Chapter 21
(Kit)
“Wait, wait, wait, let me see that again?” I said, a shove from behind, as I leaned over the arm of the chair to get a better look at Steel’s phone, sending me sprawling across his lap.
“If you’d given me a moment, I’d have brought it back up,” Steel said, fingers carding through my hair as I sat up.
I hadn’t expected him to be so tactile, but the longer I spent in his company, the more I noticed his tendency to touch my shoulder or stroke his hand down my back.
He was the same way with Rebel. Sometimes, he’d brush Rebel’s hair to the side so he could squeeze the back of his neck when Rebel got impatient, but tonight was the first time he’d played with mine.
I liked it and lingered there, now that he had found the meme. If you don’t like my attitude, wait a few minutes; you won’t like that one either.
“We need that on a t-shirt,” I told Rebel.
“You’re damn right we do,” Rebel said, leaving me to flail and dangle while he went in search of his phone.
“A little help,” I yelped when all Steel did was chuckle when I couldn’t right myself.
“You’re fine right there,” Steel declared, one hand resting on the back of my knee while Rebel giggled.
Of course he found my predicament amusing. He was the one who’d put me here.
There were better places Steel’s hands could be, especially with me in this position. Maybe he just needed a little incentive to adjust his hold. I wiggled, and his hand shifted from my knee to my ass and pressed me flat so my head was resting on his chest.
Much better.
Dammit!
His hand slid to the small of my back, the other one playing with my hair again now that he’d laid his phone back on the arm of the chair.
“Oh shit, they make them,” Rebel declared. “I’m ordering ones for everyone in the band.”
“Better order a few extra,” I warned. “In case you forget what you have on and pitch it into the crowd.”
“Fuck! Good point,” he remarked.
He was infamous for tossing t-shirts or taking them off backstage if they made it through a show, signing them, and giving them away to fans.
Most of them were old metal shirts and skater tees pillaged from thrift and consignment shops.
He had dozens of them packed in a trunk in the equipment trailer and still insisted on getting new ones whenever he had the opportunity.
“It doesn’t take much to make you happy,” I teased.
“Nope.”
“Doesn’t take much to amuse me either,” he said, pointing his camera my way.
I tried to flip him off and ended up yelping and flopping around like a fish when Steel pinched my ass.
“How did this become a tag team match?" I complained, reaching to rub the sting away when Steel brushed my fingers aside and did it for me.
The cutoff sweatpants I had on were so worn I’d put on underwear beneath them. Now I wished I hadn’t as he softly caressed my rear while we watched Black Panther.
“You’ve got your matches wrong,” Rebel corrected, “This would be a triple threat match, where it’s every man for himself, except when two of them are double-teaming another.”
“Fine, then I’m calling a foul on the play,” I grumbled.
“Can’t switch sports in the middle of the game,” Steel declared.
“He’s right,” Rebel said. “It even says so on the internet.”
“So it can’t possibly be wrong then, now can it?” I snarked, rolling my eyes, even while I settled in and got comfortable.
Steel’s fingers carding through my hair again helped, as did his rumbling voice when he addressed Rebel.
“Now what do you know about triple threat matches?” Steel asked.
“I know all the matches,” Rebel said, “especially the hardcore ones.”
“Really, how am I only finding out now that you’re a wrestling fan?” Steel asked.
“Because I’m picky and don’t like the current programming,” Rebel replied.
“Gotcha.”
“I admit to knowing absolutely nothing about it unless you count binging episodes of Celebrity Death Match,” I admitted.
“The Claymation thing?” Steel asked. “I remember seeing something about that.”
“It’s fucking hilarious,” Rebel said. “I’m sure we can find episodes on a streaming service if you wanna check it out.”
“Yeah, we’ll have to do that one night,” Steel said as Rebel sprawled on the couch, phone in hand, still scrolling through t-shirts.
“One question,” I said as I watched him add more to his cart. “How are you going to get them?”
“That’s easy,” he replied. “Everything I order while I’m on the road just gets sent home for me to sort through the next time I’m back there. The best part is that half the time I’ve forgotten what I ordered by the time I open it, so it’s like unwrapping gifts on Christmas morning.”
It was easy to picture him having the time of his life opening a bunch of packages, paper bits flying everywhere.
I thought about what it would be like to be there for that and even capture a few photos of him in the act.
I'd already been considering his offer to join him at his place during our break before Rocktoberfest. Seeing Rebel in his natural habitat, with no schedules or cameras in his face, was a chance I couldn’t pass up.
“I can see where that would be fun,” I said.
“I live like a beach bum when we’re not on tour,” Rebel murmured. “Up with the gulls, sipping coffee on the deck, not a care in the world. Sometimes I spend the whole morning out there, just staring at the water.”
“You didn’t say you lived on the beach,” I said, trying to sit up so I could shake him for leaving that part out.
He hummed and paused his scrolling. “I could have sworn I did.”
“No, you left that part out.”
“Oops. Maybe I told Steel.”
“You said Newport Beach,” Steel said. “You never said on the beach.”
“Well, it’s not technically on the beach; there’s a slight drop-off at the edge of the yard and some rocks, then you’re on the beach.”
“So, it’s on the beach,” I said, shaking my head at him, since Steel’s hand on my ass, again, meant I wasn’t moving out of his grasp.
“Pretty much.”
“Looks like we’ll be vacationing together,” Steel said. “I’ve decided to take him up on his offer too and see if I can help with the Impala.”
“That doesn’t sound like a spectator sport to me, so I’ll find some other way of amusing myself,” I declared.
