USE YOUR ILLUSION, slash

three

    It's been four hours since they started on the road. Steven and Slash are playing cards. There's no telling which game they're on now, they've played almost every card game one could think of. Steven even started doing card tricks at one point. Danielle stays slouched in her seat, her arms crossed over her in a defensive and closed off manner. The reason for this, Axl's been irritating her this entire time.
"Hey Daniel, could you go to the back and grab me a water bottle?" Axl asks, leaning in his seat toward her.
"My name isn't Daniel, so no. Why can't you do it?" Her eyebrows furrow, not wanting to interact with the ginger anymore.
"'Cause I'm asking you, dipshit," He snaps at her. Both Slash and Steven quietly stop their game and focus their attention on the two arguing.
"Ok, well you're a grown man who can do things for himself," Danielle sits up in her seat, her body facing the empty seat in front of her. It's empty because Slash is sitting beside her and Steven across from him.
     "And you're a grown woman who can do favors for people. Just get the fucking water bottle, I don't understand what's so hard about that," Axl's voice raises a little bit, not a ton, but enough for the entire band to notice. Izzy and Duff pay their attention to the situation. Danielle gets up, not happy whatsoever, she goes to the back.
     "Dude. What was the reason, honestly?" Slash asks, setting his cards face down.
     "Man, I just didn't wanna get up," Axl laughs, expecting the other to laugh, they didn't. His fades. Danielle comes back with an ice cold water bottle
     "Here's your fucking water," She tosses it in his lap. For Axl unfortunately, he was wearing practically underwear, so the freezing bottle touched his bare skin unexpectedly. He jumps.
     "What the fuck, man?!" His voice raised louder than it was before, "Slash this is why you can't make decisions like this. You end up bringing shitheads along that ruin the whole tour!" Slash moves into Danielle's seat, causing Danielle to have to move into the seat by Steven.
     "Can I talk to you? In the back? Away from everyone else," Slash is the complete opposite of Axl, he's very soft spoken. Internally, he's upset, but he doesn't verbally let it out just yet.
"Sure," is all that Axl responds with. Slash gets up first, Axl follows.

"Seriously?" Slash crosses his arms, locking eye contact with Axl.
"What?" He throws his arms up defensively.

Back in the front of the bus, all the others can hear yelling. It's inaudible so nobody can really understand anything they're saying, but what they can understand is that most of the yelling and irritation is coming from Slash, but soon Axl's voice overbears his.
"Do they always fight?" Danielle asks.
"Not recently, no," Duff answers her, a cigarette hanging out of his mouth.
"Well, since we're here, let's play get to know each other," Steven smiles.
"I'll go," Izzy starts, "I'm Izzy, I play rhythm guitar and I'm probably better in bed than Slash, in case you were wondering."
"Hi, I'm Danielle, I actually wasn't really wondering.. Slash and I haven't done anything and I don't plan on doing anything with any of you," She shrugs.
"I'm hurt," Duff places a hand over his heart, "truly. I'm Duff, I'm on bass," He gives her a thumbs up.
"I'm Steven," The man sitting next to her smiles.
"What do you play, Steven?" Danielle faces him.
"Drums."
"Guess I should stay away from you, heard drummers are crazy," Danielle jokes.
"I'm not crazy, I swear," He gets a little defensive. The sound of arguing from the back of the bus continues, but isn't as severe. Duff and Izzy eye each other and then look back at Danielle and Steven.
Slash and Axl come back to the front. They sit down in their respected seats. The whole situation seems a little dramatic, but in the moment, it didn't. Slash only wanted to talk things through with Axl, there was no intent to start yelling at each other.
"So, how was it?" Danielle asks Slash.
"How was what?" He looks at her.
"Your little talk," she does not look at him.
"Fine."

     The band, plus Danielle, arrive in their first city; Modesto, California. Immediately, Duff and Izzy leave first, wanting to walk around as much as they can. The show is tomorrow night and they only have so much time. Axl and Steven pair up, leaving Danielle and Slash to pair together. Walking down the street, Slash gets looks from several women, some men too. All good looks, no negative. Slash is beautiful, who could blame them? Danielle catches the looks and starts to feel a weird sensation in the pit of her stomach. Nervousness? No. Jealousy? No, it can't be, she just met Slash the day before. In turn, Danielle gets a few eyes from men. One man, comes up behind the two of them, keeping his eyes on Danielle. Both Slash and Danielle notice fairly quickly.
     "Let me take you home, baby," The man says to Danielle. Danielle feels her heart drop, yet she tries to ignore him. Slash ignores him too, "Come on, a little me and you time, if you know what I mean."
     "I'm good," Danielle says in a monotone voice.
     "You're never good till you've tried me," Anyone can hear the smirk in the way he speaks.
     "She said she's good, man," Slash looks over his shoulder.
     "Stay out of it. I'm not speaking to you," The man snaps at Slash.
     "Ok, and she doesn't want to speak with you. So leave her be," Slash feels his jaw tense up and tighten.
     "Come on, sweetheart," The man moves closer to Danielle, pretty much breathing on her neck and sniffing her hair. Danielle shudders and moves closer toward Slash, moving away from the man. Slash smacks the back of the man's head.
     "What the fuck is wrong with you? You're fucking weird," Slash smacks his head again.
     "I could call the police on you!" The man stands dead in his tracks as the other two continue walking.
     "Go for it!" Slash shouts.