U-N-I Ch. 27

As Alicia had dreamt of, Dylan and she had gotten married on a beautiful Australian beach and so we weren't the only one using the break from touring to go on a honeymoon. They travelled around New Zealand for a month and when we eventually all got back home in London, we started rehearsing together again, even writing new material.

Indeed, we had decided early on that we'd continue touring the world in 2020. The gigs were going so incredibly well that we really wanted to please our fans and play in as many cities and countries as possible so we kept adding more dates when it was possible, knowing that we'd take a very long break from it all afterwards. We'd been offered four more gigs in Japan in late March which we accepted before embarking on our planned tour schedule in South America in April.

A few weeks before Jordan and I had been working out in the gym we'd had installed in the basement of the building we'd bought collectively all that time ago; the other three were in our studio working on a song we'd all been going through before lunch.

Jordan had seemed distracted, distant, not quite like himself as we'd trained and although I knew I had to wait for him to express whatever was on his mind, his attitude had got me worried.

I couldn't think of a reason why he'd be acting this way. There was a deeply thoughtful expression on his face that I couldn't read. I could only hope that it wasn't anything serious and that it didn't involve the tour. But what if it did? Did he not want to go back on the road? Had he had enough? - Maybe he was only tired.

"You ok mate?" I asked.

"Yeah," he just answered, not looking at me.

We were going through our post-exercise stretching with the quiet voice of Yasmine Hamdan playing in the background.

"You're awfully quiet, you've barely said a word for the past thirty minutes. Are you upset about something?"

"Uh?" he asked, looking at me, No, why?"

"I dunno, you seem thoughtful."

"Oh - yeah I guess I am, sorry."

He continued stretching but I stopped and just wondered what was going on with him with an annoying knot in my stomach.

After a couple minutes, he stopped, took a few deep breaths and exhaled loudly.

"Mark," he began saying then stopped as if he was hesitating, "do you remember the Dublin launch event for the album and tour?" he asked.

"Just about," I said, "we've been a bit busy since then," I chuckled. "Why?"

"Erm, well - there was somebody there who worked for the promo company. I'm sure you remember her cause we talked with her and she told us she was in some of Rachel's classes when she was in Trinity College."

I thought about it and quickly remembered who he was talking about.

"Yeah, sure I remember her," feeling relieved to hear him talk about a girl, "her name was," I thought about it for a moment, "it was typically Irish I remember."

"Grainne," he put in.

I nodded,

"What about her?" I asked quietly.

"Well, we really hit it off that day, like really. You probably don't remember this but I didn't leave with you guys after the event. I drove her home and we talked for like an hour in the car and then we had dinner..."

"Wait, that was back in January? Like a year ago! Why are you only talking to me about her now?"

He let out a small chuckle,

"We've been keeping in touch, while we were on the road I mean," he said and paused, "and then when you got married, we saw each other again; I didn't stay in Dublin just to see my mum and dad. I figured that it'd be a great time to really get to know each other."

"So now you're interested in getting to know the girls you sleep with?" I joked.

He shook his head slightly,

"C'mon, the whole trophy-girlfriend-syndrome antics I think I was only doing it because it's what's expected 'cos one of us had to," he sniggered, "I was just waiting for the real thing. I want someone who gets me and Grainne does."

"Holy shit!" I thought, knowing my jaw had dropped, this was so far away from Jordan's usual love-'em-and -leave-'em behaviour I could've believed it was Dylan I was talking to.

"I think there's a but in there, am I right?"

"Not exactly, well sort of, look," he dropped his head and huffed, "we've pretty much done all our growing up doing what we do, this, our crazy life's become normality for us, including Rachel - and Grainne sort of works in the business, I mean she's worked with Muse, Snow Patrol and a boatload of others so it's not like fame, or rather dealing with famous people would be a new experience for her," he paused.

"But doing what she does doesn't put her slap bang in the middle of the craziness you mean," I put in to tell him I understood what he was trying to say.

"Yeah, exactly and she sort of knew us when we'd just left school, but that was twelve years ago. She needs to get to know me, us, the way we are now. How do you think the rest of the guys'd feel about her travelling with us when we go back on the road?"

"Wow! Didn't see that coming bro'."

