I knew that Dan was a decent guy. He had been working on Warped Tour for just as long as I had, which at least told me that he was reliable. I was pretty sure that even for the years that I hadn’t been able to work, he was there, probably working double the load to pick up the slack of having one crew member missing. I never knew much about him - he used to sleep with another roadie that worked with us, but I never knew much else about his love life. I knew that he lived with his mother in Washington whenever he wasn’t touring with Warped or another band. His heart belonged to the Earth, he was never grounded to one location.

I knew that he was reliable and genuine, but after I had admitted to one of the things that haunted me most about my past, I couldn’t help but avoid him at all costs. He would give me a smile when we passed by each other on the bus, but besides that I tried my best to not even get near him.

I now had added another name to my list of people to avoid:
1. Austin Carlile
2. Dan Lindberg

I weaved my way in and out of the buses after we arrived in Boston. Our bus just had to be parked right beside Austin’s, and now both people on my list were far too close for comfort. Austin exited his bus just as I vanished from the lot, and I watched as he took notice of the roadie bus that was right in front of him. I walked toward the venue, keeping a close eye on Austin, until I bumped right into another person.

“Woah, sorry- Oh.” I heard a chuckle escape the lips of the person in front of me. I calmed myself down - my eyes were scanning around frantically and my hands shaking to the point where it was nearly uncomfortable. “Sam, you okay?”

I looked up to finally look at who I had bumped into. “Yeah, Tony,” I said with a sigh of relief. I was glad that I had bumped into someone that I wasn’t trying to avoid. “Sorry, I should watch where I’m going,” I said with a nervous laugh.

“I’m no better,” he reasoned, holding his cell phone up to show me that he was in the middle of typing a text. “Texting while walking is a horrible habit.”

“Well, at least you text people back, I just tend to never reply.”

Tony chuckled a bit. “Yeah, I know,” he said.

I gave him a confused look, cocking my eyebrow so it was visible from behind my over-sized sunglasses. I shoved my hands into my back pockets to try and get their shaking to stop as my mind began to reel - like always.

“Vic is always complaining about it to me,” he explained, shrugging his shoulders. “It really bothers him when people don’t reply.”

“Why?” I asked, my voice quiet. I was sure that it wasn’t his intention, but Tony was starting to make me feel guilty for never texting Vic back.

“He worries easily,” Tony explained. “Well, that and we all kind of tend to not reply to his texts. Woops.” Tony chuckled a bit, but his laughter was cut short when his phone started to ring. “Speak of the devil,” he said with a grin. “Be right back.”

He turned around and took a step away so he could answer Vic’s call. Tony turned to look at me a couple of times throughout the conversation, and each time he would give me a gentle smile, as if to say that he was just checking up to make sure I hadn’t left. I didn’t know why though, there wasn’t enough in our conversation to continue.

He hung up the call, but remained to the side so he could finish his text from earlier. After giving one final tap to the screen, he walked back over, words already forming on his tongue. “Vic says to kidnap you and bring you to catering for breakfast,” Tony explained. “So, just don’t resist and this will be easy for us all.”

I shook my head, letting out a small laugh as we headed towards catering. His hands were swinging casually by his sides, and every time his right hand would swing forward, I would catch a glimpse of his tattoos - every time they came into view I found a new detail.

I liked Tony - there was a shyness about him that didn’t make me feel too nervous. He was able to remain shy and reserved, but yet he was completely approachable and conversational at the same time. I envied him for that, and I also envied the way his hands could carelessly swing to and fro, out in the open.

I pulled my hands from my back pockets and held them by my sides, trying my best to imitate Tony by trying to forget that my hands were even there. I tried walking normally, but I felt too stiff. I felt as if my arms were placed so firmly against my sides that I looked like a member of some sort of robot army, marching forward. I sighed while thinking about how ridiculous I must have looked in comparison to him, and just before I could stop, I saw Vic coming into view, his eyes already fixed on me.

