Never Gone
I didn’t want to get out of bed and start my day. I just didn’t feel like it. This was it, the last real breather before the new album and everything that came with it. I let out a sigh a little louder than I would have liked.
“What’s wrong honey?” I felt Kristin wrap her arms around my torso as she rolled over to spoon her body with mine. It’s funny but the first time we ever did that, I turned to her and said we were the perfect fit. It was like two puzzle pieces just kind of finding each other.
“Just not looking forward to it I guess.” It made me sad to say that because no matter how tired I grew of this business and all the crap that came with it, when it came time to start something fresh I was always excited. Not this time though, there was something different about this time.
“I’m sorry to hear that baby, but I’m sure once you really get into things, you’ll feel that excitement again.”
I turned around and faced her, placing my arm under my head and holding myself up. “What if I don’t?”
She sat up and pulled her long hair back as if to make a ponytail, “Then maybe you should start re-evaluating your situation.”
I nodded at her, “This is all I’ve really ever known Kris, but I don’t know…I want to be happy but I don’t want to leave you.”
That brought a smile to her face and she leaned over and gave me a kiss, “I know you don’t, but like I said…once you start, you’ll feel differently.” And with that being said she winked at me and got out of bed. I guess that was my cue to move as well.
I stood up and stretched. My bones cracked as if I was a seventy year old man. How on earth was I supposed to dance every single day for the next year? I was getting to old for this and maybe that was the problem. I mean, I’m a guy in relatively good shape but I’m not as young as I used to be. When I was Nick’s age I always felt like nothing could bring me down. I could do an entire show and then have enough energy left over to go down to the gym and workout or jump into the pool and do some laps. Those days are long gone now.
I walked over to the nightstand and picked up the copy of our CD that Johnny sent up to the room after I told him I would be a no show for the meeting. I liked the look of it, but it was the sound I was more interested in. That was another thing that changed about this time around. All our other albums, the first thing I did when I got it was run to the CD player and put it on full blast. Not because I was an ego maniac or anything, but because I was that proud of our accomplishment. I wanted to hear what a year or sometimes more of recording ended up sounding like all in one pop. We always listened together as a group, but I would sneak a listen first before that happened. I would listen and be so critical of every little thing, “Brian was off right there…or Nick missed a word or AJ babbled etc... I was always most critical of myself though. I’d wince if I heard even the slightest glitch in my voice. It used to drive me crazy.
When this one showed up at the front door, I didn’t even care. I took it from the guy, said thanks and placed it right there on the night stand. I wasn’t at all excited to hear it because in my head I knew I’d be hearing it for the next year or so.
I flipped it around in my hand and finally opened it up. “I’m going to order us some breakfast, what do you want to eat?” Kris asked as she came out of the bathroom wearing only a towel.
“You pick.” I answered, still eyeing the CD.
“Are you sure because you always say that but when the food comes…”
“Okay, just yogurt and fruit.”
She nodded at me, “See? I would have gone for bacon and eggs.”
“Liar.” I said to her, smiling. She always makes me smile. Thank God for her.
“I’m going to take a shower; you think you can handle the room service thing?”
“I’ll manage.” I walked over and gave her a kiss on the cheek.
“Are you going to listen to that?” She asked me, pointing to the CD in my hand.
“I was thinking about it, but I’d much rather join you in the shower.”
“You have to stay out here and wait for our food young man.” She winked at me, walked over to the bathroom and making sure to drop her towel so I could see her silhouette; she blew a kiss at me and closed the door. My wife is such a tease.
I glanced down at the CD once more as I walked over to the bed. We worked so hard on this thing. When I think back to the beginning, all of us going out to LA to work together, no wives or outside distractions, I was so hesitant about this thing. I really didn’t think it was going to happen. That seems like such a long time ago.
My phone rang which almost made me jump out of my skin. When I’m in deep thought I tend to block everything else out. “Hello?”
