Walls
Stay Gone
The rest of the day I tried to spend as much time as possible by myself, just mentally preparing myself for what was to come the next few months.
I had all loose ends tied up in the city, so I wasn’t sure why I was so nervous about leaving. I honestly didn’t have anything holding me back from travelling the world like I had always wanted. Maybe it was because I had always wanted to travel the world with my sister and I was just having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that I was going to have to fulfill my dreams without her by my side.
After the show, it was time to go to the hotel rooms for an early night because the band had to get up early for a day full of press. All the All Time Low band and crew had a shared suite, which apparently was a rare occasion judging by the fact that Jack and Rian were geeking out over the fact that there was more than one TV available to them.
Despite that entertaining moment, I was the only girl in the suite of twelve guys, God help me.
Considering the only people who had to get up ridiculously early tomorrow was the band and Matt, they were also the only ones who were settling down for the night.
It was only half past midnight and Danny and Vinny were already having a drunken heart to heart across the main room of the suite.
I looked down at the beer in my hand cursing myself for turning down Alex’s offer to take the couch so that I could have a bed. Instead I had to wait for everybody to go to their rooms before I could even think of attempting to fall asleep.
Around two I got sick of just sitting on the couch quietly sipping on my beer while everyone else was far past hammered so I grabbed my keycard and jacket and walked out of the hotel room.
Exploring the hotel, I eventually made my way up to the roof of the building overlooking Times Square. Although I had lived in the city for over a year, the fact that Times Square could still be just as crowded at two thirty in the morning as it was in the middle of the day absolutely amazed me.
I was perfectly content with people watching from a hundred stories above and sipping on my beer in the crisp New York early November air. My thoughts were silent for once; whether that was due to the alcohol flowing through my blood stream or simply exhaustion I couldn’t be sure.
I heard the door to the building open and my head whipped around, the serenity I had been in disrupted and gone. My heart beat slowed a little when I realized it was just Zack, not some creepy stranger.
“Hey, what are you doing out here this late?” His quiet voice asked as he walked to the edge of the building and leaning against the railing, mimicking my position.
“I could ask you the same thing,” I responded, tilting my head back to get the last few drops of beer in my red cup.
“Fair enough,” he responded, “I just couldn’t sleep.”
“I guess I could say the same thing,” I smirked as I placed the empty cup by my feet and returned my attention back to the people down below.
He let a breathy laugh out before it was silent for a few moments as both of our attention was focused on the city life down below.
“Well I think Vinny and Danny were about to pass out when I saw them, and the others didn’t look too far behind them if you wanted to go catch some sleep.”
Shrugging, I turned to look at him, fiddling with the phone in his hand.
“I guess I should. But I better get used to this whole no sleep thing.”
“You live in New York City, you can’t tell me you’re used to a full night’s sleep every night.” He shook his head and laughed awkwardly.
“You’d be surprised,” I informed him as I pushed myself off of the railing and bent down to pick up the empty cup. “I’ll leave you alone now so you can call your girlfriend, or whoever you came up here to talk to,” I told him, smirking as I began to walk toward the door.
Zack looked absolutely dumbstruck before he finally got the words out of his mouth “How did you know I was going to,” He trailed off.
“I guess I’m just good at reading people,” I smirked before shutting the door behind me and beginning the trek back to the hotel suite.
The late night conversation on the roof of a hotel in the middle of New York City was endearingly awkward, and I felt comfortable around Zack almost immediately. He didn’t pry, didn’t question much, and just kind of accepted the silence; just like me. I could honestly see him becoming a good friend on this tour out of just this one conversation in the middle of the night.
I got back to the room and laid down on the couch and fell asleep with the rare optimistic thought that maybe this tour won’t be absolutely terrible if I could find little escape places like hotel roofs to be alone.
The next morning I woke up around ten to find the band and Matt gone and the few members of the crew that were actually awake looking extremely hungover.
I walked into one of the bathrooms to take a shower got dressed in leggings, combat boots, and a cardigan before applying some make up and leaving my long hair to dry on its own.
Matt had told me last night that today the crew was just preparing for tour considering the two New York shows were the kick off and they’d been living in the hotel for the past week, so the bus wasn’t exactly ready.
