The name is Ricky

Chapter 12

//sorry for the time jump again but I don't know what else to write. It's gonna get weird. And from here I'm going to do the mashup with the other fic. Just a little bit tho.//
*3 years later*
Today was my birthday. And I would be turning 40 today. Oh man, I feel old. I made a few friends over the past years and I had invited them to come over. Yes, you are hearing that right. Friends. It hadn't been my intention but somehow they cared enough about me to be my friends. When I was feeling down they would try to cheer me up and most times it would work. But for tonight Ralph had invited me to come to their gig here in Dublin. He and his band are supporting act for Imagine Dragons and he was all excited about it. Now you're are probably wondering why Ralph would have invited me if I didn't like him. Well, you had that right. But things have changed. It happened while I was staying at Dan's place. He was on tour, but there had been a car accident and he died. Well, that was the story everyone told when they were asked about it. He truly had died from a drug overdose. I had to move to Dublin earlier than planned and when I had settled in I had contacted Ralph again. That was about 2 years ago now. He was wandering around and he had stepped out of his band. They didn't want to find a new lead singer and almost had to live on the streets. Ralph came back to them before that could happen and they had gone into the studio to record a new album. When that album was released Imagine Dragons had asked them to go on tour with them and the gig here in Dublin was one of the last, so not the last, gig of the tour. They would play in Amsterdam after this and then it would be over I think.

I'm pulled out of my thoughts by my doorbell ringing. Could it be that my friends were here already? I thought they would be later? When I open the door I see Ralph, Ben and 3 other guys standing there, what I assume is the rest of his band. "Hi!" I say. "Hi Rick, happy birthday!" He says and I give him an evil glare. He wasn't supposed to call me Ricky anymore. "Eeehm yeah. I might have accidently told them." he says and bows his head. "Ah well, it's done now. Come in!" I say and they walk in after me. "Anyone who wants some tea?" I ask and I hear yes 5 times so I get 6 mugs. When I walk back and everyone has their tea I look around. "Well, I don't know most of you. So let's do a name round. Don't worry Ben, I do remember you." I say and Ben laughs. "Okay, I'm Ricky, but everyone calls me Daniel so please call me that." I say and everyone groans. "Ralph, why do you have to know so many Daniels?" Ben asks and I laugh. "This is like number 4?" Someone else says and I laugh. "You can also call me Charles if that's easier?" I offer and everyone nods. "Well. I'm Josh, but everyone calls me Taffel." one of the guys says. "I'm Grant. No weird nicknames." he says and I laugh. "I'm Josh. That's why he is Taffel." The last guy says and points at Taffel. "Good, now I know all of your names." I say and lean back in my chair. "I don't have cake if you were hoping on that." I say and laugh at their disappointed faces. "We can make one!" Ben says and he jumps up. "go ahead. But please don't mess up the kitchen too much." I say and Grant follows Ben into the kitchen. "They really are little kids." Ralph says and we laugh. "Talking about us?" Ben yells from the kitchen. "No!" Ralph and I say at the same time and we laugh again. "Yeah yeah." Grant says and I keep smiling. The doorbell rings and I jump up. "Remember. From now on you call me either Charles or Daniel." I say before I walk to the door and open it. My friends Jack, Eoin and Jamie stand in front of me. "Happy Birthday!" They yell and give me a box with a cake in it. "Grant, Ben! Stop ruining my kitchen. We have cake!" I yell over my shoulder and turn back. "Just in time. Even kids are better at baking cakes." I say and they follow me inside after laughing for a bit. "Find somewhere to sit." I say and take the cake to the kitchen to see Grant and Ben completely covered in flour. Same for the rest of the kitchen. "Oh no guys!" I say and they smile sheepishly. "Sorry." Ben says and they laugh. "Just clean it up!" I say and put the cake on the dining table. I walk back into the livingroom and everyone is sitting there awkwardly staring at the ground. "I'll introduce you." I say. "That's Ralph, that's Josh, and that's also Josh but everyone calls him Taffel." I hear footsteps coming from behind trying to not be obvious. I turn around and swing my arm up. And of course Ben was standing there with flour in his hands. As I hit him the flour falls out and lands on the ground. "Well. This is Ben, and he is being very annoying today." I say and walk past him to the kitchen to get something to clean it up with. Once the floor is clean again I give Ben another dirty look and walk back into the kitchen. When I come back out I introduce the rest and sit on the ground because there are no seats left and I don't like standing for too long. "Oh come on Dan! It's your birthday! Don't sit on the ground!" Jack says and he stand up from his chair and waits for me to stand up and sit on it. "Neah. I'm fine." I say and just stay where I am. "No Dan. I insist." Jack says and I stand up and slowly walk to the chair. He pushes me on it and I pull my knees up to make myself as small as possible. "Come on Dan. No need to go all shy." Jamie says. "You should know how he is by now." Eoin joins in and I feel my face going red. "You better don't be shy at the suprise we have for you for tonight." Jack says and I look at Ralph. I totally forgot to tell my friends that I have plans already. Ralph gives me a look back that says that he doesn't care. "Uhhm." I say, wanting to tell that I had plans already but Eoin yells straight trough it. "We're going to Imagine Dragons!" He yells and evergone except Eoin, Jamie and Jack starts laughing. I join in and Eoin gives me a weird look. "You were planning on going already right?" He asks with a sad face. "Yep." I say. "I just absolutly love the opening act so that's why I wanted to go." Eoin says. "Thank you." Ralph and the guys say and Eoin looks shocked. "Omg! That's you guys!" He yells and he suddenly looks like a little kid in disneyland. "Yep. That's us." Ralph says and he laughs. "So cool!" Eoin yells and I smile. "Why did you never tell me you know To Kill A King?" Eoin asks and he looks at me. "I only knew Ralph, I just met the rest of the guys." I say back and look down. "Wait, but how do you know him?" Eoin then asks me and it's making me uncomfetable. "I dated his brother when I was at uni. And we had a friend in common." I say and then I could slap myself. My friends don't know that I'm gay. I jump up from my chair and sprint to the bathroom. I grab the razor and put it on my arm. It had been so long since I've cut but I need it now. I hesitate for a moment but then slice the razor across my arm, just above my wrist. It hurts so much and for a few seconds I'm on a high. I forget about the problem waiting for me in the livingroom and everything seems alright. Until the pain kicks in again. I slice it again and again and again. There is a soft knock on the door that takes me off my high. "Ricky? Are you alright?" I hear Ralph say. "Rick?" He asks again, in a more worried tone when I don't answer. Suddenly the door goes open and he is standing there. "Oh Ricky." he says and sits in front of me. He gets a clean towel to stop the bleeding and with the other hand he grabs the razor. When he has done that he puts my other hand on top of the towel so that I'm holding it myself. He stands up and comes back with the first-aid kit. How did he find that so quickly? He takes a bandage out and some other stuff. I look away, the blood being too much. I feel the towel being removed and Ralph slowly pulls me up and puts my arm under the tap. The wounds burn like hell but he isn't letting go. When the wounds are clean he carefully dries my arm with the towel and puts something on the wounds that makes them sting even more. "Ow." I say. "I'm sorry Rick, it has to be done." Ralph says back and I look the other way again as I see blood appear. He bandages my arm and walks away and comes back with a hoodie. "Put this on, they won't see your bandage. And when you are back downstairs say that you were cold and then turn up the heat, alright?" Ralph asks me and I nod. I walk back down and Ralph comes after me. I turn the heat up and sit on the chair I was sitting on. I look at my shoes and I'm pretty sure that my face is bright red. "Dan, you don't have to be ashamed for being gay. And we already knew it. You once let it slip when you were pissed drunk." Eoin says and I look back up again and see that Eoin is smiling. Okay, he doesn't mind. I then look up at Jamie. He smiles at me too. Finally I look at Jack, he is smiling too. Pfiew. That was close "Who wants some cake?" I say and everyone yells yes. I walk to the kitchen and slice a piece of cake for everyone. When I walk back with all the plates everyone is chatting with each other. I give everyone their cake and sit on the ground as there are no more seats left. "Didn't I just tell you to not sit on the ground?" Jack tells me and I shake my head. "Just let me be." I say and he nods. "Alright then." Eoin says and he takes another bite of the cake.

