The Loud Crowd

2.

Second Chapter, here we go! Lets get this rollercoaster started!

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Dad had started giving me 'space'. I don't know why he bothered, since I never left the apartment unless it was to spend hours on end trapped in Number Four. I appreciated the obvious worry and concern he held, but it made me feel paranoid, like perhaps I should be constantly crying and going crazy.

Although, crazy might just be a matter perspective.

Waking up in a tangle of bedsheets and lyric sheets, I glance at the clock. 9:30. A nice, respectable time to be making an appearance. Nevertheless, I slumped back down amongst the pillows and rolled onto my side. I could see my horizontal reflection in the mirror on the opposite wall, and I looked like the mess everyone expected me to be. The press would have paid an arm and a leg for a shot to plaster the front of every newspaper with. My hair stuck out at all angles, my eyes smudged with the remains of yesterday's mascara and my skin a sallow, unhealthy pale white.

I sat up again and frowned at the pile of clothes slung over the chair in the corner. I wasn't in the mood to clean up. Instead, I padded into the living room.

Dad was already gone, no trace left apart from a note on the fridge:

Gone to Andy's. Should be back by dinner. Love you.

I poured a glass of orange juice and thought. Thinking was OK in the mornings - it was a time between sleep and wake, and so any thoughts were acceptable as they could be blamed on doziness.

I wondered if Nate was OK, the same thing I wondered every single day. I wondered if Freddie was with him. I wondered if Freddie was still angry with me. I wondered if the press had stopped hailing Stepping on Clouds as a love song between Nate and I.

It made me angry, that they'd misconstrued the lyrics of the song we'd spent weeks on in the wrong way. It was a song about grief and death and how to not cope with it. How could they think it was about love?

I chugged the orange juice down quickly.

The press had been a nightmare. The second to last concert, the one where I had worn Nate's shirt and sung Closest Thing to Crazy for him, had been televised to over three million people. The last concert- the one after the 'accident' had over a billion hits on YouTube. And there was article after article describing the accident and how we, as a band, had been taking it, and whether we were breaking up. I didn't even know the answer to that.

It made me sick that we had never been as famous as we were then. It seemed the second the press caught wind of the crash, the EP sale records flew through the roof, and the fact that we'd postponed the tour caused utter uproar.

I tapped on the counter-top with my fingernail. Today would be the same as every other day - I'd spend hours alone in Number Four, attempting to better my piano skills. I'd eat virtually nothing.

Only today would be different - today was the first day that there was a chance we'd get proper news.

I dumped my glass into the sink and headed back to my room.

I saw my phone on the bedcovers, its screen indicating numerous missed calls and texts. I already knew they'd be from Freddie. My heart jumped at the thought of there being news. And yet I wasn't sure I wanted to hear it.

I threw on my Stones t-shirt and a pair of purple leggings. Then shoved my feet into my black Docs. Brushed my hair. I caught sight of my song book, wedged at the side of the vanity table. Its think leather cover seemed to be glaring at me for leaving it untouched for over two months. I winced, before pulling it out and sitting in my corner chair holding it.