Colussy stumbled out of his room, phone glued to his ear; I could clearly hear yelling from the other side as he made a beeline to the counter where the Advil bottle was located.
Trying to keep to my own business, I stuffed my pajamas and toiletries into my suitcase and tried to get my stuff together and organized.
“Braedynne!” I slowly turned at the sound of my name being called; finding that it was Colussy who looked as if the greatest idea known to man had just hit him.
“Yes?” I asked hesitantly.
“Since you’re the only one not hungover, would you mind going shopping for food? I’ll give you money!” He said, waving his wallet in the air for emphasis.
“Okay,” I said hesitantly, slightly taken aback by his enthusiasm.
“Great, here’s three hundred bucks, just get stuff for the week,” He said, forcing the money into my hand as he turned his attention back to his phone conversation with who I have now determined to be Matt.
I grabbed my wallet, phone, and room key and headed out; still not completely clear on what exactly
I was supposed to be buying but thankful to be alone.
The elevator opened and I found no other than Zack, Rian, Alex, Jack, and Matt in it; Matt still on the phone.
“Hey Braedynne,” Zack said as he shot me a smile before walking past me towards the hotel suite.
Jack just nodded in my direction before he walked, well, more like dragged his feet in the direction Zack had gone, and Rian smiled in my direction before taking a big gulp of his Starbucks as of it was his lifeline.
“Hey, where are you headed?” Alex asked me, seeming to be the only one out of the four of them to be fully awake.
“Just headed to get food for the bus,” I answered, shooting a smile in his direction as I stepped on the elevator.
“Oh, I’ll go with you. Did Colussy give you money?” Alex spoke as he did a one eighty turn back onto the elevator.
“Yeah, uh, don’t you have a press day or something?” I asked as I pressed the lobby button when it was clear that Alex wasn’t going to leave.
“Yeah, but I’m done now, Jack and Rian have an interview and then Rian has to do a thing with SLJ drums and Jack has a photo shoot for his clothing line, but I’m done,” He explained.
“Won’t Matt be mad? He looked kind of irritated a few minutes ago,” I pointed out, trying to get him to
leave, but deep down wanting him to stay with me.
“He’ll get over it; he’s always irritated during press days. They suck.”
“Oh, well, what was wrong with Jack? He didn’t seem quite so hyper this morning.” I questioned, curious as to why the boy hadn’t been practically bouncing off the walls a few moments ago.
“Flyzik’s on his man period and wouldn’t let him have any caffeine after yesterday,” Alex explained.
I had to laugh at the idea of a grown man getting treated as a child and Alex’s accurate description of Matt’s attitude this morning.
We got off the elevator and began to walk down the street in search of a grocery store.
The city streets were crowded as always, and the sky was gray and looked as if it was about to open up and start pouring rain any moment now.
“It looks like it’s about to rain, we better hurry,” Alex stated as he took notice to the same thing I did.
“There’s a grocery store right there,” I pointed out as I changed direction of where I was walking.
Alex walked ahead of me, side stepping the crowd around him. He was walking so fast that I had to jog to catch up to him as we entered the store.
“Why are you in such a hurry? We have three hours until bus call,” I asked as he grabbed a cart.
“It’s gonna rain,” he said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
“So,” I drawled out, confused to why that would matter.
“So, if we get caught in it, we don’t have an umbrella,” he stated, reaching for a loaf of bread.
“It’s not that big of a deal, a little rain never hurt anyone,” I pointed out, confused to why the idea of rain made his hurry so much.
“You’re a girl, aren’t you supposed to be worried about your hair or make up or something?” He asked, changing subjects.
“When you’re from a town that gets rain pretty much every night, you get used to it.” I replied honestly.
“I guess that’s true.” He stated before a thought came to him. “How often do you visit back home?”
He asked, seemingly genuinely curious.
“Never,” I replied honestly, surprising myself.
“Don’t you miss your hometown though?” He asked as we walked to the sandwich meat aisle.
“I guess sometimes it wouldn’t hurt to get away from all the craziness of the city, and go back to the small town life,” I replied honestly, though still not directly answering his question.