I crossed my arms over my chest as we came to a stop in front of him. He was standing at the back of the line to get breakfast, and I felt like everybody was watching me. I knew that nobody had even noticed that more people were joining the line, but I just had this strange feeling that I couldn’t shake. I hid my hands somewhere in my folded arms, burying them into any crevice that I could - anything to make them less visible.

Vic noticed this, and as his silent way of telling me this, he placed his hand on the small of my back as he guided us forward to fill in the few feet that the line had moved.

“What are they serving today?” Tony asked from behind us.

I turned to my side to shake Vic’s hand from my body. I didn’t want Tony to feel awkward with Vic’s affection, but when I turned around to face him, he didn’t even seem to notice.

“Looks like the usual,” Vic said with a sigh as he stood up on his tippy toes to try and see over the crowd of band and crew members that were waiting in front of us.

“What does ‘the usual’ consist of?” I asked, trying to imitate Vic’s actions to see for myself. It was no use though, I was still too short. And even if I was tall enough to see over the people in front of us, it would be no use because the line was insanely long. We weren’t even under the EZ-Ups that they had set up over the catering area yet. “You know what,” I mumbled to myself, but Tony and Vic both heard because they asked me what at the same exact time.

I took a step out of line so I could see who was working the catering line. It was a few of the new roadies that I recognized, and I could tell that they were all frazzled and unsure of what they were doing. The line was growing impatient, and I could hear some people behind us talking about how they were going to be late to their set if the line didn’t move a little faster. I felt bad for the roadies - they were trying their hardest to get things going, but every single one of them were new to warped tour this year. Who was the tool that had set them all up by themselves?

“I think there’s some hazing going on,” I explained with a sigh. Tony and Vic each took a step out of line, each of them keeping one foot in place so nobody would squeeze us out of our spot. They looked at the roadies as they ran around, trying to find where all of the food was while one of them didn’t even know how to turn on the burners under the food trays.

“They’re all new,” I explained. “Someone assigned them to catering together without a mentor on purpose.”

“Why don’t you be their mentor?” Vic asked, his voice low and a lot closer to my ear than I expected. I turned to look at him and had to back my face up an inch because we were so close. “Hi,” he whispered, lamely, as a smile spread across his lips. “Can I kiss you?” he whispered even quieter.

It was a tempting offer, but I just couldn’t bring myself to even answer him. I backed away a bit and turned around so I could face Tony. “Do you guys have any experience in catering?” I asked. Each of them shook their heads. “Fast food?” I tried again. Vic nodded with a guilty look and Tony chuckled as he shook his head as he seemed to be remembering something. “We’re going to be their mentors,” I explained, stepping out of line and walking straight up to the side of the catering tables that were set up.

Tony and Vic followed closely behind me, each becoming a bit hesitant as they passed by some of their friends standing in the line. I didn’t feel so robotic anymore, or so guarded - I was doing something that I knew. Although knowing a lot about catering wasn’t the biggest achievement, I still felt confident in my ability to be a roadie, and working with the food was part of being a roadie.

“Samia!” one of the girls exclaimed, her face immediately lighting up when she saw me heading toward the coolers. “We knew that they wouldn’t assign us newbies to do this all alone!” she said with a laugh.

I opened up the first cooler and pulled out some cheese to sprinkle over one tin of eggs. I turned around and gave her a sad smile. “Actually, you were. Whoever made the schedule for catering today is trying to bring back the ancient ways of hazing. But I saw your struggle from the end of the line as we’re here to help,” I explained. I felt bad for telling her this, but I figured that it was only fair if she knew. And that way she could try to get revenge on whoever wrote the schedule.

“Who is we?” she asked after a moment.

I turned around and waved the boys over. “This is Vic and Tony,” I explained.

“I know who they are,” she said with a chuckle. “I’m Melissa,” she said with a grin. They shook hands, and Tony tried striking up a conversation with her, but I decided to get back to the catering line.

I fixed up some of the eggs and potatoes that were simmering in the tins, and then turned on the rest of the burners to get the tortillas and beans warmed up. I wasn’t exactly sure why we had to have beans with every meal of the day, but I learned to not question it. Beans helped fill you up, and I guess that was a plus when some people were in a hurry to get off to their sets.

