[ chapter 14 ]

Worry and doubt and fear and guilt had completely taken over my mind during the awkward and silent ride to the hotel. I just couldn’t get my mind to stop thinking even though I was exhausted. Even Cayden couldn’t put my mind at ease this time, but it wasn’t by lack of trying. He sat by me for a couple of hours to try and calm me down by talking to me and letting me rant to him and by holding me, which all helped a little, but it wasn’t enough. Eventually I told him to just go to sleep, since there was no point in both of us staying awake and I could tell he was tired. He agreed, but sat with me another thirty minutes before he slipped beneath his covers and fell asleep.

Not long after that I crawled beneath my own covers and lay in the dark watching him and listening to his breathing, which slowly turned into a soft snore. The sound was incredibly calming and though I was still worried, I eventually fell asleep. Or I must’ve because the next thing I knew was being violently awoken by the sound of Cayden’s alarm which was ridiculously loud and annoying.

“When are you finally going to change that?” I asked with a groan as I pulled my pillow over my head and pressed it against my ears pointedly until he turned it off.

“When I get bored of it.” He answered. “Which is probably never.”

“I really don’t like you.” I muttered as I turned from my stomach to my back and removed the pillow from my face.

“Didn’t your momma teach you not to lie?” He asked with a mocked southern accent to the word ‘momma’.

I groaned and sat up. “Let’s not talk about my family right now. I’m actually feeling not all that worried and I’d like to keep it that way. For a while at least.” I said and I really did feel less worried. Those couple of hours of sleep had really helped to put my mind at ease a bit, though it had done nothing to relieve me of my exhaustion because I still felt tired, but I was used to that.

“Maybe it’ll be better today.” Cayden said with a shrug. “If you can feel less worried by sleeping, Tay might feel less. Whatever too.”

“I don’t think so. He’s too much like mom. I’m like dad. We can totally forget about a fight after a night of sleep, but mom and Tay aren’t like that. They still get up angry in the morning and they’re sure to remind you of that. They really know how to burn down a good mood. It’s really annoying.” I said and sighed just thinking about it. “Please tell me you’re not like that too.” I asked as I looked at Cayden almost desperately.

He laughed. “I’m not. I’m usually fine after taking a long relaxing shower, unless it’s a really bad fight. It might take some sleep then.”

“I can totally live with that.” I said and got up to press a kiss against his lips.

He smiled. “Morning.” He mumbled and kissed me again.

“Hi.” I said with a starting grin as my lips left his.

“You still look incredibly sleepy.” He stated with a smile of his own and I rubbed both my hands over my face in response.

“I still feel incredibly sleepy too.”

“Do you want to shower first then?” He asked.

“No, it’s fine. You go.”

“Sure?”

“Yeah.” I said with a nod and kissed him again before he grabbed his things and moved into the bathroom. I grabbed my I-pod from my bag and let myself drop back onto the bed. I turned my music player on and popped the earplugs into my ears. The volume was much louder than necessary and it was probably bad for my hearing, but I was sure years of drumming had already ruined that anyway. Right now the distraction the loud music offered was more important than the ability to hear in the future.

I had my eyes closed and I was startled when I suddenly felt a push against my foot. I opened my eyes and saw Cayden walk to his bag, still shirtless. I’m sure he was doing it on purpose, because he knew I loved to watch him like that, especially with the wild state his hair was in by towel drying it.

I smiled as I sat up and switched off my I-pod and dropped it on the bed besides me. I stared at him for a couple of seconds before I got up and walked to my bag to grab the things I needed for my shower. Of course I couldn’t resist pressing a kiss in his neck and taking in a deep breath of his scent as I walked by him to disappear into the bathroom.

After a long and relaxing shower I slipped in some boxers, shaved and then got completely dressed. I pulled a comb through my hair, only to mess it up again after that and then walked out to find Cayden sprawled out on his bed with my I-pod with the music still blearing loudly. I laughed softly and then pushed one of his feet as I walked by him which startled him too, which I thought was only fair, but made him swat my butt anyway.

We both packed our bags and I then checked the room for forgotten items before my lips locked with his in a bunch of kisses that were supposed to make up for all the ones we would be missing during the rest of the day. We usually repeated this as soon as we stepped inside of a hotel room at night. It was real torture not to be intimate with him during the day, because I really liked the physical attention, even if it was only holding hands. I knew I would miss it even more today than I did usually, because this whole thing with Taylor only made me want to be closer to Cayden, but that was just not a possibility since it would possibly freak Taylor out even more.

