Love Buzz

“I can’t believe it! Every time I try to tell Kurt once and for all, she has to ruin it,” I ranted to Krist after Kurt had gone home early again. Krist looked lazily at me; this had been the over 9000th time (or, at least, it felt like it) that I had ranted about Kurt or Courtney to him. “I’m so tired of this!”

“If you’re so tired of it,” Krist suggested, looking down at his fingernails boredly, “Why don’t you just TELL HIM ALREADY?!”

I wouldn’t hear of it; I had tried again and again to tell him, and I’ll be sooner damned than I would tell him at the wrong time. I stayed quiet, knowing that anything I said could and would be used against me at a later time. Krist sat on the stool he had been practicing on, waiting, daring me to say something.

“I can’t,” I said weakly, biting my lip. “It’s not the right time.”

Krist rolled his eyes and shifted in his chair, focusing back on me.

“Why not?! Why wait and tear yourself up about it when it could have been over with weeks ago?! What, for a special moment that won‘t come?! You‘d be lucky to even get a moment where you could.”

I stood silent as Krist basically broke down my excuse at not telling him and make me feel ridiculously stupid. I looked down at the floor, knowing Krist was right, but damn it all if I’d let him know I knew.

“It’s not a matter of luck, it’s just a matter of time.”

Krist threw his hands up in the air, obviously fed up with my attempts to make myself sound the least bit smarter.

“OH MY GOD, JUST TELL HIM! I’m sick and tired of your bullshit, and if you don’t tell Kurt that you love him tomorrow, I will myself, and trust me, I won’t make it easy on you.”

I was stunned, to put it quite simply. Krist was normally a gentle person, but the words were spoken with such aggravation; I didn’t know that I had bothered him that much with my problems.

“Fine,” I found myself retaliating, heading for the door. “I will tell him tomorrow!”

“Good!”

I walked out of the basement before I could hear Krist shout any more behind me.

---

The next day I found myself frozen to my drum stool, nervously staring at Kurt and then back at my bass drum. I had seemed so confident yesterday…where was all of that? Gone with my mind? Most likely. Kurt didn’t pay any attention to me; he was just staring off into space, most likely thinking of either his daughter or reflecting upon his life. Or maybe how he just wanted some macaroni and cheese. You never knew with him.

I had never been so nervous in all the twenty-three years I’d been alive on this planet. What if he rejected me? What if he never talked to me again? He would have left Nirvana, and I would have been at fault. I would have ruined the band, and millions of people would hate me for it. I could almost feel the weight of the hatred on my heart; but I couldn’t be afraid. Life was like a box of chocolates, people always said. My life, however, seemed like a box of active grenades.

“Earth to Dave! Houston, we have a problem,” Kurt suddenly started saying to me, snapping me out of my thoughts (which people seem to be doing a lot lately…maybe I should attempt to stop thinking). I shook my head, looking at Kurt, who was waving his hand wildly in front of my face.

“You can stop trying to fly now, Kurt, you can learn later,” I smartly remarked, making Kurt smack me playfully upside the head. I stuck my tongue out at him, which he returned with an adorable pout. I was suddenly finding it very hard to restrain from just tackling him and planting my lips against his. Okay, focus, self, you’re losing it. But he was so gorgeous…SHUT UP.

“I’m going to go check on something upstairs,” Krist intervened, standing up from his stool and setting Nellie down next to it. He stretched, his hands almost reaching the low ceiling of the dingy basement. Swinging his hands back to his sides, he headed for the stairs to the kitchen above us. But before he could go, he turned his head towards me, and said slyly,

“Now would be a good time to tell him!”

I didn’t know what I was going to do first after I was brutally rejected; find Krist and strangle him, or…find Krist and strangle him. It was the only option open for discussion, and I bet I could pull it off beautifully. My cheeks felt like stove top coils implanted onto my face, and I bet they were as red, too. Kurt turned to me, a questioning look on his face.

“Tell me…oh! What you were going to tell me on the phone and at the restaurant?”

I’d hoped he wouldn’t remember. Of all the things Kurt Cobain had forgotten, he had to have remembered this. I looked around desperately for something to lie about, but Krist had said he’d do it himself if I didn’t. And with Krist, you don’t know what he’s going to say and what he’s not going to say.

I looked back at the stairs, hoping that the tall bassist wasn’t going to pretend to be upstairs when he was really just hiding and watching us. I sighed, looking down at the floor, defeated. It was now or facing the wrath of Krist Novoselic later.

“I-I’m…” I started out slowly to prevent my voice from cracking, and Kurt looked at me, extremely intrigued. I stopped to regroup and keep from completely ruining the moment by running off. But now, all I had to do was finish the sentence, and then see what happens. I was what? Pregnant? “I’m gay…”

I didn’t even get to finish before Kurt interrupted me.

“That’s it? Well, I suppose not everyone takes this the same…who’s the lucky guy?”

“That’s the thing,” I pointed out, finally meeting Kurt’s eyes. My heart stopped as I choked out. “He’s you.” I sighed, feeling all the weight that had built up on me for the past month just disappear. Kurt stood shocked, possibly horrified. We grew dead silent to the point that we faintly heard Krist’s footsteps above us. Kurt didn’t say anything; he just stood still, taking in what I had just said. I bit my lip, anticipating the wrath of an angry five-foot-eight grunge singer/guitarist. Kurt said nothing to me, but instead, turned to go to the stairs of the basement.

“I-I don’t know…I have to go,” Kurt said hesitantly, heading up the stairs to go to the kitchen, and leave me to wallow in my guilt. I thought telling him would be right…Krist had told me it would. But why did it make me want to cry? My stomach felt like it was going to fall out my butt, and there was a lump in my throat that felt like I had dry swallowed a large pill. Why did it have to be this way? Tears stung at my eyes as I sunk back into my drum stool, but I blinked them away. So Kurt didn’t like me, so what? It was stupid to cry about something like that. My heart was aching just like that song Achy Breaky Heart*.

Krist came back down to the basement shortly after Kurt had made his hasty exit to see me leaning on my bass drum, my head on my hand. I knew it was him from the way he jumped down the stairs and the way he just loomed over you right before he was going to talk to you. Apparently, he still hasn’t gotten the note to not be creepy.

“You sit there in your heartache, waiting on some beautiful boy…it doesn’t work like that, Dave.”

All of a sudden, raging fire took place in my heart as Krist began to try to comfort me (also known as telling me how I fucked up and how I should have done it). It was his fault that Kurt left. I could have done just as well without telling him. Krist told me to tell Kurt, and look what happened. Okay, maybe it wasn’t all his fault, but I needed someone to blame for my actions right now.

“You told me it would help if I told him.”

Krist didn’t say a word after that; he just simply looked at me with sympathy in his eyes and guilt in his heart. I wasn’t sure what to think after this, but I was pretty sure that I had ruined it all for us, and I wouldn’t have been surprised if neither Kurt or Krist ever talked to me again.