pain, pleasure & eurovision ; Damiano David

DUMB THOUGHTS

"No, I can't. I'm so exhausted." I slur.

Vic gives up asking whether I'd like to dance with her and takes a seat on the night stand beside Ethans bed. I'm lying on his mattress and watch Damiano jumping and singing with Joonas, the guitarist of Blind Channel.

Thomas plays the acoustic guitar and Ethan drums on his lap together with the Finnish drummer. Joonas and Alex are the last ones at our little celebration, the rest of the band went to bed at around 2.30 am.

Damiano freaks completely out, howling (as far as that is possible, his voice is already consumed).

I have a look at my watch, it's 3.47 am.

"Dami can you keep it down before Claudio comes and sends us all to sleep?" I try to say as loudly as possible.

"No, not really."

As if on cue, there's a knock on the door.

"Happy?" I mouth.

Damiano glares at me deadly before opening the door.

"Hello!" he says cheerfully.

"Hi."

I get up with a few difficulties but eventually make my way over to him. A short man with glasses stands in the door, I read his name tag: Hugo. He looks exhausted, his face is pale and the dark circles around his eyes look painful.

"First of all congratulations guys." he smiles tiredly.

"But please, if you were so kind and could keep it down... I've already received calls of people complaining about the volume."

"I'm so sorry, we're just very happy." Damiano excuses us.

Surprisingly, he says it pretty serious, trying hard to not let the alcohol control him.

"I understand but please be considerate of the others spending the night in this hotel." he becomes impatient.

"Of course sir, we'll keep it down." I nod.

Hugo goes back to the reception and Ethan decides it's time for us to go.

"See you" I hug the Finnish guys and give the other three a kiss on the cheek.

Damiano and I walk back to our room. Unlike usually after a party, we're walking separately, not daring to touch each other. We don't talk, he simply hums the melody to "ZITTI E BUONI".

In the hotel room Damiano uses the bathroom, again not thinking about a closed door. I lay down on the bed, get out of my pants and start scrolling through Instagram.

My eyes flutter open, I look around and remember where I am. Suddenly I feel very sick and cover my mouth with a hand. As I get up my head pounds in pain.

It's still dark outside, that's why I stumble over a Suitcase on my way to the bathroom.

"Fucking shit!" I curse not too quiet and kick against it, making the headache even worse.

Forcefully I open the door to the bathroom and lean over the toilet bowl to throw up my guts. I don't take care of my hair which falls inside it as well. A few minutes go by and I feel a hand take my hair and make a bun out of it.

"Thanks" I mumble, now at the sink and rinsing my mouth.

"Could you help me wash my hair?" I look up into the mirror to see Damiano standing behind me.

He wears nothing but his boxers which let's me recall the situation we were in, a few hours ago. I give myself an internal facepalm but just act normal in his presence. I almost forgot about the moment and I believe he did too, at least he shows no sign of unusual affection.

"Of course" his voice is raspy as he glares at me through his tired eyes.

I sit down in the bath tub and narrow my eyes into a slit because of the disgusting feeling in my stomach. Damiano hands me my toothbrush, it's a wordless understanding. I have a look at his phone when he looks for my shampoo. It's 5 in the morning, we've barely slept an hour.

I take off my sports bra, not caring about Damiano looking at me. I cross my arms over my chest and slowly brush my teeth.

He opens the bun and I soon feel warm water running through my hair and down my spine. My underwear gets soaked as well but I ignore it.

"I'm sorry about what happened earlier, I was drunk and turned on. Shouldn't've kissed you."

I stay silent for a few minutes as he massages shampoo on my head. I didn't think he would apologise and I also felt a bit hurt that he regrets it.

"Well, I kissed you back..."

He takes a deep breath and chuckles slightly.

"Yea you did."

I know he's thinking back to the situation and I do too. He turns the water back on and I think about what would've happened if Ethan hadn't called and what the consequences would look like. I feel some kind of sad but then angry for having feelings like these.

I decide it's better this way, I can't loose my best friend who also needs me. I feel numb as he finishes washing my hair. Out of the bath tub, I wrap a towel around my body and on in my hair. I lie down, cover myself with the huge blanket and don't talk to Damiano who comes under the cover as well. We both are tired as fuck and I don't know who the first one is to fall asleep.

.................
jb