Girl, I Don't Know What You See, You're More Than Just a Mannequin to Me

“Cayne, get up, it’s a busy day today!” Emmie was screaming. I groaned. “Abner, take a shower, you smell like BO. Cayne, if you want breakfast you have to get up now.”

I ignored her and cuddled closer to the body beside me. He was so warm.

“Cayne, aren’t you hungry?” a groggy voice said to me. But it wasn’t Peyton. It was Alex. I had completely forgotten last night’s events.

“Yeah,” I muttered. “Just give me a mo’.”

Alex wrapped his arms tighter around me and waited for me to wake up more.

Slowly I felt his fingers inch up and wrap around the necklace he had given me. I could feel him smile into my hair.

“Mkay,” I said after about five minutes. “I’m getting up.”

We climbed from the bunk, Alex throwing his shirt on. Everybody seemed surprised to see him here.

“Oh, hey Alex,” Ree said. “Would you like to join us for breakfast?”

“Uh, sure,” Alex replied, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. “I just need to go freshen up a bit.” He turned towards me. “I’ll see you in a little bit?”

“Uh, yeah, later,” I smiled awkwardly at him, rubbing my arm.

He left the bus. Emmie rushed towards me as I went into the backroom. She shut the door behind us.

“What happened last night?” she hissed at me. I pulled my bag towards me.

“We didn’t have sex, if that’s what you’re asking,” I told her, grabbing a couple clothes to wear for the day.

“But he went to sleep with you in your bunk?” she asked. “I knew he passed out over here, but I didn’t know he did with you.”

“We didn’t do anything!” I said, throwing my arms up. I was just in my underwear, so I probably looked ridiculous. “I swear to God, I would never cheat on Peyton. I just didn’t want to go to sleep alone last night, was all.”

“So you’re going to mess with Alex’s feelings?” She crossed her arms over her chest. “I’d rather you cheat on Peyton."

I glared at her as I threw my shirt over my head. “Well that’s a shit thing to say. Nice.”

I pushed past her out of the back room and shoved into the bathroom, angry enough to ignore a naked Abner cooing at me to join him in the shower between bits of laughter behind me. I quickly did my makeup and hair and left the bus.

Ronan and Abe were chilling outside of their bus, smoking a couple cigarettes.

I didn’t even care. I walked up to them and asked if I could bum one.

“Thanks,” I said to Ronan, as he handed one over, including a lighter. I lit up. “God, I haven’t smoked one of these since I was like 20.” They chuckled.

We stood there and smoked our cigarettes and got to know each other better. It was about 15 minutes later that Friday and Alex finally came out and climbed into the van. I said goodbye to the guys and ran to meet up with them.

“Ew, it smells like cigarettes in here,” Alex said, sniffing there air with a screwed up face from besides me.

“No way,” Oceanne said. “None of us smoke.”

I looked away and out the window. I didn’t want anyone to know that I had caved on my Straightedge promise, so I kept my mouth shut.

We ended up going to a cute little diner right at the edge of the city. The food was really good and they had a really good staff.

“So, last night I had a dream about this like 4 foot cartoon dude who tried to shoot me because we stole his unicycle,” Abner said as he took a bite of his Belgian waffle.

“I swear to God you smoke meth or something before going to sleep, Ab,” Erix laughed, shaking his head at him. He raised his arm and asked for another coffee.

“I had a dream that I was sleeping on this cloud over Nebraska, and then – “

And suddenly we were all talking about dreams and laughing asses off. It felt really good. I hadn’t gotten along this well with my band for awhile.

Eventually we were going back to the venue.

“So how about we go out tonight?” Alex asked me under his voice. “Away from the craziness of tour? After the concert?”

“Alex, it wouldn’t be a date,” I said, looking up at him and chewing on the bottom of my lip. “If I gave you the wrong impression last night – “

“No, of course not,” Alex shook his head. “I just know you’ve been really stressed a lot lately. I want to make it better, somehow.”

I smiled, “Okay.”