Barrett laughed loudly, the sound bouncing around the bus. “That’s a great idea. I’m going to have to steal it.” When I glanced over at her, she added, “I also bus with a few guys.”
“Oh sure. Feel free.”
“OK.” She clapped her hands together, as if she wanted to make sure we were all paying attention. “How about we go meet the guys? You can leave your bags here if you want to.”
My heart galloped like a racehorse. We’d met other bands over the last three years, but I’d also loved Courting Chaos basically since they’d hit the airwaves.
As we passed the crowd again on the way toward the venue, Barrett fell in step beside me.
“No argument over who gets the big bed in the back of the bus?” she asked me. My brothers weren’t paying us any attention.
“No,” I told her. “I’m the youngest, the baby, and the only girl. They always give it to me.”
Her eyebrows rose in surprise. “That’s about the opposite of how I was thinking it’d go.” She stopped to pull open the venue door for me to step through then slid in behind me. The sound of drums took my excitement to the next level.
I snorted. “Yeah, me too. But I really think they don’t want me to know what they’re doing when I’m in bed. Best way to do that is to keep me separate. So they give me an actual room I’ll want to stay in.” I glanced over at her and lowered my voice. “I still always know.”
Barrett giggled as she entered the dark area that I knew led to the stage, the floor marked with glow tape so no one would miss a step and fall. The music grew louder and now added to it were voices bickering back and forth. I knew that sound well, too.
“Or you could sing the fucking lines,” one of the distinctly male voices said.
Someone chuckled into the microphone and replied, “I like mine better.”
Finally, we stepped on stage, which meant I’d know who was saying what. But this was the huge stage we’d be performing on that very night. My heart rate ticked up and my chest swelled. This was our break.
“Why do we have to do this so often?” Cross asked as he sat behind his drum kit.
He looked the same as when I’d seen them last year. Muscular, tall but we couldn’t see it because he was sitting. His hair was kept short and neat and his tattoos roped down one arm. The way he held his drumsticks, I knew they were an extension of his hands. It was like that with my violin.
Hot. Of course. They were all hot.
Ransom laughed. “Because you guys like to give me shit. If one of you would rather sing, have at it.”
Ransom had dark hair but it was a little floppy now compared to when I saw them in concert. And he was taller than he’d looked on stage. Of course, I didn’t have very good seats for that show.
The other three guys groaned, but I couldn’t help my smile. They sounded exactly like my brothers and me, though none of them gave me shit about singing. It was the bickering back and forth that felt familiar.
Booker, their bass player was maybe the tallest of them all. With long, lean muscles, dark brown hair and an armful of tattoos, I’d read he was also the quietest of the group. Suppose I’d find out on the tour.
Then there was Dixon. Looking at him caused this nervous tickle low in my belly. Not because I wanted him. No. He had a girlfriend anyway but he was the hottest of them all as far as I was concerned and I may have had a crush on him at one point. He had the darkest hair of the four guys and the kindest brown eyes. Again, all of this was opinion.
“Do any of you realize you have an audience?” a fifth man, not part of the band, asked as he strode out of the darkness in a white dress shirt and dress pants, sleeves rolled up like he was really getting to work at something.
My dad did that sometimes when he’d been at his practice too long or had a lot of patients left to see. Dad was an internist and he never left the office until the job was done. This man’s dark hair was short on the sides and the back but longer and wispy on top. The beard brushing his jaw looked more like he just hadn’t shaved in a couple of days than that of a person seriously growing a beard.
I didn’t know who this guy was, but stupid hot came to mind.
The four members of Courting Chaos all turned to us at the same time.
“Come on,” Barrett said quietly as she strode out onto the stage.
We did as she’d instructed, but after the third step, the bottom of my shoe caught and I stumbled and like the complete dork that I am, I tripped over my own feet. The only positive to this was that I didn’t fall flat on my face.
That was when I got my first proper glimpse at the size of the arena, it wasn’t only my stride that faltered. My breath caught in my throat and as much as I may have tried to hide it, this… this was a like a dream come true and the excitement of it all gave me an extra energy that I had nothing to do with.
“Hey, guys,” Barrett called all of their attention to her. “If you can refrain from bickering like a bunch of little girls for five seconds, you could meet your new opening act. Pushing Daisies.”
Cross came out from behind his kit while the other guys made their way toward us. At the same time, we moved farther out onto the stage that was about to become like a second home to us.
Barrett quickly went through Courting Chaos’ roster, as if we didn’t already know.
Mack took over for us. “I’m Mack, their manager. These are my brothers, Daltrey, guitar; Van Zant, bass; Bonham, drums; and our little sister Daisy, lead singer.”
I rolled my eyes so hard, it almost hurt. “You know,” I began, “‘sister’ works fine all on its own.”
Mack scrunched his eyebrows down like we hadn’t had this conversation a million times in my lifetime. “But you’re our little sister.”
“And you are pretty little,” Dixon agreed.
I just shook my head at the lot of them. I was twenty-one. Of age, as they say. Would I ever not be their little sister? My brothers chuckled around me which probably meant I never would be. I went through high school as Bonham and Van Thompson’s little sister. As if I didn’t have my own name.
“You know,” Van said, cutting in, “she still has a poster of Dixon on her bedroom wall at home.” The guys of Courting Chaos snickered, but the sound made it clear that they were trying not to.
My eyes widened as I turned to him. “What. In. The. Hell?” My teeth clenched so hard, my jaw ached. “Why would you tell him that?”
Van shrugged with a shit-eating grin on his stupid face. “Because you do.”
“It’s still on the wall because I moved out. Mom didn’t take it down.”
“You moved rooms,” he countered. “You didn’t leave the house.”
“I moved to the side house. It’s a completely different space.” I sighed. This wasn’t going to work. “You’re all dead to me.”
“See, Barrett?” Dixon said as he pulled her over to him and my heart dropped. I’d read Dixon had a girlfriend, they all did, but didn’t pay much attention to the name. It was a little crush. Totally normal. Now depending on how Barrett reacted, I might’ve lost my opportunity for female companionship on this tour. “Maybe you should put a poster of me on your wall.”