Sing Me Your Song

Chapter 12

The crew, especially the band had loved Emma and her cooking, they had enjoyed her easy banter and the way she made everyone smile with her easy-going attitude. And he was more than happy to be able to offer her that job.

And it was only a little bit selfish when he thought about how they would be spending the next several months together.

The days were filled with planning and preparation and talks with a very stressed-out Stella that was doing nothing much other than yelling orders at Matt who was close to losing his mind.

All the while Neal and the crew did their very best to not let it show that they were close to laughing their heads off. But it was stressful, yet the excitement and buzz of the start of the tour was throbbing through the air.

Neal made sure to get Emma acquainted with everyone and took her to the rehearsals and meeting as often as he could. She seemed to warm up to the others, and it was clear that the crew would love her as much as he did, or almost as much.

He could feel that she was incredibly nervous, trying to drink in every little piece of information that she could and making plans on how to deal with the food and nutrition needs and preference of the gang. And while he knew that she should not stress out that much because he knew that she would do great and everyone would be happy to just have anything edible while they did all the set-ups for the gigs.

And she would be good, he was sure of it. And while she did her best to act professional and casual with the others around, especially management and the rest of the crew that she would be spending the most time with, he could see that she was still nervous.

Now that he knew about the tragic events that had happened in her life, even though she did not reveal nearly as much as he wanted to know to be able to help her, he caught on things that he had not noticed before.

She looked over her shoulder whenever she exited a building, scanning the area she would walk through. She would slightly jump at sudden noises, and he sometimes caught her with that far-away look in her eyes while she ran a thumb over her inner thigh where he knew her scar was.

She never told him how she had gotten it exactly, but it seemed that it was a big deal for her, a memory she would not forget. And while those slip-ups of her were very subtle and one would not notice when they did not know to look out for them, he saw them now.

And they sent a pang through him every single time, and he would just want to hold her close and tell her that she would be okay, but he could not do that. She would not want him to know that she was hurting, that she was most probably scared out of her mind, and he could not wait to go on tour for exactly that reason. To get her away from here and make her forget her troubles when she was on the road with them.

Finn and Neal met up a couple of time as well and Neal knew that Finn was not satisfied with the answer he gave him when he asked about the circumstances of Emma coming back and now touring and actually living with him for the moment.

Finn was stoked and he was happy for his mate and he had been coming over and hung out with the pair of them but he was still trying to get behind the actual reason. Neal and Emma had both tried to convince him that the reason was just that she did not like the internship and decided to come back because she was homesick.

And while Neal was sure that Finn assumed they were lying and that there might be more going on between the two of them than they let on, he was thankfully tactful enough to not confront Emma about it directly.

Neal loved having her live with him. She had talked about moving into a hotel or something to not get on his nerves, but he insisted that she should stay. Mostly for her own safety because here he could keep tabs on her.