Catch My Breath (33 page)

And really? Did their publicity team think that was such a good alternative to people thinking Elliot was gay? Sure, he wouldn’t be convincing with a cover girlfriend like Chelsea. Elliot had never been able to act. But did he have to be sleeping with every chick in town? Jesus, even his mother…. Danny couldn’t imagine that had been their management’s idea. The press probably had just taken a theme and run with it. Elliot had actually cried that night and called his mom just to make sure she knew none of the stuff was true. Every day, the whole thing got less fun, and the money pouring into their bank accounts didn’t really do much to cover the big festering mess their lives had become. Danny couldn’t wait for the tour to start. Everything would be better then. It
had
to be.

“O
KAY
, Elliot, Danny. Intervention time.”

Webb came up behind Elliot and pushed him down onto the stools they had on stage for when they sang Chris’s ballad. They’d just finished their final rehearsal, then had four days off before they left. Elliot saw Tate pushing Danny onto a stool as well. Danny was across the stage, and still he wanted to be near him. No matter how weird and uncomfortable things had gotten between them recently, Elliot always wanted Danny by his side. Reece glared at him, then turned to glare at Danny.

“You promised,” he said. “Twice. Now, you haven’t said what’s going on between the two of you, but it’s fucking with our mojo, and I don’t like it. Webb doesn’t like it. Papa Tate doesn’t like it either. We’re fixing it now before all of us are on a bus together for three months where there might be sharp objects.”

Elliot felt like a jerk. He seemed to feel like a jerk a lot of the time lately. “We aren’t broken up if that’s what you’re asking. Things have just gotten hard the past couple of days with that article and all the Chelsea stuff.”

Reece rolled his eyes. “None of that shit matters. It’s not real.”

“We just don’t get to spend much time together,” Danny said. He stuck up for Elliot. Of course. Elliot wanted to reach out and grab his hand. Of course.

“Do you guys love each other?” Webb asked bluntly. “Do you want to be together?”

“Definitely,” Elliot answered. That would never require thinking.

“Yes. Always,” Danny answered at the same time. They exchanged shy smiles. Even with the way things had been the past week, it didn’t take much for them to smile at each other.

“Then knock it the freaking hell off,” Tate grumbled. Tate who was always so level-headed and rational. “If you guys love each other and want to be together, none of that surface fake crap means a damn thing. Just like Reece said. Be together. Be happy with each other. Ignore the rest. Do you know how many articles there’ve been this month about me cheating on Felicia? Last week I broke up with her for Christina Aguilera. I’ve never even
met
Christina Aguilera.”

Elliot couldn’t help it. He snorted. “See?” Webb smiled. “That’s what we’re looking for. Elliot who smiles and giggles like a little girl, and Danny who can’t keep his hands off of Elliot even when the rest of us are gagging ’cause you guys are like nauseatingly cute. Can we please have that back?” Webb rolled his eyes. “I never thought I’d be asking for cheeseola, but here I am doing it.”

“Sorry,” Elliot mumbled. “I know we promised not to ever make things weird with the band. Didn’t mean to let it happen.”

“It really was only these past two rehearsals,” Tate said gently. “And if it’s done, we’re cool.”

Elliot looked at Danny, who got up and walked over, pulled Elliot’s face to his belly, and sank his fingers into Elliot’s hair. “It’s done,” he said.

“Yeah. We’re good.” Elliot wrapped his arms around Danny’s waist and inhaled. He didn’t know what had made him act so weird the past few days, even after their apologies. He’d barely been home, spent a few nights on Chris’s sofa, and slept in the other room the night before. He hadn’t slept well without Danny’s smell and his even breathing. It was stupid. He’d just let things get to him when he shouldn’t have.

“I have an idea,” Tate said quietly.

Danny pulled back a little and turned to look at their bandmates. Elliot didn’t unwrap his arms though. It seemed like the second he was done being mad over nothing he turned back into a needy little octopus. Danny didn’t seem to mind. He just put his hand back in Elliot’s hair and smiled at Tate.

“We need to get the hell out of here,” Tate said. “Just for a few days. Somewhere that nobody can find us, no fans, no managers, nobody.”

“You’re not seriously thinking of disappearing and not telling anyone, are you? They’d kill us.”

Tate sighed. “I guess not. We can let Peter know where we’re going, and our family members, but nobody else. We’ll just go somewhere quiet and hang out. It’s been a long time since we got to do something like that.”

“It has,” Reece agreed. “We need it.”

The others nodded, Elliot included. It sounded like heaven, to be honest. Just a few days with the guys and no worries before they left for months of touring. They did need it.

“I’m in,” he said.

“Me too,” Danny added.

Webb nodded. “I’ll just tell my mom. She’d freak out if I took off completely.”

“Of course, man.” Tate clapped him on the shoulder and grinned. “I’ll find somewhere tonight and text you guys tomorrow. Start packing.”

Chapter 17

“T
HIS
place is dope, especially for last-minute planning,” Webb murmured as he looked around the lake cabin Tate had found for them out in the middle of nowhere. They were nearly an hour outside the closest town. There was nobody around. It was exactly what they all needed.

“I’m really glad we did this. Who exactly knows we’re here?” Danny asked. He hadn’t wanted to be the one to make phone calls. Nothing he said to Rebecca or any of their other team members would’ve been pleasant after the week he and Elliot’d just been through.

“Just Peter. And I’m assuming people told family?” The other guys nodded. Danny didn’t. It wasn’t that his parents were horrible, but they hadn’t exactly cared where he was when he still lived at home, and he hadn’t lived there other than for a few weeks since before the show. They were like mostly pleasant acquaintances at that point. Elliot’s mom knew where they were. That was enough family for Danny.

