Becoming Starkid

Missing You

CHAPTER THIRTYONE:

                  It’s our first day of rehearsal the next day.  We are just doing basic line-running and blocking when we hear someone come in the door.

“Did you all really start without me?”

“JOEY!” we all scream excitedly. Lauren drops her scripts and runs to him, jumping into his arms. He picks her up easily and she straddles his waist. They don’t make out, they just look at each other with utter adoration and Joey sweetly gives Lauren a small kiss. Lauren looks into his eyes and whispers,

“Please never leave me.” Ugh. People in love annoy me. But Joey is very well prepared for this rehearsal, more so than the rest of us. He the majority of his lines memorized and fits in with us perfectly. But I have realized now that we all fit together perfectly. No matter what, we are a team.  During rehearsal, Joe goes out of his way to try to ‘discreetly’ grab my ass. But he is not at all subtle. Brian is the first to comment,

“Okay guys, I know you’re in the whole, can’t keep our hands off of each other phase, but try to keep your PDA to yourself. Especially after what we all had to listen to last night.”

“What are you talking about?” I ask.

Brian pounds his foot repeatedly on the ground and raises his voice to a girlish octave and moans,

“Ooh, ahh, oooooh, OH, YEAH, joe, OOOOOooooOOh, ah, ah, ah, yes.” I feel my cheeks burning and I slap Brian,

“Cut it out! I don’t sound like that!”

“Wanna bet? I live, literally next door to you two animals.” I find this to be extremely embarrassing but Joe looks very pleased with himself, so I slap him too for good measure.

We all gather for the airing of Darren’s first episode of Glee. I hear Nick on the phone saying,

“Yeah, we’re all here, even Joey. Yup, we’re excited, yeah, yeah, we’ll tell you what we think. Okay bye,” he hangs up the phone, “Darren says hi, and he is freaking out about this.” I see Lauren sitting in front of Joey, leaning back on him, his legs around her. And Meredith has her head in Brian’s lap and he is playing with her hair. I cuddle up next to Joe. And then I see Darren dancing across the screen. It is a unreal feeling of watching Darren on TV. It’s like it’s him, but its not. Because, it is Darren on there, but he is a character, it’s not him. But it still makes me feel twinges of sadness. I miss my best friend. Darren and I have had complications, but I miss how he makes me feel. He makes me get out of my head for once and I am relaxed around him, well most of the time. And he makes me feel special, and I love that feeling, even if it leads to confusion later. I feel Joe tighten his grip on me and look at him, forcing a smile. I want to forget this feeling of sadness, and I am with the one person who can really make me forget Darren. I pull Joe into me and kiss him passionately. He responds immediately and we start to make out. He rolls on top of me pushing me back on the couch. The people around us start to notice and grimace at us. But I need this right now.

“Wanna catch the rest on hulu tomorrow? I whisper in Joe’s ear.

“More than anything.” He says eagerly grabbing my hand. We giggle running out of the room and into Joe’s bedroom, slamming the door behind us.

Having sex with Joe numbs the pain, but its still there. I want to forget. I always want to forget.

“Joe, you do drugs, right?” I ask,

“Yeah, sometimes,” he replies skeptically.

“I wanna do them. We can do them together.”

“Why?”

“Why not! If you do them, why can’t I?”

“Because your still young, and I don’t want to get you started on anything.”

I groan, “Never tell me I’m young again. I’m legal now, and think of all the shit you were doing when you were my age? And if I’m so fucking young why are you having sex with me? And fine, you don’t have to give me shit. I’ll find it some other way.” I pretend to storm out but I know Joe will stop me,

“Andy, wait!” he says predictably, “I don’t want to give you stuff that could hurt you because, I care about you, and I’d rather bad stuff happen to me than to you.”

“That’s sweet Joe, but I know what I’m doing. What do you got?” He gives in and lies down on the floor, searching under the bed. He pulls out a teddy bear. I watch him, confused, but he pops off the head of the teddy bear and pulls out two tablets. They look like thick tattoos with little Scooby-doo cartoons.

“I didn’t choose the print,” he explains, “Andy, this is LSD. You’ve never done it?” I shake my head no.

“Okay. I’m warning you this stuff is dangerous, it’ll confuse you, change your emotions. Are you sure you want it?” I hold my hand and take one tablet from Joe and place it one my tongue feeling start to dissolve a bit. Joe smiles,

“Ready for the ride of your life?” he asks.