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A Match Into Water

Chapter Seventeen

“No,” I snap, my attitude doing a complete 180. “Absolutely not.”

Ricky raised an eyebrow at my outburst, though he did look quite amused as well, but before he could open his mouth to speak, I was already whipped around to face Chris and ready to get in his face.

“Switch me out of my room,” I demand, all but glaring at Chris.

Chris fidgeted uncomfortably under my intense gaze, and it took him a moment to compose himself, but as he was getting ready to speak, the manager from Deaf Lions spoke for him.

“We planned this list out very carefully,” the manager spoke, “we can’t just-”

“Was I fucking talking to you?” I snarl, turning on the Deaf Lions’ manager instead. “No, I wasn’t, so shut the fuck up and keep your mouth shut!”

“Um, Dean?” Chris finally spoke up. “Can I talk to you for a moment over here?”

I let out a sigh and rolled my eyes at his request, but I followed him nonetheless. I could feel practically everyone’s eyes staring into my while I followed Chris away from the group, and it took all of my willpower to not snap at them either. To be honest, I hadn’t meant to snap at Chris, or anyone else for that matter, it was just that being paired up in a hotel room with Ricky was freaking me out. It didn’t matter if he left me alone the entire night or whatever, I just knew I wasn’t going to be able to handle being so close to him for an entire night or take the risk of him doing something else to me.

Chris stopped over by the vending machines near the elevators, several feet away from the group’s hearing range, and when he finally stopped, he turned around and looked at me with a look of both worry and frustration.

“Dean, what’s going on with you?” he questioned.

I nervously gulped and tried to suppress the urge of being thrown into a panic attack. “I- I just can’t be paired up with Ricky-”

At this, Chris let out a mildly exasperated sigh and shook his head at me. “Look, I know you have your issues with Ricky and don’t entirely trust him, but-”

“That’s not the problem, Chris!” I hiss, my voice cracking at the end. “I literally cannot be in a room with him for an entire night!”

Chris must have noticed how my body had begun to shake and how there were tears forming in my eyes, because his face softened and all previous signs of frustration were completely gone. Now, all he had for me was a look of concern. “Why not?” he quietly asked me. “What’s going on, Dean?”

I opened my mouth to speak, almost ready to spill my guts to our tour manager about what happened the previous night, but I couldn’t. The words just wouldn’t come out. The memories were flashing before my eyes and Ricky’s warning to me before any of this happened came rushing back, and I couldn’t find it in me to speak. I shut my mouth and closed my eyes, shaking my head and shakily running a hand through my hair.

“I...I just can’t,” I say, my voice small and weak. “I can’t tell you why, but being paired up with Ricky isn’t good for me. Please Chris, I’m begging you, please switch me out of my room with Ricky. I don’t care if I have to sleep in the lobby or on the tour bus, but you have to switch me out of my room.”

A few tears had slipped down my cheeks as I pleaded with Chris, and I could see how his face fell when he saw them trailing down my face. He looked back at me with a practically heartbroken expression, and after studying me for a few more moments, he hung his head and let out a defeated sigh.

“Dean,” he began, already not liking where this was going, “I’m really sorry, but there’s nothing I can do-”

“What do you mean?” I exclaim, most likely getting the attention of a few of the other band members with my outburst.

“What I mean, is that no matter how much I want to help you out and switch you out of your room, I can’t,” he explained. “The other managers and I agreed to not let anyone switch out of their rooms, because if we let one person do it, then we’d have to let everyone switch, and that would kind of defeat the purpose of all of this-”

“We’re not in fucking middle school anymore, Chris!” I hiss, my eyes narrowing at him. “We all don’t need to bake a cake full of rainbows and smiles and get along with each other!”

“Yes, but being able to at least tolerate each other would make touring easier between everyone,” Chris tried to reason, but I was already done talking with him.

“Fine, but you can go shove your stupid unicorn fairy idea up your ass,” I spat. “And anything bad that happens tonight is all on you, buddy.”

Chris’ face contorted into a look of hurt, but I could care less about how he felt. He wouldn’t even try to help me out with my problem, so why should I care if I hurt him? I readjusted the strap of my Jansport on my shoulder and held out my hand in front of me. “Give me my hotel key,” I demanded.

