by Ava Manello
“There’s something else.” All eyes turn to him, his voice more serious now than before.
“Sally might be in danger from her friend’s ex. He thinks she caused the marriage to break up. We need to make sure one of us is with her at all times. Keep her safe.” There’s a quick chorus of agreement, followed by a lot of questions.
I end up having to tell them about the whole dating site article. Alex gets a funny expression on his face when I mention the site name, I’m sure he did that when I was talking to Tiny about it before, but I let it pass.
The guys decide for me that I’m not going to be left alone, even to the extent that they’ll escort me to and from my room for meals and so on.
“For god’s sake guys, give it a bloody rest.” I lose my temper. “I don’t need babying. I’m a grown woman who’s perfectly capable of taking care of herself. I managed it before I met you lot and I’ll manage it when this tour is over. Just back off.” I stand quickly, knocking my chair back to the floor as I do.
A couple of the other diners look over in concern. I ignore them. Instead I stalk out of the dining room and head back to the elevator.
I can hear Alex try to follow me, and then Tiny’s murmur telling him to leave me be. Thank fuck for that.
When I get into my room I lose it. My temper that is. I pick up anything that’s not breakable and throw it. Surprisingly that really does make me feel better.
The room looks like a hurricane blew through it when I hear a tapping at the door.
“Fuck off!” I shout. I don’t want to see any of them right now. They can take their he-man behavior and piss off as far as I am concerned.
“Sally, come on, let me in.” I hear Tiny’s voice on the other side of the door. He sounds disappointed. Reluctantly I open the door to him, I leave it ajar and return to the room, my back to him.
I cringe when I see the state of the room.
“What’s going on Sally? This isn’t like you?” Tiny asks. “I get that you’re upset over your job, but you seem to be taking it harder than I would have thought. Are you scared of this Gary bloke?”
He hasn’t a clue thank god. He still thinks this temper tantrum is about a job or a stupid bully, not a broken heart. How the hell can I have a broken heart when I wasn’t even in a relationship with Alex?
“I just can’t stand this macho bullshit Tiny. You know me well enough by now to know I can’t stand being treated like a bloody child.”
I sit down on the end of the bed, the energy rush from trashing the room now gone.
“It was just one thing too much today, that’s all. Everything got on top of me. I’m sorry.”
The bed dips as Tiny sits down next to me, almost tipping me to the floor, as I have to shift over to accommodate him. He puts his arm around me and draws me into a hug. Tiny gives brilliant hugs. In his arms I feel safe and protected.
“Come on girl, let’s get you out of here. I’ll help you clear this mess up later.” He offers. That sounds like a good idea right now.
We head off outside to explore yet another town that I’ve forgotten the name of, that looks like every other town we’ve been to with it’s chain of coffee stores and mobile phone shops. Right now this anonymity is just what I need. It means I don’t have to think. I can just cruise along.
And that’s what I do for the rest of the afternoon. I cruise along, refusing to think about what the future contains, or rather what it doesn’t. I decide I’ll worry about that another day.
Chapter Thirty
Sally
I feel a little better after my walk with Tiny. I’ve calmed down some. I feel a little bit more like myself now.
I declined joining the guys for dinner. I just can’t face it before the show tonight. Instead I order a meal from the bar and take it back to my room.
There’s a notification on my phone when I check it from the guy I’ve been chatting with on the dating site – JamesT89. That bloody site is responsible for half my problems right now. I almost don’t log on, but sod it. I enjoy chatting with him.
Hey. How was your day?
How do I answer that? Honest?
My day sucked. Let’s not talk about it. Tell me again why I still can’t see your photo?
I know I’m pushing my luck, but I just need to know I’m not talking to some fat, balding businessman. That would be the last straw today.
I told you, I don’t want people from work to recognize me. It could cause problems. Tell me what I can do to cheer you up?
Argh. I hate that he can see what I look like, but I don’t know about him. Still it does mean I didn’t make a snap judgment based on an image. I’m guilty of doing that with some of the people the site has suggested for matches.
Just talk to me about your day, take my mind off mine. It’s nothing I want to share right now.
I need to escape for a little while. I check the clock to make sure I’m still okay for time.
Nothing interesting. Had a sports massage this morning. Had lunch with the guys I work with.
We talk about nothing and everything for the next half hour before we both have to sign off for work. I love that he even seems to have the same odd work pattern as me some days.
The talking about nothing, things that were totally outside of what I’m going through right now was good for me.
I bristle as I hear the knock at the door. One of the guys has arrived to ‘escort’ me to the venue. It’s Tiny. Now there’s a surprise. I do love him but this unofficial bodyguard crap is wearing thin already.
