Snake woman strikes.
" Niiiiiiicccckkkkk!!!!" A loud scream from the center of the bus.
" Kaos" Same caller, now the scream is more out of desperation and closer.
" Nick! Get up!" An even stronger scream, with an angry tone to it just over my head.
The owner of the angry voice is shaking me, rudely disturbing me from a good nights sleep. Peering up with an eye I see that it’s Kevin that is trying to get my attention. Obviously something must have upset him dearly since Kevin is NOT a morning person. In fact he dislikes mornings even worse than I do!
If Kevin is this upset something most have happened that has to do with a thing that he hates. Thinking back to last night’s event it hits me like a flash in a thunderstorm. Kevin most have been in the back of the bus! The mess that I made earlier in the night has not been cleaned up and Mr. Perfect gets a fit when there are bags, stuff on the floor and it looks like a dump. Why I have no idea since it doesn’t bother me, not as long as I have somewhere to sit and I can find my Nintendo. My gut tells me that I will be in for another round as soon as Kev has regained his breath after the first screaming session.
Speaking about my gut, I am as good as can be and that feels great. I don’t think that I could have lived down another day of humiliation. This tour has been one long ride for me when it comes to making a fool of myself or sharing bodily fluids of all kind with my fellow inhabitants. By now I think that all parts are pretty tired of that combination and I swear to myself that I 1) Won’t stick my foot in someone else’s business. 2) Stay out of trouble and 3) Stay healthy. Nick Carter is about to start a new life and this is the first day.
Look how great THAT is going!
" Go!!," I yell, fending the intruder away with my hands. Kevin, deciding that I have slept much too long (he can be so cruel) snatches my blanket and I grab it for dear life. There is not a chance that I’m giving away this precious belonging besides it’s much too cold in the bus to let it go without a fight. They better fix that heater on the bus or I will turn into a Popsicle. A frozen one. After waking up a bit more I notice that I’m still at the seat next to Fritz and judging by it I most have fallen asleep somewhere in the late or more likely early hours, talking to the German driver.
" Oh no, Nick, You’re not getting out of this," Kevin yells as he once again tries to get me up to the land of the living.
Fritz, the great guy that he is as well as my new found friend turns to Kevin, " Er ist nicht gut.." And then he says something to Kevin that they have to be good to me. Smiling inwardly I listen to the German driver and there is a frown from Kev’s part. To emphasize what Fritz is saying I mumble, " Leave me alone. I’m tiiired!" and roll on my side on the hard seat. It hurts my back, in fact all of my limbs are pretty sore and I feel all achy. Accompanied me is also a feeling of mush in my head, you know the same feeling as you have when you have been up way too long and pushing yourself over the limit.
Kevin however is in no mood to listen to me complaining and he states sourly, " Nick, I’m just saying this once. You better get your butt up now and clean up the mess you’ve done in the bus. That or I throw you off at next pit stop!"
Oh how scared I am. Kevin would never do such a thing. " Ok," I mumble as I lay down again, not taking too much notice of what he is saying. Kevin is always talking and if I would listen to everything he nags about I would have to do nothing but clean and straight up things. Not an understatement either.
" Nick, are you at all listening?" He shakes me. "You clean that mess up now so that we have somewhere to sit and eat. If not I’m putting you on the same bus as Donna and Johnny.
Now he’s got my attention!
" Okay, okay, " I murmur and sit up. " Where are we?"
" Somewhere in Germany, who cares?" AJ have entered the premises, no doubt checking out what is taking Kev so long to wake me up from the dead. " Kaos get your ass down here and clean up the shit you have created. It looks like a fucking bomb has exploded. What have you been doing?"
" Nothing."
" Nothing my ass. D' is tearing the place upside down since you most have thrown out all the bags there is and he can’t find his favorite shirt." Good, I thought a bit evily. That orange and red shirt with dots looks bad and frankly I don’t think that I can take watching him in that one today. Brian has name the shirt " Hangover" since he says he gets a headache from it. And he is not the only one. Nausea included.
" I was searching the black controller," I say with a sigh as I stand to follow AJ to the back, preparing myself for a total attack.
Bone whispers into my ear, " D' is getting a nervous breakdown and you should have seen Train. He about broke down." I looked at him, " And?"
" Just wanted to congratulate you for almost sending Howie to the psychiatric ward." He grinned widely, patting me on my back. I smiled palely. An upset Howie is no fun. Sweet D' is mostly just as he is called, sweet. But there are times when he can be quite the opposite, especially if you mess with his clothes or his hair. Man, then you don’t want to be near him!
