by Nikki Wild
“So,” Aiden grinned, reaching for a bottle of water after we stopped our instruments. “What do you guys think of that?”
Nicole whispered in Patrick’s ear for a second. He nodded, scooting over a little so that she could push her thumb down on the intercom button and lower her face to the microphone.
“I think I can sell the shit out of that.”
Dylan
Nicole had secured us three full days of one-on-one studio time, but we managed to knock that album out in less than 48 hours.
It helped that we all knew what we were doing, and that we were only putting twelve songs on the disc.
“You know, I always wanted to do one of those bonus tracks,” Trevor mentioned aloud over a slice of victory pizza. “You know, one of those songs where the final track goes on in silence for maybe fifteen minutes and then, all of a sudden, BAM! Mystery song!”
“Why can’t you do that now?” Phoenix asked, tilting her head.
“Internet,” Carter chuckled, tugging free a fresh slice of greasy, cheesy goodness. “iTunes has the track times on each song, and with all the instant scrutiny on new releases, it’s not a surprise anymore.”
“Yeah,” Trevor looked downtrodden for a second. “It blows.”
“Hey, it’s not all bad,” I reminded him as I swallowed a bite guaranteed to burn the roof of my mouth. “We’ve got pizza!”
“Hell yeah! Pizza!” Trevor laughed, his spirits instantly lifted.
It was always funny how quickly that guy could turn around. He’d be down one second, but remind him that a new video game was coming out, or that Taco Tuesday was right around the corner…
This was the first time that the five of us had eaten alone in a while.
Usually, Nicole and Jeremy joined us, but they were tied up on the phone with the Snow Leopard people.
It was nice to be alone this time.
Speaking of alone…
I just couldn’t get it out of my head that I wanted to have Phoenix to myself for a while…
Of course, that broke the unspoken rules, but the thought spread in my head like a virus. For now, Aiden was walking the walk, but it wouldn’t be long before he fell back into his usual pattern. He’d burn her up, and this time, I’d be standing in the crossfire.
There was no way that I could watch that happen to the girl I wanted so desperately.
I was dwelling on these thoughts one day, sitting in a popup chair outside the tour bus during a standard fuel refill, when I suddenly had unexpected company.
“’Sup.”
I turned just in time to see Nicole Fisher pop out another folding seat and plunk herself down on my left. In an instant, she was seated beside me, her elbow against her thigh and her chin in her hand.
“Hey,” I nodded. “What’s up?”
“Asked you first,” she grinned.
My voice caught in my throat, and I found myself laughing lightly. Something in her gaze pried down my wall, and I realized that my mouth was running without me.
“Just working through some shit. Doesn’t really matter though.”
“Well, that sucks,” Nicole quickly nodded in sympathy. “Want to talk about it?”
I paused a moment.
“I guess.”
She widened her eyes, tilting her head in a classic expression, as if to say Weeeelll…
“You’d think that I’d be happier.”
“A national tour, an incredible bus, an album kicking ass, a hit song, and a willing piece of ass, huh?” Nicole sardonically grinned. “Nope, life really sucks, doesn’t it?”
“Didn’t take you for the mocking type.”
“What type did you take me for?”
I was caught off-guard. “I don’t know.”
“Such a boring answer,” she scoffed. Before I could interject, she switched topics. “So, what’s got you so butt-hurt, then?”
My gaze fell to the floor.
When I didn’t answer, she rolled her eyes and made an educated guess. “Aiden, right?”
I swallowed, angry that I was apparently so utterly fucking transparent that even she noticed it. “I guess so.”
“I can see why.”
“Yeah?” I turned to her.
“Of course,” she nodded wistfully. “Sexy or not, the guy can be a tremendous prick. I mean, I feel like my friend’s influence is dulling that down a little, but he’s still got a long way to go. She always did like the fixer-uppers.”
Nicole laughed, and I don’t know why, but I gave a little chuckle too.
“He’s like that,” I grumbled.
“Well he’s not the only fixer-upper around here… I think Fee is drawing you toward the center too, isn’t she? Ever since she showed up you’ve been trying to take more control around here. The whole band is talking about it.”
We sat in silence for a moment.
“Did you want something?” I asked her.
“Yeah,” Nicole grinned. “Some alone time with you. I’ve gotten to talk to the others individually, but we never have.”
“I guess not.”
She leaned back in her seat, gliding her fingers through her hair. I’d been physically close to her on the bus, but only in passing. I couldn’t help but notice the smell of her perfume as she sat next to me.
“Perfume, huh?” I noted. “That for me?”
She flicked her face my way. “Uh huh.”
I shook my head in wonderment. Nicole had my level of effortlessness to flirting, even though I knew she didn’t mean anything by it. After all, I was fucking her best friend, and she knew it.
Maybe I could open up to her, though.
I felt like her heart was in the right place.
“If you want to know the real problem,” I told her carefully, “Aiden casts a large and heavy shadow.” I grunted with irritation. “It’s been hard for me to figure how to get out from under that.”
“Right,” she nodded. “I’ve been trying to nail the exact dynamic between you two.”