We have all finished our cake and are on our way to the venue. It wasn't that far away so we were walking there. As we are there someone comes walking towards us with a worried face. "Greg! What's up?" Ralph asks the guy. "They are fighting again!" Greg says and Ralph runs inside the venue. Ben and Grant follow him. "Uhhhm. What's going on?" Jack asks. "Probably another disagreement that went wrong." Josh says and I still don't get what's going on. "I still don't know how they haven't killed each other by now. But let's get in." Taffel says and we follow him. I walk behind and as we walk trough some corridors I hear a lot of screaming and there is a broken violin laying on the ground. I stop and pick it up. "Well fuck." Josh says. "Now we know why they're fighting." Taffel ads and a door flies open and someone gets kicked out, that person being Ben. He looks at me and shakes his head. "Put that back down before you're the bad guy." he says and I carefully put the violin back on the ground. The door opens again and Ralph comes out dragging a guy along. "Just get out of my sight." He says to the guy and he walks away. The guy walks past us after giving a kick to the violin. "Sorry for that." Ralph says to me. "What happened?" I hear Jamie ask. "Well, Platz was playing his violin and somehow Wayne and Dan got into a fight and when Platz wanted to pull them apart Wayne got mad at him and broke his violin. Which made Platz really really really mad and then it was war." Ralph says and I nod. There is a lot of shouting and the door flies open again. Someone runs out and Ralph stops him. "Platz. Come on, it's not worth it!" Ralph says. "I'm gonna kill him!" Platz screams. "No, you're not." Ralph says and he tries to push him back into the room. Failing, Platz gets past him to be stopped by Eoin. "Going somewhere?" Eoin says and he pushes Platz back. But suddenly Platz stops stuggeling as he sees his violin on the ground. He picks it up and walks back into the room. "Well, that was easy." Eoin says and I punch his shoulder. Hurting my hand in the process. "It hurts?" Eoin asks me with a smile. I nod. "I was going to say that it's your own fault." he says. "But let me see it, just check that you haven't broken anything." I stick my hand out and he presses on it. I manage to keep a scream in. And he can see my bandage! I pull my arm back and tug the sleeve further down. "It is bruised. Rest it for a while. And don't do that again, it's not worth it." Eoin says while pointing at my arm and I give him an evil glare. "Wow. It's your own fault." he says. "Let's go." Ralph says and we follow him into the room. I go in last and lean against the door, still holding my hand.