“Dean-”

“Just give me the damn key!” I growled, making Chris jump a bit as he fumbled around for the right key. Once he handed it out to me, I yanked it from him hand and stalked over to the elevators. I heard a few people try to call out for me, but I just ignored them and slid into the elevator with a family that was just about to go up. I told them what floor I was going up to and anxiously waited for my stop.

If Chris wasn’t going to switch me out my room, I was just going to have to improvise.

Once we reached the fifth floor, I quickly thanked the family and slipped out of the elevator. I followed the arrows down the seemingly endless hallways of the fifth floor until I ended up in front of the room Ricky and I would be sharing for the rest of our stay here.

Just thinking about having to share a room with that son of a bitch was enough to make my skin crawl and my stomach want to puke. Regardless, I was stuck here, so I might as well make the most out of it, right?

Absolutely fucking not.

I jammed the key into the proper slot, and once I was given the green light, the door unlocked and I pushed my way into the hotel room. The room itself wasn’t all that bad, it (thankfully) had two separate beds, a decent sized bathroom- for a hotel that is -a sofa, and a large flat screen sitting on top of a dresser. There was even a mini fridge shoved into one of the corners of the room. But really, I could care less if the entirety of Narnia had been shoved in our hotel room. All I cared about was getting situated and hiding out before Ricky got here, which I’m sure was going to be sometime in the next few minutes.

I shoved my hotel key into the back pocket of my jeans and started looked around the room for a place where I could be for the night. Forget that there were two beds in the room, there was no way I was going to be so open and visible to Ricky. As I frantically searched around the room for a hiding spot, my mind was coming up empty and I was beginning to get frustrated. It was probably a lot to ask of a Holiday Inn hotel room, but why wasn’t there any sort of mildly decent places for me to hide out in? I mean, I’ve literally checked every single spot in this room except for-

“The bathroom,” I muttered softly to myself, the lightbulb above my brain finally going off. Of course, why didn’t I think of the bathroom before? I quickly made my way over to the bathroom and closed the door behind me. The lights came on thanks to the automatic sensors and I scanned the door for some sort of lock. Unfortunately, there wasn’t any sort of lock on the door, but there was no way in hell that I was going to risk leaving that door unlocked around Ricky.

There were some towels resting on a towel rack next to the door, so I grabbed one of the medium-sized towels and began tying the towel around the door knob and attaching it to the towel rack. Granted, it wasn’t much of a lock, but if Ricky tried anything, it would at least give me enough time to figure out my escape plan or maybe call one of the other band members.

Once the towel was securely tied, I slung my Jansport off of my shoulder and made my way over to the shower, which thankfully was also a bathtub. I crawled into the large porcelain tub and pulled the curtain all the way around it. This way, I had some-what of a protective barrier between Ricky and I and possibly some coverage from him as well. Once I’d settled into the tub and had my arms securely wrapped around my Jansport, another thing I wasn’t going to let Ricky have free access to, I couldn’t help but think of some of my older memories from before I moved to San Diego. To be honest, this wasn’t the first time I’d hidden out in a bathtub from someone, and this time didn’t really feel all that different from any other time I’d done it.

Except now, I was in a hotel room instead of my own home, and that just added a new level of panic and fear to rise up inside of me.

I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to focus on my breathing as I felt my throat close up on me. I was not about to have a panic attack, not right now. Not when Ricky could possibly walk into room and hear me freaking out in the bathtub. That’d be very bad. Instead, I focused on calming thoughts and put my focus towards sleeping instead of screaming. Slowly but surely, I was able to ward off the oncoming attack and I felt myself drift back to sleep.

Let’s just hope my mind kept things on the down-low and Ricky didn’t break into the bathroom to try anything.



When I woke up from my sleep, I first was extremely confused. For starters, it was darker than I remember it being when I fell asleep. Secondly, I no longer felt the cool porcelain of the bathtub beneath me and felt a warm, soft comforter instead.

Once my brain finally pieced together that I was no longer in the bathroom, I shot up in a panic and looked around the room frantically, trying to figure out what was going on. I heard the bed next to me creak and my head whipped towards the noise. The first thing I saw was a shirtless Ricky staring at me, and when he started to get up and come my way, I just scooted towards the opposite side of my bed and blurted out, “Stay away from me.”