I was so comfortable around Alex after only knowing him for a short period of time, and it scared me.
I knew from past experience that I shouldn’t trust not only him, but anyone; but I still had this gut feeling that I could talk to him and that I could trust him.
“Well why don’t you? You said you had a sister right, just go visit her when the craziness is too much,” He said, acting as if it was the simplest solution in the world.
“It’s not that easy,” I said, not liking where the conversation was headed.
“What’s so difficult about it?” Alex asked me as we got in line for the cashier, our cart now full. He turned his head to look at me, noting the tears welling up in my eyes.
“Hey, Brae, what’s wrong?” He asked, turning his attention on me, concern evident in his eyes.
I just shook my head and looked down at my shoes, hating when I teared up. I hadn’t cried since the night Bobbi died, but I definitely teared up at the mention of her every once and a while.
I felt arms wrap tight around me, and I came to realize they were Alex’s.
Surprising myself, I lifted my arms to hug him back.
This hug was different than Jack’s. Jack’s was forced and fast, while Alex’s was just letting me know that he was there. He would listen; he was hugging me in the middle of a grocery store in the middle of the city as an attempt to prevent the tears from falling.
He didn’t ask any questions, just stood there holding me as an attempt to calm me down. He barely knew me, why did he even care?
I realized that it didn’t matter why, what mattered was that he was there.
Yet, even with that realization, I still couldn’t bring myself to tell him anything too personal. So instead of explaining why it was so difficult, I stepped away from the hug, put a smile on my face, and pushed the cart up to the cashier, praying that Alex wouldn’t bring it up again.
I had all loose ends tied up in the city, so I wasn’t sure why I was so nervous about leaving. I honestly didn’t have anything holding me back from travelling the world like I had always wanted. Maybe it was because I had always wanted to travel the world with my sister and I was just having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that I was going to have to fulfill my dreams without her by my side.
After the show, it was time to go to the hotel rooms for an early night because the band had to get up early for a day full of press. All the All Time Low band and crew had a shared suite, which apparently was a rare occasion judging by the fact that Jack and Rian were geeking out over the fact that there was more than one TV available to them.
Despite that entertaining moment, I was the only girl in the suite of twelve guys, God help me.
Considering the only people who had to get up ridiculously early tomorrow was the band and Matt, they were also the only ones who were settling down for the night.
It was only half past midnight and Danny and Vinny were already having a drunken heart to heart across the main room of the suite.
I looked down at the beer in my hand cursing myself for turning down Alex’s offer to take the couch so that I could have a bed. Instead I had to wait for everybody to go to their rooms before I could even think of attempting to fall asleep.
Around two I got sick of just sitting on the couch quietly sipping on my beer while everyone else was far past hammered so I grabbed my keycard and jacket and walked out of the hotel room.
Exploring the hotel, I eventually made my way up to the roof of the building overlooking Times Square. Although I had lived in the city for over a year, the fact that Times Square could still be just as crowded at two thirty in the morning as it was in the middle of the day absolutely amazed me.
I was perfectly content with people watching from a hundred stories above and sipping on my beer in the crisp New York early November air. My thoughts were silent for once; whether that was due to the alcohol flowing through my blood stream or simply exhaustion I couldn’t be sure.
I heard the door to the building open and my head whipped around, the serenity I had been in disrupted and gone. My heart beat slowed a little when I realized it was just Zack, not some creepy stranger.
“Hey, what are you doing out here this late?” His quiet voice asked as he walked to the edge of the building and leaning against the railing, mimicking my position.
“I could ask you the same thing,” I responded, tilting my head back to get the last few drops of beer in my red cup.
“Fair enough,” he responded, “I just couldn’t sleep.”
“I guess I could say the same thing,” I smirked as I placed the empty cup by my feet and returned my attention back to the people down below.
He let a breathy laugh out before it was silent for a few moments as both of our attention was focused on the city life down below.
“Well I think Vinny and Danny were about to pass out when I saw them, and the others didn’t look too far behind them if you wanted to go catch some sleep.”
Shrugging, I turned to look at him, fiddling with the phone in his hand.
