“I don’t know, I don’t have a babysitter, and the people I normally have watch him will all be at Bush’s.”
“Come on, Dev,” Eli whined. “I need you there and we can find you a babysitter.”
“I don’t think it’s going to happen.”
“What if I knew someone who wasn’t going to the show, and they would watch Jaks?” Drake asked.
I looked up at my brother shocked, “Who do we know that won’t be going to the show?”
“Cris’s mom, I already talked to her, she would love to have Jaks stay the night,” Drake said. “You know she loves that boy, and since Cris hasn’t given her any grandchildren yet she lives vicariously through Jaks.”
“You already talked to her?” I said starting to get angry.
“Well yea, I knew it would be important to Eli that you are there,” Drake said with a shrug. “And I know Seth wants you there.”
“Damn it Drake!” I was pissed now. “Seth and I aren’t going to work out, let it go.”
“You little sister, need to figure out what your so scared of and deal with it,” Drake growled. “Then put your family back together, and you need to do it soon. Jaks needs his dad and a couple hours a week isn’t enough.”
“How much time do you think Seth will have for him when he goes back on tour?” I asked.
“You can cross that bridge when you get to it,” Drake replied. “For now though, fix this with Seth, Dev or you’re going to end up regretting it.”
“I’ll think about it,” I said, wanting him to stop talking about Seth.
He snorted, “Yea, right, ok I am heading out. Seth and Sam should be back at X’s with Eli’s drum kit and we both know he gets antsy when anyone touches it but him.”
Drake gave me a kiss on the cheek and Eli gave me a hug then they left. A few minutes later, Max walked in and I quickly gathered up Jaks and headed home. I knew I wouldn’t sleep tonight; I had too much on my mind.
¯¯¯
We all sat around watching Eli set up his drum kit how he wanted it, we decided to clear out some of the stuff in Xavier’s back living area and practice there. None of us wanted to touch Alex’s kit, I don’t think any of us really wanted to believe that he had quit. The call to the label went about as well as expected, they were pissed, and they wanted answers, unfortunately none of us had answers to give. Someone from the label is supposed to call Alex, and a rep from the label is going to be flying down tomorrow to “access the situation” but basically they told us to either fix things with Alex or find a new drummer. For now though we’re to put the CD on hold and focus on the issues in our band. I knew that this kind of thing had happened to other bands, and that they survived, but I didn’t know how we were going to, we’d been friends for almost 10 years now; it was like losing a brother.
“I’m almost ready,” Eli said.
“Take your time, we’re not in a hurry,” Sam told him.
I walked outside to get a breath of air trying to clear my head; none of us had really talked about plans if Alex didn’t come back. Right now we had to focus on the show we had in roughly 9 days, none of us wanted to cancel it. Bush’s is where we got out start and we all had been stoked to be playing there again. I heard Eli warming up with Sam and knew I would have to go inside soon, but first I needed to call Devi and work out time with Jaks for the next few days. I knew we were going to be busy trying to get Eli up to speed on the new stuff, on top of dealing with the label’s rep.
I pulled out my phone and flipped through my contacts until I found her, I stood there while it rang, not sure if I wanted it to go to voicemail or not, after about the fifth ring I was about to hang up when she answered.
“Hello,” she said sounding like shed just run a mile.
“Hey, Dev everything ok?”
“Yea just been chasing Jaks around the house,” she said I could hear the smile in her voice.
“Ah,” I said. “He’s full of energy.”
She chuckled, “That he is, so what’s up?”
“Well as you’ve probably heard things kinda blew up with Alex today.”
“Yea,” she said quietly. “I’m so sorry, Seth.”
“It’ll work itself out,” I responded but not sure I believed it. “Anyway things here are going to be crazy for the next few days, I’m not sure when I will be able to take Jaks.”
She sighed, “I understand Seth; we’ll just work it day to day.”
She didn’t sound happy. “What’s the matter Dev?”
“It’s nothing, it’s just that this is what I was worried about,” she said quietly.
I knew exactly what she meant, she was worried Jaks and I would get close then I would disappear on him, but I also know it was that same fear that wouldn’t let us try and make it work as a family.
“It’ll only be for a few days Dev, and I still plan on seeing him, I’m just not sure how it will work day to day.”
“Ok, we’ll work it out,” she said. “Seth I gotta go, I’ll talk to you soon.”
She hung up without me being able to say bye, I cursed. This was all happening at the worst time possible, here I was trying to prove to Devi I could have an active role in Jaks’ life while juggling the band and now I’m doing exactly what she thought I would do from the beginning—bailing.
