Chapter 5
Where has the time gone? Kim looked down at her watch it was getting on for 1.30pm. It had turned out to become a pretty busy day helping Ash get himself sorted. She headed over to the drinks stand and got herself a bottle of water, as she took a slow walk around the arena she noticed a huge line of girls outside the doors, they must be the sound check people she thought to herself. She scanned the line of girls and noticed a few guys in there to. A few looked like they’d been dragged there by their girlfriends and they weren’t too impressed by the screams every time a member of staff walked past the entrance. As Kim turned to walk away she collided with a bearded, shaggy haired fella and spilt a bit of her water down herself.
“Ah man, I’m so sorry” The guy cried.
“Hey don’t worry about it, it was my fault. I should have been looking where I was going not staring at a bunch of people waiting to get in.” Kim apologized.
The guy looked at Kim before asking “So I’m guessing you’re the girl working with the stage crew?”
Kim looked at him slightly puzzled, what did he mean by that? She wondered.
“I guess I am” she snapped back at him feeling defensive.
Sensing the tone to her voice the guy quickly added
“Oh I’m sorry I didn’t mean to be rude, it’s just well, we never really get girls doing this job so when one appears it kinda gets noticed you know?” he tried to laugh it into a joke but Kim felt a little uneasy.
She began to think she wasn’t wanted there because of her gender, and everyone was talking about her and didn’t think she was able to do the job.
Her eyes began to water slightly it was the first time since she got there that she’d felt so self conscious and out of place.
The guy noticed the look on her face and tried to rectify his comment.
“Hey if I’ve made you feel bad I really didn’t mean too, it was just an observation don’t take it to heart, seriously dude, it’s cool to have a fresh face around the place.”
Kim took a deep breath and pulled herself together, if she was in a man’s world then she couldn’t show a weakness, she needed to well ‘man up’.
The guy stuck out his hand towards Kim. “Hey I’m Justin” he said with a smile.
Kim shook his hand “Hey I’m Kim” she replied with a half hearted smile.
“Wanna see something cool?” He asked her.
Kim nodded feeling she needed a cheering up.
“Watch this” Justin beamed.
He turned around and headed towards the door taking some keys out of his pocket. As the girls noticed him they let out an almighty roar. Justin stopped just before the door and pretended to mess with his keys before looking up at the crowd and signalling he’d not got the right key for the door.
Kim burst out laughing at the crowd’s reaction. Justin headed back towards Kim laughing at himself.
“Oh man, that’s just mean” She said between the giggles
“You wanna know the best bit?” he said with a twinkle in his eye.
Kim nodded.
“I don’t even have the keys to this place. I work for the guy’s, I co-ordinating the meet and greets” he added trying to catch his breath from the laughs.
Kim threw her hand to her mouth
“Oh them poor girls” she gasped but soon began laughing again as Justin headed back out into the foyer only to turn around half way and come back.
The screams were deafening.
Kim shook her head “That’s just, just mean, funny, but mean”
“It’s all good fun get’s them ready for when they come in” he laughed. “Well I best go and get a time check off the guys” he added.
“Are they already here?” Kim asked her stomach began to feel funny again.
“Yeah, we’ve been here for a few hours now. They’ve been hiding out in their buses out of sight from the crazies.”
“Cool, well I’ll see ya around then, hope you don’t get beat up by angered fan when you let them in” Kim taunted.
“Yeah I’ll get beat on one day” he joked back, “well if you get bored over the coming weeks n wanna play make the fans scream you know where to find me.”
He flashed a smile at Kim as he headed off out the back.
“Thanks, I might just do that” she yelled after him.
Chuckling to herself Kim made her way around the arena to the sound desk to find Ash, she was glad that guy didn’t turn out to be a jerk and he seemed kinda cool, she soon pushed the feelings of being an outcast to the back of her mind, as she pulled herself up to the platform the sound desk was on and found Ash and John checking the stuff over.
“Can I do anything?” She asked
“Nah not at the minute just hang around in case there’s any problem with the mic’s when they start n you can change them for me” Ash told her still engrossed in what he was doing.
She sat herself down on the edge of the platform and let her legs swing down.
Ash looked down at her and smiled as he watched her examining her surroundings looking like an excited little child.
Kim turned around to catch him watching her causing him to blush for getting busted.
“Sound check should last about an hour” he informed her “then we’ll go grab a burger or something before the show starts and we’re back to work.”
