“From the get-go I knew this was hard to hold. Like a crash, the whole thing spun out of control.”

The next day we traveled to New Orleans for the next tour date. We had a day off to spend there, so I decided to ask Caroline to show me around. I figured it could break the ice from last night, and she always talked about her love for New Orleans. Nobody answered the door at the bus, so I searched a good thirty minutes for a member of their crew. My heart plummeted deep down whenever someone told me they had drove back to Lafayette for the day to visit family. That’s when I knew I ruined everything. I called her and it went straight to voicemail. Fuck fuck fuck.
I called again, and tried to leave a voicemail but got too choked up. I typed and retyped a text to her, telling her how sorry I was and that I didn’t mean to spill my guts and if I could take it back I would. But then it hit me, she fucking kissed me. Why did she run away?
I found Jack and Zack in the meantime and went for a few drinks, always checking my phone for a text.
She never called, she never texted me back. The day came to an end and I felt so empty. This whole tour, I always had Caroline. I tossed and turned all night, having nightmares that she would never speak to me again. The next day she was still nowhere to be found. Heartlines was playing at 1:30, and I wasn’t even sure she would show.
I waited behind the stage for her, and I felt so relieved to see her with fucking pink hair.
“Caroline, where have you been? Can we talk?”
She looked at me like I was an idiot. “I’m about to go on stage.”
“What did you do to your hair?” I ask, grabbing a strand of it between my fingers.
“Dyed it?” Once again, she gave me that look.
“I can see that.” I responded, dropping my hand back down to my side.
“I don’t know, I kind of just felt like doing something drastic…I needed a change.”
“Is this because of what I said to you the other night?” I started to feel that pit of anxiety forming in my chest. I knew Caroline was scared of being hurt, but I hadn’t thought the effect of someone promising to love her forever would be so bad on her. Her gaze shifted to her feet, and the silence between us was unbearable.
“Babe…” I took a step towards her just for her to quickly take one back.
“Don’t call me that. I’m not your girlfriend, Alex.”
“I’m sorry, I…I don’t want to lose you over this. As a friend.”
“You made it pretty clear you don’t want to be friends.”
“What about you? I’m pretty sure you kissed me first, Caroline.”
“You go on in 5 minutes, Caroline!” The stage manager called out to her, causing her to jump.
“Oh…okay, I’ll be there in a minute!” She called back, and looked up at me. I noticed that, normally, at times like this Caroline would be crying; this time, no emotions were clear in her face and I didn’t know what to make of the tension between us.
“Well, maybe if you hadn’t drug me out on your little date scheme, I wouldn’t have felt pressured to.” The anxiety in my chest was starting to be replaced by anger. Maybe I was wrong to take her out that night, but I had never meant for it to be a “scheme”. I never tried to make her feel pressured into being with me, I never once changed our normal pace of friendship to anything deeper.
“Last time I check, I wasn’t the one holding your hand all night and initiating kisses. All I wanted to do was take you see your favorite band.” I said through gritted teeth, trying not to yell, trying not to trigger any deep rooted hurts buried in her. I just needed this to stop, I needed my friend back.
“3 minutes!” Someone called again.
She looked back in the direction of the stage then back at me.
“It should have never happened. I’m sorry.” She said, dryly.
My mood did another shift to sadness and regret, wishing I could go back and change that night around. “I never meant to make you feel pressured. I just wanted to have a good time with you, as my friend. And I’m sorry I let my emotions get the best of me. Can we go back to normal?”
“I don’t know. Can we?” She crossed her arms over her chest, and eyed me suspiciously. The truth was, I didn’t really know. I didn’t know if we could fight past the awkward truth hanging in the air; the truth that I had real feelings for Caroline and the truth that she didn’t feel the same. That maybe she really had felt pressured and kissed me strictly for that reason. Before I could answer, she was turning around to leave.
“I have to go now.”
“Okay.” I replied but it barely came out as a whisper. I watched her walk away and go perform for the day. I stood around for a minute, listening, and trying to collect my thoughts. After a while, my feet brought me back to my bus but my mind was still with Caroline. I opened the door to find Zack and Jack playing their acoustic guitars, practicing for our acoustic set later that I completely forgot about.
“Hey, Alex. ‘Bout time.” Jack said, looking up at me.
“Shit, I’m sorry, guys.” I plopped down on the couch next to Zack, who was looking at me with a concerned stare. “You look like shit.” He said.
“I feel like shit.”
“Oh no, everything okay?” Jack put his guitar into the case. “I’m sensing girl troubles.”
“Just a bunch of shit finally hitting the fan. Nothing we need to discuss now. We need to focus on this.” I say, motioning towards the instruments that had been placed back into their cases.
“Where’s Rian anyway?” I ask, realizing the fourth member was not present.
“Went to grab some more beer, we’re running low.” Jack replied, picking his guitar back up and putting it into place on his lap.
“Great. I’m going to need a lot of that.”

Notes

Okay, so I've decided to go a completely different route with this story. I just typed all this up about an hour ago, and I'll be adding more characters to the list, as well. :)
There's going to be plenty more twists and turns, and crazy things to happen. But I'm going to refrain from posting chapters until I get more feed back. So let me know what y'all think!
If you love it, hate it, have any opinions on where this should go, or where you'd like it to go, I'm all ears! And thanks to the people who have responded so far!