti was one of his favourite Michael, because Rose was touched to see that this stiff man would actually let he loose his temper in front of her. “Just promise me you’ll be a good girl when you’re in England, okay?”

“Michael, I’m not five,” Rose couldn’t contain her excitement when she thought about going to England.

“You’re twenty-three. Got it. I’m just worried. Please don’t get mad at me—and what kind of noise is that? What are you doing? Wait—what are they doing? Are they singing some kind of stripper song?”

“Some kind of what?”

“Never mind—just…” Michael groaned once again. “Alright. You can tell them about this and this means Gustav will have the surgery on England—which is good, because sometimes your medical record could get tangled up and it would complicated if he does it here or somewhere else… or maybe not. I haven’t seal the deal, so maybe you’d want to keep this up for yourself first and report to me how they’re going… especially him.”

“Yes, Michael.”

They didn’t say anything for a while. Lestat was sleeping next to Rose and Ben sounded like he just smashed the table too hard and Fraser and Gustav was shouting something inaudible.

“Thank you,” she finally managed to whisper.

Michael sighed loudly, “I’m just doing this for you, okay?”

Rose smiled, “No, I think you’re doing this because you’re a kind-hearted person.”

Michael laughed loudly, resulted a soft pang in Rose’s heart because the sound of his laugh used to be so familiar when they were together—and how she loved it when he laughed; that stuffy Michael Jones-Andretti laugh. Rose could hear him smiling as he said, “Alright then, why don’t you go join them and have a good night sleep afterwards?”

“Alright. Good night, Michael.”

“Good night… Rose Julie.”

She hung up first and went straight to her bedroom.



Rain.

John Taylor moved in his sleep.

Thunder.

He woke up slowly, in despite of his uncomfortable feeling against the rains and thunders out there. It was dark when he opened his eyes and he could hear nothing but the sound of rain outside the closed, curtained windows on the bedroom he shared with Gustav. It had been quite a while since it was raining in his life and John couldn’t believe how long he had been there in Australia and everything seemed and felt like a beautiful, ethereal dream—only that nightmare was crept in the corner, in the form of Gustav’s voice that decided that it wouldn’t come back forever. With help of Rose Lette, they could try to push the nightmare as far as they want, but could they do it for the rest of their life?

John blinked in the darkness.

It was hard to argue that in the beginning, he was rather confused with her presence. Sure, everyone liked him—and by everyone, he meant his best friends, the rest of Young Guns—but he felt achingly uncomfortable with the idea of someone among them. She was not their tour manager, nor their driver; she was nobody and she was there simply because she helped Gustav connected with them again. John felt uneasy, because he knew he should be thankful to the red-haired girl, but the fact that now they went together for such a long time made him think that whether he was such a bad person for not liking her so much.

Of course she was kind. But she was still an outsider to him. There were billions of kind people on the face of this earth and he didn’t need one near him, in a zone that he felt comfortable of; his friends. John liked his solitude, especially his solitude among his friends. And he thought, who does she think she is, jamming herself in the midst of his best friends? John rolled on his bed and he knew that he wouldn’t be able to sleep again unless he got distracted from the rain—and he definitely wouldn’t be able to do so by just lying there. So he got up and walked to the bathroom.

He could start with washing his face.

It was two in the morning and John couldn’t hear anything except the song of rain softly tipping on the ground, trees, and roofs outside. He walked to the bathroom, opened the window, and turned on the lamp, just to jump at the sight of something that looked like a big flesh-coloured ball wrapped in white sheet with long red-coloured hair all over it on the bathtub. John was almost screamed before he realised that it was just Rose Lette, curling like a ball inside the porcelain-white bathtub, sobbing like a little child.

“Rose?” John groaned; his breathing was ragged. “What the fuck are you doing?”

She flinched at his cursing word and lifted her head slowly to stare at him.

Her big, green eyes were watered with tears and her whole face was red. Her hair was messy and she looked like she had been crying for hours. John Taylor didn’t remember that he ever laid his sight upon something so sad and pitiful before. He walked closer and knelt beside the bathtub while Rose Lette was staring at him. She looked confused, but John was the one who was confused there.

“Are you okay? What happened?” he asked, hating himself as he realised that he was being nice to her, right when John didn’t know whether how to act upon her presence. He couldn’t even think of why would this girl crying on the bathtub in the middle of the night. Surely she couldn’t be fighting with Gustav? It wasn’t like John never witnessed Rose and Gustav fighting. They actually fought over little things, like when Gustav didn’t finish his meal or when Rose was spending too much time trying to cook something perfectly. John didn’t know anymore whether they were like mother and child, a pair of husband and wife, or siblings who fought about small things all the time.

