Chapter 8: Show Off

POV: Zac

September 19, 2007; Somewhere between Columbus and Cleveland, Ohio.

Gabrielle and I were the only ones awake, it was about four in the morning and we were headed to Cleveland for the House of Blues show tomorrow. The last few shows had gone well and everyone seemed to be gelling now, the set up and break down were taking less time and sound checks, were for the most part going well. Even the walks were going well, that is when I could avoid staring at Gabby. She was presently sitting in the curve of the seats reading a book, something she did quite often really. I was sitting in the bean bag chair playing the infernal racing game that someone had brought with them.

I hadn’t mentioned it to anyone but I had seen her and Austin outside before they ran together, I didn’t understand why his hands being on her side made my blood boil. He was only showing her the proper way to stretch before running, ones she’d done alone before setting up after that. When she’d bent forward to lean down I saw his head look down, surely his eyes on her ass but then he look away. Still, it irritated me and I didn’t understand why. I would have gladly taught her proper stretching techniques. I’d even run with her maybe, but I just didn’t understand why it pissed me off so badly.

I was also certain in Arkansas that what happened was Taylor and I interrupted her little private session, her face was so red when she came out of the bathroom and the color of her skin was flushed such a gorgeous shade. Clearly she’d been masturbating on her own and we’d interrupted before she could finish, it made me wonder what she thought about and exactly what she looked like during sex. It had been a long time since I cared what the other person looked like. That rather scared me some.

“Is reading all you do?” I asked.

I really hadn’t seen her do anything but read, made me wonder if she did anything else.

She glanced up. “It’s all you give me time to do. Remember, you sent me across town for a specific soda and then you had to have Hasbro gummies again, dinner from the restaurant that was clear across town? When do I have time to do anything else?”

“It’s what I wanted.”

“I am sure the last week and a half of odd request has nothing to do with me saying no. Despite it coming after me saying no.”

“Well, if you had said yes, I wouldn’t have had the craving.”

“I hope you like those soda flavors and those gummies, I bought full cases I am sure it would satisfy your little craving.”

They probably wouldn’t, because really it wasn’t those items that I wanted. Hell, not even blondes worked. We were at the 9:30 club Sunday and after the show we stayed a bit to have some fun, but the blonde that was very aggressive did nothing to me, in fact I got no reaction to her period. She had tried though, everything she knew and nothing worked. I’d even tried thinking about Gabby and that didn’t work! Unlike the last blonde, this one was downright mean. Basically called me a limp dick and that I was no man at all because I couldn’t even get hard. I’d returned to the bus feeling very bad and quite depressed. She’d been reading then too. She read about another 45 minutes before she got up and went to bed. I followed not long afterwards.

It was around 11 when I woke up and that was because Isaac was shaking me.

“What?”

“Dude, lunch is here and you need to get up, the walk is in a few hours.”

I got up and after changing clothes, I headed inside, waving to the fans but while my brain mentally scanned the crowd for a potential hook up, no one stuck out. Yet, I saw Gabby the moment I walked inside. She was sitting at the end of the table next to Carrick and Austin and they were talking about the last show they had done. Isaac was fixing a plate so I did too and I sat down across from Gabby and the others, it wasn’t totally intentional, it was the only seat available. Everyone was done eating, just talking when Mikey got up and left, he had a friend visiting today so he was probably meeting them. Austin got up and went to do something, I think he mumbled something about a shower.

“Gabby, didn’t you say you toured for some bands before?” Andrew asked.

“Yeah, I have for some time. Why?”

“Just wondered, I hadn’t heard your name really. Like Max is a well known person, but you were new.”

“Oh, well I didn’t band hop like some. I was pretty much with like three or four, the last few years I was with the same band.”

“Ahh, that makes total sense then. I mean, we sometimes see band hoppers but sometimes we don’t.”

“Exactly.”

I wondered what bands she’d traveled with but I was afraid to ask, she didn’t seem to really answer personal questions. I’d overheard Demetrius ask when her birthday was she told them it wasn’t important. I was actually kind of wondering because I wanted to know. Added, if I wasn’t mistaken she really only talked to two other people, Abigail who’d asked her for vibrator help and Maxwell, the man who dropped her off. She rarely called him Max which is how we knew him. I wondered about her relationship with Max, the ringtone for him was Rebel Yell by Billy Idol, I was trying not to classify it as personal.