“I don’t want to go.” I said in a pathetic whisper.

“I know. I don’t particularly want to go either, but we don’t have much of a choice anyway. Just give him some space and time. It’ll probably be fine.” Cayden said positively.

“You don’t know that for sure.” I responded quietly.

“I know.” He said. “But it can’t hurt to think positive.”

“I guess.” I said with a sigh, though I wasn’t sure if I agreed. If I believed it would all be okay somehow and it didn’t turn out that way after all it would only hurt more, but if I didn’t think it would be okay to begin with and it turned out okay anyway it would feel great and if not, than I wouldn’t be extra hurt either.

“C’mon, let’s just go and get it over with.” Cayden said and I nodded, but didn’t let him go until I had had a last kiss.

We were the last to arrive for breakfast, but it didn’t look like we had missed much since everyone was munching on his own food in complete silence in contrast to the usual talkative breakfasts which, more often than not, made me want to cover my ears because it was just too early in the morning for that much conversation. Today I missed it though, because the silence was absolutely horrible. Even Charlie and Jacob were quiet though they didn’t even know what was going on, but they had obviously realized something was wrong.

My stomach felt like it was tied in a knot, kind of like the first week Cayden had been with us, only this time it didn’t feel good like it had done then. I didn’t eat much because of it and just pushed my food around on my plate a bit and took an occasional small bite that I took my time chewing before I took a sip of my milk to swallow it down completely. Cayden shot me a concerned look from across the table and I gave him a small smile in return to convince him I was fine even though I wasn’t, which he knew too.

After breakfast we split up; my brothers and I had interviews and Charlie went along like he always did to make sure everything was okay so we wouldn’t have to worry about that kind of stuff, which was nice. Cayden and Jacob, on the other hand, went to get some groceries for on the bus since we had a long drive ahead of us after we played our second show in Washington tonight. We had run out of food, snacks and drinks and we also needed some new guitar picks and drumsticks since we were running out on those by throwing them into the crowd or by simply losing them elsewhere.

I had much rather gone with Cayden and Jacob because being squashed in the backseat with Isaac and Taylor wasn’t particularly where I wanted to be right now. Isaac had cleverly sat down in between us, but Taylor still sat pressed up against the door as much as he could and was making a point by staring out the window and ignoring Charlie when he asked him if he was all right. He didn’t respond to Isaac either and I didn’t even bother trying to get him to talk, because I was very likely to get the same response or one that involved a lot of screaming and neither was particularly appealing.

Before we arrived at the studio we got another lecture by Charlie about trying to act normal during the interviews today and he took another shot at prying something out of us, but we all staid quiet, which caused him to repeat half of his previous speech until we all nodded agreeingly. He didn’t seem all too convinced that we would try, but neither were we so I couldn’t blame him.

I was kind of surprised when Taylor did open his mouth during the interview and not just for a couple of hums or yeahs, but to actually talk about the music and the tour. The simple fact that he talked made Isaac and I relax a bit too and we just talked to the host for a while, though it was still different from our usual interviews. Isaac and I weren’t joking around and we didn’t even dare and interrupt each other while talking which we normally did every ten seconds or so. There was still a tension, but at least we were talking and I thought that was good enough for now, especially with the way Taylor had been in the car.

Unfortunately his talkative mood didn’t last once the interview was done. He turned right back into his quiet, moping and pathetic state and didn’t say another word during the drive to the radio station we had to go to next.

It went like that during the three other interviews we had that day too. He’d talk while we were on air, but after that he wouldn’t say another word to anyone. Charlie was utterly confused and to be honest, so was I. I couldn’t understand how he could switch that easily and it somewhat scared me that he could too, but at the same time I considered it a good thing, because the less different we acted, the less the fans would notice.

He talked normally to them too and signed everything they pushed into his hands and he smiled politely at the things they said to him. If you didn’t know any better you would say nothing was wrong at all. Except I did know better and I noticed how he stayed as far away from me as possible. When I was signing on the right side, he would be signing on the left and the other way around. There was no meeting in the middle like usual and it hurt, but I didn’t let anyone notice and just plastered a smile on my face and hoped it was a believable one.

My cheeks had started to hurt from smiling so much and for about a second I was relieved to be done signing, but then I realized the sound check was up next and my mood dropped again. Taylor was back to his unusually quiet self too and that didn’t promise much goods.