Someone cleared their throat from the doorway into the house; I glanced over and saw Drake standing there, “They’re ready to get started.”
I nodded, repocketed my cell and started heading back into the house, Drake stopped me with a hand on my shoulder. “Look at this as a test, make it work, and prove to her you can be a father to Jaks, a husband to her, and the bassist of My Misery Muse,” he said. “I don’t know how you will do it, but I know you can.”
With that he let go of my shoulder and we went back inside.
I walked straight over to my favorite bass, and slung it on, everyone was ready and waiting on me. I gave it a quick strum, it sounded sweet as always. “Alright what are we starting with?”
“I thought we would start with something from the first album, what’s your favorite off that Eli?” Sam asked.
“Broken,” Eli said without hesitation and it made me flinch. That was a song that’s bittersweet to me, it was our first single and it broke the top 10, but it was a song about Devi that I had written after she told me to get out, go to La, and forget about her. I snorted, and Sam gave me a knowing look, like I could ever forget about her.
We practiced together for about 2 hours, and just like Drake had said Eli knew all of our stuff, and he was a badass drummer. Both Sam and I had known instantly that if we had to replace Alex it would hopefully be with Eli and we had conveyed it to each other with a look. Sam and I had been able to talk without actually talking for years, it comes in handy when on stage, and with just a look and I knew what he was thinking.
We decided to call it quits for the night and start up again the next afternoon. This time teaching Eli the new stuff, I was interested in what he would do with it. Since a lot of it wasn’t finished we were going to let him have some free rein and see what he could do with it.
“That was badass,” Xavier said.
“Yea, I haven’t had that much fun playing in a while,” I said.
“I’m just happy I could keep up,” said Eli with a cocky grin on his face.
“So you going to play Bush’s with us?” asked Sam.
“Hell yea,” said Eli.
I grinned; it had been a long time since I had had fun playing. We were usually so tangled up in drama that we rarely got to just play to play.
“I’ve got to play now, especially since I’m in the process of guilting Dev into going because I’m playing,” Eli said.
I laughed leave it to Drake to use any angle he can to manipulate his sister.
“She agree?” asked Sam.
“Hasn’t said so, but I know that look on her face, she’ll be there, especially since I found her a babysitter,” Drake said.
; “Who’d you set up to watch Jaks?” I asked Drake.
“Cris’s mom, she’s always a willing babysitter for Jaks,” Drake said.
“Cool, she’s a nice lady,” I said feeling better now that I knew who was going to be watching my kid.
“Yea and it would be good to get Dev out of the house and having fun,” Eli said.
“So who do we put on the list?” Xavier asked. “We got 10 slots, so everyone gets 2 picks then we have an extra 2 I was thinking those 2 are for Drake and Cris.”
I nodded, “Makes sense. Make one of mine Devi, then other Mags.”
“Cin cause I will never hear the end of it if I don’t,” Eli said. “After that I don’t care.”
“Max,” Sam said. “I’ll ask him if there’s anyone he wants to bring with, if not it’s open.”
“Uhm, if everyone’s from the shop is at the show, what’s Cris going to do?” asked Xavier.
Drake shrugged, “The same thing he did last time, leave Vic at the shop and call in another artist or two in the area to help him cover.”
“Well, we can work out the rest of this later, we don’t have to have the names until we set up Saturday,” said Sam. “I’m going home, night.”
With that said we gathered our stuff and left for the night, and for the first time in a relatively long time, we left without an argument ending with having one of us storm out.
Chapter Eighteen
I’d finished with my appointments early and Cris had sent me home, not that I’m complaining, but Seth was picking up Jaks and I really didn’t want to see him. So I decided to get some designs done that I had been playing with. I’d turned on Drowning Pool’s Sinners and got lost in my work, I hadn’t realized Seth had shown up until I glanced up and saw a pair of boots standing in front of me, and screamed.
He laughed, “Sorry didn’t mean to scare you.”
I noticed Bodies was playing again, damn how long had I been out of it? I glanced at the clock and realized it’d been two hours.
“I didn’t know anyone was here.”
“I realized that,” he said looking around. “So where’s Jaks?”
I jumped up, “What do you mean where’s Jaks, you were supposed to pick him up!” I yelled.
“I went up to the daycare to get him; I was told he’d already been picked up. I asked if you’d been the one to pick him up, and his teacher said no another girl had,” Seth said getting angrier.
I grabbed my phone getting ready to call everyone I knew when I noticed a text message I hadn’t realized I’d gotten.
MAGS: JUST A REMINDER, JAKS IS STAYING WITH ME TONIGHT, SO YOU CAN GET WORK DONE
Fuck, I completely forgot it was the first Tuesday of the month. “He’s with Mags,” I told Seth.