I grab my jacket and notebook and follow him reluctantly to the elevator. I feel like a naughty child being escorted everywhere.
***
This is the part of the show I dislike the most. The one where they choose four audience members to come up on stage and get lap dances from four of the dancers.
Eric goes out on stage to ask for volunteers. There’s a girl on crutches that he was a bit reluctant to accept, but she was so eager he gave in. She’s hobbling her way to the stage as he looks around the audience. I don’t see it but from the reaction one girl has flashed her breasts at him. She gets picked.
I hear Eric’s voice over the sound system as he politely thanks another girl who obviously decided to flash her arse to get picked. He advises her that she was a little over eager.
He picks a girl from the other side of the audience then turns to me and winks before announcing that he gets to pick the final candidate.
I’m curious. I can see him scanning the audience and wonder what skanky candidate will be next. I’m startled when the spotlight that’s following his hand stops on a man who seems over eager to come up to the stage.
One of the guys is not going to be pleased that’s for sure!
Eric goes down the row of chairs, asking each audience member to introduce themselves and who they’d like to dance for them.
The girl on crutches is called Helen and she’d love to have Guido dirty dance on her. The next girl, the boob flasher is Kelly. When asked who she want’s she bluntly replies “I don’t care who as long as he puts his cock in my mouth.” Behind me I hear the guys groaning. This isn’t what they want to hear. It normally leads to stalking after the show.
Eric turns to the next woman, she’s high pitched and screechy when she tells us she’s another Kelly and she’ll take some of what she’s having please.
This leaves the guy at the end of the row. I’d expect that a guy pulled from the audience would be reluctant to be on stage, but no, this guy’s the total opposite.
“I’ll take the cock in my mouth and add a cock up my arse as well mate.” My mouth drops open in shock.
“Shit. I’m not doing him.” I hear Guido muttering. “Alex should be in this fucking routine not me.” He continues. That’s a bit harsh. He can tell I’m not impressed from the glare that I give him.
“I’m getting too old for this shit.” Rick complains. The rest murmur their agreement. I have to laugh. I don’t think one
of them is over 25.
The music to Dirty by Christina Aguilera comes on. The guys walk out onto the stage as the talk intro comes on and move in front of their allocated audience member.
They make a show of pulling shiny silver handcuffs from the back of their police trousers and fasten their fan’s hands behind the back of the chairs.
At least this way they know they won’t get groped.
They dance around the chairs erotically, occasionally coming close and dry humping closer to the chairs.
Every time the song has the word dirty they pretend to wipe the sweat from their faces.
At the rap section they stand with their backs to the chairs, unfastening and fastening their black police shirts. They’ve gone with the US style uniform as it fits much more closely to the skin than the English counterpart. By the time the chorus is back the shirts are discarded and the guys are strutting up and down around the stage.
The guys do a series of kicks; hump the stage, and hip swivels before walking backwards and rubbing their arses in the seated faces. This does nothing for me but the girls and the guy out on that stage love it.
This isn’t a full strip routine; they just strip down to boxer briefs. It’s a popular end to the first half of the show.
I’ve never seen the guys look so relieved as they do when they come off stage.
“I feel dirty.” Rick complains, rushing for the dressing room. I’m not surprised. The girl he was dancing for took every opportunity she could to reach over and put her mouth on him whenever he came close enough.
I hear the blast of the shower from the dressing room. I don’t go in. I learned my lesson the other week when I walked in just as Alex was dropping his trousers. Holy hotness.
There’s a bellow from the dressing room and we all rush in. There’s a very naked Rick standing there, covering his modesty with his hands. He’s dripping wet. In front of him is the girl from the audience he was dancing for.
Eric shouts outside the door for security as Tiny grabs her arm to take her outside.
“Can’t I even have a fucking shower in peace without these crazy fans following me in there.” Rick pleads. “I’m sick of them offering to service me.” He moans.
This should be funny, a male stripper standing there naked and dripping wet, complaining about over eager fans but for some reason it isn’t.
I don’t know about the rest of them but previously I’d always felt safe in the backstage area of the theaters. Out front is different. We expect this to happen out there. But back here is our space, where we’re supposed to be free from the chaos.
Security arrives and leads the girl away. Eric complaining to them all the while that this shouldn’t have been allowed to happen.
Rick shrugs it off and heads back to his shower. They don’t have a lot of spare time in the interval after all. The guys start changing, seemingly oblivious to my presence in the room. I hurry out before I see anything else I don’t need to see.
Chapter Thirty One
Sally
The incident in the interval at the theater combined with the guys over protective macho bullshit gave me a terrible nightmare. It’s one of those nonsensical one’s where the lines between reality and fantasy become blurred.
