Never in a million years did I think I’d be prepping for an eight-month-long tour to sold out crowds upward of twenty thousand people. I hoped for it. Oh man, did I hope for it. But it was one of those things that seemed too impossible to ever really happen.
And yet, here we are. The details are finalized, and Robbie’s buzzing around the room like a ball of energy gearing up to get everything ready. I sometimes imagine that he’d probably be a really successful CEO of some Fortune 500 company if he hadn’t gotten swept up in our band stuff. I’ll never tell him that though. We couldn’t afford to lose him.
“Anyone want anything to eat? I’ll make us some lunch,” Robbie offers as he heads toward my kitchen while the rest of us stay in the living room. Everyone nods or mumbles, all of us lost in our own thoughts.
Kasen’s texting on his phone, probably setting up his next party, but will no doubt be joking with Robbie again soon. I swear those two could be the next Abbott and Costello. If Robbie was ever on the hunt for a new best friend, I’m sure Kasen would be first in line. Miles sits next to him, drumming his hands on his legs to the beat of one of our songs while he talks about the Prince Albert piercing he just got. Personally, I’d rather hear about his kinky sex life than his dick piercing, but maybe that’s just me since none of the other guys are saying anything.
Tristan is sitting in the corner, writing in the notebook he uses for lyrics. His gaze darts around the room, occasionally lingering on Jolie where she sits on the couch, her laptop on her lap, editing images of our last band shoot. She’ll be our tour photographer and always posts on our social media for us.
My fingers absently strum the guitar in my hands as my mind swirls with how far we’ve come and all the ways we’ve changed since those teenaged boys with big dreams. Somehow along the way, I got deemed the responsible one. I suppose I am now, but it wasn’t always that way. When the band first started up, I was your stereotypical rock star. It was easy to get sucked into the crazy life—women, alcohol, parties. I never did drugs; after my mom died, I swore I’d never touch them and I haven’t. But I lived hard for that first year or two that we were really hitting it big. We all did.
But then Kasen nearly overdosed and that was a huge wake-up call for me, for all of us really. We decided to chill out for a while, and within a few weeks, all our so-called friends completely disappeared. That was when I realized how fake all of it was. People just wanted a piece of us because we were topping the charts. They didn’t really care about any of us. I wasn’t the only one who noticed the disappearing act, and apart from Kasen, we all agreed to only rely on each other.
That’s when I fully embraced my role as caretaker and papa bear of the band.
Since then, I’ve become the de facto responsible one who keeps the family in line. Miles is the long-haired drummer who is chill and fun and always down to smoke a joint if it’s offered. Kasen is the tatted-up party boy who plays as hard as he rocks out on his bass. And Tristan is the stoic playboy while he secretly pines for the woman he can never have.
Sometimes being the papa bear is fucking exhausting. Besides watching over Miles, Kasen, and Tristan, I also work with Robbie on the band management side. He doesn’t really need my help, but I like knowing what’s going on, and Robbie doesn’t mind. He’s as dedicated to the band as the rest of us, and I’m endlessly thankful that Tristan brought him into our life.
I glance over at my brother again to see him discreetly watching Jolie who’s now in the kitchen wrapping a Band-Aid around Robbie’s finger. That guy is the most accident-prone person I’ve ever met, but he’s also one of the happiest and nicest guys in the world. He never has a bad thing to say about anyone and can defuse a bad situation in sixty seconds flat. He’s also as loyal as they come and has been like a second brother to me since he and Tris were in kindergarten.
I wish my brother was just watching Robbie as he gets fixed up from slicing his finger with a knife while he was trying to cook something, but I know his gaze is solely focused on the redhead laughing as she stands between Robbie’s legs.
I glance at Miles, who’s now surfing through the hundreds of channels on my TV, and then lean over and whisper to Tristan, “You need to move on.”
He doesn’t even bother to deny it. “I will.”
He won’t. He's been in love with Jolie since the very moment he laid eyes on her. But his best friend got to her first. When he saw how happy she was with Robbie, he stepped back. That’s why he’s never had a serious relationship, or any relationship that wasn’t just sex. That’s the reason he’s embraced his life as a bachelor playboy even though he’s only twenty-four.
I’m pretty sure my baby brother will love her until the day he dies, which breaks my heart because no one knows my brother like I do.