“Hey Kevin.” It was Brian. I knew he would call the second I decided to not go to that meeting.
“Hey Brian, what’s up?”
“Nothing much…just making sure everything is okay. We missed you at the meeting.”
“Yeah, I’m good. I know…Johnny said it wasn’t really a meeting anyway, nothing important. He sent the CD up to my room”
“Well call me crazy, but I think our CD is pretty important, don’t you?” He laughed, but it was one of those I’m annoyed at you, type laughs, nothing ha-ha about it.
“Of course that’s important but sometimes you just gotta say no.”
He hesitated, I could tell he wanted to say more to me, but instead he changed the subject, “So, did you listen to it yet?” He asked.
“No, I have it in my hands as we speak though. I was just about to put it in. Have you listened to it?”
“Some of it.”
“And?”
“It’s good, I like the order they put things in.” He answered.
“Yeah, I was noticing that too.”
“Kevin, is everything really okay?”
“Brian I missed one meeting, the world will not end.”
“I know but it’s kind of unlike you man.”
“Well maybe I’m taking a different approach. I’m going to go Nick this time around… you know just try to be laid back and relax, occasionally dance around my room naked and destroy things.”
“We don’t need another Nick.”
I laughed, just trying to picture myself as carefree as my band mate. “Tell me about it.”
“So, it’s all good then?”
“Brian everything is awesome.”
“Good…Leigh and I are taking Baylee to the zoo today. You and Kris are welcome to join us if you’d like.”
“Thanks for the offer but I think we are just going to take in a show and relax or something. You guys have fun though.”
After hanging up with my cousin, I finally moved over to the CD player, popped in our new one and pressed play. Hearing the first few strands of Incomplete coming through the speakers didn’t leave me feeling exhilarated, it left me feeling tired.
“Are you going to the zoo?”
I looked over at Nick and shook my head. “No, I’m not in the mood to hang out with functional people today. So, what are you up to?” He got a kick out of that just like I knew he would.
“Oh I see, I’m in the mood to hang with someone who makes me look good so let me pick Nick. Is that how it goes AJ?” He asked me using his high mocking voice he uses when he thinks he’s being insulted.
“Pretty much, yeah.” I was quick to answer.
He stuck his middle finger up at me but in all honesty I was just in the mood to hang out with Nick. It happens from time to time. Besides, sometimes I think he just needs someone to keep him out of trouble and for some reason that was kind of the mode he was in, the ‘I’m going to get myself into trouble’ mode.
While he was in the bad boy frame of mind, I was in the melancholy one. I don’t know why but I was kind of sad. After the initial excitement of seeing our CD, I just found myself getting depressed.
Being sober for all of this sometimes isn’t what it’s cracked up to be. That probably sounded horrible. Don’t get me wrong, I would never ever want to go back to that kind of life ever again, but when I was a complete and total mess, I didn’t really care or think about much else but getting drunk and or high. Nowadays though, I can’t help but think with a clear head and lately my brain kept going to one thing and that was how alone I was feeling.
I mean I look at Kevin and he had his gorgeous wife here to share in the moment. Brian had his perfect family and hell Howie brought up just about everyone he was related to. My mother and her husband are here in town but they are too preoccupied with each other to care about me. Wow, that made me sound like a total spoiled brat huh? It’s true though; my mother has barely even mentioned this new CD and for some reason it was beginning to really hurt me.
I had made all these plans for the three of us today but when they woke up, they decided they were going to go do their own thing and meet up with me later on for dinner. I guess that’s fine, but I was in an anxious mood. I didn’t want to be alone.
“What do you want to do?” I looked up at Nick who was staring at me.
“I don’t know.”
“We could go mug people.” The way he said that, people that didn’t know him would think he was dead serious.
“Yes, we could do that I suppose.” I shrugged at him. What the hell did I feel like doing?
“Where are the mom and new dad?” He asked me as he motioned for me to follow him up into the elevators. A small crowd of fans were beginning to gather outside and I think like me, he wasn’t much in the mood to deal with them.