“I guess I should. But I better get used to this whole no sleep thing.”
“You live in New York City, you can’t tell me you’re used to a full night’s sleep every night.” He shook his head and laughed awkwardly.
“You’d be surprised,” I informed him as I pushed myself off of the railing and bent down to pick up the empty cup. “I’ll leave you alone now so you can call your girlfriend, or whoever you came up here to talk to,” I told him, smirking as I began to walk toward the door.
Zack looked absolutely dumbstruck before he finally got the words out of his mouth “How did you know I was going to,” He trailed off.
“I guess I’m just good at reading people,” I smirked before shutting the door behind me and beginning the trek back to the hotel suite.
The late night conversation on the roof of a hotel in the middle of New York City was endearingly awkward, and I felt comfortable around Zack almost immediately. He didn’t pry, didn’t question much, and just kind of accepted the silence; just like me. I could honestly see him becoming a good friend on this tour out of just this one conversation in the middle of the night.
I got back to the room and laid down on the couch and fell asleep with the rare optimistic thought that maybe this tour won’t be absolutely terrible if I could find little escape places like hotel roofs to be alone.
The next morning I woke up around ten to find the band and Matt gone and the few members of the crew that were actually awake looking extremely hungover.
I walked into one of the bathrooms to take a shower got dressed in leggings, combat boots, and a cardigan before applying some make up and leaving my long hair to dry on its own.
Matt had told me last night that today the crew was just preparing for tour considering the two New York shows were the kick off and they’d been living in the hotel for the past week, so the bus wasn’t exactly ready.
Colussy stumbled out of his room, phone glued to his ear; I could clearly hear yelling from the other side as he made a beeline to the counter where the Advil bottle was located.
Trying to keep to my own business, I stuffed my pajamas and toiletries into my suitcase and tried to get my stuff together and organized.
“Braedynne!” I slowly turned at the sound of my name being called; finding that it was Colussy who looked as if the greatest idea known to man had just hit him.
“Yes?” I asked hesitantly.
“Since you’re the only one not hungover, would you mind going shopping for food? I’ll give you money!” He said, waving his wallet in the air for emphasis.
“Okay,” I said hesitantly, slightly taken aback by his enthusiasm.
“Great, here’s three hundred bucks, just get stuff for the week,” He said, forcing the money into my hand as he turned his attention back to his phone conversation with who I have now determined to be Matt.
I grabbed my wallet, phone, and room key and headed out; still not completely clear on what exactly
I was supposed to be buying but thankful to be alone.
The elevator opened and I found no other than Zack, Rian, Alex, Jack, and Matt in it; Matt still on the phone.
“Hey Braedynne,” Zack said as he shot me a smile before walking past me towards the hotel suite.
Jack just nodded in my direction before he walked, well, more like dragged his feet in the direction Zack had gone, and Rian smiled in my direction before taking a big gulp of his Starbucks as of it was his lifeline.
“Hey, where are you headed?” Alex asked me, seeming to be the only one out of the four of them to be fully awake.
“Just headed to get food for the bus,” I answered, shooting a smile in his direction as I stepped on the elevator.
“Oh, I’ll go with you. Did Colussy give you money?” Alex spoke as he did a one eighty turn back onto the elevator.
“Yeah, uh, don’t you have a press day or something?” I asked as I pressed the lobby button when it was clear that Alex wasn’t going to leave.
“Yeah, but I’m done now, Jack and Rian have an interview and then Rian has to do a thing with SLJ drums and Jack has a photo shoot for his clothing line, but I’m done,” He explained.
“Won’t Matt be mad? He looked kind of irritated a few minutes ago,” I pointed out, trying to get him to
leave, but deep down wanting him to stay with me.
“He’ll get over it; he’s always irritated during press days. They suck.”
“Oh, well, what was wrong with Jack? He didn’t seem quite so hyper this morning.” I questioned, curious as to why the boy hadn’t been practically bouncing off the walls a few moments ago.
“Flyzik’s on his man period and wouldn’t let him have any caffeine after yesterday,” Alex explained.