“Woah, relax Darling,” Ricky cooed, “I’m not going to hurt you-”

“Bullshit,” I spat, trying to glare at him as my body trembled in fear. “Besides, how am I supposed to know that you didn’t do anything to me once you moved me out here?”

Ricky’s eyebrow cocked up momentarily before he just shook his head at me. “I didn’t touch you at all, if that’s what you’re worried about,” he spoke. “Your boyfriend wouldn’t even let me near you when he came in here-”

“Wait, who?” I asked, confusion written all over my face. “What are you even talking about?”

“Um, your boyfriend, Vic Fuentes,” Ricky elaborated, looking at me curiously as my face flushed in embarrassment. “He came in to check up on you when Chris had to let me in, you know, because you just took our hotel key and stormed off from the group.”

“Right,” I mumble quietly, looking away from Ricky and staring at the comforter scrunched up between my fingers. I had totally forgotten about my slip up when I said Vic was my boyfriend. I really hope Ricky hadn’t spread that around to anyone else on the tour.

There was a long moment of silence between Ricky and I, and nothing was said until Ricky let out a deep chuckle that made me look up at him in slight fear.

“Vic really isn’t your boyfriend, is he?” he asked with a smug smirk.

I couldn’t stop my face from flushing even more as I tripped over my words trying to defend myself. “Um, well, I-”

Ricky suddenly began howling with laughter and started to make his way back to me again. “Did you really start spreading around a lie to everyone saying that Vic was your boyfriend?” he asked mockingly. “Are you that desperate or are you just pathetic?”

Anger bubbled inside of me and momentarily overpowered the fear I was feeling. “The only person I told that to was you, and that was just to get you off my back,” I spat. I shook my head at him and suddenly got up from the bed, slinging my Jansport over my shoulder as I did so.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Ricky growled.

His tone was enough to make me flinch and cower back a bit, but I didn’t let it sway me that much. “Just because we’re sharing a room doesn’t mean I have to be here the entire time,” I bluntly told him. Before I reached the door though, I fished my hotel key out of my back pocket and chucked it towards Ricky. “Here’s your stupid key, by the way.”

Ricky was fuming, that much I could tell, and just as he was about to open his mouth to speak, I was already walking out the hotel room and slamming the door behind me. Chris technically never said that I had to be locked up in my shared hotel room for the entire time we were staying here, and he certainly never said anything about not going over to a different person’s hotel room either.

I kept on walking through the halls until I was standing in front of a door marked ‘506’. I awkwardly stood in front of it for a few moments, contemplating whether or not I should actually knock, until I decided I was being stupid and then knocked on the door.

It took a few moments until someone answered, but when the door opened, I was met by a confused yet smiling Alexis. Random sounds came from the the TV inside and several loud cheers were soon followed.

“Hey Dean,” Alexis greeted, “what brings you here?”

“I’m rooming with your lead singer, remember?” I joke, returning his friendly smile.

Alexis laughed a bit and shook his head. “Right, let me apologise in advance for that pompous ass while I’m thinking about it,” he told me. “So yeah, come on in! You’re actually not the first person to come by our lovely little room.”

“Yeah, I could kind of tell by all of the cheers that sounded off when you opened up the door,” I say with a light laugh, stepping inside of the hotel room and closing the door behind me.

“Hey Alexis!” I hear Jaime shout from further inside the hotel room. “Is Kellin back yet?”

“Nope,” Alexis called back, earning him several groans in return, “but we’ve got another person crashing the party.”

I rolled my eyes a bit at that and followed Alexis out to small front lounge that he and Vic had gotten in their room. When I walked in, I saw that they’d moved the couch to in front of the TV and Vic, Jaime, and Tony were all squished onto the small sofa, concentrating on the TV in front of them.

Oh, and from the looks of it, someone went down to our bus, grabbed the Xbox and the video games, and the three dorks on the couch were sitting there playing FIFA.

“Seriously guys?” I ask with a laugh. “You grabbed the Xbox from the bus just so you all could play FIFA?”