After spending several hours cleaning up the mess as well as listening to Howie and Kevin telling me what a messy person I am, duh it’s not for nothing that my nickname is Messy Marvin, and at times I start to think that they might be right. AJ was totally correct saying that it looked like a bomb had been dropped. They were all yelling at me, saying Nick do this, Nick do that. All but Brian who was hanging around in his bunk, complaining about a migraine.
Like he was the only one that suffered?
****************
" When are we going to take a break? I’m thirsty," I complain, hunching down on my knees. It’s hot and we have been standing with photoflashes in our eyes much too long. We are at another photo shoot and this time the photographer is really at it. They have been taking pics of us in all different positions. I’m about to sweat away as we are all wearing ski jackets. Could someone tell this dude that it’s about burning point in here? And that we instead should take the shots outside. It would look much more realistic too.
The photographer however has different ideas and he wants us to spin in some kind of circle, or at least pretend that we are spinning. I’m glad that this isn’t on film since the spinning part would set all off my bodily functions into a spin. As I mentioned before roller coasters and spinning devices are bad for my health.
" Stop whining," Kevin says and I glare back at him. He is obviously still pissed over my cleaning habit, or more likely lack of it. Brian is awfully silent and he is popping Tylenol all the time, complaining that the light hurts his eyes. Wouldn’t it be funny if B wound up being sick? He says that he is just tired and that I have had him up all night. Me? As far as I am concerned B'rok slept like a pig, snoring away and wasn’t the one that was exactly complaining that I was up alone in the front of the bus all night. If the guys would have let me sleep like a normal being in my bunk they wouldn’t be so grumpy today. Pay back time!
" But I AM thirsty," I state, " And my legs hurt and it’s hot and." The whining is complete. The boys glare at me and I can see Bone pointing to his neck, gesturing that I would get my neck ripped off if I complain one more time. Sigh. It’s not even noon and I’m already tired. Deep in my mind I start to think how I will have the strength to manage another concert. I’m totally exhausted and the lack of sleep doesn’t help my condition. On top of everything my bones ache in my body after spending time in that cramped up seat.
The only comfort that I have is that Donna and Johnny have been nowhere to be seen the whole morning. They have been riding on the band bus and the word is that Johnny has been on the phone with Canada and that we are about to make it over there. I really hope so since I am sick and tired off all this European food and it would be great to go somewhere I can understand the language for once. I still haven’t encountered Donna about last night’s event. Maybe I had misjudged the situation been dreaming everything. One thing is for sure that if what I saw last night is true I will be in for an attack.
" Now he is spacing out again," I hear Howie complaining to Kevin. " First whining and now gone to the world. This is getting on my nerves." Looks like me loosing the "hangover" shirt wasn’t such a smart move. You see, even if I cleaned that whole bus, like it was shining like a "dog’s balls in moonlight!" (Favorite expression) he still couldn’t find that precious belonging. He had probably left it at a hotel room and they had mistaken it for a cleaning rag. That I am pretty sure off and also "happened" to mention to sweet D'. As I said before, and I say it again, D' is not easy to get really pissed and I’m very proud that I manage to work up such a temper that had him yelling that it was my fault. Feeling pretty misjudged I turned to B'rok for some comfort. It was no use since B was still nursing a migraine headache.
The boys were pretty irritated with me and I was getting more and more cranky as the photo session dragged out in time. And whiny, tired and hungry. Not a good combination when you have a day packed with stuff ahead of you.
" Where do you think that you’re going?" This time it was the photographer that stated sourly that I better not be away for long since he had several shots left to be taken.
I felt grumpy. It was enough that Kev and Howie was bugging me all the time. I didn’t want to hear a German photographer with a baldhead and ring in his ear complaining that I was a pain in the butt too. " To get something to drink," I said as I moved away from the studio to the hallway. In the background I could hear him gritting under his teeth about how much he hated working with kids and I made a face just as I passed him. Pretending to stick my fingers in my throat. Gagging. This had AJ breaking out in laughter and Kevin rubbing his temples from his so called "Nick-whines-so-much-headache".
Leaving the guys behind I walked in to the small kitchen to get some water to drink. As I rinsed some of that highly disinfected water that tastes like chloride into a cup I felt a hand on my shoulder. I didn’t have to turn around to know who was behind me since I could smell it from the day old booze as well as the perfume. And true to my words, Donna Wrights steel cold eyes looked me deep in my eyes." What are you doing Nicky?" she asked and I shrug to get away from her grip. Donna has a habit of calling me Nicky whenever she wants me to feel intimidated. She knows that I hate that nickname.
