The Desired Effect ~ Cameron Liddell

Chapter 8. "Nashville TN"

I felt like I slept for years. Cameron was holding me spoon style, with me on the inside of the bunk - the ideal way to wake up every morning. I opened my eyes and turned around in his arms to face him. I kissed his nose. When he didn't wake up I kissed his eyelids, and forehead, and both of his cheeks. When he still didn't wake up I kissed his lips. He opened his eyes and laughed. "I've been awake this whole time." I rolled my eyes and rolled onto my stomach away from him.

"Good, I was prepared to do a lot more to you to wake you up." He closed his eyes and started snoring so fast.

"Come on. Do it. I'm ready." I laughed and he pulled me close.

"I hate you." He laughed and pulled me close again.

"Nope. You love me."

"Oh yeah says who?" I teased.

"Me. Everyone who knows you. The ring on your finger. The state. To name a few." I laughed and twisted the ring on my finger. We did get new rings when we could afford them, and mine had looked just like its original but with a real diamond. I still kept the old one in my jewelry box back home.

"Yeah, I guess you're right. I must love you a lot to have married you so soon. And so young? What kind of man that's right in the head does that? Stole me and corrupted me, you did."

"Naw, you were corrupt before we met. Maybe I'm not right in the head because I don't regret anything for a second." He kissed me again. We got out of bed and everyone except Danny was in the front. I slept right through they day, and their show, and the night.

"I'm not taking questions about yesterday." I said immediately, grabbing a beer and jumping up the counter. Everyone laughed.

"I think I have the answer to a few of yours." Ben spoke up. "Take a walk?"

"She's not going anywhere with anyone."

"It's not me you're mad at, Cam." Ben looked back to me. Oh god. Why are people mad again? I kissed Cameron's cheeks and slid on my converse before leaving with Ben in my PJs. I wore soft black shorts and the same black tank top as yesterday. I assumed Cameron changed my pants in the middle of the night. He always hated when I wore pants in bed because our skin wasn't touching and he didn't feel close to me. "What's up?"

"Look, I know tour just started, and Danny's been less than ideal with you." I forced a laugh, stealing a cigarette from Ben's pocket. We both lit up and kept walking.

"Actually, he's been an ass. He keeps looking like he wants to be nice and do nice things, but then he just puts up this wall, and goes back to Asshole Danny."

"That's it. That's exactly it. He wants to be nice, and he wants to be your friend, and he wants to be friends with Cameron again, and he wants to be Good Danny, but he can't. It's even harder on the road. He has to act a certain way so people think certain things about him. That he can't look like he cares about anything. He can't look weak."

"That doesn't explain him harassing me constantly." I shrugged. I didn't really care to hear anything Ben was saying at that point. "I was too high to stand up yesterday, never mind sit up on my own. Danny literally broke the bus to get in and make sure I was okay and then left me on the floor." My friendship with Ben was once again slipping through my fingers. I don't want to be a problem. I never did. I don't want anyone to fight and be upset and not because of me.

"That's just how he is."

"I'm not doing this again, Ben. That's your excuse for him all the time. I don't really care why he is the way he is, and I don't really like how that is."

"You know what they said, never meet your idols, hm?" A drunken night I confessed to Ben how much I loved them and how they were my favorite band, and how much I looked up to all of them before we met. Before I became who I am, and before I knew them like I did. Ben asked if they were better or worse than I imagined. I didn't have an answer. "If you don't like it, you should go home." He bit. I stopped dead in my tracks.