“Hey, FIFA is pretty great, thank you very much,” Jaime said, turning to look over at me since he wasn’t the one playing at the moment. “Oh, and by the way, hey Dean.”

A small mumbled chorus of ‘Hey Dean’ came from Vic and Tony as well, but they were both very concentrated on playing the game that they hardly payed attention to me. I found it to be kind of adorable and hilarious actually, so I just giggled and shook my head at the three of them.

“Hey guys,” I say, plopping down next to Alexis on the bed he was sitting on. I watched Vic and Tony play for a little bit before I finally got bored and turned my focus onto Alexis. “So is this what you guys have been doing since we’ve got here?”

Alexis nodded at me. “Yep, for the past two hours,” he told me, intently watching the screen in front of him.

“Two hours?” I asked in shock.

Alexis nodded again and shrugged. “Yeah, give or take,” he said. “We started about the time Vic came back from checking up on you. Also, nice job on locking Ricky out of the room,” he added, finally tearing his eyes away from the TV screen so he could smirk at me.

I rolled my eyes a bit at him and smiled a little. “It wasn’t really intentional, but it is kind of funny, isn’t it?” I ask.

“Totally,” Alexis agreed with a small chuckle. We both went back to watching the virtual game of FIFA unfold, but after a few moments, I saw Alexis shift out of the corner of my eye and face me.

“Can I ask you something?” he asked in a quiet tone.

“Um, sure,” I replied in the same voice, subconsciously picking at the comforter beneath my fingertips.

Alexis silently studied my facial features for a few moments before looking me straight in the eyes and all but whispering, “Why were you hiding out in that bathtub?”

My body immediately tensed up at his question. How did he even find out about that? Did Ricky tell him? If so, what else has Ricky told him? “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I told him, looking away and back at the FIFA screen.

A soft snort came from Alexis and I didn’t have to look over at him to know he was rolling his eyes. “Oh really?” he said. “Then why did Vic come up to me when he got back and asked if there would be a reason you’d be hiding from Ricky?”

I didn’t answer Alexis right away. I was staring blankly at the TV screen in front of me, hoping that it would possibly swallow me whole. When I finally did answer, I sighed and bowed my head in defeat. “So I’m guessing he told you about the towel on the door too, right?”

Alexis just nodded, urging me to continue. It took me a moment, but after organizing my thoughts, I finally spoke again. “I...Ricky scares me,” I say, deciding those would be the best words to use. “I don’t why I hid out in that bathtub, I just panicked. Old habits die hard, I guess.”

Before I could even stop them, those last few words were out of my mouth and in the open. I immediately regretted saying them, and I could see Alexis’ astonished look on his face. I didn’t say a lot, but he already knew too much, and I couldn’t let that happen.

“What do you mean by that?” Alexis asked. When I wouldn’t answer, he tried again. “Dean, is there-”

“Look, I don’t want to have this conversation right now,” I quickly say, my eyes already brimming with tears. “And no offense, but I don’t really want to have this conversation with you.”

Thankfully, before anything more could be said between us, there was a knock on Vic and Alexis’ hotel room. All three boys were still very immersed in the world of FIFA and I didn’t want to be lying here anymore, so I quickly jumped up from the bed and called out, “I got it!”

The three guys on the couch grunted their acknowledgement while Alexis didn’t even say a word. I could feel his worrying gaze following me as I left the room, but I didn’t my best to ignore it and him. When I got to the door, I quickly looked through the peep hole to see who was at the door, and I already didn’t like who I saw standing there.

Honestly, I had half thought about just leaving him standing there and not answering, but I decided to answer regardless, because really, if anything happened, all I had to do was scream and I would have four other guys to help me out. I undid the lock on the door and opened the door with a bit of a scowl on my face. “What do you want, Ricky?” I asked in a bored tone.

Ricky’s lips turned up in a bit of a satisfied smirk as he leaned up against the doorframe and looked down at me. “I had a feeling you’d be here with these losers,” he said smugly.

“Oh Ricky, are you talking about yourself again?” I replied in a mockingly sweet tone. His face fell into a frown and I just rolled my eyes at him. “But seriously, what the fuck do you want?”

“Can I come inside?” he asked me, peering in behind my shoulder.

“I don’t know, can you?” I mocked him.