But it wasn’t like Rose was going to cry because of any of those fights.

She looked like she wanted to answer him, but she couldn’t say anything. Instead, she opened her mouth and stuttered something about ‘flounder’. John tilted his head, his forehead wrinkled. Flounder? What the hell was this girl talking about? He was halfway thinking about how annoying her existence could be before one big thunder rumbled on the sky and she flinched shockingly and cried harder, as if John had just hit her with his punch.

“Hey… what…?” he copied her stutter in confusion.

And then it hit him hard; she was afraid of thunder. The first thought came afterward was, ‘Really? Thunder?’ She was twenty-three years old, if he could believe his memory about her age, and she didn’t have reason to be afraid of thunder. Thunder, not flounder, John noted as he stared at her awkwardly, because he didn’t know whether he should comfort her or something. Should he call Gustav instead? But the sight of her crying made her heart ached and John Taylor wasn’t a heartless monster.

“Listen…” he sighed, while he was putting his big, spidery hand on her shuddering head. Her hair was so soft, like cat’s fur, but she looked so scared and it was painful to look at her shuddered like that. “It’s… okay. It’s okay, really, it’s just thunder. It’s not going to hit us or anything, I can promise you that. Why are you so afraid of thunder anyway?” John asked, rather impatiently, before he looked at tears flowing into her cheeks and muttered, “Never mind.”

And then he just sat there while she was crying.

“If you’re so afraid of thunder…” John said after a while, “Why don’t you just ask us to stay on your room or something? Like when we watched A Woman in Black back on Gilbert’s house near your place. I don’t think any of us would mind.” He felt a little guilty knowing that he would slightly mind, but now he wouldn’t anymore. He thought it was okay for someone to one or two terrible weaknesses. To his surprise, Rose stared at him like John just said the most brilliant thing ever.

“What?” he said. “You didn’t think of that before?”

Rose blinked and then stroked her eyes so hard that John was afraid that her eyes were going to fall out in the process, but then she spoke and she had stopped stuttering. “I… I never thought about that before,” she whispered, her voice was hoarse. John almost blurted out, ‘Well, why the fuck didn’t you?’ but Rose continued, “I guess I was forgot about… you guys.” There was a weird sparkle in her eyes, even though both of them are still red from crying. “Right. You guys are here… and I shouldn’t hide in the bathroom just like usual, but we could sleep in the same room together so I don’t feel that scared anymore…”

And then Rose laughed, but slowly, she was crying at the same time.

John was confused, but most of all, he felt really sorry for Rose. He also felt hatred towards himself as he thought; how could he hate this girl? She was harmless as a fly and if John hadn’t realised it yet, she was helping them to get back on the track of their career as a band. Maybe he done it because he hated to see her so happy and so loose and so honest and so free in expressing herself, all the time. John thought about how he couldn’t accept someone that happy before he realised that Rose Lette was just as human as he was—as everyone was. She had her own flaws; she had things the scared about as well. The red-haired girl was still crying and laughing rather hysterically before she stopped and she talked as tears were streaming down her cheeks.

“I was always afraid, you know?” she said.

And she stared at John like she was staring right into who John Taylor really was with those big, green, watery eyes.

“I was always afraid of thunder. I didn’t know when I developed it, but I remember I spent my entire childhood trying not to cry under my blanket whenever thunder comes. I remember people said that if there was hurricane, you should hide on the bathtub, so I started to hide on the bathtub whenever there was thunder around, just to feel safe. People thought it was weird and they dislike it. They always thought I was such a weird kid and they never like me. I just want to hold on to someone whenever thunder comes, but I guess I haven’t cure this stupid thing until now… I even get really scared that I forgot that you guys are here and we are in the same building!” she laughed even though she was crying as well and John was dumbfounded.

He forgot.

He forgot that Rose Lette had this horrible childhood and she had to spend countless night crying alone because she was afraid of thunder. She was so alone for so long that somehow she kept thinking that she had nobody to cry upon—that she was alone for such a long time. She was even forgot that she wasn’t alone anymore because she was so scared and she had always been scared alone for too long. John liked his solitude, but his solitude wasn’t a forced loneliness that he had to carry upon himself for years. He had his parents, his brother, and his best friends, and they were always there for him. He forgot because she always looked so happy. And at that moment, all he could say was, “I’m sorry.”

Rose stared at him, dazzled, but she didn’t say anything.