I had to laugh at the idea of a grown man getting treated as a child and Alex’s accurate description of Matt’s attitude this morning.
We got off the elevator and began to walk down the street in search of a grocery store.
The city streets were crowded as always, and the sky was gray and looked as if it was about to open up and start pouring rain any moment now.
“It looks like it’s about to rain, we better hurry,” Alex stated as he took notice to the same thing I did.
“There’s a grocery store right there,” I pointed out as I changed direction of where I was walking.
Alex walked ahead of me, side stepping the crowd around him. He was walking so fast that I had to jog to catch up to him as we entered the store.
“Why are you in such a hurry? We have three hours until bus call,” I asked as he grabbed a cart.
“It’s gonna rain,” he said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
“So,” I drawled out, confused to why that would matter.
“So, if we get caught in it, we don’t have an umbrella,” he stated, reaching for a loaf of bread.
“It’s not that big of a deal, a little rain never hurt anyone,” I pointed out, confused to why the idea of rain made his hurry so much.
“You’re a girl, aren’t you supposed to be worried about your hair or make up or something?” He asked, changing subjects.
“When you’re from a town that gets rain pretty much every night, you get used to it.” I replied honestly.
“I guess that’s true.” He stated before a thought came to him. “How often do you visit back home?”
He asked, seemingly genuinely curious.
“Never,” I replied honestly, surprising myself.
“Don’t you miss your hometown though?” He asked as we walked to the sandwich meat aisle.
“I guess sometimes it wouldn’t hurt to get away from all the craziness of the city, and go back to the small town life,” I replied honestly, though still not directly answering his question.
I was so comfortable around Alex after only knowing him for a short period of time, and it scared me.
I knew from past experience that I shouldn’t trust not only him, but anyone; but I still had this gut feeling that I could talk to him and that I could trust him.
“Well why don’t you? You said you had a sister right, just go visit her when the craziness is too much,” He said, acting as if it was the simplest solution in the world.
“It’s not that easy,” I said, not liking where the conversation was headed.
“What’s so difficult about it?” Alex asked me as we got in line for the cashier, our cart now full. He turned his head to look at me, noting the tears welling up in my eyes.
“Hey, Brae, what’s wrong?” He asked, turning his attention on me, concern evident in his eyes.
I just shook my head and looked down at my shoes, hating when I teared up. I hadn’t cried since the night Bobbi died, but I definitely teared up at the mention of her every once and a while.
I felt arms wrap tight around me, and I came to realize they were Alex’s.
Surprising myself, I lifted my arms to hug him back.
This hug was different than Jack’s. Jack’s was forced and fast, while Alex’s was just letting me know that he was there. He would listen; he was hugging me in the middle of a grocery store in the middle of the city as an attempt to prevent the tears from falling.
He didn’t ask any questions, just stood there holding me as an attempt to calm me down. He barely knew me, why did he even care?
I realized that it didn’t matter why, what mattered was that he was there.
Yet, even with that realization, I still couldn’t bring myself to tell him anything too personal. So instead of explaining why it was so difficult, I stepped away from the hug, put a smile on my face, and pushed the cart up to the cashier, praying that Alex wouldn’t bring it up again.
Notes
Not a big fan of this one, but here you go.So ATL and PTV announced their tour today. Funny story: I was with my best friend and I saw the tweet, started literally screaming and jumping and when I saw my tour date to be April 28, literally fell down sobbing because I'll be in Atlanta that weekend for my Uncle's wedding. My friend of course found this hilarious, as I had to go out to dinner at Hooters for my brother's eleventh birthday with a tear stained face. But everything's okay now because I think I'm driving four hours to go to the Pittsburgh date instead.
but yeah, story aside, here's your chapter! I don't know how much writing I'm going to be getting done the next two weeks, I have midterm week coming up, and I've been slammed with homework, plus working extra hours, plus I have a bet going with my friend which is more time consuming then one would think. Plus, I have to sleep sometime! But I will try, and COMMENTS (which have been amazing so far, thank you so much!) encourage me a lot couchHINTcough.
So enough with this obnoxiously long authors note, hope you liked the chapter!
XOXO
Lilly
i love this story btw^.^
1/22/13