Ricky suddenly growled and banged the door frame, causing me to jump and shrink back a bit in fear. “Watch your fucking mouth, bitch,” he snarled at me.

I was still cowering in front of Ricky, but yet, I still found it in me to be sarcastic and stand up somewhat to Ricky. “Or what?” I challenged. “What will you do?”

Ricky’s eyes darkened as they narrowed at me. It was obvious I had pissed him off, and I wasn’t for sure if I should feel scared or be happy about that. “You listen here-”

“Everything okay over here?” Kellin asked, coming up from behind Ricky with several cases of beer in hand. Ricky was a little caught off guard with Kellin’s sudden appearance, but he shook it off and offered him a kind smile.

“Yep, we’re just having a casual conversation, aren’t we Dean?” he asked, looking down at me with a knowing smile.

I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to roll my eyes at Ricky, and while the look I got from him scared me, I just focused on Kellin and the beer he was carrying. “You probably should get in there, Kellin,” I say, joking a bit as I spoke. “The guys have been anxiously awaiting your arrival, and to be honest, Jaime’s FIFA commentary is only entertaining for so long.”

“Nothing some beer can’t fix,” Kellin replied with a wide grin. I chuckled a bit and stepped aside to let him in, but when Ricky made a move to come in as well, I blocked him off and forced him to take a few steps back.

“Oh, so he can go in there, but I can’t?” Ricky complained.

I snorted and rolled my eyes yet again at Ricky. “Kellin was already invited into the room and he had beer with him, so he’s clear to come and go as he pleases,” I tell him simply. “You on the other hand, haven’t been cleared by either Vic or Alexis, so-”

“Then let me in, Darling, so I can ask them,” Ricky demanded with false sweetness in his voice.

My eyes narrowed at him as I bluntly stated, “No. There’s no way in hell I’m letting you step foot inside this hotel room. The main reason I’m over here is because I’m trying to avoid you, so fuck off Ricky.”

Ricky let out a snarl at my words, and just as he was about to come at me, I felt someone else come up beside me and cut Ricky off.

“You heard her,” Vic simply stated, his tone a little harsh as he glared at Ricky. “She doesn’t want you here, and quite frankly, the majority of us in this room don’t want you here either, so just leave.”

Now, Ricky’s intense gaze was focused on Vic as the two stared each other down. It was definitely a well known fact the two of them don’t get along, and you could practically see how much tension there was between the two right now. Ricky’s gaze flickered over to me momentarily before settling back on Vic as he spat, “I’m not listening to a fucking guitar tech, and I’m definitely not listening to you, Fuentes-”

“Then listen to me,” Alexis boomed, startling everyone at both his harsh tone and sudden appearance. “No one wants you here Ricky and you’re just going to cause unwanted problems. Besides, I’ve personally gotten tired of your petty bullshit, so I’d suggest you leave before this turns into an ugly mess-”

Ricky started to laugh in Alexis’ face and just grinned at him with one of his signature smirks. “You’re not going to start a fist fight, Alexis,” he confidently stated. “I know you; you’re too quiet and too much of a peacemaker for that-”

Alexis, who admittedly was several inches taller than Ricky and probably the tallest person we had on tour, took a step towards his bandmate and towered over him threateningly. “You want to test that little theory of yours, Jones?” he snarled.

If I didn’t know any better, I would say that Ricky was actually scared. His body trembled ever so slightly, and I could have sworn I saw a flash of fear run across his eyes. Nonetheless, Ricky managed to compose himself and take a few steps back from the scary-looking Alexis.

“You know what, I didn’t want to be here anyway,” Ricky casually stated, letting out a cough to hide the crack in his voice. “Joe and Steven are better company than you losers-”

Alexis didn’t even bother to stop himself from snorting or rolling his eyes at Ricky. “Right, well make sure you tell those two assholes ‘hi’ for me while you’re bitching to them about your problems,” he grumbled, stepping away from the door and walking back into the room where everyone else was still playing FIFA.

Ricky glared at his bandmate as he walked away, but soon shook it off to look back at Vic and I. “You know Dean,” Ricky began as his eyes wandered over to me, “you don’t have to stay here with these guys…” His sentence trailed off as his eyes trailed over my entire body, making me extremely uncomfortable and causing Vic’s arm to snake around my waist protectively.

