"Youngblood! Say you want me, say you want me out of your life, and I'm just a dead man walking tonight!" Zaire followed after 5 Seconds of Summer. "But you need it. Yeah, you need it all of the time!"
"Ooh ooh ooh." Nathan followed up.
"Jesus Christ," Ashton mumbled. "Who invited these kids on tour?"
"Remember when we used to be as annoying as they were?" Michael said. "It came back to haunt us."
Nathan glanced over at Javier, Kian, and Madison as they were tiptoeing down the hall with water guns.
"We were young and annoying. Now look at us. Old and pissed off." Luke laughed.
"Luke, you are only three years older than them." Calum chuckled.
Michael squinted his eyes as he watched Nathan and Zaire. "What are you guys looking at?" He leaned his head out and winced when he got sprayed in the eyes with the water gun. "Oh my god!"
Nathan and Zaire took the water guns tucked in their waistband and sprayed the four Australians.
Out of instinct, Ashton closed the door to the dressing room. "Fuck off!"
They all bolted off towards the meet-and-greet area, still giggling like children.
"Hola!" Zaire exclaimed as he climbed onto the stool.
"Alright, we have three ground rules. Raise your hand if you want to say something, try not to talk over each other because the room will get really loud if you do, and please be respectful to everyone in this room." Nathan said. "Now that we've got that settled. Do your worst."
"Hi Madison!" A faint yell bounced through the room.
"Hi!" Madison said.
"Get her out of here." Nathan playfully side-eyed Madison. "Madison's only here to promote her music. She doesn't give a damn about us."
"Didn't I dedicate two days of my life to star in the 'Morning' music video?" Madison retorted. "Then I helped you write 'Caught in the Fire.'"
Nathan blocked her off by shoving a hand in her face. "Madison is a clout chaser."
A petty smirk overtook Madison's face. "13 million followers on Instagram," she whispered into the mic and laughed as she saw Nathan's grin gradually become straight. "How many followers do you have, Nathan?"
"Anyway," He cleared his throat before facing the audience. "You see how she preaches about how she doesn't care about how much clout she has, but she just humble bragged about how many Instagram followers she has."
"I had to flex on you a little," Madison teased. "You're getting too cocky. Someone has to crush your ego."
"Ha ha ha!" He sarcastically laughed. "What's your question, sweetie?"
"Who is your favorite member of 5sos?"
"Calum. He has a perfect mixture of weird and mysterious. He can also be funny when he wants to." Nathan answered. "Cool guy."
"Green shirt in the back,"
"Okay, first off, I love you." The girl started.
"I love you more," Javier responded, resulting in a crowd of awes.
"What is the funniest fan encounter you've had so far?"
"Usually, for the meet and greet, it can get super weird. It's never the fans. It's always the parent of the fans. Sometimes the parents are way more excited than the kid." Javier said while laughing with the crowd. "It's always amusing when the parent walks in first, and then they hug me before the kid."
"Then they look at me with the most star-struck face ever and say, 'My daughter or my son is a huge fan,'" Nathan continued. "And I'm like, are you sure you're not a big fan?"
"Black and white hoodie in the back," Zaire said. "By the way, your hair is lovely."
She blushed and said, "Thank you. Will you guys and Madison ever work together on a song?"
"What do you think, Nathan?" Madison turned to face Nathan with a smug smirk. "You wanna hop on a track?"
"Absolutely not." He said. "Never in a billion years." He continued to joke. "Yeah, I can see that happening. Her and our fan bases are pretty much intertwined, so releasing a song will be cool. It won't be released anytime soon because we've released too many songs. So it's a big no-no right now."
"If you could tattoo one of your lyrics, which would you choose?"
"Wow, what a good question," Kian thought out loud. "I've always wanted to do this. I'm flip-flopping between 'heavens what's you get when you fight through hell' from Nobody Knows or 'lost in my imagination' from Comethru." He explained. "One tattoo that all four of us must have is the butterfly tattoo. I don't care where it is, but I will get that tattoo."
"Face tattoo?" Javier teased.
"Of course. I'm going to be looking like 6ix9ine." He joked back. He caught Madison's annoyed face and did a double-take. "What?"
"If you get a face tattoo, I will break up with you," she said, making the fans laugh. "I'm not even kidding."
"Oh you're serious? What happened to be nonsuperficial Madison?"
"You have such a beautiful face. Once you put a tattoo on your face, it'll ruin it. I don't know. Maybe I am being superficial." She responded.
"I will never get a face tattoo," Kian said. "What's your question, darling?"
"Why didn't Sober make the setlist?"
"Nathan couldn't do the high notes live. He said it'll bruise his vocal cords." Zaire answered. "He's not a real singer."
"Zaire, I will beat the crap out of you," Nathan said as he pounded his fist into his palm. "Some songs just don't make the cut. We can add it if you guys want it. What's your question?"
"What is your favorite Madison Beer song?"
"Jesus Christ, how many questions will we get about Madison?" Nathan threw his hat on the ground. "I'm not answering this question."
