Chapter 35
As the taxi spun round the corner the huge venue came into view, towering in all its magnificence above the small buildings that cowered below it.
Kim inhaled deeply then softly blew out as for a brief moment anxiety crept in ready to consume her, bravely she fought it off and lifted her head high allowing her new found confidence to regain its rightful place.
‘This is it.’ Kim said to herself as the large cast iron gates of the loading area appeared in the front window.
‘You’re a strong, confident woman without worry or regret and you’ll get what you want from this new journey.’
She continued to prep herself in her head sounding more and more like some whack self-help recording until the taxi pulled to a halt.
Opening the door she slid off the back seat and out of the cab, quickly stepping round to the boot of the vehicle, Kim thanked the driver and hauled her bag over her shoulder.
It looked pretty busy considering Ash said there wasn’t much to do till after the show that evening, everybody seemed to be rushing around with their hands full.
Kim took the warm blast of heat on her shin from the taxi exhaust as her cue to get moving and headed straight for her bus.
As she crossed the car park a few of the crew shot her uneasy smiles but she kept her head up and smiled back.
No one was on the bus when Kim got on there so she quickly dumped her bag on her bunk and decided to go off looking for Ash, grabbing a can of sprite as she passed the fridge.
Stepping off the last step Kim dug in her jacket pocket and pulled out her cigarettes and lighter quickly flicking the bottom of the pack one stick rose above the others, Kim pulled it from the box using her mouth and lit it before putting her lighter inside the cigarette box and shoving it back in her pocket.
Taking a slow stroll towards the building Kim continued to watch the army of workers running back and forth with different wires boxes and tiny leads.
‘YO’
Looking ahead Kim beamed as Ash appeared in the doorway.
‘Yo’ Kim shouted back laughing.
Ash walked forward to meet her halfway.
‘It looks pretty busy round here, thought you said it was lazy day till after show?’ Kim raised an eyebrow.
‘Ah it’s nothing just thought we could do our checks earlier so everyone can have a longer rest ready for tonight, the travel and then the next mammoth set up. I tell you, I never been on a schedule this tight before and I’m proper shitting it!’ Ash screwed his face up.
‘Well it’s a bloody good job I’m back then isn’t it!’ Kim joked.
‘Sure is.’ Ash smirked.
‘So you ready to get started? I could do with you helping me check those moving heads and I’m not sure about them PAR 64’s on the right.’
‘Yeah, Yeah sure.’ Kim smiled before taking another drag on her cigarette.
‘Cool, so give me the rest of that.’ Ash pointed to what was left of the cigarette.
‘Then you can go grab me some C clamps and a couple of yoke’s just in case and I’ll meet you up there.’
Looking highly unimpressed Kim handed to cigarette over to Ash and screwed her face at him before heading off to perform her duties.
A short while later Kim found herself standing at the foot of the enormous stage staring up at all the lights above her head, she was fighting her hardest to hold back feelings of doubt and uncertainty that were clawing away at her trying to break her spirit.
‘NO’ she shouted in her head but it was with that much force sound actually surfaced.
‘Hey’ a voice echoed the almost empty arena.
Kim looked up and spotted Ash up in the rigging.
‘Come on up with them clamps you waster.’ Ash flicked a tiny ball of rolled up gaffer tape down at Kim as she tried to dodge it she embarrassingly fell head first over the row of seats at the side of her causing her backside to become marooned over the top of the seats for the world to see.
Hearing the rumble of several fits of laughter Kim quickly got back to her feet and began smoothing down her clothes and hair.
Looking back up to Ash who was now lying on a tiny platform holding his stomach through laughter an unimpressed Kim flipped him the finger.
‘Fuckin knob.’ She cursed up to him but this just made him laugh even more, beginning to see the funny side Kim to let out a little snigger as she walked over to the ladder and hooked herself up to the harness.
‘That’s not funny Ash.’ Kim huffed as she reached the top off the rigging and shuffled across to change harnesses.
‘Yeah it bloody was your face was even funnier though.’ Ash began to crack up again as he impersonated Kim’s facial expressions in slow motion.
Kim shook her head and sharply slapped Ash across the top of his head.
‘Loser’ she muttered jokingly.
‘Here take your dam clamps you Muppet.’
Ash clutched the bag to his chest and tried to compose himself, but it was no good every time he looked back at Kim it triggered his giggles.
‘Alright, alright, get a grip now, Kim fell over and it was so, so funny, let’s move on shall we?’ Kim rolled her eyes.
Ash tried to instruct Kim through the laughing but he was failing miserably, it wasn’t long till their attention was brought to the sound of over excited girls giggling and chatting away.
Kim looked down at her watch.
‘Sound check time already?’ She turned to Ash.
‘bit early aren’t they?’ she continued.
‘Yeah they decided to open the doors and get them in early because it’s a big crowd today but the official start time is still the same. You wanna get out before it starts? Ash asked.
Kim paused for a moment to think about it then shook her head.
‘Nah it’s ok, I’m not hiding away any more and it can only get easier after this one right?’
Ash smiled and gently rubbed his friends shoulder.
‘Cool, lets crack on then.’