“Out and about.”
“Oh, I see. Does that bother you?” He pushed the button to our floor right as a few fans started running for the elevator. We both made sure to wave and smile at them as if we hadn’t noticed them and were disappointed we were leaving.
“Why do you ask?” I asked him just as the doors closed.
“You seem unhappy about something. Did Howie pee in your Cheerios again?”
“Where the hell do you come up with this stuff Nick?”
He shrugged at me, “It’s a gift I guess.” He was anxious too, I could tell by the way he was biting on his bottom lip and fidgeting like he had to go the bathroom.
“I’m just feeling lonely.” I confessed to him as we landed on our floor and stepped out of the elevator.
“We can always go babe hunting you know, I mean in the lobby alone we have our pick of adoring fans.” Yup, he was in prime self destruction mode. He was probably feeling as alone as I was. I could tell by the inflection of his voice. Wow, sometimes it scares me how well we know each other. That’s when it really dawned on me that he had no one at all to turn to for this big milestone. No one even cared enough to call him from his own family. No wonder he was in the frame of mind he was in.
“Maybe later,” I said as I opened the door to my room. There was no way we were going to hang out in his room with all the alcohol he probably had lying around in there.
“So, are we going to go to Howie’s thing?” He asked me, quickly making himself comfortable on the bed.
“I don’t know…what do you think?”
“I’m not sure I’m in the mood to be with his fans.”
“I’m sure they are our fans too Nick.”
“I don’t know about those Howie people. Most of them hate my guts.”
“Howie people?”
“Yeah….you got anything to eat in here?” He stood up and moved to my fridge.
“I don’t know if I’m in the mood either. He’ll hate us if we bail on him.”
“I want Burger King!”
“You are being the king of random today Frackolas.”
“Sorry…I’m hungry.”
“I get that.”
“Let’s go to BK then.”
“Do you think that’s wise with that crowd outside?” He stood and thought about this for a few minutes. I mean really thought, I actually saw his brain working.
“We could always send one of them to get it for us.”
“What? You mean a fan to do a food run for us?” He was amusing me. This was exactly why I wanted to hang out with him today. I think I needed the comic relief.
“Think about it AJ. We can invite them up and they’ll think we’re about to have hot sex then we’ll ask them for Double Whoppers with cheese!” He started laughing really hard which made me do the same. He’s such a retard.
“Wow you think you’re hilarious, don’t cha?” I asked him as I laughed right along with him.
“I am.”
“Shit, now you have me wanting Burger King, damn you Carter!”
“Do you think this album will do well AJ?” He was all over the place today.
“I don’t know Nick.”
“This one feels different somehow, doesn’t it? I mean from all the other ones.”
“It does for me because I can actually remember recording it.” He rolled his eyes at me. Sometimes I think they get tired of my whole ‘I’m no longer an alcoholic’ thing.
“I don’t mean that, I mean…well…” He stopped for a second and sat up, brushing his hands through his hair before continuing on, “Just that whenever we got our new CD, we all just kind of stayed together. We would all listen to it, order pizza and hang out. You do remember that, don’t you?”
I nodded at him, of course I remembered. It was something I always looked forward to. He was right we didn’t even talk about doing that this time around. We all scattered away from each other, quick to go back to our regular lives. I looked over at him, “We can always listen together. It would give us something to do, right?”
He gave me a small smile, “Right.” He answered.
“And we can order a pizza like always, this way we don’t have to bother one of our fans to go on a Burger King run for us.” AJ joked. He was mocking me. So sue me, I thought it was a good idea. I know for a fact anyone in that lobby would have been pleased as punch to get us some food.
“Sounds good to me.” I said, laying back down on his bed and putting my arms under my head. “I wonder if the other three even bothered to listen to it.” I sat up again. I was restless. I hated feeling this way.
