Dance puppet

15

Full of new energy I was getting ready in Malmö's venue. The second George left the dressing room, the comments came in. "I see you two had a really, really nice walk today." "Hope you didn't leave the condom there, plastic in nature is a serious problem." "Johannes, you fucking clown. Literally." Between all the laughs we had, I noticed that Jonas was the only one who wasn't really joking along. He was also the first one to get serious again, and said: "Kate, I really want to emphasize that George cannot know about this. Absolutely not." "Why not?" "We might all be cool together, but George is not. I mean, cool guy, but he insists on keeping relations professional, and aside from that he also had a nasty divorce with his ex wife a while back. Best case scenario he'll be mad at you, worst case scenario he'll kick you out of the tour. Let's just keep all unprofessional escapades between us six." I put down the devil's horn I was about to clip in my hair and turned around. "Kick me out?" "Well, that hasn't actually happened before," Henrik chipped in. "But be careful. He'll do what he feels like he has to do." I got back to my hairdo. "He can't kick me out," I said with slight arrogance. "I'm part of the show." John awkwardly laughed, and said: "Well, to us, yes, but not yet for the audience. People will still come to our shows if you're not there." My ego immediately dropped. John was right. This tour wasn't about burlesque. It was about Avatar, not me. I'm still just someone who works with Avatar, but I'm not part of the band. "You're right," I said softly. "Sorry. I will keep this away from George." "Come on, John, you don't have to be so harsh," Johannes complained. "No, it's fine," I said, although I was hurt a little bit by John's words. "The main point was that George can't know about us. We can do that." Unwillingly, my heart skipped a beat when I said "us". I looked at Johannes, but he didn't react any different. Whatever. The fact that I could call us, "us", in whatever context, was enough to feed my ego again.

I was about to go on stage and I was just as nervous as the previous time. I wasn't sure what exactly caused it, but I think it was a mix of my new reality still sinking in, the size of the audience, and John's comment. People will still come to our shows if you're not there. I took a deep breath, and walked up on the stage. People cheered. The lights were less bright than last time, so I could actually see them. There must have been hundreds of people! And they were yelling and clapping, while I hadn't even really done anything yet. You're wrong, John. They love me just as much as they love you. Even without seeing my act. Full of regained confidence I started to dance.

When Avatar finished their show too, I was still waiting for them backstage. I gave them all high fives, like I was greeting an entire football team. "Good show. Amazing. Nicely done!" As we walked back to our dressing room to freshen ourselves up, John walked next to me. "I hope you didn't take my comment before the show to heart," he said. "I realised that it came out a little more rude than I intended." I smiled. "It's okay. The show went well." John gave me an awkward half-hug while still walking as amends, but I accepted his apology anyway. "Great, now I smell too!" I joked. "Like a freakshooow!" sang Johannes in front of us. "But John is even worse than that!" he quickly added. "A pig in the mud smells like roses compared to John." Everyone laughed, and John had that "god damn it, Johannes"-look on his face. "Okay, we're even," I laughed, trying to tone it down.

We entered the dressing room and I playfully let my cloak slide off my body. "Private show, let's go!" I yelled while making sexy poses. The guys were taking off their jackets and tried to mimick me. We all laughed at each other. "Maybe just stick with playing instruments," I laughed as I helped Jonas getting his jacket unstuck from his elbow. "One smooth motion, like this," I said close to this ear while stroking his arm. I watched my hand slide down his tattoos. I never really got a closer look at them. When my hand got to his hand, I pulled away and looked at his face. Jonas was blushing! Okay, maybe I went a little too far. To be honest, since I went to the forest with Johannes, I had already forgotten about the bathroom incident with Jonas... I smiled at him, and continued to make fun of the not-so-great dance moves I was seeing.