Kim watched over the banister as 100’s of girls poured into the arena and rushed to get as close to the stage as they could, occasionally passing Ash bits and bobs as he requested.
There was a crackle over Ash’s radio as his name was called through.
Ignoring his conversation Kim continued to watch the antics of the girls below, admiring some of their outfits and trying to make out what some of their banners said.
‘Yeah get everyone in place for sound check, good to go in the next 10 to 15 minutes, I’ll be up in right side rig if anyone wants to know where I am but radio through if I’m needed over.’
Ash conversation began to filter through to Kim’s radar.
’10 minutes’ she thought.
‘If I go know I can get down and out before it starts’ she toyed with the idea for a few minutes but then it was too late as the crowd roared and Brian had snook out on stage early with Baylee.
‘Here sort these.’ Ash interrupted her thoughts as he fisted a handful of blue and red wires in her face.
‘He’s a cute kid.’ Ash smiled as he peered over the banister towards the stage
‘Yeah he is.’ Kim smiled in agreement.
‘Boy can do some bloody talking though.’ Ash chuckled.
Kim looked at him as if to say how do you know?
‘He came over the other day after he hit me with a ball, then just stayed.’
He laughed as he read Kim’s face.
‘His mom’s pretty cool to.’
Kim’s eye’s nearly popped out of her head.
‘So what now you’re all best friends?’ her tone was slightly harsher than intended but she didn’t understand how Ash seemed to have gone from not really liking any of them to thinking there cool.
‘Nah chill out man, she came over to fetch Baylee when he was talking with me, then we just started talkin n she seemed a really nice person.’ Ash tried to be blasé about yesterday’s encounter.
‘So what did you talk about?’ Kim had to shout the roar from the crowd below began to drown her out as AJ now appeared on stage.
‘Nothing, just Baylee and what he had been doing.’ Ash shrugged.
Kim looked straight at Ash filled with suspicion. ‘and the rest.’ She shouted again as Howie took to the stage.
Ash innocently raised his palms to the ceiling. ‘I dunno what else you want me to say, I got hit with a ball, I got talking to Baylee, he wanted to help me with the wires, his mom came looking for him, we started talking they went off to look for dogs, what else can I tell you?’
The screams below were almost deafening as Nick finally took his place on stage.
‘I know there’s something else you must have talked about Ash because I know you and I know when you hold back, so you can tell me the truth.’ Kim was almost screaming to be heard above the noise.
‘The truth!’ Ash bellowed back
‘The truth is you need to get the fuck over Nick Carter!’
The two froze as they both realised the whole arena was silent.
Kim closed her eyes and took a few steps right to get out of sight.
Ash bravely looked over the banister and winced at the sight of hundreds of set of eyes all looking up in his direction. Ash embarrassingly smiled before shimmering back out of view to hide with Kim.
Luckily enough down below had only heard Nick Carter being screamed so Brian did his best to smooth it over and made jokes about the crew being in love with Nick, but Nick couldn’t take his eyes away from where Kim had stood, his facial expression was hard and unwarming as he perched on the edge of his stool.
Brian began to take requests for songs to move things along and Nick finally snapped back to reality as Incomplete began to filter through the speakers.
Back up in the rigging Kim threw her head into her hands and shook it.
‘Oh My God Ash, how friggin embarrassing.’
Ash was bright red and slumped down to his knees.
‘Shit’ he looked up to Kim.
‘It could only happen to us couldn’t it?’
Kim shook her head then crouched down to sit next to Ash; she stretched her legs out in front of her so her feet hung off the end of the ledge.
‘Yeah it could only happen to us.’ She repeated before beginning to laugh.
Ash soon joined in, Kim rested her head on his shoulder. ‘I guess we’re stuck here now till down there clears.’
She felt Ash’s head nod.
‘Sorry again, I’m not doing well am I, how long have I been back?’ she joked.
‘It’s ok’ Ash paused. ‘You were right though.’
‘What you mean?’ Kim asked tilting her head to look at him.
Ash took a deep breath before informing Kim on everything Baylee had told him and Leighanne.
Kim sat up straight as she processed what Ash had told her.
‘I’m sorry I didn’t tell you straight away, I just didn’t know what to do.’ Ash looked doe eyed at Kim who just shrugged.
‘You Ok?’ he asked
‘Yeah, I’m fine.’ Kim softly spoke.
‘So what you gunna do about it?’ Ash questioned.
Kim shrugged again. ‘Probably nothing.’
‘What?’ Ash shook his head confused.
‘I just dunno how I feel about it at the minute.’ Kim paused.
‘Part of me understands why he never called and now has a new girlfriend so I forgive him, then another part is kinda pissed he thought I could do something like that and I wanna know what made him think that and then I wonder why he just let it go with question or fight. So yeah, I’m not sure, we’ll see.’
‘You sure?’ Ash pressed not quite comfortable with her response.
‘Yep.’
‘You not gunna mention it to him at all?’
‘Dunno? Maybe if the time or place calls for it, but for now I won’t stress, let’s just see what happens.’
Kim looked over the edge to see how far along sound check had gone as she looked down Nick looked up and the two locked gaze immediately.
