How Many Times Can You Race Around the Tree Before You Catch Me?

We both laughed as he put me down.

“i’m gonna go grab clothes from a bay. Let me know when you’re decent.” I nodded at him. The second he was around the corner I quickly wrapped the towel around myself. I shimmied the pants on.

“Dang it.” The shirt was a ripped one and I couldn’t wear it without a bra.

“Vinny are you decent?”

“Yes” He laughed and I walked around the trailer over to him with the towel wrapped around me.

He was sitting in the bay going through his clothes.

“No top?” He smirked.

“Ripped shirt ya goof.” he stuck his tongue out at me.

“Here.” He handed me a shirt.

“Dat Fall Out Boy swag.” He smiled proudly at my recognition of the album cover on the shirt.

“Only the best for the best.” I smiled and kissed him before slipping the shirt on over the towel.

“I’m gonna grab the stuff and head back inside. Hurry in.” I kissed him again before doing exactly what I said I was gonna do.

“You took a bath in the lake?” Rich looked incredulous.

“Hell yeah, we all tour for a living. You should know that a shower is fucking gold around here, so I’ll take what I can get.” I paused to put two hot pockets in the microwave before continuing to put everything away.

I slipped on my blessthefall hoodie while I was in the backroom before heading back out to the front. Vinny was clearly getting grilled by everyone. He was in just a pair of sweatpants.

“What kinda fucking weirdos did we bring into this bus? There's a shower right there” I chuckled at Balz as he motioned to the bathroom.

“Not weird, I’m just used to the ‘clean how you can’ rule and we have limited water. He may just be weird.” I motioned to Vinny.

“She just called you the fuck out.” AJ laughed loudly.

Vinny rolled his eyes before sitting down at the booth. I slid in next to him and pulled my computer and phone away from the wall to open. As a product of not checking my email or messages from the day, I was basically being blown up. Most of them were from Sumerian and Fearless about my recent ‘self-termination’ and what to do about the future tours.

“God fucking dammit.” I groaned loudly as I read through the emails. One of them was from the label on behalf of the guys. They pulled the contract card.

“What happened now?” Josh asked from across the table.

“The label is threatening to sue me.” He scoffed.

“For what?”

“Breach of contract.” He frowned.

“You’re on contract?” I gave him the hand sign for ‘sort of’.

“What’s the supposed to mean?” I sighed.

“I signed in Christian’s spot in the original contract with Sumerian. He signed under Fearless. I’m technically with them through this next album, but it’s really hard to explain because we had the contract altered to basically make me head of finances and such. Me leaving the team prevents the guys from getting paid apparently and that creates a headache for them and the labels.” He gave me an odd look.

“You and what you were involved with are the most untypical and difficult sounding….just….” His hands just pointed towards me as he tried to find the right word.

“Yeah, I know. We did that on purpose.” I went back to reading my emails.

Each one was marked urgent and it made my eye hurt. When I switched over to my phone it wasn’t much better. Jeremy, however, had asked me to call him so I figured that would be a good place to start.

“Do you always have to call when I’m with my girlfriend?” I chuckled.

“You live with her so I’ll probably always call when you’re with her.” He chuckled.

“Anyways, whatcha call for earlier?”

“oh how are you doing on those animations?”

“I should have them done by the end of the week I think. Why?”

“Well send me what you have, Bring Me wants to see what you’re doing. We’re considering doing a simplified stage setup and having them do everything based off a projector would be great because it would cover our set.” I wanted to scream. This was huge for me but the amount of work that I had to do in the next week was ridiculous.

“Send me a setlist and what they want. I’ll try and get it done by the end of the week but your 17 individual videos plus fillers and then their 12-15 song set I’ll probably need another week.”

“Eh. I’m not worried about it. I doubt they’ll be worried either.” I sighed.

“They may not be but I want everything done before you come out. Speaking of which, you got the email with the plane tickets and shipping schedule right?”

“Yes ma’am, on the 14th we’re packing everything up to send by air freight. It will arrive to you on the next drop shipment day.We get in at 7 PM the day before. Question, where are you going to put all of it?”

