Learn to Spell, God!

Zacky’s POV.

Destruction? That's one word for it. I think we may need to pay the hotel some more money. Well actually, a lot of money. That’s the third one we’ve trashed this tour. I’m not going to point fingers, because it’s only fair that we, Avenged Sevenfold, take the wrap because the girls have stayed sober every time. They’re really good to us those girls; they clean up on the bus and organise our meals. They’ve done laundry trips at every hotel, our hair and make up most nights as well as their own. But agreeing to tour so early was by far the best thing they have done for us.

Right now they were being their saintly selves, cleaning dishes and delivering aspirin to all those with a hangover. Unsurprisingly, that was all of us guys. Layla was skipping between the bunks, singing loudly as she came.

“Morning sunshine!” Her infectious grin was mildly irritating. I rolled over in our bunk and pulled the covers over my aching head. “Oh no you don’t!” She scolded.

Before I could tighten my grip around the soft material, it was swooped over my head and revealed my semi-naked body to the cool air. The bed shifted and Layla rolled me over with ease.

“Drink. You seem to be good at that.” I couldn’t remember much about last night, but I know I didn’t fall asleep in the bunk. I took the water and popped the pills in my mouth.

“Care to explain what happened last night?” I asked, attempting to sit up.

“Well, we went to a club after the gig. We had a few rounds and us girls decided we should dance seeing as ‘Love Stoned’ came on. None of you lot wanted to join us, so carried on ordering shots and pints and far too many alcoholic drinks! When we returned, you were all comatose and there was already a small pile of . . . anyway, you got so hammered we spent the night helping you guys throw up and forcing you to drink water.” She sounded very pissed off.

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh! We were up until 5 this morning with you lot. And it’s now eight – that’s three hours sleep, Zack and we have an early sound check!” She left the bunk area and I heard the bus door open and then close. I could hear other voices on the bus, cussing and arguing.

I decided I should get up, so pulled on the first pair of jeans I found and pulled on the T-shirt that was screwed up next to me.

“Fuck off, Matt!” I heard as I left the bunks, followed by Matt who had obviously been kicked out of the bunk.

“I don’t see why their so moody.” He grumbled “We’re the ones hung over!”

“Dude, they got 3 hours sleep. They spent the night making sure we didn’t choke on our own puke.”

“Ouch!”

I left him in the lounge, and stepped into the bright sun. Despite it being blindingly sunny, there was still a chill in the air. We were now in New York City, and had the girls managed to sleep, they would have been totally hyped and off shopping right now. As it was though, they had retreated to their bunks, the tech’s bus or a coffee shop.

I didn’t have to go too far before I tripped over someone’s feet. I stumbled, keeping my balance thankfully. I’d obviously woken the body on the floor though.

“Shit, Zack! You scared the friggin’ crap outta me.” Sophie was an excessive swearer when tired. We’d all learned this when she walked around the bus cussing everyone. She should really learn to drink coffee, whether she likes it or not.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to wake you. How come you’re using the tire of the bus to sleep against?” I inquired.

“All the bunks on the techie’s bus are taken, if I go out in public I may just end up sleeping in a shop, and here is the only quiet and available space.” She sighed, forcing her eyes to stay open. “Layla came past, said she was going to Starbucks; getting me a frappacino.” Monosyllabic sentences were also common among the girls when tired.

“No caffeine?”

“Sugar beats caffeine. Like rock beats scissors.”

“But dextrose tablets beat sugar?” Noticing she had a packet of the magic tablets in her hands.

“Caffeine then has to beat dextrose.” She managed to laugh.

“Touché!”

“Layla seemed a bit peeved . . . You guys were really selfish last night, you know that right?” I bowed my head, ashamed for and by us all. We can be real dicks sometimes.

We sat in silence, and I’m pretty sure Sophie had fallen asleep because she was breathing quite heavily. I tried to wrack my brains, searching for some indication of what we did last night . . .