For Kim it felt like time froze for that split second and morphed into an eternity, her heart pounded heavily into her chest as she remembered how engaging those angle blue eyes were.
As Nick broke the gaze she remembered to breathe again and inhaled deeply, she quickly sat back licking her dry lips.
For Nick his heart sank, for that brief moment in time that feeling of butterflies in his stomach, his heart beating double time and that ball stuck in his throat returned. He’d forgotten how exciting and euphoric that feeling felt but then he remembered the final scene of that last day and a pain shot through his heart.
Nick couldn’t concentrate for the rest of the sound check he was completely off and kept forgetting words, although his audience found it quite cute he was struggling to keep up the façade the pain of missing someone who was now that close was worse than he had expected, he continued to glance up to where she was every chance he got but she never looked back over.
‘You Ok there bro?’ AJ danced around Nick as they made their way to the side of the stage for the photos.
‘HUH?’ Nick responded.
AJ stopped. ‘You OK bro?’ he asked again.
‘Nah, Erm can you do me a favour bro and take my backstage tour today? I’m not feelin too good.’ Nick quietly spoke turning his back to the crowd so they wouldn’t know what he was saying.
‘Yeah sure, no problem. You get checked out though you looking a bit grey and out of it.’ AJ smiled.
‘Yeah will do I’ll be fine in a bit.’
As the boys smiled and posed for their photo’s Kim and Ash shimmied down the ladder as fast as they could laughing as they made a quick break for freedom without being spotted.
Once outside Kim and Ash laughed again at their misfortune, they each lit up a cigarette and listened as the buzzing of swarms of fans making their way towards the arena filled the air.
‘Its gunna be a good show tonight.’ Ash said as smoke filtered out of his mouth.
Kim cocked an eyebrow at him. ‘And what brings you to that conclusion oh wise one?’
Ash shrugged, ‘You can just kinda tell, there’s an atmosphere you know something in the air.’
‘Oh well that explains it then.’ Kim laughed.
‘Yeah yeah. Well you know the drill I got calls to make, people to track down and last minute adjustments to make before the show begins.’ Ash stubbed his cigarette out.
‘So I’ll go get myself a coffee and we’ll meet for briefing in 30 minutes outside bus.’ Kim mocked.
‘Yeah you got it sparky. See ya in a bizzle.’ Ash winked and headed back inside leaving Kim to make her way back over to the bus.
As she put her cigarette out she spotted Ash’s radio on the box next to where he was standing.
‘Dam fool, he’d forget his head if it wasn’t screwed on.’ She laughed and picked the radio up ready to chase him down.
Back inside she couldn’t spot him, he was like a whippet once he got going. Kim thought.
Looking around she could see AJ and Josh talking to a crowd of girls who hung on his every word and headed down in that direction.
As she passed she gave AJ a quick wave before disappearing behind the stage.
There was a lot going on people wondering around with clothes, guys performing security checks and dancers stretching up walls.
As Kim delved further into the circus she spotted Jen and Q talking on their phones, she waved over and they both smiled and Jenn waved her over.
Jenn hugged her as soon as she reached them and Q went in for a high 5.
‘Where you been hiding?’ Jenn asked hanging up her call.
‘Nowhere it’s just been so busy hasn’t Kim.’ Kim lied hoping Jenn didn’t know the full story.
‘It’s good to see you, we wasn’t sure if you’d come back after, you know.’ Jenn smiled.
‘Yeah its good be back doing it all again.’ Kim lied again.
‘So I’m guessing you and Nick haven’t spoken?’ Jenn’s tone had changed to a soft and light one rather than her usual loud out spoken way.
Kim shook her head not wanting to go any further with that conversation.
‘I’m sorry.’ Jenn grabbed Kim and pulled her in for a tight hug.
‘It’s Ok honestly, I’m fine.’ Kim continued to lie.
‘Oh you’re so brave; I honestly don’t how you’re doing it.’ Jenn continued to warble on but Kim’s attention was drawn to the end of the corridor where Nick’s girlfriend was loudly giggling with Howie and his wife.
Both Howie and Leigh spotted Kim with Jenn and smiled and waved but Kim could tell they were uneasy as Lauren looked at her then turned to Leigh obviously asking who Kim was because she instantly looked back with a narrowed I’m watching you kind of look on her face.
Nick then walked through the door instantly feeling the tension as he spotted Kim down the corridor and everyone looking at her.
Nick swallowed hard trying to clear his dry throat and embarrassingly smiled down to Kim.
Like a hawk Lauren spotted the smile and wrapped an arm around her man, stating her claim.
‘Well, this is awkward!’ She spoke with a high pitched strong LA accent like everything rhymed.
Kim turned back to Jenn. ‘So I gotta go find Ash and Erm, give him back this,’ she waved the radio in Jenn’s face. ‘So Erm. Yeah, I’ll see you around then.’
She smiled at Jenn and Q and as quick as she could turned on her heels to get the hell out of there.
Nick chewed on the side of his check beginning to feel like a complete ass as Lauren pulled him tighter into her body.
Chapter End Notes:
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