“Kevin is storing it in the bays of his bus, so make sure you thank him when you get here. After wards, I’m going to help you pack up the gear and it’s going to Europe. You guys will return to the hotel and the next morning a car will bring you to the airport at 10 AM sharp.” I continued to work on a video while I was on the phone.

“Alright, well I’m gonna go. I’ll have Bring Me’s TM call you. Night”

Jeremy hung up after I said good night to him and I got to work on the videos while talking with Josh about what was happening over the next few days.

“Oh so the APMAs are in three weeks. Did you need a pass for that?” I chuckled.

“No, unfortunately part of getting my replacement job was selling my soul to Kevin and now I’m stage managing the event. Thank you though.” He laughed a bit as well.

“That’ll be fun.” I laughed again.

“Oh you have no idea. I get to deal with asshole and his flying monkeys.” He was confused by my nick name for the band I hated.

“It’s a band I really don’t like. I’m not going to tell you who.” He shrugged.

“As long as it’s not us, I don’t care. Are you still going to be with us bus wise for that?” This was on the list of things I needed to discuss with Kevin.

“I have to ask Kevin. I think I have to be there really early.”

“Just let me know ASAP there are a few people trying to catch a ride with us.” I nodded.

“I’ll ask Kevin tomorrow. If anything I’ll catch a ride with someone else and leave with you guys. Unless we’re celebrating.” Devin should win best bassist but we knew it wouldn’t happen.

“Well, even if we were celebrating. It would be on the bus because of that stupid drive we have to do after.” We had to drive to Maryland after that. Who ever has been doing these routings is crazy.

“no fucking kidding. It’s stupid.” We both got a laugh out of it.

“How are you getting home at the end of tour?”

“I flying out of Denver to California. I don’t know about you guys but I will be at the last Bleeding Through show.” I sat back and crossed my arms to form an X, hardcore style.

“You’re going too?” I looked back at Chris.

“Uh duh?” He laughed.

“Me, Devin, and Sabrina fly out at one that day.” My eyes lit up.

“We’re probably on the same flight. There was only one mid day that I would make it to the show in time with” He nodded.

“Yeah good point.” Everyone broke off into their smaller conversations.

Vinny put his head on my shoulder and watched me work through my emails. I answered each one honestly and truthfully. It would do me no good later on to have lied to the label.

“We they accept that?” Vinny asked quietly.

“I don’t know. They’re pretty pissed.”

He didn’t say anything else as I fished through more of my emails. Everyone else had gone to bed by the time I had finished.

“You should go to bed…” Vinny nudged me as I typed some more emails.

“Should and can are really two different things….” He sighed and stood.

“come on, bed time. This time bed and not booth.” I rolled my eyes and ignored his hand that was extended towards me.

“No really. Come on.” His hand reached over and gently closed my computer.

“Vinny I really have to finish this stuff.” He smiled at me.

“We have another day off tomorrow. I’ll sit with you in the back all day while you do your work if you get up…” I sighed and took his hand and he helped me up.

“Why are you so obsessed with keeping me away from my work?” I stood in front of him and he wrapped his arms around my waist.

“Your my girlfriend, I just want to spend time with you. Also, watching you freakout like this is completely unnecessary. You’re an amazing, wonderful, talented, hardworking, dedicated individual. If something happens you will always have somewhere to go…” I laid my head on his chest and sighed.

“I just worked so hard to get here, I don’t want to lose my friends and my job over this…” He hugged me tighter and remained silent. It would have been awkward if he hadn’t started humming.

I recognized one of my favorite songs very quickly.

“A lonely road crossed another cold state line….” I smiled as the words flowed from my mouth. He joined in and spun me around.

“Dear god the only thing I ask of you, is to hold her when I’m not around. When I’m much too far away…” We sang together.

He smiled at me as we danced while quietly singing. A moment like this brought us much closer together.

This had been such a whirlwind relationship. My mind still can’t process why I asked him to be with me. It was just so unusual for a wandering spirit as me.

“Now, will you please go to sleep?” I sighed.

“Yes, just let me change.”