He’s got so much love inside of him, even after all the shit we went through as kids. And I know for a fact, if he could just let Jolie go, he’d be able to find someone who he can finally share all of that love with instead of living an unfulfilled life with just one-night stands. That might be the dream for some guys, but I know it’s not enough for Tristan. It’s just what he settles for.
“I gotta pee,” Kasen says, standing up dramatically.
“Thanks for sharing,” I reply as he walks away.
Settling on The Big Lebowski, Miles sets the remote on my coffee table, glances down the hall toward where Kasen disappeared, and then pierces me with his brown gaze. “I’m worried about Kase.”
That catches my attention. “Why? Did something happen?”
He rubs his short beard. “I thought I saw Charli at that party we went to in Malibu the other night.”
My blood runs cold. “Charli? I thought she moved to Miami.”
Two years ago, Kasen almost overdosed on drugs supplied by Charli, the girl he’d been seeing at the time. She’s a party girl who’s become famous—or infamous—for supplying the highest quality goods. She’s connected to all the best hot spots and hooked Kasen the first time we partied with her back in the day. He thought he loved her, but I knew he didn’t. He was too consumed with the drugs, the rush and high she provided him. But that’s literally the only thing he knows about her. Charli is a chameleon. She becomes whatever you want her to be. She’s anything but real, but Kasen’s always been too high to realize that he’s enamored with a woman who’s put him on a one-way path to destruction. After his almost overdose, he promised us he’d stop seeing her.
Out of everyone in our band family, Kasen is the one I’m the most worried about.
“So did I, but I swore it was her. Her hair’s blonde now and she’s thinner than I remember, but drugs will do that to you.”
“Did Kase see her?”
Miles lifts his hands in a who knows gesture. “I didn’t see them together, but if I saw her, he could have.”
“And you’re sure it was her?”
“Not one hundred percent, but I’m pretty sure.”
“Well, I guess it’s a good thing we’re leaving for tour soon. He can’t hang out with her if we aren’t here, but I definitely want to keep an eye on him. I don’t know that there’s anything we can do until we confirm there’s a problem. I haven’t noticed him acting like he did when he was partying with her before.” I look over at my brother. “How’s he been with you?”
“His usual self. He hasn’t mentioned Charli at all.”
“That’s what worries me,” Miles says. “He knows we don’t like her or how she gave him bad shit and then left him in that seedy motel.” He looks at me. “I don’t think he’ll say anything if he’s seeing her again. I think we need to just be extra observant and look for the signs. If he’s using again, I want to catch him early and get him the help he needs.”
Miles takes a puff from his vape pen that he uses to smoke weed—all the high, but none of the smell. I look over to Tristan to see him taking a sip of his beer. He never drinks more than two—neither of us do—but we aren’t exactly saints either.
“Maybe we need to have a clean tour.”
“What do you mean?” Miles asks.
“I mean no drugs, no alcohol. We all know it’s a slippery slope. Maybe Kasen has a few beers and then smokes a little weed, but how long before that’s not enough for him anymore and he goes back to pills or cocaine? Or worse? But if we stay clean and sober maybe that’ll help him.”
“He’s still gonna go to parties,” Tristan points out.
“Probably. We can’t stop him, but we can go with him and keep an eye on him. Look out for him,” I say.
Miles rubs his bearded chin. “Weed helps with my anxiety, but I suppose I could try not using it for this tour.”
“If it gets too bad, let me know and we’ll figure out something else. I was just thinking this could be a way to minimize his temptations,” I say.
“It’s a good idea. I’m in. Whatever it takes to make sure Kasen stays clean, I’m all for it,” Miles says.
Tristan nods in agreement just as the bathroom door swings open and Kasen wanders back out to my living room.
“Let’s go practice while Robbie makes lunch. We can talk more tour details later,” Kase says, completely unaware of what we were just discussing.
Miles grabs his sticks, Kasen picks up his bass, and Tristan grabs his guitar from his room, since we live here together. We all meet in the studio, which is a room I converted when I bought the house. Before long, we’re lost to the music, and as I sing into my microphone, I feel a peace settle over me that only comes when I’m singing. The music wraps around us, and it feels more like home than any physical place ever has.