Chapter 1 – The Next Kurt and Courtney
I stared at the two suitcases that lay open on my bedroom floor, both of them now unclosable due to the amount of clothes and other essentials stuffed inside them. I’d tried everything. I’d sat on them, pushed them, jumped on them, repacked them, and still they bulged at the seams. I had a weight limit to comply with which I was already way over, but the idea of taking anything out made me want to cry. A girl can’t go away for over a month without taking everything she needs.
One more try.
I rose to my knees and pushed hard on the freshly washed and ironed clothes in the suitcase in front of me, a burst of sweet cherry blossom dispersing in the air around me. Pressing one arm firmly on the contents, I used my other hand to flip the lid of the case over, quickly yanking my arm out then pushing down before everything sprang up again. I tugged at the zip, holding my breath in the hopes that this time I’d win the battle with my luggage, but again, it defeated me and I growled and leaned back against my bed, wiping beads of sweat from my forehead.
“Do you need a hand?”
I snapped my head towards the doorway where my sister stood, trying to conceal a smile at my struggle. Of course, she never had this problem. That girl was an expert at travelling light.
“Ellie, this is ridiculous! How am I supposed to fit everything in?”
She shook her head. “You can’t. You’ll have to suck it up and take out everything you don’t absolutely need.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t understand what you just said. I need everything.”
Chuckling, Ellie stepped over the case I’d just fought with and gestured for me to shuffle over so she could sit. She took a hairband from her wrist and pulled back her mane of dark hair; she was ready to get down to business. “I bet I can find at least ten things in this one suitcase you could live without.”
I raised an eyebrow at her challenge then extended my hand for her to shake. “Loser buys dinner.”
“Done.”
Over the next thirty minutes, Ellie was like a whirlwind, yanking everything out of my cases and inspecting each item, occasionally throwing out comments like, “Lucy, seriously? Ten bikinis? When do you think you’ll have time to wear them?” and, “A box of five spare phone chargers? You’re going to Europe and the US, not a third world country. You can buy replacements if you need them when you get there.”
As she sorted through my luggage, I leaned back against my bed, thinking about what was to come.
While many students spend the summer before going back to university at home, slaving away to earn some extra cash to get them through their second year, I was about t
o embark on the kind of adventure most music fans could only dream about.
Over the last year Razes Hell’s increasing popularity had landed them a number one single in the UK and a number one album in several countries. Now they were about to embark on a month-long tour that would take them to France, Germany, and many cities in the U.S.
What did this have to do with me? Well, as a journalism student at Sheffield University, I’d been offered a chance to go along on the tour as a sort of… summer project. The idea was for me to report on the tour, plus experience life on the road. Technically, the “project” had no real relevance to uni. I’d gain no special credit for anything I wrote on my travels but it would look cool on my CV. It was an incredible opportunity, one I couldn’t pass up, especially since I’d known most of the band for my whole life. I knew I’d be safe with them. It was a no risk, huge gain kind of holiday, and I couldn’t wait for the adventure to begin.
Well. When I say “no risk” that wasn’t the whole truth. There were risks. Not to my physical safety, but to the safety of my young, inexperienced heart which had tied itself to the band’s lead singer, Jason Brooks.
Yeah. I wasn’t alone. Every woman who’d ever seen him on stage and heard that husky, sexy voice had fantasised about him. But none of them knew him. Maybe I didn’t really know him either. He was Ellie’s best friend, not mine. But I liked what I knew. I liked his passion for music, and his strength for overcoming the cocaine addiction that had almost killed him a year ago. He’d changed since then. Still crazy and willing to do almost anything to please a crowd, but he’d tidied himself up in more ways than one. His trademark long, multi-coloured hair had been cut and it mostly stayed black. His physical change didn’t dampen the legions of horny fans – in fact – for some reason they seemed to like him more for it. Women go crazy for a clean cut guy with a dangerous sparkle in his eye. And… well, what girl doesn’t love a man with sexy stubble and a chiselled jaw?
“Luce?”
Ellie nudged me in the side, jolting me out of my thoughts before I got carried away – again – in fantasies that saw Jason and I becoming the next Kurt and Courtney.
“Huh?”