Vic and Tony followed my lead, setting little things up here and there until we finally had everything ready and were able to get the line moving.

“It goes by faster if we serve the food to them,” I explained to Melissa. “If they want more than what we give, they’ll ask.”

We slopped beans onto the disposable plates, handed over waters and sodas, and in no time we had the line cleared out - with only a few stragglers coming in for whatever was left. We turned off the burners and I left the clean-up to the roadies who were actually assigned to the catering.

“That was awesome,” Vic said with a smile. “You’re a pro.”

“Yeah, awesome,” Tony agreed. “But what about us?” he asked with a pout, placing his hand over his stomach.

I rolled my eyes. “Don’t worry," I explained, pointing over to the back where a metal tray was sitting on top of a cooler. “Go take a peek in there,” I said, nodding over in the direction I had just pointed at.

Tony pulled the foil off of the top and let out a sigh of relief. “You’re magical,” he explained as he grabbed one of the tortillas I had stashed.

While I was setting up the food, I made sure to sneak a decent amount of food into an extra tray so we would be able to eat later. I learned that trick back on my first year of working with warped tour. Even though the food wasn’t the greatest, sometimes it was all we had.

Warped tour was all I had. As I made out a few plates for the few of us that had served the food, I couldn’t help but stare at the disgusting beans that looked like slop. We always had these damn beans because it was all we had. Did that mean that all I had in in my life was beans?

My hand froze as I was scooping up the beans and I just stared. I stared at the beans. At the tin tray. And at my hands. I let go of the utensil that I was holding and watched as it splattered down into the beans, making quite the mess.

“Sam, you okay?” Vic asked. He was holding his plate out, waiting for me to serve the beans, but I couldn’t move anymore.

“Uh, yeah. I dropped the thing,” I explained, my words coming out in a panicked stammer. “I-I have to go,” I said.

“Go where?” he asked.

I looked behind him to see Tony and the other two roadies, Melissa and Sherry, piling their beans into their mouths.

“I hate beans,” I muttered. I watched them eat the crusty beans like it was nothing. Like they didn’t care because they knew that this wasn’t all they had to live for. These beans were the least of their worries because they still had lives outside of warped tour. They probably had nice homes and families back where they usually lived. All I knew was warped tour. I had no family and I barely had a home.

“What are you talking about?” Vic asked, a chuckle escaping his lips. When he saw that I wasn’t returning any sort of emotion, he stopped his laughing. His face fell serious, but I couldn’t look at him. “What’s wrong?” he whispered, taking a step closer to me. He reached out for my hand with his left one – his right hand was still holding his plate.

“No,” I said, pulling my hand back. “I really have to go. I need a cigarette,” I explained.

I turned around quickly and headed back toward the buses, pulling a cigarette out from my back pocket as I neared my bus. I looked down for a second so I could concentrate on lighting the end, but my hands were shaking so badly that I could hardly even keep the flame on my lighter going. I walked blindly toward my bus, and when I finally got it lit, I looked up to see a whole gathering of tattooed men sitting outside the bus that was parked next to mine.

“Shit,” I muttered. I had totally forgotten that Austin’s bus was parked next to my own, and now I was walking straight toward him.

I tried to change my route without it being obvious, but it was too late, Austin’s eyes met mine from where he was standing with a few of his band mates and I watched as he smiled, excused himself from the conversation, and headed over towards me. His band mates watched as he left, one of them whistling after him when they noticed me standing there.

“I knew you’d come back,” he said.

“I didn’t,” I grumbled as I blew out my smoke. I could feel my hands still shaking as I tried to steady the cigarette enough so I could take another drag.

“Woah, why are you shaking so much?” Austin asked.

I shrugged. “I needed a cigarette,” I lied.

“You need to relax,” he corrected. He took a step closer to me and gently pushed my hair away from my ear. I felt his breath against my neck and it was all I could think about. “I can think of a couple of ways to relax you.”