“So where do you want me this evening?” she enquired,
Ash n John let out a little laugh
“Ergh you guys are gross that didn’t even sound dirty!” she tutted at their behaviour.
Ash was still chuckling as he answered, “you can just hang about for the first few shows see what’s what and how things work, the more you watch the more you’ll learn then you can take on specific roles.”
“Great another lackey role” she huffed causing Ash to role his eyes at her
“You’re not a lackey you’re learning the ropes, we’ve all been there mate.” he protested.
“Yeah I get it, I’m just messing with ya” Kim explained.
She didn’t mind really, it meant she got to watch the show’s more closely.
Ash’s face suddenly screwed up and he cursed. “
What’s up?” Kim asked.
“We gotta lose wire somewhere, wanna come investigate with me?” He grinned.
“Yeah sure” she said getting to her feet, “So where do you think it is?”
Ash smiled at her as he pointed up, Kim looked up to see lots of lights attached to metal frames. She swallowed hard before asking the dreaded question,
“So how do we get up there?”
The next thing Kim knew she was strapped into a harness and making her way across the arena some 30ft in the air. There was a small ledge which they used to get around to the lights they needed to check, as Ash sifted through endless wires Kim watched as hoards of people entering the arena and being ushered into seats, after a few minutes the boys appeared on the stage the screams were so loud it made Kim wince.
“Crazy in it” Ash looked down at the goings on.
“Yeah crazy” Kim muttered as her gaze fixated onto Nick.
She watched as the boys played the fans up jumping off the stage and sang a few songs.
Kim quickly forgot she was up so high and meant to be learning stuff for her job as she lightly lent on the safety bar to watch the guys showing off below her. Next up was a questions and answer session, Justin appeared again and was going around with a microphone to each person picked to answer a question,
As Kim was laughing at Brian’s answer to the last question she noticed AJ had spotted her and was waving franticly in her direction. She felt extremely embarrassed as everyone below began turning to look up at her.
“Oh great” she said to herself but the words escaped a little louder than expected causing Ash to take notice of the situation.
AJ got off his stool and spoke loudly through the microphone.
“Hey everyone say Hi to English, she our newbie.”
Like a sea of robots below her 90% of the crowd waved up to her and shouted Hello. Her face felt like it was on fire and she shyly waved back down. She looked at AJ and shook her head as he fell about in a fit of laughter.
Brian quickly brought the attention back to the boy’s by singing lots of hellos in strange voices; Kim smiled back down to him and nodded her head acknowledging his way of taking the spot light off her. Brian then nodded to Justin to get the meet and photo’s underway.
“Fuckin idiot!” Ash suddenly blurted out.
Kim spun round to see Ash glaring down at AJ “What’s up?” she asked.
“Who does he think he is? Ash snapped back shaking his head in disgust.
“What’s your problem man? He was only joking around, it’s no big deal, and he’s cool.” Kim tried to defend AJ’s actions, but couldn’t believe Ash’s reaction.
Ash’s eyes narrowed as he looked down on Kim.
“Yeah well the joke will be on you when you got a 100 girls bitching about ya and he’s still a fuckin God!”
Kim was shocked she’d never seen Ash this way before, he was freaking out about nothing what AJ did really wasn’t a big deal to her. She stood there open mouthed just staring at her friend. Ash’s face suddenly softened as he looked into Kim’s worried eyes and he dipped his head feeling slightly remorseful.
“Look I’m sorry” he finally said “I shouldn’t have snapped like that, I just don’t want you to end up getting into something that’ll either hurt you or you’ll regret. I’ve spent time with guys like these before there’s always another city with another girl in it. Just be careful ok.”
Kim shook her head at him not knowing what to say. Ash knew she wasn’t the kind of girl to just jump into bed with any guy so what was his problem and even if she did it had nothing to do with him, she wasn’t stupid.
Ash let out a heavy sigh “I’m sorry”
Kim rolled her eyes but no matter what she couldn’t stay mad at Ash.
“Thanks for looking out for me n all but seriously Ash it’s nothing, a joke to pass sometime. I’m really not looking for, wanting or expecting anything and I get the ‘being on the road’ thing ok.”
She smiled at Ash and gave him a hug trying to make him feel better but underneath she was still a bit freaked out by his OTT rant.
“We all done?” she asked desperate to get out of there.
“Yeah! Let’s get outta here a bit ay?” Ash smiled back at her.