" Just getting some water, I’m thirsty," I beeped and she raised an eyebrow.
" I think that you and me need to have a talk, don’t you?" Her teeth were yellow from nicotine as she smiled and my stomach turned from the sight. Setting down the cup of water, untouched, I mumbled something that I didn’t know what she meant. Donna had no intention of letting me go. " We both know that you saw me in the restroom."
" Restroom, where?" I was trying hard to sound stupid, which is if you ask Bone such an easy task for me to do since I’m a natural in that area. Donna however was NOT fooled.
" Knock it off, Nicky. I know that you saw me during concert time and I just want you to know that what ever you THINK that you saw, you’re clearly mistaken!" There was a threat in her voice and it made me feel insecure.
Sometimes I wish that I just for once could think before I talked. Me, using my mouth before my brain have set me in for so many difficult situations that you wouldn’t believe in my life time. Some people would call me way too honest (about everything), others that I’m a dumbass that never thinks before talking. That is not true! It’s just that whenever I get nervous, which by the way I am right now, I have a tendency to say what I am thinking out loud. And that have left me sticking my foot in my mouth more than one time. Here I was in for another one as I blurted out, " Oh, you mean when you were drinking?"
I could just as well have pulled my own switch on the electric chair! I was a dead man, or teenager if you prefer that expression better.
If Donna’s eyes had been cold it was nothing compared to what they turned into. I swear that you could scrape ice blocks from her iris. The saying “If looks could kill” was something that could be practiced in this situation. I shivered involunarily as she whispered, threateningly, " If you ever so much as breath about what you saw happened yesterday I will make you suffer so bad that you can never get an job in this business again." I stared at her, not saying a word. Obviously she wasn’t content with my reaction as she said further on, " And that is not all, the rest of the guys won’t have a name either to talk about, and they will be on the unemployment list too."
" No they won’t," I said, " It’s us that is doing the work and you just sit on your fat Asses collecting money!" I wish that I had kept my mouth shut, but when you piss me off too much with threatening about my friends I about had enough.
" Says who?" she hissed, challenging me to get the "truth" out.
" Kevin," I blurt out before thinking. Again. This was starting to get into a bad habit and I wanted to cut off my tongue as I mentioned my "brothers" name. Accidentally.
" Oh well..so..Kevin is saying that." She grinned evily, (at least that what I thought it looked like). " Very well I better talk some words with him then." She looked me sternly in my eyes and I felt frightened.
Getting Kev into trouble was the last thing I wanted and I hurried to his protection, " No, you don’t have to talk to him. I won’t say anything. I promise." I talked as fast as I could, wanting to get out of the situation. Looking down at the door I hoped that someone would come into the room, but no one entered. My tough luck.
" That is good, because as I said before you don’t want to hurt the boys do you?" I shook my head.
Donna seemed satisfied, " That a boy!" She patted me on my head like I was some kind of dog and I felt physically sick.
" Glad that we can come to such understanding," she continue, acting like if nothing had happened. I couldn’t get out from the room fast enough and I bolted, running to the studio room again. I was still panting, breathing hard as I reached the boys again and they looked up at me with mixed feelings.
" Where have you been? We’ve been waiting for you." Kevin sounded upset and he was wiping off sweat from his forehead like he was hot and miserable.
" Man, did you drown the whole place or?" AJ was never late in making a joke, and usually I come up with something witty back. Today my mind went blank. I shrug. Not knowing what to say.
Brian, looked like he really wanted out of this place and he patted on the chair in the middle, " Nick come on. Sit down so we can end this torture."
" Ok," I was obeying them, thinking of other more important stuff. The photographer didn’t look to pleased with my absence and he was mumbling through gritted teeth that it was the last time that he waited for some teen pop stars and that he would quit his job if he had to deal with people like us again. " Sorry," I responded as I sat down, waiting for even more chewing to go on. Instead I felt a comforting hand on my shoulder. It was Howie that had forgot all about his shirt, at least for now, and was trying to make me feel better. I smiled to him gratefully. At least one understood my situation. The guys had no idea what pressure I was going through and this made my head hurt even more than before.
Turning on my side I saw that Donna was looking straight at me and she was smiling. Like a snake ready to strike.