John stared back at her, his mouth was opened, but he couldn’t say anything, I’m sorry because I choose this much loneliness while you were begging to get rid of it completely from your life? Everything sounded wrong when he thought about it and in the end he just sighed and babbled, “I don’t hate you. It’s just the way I am.” He sighed harder and he felt a little relieved when he saw her smile.

“I know,” Rose said. “I always know.”

Another thunder rumbled and Rose flinched uncomfortably on her sit. John sighed once again and then he climbed on the bathtub. Now they both sat there. He mumbled, “Don’t worry. Let’s just stay here a little longer until the storm passed.”

Rose nodded.

Then someone walked to the bathroom.



Gustav woke up and thought about the thunder. It sounded unpleasant. He sat, ruffled his own hair, and looked at the empty bed on the other side of the room. He stood to check whether John was okay, because clearly he wouldn’t spend that long in the bathroom—or did he went somewhere else? Gustav saw the bathroom door was opened and he peered inside to see one of the most peculiar things that he ever witnessed in his life; John and Rose were sitting on the bathtub, curled like two big balls of flesh and Rose was crying.

John raised his right hand and said tiredly, “It’s not what you think it is.”

“I… I can’t even think of anything about what you guys might do in there,” the man without shirt on the door said as he shook his head.

Rose giggled, even though tears were still falling down her cheeks, and then Gustav laughed too, at his words, or at the sight he saw, he didn’t even know. John laughed as well and then they just laugh like that until another thunder made Rose jerked in fear and quivered violently. For some reasons, that reminded Gustav of a cat and he immediately understand what was going on.

“That’s it, I’m going to sleep with you until the thunderstorm stops,” he said, putting on the tone of a leader. “John, are you okay with sleeping alone?”

John laughed out loud, “Sure, Gus.”

“Come here,” Gustav bent and helped Rose climbed out of the bathtub, while John walked out easily by himself. After Rose stood straight, she murmured, “Do you guys mind if I use the bathroom before…?”

“Yeah, yeah, sure.”

“Of course not, Rose.”

Gustav and John were standing on the corridor outside the bathroom when Gustav gave John the stare. John grumbled at his best friend, “What?” Gustav shook his head, but he couldn’t contain his big grin, “I’m just wondering what will happen if I didn’t wake up to find you.” He started to chuckle and John smirked at him.

“Probably you’d be rather jealous of me.”

“Oh, I even got jealous of Hamish.”

John raised his eyebrows, confused, but Gustav Wood just flashed his smile once again.



The bed Rose used while they were staying in Jervis Bay was not very big, but Gustav was sure that both of them would fit there nicely and comfortably until he lied there himself, only to realise that he was way bigger and taller than the red-haired girl, who giggled by the sight of him being to big for the bed, from the opened door. Rose closed the door and look at him. She had opened her mouth to say something, but Gustav was faster and he knew that she would say something like ‘You don’t have to do this if you won’t want to’, so he just shook his head, his expression was stiff, and he gestured to her to lie next to him.

She climbed on the bed; her shoulders were still slightly shaking.

The bed was too small for two people, especially because he was way taller than her, but Gustav still held her softly, his left arm was under her neck, and Rose stared at her. Her green eyes were glowing because of tears that somehow were still ready to fall. He gazed down upon her lovingly and ached at the sight of her scared. Softly, Gustav planted a kiss on her forehead. Rose closed her eyes the second his lips touched her forehead and opened it the second they left. “I’m sorry,” she whispered without sound.

Gustav just kissed her forehead again.

“I feel annoying,” Rose gulped, closing her eyes. “Like a main character of a story who are troubling everyone around them because they don’t believe in anyone, not considering anyone as their friend and putting those people nicely inside their heart to ask help for.” He just stared at her, knew that she was referring to the guitar accident with Fraser. “Please don’t be angry,” she pleaded, eyes closing.

“I won’t,” Gustav whispered back as fast as he could.

She opened her eyes once again to stare at him before she closed them again, “I think we’re wonderful… I mean, human. We got beaten, fell, hurt, but somehow, we always manage to wake up, because our scars heal. Any scars heal…” her voice vanished into steady breathing sound and Gustav knew that she had fell asleep. He pulled her closer slowly and thought about the girl who cared about her new neighbour months ago, the very girl who now nestled, and her face on his chest, sleeping peacefully. Gustav closed his eyes as well, but he couldn’t fall asleep. All he could do was listening to the sound of Rose breathing and he unconsciously recalled Aerosmith’s song, I Don’t Wanna Miss a Thing.

I could stay awake just to hear you breathing
Watch you smile while you are sleeping
While you're far away and dreaming

He fell asleep with his lips on her forehead.