I hopped out of bed the moment my alarm went off, excited to meet this new band. To be perfectly honest, it’s been a while since I’d seen any new faces, I was ready to meet new people… hopefully. I mean, it could always turn out to be someone I tour managed before.
I hopped in the shower and let the hot water run down my back, slowly easing me out of my sleep. As I rubbed the shampoo into my scalp I noticed that my pink color was fading slightly and made a mental note to buy some hair dye today.
As soon as I was out of my bathroom I reached over to turn on my stereo, Theory of a Deadman floating through the speakers and making me smile… Tyler Connolly had been one of the best decisions I had made in my life. Although it did end up costing me my first ever TM job.
The memories made me smirk as I slid open my closet doors and pulled out a creamy pink sweater with a cross and the word ‘LOVE’ on it, a pair of tight black pants with an almost leather quality to them and finally a pair of white heels, I wanted to look presentable today but not like I was truly a business woman.
I loved working at Universal, my boss was great and they didn’t kick up a fuss when I turned up to my interview with pink hair. I guess they decided that it wasn’t hurting anybody so they let me be… or it could’ve been that I was clearly in a bad sate when I first joined that they didn’t want to push me to insanity.
“The bitch came back, the very next day. Oh the bitch came back, thought she was a goner but the bitch came back. She just couldn’t stay away.” I sang to myself. Yep, still got the voice.
I was about halfway through doing my eyeliner when my cell phone rang, causing me to jump and poke myself in the eye with the gel I had taken to using.
“Ow.”
I scrambled around, searching for my phone and then held it up to see who was calling me this early. I thought I was the only one who had to wake up this early.
There was no caller ID on the screen and so I was cautious as I answered it.
“Hello?”
Silence.
“If this is a prank call then whoever it is needs to sleep with one eye open from now on.”
More silence. I was about to hang up when I finally heard a noise on the other end.
“Natalie?”
I froze. I knew that voice. I’d know that voice anywhere. It was the voice from my nightmares. It had haunted me for months. So that’s why I hung up the phone and ran around frantically, getting myself ready quicker than usual, before running out of my front door, not bothering to have breakfast, and jumping in my car, doing ten above the speed limit to get to work on time.
As soon as I reached the front desk I felt safe again and I sat down in one of the waiting chairs, just so that I could calm down a bit before going upstairs to my desk.
“Natalie?”
My head snapped up, fearing the worst and came face to face with one of the security guards in our building, James.
I’d always liked James, okay, so he was getting close to retiring age and he was starting to get a bit chubby from all the junk food we ate whenever we had lunch break at the same time but he was sweet, kind and… he kind of reminded me of my own Dad.
“Hey James.”
“Natalie are you okay?”
“Yeah just a very realistic nightmare.” Dammit, why did I feel the need to lie?
“About that time?”
Another thing I loved about James, he knew about my history with Avenged Sevenfold and he didn’t judge me. The only thing he’d ever asked me to do about that was meet his son who was a major Avenged fan. I’d even enjoyed it.
“Yeah.” Liar. Shut up conscience.
“Do you wanna talk about it?”
“No, I’m good but thanks anyway James.”
“You’re welcome Natalie. What time’s your lunch break today?”
“Oh, Phil’s got me showing a band around New York today, sorry James, how about tomorrow?”
He checked his schedule on his palm pilot, yeah, he’s a little bit stuck in the nineties, and then nodded at me.
“Tomorrow’s perfect.”
“Cool, see you later James, oh, could you give me a buzz when the band come in, I’m supposed to meet them down here.”
“That’s fine.”
“Thanks.”
I headed upstairs and into my little area. I set my bag down on the desk and then pulled out my to-do list for work. I started with number one and worked down from there. One of the things that had never changed was my OCD, if things weren’t in order I would go crazy, I guess that’s why Phil picked me. He was the least organized person I knew but with me around everything was filed and in order.
At about eight fifteen Phil came in and gave me a pep talk about today and then retreated into his office to work on those contracts so I was left to wonder about who these guys (or girls, maybe both) were.
I was pulled out of my thoughts when my phone started to buzz.
“Hello?”
“Natalie, um, the band just got here, you better come down.”
“Oh, okay. I’ll be right there.”
The tone of James’ voice had me worried and I guess in hindsight, it might not have been such a bad idea to call in sick that day.
I pulled my jacket on and grabbed my bag before heading down the stairs towards the main lobby. People were starting to come in for work and so it was a little bit busier in the main lobby then before but nothing and I mean nothing, could’ve prepared me for seeing the three men who stood out like a needle in a haystack amongst all of the business people.
At that point I wanted to crawl into a hole and die. Why? Why did it have to be them? Out of all the bands in the whole state of California, why did it have to be those three. Then I noticed someone was missing. I felt a pang in my heart at the absence of the person but then I remembered that I had no right to feel that way so I swallowed back the tears and walked towards them with a smile on my face just like it was anybody else.
“Hey guys. How are you?”
Their heads snapped up, searching for the source of the voice that they all recognized. When their eyes found me I gulped and tried not to fidget under their gaze, letting them take in the changes and waiting for a response.
“Natalie… is that really you?”
**THE EXTERNAL LINK ON THE SIDE IS HER OUTFIT**