"I really think her coming with us would show her that actually, most of the time, being on the road is hours, days, of boring travel to nameless hotels in places we rarely get to explore with a sudden, exhausting, explosion of energy to cap it off every couple or three days."

"Hey, carry on talking like that you'll put me off touring for good," I laughed.

"S'true though, isn't it? And I need to know that she fits in with all of you guys, don't want to create a so-called Yoko Ono situation." he looked away so I waited for him to sort his thoughts, "When you think about it the people Dylan and me marry are actually marrying into our band-family not just our genetic ones aren't they?"

"When you put it like that yeah they are. Looks like Rach, Damon me and himself got off lightly," I chuckled.

"Do you recall what Dylan said to you, the night of your wedding before we went on stage, about the opening lines of"Green Eyes" I mean? Well he was right, you two are the rock this band stands on."

"Wow, that's - it's," I stammered, hearing him repeat Dylan's words - it had clearly made a big impression on him.

"So do you think the others will go for it?"

"Gets my vote dude, if she can handle being around us, especially on tour, without losing her marbles then she's definitely a keeper. But what about her job?"

"She's asked about taking a sabbatical and they're ok with it."

I'd heard his reference to marriage but hadn't commented on it, Dylan and Alicia had got married barely more than two months before so maybe he'd been thinking of them when he'd said it.

Maybe.

I thought about the fact that the round of major promotional events had been a year before, way back in January 2019, and I wanted to ask when their relationship had officially started, before or after our wedding, but then I remembered something.

"Hang on, when we went to Madeira," I paused then smiled at him, "now I remember, Rachel told me that you were gone the whole time and told no one where you went. You went somewhere with Grainne didn't you?"

"Yeah," he laughed, "as soon as you let the rest of us in on your proposal plans, I asked if she'd be able to get the time off work immediately after it."

"Where'd you go?"

"Well, like I said, I really wanted to spend time with her so I surprised her and we went to Florence for a day and then from there, we went where the mood took us. We rented a car and just drove around the country. We ended up in Croatia. It was fun."

I laughed,

"You drove from Italy to Croatia?"

"Well, yeah, through Slovenia."

"Dude, that must've been great. And come on, if she's willing to take some serious time away from her work it's gotta be significant bro'."

"We, um, we missed each other," he mumbled, looking at his feet again.

"Know how that feels," I said quietly, "and Rob was only gone a few weeks, you two have already survived being apart for longer than that."

"Not quite," he grinned mischievously.

"What d'you mean 'not quite'? We were on the road for months last year."

"Remember the parties I was going to on my own? Me buggering off to go skiing or rock-climbing? Me doing stuff none of you were interested in at the time whenever we had a couple or three days down-time?"

"You were meeting up with her!" I exclaimed.

"Sure was, we racked up some serious frequent-flyer miles," he chortled.

"Good on ya!"

He smiled and the look on his face was priceless.

"Dude, you are so in love with this girl!"

"I am!" he replied unabashedly.

I grinned.

"I swear, when I first saw her, I just knew she was what I'd been waiting for."

"You knew as soon as you saw her?" I asked surprised.

"I knew within fifteen minutes yeah," he said convincingly.

I was silent for a short moment,

"C'mon, let's tell the others," I said, "I can't believe you were missing a woman, you getting all mushy on me?"

"You want me to?" he sniggered, as he mimed blowing me a perfectly-pouted kiss in the most outrageous manner, it had us both laughing instantly.

"Well you know that bet was never paid out, are you thinking it's time? Before you seriously think about committing to straight-dom," I smirked, blowing him a kiss in return and adding a lascivious wink.

"Fuck off," he'd laughed as we left the gym.

"Am I the only one who knows?" I asked quietly before we began to climb the stairs.

"Not for much longer," he replied.

To Jordan's relief, but at no surprise to me, Rob, Dylan and Damon thought Grainne spending time on tour with us would be a good move, once they'd got over their collective surprise at Jordan being in a relationship and having been able to keep it going pretty much long-distance for so long - and without any of us catching on.

Rachel was all for it too; what she'd suggested was that Grainne's presence, should it be noticed could be easily explained away as her being part of the promo team.

"So when do we meet this girl?" Damon asked with eagerness.