Sound check was indeed a living hell. It was much like the day before, only worse and I hadn’t thought that that would be possible. We barely communicated or argued and just went through it like it was a chore, instead of something we did for our own pleasure. That was why Isaac and I were only remotely happy with the sound as we called it quits, because we both knew it wouldn’t get any better than this with the way Taylor was acting anyway.

The lousy sound check gave us a bad start at the show too. We were all on an edge and it didn’t make playing any more fun. I was scared of screwing up my beat, because Taylor always hated it when that happened and I didn’t want to piss him off any more, though I wasn’t even sure if he would even yell at me for it right now or just ignore me more. I almost felt as if a gun was pointed to my head that would go off if I screwed up by missing a beat or a note or a line of the lyrics and it didn’t make playing any more comfortable or fun. The only thing that made up for the whole struggle of being on stage were the fans who were having a blast and clapped and danced and sang along to the music and didn’t seem to notice anything of the charade we were putting on. It was like I was a freaking actor and singer at the same time and those two really didn’t go together well.

It didn’t get better after that, because we had a long drive ahead of us which meant I had no opportunity to talk to Cayden alone, let alone kiss him or hug him or something. As an alternative I crawled in my bunk after a quick snack, since I was a little hungry by not eating much all day, and pulled the covers all the way up my body and curled in to a more comfortable position as I texted back and forth with Kelsey for a while. I had much rather called her, but I didn’t because it was extremely quiet inside of the bus since everyone was either asleep or doing something that made practically no noise so others could sleep and I didn’t need everyone to overhear the entire conversation.

Texting her made me feel a bit better since she still knew what to say to distract me and even to make me laugh softly. I was a little disappointed when she finally texted she was going to go to sleep, but I couldn’t blame her since it was a school night for her and I had already kept her up late enough. I sent her a last goodbye and then switched off my phone and eventually fell asleep with the hope it would all be over tomorrow.

Of course, it wasn’t all over the next day or the next week for that matter. Taylor kept ignoring me and Cayden completely, though he opened up a bit to everyone else. During interviews and when he was with the fans you still wouldn’t say something was wrong, but he didn’t talk to me then either and I didn’t even bother to try and talk to him at those moments, because it would surely raise questions if he ignored me in front of the fans. It raised more questions within Charlie and Jacob too, but they didn’t speak them out loud since none of us would give a response to them anyway.

Isaac had a bunch of questions of his own too. He wanted to know everything that had been going on lately and I didn’t mind telling him, because it was nice that he showed this kind of interest. I also knew he needed to know these things to piece it all together in his mind and to have some sort of peace with it. Knowing things made him feel more comfortable with it. It had always worked like that for him, while Taylor was the one that ran away from dealing with stuff he didn’t want to deal with. I hung somewhere in between that. I liked to know certain things too, but sometimes I was completely satisfied with not knowing.

Isaac, however, asked me basically everything there was to ask. He asked whether Cayden had told me that he was gay or if I had figured it out, or the other way around, which both wasn’t exactly the case and I told him that. He wanted to know if the weird way I had behaved around Cayden the first weeks he had been with us had anything to do with the way I felt for him or if I had just disliked him because he wasn’t Kent, like he and Taylor had told him. He asked me what I felt when I was around him, which made me blush slightly when I told him, because I felt silly as I described it to him because I sounded like some sort of love struck teenager, which I was, but still. He even ended up asking whether or not we had sex already which really caused me to turn as red as a tomato, because that was about the last question I had expected. I wasn’t sure whether he would’ve wanted to know the truth if we had had sex already, but we hadn’t and I told him that with a reminder that we’d only been together for three weeks and that I wasn’t ready for something as big as that yet. He laughed to that and seemed satisfied with my answers and went to find Taylor for yet another dreadful sound check. There really wasn’t any improvement and I started to believe that even the fans had noticed by now.

It had been ten days since I had told him and I was getting completely fed up with the way he acted around us. I wouldn’t even care anymore if he would yell at me or Cayden for hours as long as he’d say something - anything. I just wanted him to fucking deal with it already or just own up to the fact that he hated me and didn’t want to have anything to do with me anymore. Of course that would hurt like hell, but right now it seemed better than this ongoing silence and ignoring. He didn’t even acknowledge me when I entered a room and I was so done with it. I was done with giving him time and space, because it didn’t help one bit since not a thing had changed in the past ten days except my growing anger and annoyance towards him. I was completely and utterly ready to burst.