“It means more to him to swing the bigger bat,” I explained. “Personally, a lot of the shit that he gets his head twisted up over, I don’t really care about. Or at least, I didn’t.”
“Oh? So what changed?”
“I was starting to get tired of his shit before Phoenix even showed up,” I told her. “But having this girl in the mix amplified how unhappy I am with the way things are.”
“You want your proper share of the attention?” She asked, her sparkling eyes locking onto mine.
“I want respect,” I clarified.
“You feel that he doesn’t respect you.”
“I know that he doesn’t.”
“And what would it take for him to do that?” She prodded, leaning a little closer to me. “What would change that for you?”
“He could give up Phoenix.”
Her eyebrow lifted. “Oh yeah?”
“She’s not some fucking game to me,” I growled. “I’m not going to just roll over and let him take her away. Besides, he’s just going to burn her up like all the others.”
“And what if she’s not like the others?” Nicole replied. “How long does it usually take Aiden to move on? A day? An hour? Fifteen minutes? Far as I can tell, this little game is running into overtime. I think you’ve gone a bit further than hormones and chemicals and a little fun with no strings attached… I just don’t want to see anybody hurt.”
I thought about that as I felt her hand rub my shoulder blade. It didn’t escape me how that little gesture made me very suddenly aware of my own breathing.
“I know that you love your brother, and I’m sure that he loves you too. I also know that you two share everything,” Nicole smiled, her head tilting a little. “But does that really have to extend to your sex lives, too?”
“What are you getting at?” I narrowed my eyes at her as she pulled her hand free.
“I’m just saying, this whole second-best complex of yours… you’re better than that,” Nicole repli
ed. “You don’t have to beat Aiden to be his equal. You just need to step up!”
Her quirky eyebrow rose at me. “Besides Dylan. There’s gotta be someone out there for you. Somebody who you want… right?”
I swallowed.
“Phoenix wants the two of us, together.”
“Yeah, I would too,” she laughed airily, her bangs bouncing as she shook her head. “The whole threesome thing is a pretty sweet deal. Drop me at the next crossroads and I’d sell my soul for that!” She chuckled again, yet her voice slowly grew more serious. “But I mean, we both know that’s not gonna last forever. You can take it as long as you can, but just be prepared for the fallout. I don’t want to see any of you guys hurt. Especially not you.”
I turned to our promo chick, gazing into those harmless, precocious eyes of hers. She innocently sucked the side of her bottom lip in as she searched my gaze.
Maybe it was because we’d never had any one-on-one time together, but I felt like I was seeing her for the first time. Nicole had a naturally mischievous slant in her eyes, and they had these pretty little yellow rings in them.
Had she always had freckles?
I brushed my thoughts aside. There was no way that I was going to let myself get distracted when I finally had Phoenix’s hot, willing body just ripe for the taking.
The promo girl smirked, as if she were reading my thoughts and scoffing at me.
“You’ll be fine, Dylan,” Nicole told me, springing up to a stand and affectionately tussling my hair. “You’ve got a real loving streak in there. I just know how bad it hurts when a heart that big gets broken.”
That look in her eyes…
I couldn’t tell if she was enticing me or mocking me. Hell, she might have not even meant anything more than sincere concern.
The ambiguity was annoying.
Nicole started wandering back to the bus, but turned to grin slyly over her shoulder at me. “Oh, remember that willing piece of ass I mentioned a second ago?”
“Yeah?”
She bent forward slightly, biting her lip, lifting her miniskirt a few inches, and giving me a sexy little wiggle of her butt. “I wasn’t talking about Phoenix...”
Then she was out of sight.
I waited a few moments to climb back onto the bus. It was just long enough for me to mentally push my surprise erection into dying back down.
Phoenix
The three of us, enjoying one of our nights off from touring, were comfortably curled up in bed naked, watching a movie together when…
“There’s something I have to ask,” I glanced down at my hands as I wrung them together. “And I don’t want you to be mad.”
Dylan planted a finger under my chin. “It’s okay. What do you want to know?”
Hesitation caught my voice in my throat. “You’re going to be angry if I do.”
“Can’t think of much that would piss me off,” Aiden spoke, his voice like dark smoke. “Say your piece.”
I took a deep breath.
“Okay. But before I do… do you want to know about my old name?”
The twins shared a glance.
“Your name isn’t Phoenix Flynn?”
“It is now,” I quickly clarified. “I had my first name legally changed on my eighteenth birthday, although I hadn’t gone by my old name since I was maybe eleven years old. But no, I wasn’t born Phoenix Flynn.”
“Alright then,” Dylan smiled.
This was a huge step for me. Nicole was pretty much the only person in my life who knew the name I’d been born with, and that was only after years of close friendship.
But I felt that what I wanted to know deserved a trade.
I exhaled slowly.
“Phoebe. I was born Phoebe Flynn.”
“Phoebe?” Aiden tilted his head.
Dylan shook his. “That’s… actually pretty clever. Only swapped out a few letters at the end there, right?”
“Yeah,” I nodded.
“Why Phoenix, then?” Aiden asked.