"Yeah, bring her over," Rob said, "if she got you to settle down, she must be quite special!"

"She is," Jordan confirmed, "and don't you scare her away with all your stories," he laughed.

Rob smirked at Jordan and seemed to think about all the stories he could share with Grainne.

"I swear to god!" Jordan threatened laughingly.

----

As soon as we all met Grainne it almost immediately felt like our band family was complete, Grainne fitted so well into our group of friends. She was a truly lovely girl, fun, sweet but no pushover and beautiful in a very natural way. Jordan was crazy about her it was obvious how much they were meant for each other.

She came with us to Japan for our first-ever gigs in Osaka and Fukuoka. We were to play at the Fukuoka Dome baseball stadium. One of the reasons we'd chosen the venue was because of its retractable roof - if the weather turned against us we could at least keep our audience dry!

Much to the crew's happiness, Calvin my former guitar tech had been given his old job back and was going to be back on tour with us in 2020 but Rob and I were worried that Nick wouldn't be. We were thrilled to find out a couple weeks before flying to Osaka that he'd been offered work with the sound crew to run the live recording desk.

I might have had something to do with it.

Because of the virus and the semi-quarantine we'd been in, Rob and I hadn't been able to go any further with Nick than some very superficial flirting. My 'secret' wedding planning had quickly taken up virtually every moment I could get alone, including when Rob was sleeping and then after we got married, any thoughts of inviting Nick to have some fun wasn't so appealing anymore. We only wanted each other and so we almost stopped talking about it.

Besides it had taken a while for both of us to be absolutely certain that Nick was nowhere near the '150% straight' Damon had described him being the first time Rob and I had seen him. But now that he had accepted to keep touring with us and he seemed more than happy to be in Japan to kick off our 2020 tour, we couldn't wait to see if something would finally happen with him.

--

We had already played two gigs in Osaka but had had very little time to talk with Nick. He'd either been working with Calvin in Osaka to bring him up to speed or he'd spent most of his time with the other tech guys.

"I've missed you today," I said to Rob as I placed my hand behind his neck and pulled him close to me for a kiss.

"Yeah, me too. Feels like we've hardly seen each other."

"We haven't," I said and he kissed me some more.

"How were the interviews, learnt any Japanese?" I eventually asked since I hadn't gone with him.

"I have, but I can never remember what each word means!" he joked and pulled out the paper on which he had written what he wanted to say to the crowd during our first gig in Fukuoka.

"Look," he said and started reading it to me.

The first two sentences he seemed to master the pronunciation to but then he struggled to say the third one,

"Like, I can never remember how to pronounce this word. I'm gonna ask Nick later. Have you worked with him at all today?"

"Oh my god yeah I have! Is it me or is he even hotter than he was last time we saw him?" I asked.

"No, he is, he totally is," Rob confirmed, "the outfit he's wearing today..." he groaned with lust, "Let me break it to you right now, we're gonna have sex with him before this tour is over!" he said laughingly.

I laughed too,

"He's so hot!"

"You know, you can flirt with him again, I'm all for it!"

"Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to have him back on the crew, that's too much temptation!" I said.

"Hey why not call him and see if he wants to come here to go through the acoustic set, so we can get to spend a bit of time alone with him?" Rob asked devilishly.

"Are you serious?"

"Well yeah, not saying anything's gonna happen but...," he smirked.

I wiggled my brows,

"I should ask him to bring your Seagull, in case we actuallydo end up just going over the acoustic set."

"That's likely," he retorted.

I laughed,

"How the fuck do we go from 'hey let's go over some guitar stuff' to 'hey let's have a threesome'? Or do we just molest him as soon as he walks in the room?"

"Dude we, well mostly you two, have been flirting our way around the elephant on this tour since fucking Tokyo last year. Don't you think it's time we actuallydid something about it? It's obvious he's up for it, he gave us so many signals last year...thatwe've chosen to ignore," he said as he waved a finger between us.

"Yeah, but like I said where do we start?"

"We don't,you do. You know what, don't call him, go and find him, see if you can get him alone, well alone enough to do a bit more flirting," he sniggered, "but just make it frigging obvious that the guitars are just an excuse."