I didn’t want to have sex with Austin again. He didn’t do anything wrong and he didn’t hurt me, but the words he said had triggered some memories that I thought I had buried down deep. But apparently they weren’t deep enough. Austin’s lips grazed over my ear and I could feel the desire pulsing through me. I knew that having sex with Austin the first time was a terrible idea, but there was something about him that I just couldn’t shake. There was something about him that was dangerous and alluring, and as much as I wanted my mysterious and dark days to be behind me, I couldn’t help but give in to the urge to climb under them and let them have their way with me, which was exactly what I was doing with Austin.

He trailed his hand down my back until he reached my ass, giving it a strong squeeze and subtle slap before he turned around and started to head back toward his bus. I didn’t follow him though. There were people there. People to see me follow him and that was the last thing I needed.

“Are you coming, or what?” he asked, a smirk on his lips as he turned around to wave me towards him.

Was I going to follow him onto the bus? I really didn’t know, and I half expected myself to just start walking, but something was holding me back. My feet wouldn’t move, no matter how bad the temptation was to let myself give into the lust, I just couldn’t.

“Samia!”

I turned around at the sound of my name and saw Vic jogging up towards me. Worry was written all over his face – his eyebrows furrowed when he noticed Austin standing a yard away, his body turned toward me, clearly waiting for me to follow him. They met eyes and I looked between them a couple of times to try and read the situation, but I just couldn’t. Unspoken words were being exchanged and I suddenly felt the tension in the air.

“Sam,” Austin said, his voice angry and impatient.

“Sam,” Vic mimicked, his voice concerned but firm.

My head was spinning as I was forced to choose between them. Did I want just a careless, physical relationship with Austin, or was I ready to try something meaningful and deep with Vic? I couldn’t weigh any of the options in my mind, because even though I knew that I had more of a connection with Vic, I was still afraid of committing to something serious. I couldn’t go through love again, I wasn’t emotionally ready.

“Are you coming?” Austin spoke up, his tone almost confused as he looked over to me.

I opened my mouth to say something, but no words would come out. I knew that I would chose Vic over Austin in general, not just for a relationship, but I was afraid that if I did walk over to Vic, he would think it was because I was ready for whatever connection we had to be put to the test.

I needed to answer them. I needed to do something, anything, but I was frozen. Before I could do anything, I felt a stinging sensation between my index and middle fingers on my right hand. I ignored it though as I tried to set my mind straight. The stinging turned to burning, and just as I heard a sizzle, my fingers burned so bad that I let out a slight yelp and looked down at my hand, flicking away whatever had burned me. I cradled my right hand with my left and looked down to see what was left of my cigarette burning in a scattered pile of ashes. I had completely forgotten that my cigarette was even burning, and I suddenly realized that I hardly even got to feel the satisfaction of the nicotine.

I began to shake, feeling both sets of eyes on me as I reached for another cigarette and lit it, this time using my left hand to hold the stick instead of my right, since the skin was red and rubbery from the contact of the lit end.

“I, uh, need to get this burn checked out,” I said, keeping my head down as I dismissed the situation.

I began to walk away, passing Vic at a distance. I could feel his tension and sadness as I passed, and it crushed me. I could feel his pain, even though I was the one who had caused it. I didn’t want to feel his pain. I didn’t want him to be in pain.

I continued to walk away, but I felt incomplete. These past few years without anybody by my side had made me so broken. All this time I thought that I was just independent, but that wasn’t the case. I was broken, and I needed someone by my side.

I stopped walking and turned around to face Vic who was now looking at me, almost as if he knew what I was thinking. He knew that I needed him. He was the only person that could calm me down. I don’t know why he was the one to make things feel a little bit better, but I knew that I couldn’t throw away the security he gave me. I needed Vic.

“You want to come with me?” I asked. Austin looked over, and I didn’t even realize that he was still standing there. It confused me as to why he was still around – what we had was purely physical, but yet I managed to pique his interest by my offer, even though I felt it was pretty obvious that I was asking Vic. “Vic,” I clarified, “you want to come with me?”