“There’s plenty,” Rebel said. “The den has theater seats and a flatscreen, several different game systems, and a fridge stocked with drinks and snacks. There’s a whole wall of games in there too, and I don’t just mean video games. And then there’s the pool table.”
“I’ve been dying for a game,” Steel admitted.
“I don’t doubt it, not if Jagger and the boys still play anytime they can,” Rebel said.
“It doesn’t help,” Steel said.
I’d never thought about it that way before and wondered if Rebel had either. I was glad Steel was coming to Rebel’s too. It would have felt odd to not have him with us.
“We can play all you want,” Rebel said. “I’m always up for a game. Sometimes, I’ll play just because I need to have something in my hands while I think.”
“Shocked you don’t pick up your guitar,” I said.
“Sometimes it’s distracting,” Rebel admitted. “You’re lucky to have those drumsticks; you can take ‘em out and spin them whenever you want.”
“Only if I want to be stared at as I walk down the street.”
“Happened a time or two, hasn’t it?” Steel said.
“More than that, but yeah, I get what you’re saying. You’d wind up playing if you picked up your guitar, which wouldn’t get the issue sorted out.”
“Exactly.”
“I’ll start spinning my sticks when I’m trying to remember something,” I said. “I don’t know why, but it helps.”
“Johnny and I would shoot pool and quiz each other on whatever test we had coming up,” Rebel said. “Even when we weren’t in the same class, the material was the same; everyone carried the same book covered in brown paper wrapping.”
“Mine was never brown by the end of the year,” I said. “I’d draw all over it with Sharpies when I got bored in class.”
Rebel chuckled, scrolling slower now. “Mine were covered in stickers from the skate shop. Johnny’s were too. My folks gave me two dollars a day for lunch. I’d spend half on ice cream bars and half on stickers and guitar picks.”
“Man, you only paid two dollars for lunch?” I said. "That's bullshit; it was three by the time I went.”
“Damn, make me feel old.”
“It was a buck when I was in high school,” Steel said. “So, I’ve got both you younglings beat.”
“He called us younglings,” Rebel snickered, losing control of his phone, which landed on his face. “Owe.”
“And that’s the universe telling you to respect your elders,” Steel declared.
“Why’s the universe gotta be on your side?”
“Because I have wisdom in my favor,” Steel said, rocking me with every chuckle he let out. “And you should put that thing away before you hurt yourself.”
“Was just about to check out,” Rebel said as he rubbed his forehead.
“Sounds like code for fifteen more minutes of shopping to me,” I said. “What do you think, Steel? Do you think he’s really checking out, or is he planning on adding a few more things to his basket first?”
“Definitely adding more,” Steel said.
Rebel grumbled, but seconds later, a whispered ohhh clued us in to the fact that he was still shopping. “I just got a badass bunny dressed like a steampunk mad hatter and the matching t-shirt.”
“Fifteen more minutes for the win!” I declared.
Rebel flipped me off and went right back to what he was doing, while I stared at the show on the screen, shocked when he announced he was finished less than two minutes later, before blowing a raspberry at me.
“That’s what I think about your fifteen minutes,” he said and laid the phone on the coffee table.
“Admit it, you’d have used the full fifteen minutes if I hadn’t given you shit about it,” I said.
Another middle finger in my direction and silence from Rebel, which was as telling as if he’d just owned up to it.
“He’d probably have gone twenty-five and dropped the phone on his face again,” Steel said, needling him enough to get flipped off too.
He was getting tired, though. His eyes started drooping and might have closed altogether if his phone didn’t blip.
Grumbling, he picked it up, grimaced, then took a picture of his middle fingers. I guess everyone was getting flipped off tonight.
Bloop.
Bloop.
"Fuckkk," Rebel groaned, phone halfway back to the coffee table. “Come on.”
“Who is it?” I asked.
“The first one, Knightly, which is what the middle finger was for,” he said. “Those last two times were Dash; he’s got something that he wants us to listen to.”
Now it was my turn to groan, because I’d grown quite comfortable on Steel’s lap and was no longer in a hurry to move.
“Tell him to come here; I’m not getting up,” I declared.
“He recorded it.”
“Even better,” I said and waited for Rebel to hit play.
Basslines filled the room, but my mind kept drifting away from the music instead of dialing in and being inspired.
“What were we supposed to be looking for?” I asked when it finished playing.
Silence.
I glanced from the phone to his face to see him blinking at it sleepy-eyed.
“Fucked if I know,” he said at last. “Want me to play it again?”
“No,” Steel said, pressing on my shoulder until I sat up. “I want you to tell him you’re going to bed and will listen to it in the morning.”
Damn, okay, those were serious Daddy vibes he was giving off. He sure sounded serious too.
“Good plan,” Rebel muttered, poking clumsily at the keypad on the phone before sending the message and turning it off.
We crawled into our own beds, though there was no saying which bed we’d crawl into after an early morning trip to the bathroom.
Neither of us was ready to ask Draven to book our room with a single king-sized bed yet, but we’d tossed around the idea a time or two.
Steel stroked my hair back from my cheek and smoothed out the haphazard mess of blankets I’d yanked across me.
He did the same with Rebel, turned out the light, and reminded us that he wouldn’t be free until after tomorrow’s show.
Sad.
“He’s good for us,” I murmured as I snuggled into my pillow.
“You’d be good with us being, well, us, as in the three of us, right?” Rebel asked. "Because I can see myself falling in love with you both.”
“Ditto. I’m more than good with it. I just hope he is, too.”
“Same,” Rebel muttered, sighing contently.
Soft snores followed as I slowly drifted off, wondering what it would be like to be sandwiched between him and Steel in a bed like this, while remaining hopeful that it would happen soon.