"Why don'tyou go, I'm not good at this!"

"Oh, come on, try it!" he insisted.

"I don't know!" I said, shaking my head.

"Well babe, we're turning thirty in two months...," he said and stared at me, "Time is running out!" he exclaimed playfully.

I cracked up and he did too.

"Alright, I'm gonna try!" I said with a huff, "I'll be back soon."

"Maybe you won't be returning alone," he grinned, "just buzz me if you don't!"

--

I wandered through the backstage area, everybody else must have been in their own dressing rooms because I saw that the Green Room was empty as I walked past it. That sent me in the direction of the stage hoping that I'd find Nick there rather than the crew-room.

I did.

I hesitated waiting in the shadows, trying to figure out a way to do this, Rob had always been better at this than me. Nick had his back to where I stood as he compared the settings on my back-line amps to something on his tablet, deep in concentration; when he got to the end of the row he was as close to the Dobro as he could be. I pushed myself forward, my trainers making no sound on the stage floor and by the time Nick realised I was there, I was barely six inches from him, already reaching round him as if to pick up the guitar.

He jumped when he suddenly became aware of my proximity,

"Oh hi Mark," he gasped as he spun round to face me, bringing us even closer together.

"Sorry, I thought you'd heard me mooching over," I fibbed, as I pulled my hand back from the Dobro, I locked eyes with him.

"No, I was away with the tech fairies," he smiled.

"How is Calvin catching up?"

"I think he's ready to take over from me."

I nodded, faking disappointment,

"To be honest, I wish he wasn't," I said straightforwardly. "I think I'm gonna miss you, you're the best guitar tech I've ever worked with."

"Really? Wow, thanks. I take that as a huge compliment. You know I'm here to..."

"...make you guys happy," I said together with him and we both let out a small laugh.

He grinned and that dimple I remembered so well popped,

"I must have done a good job."

"You did agreat job."

"You know, uh," he said hesitantly. "I was well chuffed when Steve asked if I fancied running the live recording desk out front." he smiled.

"I know. Rob and I were glad you could get the job. It wouldn't have been the same without you. I just wish I could have kept you as my guitar tech. I mean Calvin's good - but you..."

I paused and he opened his mouth to speak,

"Well, look Mark," he interrupted and took a quick look around him to make sure we were still alone, "Can I be honest with you?" he asked in a whisper.

"Of course," I nodded.

"Please don't tell him I told you this but Calvin's been itching to move to the sound crew for ages. He just didn't say anything because up to him having to go home last year, there'd never been an opening to do it. He was just happy to get his job back - but I saw his face when he realised I'd been offered the job he actually wanted... And before you ask he took a very similar sound-engineering course to the one I did, maybe the live recording desk isn't a great place for him to start but from the conversations we've had, I've no doubt that driving the front of house sound desk is well within his skill-set."

"You mean, there's a possibility that I could still haveyou as my guitar tech?" I smiled.

"That's your decision but I'm sure Calvin would agree."

I knew I had a bright smile on my face. I couldn't hide my satisfaction,

"Well, as I've said, you're the best tech I ever had - and I only want to work with the best!"

There was a short silence and we locked eyes with each other.

"I wouldn't want to make things - awkward though," I could tell from the look in his eyes that he knew I wasn't just talking about him swapping jobs with Calvin.

"Yeah, I understand."

We kept looking at each other and stopped talking for a short moment, the sexual tension was palpable.

"So -" I began saying, knowing it was now or never, "I'm here because I was thinking of going through the acoustic stuff with Calvin, but," I stalled.

"But?" he asked.

"But now I think we could find a more fun way of passing some time."

I took a very small step closer to him and hedidn't try to move away.

"Hey I can't blame you, you know your stuff, going through it over and over again can get a bit boring...," he said with a smirk.

"Why don't you come with me? Rob and I were just chilling in our dressing room, we'd love to have your company," I said with more authority in my voice than even I had expected and he looked at me for a few seconds.

"Yes, sir!" he smiled flirtatiously, knowing exactly what I had in mind.

I leaned to pick up the Dobro and my body brushed against his.

"Should I bring Robbie's acoustic?" he asked me.

"Sure, we don't want anyone jumping to the wrong conclusions," I said quietly.