Vic’s face lit up and he nearly skipped over to my side as he nodded. I was afraid that he was going to try to lace our fingers together or try to kiss me, but he didn’t try anything. He just fell into step beside me and walked with me out of the bus lot.

My burns were nothing serious, which I pretty much already knew. They applied some cream to my fingers, laughed at me for burning myself on my own cigarette, and then they gave me a small packet of wipes and cream for the next day. Vic stood there, texting every now and then, with a large smile on his face.

I stood up from the chair that I had been sitting in and approached Vic who was in the middle of a text message.

“Ready?” he asked, without looking up. He finally finished his text, hit send, and then looked up to meet my gaze. “You feel better now?” he asked in an over exaggerated, baby voice.

I groaned and rolled my eyes, ignoring his teasing entirely. I walked away from the tent right when my walkie talkie began to buzz from where it was clipped on my shirt. I had almost gotten used to the silence that I had been blessed with for the morning, but now that it was nearing the afternoon, the venue would be packed – most likely sold out – and all hell was bound to break loose.

“Sam, ya copy?” It was Dan’s voice. I had almost forgotten about him, too.

“Yeah, I’m here,” I replied.

Vic walked beside me, silently taking in the surroundings and smiling at kids who recognized him. Before I even knew what was going on, people were starting to approach Vic, asking for a picture and a hug. I stopped with him, unsure of what to do since I wasn’t used to walking around the venue with a band member like this. I was usually so busy with stage work or security duty that I didn’t really get much time to hang out during open hours, all of my friendships (not like I had very many) were made after hours.

“Hey, meet me at the bus? Kenny wants us to help sort the mail.”

I groaned, but knew that there was no use in arguing it. Kenny always assigned us to sort mail, mostly because we were the only ones who knew how to do it without getting overwhelmed.

“I’ll be there in ten, over.”

I turned to tell Vic that I needed to leave, but he was completely swamped by fans and I didn’t know if I should bother him, and quite honestly, his fans seemed scary-passionate, and I was a bit too intimidated to even approach them. “Vic!” I called out. He finished posing for a picture and then turned to face me. “I got called to work. I’ll catch you later.”

“Okay!” he replied, his happiness almost exceeding levels that I even thought possible. He was feeding off of the energy and love from his fans, and it was making me smile just by witnessing it. “You think you’ll be able to catch our set?” he asked.

I shrugged. “I’ll try, but I can’t make any promises.”

“Okay,” he said, a bit saddened by my lack of promises. “I’ll see you later.”

He stared at me for a second longer and I was almost certain that he was going to say something else. He almost looked as if he wanted to walk towards me and say a proper goodbye. And part of me wanted him to give me a proper goodbye.

I smiled weakly and turned around, feeling my cheeks heat up and my stomach swirl as I thought about how I had chosen Vic earlier. Although nothing was said, I knew that I was blindly throwing myself into something that was going to be complicated, intense, and possibly amazing. And I knew that I wasn’t ready for it, but that wasn’t enough to keep me from spending time with him.

Notes

Hey guys! I know it's has literally been FOREVER since I have updated and I apologize! I'm so sorry I left you guys for so long. A lot was going on: I was in a funk for a while, I almost failed out of school, I got my grades back up, I kind of had a boyfriend thing, I got fucked over by boyfriend thing, went back into a really low funk, and I just got things back together and now I'm ready to write again! Sorry if my writing isn't as deep or entertaining as it was, I'm trying to get back into the flow of writing. I feel like I lost my natural voice, so now I have to find it again.

Either way, I'm sorry again!

So, like always, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. Do you think that Samia is opening up a lot more? What about her weird little dilemma between Austin and Vic - do you think everything is settled there? I want to know everything in your minds after you read this!

Thank you guys for sticking around. You're all so amazing. I appreciate your support so much and I love you and your comments so much!

Don't forget to check out the story I'm writing with my BFF Jolee! It's called Now It's Your Turn to Run! Check it out! And also give Jolee's stories a read. They are absolutely fantastic!

xoxo