Page 57 of Higher Notes

“Hello, everyone. I’m your bus driver, Andy. If you are set we’ll hit the road.” Andy honked the horn a couple of times for the kids. Nicole and Nolan giggled. Gabe did his best not to smile but when he spotted the gaming systems he was in heaven.

“Holy crap!”

“Watch your mouth, Gabe.” Nicole corrected before Mom could.

“Little Missy, I am the mother here.”

“Sorry, Mom.” Though Nicole was anything but sorry.

“You have every gaming system, and all the new games loaded. Can I go on the road with you?” Gabe’s wide-eyed expression nearly had me saying yes but he still had two months of school left.

“Maybe next time you can travel with us or later this summer. We’ll see how it goes after school’s out. Deal?”

“Deal.”

Probably not a bad idea to get Gabe out of the house for a couple of weeks. I’d definitely keep that in mind.

Venue security met us at the gate and directed the bus around to the back lot. The Embrace buses were already there. Sikes and Snipe exited the bus first then waved the rest of us out. Thankfully, given the growing crowd outside the gates, the twins held onto Mom’s hands instead of expecting Sikes and Snipe tohold them. We had a talk with them about work and what Sikes and Snipe’s jobs were, explaining it as best we could to six-year-olds but so far, so good.

“My brothers!” Rhone said as he, David, Seltzer, and Chase approached us.

“I’d like you to meet my family. This is my mother, Dana, my brothers, Gabriel and Nolan, and the princess of the family, Nicole.” The guys said hi to each of them then headed for their dressing room. “Come, on, I’ll show you what a dressing room looks like.”

Sikes and Snipe led us to ours. As soon as we opened the door, the voices of my band brothers poured out.

“Yo, Jase!” Marley hollered. “Who do we have here?”

“My mom, Dana, my brothers, Gabe and Nolan, and my sister, Nicole.” It just hit me. All these years playing with these guys and never once had they met or likely even known about my family. Unintentionally, I’d never opened my private life to them much as I’d recently accused Marley of. Fuck, I was such a dick.

Diamond barreled into the room. “You guys ready to rock?” Then he spotted my family. “Oh, hey, hi. I’m Diamond.”

“You’re big, but not as big as Wyatt.” How did you react when a six-year-old obsessed with one of your boyfriends did this shit?

“Um, who’s Wyatt?” Sikes shook his head and gave a two-finger salute. “Oh, gotcha. Yeah, he’s a big one.”

“Sorry, D. She’s a bit…obsessed?”

“Mr. Sniper is super smart.” And now it was Nolan’s turn. Those two were forever trying to one-up each other and had claimed both my partners.

“I bet he is.” Diamond knelt in front of them. “What are your names?”

“I’m Nicole. Jason is our brother and so is Gabe.” She pointed to Gabe who desperately tried to fade into the background. Didn’t blame him one bit.

“And I’m Nolan. We’re six.” Nolan was still in the holding up six fingers phase.

“It’s nice to meet you both.” Diamond shook their hands. “Are you ready to hear your brother sing?”

“Yes. He sings to us when we have trouble sleeping. Mom says he has the voice of an angel.” Sweet, sweet, no holds barred Nicole. That child was something else.

When all heads turned my way, I dialed it up and tucked my hands under my chin, batting my lashes like the angel I was.

“And on that note,” Diamond hopped up. “You’re on in twenty. Nice meeting you all,” he waved as he left the room.

“It smells like dirty feet in here.”

The real Nicole had arrived. She’d been quiet about it for far longer than I’d expected. When the scent hit me I knew she’d call it out.

“All right, my brothers,” I addressed my band mates. “We’ve got a big tour ahead of us. Are we ready to roll?” My band brothers cheered. Sikes and Snipe stood off to the side with the twins while we ran through the lineup we’d worked out earlier this week. No sooner had we finished that than the butterfly-inducing knock came.

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