The girls all had their puppy dog eyes on. We knew this meant they wanted something.

“Yes?” Asked Jimmy.

“Come and dance, please!” Pleaded Jenn. They knew full well we didn’t do that kinda thing.

“Nuh uh.” Johnny said simply.

“Fine . . .” The girls walked away, looking disappointed. I saw Layla whisper in Pippa’s ear, who passed on the message to Sophie and so the obvious plan was sent around the five of them.

I took a swig of the beer that had been put in front of me and looked back to the girls, or where they had now been. I scanned the dance floor, and found a sight most pleasing to mine eyes. The girls were in the middle of one very large grind line. They were tossing their heads back, laughing and singing along. The others had spotted this too and all had the same mischievous glint in their eyes. To us, there is nothing hotter than our girlfriends, and support band, dancing dirtily with each other. They were purposely making it erotic to tempt us onto the dance floor, but we knew better. If Sophie hadn’t taken her camera with her - and wasn’t currently taking snap shots of them dancing - I would have videoed them for future enjoyment.

The fun ended pretty quickly however. Maybe ten minutes of watching them dance, and downing far too many shots. Everyone at the table was past drunk now. I hadn’t been concentrating on the girls, mainly because I was trying to keep my thoughts straight, but when I returned my attention to them I saw five guys trying to put their hands on the girls.

I nudged Brian, who was lolling next to me. I pointed out the tall guy who kept having his hands smacked from Sophie’s hips. The others noticed and joined me in glaring. How dare those guys try hitting on them! Another round of pints was slid in front of us and we all drank deeply, trying to inebriate the anger we were all feeling. We knew it was no good trying to get the strangers to back off; we were too drunk to stand up properly, let alone fight.

Shit. We did mess up, big time. They were stopping those guys from hitting on them, and we drunk ourselves stupid through jealousy. No wonder the girls were pissed at us.

*

We’d delayed our sound check and let the girls sleep. I had managed to round up the other guys and explain to them what had happened. Turned out that once I refreshed their memories, they remembered what idiots we’d been. W concocted a plan for our sound check, not after strolling through the streets of NYC and making a few purchases’ in case plan A didn’t work. And because we knew the girls had wanted to get very specific things from the street side stalls.

Pure Poison were having a game of catch on the arena floor, passing the time whilst we did our sound check. I picked up my guitar, giving the others the thumbs up for our plan to begin.

“We’d like to dedicate this song,” Matt chuckled into his mike, “to those awesome girls out there, who look after us so well. We screwed up their day today ‘cus we were drunk and jealous bastards.”

“Too right!” One of them yelled from the floor.

They were all glaring at us, obviously not amused by Matt. We ignored this and continued, un-phased.

“Hey there Delilah, what’s it like in New York City? You’re a thousand miles away, but girl tonight you look so pretty . . .” If it was one thing we knew this lot liked, it was mushy love stuff. Chicks.

From the looks on their faces, they were obviously forgiving us slowly. It was nice to see a smile on Layla’s face. Even the caramel coffee she got a Starbucks earlier didn’t cheer her up. Before we could finish the song, they were all climbing onto the stage and running towards us. I dropped my guitar from my hands, letting it swing on my shoulder strap, and pulled Layla into the biggest bear hug ever. The same was going on around me, along with some tears and a lot of kissing.

We ended up forgetting to give the girls their ‘I heart NYC’ tops before our show that night. It was probably because they had already got outfits. They’d been planning this night for a while, and wanted to open New York with and unforgettable show; they were going to have a super hero fancy dress theme with their outfits. The funniest outfit by far was Jenn’s. She emerged from the dressing room in a superman top, bright blue skinnies with a pair or laced red knickers over the top. This earned wolf whistles from most of the tech staff and the other members of Avenged Sevenfold.

“The themed nights will continue through out this tour!” Pippa warned us, implying that we were going to have to participate sooner or later. I pick later.