Page 55 of Too Little Too Soon
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A weekand three more shows under their belts, and the band was finally, officially on break. They had two weeks before they had to be in Jacksonville, Florida, to kick off the next leg of the tour. Travis was looking forward to hanging out in the far warmer southern US for a while.
The best part of the whole thing—besides how much the band’s popularity had grown—was that Mitch reported that the stalker had wished Travis and Ava well on her Twitter account. The last time she’d stalked Travis, she’d simply gone radio silent, but that had been forced by the label and, likely, her parents, since she’d been under eighteen at the time.
Mitch said he was cautiously optimistic that she would leave Travis alone, although, he added, he felt strongly that Travis should carry on with his fake relationship, if his friend was willing, for at least another month or so.
Preferably through the end of the tour.
Early May. Three months away.
If she wanted a break for the summer, Mitch thought it wouldn’t be a big deal if she wasn’t around much while Demigoddess Revival played the festival circuit. That was always a hectic time, he claimed, which Travis knew from experience.
Honestly, carrying on this ruse wouldn’t be a hardship. Not if the last week was any indication.
He and Ava, they simply fit together. Like peanut butter and jelly. Yin and yang. Rum and Coke.
He could go on.
She was classy and smart and sexy, and once she got over the shock, she’d taken to the PDA like a champ. Like she liked it as much as he did.
That part didn’t help his guilt any. Shedidlike him, as it turned out. A lot. She was into this relationship—which she believed was real—as much as he might have once fantasized she’d be if it were real.
Not a day went by that he didn’t contemplate telling her the truth. Sometimes, he imagined she’d laugh about it and nothing would change except it really would be real.
Sometimes, he imagined she’d be furious and would walk away and never speak to him again.
Those thoughts were the ones that kept him from confessing.
That and Mitch, who texted him daily, letting him know he was doing the right thing, keep it up, don’t fret; it was all worth it to get that stalker off his back.
Now, they were about to step away from touring for a couple of weeks. No public scrutiny, no need to beonfor the fans and the media—and the guilt was riding him hard.
It had been reasonably easy to convince himself to follow Mitch’s direction while on tour; honestly, it made sense, shitty as it was to keep Ava in the dark.
But now? Now that he was about to board a plane and go home to New York with her?
Yeah, he really should come clean.
“For the next break, we should take a vacation,” Ava said, seated next to him at the airport, waiting for their plane to announce boarding.
They were both dressed like civilians, as he liked to call it; she wore a jacket with a zigzag pattern over a white camisole and fitted black pants, while he wore a blue button-down shirt and brown slacks that hid all of his tattoos, and, of course, his fisherman’s cap. No one had approached them. He hadn’t noticed any attempts to covertly snap pics. Their disguises worked.
He said “they” because nowadays, courtesy of the record label playing up their public relationship, Ava was almost as famous as he was. Luckily, she found it more funny than frustrating.
“Maria and Oz are taking the kids to Disney World,” Ava continued, drawing his attention back to the here and now. “We could go with them. Have you ever been?”
“Yeah.” His parents had taken him and his brother when they’d been in elementary school. Travis had eaten way too much junk food and had puked on the table during dinner one night.
His dad had beaten the shit out of him, and he’d not been allowed to go back to the park for the rest of vacation. He and Mom had hung out in the hotel room while Dad and his perfect brother explored Disney.
“It hadn’t been a good experience,” he admitted.
“Oh.” Her face fell. “We can do something else.”
He patted her leg. “No, it’s cool. I’d rather go and make happy memories with you.”
She leaned over and kissed his cheek, her fingers teasing the hair at his nape. “I love making happy memories with you,” she murmured.