“It was a reinvention thing,” I told them. “When my parents died and I went into foster care, I didn’t want to be weak. My life was gone, destroyed… burned down to the ground. So I chose a name that meant I would rise back up. I became that.”
The twins were taken aback.
“So what did you change?”
Deep in thought, I stroked the side of his face. “Everything. I changed everything.”
“What were you before? Aiden asked.
I had to think back on that for a moment. “Quiet. Weak. A pushover. A crybaby. I wasn’t equipped to handle the world.”
“You were also eleven,” Dylan noted.
“And an orphan,” I countered. “I got bounced around the system a little. It was all tough on me. But by the time I wound up with a halfway decent pair of parents to take me in, I had risen back up from the ashes of my life into something new.”
Dylan asked: “How did you do it?”
“Books, mostly. I was always a pretty avid reader, you know. I dove into stories and picked apart the bits of the female protagonists I liked best. I made a conscious mental effort to embody these things.”
“At that age?”
“I read above my grade level,” I mentioned. “Had a book in my hand as long as I can remember. Anyway, I didn’t want to be that lonely and weak little girl any more…”
“You’re strong,” Dylan told me, his thumb tracing my lips.
“And intelligent,” Aiden added, kissing the top of my head again.
“And I have a long way to go,” I told them. “This whole band situation is giving me a new reason to reinvent myself. To move past what I was before.”
“Where do you want to go now?” Dylan whispered supportively.
“I was kind of thinking rock goddess.”
We shared an affectionate laugh, the three of us curled up together in the bed. It was great to laugh with them, and better to tug down one of my heavier walls… to show them what was behind it.
“You wanted to ask us something?” Dylan reminded me, the backs of his strong knuckles sliding along my cheek.
“Yeah…” I hesitated.
“Go on,” Aiden replied, planting a warm kiss on top of my head. “Ask us anything.”
I swallowed.
“Were there always just two of you?”
The energy in the room changed in a heartbeat. Like a fire being extinguished, I suddenly felt cold and alone.
“What makes you think that?” Dylan asked calmly.
Aiden was more direct.
“Carter. That asshole…”
“Don’t be mad!” I blurted out, grabbing both of them with a hand apiece. “It’s not like that, he didn’t mean to say anything. It just kind of came out.”
“When?” Aiden snarled.
“After he caught us all together, and I bolted from the room,” I confessed. “He was trying to give me advice on how to handle things, and it just kind of… slipped out…”
The brothers shared an angry glance.
Aiden was the more furious of the two, while Dylan merely looked despondent.
“I’m going to kill him.”
“We got lucky replacing one bandmate,” Dylan chuckled mirthlessly. “Let’s not make it a habit.”
Aiden growled. “It’s not his place…”
“Forget I said anything,” I groaned. “I’m really sorry. I couldn’t hold it any longer. It was stupid of me… I should have followed his advice and waited for you two to say something.”
Several long, aching moments passed.
As I noticed Dylan watching his brother calmly, waiting for a lead to follow, Aiden finally broke the silence.
“What exactly did he say?”
“All that he said was that, once upon a time, there were three of you. I promise that’s all he told me. And even then, he felt like he’d accidentally betrayed you both.”
The brothers thought for a moment.
Aiden spoke up. “We were
not born the Carpenter twins.” I had never heard his voice so melancholic. “We were triplets, once upon a time.”
Dylan chimed in sadly.
“Aiden, Dylan, and Camden.”
I swallowed. “Camden?”
“Our mother was into symbolism,” Aiden responded with a light scoff. “She named me after the fire of the sun. Thought of me as her little fireball…”
“Makes sense,” I smiled softly. “You have a burning passion inside, something that radiates a warmth you try to hide.”
Before Aiden could respond, Dylan picked up the topic. “I was named for the cresting waves of the sea. Mom said that when she looked in my infant eyes, she saw a deep compassion and love…”
“Also accurate,” I trailed my fingertips along his cheek. “You’re adoring and caring in ways Aiden isn’t.”
“Which leaves Camden,” Dylan revealed. “Named for the rolling wind across a valley.”
“What was the reason?” I asked.
Aiden took the lead. “Because she looked in his eyes and saw that he was a free spirit. A dreamer. A wistful force of nature that could never be bound or tied down.”
“Was that what he was?”
“Oh, absolutely,” Dylan nodded. “That was Camden alright… always dreaming, never wanting to stay in one place for long…”
It was time I asked the big question.
“What happened to him?”
Aiden and Dylan shared another one of their trademark glances, but they were saddened now.
“He was doing what he loved most,” Aiden answered. “Bastard was always into the extreme stuff. Skydiving, white river rafting, always climbing where he wasn’t supposed to be…”
“Higher and higher,” Dylan reminisced. “Like he wanted to be separated from the Earth. He hated the ground so much he should have been a damn astronaut.”
“The accident was quick.” Aiden’s words were smoky ash in the air, devoid of warmth. “Rock-climbing. He had all kinds of certifications. Got into it professionally…”
“Oh no,” I gasped.
“Equipment malfunction, something with the rigging. He lost his footing, the straps didn’t catch, and he fell away from the cliff instead of down. There was nothing anybody could have done.”
I closed my eyes.