Isaac mentioned he asked about her family and she stone walled him Carrick had even agreed because she had done him the same way, didn’t say anything. I saw Mikey come back into the room and I saw the friend with the little plastic case. I wasn’t entirely sure what it was but he called her name and then tossed something in her lap, she looked down but then she just kind of stared at whatever it was.

I waited for her to scream, laugh, tell him to fuck off, anything because that’s what he was aiming for, some reaction. But, she just sat there and I swore the color of her face had paled quite a bit since she’d look down.

“Mikey, what was that?

“Tarantula.”

She didn’t look all that well anymore, her cheeks looked extremely pale and her whole face seemed to lose most of the color.

“Gabriella?” I asked.

She barely looked up at me and then she was falling sideways, the sound her head made when it hit the floor scared me and it appeared Taylor and Isaac too, I heard them gasp. A spider went scurrying and Mikey ran to grab it, but I went to her. The first thing I checked was to see if there was blood anywhere around her head but there was none. She however was out cold. Isaac got the smelly salts and tried to bring her around, which actually worked but Taylor had already called the paramedics. None of us would let her up but when Mikey got close with the caged spider, her breathing began to quicken and I could tell that she was afraid of the spider.

“Mikey, get that thing out of here. She’s obviously not okay with it.”

“It’s caged. Besides they can’t bite, so there harmless.”

“Mikey.” Carrick said.

He turned and huffed but left with his friend and the spider. He clearly didn’t know that it was possible to be very afraid of spiders or other animals, including deathly afraid of them.

“Gabby, are you afraid of spiders?” Taylor asked.

Her head barely moved but it was a nod, the three of us and the crew backed away when the professionals arrived and they checked her vitals, made sure she was responding well. She still seemed very shaken up after they were done. They cleared her but did warn if she developed a severe headache to call them back.

I helped her up and back into a chair, but she just seemed afraid of something and it didn’t seem like the spider was all.

“Do you want me to call Maxwell?” Taylor asked.

She shook her head. “No, he’ll just worry.”

“Like we’re going to? You scared us.” Isaac said.

“I’m fine, really. The paramedics weren’t even needed.”

“Yes they were. Your head hit this floor hard and it sounded even worse.” I said.

“I’m fine.” She snapped.

“Okay.” We said.

We backed off but we agreed to keep an eye on her just in case, concussions weren’t to be taken likely, the sound of her head hitting that floor was just sickening but I was glad she was okay. However, even as she set up and finished her job, she just didn’t seem to be okay. She looked better, the normal color of her face was back with a slight pinkness to her cheeks. After several hours Taylor asked if her head hurt or if she felt different and while she seemed a bit annoyed, she said no. She was avoiding Mikey, but really none of us could blame her but I did wonder about it. After our walk, I caught Mikey alone in the green room.

“Did you know she was afraid of spiders?”

He shrugged. “She said something to that Abby girl the other week, said she didn’t like them.”

“If you knew she didn’t like them, why did you do that?”

“I thought she’d scream Zac, chill.”

“No. I’m not going to just chill Mikey. You knew she didn’t like them and you never connected that she could be deathly afraid of them? She could have gotten seriously hurt when she fell over like that.”

“But she didn’t, back off. I didn’t know she’d react that way. You act like your fucking her already or something.”

“You need to back off, no more stupid ass pranks. We’re not here to try and scare people. We’re here to entertain people.”

I then left the room, he fucking knew she was afraid of them and did it anyway. That wasn’t simply trying to scare someone that was being a pure asshole, not even I was that bad!

“Zac?” Carrick asked.

“He knew before he ever came in with the spider, he knew. I just need to be away from him, I’m sorry but even if wasn’t her then I’d feel the same way. Pranks are one thing, but doing something intentional is wrong.”

“Austin and I will talk to him Zac, he should have known better and especially if he knew as well. She told me she didn’t like them, but she didn’t mention being that afraid of them. She literally passed out from fear, I’ve never seen that.”

“Yeah, I haven’t either but in your talk tell him no more spiders. I’d hate to replace the whole band because of him but we can’t have him doing stupid shit like that.”

“Understandable. Hah, Austin and I would just show up anyway.”

I smiled and nodded, then I went to find her, she was sitting at the drums on her phone, talking to one of the only two she does talk too, based on the conversation I could hear it was Max.

“No, I’m fine really. I told Taylor not to call you. They called the paramedic and they said I was fine. Really, I’m fine. My head not hurting and I feel okay.”

I paused, deciding to wait before I approach her. I mean, she was on the phone and when I was talking to people she didn’t interrupt me.