Down on the floor Nick found it hard to concentrate on his work once he spotted Kim. Whenever he thought no one would notice he kept glancing up at her. He could see she was talking to someone and it looked a little heated, like the guy was telling her off.
Was that her boyfriend or just her boss? Whichever it was it looked like she was in trouble for something. He wondered to himself. Either way he shouldn’t be talking to her the way he was,
he could tell she was uncomfortable by whatever was going on up there.
Nick felt like he wanted to just go up there and tell the jerk to back the fuck off, just then he saw her hug him.
He instantly looked away, like he couldn’t bring himself to watch,
Guess it is the boyfriend then! He said to himself, he tried to take a last look at her to see if things we’re ok but they’d both disappeared out of view, he wasn’t given the chance to continue with his thoughts as his fans were being sent towards him and crying his name in frenzy so he put on his happy face to welcome them trying to push Kim’s image to the back of his mind.
Kim and Ash headed towards the food stand, both trying to keep off the subject of what had just happened.
“Oh crap I can’t find my phone” Kim complained “It must have fallen out my pocket when we were inside.” She began patting herself down hoping she’d come across it.
“I have to go back and check” she continued.
“You want me to come with you and help you look?” Ash offered.
“Nah, I’ll be fine, you go get the food before the queue’s start I won’t be long it’s gotta be by the sound desk where i was sitting.”
She began to jog back over to the arena.
Just as she arrived to the sound desk the last of the fans were leaving for their backstage tour with Howie. Kim searched frantically around where she had been looking for her phone. She bent down to look under the seats by where she was sitting earlier.
“Yes” she cried as she spotted the phone on the floor.
She soon jumped as she felt a hand on her back.
“Are you ok?”
she looked around to see Nick standing behind her. She instantly smiled as she saw him.
“Yeah fine thanks I thought I’d lost my phone, but here it is” She let out a little school girl giggle as she waved her phone at him.
Nick held out his hand to help her to her feet, never removing his gaze from hers.
“Hey, I’m sorry If AJ got you in trouble with your boyfriend earlier, he just likes to mess about and sometimes forgets it can have implications.”
He explained but he was soon interrupted by Kim’s burst of laughter.
His looked at her a little confused as well as embarrassed.
“What?” He questioned.
“Oh I’m sorry, I shouldn’t laugh in your face but that’s just too funny, my boyfriend” she continued to howl.
“Am I missing something?” Nick chuckled as Kim’s laugh began to infect him.
Kim finally pulled herself together and wiped away a little tear that had formed from the laughing.
“Oh, Oh, Oh, boyfriend!” she began again.
Nick was now laughing with her even though he didn’t get what the joke was, but her laugh was to infectious to just ignore.
“Ash is not my boyfriend.” She soon managed to explain.
“He’s my best friend’s son, kinda like a brother but so not a boyfriend.”
She abruptly stopped laughing and then continued
“That’s actually quite gross now I think about it.”
“Oh man I’m sorry” Nick said sliding his hand up the back of his neck.
“I just assumed because he looked so pissed earlier.”
“No it’s cool he was just doing the brotherly duty thing.” she smiled back.
“So, erm, is there a boyfriend back home?”
Nick screwed his face up feeling a bit silly for asking but it just kinda slipped out.
Kim flashed a wide smile at him. “No, no boyfriend, I’m err, riding solo as they say.”
Nick beamed as soon as he heard she was unattached.
“Cool, me too” he exclaimed.
Oh NO! Real smooth Nicky he said to himself like she cares anyway!
“So will you be watching the show tonight?”
he asked trying to quickly change to subject and not feel like a dork any longer.
“Yeah I’ll be around” she answered.
“Not sure where I’ll be yet, but I’ll defiantly be here” she smiled.
“Cool, I best get back to work then, the fans will be looking for some autographs and photos about now. I’ll probably see you later then”
his eyes sparkled at Kim.
“Err, Yeah! I’ll see ya later then.”
She repeated as she walked away unable to remove the smile from her face.
Was that a little flirting? She thought. No it couldn’t have been, I’m just reading too much into it he was just being friendly. Gosh he’s so cute though I’m gunna enjoy watching him.
As she reached Ash the huge grin was still glued to her face.
“OK?” Ash asked passing her a burger box and a drink.
Kim nodded “Yeah, it’s all good, found the phone.”
She bit her bottom lip still thinking about the handsome man and the possibilities of what was around the corner.
Author's Chapter Notes:
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