My big sister gave me a knowing smile but said nothing. Instead she nodded towards my suitcases which were now zipped up and no longer bulging at the seams. “I guess you owe me dinner.”
**
Ellie wasn’t really cruel enough to make me pay for dinner. Just as well, because that evening, my parents had booked a table at my favourite Italian (read: pizza) restaurant as a farewell thing before I left with the band in the morning. All around us happy families and groups of friends chattered, the sounds mingling in with the gentle clatter of cutlery on plates, and soft jazz music. As I sat at a table with my mum and dad, and Ellie and Drew, the atmosphere was kind of… weird. Everyone was talking and laughing, but an underlying tension lurked, as if I was about to embark on a trip I’d never return from. Perhaps I should have been more nervous, but my stomach only fizzed with the excitement and anticipation of doing something so wildly unique with a band whose music I could sing and rock out to in my sleep.
“Okay, seriously,” I said, after a long moment of awkward silence. “What the heck is wrong with everyone tonight?”
“Nothing,” Mum said quickly, forcing a smile. She tucked a stray strand of her shoulder-length blonde hair behind her ear then took a swig from her glass of wine. “Everything’s fine.”
“I know that, but you and Dad keep looking at me as if I’m never coming home again.”
Mum’s eyes swivelled towards Dad then back to me. “Don’t be silly, Lucy. We know you’re coming home again. We’re just going to miss you, that’s all.”
I didn’t buy it. I mean, I knew they’d miss me, but that wasn’t all. My mum had been acting like I was going to other side of the world, and my dad had been strangely quiet about the whole thing. For the past few weeks he kept throwing concerned glances at me, as if checking I was really sure about the travelling thing. I’d pointed out numerous times that our first stop was Paris for two nights, and if I hated it, I could hop on a boat, or the Eurostar, or a plane, and be home in no time. We didn’t leave for America for another nine days, so there would be plenty of chances for me to get home easily if I needed to, plus, Ellie would be joining us right before the American leg of the tour, so I wouldn’t even have to travel home alone if I decided not to go on the rest of the journey.
I lowered my eyes back to my plate, the meat feast pizza in front of me suddenly unappealing. I guess I’d reached that age. The one where you feel like an adult, but your parents still can’t let go. They hadn’t been quite this clingy when I left for uni, although I’d had an unnatural amount of phone calls from them for the first three months. This was a little different though. This was me being exposed to life on the road. I didn’t have the heart to tell them that university life was filled with the same kind of temptations. Sex, drugs, and partying all night were what the first year was all about for many students.
Drawing in a long, slow breath, knowing their eyes were still on me, I fixed a smile on my face that could have rivalled Mum’s for its fakeness.
“I’ll miss you too. But it’s not like we’ll really be apart. We can talk on the phone every day, or more if we want to. I can see you through the magic of Facetime or Skype anytime.”
“Yeah.” Ellie straightened up. “Lucy’s right. You’ll hardly even know she’s gone.”
“And we’ll take care of her,” Drew added, giving me a subtle wink across the table to let me know he wasn’t trying to patronise me, but to calm my parents. “She’ll be fine with us.”
“Nobody’s going to dare to mess with her when there’s a group of rockers protecting her.”
Mum nodded slowly, but Dad’s shoulders were still hunched. What I didn’t understand was, if they had such a problem with this, why didn’t they say so weeks ago? I’d gone to the effort of talking the trip through with them in the most grown-up way. I’d planned and considered, and I’d done everything a responsible person would do before making such a big decision. Okay, initially, I’d run around screaming in overexcited ecstasy, but then I did what I needed to do. We’d discussed what would happen if I needed to come home. We’d been over every worst case scenario we could imagine and agreed I could handle anything the trip might throw at me.
Maybe the reality for them was a bit different to the hypothetical.
“Mum, Dad, please. Don’t make this weird. Tonight is supposed to be fun and I can’t handle you two giving me those looks. I don’t want my memory of leaving to be of you being sad and me feeling like I’m letting you down by going away for the summer.”
Mum’s blue eyes softened. “You’re not letting us down. We’re proud of you for doing this, but we’re your parents so it’s only natural that we’re going to worry. We know you’ll be looked after, and this will be a great experience for you, but no matter how old you get you’ll always be our baby. We can’t help worrying. It’s our job.”