Out of Tune: The Original 2015 Draft

chapter 25

Music to me is the air that I breathe, it's the blood that pumps through my veins that keeps me alive—Billy Joe Armstrong

"Wait, I really said that?" Spencer asked as we wheeled him out of the hospital. His uncombed dark hair was stuck up in varying directions. He had a white cast covering his left leg and it was already partially covered with signatures. The entire band, plus Taylor, had signed it, along with his mom and Jared. Miles' signature covered one entire side of the cast, partially obscuring the plaster with his large scrawl of black permanent marker.

"Yes," I said.

"I had no idea who you were?"

"Nope."

"Wow," he said slowly. "Well, that explains why you were looking at me as if I was a crazy person when I woke up."

I smirked as Miles started laughing. "Dude," he said, "we were waiting for you to be all like 'you're gorgeous.'"

"'So pretty,'" Zeke added.

"'My girlfriend?'" Charlie murmured.

"'Unbelievable!'" we all chorused as Spencer laughed.

He'd woken up officially at around seven last night. He'd recognized me right away and asked for his glasses so we'd known that he was back from his little medicinal high. We'd spent a good time joking around before he passed out again after which we debated the topic of the tour. We weren't entirely certain if he should be going on the tour or not but when he woke up and found out the nature of our debate, Spencer told us that he was going on the tour with or without us.

Needless to say, we weren't about to let our frontman go on tour alone so it was decided that we would continue on with the tour as planned. Anna and Jared, I could tell, were worried about sending Spencer off, injured as he was, but Miles assured them that he would take good care of his best buddy. I wasn't sure if that fact made Anna and Jared more or less worried. Spencer's parents had even considered coming with us, but as short notice as it was, they were unable to leave work and their other commitments for three weeks.

So, we were going alone as originally planned.

"I can't believe I really said all that," Spencer said as we reached the parking lot. Anna and Jared had gone to get the car while we got their son and the second we stepped outside, Jared was there to help Spencer hobble into the car.

"Well, you did," I replied, grinning, as I followed him in. Miles, Zeke, Charlie, and Taylor disappeared to find Miles' car so that they could get home and finish packing for the tour. We were all a little underprepared considering the fact that we were leaving in less than twenty-four hours for Detroit.

Spencer shook his head. "There's a reason I don't do drugs and I think you just realized what it is."

I laughed. "Why? Because you lose your marbles and can't remember your own girlfriend?"

"Shut up."

I grinned at him as we switched to another topic—our set list for the tour. We'd already submitted the songs we were scheduled to play at the first few shows but we'd been debating switching things up for the last few.

Three days ago, during one short period of rest between all the craziness, Spencer and I had finished our most recent, and most emotionally challenging for me, song. It was the one I'd been working on after I'd left my mother's house after returning from New York.

The song for my dad.

I'd practically bawled my way through our first rehearsal of it and that was just when it was the two of us playing it acoustically. We hadn't even shown it to the guys yet. I didn't know if I could handle that.