“What do you think it reminded me of Maxwell? He fucking threw a tarantula in my lap. It’s the same shit Jacob did because he fucking knew I was afraid of them. He did it just to be a dick. Mikey knew because I saw him when I was talking to Abby the other day.”

I blinked, I didn’t know who this Jacob guy was but I rather wanted to kick his ass. Apparently he’d done the same things to her with the spiders. That was a classic sign of a dickhead.

“I’m fine, really. Sure, it reminded me but unlike that hellhole, everyone here has kept an eye on me to make sure I’m okay. Ironically, I think Zac has been watching more than the others. It seems like every time I’ve looked around today he’s been there.”

Had I? I hadn’t noticed but given she seemed fine I did kind of back away, she was clearly okay. She wasn’t on the stage when we came back for the sound check but she was by the stage after we started, texting Abigail. I knew by the ring tone, digital get down by Nsync, it was still an odd ring tone for a female friend. I’d even looked up the whole song and well, it hadn’t helped me understand the choice.

But, I saw her glance up when I’d play and what did I try to do? Show off of course. I’d heard the ring tone so damn much I’d figured out some drum beats to it so when it played on her phone, I played along. The first few times Taylor and Isaac gave me weird looks, questioned the choice but the third time she looked up from her phone, clearly she’d heard it that time. The next time the message came in I played it again. She moved across the stage and stopped in front of the drums.

“What are you doing?”

“Playing.”

“Nsync? You can do better than that. ”

“It seems to be your favorite song.”

She got up on the platform and leaned over, fuck she’d done that totally on fucking purpose. She looked so hot in that position and the shirt was open just enough.

“It’s not my favorite song Zachary. It’s Abigail’s. You gotta try harder than that to find mine.”

She smiled at me and then got down, walking back to the side and she was clearly fine from her fall. I was far from fine because my pants had gotten a tighter and not in a good way, I had been able to clearly see down the top of her shirt to the soft looking pillows of cleavage and the black bra.

Thankfully, Tay interrupted the thoughts of sinking my teeth into those pillows and reminded me we needed to be working and practicing and not showing off.

The show itself that night went very well, no problems or hiccups and even during the acoustic I found that I wasn’t really looking for anyone to bring back, then again the person I wanted was already on the bus and she’d denied me twice already.

Truth was I was afraid to really find anyone right now, what if the same thing kept happening? Did I need to see a doctor or something about this because I was barely into my 20’s, I shouldn’t be experiencing problems in the sex department at all. Once everyone was packed, showered, and we were ready to roll I opted for the same stupid racing game. I was bound and determined to catch up with the person in first place. Of course there score was very high and I still hadn’t figured out exactly who the person was, the name said Skye but I hadn’t heard any of the crew members mention that name or anyone they knew. Gabby I’d never seen play any of them, I really wasn’t sure if she knew how to play. But, I was determined that by the end of the tour I would beat them. I just needed to play it until I could beat the races without…son of a bitch! I sighed, I’d wrecked again and Gabby who was reading yet again just giggled from the corner seat.

“You do drive better than that right? I mean you and I live in the same city and I want to know I’d be safe if we were on the road together.”

“Haha, funny.”

“I’m dead serious, Zachary.”

I kind of liked the way she said my whole name, kind of made me want to ask if she’d do that all the time. It just sounded so pleasant and made me feel…different.

“No. My driving is far better than this.”

“Are you sure? I mean you’re now driving the wrong way, which put you dead last, I mean even I know the race the other direction.”

Shit! Shit! Shit! This game was seriously going to kick my ass. I sighed and restarted the damn race. I’d been trying to beat the same one for a few days now.

“It’s your fault.”

“Not mine. But, since you’ve been stalking me all day is it safe for me to go to bed?”

“I have not been stalking you.”

I kept my eyes on the TV this time though.

“Yes you did. I saw you around me all day. But, thank you for not pushing the subject earlier and for saying something to Mikey. I don’t usually advertise my fears for that reason.”

I paused and looked at her. “You’re welcome. Mikey should have known better, pranks and jokes are okay but we don’t play around with things that people fear for that reason, we don’t know their level. If you ever want to talk about it, you know where I am.”

She got up and walked to the door, giggled. “Right below me, where you belong.”

She then walked out of the room and I blinked. Had she just…what the fuck?! Yep…I ran that car at 200 MPH straight into a wall, which was about how I felt with her comment. Surely she didn’t mean anything sexual about it, but I surely went to the gutter. Seeing as I was way too distracted to play I decided sleep might be better. Yet, my dreams were all of her.