“You know Kevin has probably listened to it ten times by now.” AJ answered throwing me over a choice of three pizza place menus we could order from.
“I still can’t believe he didn’t come to the meeting.” I mean if that was me…ugh never mind. Now I sound like a broken record. Truthfully it scared me how little everyone seemed to care about this, especially Kevin. I couldn’t help but think that maybe it was my fault. Maybe they are just all so tired of my drama that they want to have nothing to do with me unless they absolutely have to.
“What are you thinking?” I glanced over at AJ who raised his eyebrows at me, still waiting for an answer.
“I feel like it’s my fault.”
“You always feel like that.” He was right. I did always feel like that. It’s not like I can help it though. I mean nine out of ten times it usually was my fault anyway and if it wasn’t my fault I was always blamed for it so in time, it was just easier to take the blame for every little thing. “I’m not even sure what you think is your fault, Kevin not showing up to the meeting?”
How do I tell him what I’m really feeling? Do I tell him about Brian and me and our conversation concerning my reckless behavior and how in so many words he made it sound like he wanted me nowhere near his family anymore? That maybe Kevin feels the same way but would never actually tell me that to my face?
“Not being together today to celebrate.” I answered deciding to keep everything else to myself.
“That’s not your fault Nick, that’s the zoo’s fault and Kristin’s gorgeously sexy body AND Howie’s ten thousand relatives. Everyone has stuff going on, that’s all there is to it.”
“Yeah, maybe but in years past, they would have put all that stuff aside to do this.” I didn’t mean to put a damper on things. I wanted to be happy and excited but for some reason I just couldn’t get there.
“Maybe they just forgot?” AJ asked with a shrug. “I’m going to call D; maybe he’ll come and have some pizza with us.” Before I could stop him, he picked up the phone and dialed Howie’s room.
I sat on the bed, biting my bottom lip like a child waiting to hear if his best friend could come and sleep over or something. It’s odd how much it mattered to me. After a few minutes of waiting, he hung up the phone, “It went to voicemail.” He said.
“He’s busy sorting everything out for tomorrow I guess.” I said half heartedly.
There was a knock on the door, “Maybe it’s the Burger King.” AJ joked as he walked over and looked through the peep hole. “Well I’ll be damned…someone’s ears must have been ringing.” He opened the door and there was Howie standing on the other side.
“Hey guys! I’m glad I caught you both together.” He walked in and closed the door. “Have you decided if you’re coming tomorrow?” Wow, he’s quite the pushy one, isn’t he?
AJ looked over at me and I looked over at him and I’m sure we both had that same look on our faces, the ‘I don’t know what to say!’ look. “It would mean a lot to me if you guys came.” He said, which only added more stress.
“We’ll come Howie.” AJ answered. Okay, I guess that means we’re going bowling tomorrow. Remind me to kill AJ later.
“Really?” This time Howie looked over at me.
“We’ll try.” I wouldn’t commit fully because I know me.
“Okay, well I guess that’s all I can ask for.” He winked at us both. “So, what are you guys up to?”
“We were just going to listen to the CD and order pizza.”
“Without me?” He actually sounded hurt.
“Well no, we wanted you to come over. AJ just called you in fact.”
“Oh, good because I haven’t listened yet and was wondering when we were all going to get together and do this.” I couldn’t help but smile.
“How about now?” AJ said bouncing onto his bed. I think he was as excited as I was.
“Without Kevin and Brian?”
“I have a feeling they forgot about our little ritual.” They both laughed at me which made me realize I probably sounded like a baby when I said that. They always tended to laugh at me when I said things that made me sound twelve, even when I WAS freaking twelve.
“Awe, I doubt that Nicky.” Howie said, walking over and patting me on the back.
“Maybe we should call Rok and Kevin then?” AJ suggested as he went over and handed his phone to Howie. “You call Kevin, D.” I nodded at AJ in agreement which made Howie laugh.
“Fine.” He said as he grabbed the phone and walked into the bathroom to make his call. Why he couldn’t do it in front of us I had no idea.