“Shouldn’t you be leaving, Ricky?” Vic half growled.

Ricky’s gaze immediately flickered back to Vic and his lips, which had curled up in a bit of a smirk as his eyes roamed across my body, turned down in a scowl. “I just wanted to give her one last chance to leave-”

“Well I’m not interested,” I interrupt, shrinking back into Vic’s side as Ricky’s intense gaze snapped back to mine. “I’m perfectly fine here.”

If it were possibly, Ricky’s scowl deepened at my words. His eyes momentarily flickered down to where Vic’s arm was wrapped around my waist before looking back up at the two of us. “Yeah, I can kind of see that,” he spat, giving me one last venomous glare before sharply turning on his heel and stalking away from the hotel room.

We both watched Ricky storm off like he was some sort of over-emotional toddler and after a few moments, Vic finally turned towards me with his eyebrows scrunched together and his face full of worry. “Are you okay?” he asked me.

“Well, I mean, yeah,” I say, shrugging a bit as an after thought. “It was just Ricky being a prick, it’s nothing really to worry about-”

“Are you sure?” Vic asked, looking at me like he wanted to be completely positive that I everything was alright.

I looked back at Vic with a small smile and nodded. “Yes Vic, I’m fine.”

Except I was lying. I was so very far from fine. Yes, Ricky had me freaked out, if not a little paranoid, but it wasn’t just Ricky himself or what he’d done to me. It was everything else too, and that scared me. I had worked so hard to get to this point and to be the person I am right now, but given everything that’s happened, I wasn’t so sure how long everything was going to hold up.

But I couldn’t let Vic know that. Hell, I couldn’t let anybody know that. If anyone knew even a fraction what was going on, then I’d be in some deep shit. I just had to force myself to move forward with life and keep a smile on my face, no matter how painful or difficult that was going to be.

Vic smiled back at me, seeming satisfied with my answer. “Good,” he said, suddenly leaning forward and quickly kissing the side of my head. “Now c’mon, FIFA may not be all that exciting for you, but there’s beer, and something tells me Jaime’s already tried to drink half of what Kellin bought.”

My cheeks were already going red after Vic kissed the side of my head, but hearing his comment about Jaime got me to laugh, and it was basically the first real laugh I’d laughed today. Vic’s lips turned up in a smile at hearing me laugh, and I could tell seeing me at least a little bit happy made him happy. It honestly made me feel even more guilty than I already was because I knew that this burst of happiness wouldn’t last for long, but I wasn’t going to take that away from him. I was going to make it last as long as I could, just so I make Vic smile.

“Fine, but if all the beer’s gone, I’m blaming you,” I joke, getting a laugh out of a Vic as well.

“Seems fair,” he played along, smiling again at me before taking my hand and leading me back into the hotel room.

Maybe this day wasn’t so bad after all.

Notes

I know I said that this chapter would be more interesting than the last, but I had to write another filler because my original idea for this chapter just didn't really fit in like I wanted it too. Also, today was my first day back to school and I'm just so fucking done with school right now it's not even funny. I just want to go crawl into a hole and sleep for 20 years.

But yeah, enough about me. The next chapter should be up sometime tomorrow or over the weekend. Hope you're all doing great and have a great day! :D

Comments

@Thebandobsessedgirlwithnolife @traceytrac_ thank you for your input/support you guys! I have decided to rewrite Dean's story (more info coming on that in an upcoming author's note) and as for a new story, I'm still going back and forth between two ideas I have at the moment, but when I do decide, I'll be sure to let you all know :)

@traceytrac_
I completely agree. Rewriting the story isn't a bad idea but I would also love to read anything new you've made

either 1 or 3! I love Dean's story and I think you should keep writing it! but if you start any other projects please let us know because i would love to read them as well :)

traceytrac_ traceytrac_
4/14/16

@Candy_Monster of course! I still plan on staying on the site for at least AMIW, but thank you so much for still being interested in the story :D

I'm okay if you rewrite the story, but if you move to wattpad, please update here as well! I would love to continue reading!

Candy_Monster Candy_Monster
4/13/16