"You are such a hater." She said. "You're so jealous of me. It's ridiculous."
"My favorite one is Teenager in Love. The whole 50's vibe of the song is really cool." Javier answered.
"Mine is Hurts Like Hell," Zaire said. "The whole track is fire. The savagery, the vocals, the music video. All of it is dope. It also has Offset, so it's an instant banger."
"My favorite is an unreleased track. It's called– wait. Can I say the name?" Kian whispered in her ear for approval. "Okay, I can't say the name, but my second favorite song is Heartless. I deeply resonate with that song."
Soon after Kian finished talking, everyone in the room turned towards Nathan. He smirked and snorted as Madison wiggled her eyebrows.
"Although all of her music is trash," he started and cackled when Madison took a deep breath. "Dear in Society isn't horrible."
"Yes!" She exclaimed and sprinted over to hug Nathan from behind. "Thank you, Nathaniel."
"Oh my god, his full name is Nathaniel?" A fan whispered.
Nathan kissed his teeth and slapped his knee in frustration. "This is why you annoy me, Madison. Now everyone knows my name is Nathaniel."
"It's not a bad name," Madison replied.
"This is the last question. Make it a good one." Zaire pointed to a guy in the front.
"Will you ever go to South America and Europe?"
"Absolutely. We have family members in Europe, and I've always wanted to go to South America." Kian said. "We want to thank you guys for coming. I hope you enjoyed yourselves. Have a good night, and get home safe. Love you!"
Kian stayed behind to say goodbye to Madison while Javier, Nathan, Zaire, and Jordan spent the rest of the evening exploring Montreal.
In silence, the couple moved down the arena's hallway. They strode very slowly, holding each other's hands to preserve every fleeting second before Madison had to leave again.
Kian looked down at her and squeezed her hand. "How are you feeling?"
Madison took a deep breath, her shoulders lifting in a slow exhale. "These past forty-eight hours have been incredible. I met your family and went to your show; we talked things out..."
Kian waited five seconds and pursed his lips when he saw her bite her lip. "I'm guessing there's supposed to be a 'but' after that sentence."
"I don't want us to go back into the same routine where I get mad, and then you get mad, and then we're both mad at each other." She admitted. "We understand what we want from each other, but something just isn't clicking."
"I don't understand what you're saying, bear-bear," Kian said.
"What I'm trying to say is that this shouldn't be that difficult." She sighed. "We shouldn't be arguing. Why the fuck are we acting so surprised when we both knew going into this that it wouldn't be easy?"
"How hard is it for us to just communicate with each other?" she said, heaving a dry laugh. "Like damn, before the tour started, we would stay up all night talking about the most random shit."
"This is different." He said. "We're talking about different things. We're talking about our feelings and voicing our frustrations, not some stupid Rick and Morty episode."
"Rick and Morty aren't stupid." She deadpanned. "I know it's a different topic, but fuck! I really want this to work because I don't think I can handle another heartbreak. And you're a nice guy,"
Kian stopped walking abruptly, his heart sinking as he noticed the slight tremor in her voice.
"You are such a good person with a pure heart. If I lose you, it will crush me." She hiccuped. "I've been with some of the most horrible guys ever, and being with you feels like the biggest breath of fresh air because you're amazing and so good to me."
SKian gave her a sympathetic smile, pulling her into a hug. "I don't want to hurt you. And if for some unfortunate reason I do, it was never my intention."
"We've only been together for one month, and I can't be apart from you for over a week. That's not good," she whispered against his chest.
"Am I that irresistible?" he joked.
Frustration knitted Madison's eyebrows together as she massaged her temples. "Kian, please. I'm trying to be serious here. Can you stop fucking around for two minutes ?"
"I'm sorry." He quietly responded.
Madison grabbed his hands and sniffled. "I'm going to take a few days to recollect myself and think some things through. Don't be alarmed if I don't pick up your calls." She said as her Uber drove up outside of the arena.
Kian rubbed her back and kissed her forehead. "I understand." He whispered. "Don't hesitate to call me, okay?" Madison nodded, and he brought her in for a sensual kiss. "Go before I cry."
"I'll call you when my flight lands." She grabbed her backpack from his hand and waved before she climbed into the Uber and shut the door.
Kian kept his eyes on the car for as long as he could until it was no longer in his line of vision. Finally, he threw his head back and squeezed his eyes shut.
On the walk back to the tour bus, Kian's steps grew heavy, and he lowered his head, avoiding the curious gazes of passersby. The bitter Canadian wind whipped against his face, and he huddled deeper into his coat.
He finally looked up when he heard a scream from behind him. A horde of fans stood behind the security-guarded barricade.
"Hey guys," He said. "The show ended two hours ago. You guys have been standing here for two hours?"
The crowd confirmed his claim, and he snickered. "That's some real dedication." He said. "I'm sorry the more interesting band members aren't here."
"Are you crazy? You're wonderful!" A girl shouted from the crowd.
Kian shyly smiled. "Thank you,"
He then took pictures and spent the next half an hour laughing and chatting with them
"Are you okay?" One of the fans asked, noticing a hint of weariness in Kian's eyes.