I actually hesitated before dialing Kevin’s number. I knew he didn’t want to be bothered today. That was apparent once he no showed our meeting. At the same time however, I wasn’t about to break with tradition. I’m a very traditional guy. I am also a touch superstitious. I blame that on my grandmother and my mother. The two of them together are always throwing salt over their shoulders and reminding us that tradition is one of the most important parts to life. So, of course in my mind, if we didn’t get together and do this pizza/listening thing, our album and tour were going to bomb.
“Hello?” I was surprised he even answered. I thought for sure it would go to voicemail.
“Hey Kev…”
“I thought you were AJ.”
“I’m using his phone.”
“Oh, what’s up?”
“Just wondering if you are doing anything right now.”
“Not at the moment, I mean later Kris and I are going to go see a show, why?”
“Well…I’m in AJ’s room and we were just about to order some pizza and listen to the CD and were wondering if you…”
“You’re going to do that now?”
“We were thinking about it.”
He paused for a moment, “I’ll talk to Kris and then I’ll give you a call back, okay?”
“Okay.” When I hung up the phone I was disappointed with his answer but I also semi expected it. He rarely got to see Kristin while working on this album and now that she was in town all he wanted to do was be with her. It made sense to me but at the same time… well you know.
I walked back into the main room where Nick and AJ both sat staring at me with anticipation on their faces. “He’s talking to Kris but he’ll be calling me back.”
Nick looked down at the ground and AJ nodded, “What about Rok?”
“I haven’t called him yet.”
“Don’t bother.” Nick said putting up his hand, “He won’t want to come anyway. Screw them both.” He then picked up a menu from the floor, “We should order, I’m starving!”
It was clear he was hurt and disappointed. They both were, and secretly so was I. Although to be fair, it’s not like we made any plans to do this. It was a spur of the moment type thing, but still.
“I’ll call Rok if you want.” AJ said grabbing his phone back.
“He’s at the zoo, remember?” Nick said with disdain in his voice.
“Maybe when he’s done he can swing over.” AJ answered as he dialed Brian.
“But then Kevin will be going out with Kris.” I said.
“And you have plans for dinner with your mom and dad, right?” Nick added looking over at AJ.
“Yeah but for this I’d cancel.”
“I doubt Kevin would do that.”
“You doubt Kevin would do what?” Kevin asked as he walked in the door.
“Kevin, how the hell did you get in here without knocking?”
“I have everyone’s keys remember?”
“Still, knocking would be nice.” AJ rolled his eyes but he couldn’t fool me. He was happy about the intrusion.
“So, Nickolas, what do you doubt I would do and why are you talking about me behind my back?” Kevin smirked at Nicky in his ha-ha caught you kind of way.
“Uh…nothing, I was just saying how you probably wanted to spend your day with Kris instead of listening to the CD and having pizza with us chuckleheads.”
“Oh, well you’re right, I’d much rather be with Kris than you chuckleheads. I like that by the way…I’ll have to start calling you a chucklehead more often.” Kevin said as he walked over and tousled Nick’s hair. “But, this is a tradition and far be it for me to break that tradition, right?”
I was pleased and Kevin could tell by the way he winked at me. “Tradition is already broken because Brian won’t be here.” Nicky said insisting to play the role of Debbie Downer to this party.
“And who said he wasn’t coming?” Kevin asked.
“He’s going to the zoo.” AJ answered.
“Yup, he is but after we do this. He’ll be down in a few minutes.” Kevin said reassuring our youngest member who finally looked happy.
“So, let’s order the pizza and get this show on the road, okay?” Leave it to Kevin to make everything alright with the world. I’m not sure how he always manages to do that but today I was glad.
Brian came down a few minutes later and just like we did every time a new album was released, we listened to the entire CD together, singing along, sometimes wincing but always smiling and excited as we ate our pizza and got ready for the next chapter of our lives as a group.