I can’t remember it clearly when I wake but the bits I can remember are confusing. Alex was there, dressed as white knight astride his charger. Gary was there but as some sort of grotesque monster. Tiny resembled Dumbledore, the wrinkled old wizard from Harry Potter. There was some sort of fight over me as I recall before Dumbledore grabbed me and we flew off on a large golden eagle. Now that reminded me of Gandalf in Lord of The Rings. What a twisted dream. I’ve no idea what my subconscious was trying to tell me with that one.
I open my phone to check the time and see I have another message from James on the dating site. That’s not like him; he often goes days between messages. It’s one reason I feel so comfortable talking to him, as he’s not pushy at all.
Morning beautiful, hope you slept well after your bad day yesterday.
Is he some sort of psychic? I reply and let him know I had a crazy nightmare, but don’t share the details. Instead we spend a few moments talking about a new song in the charts that we both like.
I excuse myself and let him know I’ll chat later. Right now I need to go grab a shower before breakfast. We’ve got a slightly longer journey today so I need to get packed as well. We don’t have much time.
Breakfast is a lot lighter hearted than yesterday’s lunch. The guys are in a silly mood, taking the mickey out of Rick for the shower incident. Guido makes a comment about his sexual prowess with the fans that have us all in stitches.
“You’re so conceited.” I tell him.
He looks affronted. “I’m not conceited. I can have any woman I want, any time I want. I’m a Naked Night’s stripper.” He says this with such a straight face we all burst into laughter. The older couple seated at the next table look affronted at his words. That only makes us all laugh louder.
I might not have had a great night’s sleep, but I do feel better today. There’s nothing that can’t be fixed. I’ll find a new job, and if needs be I’ll find a new home. My friend is fine. The only thing that’s not fine is my unhealthy obsession for Alex, but in less than two weeks we’ll have parted ways and I’ll be able to get over it. I can survive two weeks. Can’t I?
Chapter Thirty Two
Sally
The past week has dragged. It’s been a routine of gym, travel, hotel, show, gym, travel, hotel, and show. I’m not performing and I’m shattered. I’ve no idea how the guys find the stamina for this.
Places have blended into each other to the point I’ve no idea where we are most days, but today we’re arriving in Edinburgh. This is one city I’m looking forward to. I’ve been warned I won’t get much time for sight seeing. We have a free evening tonight as it was such a long journey to get here, but the boys will be busy rehearsing most of tomorrow and they still won’t let me out without one of my ‘keepers’ as they call them.
Dan pulls the bus up on Princes Street, not far past the station. Our Travelodge is just behind this huge shopping street. We start unloading the bags before Dan goes off to wherever he’s arranged to park.
I’ve managed a few conversations with him when the boys were distracted. He’s told me that compared to some of the ‘talent’ he drives around my guys are pretty tame.
He’s driven actors, rock groups and corporate and some of the requests are hilarious. He’s too professional to tell me most of them or name them, but shares the requests for particular brands of alcohol, water or food. I dread to think what he’s seen in that rear view mirror of his some days. He winks as he tells me that he also has a camera monitoring the back of the minibus. I wonder how many wannabe rock stars and groupies have been caught out on that? He won’t tell me, no matter what I bribe him with.
“You know, that Alex is a good guy.” He tells me with a wink as he’s handing me my luggage. Alex is standing on the pavement waiting to walk me to the hotel. “You two would make a cute couple.”
“Yeah, shame he’s gay.” I mumble. I don’t know what I said, but Dan bursts out into loud, jovial laughter and walks off back towards the front of the bus.
Alex walks over and takes my bag from me. I hate it when he does that. I’m not a feminist by any means; I think it’s just one more piece of control they’ve taken away from me lately. I feel smothered.
Just a few doors down from the hotel there’s a little pub nestled in the corner of Rose Street. It’s like an alley full of little treats hidden behind the huge main shopping avenue. There’s just enough sunlight creeping down between the tall buildings to make it pleasant enough to sit outside.
We’re all here although Tiny is looking a touch uncomfortable trying to fit his large frame into the too small chairs.
It’s a glorious day; Edinburgh really does shine in the sun. I’ve not been here for a few years now. I make a mental note to c
ome back and do the tourist thing another day.
The guys are excited that there’s only another week of the show left. They’re talking about what they’re going to do when they’re finished.
Rick and Jonny have booked a trip to Amsterdam to see the girls and Guido and Jackal are considering joining them.
Eric is going down to Norfolk to spend some time with his Mum. She sounds like a lovely lady.
Tiny glows as he talks about the plans he and Alison have to decorate their new house. They bought it together just before the tour started and she’s moving in when it’s ready. He repeats the offer of me renting Alison’s flat if I need it.