"Uh, I just had a long conversation with Madison, so I'm a little under the weather right now."
"Is she okay?" The fan asked again.
"Yeah, she's fine. We're fine. The distance is just hard for the both of us." He slowly nodded. "Just the thought of you guys waiting for me here and talking to me right now makes me happy, so thank you."
"You know what, since y'all stayed for two goddamn hours, I'll play an unreleased song," he said, covering his ears when a long screech of screams resounded.
"Okay, before I play it, I want all of you to know I'm not supposed to do this. Therefore, I would be very upset if someone secretly recorded, but I trust you guys. And I hope you won't betray my trust."
Kian pulled out his phone and went to the Dropbox app with most of the unreleased music. "This one is called good news. The parts that I'm going to show you are the pre-chorus and chorus."
"Or maybe I'll lay down for a little, yeah. 'Stead of always trying to figure everything out. And all I ever do is say sorry. Half the time, I don't even know what I'm sayin' it about."
"Good news, good news, good news, that's all they wanna hear. No, they don't like it when I'm down. But when I'm flying, oh, it makes em' so uncomfortable. So different, what's the difference?"
Kian stopped the track and looked up at the fans. "Is it good?"
"I love it." A guy said, and the rest of the fans agreed after.
"Thank you." He smiled. "We might perform it at one of our shows." He teased and laughed when they started to scream again. "It's getting late, so I'm gonna head inside. Thank you again for coming out and waiting here- wait, let's take a group selfie."
Kian handed his phone to one of the security guards and hopped up onto the barricade. "Everybody say cowabunga!"
"Cowabunga!"
He looked at the photo and smiled while he waved to the fans. "Goodnight, guys. Please get home safe and make sure your parents know where you are. I love you," he said before he entered the bus.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
"Look at Javier in the back struggling." Zaire cackled as he pedaled harder on the Citi bike. "All that work in the gym, and look at him, struggling like a broke man."
"Cállate la boca," Javier responded.
Nathan took one of his hands off the handlebars and reached into his pants pocket to pick up his ringing phone. "Hello?"
"Where the fuck are you guys?" Beth asked.
"We are two blocks away from the bus."
Beth pinched the bridge of her nose and breathed out heavily. "Do you know what time it is?"
"Well, I haven't checked. Texting and biking is hazardous."
"It's eleven o'clock!" She yelled, causing Nathan to pull the phone back from his ear. "The four of you come back to the bus right now." She said before she abruptly hung up the phone.
"Beth is being an angry bitch, so we have to go back to the bus," Nathan said.
"Damn it, this was so fun," Zaire said. "I'm getting food before we go back. I'm hungry as hell." He said as he pulled up into an empty McDonald's.
"Moses! Come on!" A girly voice shouted from the outside of the bathroom.
"Avani, shut up!" The guy yelled.
Those names sound familiar to the siblings of my ex.
Nathan finished doing his business and walked out to watch his hands. He looked over, and for a brief moment, he saw a smirk on the guy's face.
"If it isn't Nathan Macari," Moses looked over. "What's good, bro?"
"What's up man," Nathan dapped him up.
"I heard you're a celebrity now," Moses said. "You finally got that record deal?"
"Yep, Atlantic Records. I'm getting money now." He cheesed.
"Alright, I see you, money man." Moses gave him an impressive nod. "You moved to Montreal, or you're still in Toronto?"
"I'm out in Hollywood, bro," he said, watching Moses's jaw drop. "Remember when y'all used to say 'he's acting Hollywood' because I stopped eating those $1 honey buns? We're in the hills now."
"Moses!" Avani shouted again. "How long does it take to use the—Nathan?"
"Hey, Avani," he said as she hugged him. "What y'all doing up here?"
"Our aunt's having a wedding," Avani explained. "What are you doing up here?"
"I had a show at the Bell Centre. What I need to be asking is, why didn't you come to the show?"
"Boy, you must be out of your mind if you think I'll travel from Toronto to Montreal for some concert," she teased. "I saw you at the VMA's, though. Was that a Gucci suit?"
"Avani, you already know what it is." He smirked. "I'm always decked out in designer."
"Yo, let's go, Nathan!" Zaire yelled, he rounded the corner and stepped back in shock. "Are those my favorite twins?" he said as he hugged them. "I would love to catch up, but Beth just called me another five times. We have to leave."
Nathan quickly exchanged numbers with them and ran out of the McDonald's. On his way out, he began laughing at Zaire and Beth's arguing. Mid-jog, he glanced at the single car parked in the parking lot.
Zaire noticed that Nathan suddenly stopped jogging and ran out after him. "What's wrong?" He asked and then progressively slowed down once he saw what was wrong. "Jesus Christ."
Never did I ever think that I'd see her again with her matte black Jeep and clean Jordans that looked fresh out of the box.
Never did I ever think that I'd ever see the high and mighty, Kelis fucking Carter.
-
Nathan Bates as Moses Carter:
Jaylen Barron as Avani Carter: