Saved by Gaga

{40}

It's two days after stayed with Cynthia and Joseph. We have been in a few meetings, sorted out what i am wearing to the VMA's, sorted out what Gaga was wearing to the VMA's (its not too crazy this time ready for the start of the new era), we went shopping because apparently if you have multiple houses you have to have a different wardrobes for each, we had been in the studio too. In fact that is where we have just come from. We had a great day there and got quite a dew demos done, some of which may be used.

I am just sat in my room sorting out cupboards and deciding what needs to go home to England with me and what doesn't. I can hear Joanne finishing on the phone. It was a heated conversation i could tell by the loudness of her voice even though i couldn't hear her fully. I have heard her like that before. Sometimes management wants differently to her and she has to fight for what she needs as a artist. I can hear her sighing now and the piano starting to play. The notes of the piano version of Gypsy i can recognise. I pick up my guitar and go though to see her. She is singing 'I don't wanna be alone forever, but i can be tonight' so i join in with my guitar and voice. She smiles at me and picks one hand up from the piano to ruffle my hair. We finish the song together.

"Come with me i want to take you somewhere." she says.

So i put my shoes on and she puts two guitars in the back. We get in together and put some old music on. We drive as the sun sets in front of us. The city is falling away behind me and the hills are coming up to greet me. She pulls over in the layby at the top of the hill. There is no noise here apart from the birds singing. Its like the rest of the world is no where to be seen and its just us. She stops and gets out. She sits on the bonnet of her car with a guitar. The picture is perfect and she will appreciate it if i get it for later so i do. Then she beckons me to sit up with her. I grab the other guitar not having any idea that it was Joanne's first guitar.

"Sometimes i recon its only me that knows about this spot and other times i think that other people come up here. But in there heads its only them that know about it. So its like this little place that only a small group of us know about. And yet we all think that we are the only ones that do." she explains. "This is the place i always came when i need a escape. There is no phone signal, no paparazzi, no rest of the world. Just me. This is also what the song Electric Chapel was wrote about. This place. But of course its not a electric chapel it just seemed so that day in my imagination. I wanted to come here but i was in LA in a boring meeting i needed a electric chapel to meet at and it was this place. That song is a load of visionary just no one knows it. Its hidden behind the music. 'Meet me baby in a safe place' That day just felt like no where was safe but here. The paparazzi was everywhere. So welcome to my utopia."

"What all the little monsters believe being famous is like is all really a super cut. 'With the paparazzi all swarming around in my Louise Vuitton white buttoned down' That was the day you wrote Princess Die. The world came crashing on top of you and yet the thing that had caused that had saved you too." i say whilst starting to play the guitar some how reading her mind.

"Yup it was the same day. I really wanted to see you that day too. I thought maybe if i died i would. I never even thought about actually killing myself but it was just a little bit of the thought. Oh well maybe if i went then Ocean would be there. But then i started reading some fanfictions. They were volumes i loved and knew. Even if i had never read them before i knew them because they were about me." she starts playing her guitar with me.

After a while Jo spoke up again. "I have something for you." She went into the car and brought out two boxes with a screw driver. In the boxes were two bracelets. Both rose gold and simple, one peace of metal that went all the way round with what looks like no way to get them on or off. "These are connection bracelets. You use the screw driver to put them on and then you can't take it off. You will always have something in common with the other. Always connected no matter how far apart. I know some couples that wear these we are a couple of a sort so i thought it would be a good idea." She takes my wrist to put the bracelet on, i can see that it has the world 'Mermaid' engraved in it. I smile as i see it and she does too. I then do hers and hers has the world 'Unicorn' engraved on it. And that is it we can never take them off with out a screw driver. Oh yeah Joanne threw that over the cliffs edge.

The sun has not set yet Joanne gets a bottle of cider out of the car. And i get up to put the guitars back and get the blanket. I also pick up and bottle of cider. I open it with my arm. I thing my friend taught me to do. I pretend to be taking a selfie of us but its actually a video when Jo realise she laughs and buries her head into me. I then turn the camera round and film the view and our legs all mixed up.

"Oi missy you are not old enough to be drinking never mind know how to open a bottle without a opener." Joanne says to me as i take a gulp. She stars to light up a cigarette which i very much disapprove of as she gave that up and has not had one.

I let her take a drag before i remove it from her lips. "This, my dear, will kill you and also lead to a relapse of you smoking again which i refuse to let happen." I then put it between my lips and take a drag too. I have only ever smoked a couple times cigarettes before. It takes me back to different days. I then stub it so we are equal and no more. I go into the car and take the packet. I open it and pull all the cigarettes in half. "No more" i say simply.

"You are such a hypocrite you told me not to and then did that exact thing yourself." i shrug at her. "And that was not your first time doing that either." She puts her arm around me as i sit back down.

"This time last year i was friends with a group of people that went out late and mucked around in the park. Some of them used to smoke and we all drank. It was quite toxic but it was only ever after school and we caused no trouble for anyone else. I always turned down smoking i never liked the thought of killing your self one breath at a time. One night i had just had a big fight at home before i went out. That night i smoked and drank a load. In reality if i was older that would have been acceptable but i wasn't older. There was another time I smoked too but i don't remember that so well. Only twice though so nothing really, I wouldn't let anything else in because for me personally it was a lack of self respect. That's just me though. Sometimes i want to go back then, it was so fun. But i pulled myself out of it for the best. Isa, Liz and Ella are so well behaved go damn it, but i love then and they are good for me too." i take a break and Joanne nods at my group activity's. I love how she does not judge me on any of it. "How could you tell i had even smoked before?" i asked after.

"One, you so casually put it between your lips and breathed in, people that never have smoked don't smoke like that. Two, you didn't cough when you puffed it all out, it came out in a steady stream that is also not a fist timer thing. You looked like you missed it when you did. A look of nostalgia came over your face like you missed it." she finished. "I miss it. But smoking now that i have given up does not feel the same. Like i am betraying myself. There was no relief either. That sucks but its for the best."

"Too right its for the effing best. If anything you will destroy your voice."

We stay until the stars come out in the warm summer night. Joanne lets me finish the bottle as she now knows that my body is used to it. We decide to go home hours later. We drive in Joanne's vintage car home and fall asleep in my room together. The VMA's were tomorrow i realised before i fell asleep. No time to worry now though.