Danny rubbed the small of Elliot’s back. He realized he’d barely taken his hands off Elliot the whole drive up to the cabin, when they’d been in the backseat of Reece’s Land Rover. He hadn’t stopped touching him in the grocery store where they’d stopped or at the last coffee shop before they left civilization.

Danny supposed he should care about someone seeing them together or taking their picture, but he didn’t. Chelsea and he were over, at least as far as contracted time went. As far as the public knew, they’d break up sometime when Danny was on tour and The Pixies were getting ready for their own smaller version of the same—not enough time for a relationship, would be the official story. The unofficial story was Danny had never been so relieved in his life. It felt like he really had it back, the Danny and Elliot that existed at the
Band Camp
house, the ones who couldn’t stand to be in separate rooms for more than a few minutes. Danny wanted that to be the reality everyone knew. Maybe someday. For the time being, he had to be happy that at least there wasn’t anything in the way.

“It’s beautiful here,” Elliot murmured. He dragged the orange sweater he’d been wearing over his head. Morning had been cool, but the sun heated the lake and the cabin, and the day was balmy and gorgeous, clear, clean.

Everything felt cleaner.

“What are we going to do, lads? Four days on our own, no babysitters…. I can barely believe it.” Reece’s accompanying grin made Danny smile in anticipation. “And don’t think I forgot about youngling’s birthday tomorrow.”

Danny cuddled Elliot close. They’d been so busy all year, but each of their birthdays had been celebrated with as much misbehavior as they could get away with. Elliot was the last of them. They had to do it right.

“We don’t have to do much,” Elliot said with an embarrassed smile. “I’m just happy to be here with you guys.”

“Yes, we do.”

And they did. No club, no B-list celebrities, just the five of them, swimming, drinking, dancing like dorks in the cabin, falling in love with each other again as they hadn’t had the time to do for months. The nights were late, the mornings even later. It was perfect.

“C
AN
you believe it’s about to start?” Tate asked.

Sure, they’d been rehearsing and planning and learning stage positions and the dance steps they all sucked at, but there was something final about that night. The next day, they’d all pack up and head back to the city, play Anaheim, get on a tour bus, and head out to who knew what.

“Remember when we thought that the
Band Camp
house was everything starting?” Webb asked.

It was nearly a year ago by that point that they’d all unpacked their things at the
Band Camp
house. They’d been so naive. Elliot remembered how he’d felt that day, the first day they all met, the day he signed his contract. He remembered how it was to be that guy, that kid really, and it didn’t feel anything like that anymore. He wondered what he’d do differently if he had to do the past year over again. Would it have been easier if he and Danny had just stayed friends? Would that have even been possible? Danny’s hand was warm against his lower back. While he could still feel that kid inside of him, the person who he used to be, he couldn’t really remember what it felt like not to be with Danny—almost like his whole body had settled into
ElliotandDanny
and there was no more just plain Elliot anymore. As much as the rest of it got to him sometimes, that part he was content with. He didn’t need to be himself alone. Danny was part of him, and that was more than fine.

“Do you remember what it was like to go to the store? Just go to the store and buy food and go home?” Reece asked. “I kinda miss that.”

Tate nodded. “Yeah. I miss taking Felicia out and having my mom be the only one who knew about it.”

Elliot understood. “I miss people thinking I was just a kid from Palmdale. I don’t like that my name comes with quotations around it, you know? And most of the stuff that comes after those quotations? Pure crap.”

All the guys nodded. If nothing else, that they understood.

“But there’s good stuff too,” Danny said. He’d been quiet for a while, just petting Elliot’s back. Ever since rehearsal the other day, they’d barely stopped touching. “We’ve got each other. I don’t want my life back from before I knew you guys.”

“Me neither,” Reece said. Webb and Tate and Elliot nodded.

Reece finally chuckled. “Jesus, we’re like a bunch of fucking chicks.”

“
Reece
…,” Elliot warned.

“You have to admit that was sappy as hell.”

They all laughed, and punches and hugs were passed around the campfire. “I’m serious, though,” Danny said. “Love you guys like brothers.”

“Brothers?” Elliot snorted.

“Not you… at least not in California.” Danny grinned. Reece, sure that his heritage had somehow been slighted, reached across the fire and punched Danny in the arm.

Another chorus of “love yous” and hugs and fist bumps was apparently enough corny emotion for the guys, ’cause they started to laugh, and pretty soon it was back to sipping beer and telling creepy stories and talking about what they expected for the next few months.

Truth was, none of them knew what to expect, and that was just fine. New horizons were good, right? As long as they had each other. Elliot decided that was enough sappiness for him too. He leaned his head against Danny’s shoulder and listened to his bandmates’ banter. He didn’t need to talk. Everything important had already been said.

E
VEN
in a different bed hours away from their house, Elliot felt like he was at home in Danny’s arms. It really didn’t matter where they were, Danny had been home to him practically since the day they met. He almost said it out loud, but then figured at the last moment they’d probably had enough sappy stuff for one day. He lay with his head on Danny’s chest, Danny’s fingers brushing up and down his spine.

“Today was awesome, wasn’t it?” Danny finally said quietly. “I don’t want to leave and go back to reality.”

“I don’t either.” Although their reality was about to change, and Elliot had no idea what was in store for them.

“It’ll be fun singing together again, though. Rehearsals have been awesome.”

Elliot scooted up and kissed Danny. “They have.”

Danny looked at Elliot for a while, quiet. “We’re good, right?”

There were about five hundred answers to that. Yes, no, maybe, who the hell knows what any of us are anymore? Elliot went with the right one, the one he was feeling at that moment. “Of course, D. We’re fine.”

And for that moment, in that cabin by the pretty lake they were fine. And for at least the foreseeable future there wasn’t anything coming their way to harm that.