He looked relieved then pissed, “Why the fuck is he with Mags, you know I was going to pick him up?”
“We have a standing date, every first Tuesday of the month Jaks stays the night with Mags so I can get some sketching and design work done,” I said. “I didn’t realize that was today.”
“Oh,” Seth said looking down at his boots.
“I’m sorry, if you want I can call Mags,” I started but stopped at him shaking his head.
“No, that’s ok, I see you have a lot of work to do, plus it’s good for him to spend time with his godmother right,” he quipped giving me an odd look.
“What?”
“I just think it’s funny you made Mags his godmother and Drake his godfather,” he said smiling, “how’d that go over?”
I laughed, “About as well as you could expect, both grumbled and threw a temper tantrum,” I shrugged. “But I didn’t give a damn, and neither of them said no when I asked.”
“I’ve been reading the journal, I noticed you got a lot shit from both of them.”
I shrugged, “They didn’t like some of my choices, but they were my choices to make not theirs.”
I knew what he was referring too, my naming Jaks after him. When I had told Drake I had named the baby Jackson Seth he hit the roof. We ended up having a screaming match in the ob ward which got him kicked off the premises.
“Thanks, by the way,” Seth said quietly.
I gave him a watery smile and a nod, not trusting my voice.
“So what are you working on?” Seth asked gesturing at the sketch I had been working on.
“A commission piece for one of my clients,” I said. “It’s turning out better than I had first expected when she came up with the idea.”
I sat back down, gesturing for Seth to join me. I showed him the sketch I had been working on, and explaining what the client wanted, showing him what I had added to the piece.
“It looks terrific,” Seth said. “You’re talented, but I’ve always known that.”
“Thanks,” I said. “So how’s practice with Eli going?”
“That man is a fucking genius on drums,” Seth said. “He’s blown all of us away.”
I smiled; he wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t already know about Eli.
“It’s been amazing working with him, we actually look forward to practicing again. I forgot what that felt like. And the label’s rep was blown away with him, since then the label’s been making noise of us just hiring Eli instead of working things out with Alex.”
“What do you think about that?”
“I think they may be right,” he said softly. “We’ve tried a few more times with Alex, but he doesn’t want help.”
“I’m sorry, Seth,” I whispered.
“Nothing to be done about it, if he doesn’t want help, then we can’t help him,” he shrugged. “But it still hurts, watching him throw it all away.”
I bumped his shoulder with mine, “You hungry?”
He laughed, “Always, you cooking?”
“Hell no,” I laughed. “I’m ordering, how about Chinese?”
“Sounds good,” he said with a smile.
I ordered dinner while Seth looked through my sketches. I went and sat back down with him, we talked about my work until dinner came. We ate dinner on the floor, talking, laughing, joking just being Seth and Devi for a change. It was nice, almost too nice, this is what I wanted with Seth, I realized. I wanted the Seth I knew and loved, not Seth the bassist of My Misery Muse. I wanted the man behind what everyone else saw, the Seth that I had feelings for didn’t come out very often away from Dallas.
“Why don’t you guys move back here?” I asked. “I understood when you first got the deal, but what’s stopped you from coming back?”
He shrugged, “Never really thought about it, never really had time to think about it. This is the first real break we’ve had in three years. We were on the road and we were recording on the road.”
I nodded, “And now?”
“And now, I think we’re all leaning towards taking it easier, this break has helped us a lot. I think we were all close to burning out. Being here has reminded us that there’s more to us and life than what we’d been living the past 3 years.”
“I hope you guys decide to stay,” I said quietly.
“Really?”
“Yea.”
“Why, for Jaks or for you?”
I swallowed hard, “For all three of us.”
He nodded, leaned over and brushed a kiss across my lips. “I’m going to head out Devi, you coming to the show Saturday?” he murmured against my lips.
I nodded, Seth stood up and offered me his hand, I took it and followed him to the door, still holding his hand.
“Yea, I’ll be there.”
“Good,” Seth said before brushing a kiss against my lips. “I look forward to it,” then he left.
I closed the door after he had pulled off and banged my head against it, what am I doing? I shook my head then went back to finish my work.
¯¯¯
“You ready for this man?” I asked while slapping Eli on the shoulder looking him over, he looked a little green.
“I guess,” he said.
“You
sure you’re ok?” asked Sam.
Eli shrugged, “Just a little nervous, that’s all, it will be better after I get behind my kit.”
I nodded, “You’ll be fine.”
He nodded, and then looked back down at his feet.
“Fuck, who is she?” Xavier said.
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