My Kind of Guy - Pt 3

Rating: PG-13 for some mature instances
Summary: The main character wins a contest, getting to be on the crew for the Kaiser's filming of their tour. It's the Employment tour, influmenced by the Enjoyment DVD.


I was sitting there, waiting to see what Simon had in store for me. My fate was basically in his hands.

“I want you to… give Ricky a lap dance. Now.” Everyone murmured and I turned bright red.

“This isn’t helping anyone to know anyone better!” Nick said. “This isn’t what I was planning on!”

“Like I said, you picked the one game that hooks up people more besides Twister. This was bound to happen.” I was trying to avoid the subject. I mean, it’s not that I wouldn’t have done it, just not in front of everyone.

“Come on, let’s have it,” Peanut said and folded his arms.

“I’m not doing it without music,” I said.

“Here, I have something,” Simon ran to the bunk beds.

“You don’t have to do this,” Ricky said stroking my hair.

“No, really, it’s ok. It’s all a joke anyway. I’m gonna totally BS them anyway, make them laugh,” I said smiling.

“Here, do it to this,” Simon said, returning with his iPod in its docking station. I got off Ricky’s lap and go into position. Simon hit play and the opening of “Every Day I Love You Less and Less” came out of the speakers. Everyone cracked up, including the bus driver. I just shook my head and got on with it.



*****



“I’ve never seen anyone dance that way to one of my songs,” Ricky said as he climbed into his bunk. We never finished our game, since one of the PTB called us and told us to go to bed, “we had a long day the next day”. Thankfully, he waited until the song, and my dance, finished before calling us.

“Yeah, well I’ve never danced that way to anyone’s songs” I had changed into my night clothes in the bathroom; there was no way that I was changing in front of five hot-blooded indie boys. I was standing at my bunk, heading to the ladder when a pillow hit me on the head. I looked up to see Ricky grinning like a lunatic.

“What’s this?” I asked, holding up the pillow.

“Your pillow, remember how you brought it up to my bunk earlier?” now I remembered. I took it up with me when he first talked to me about the Towers of London.

“Thanks,” I said and smiled.

“Lights out in two minutes!” the bus driver called from the front. I hopped into my bunk and got under the covers. Nick’s head suddenly appeared next to mine, albeit it was on the other side of the bunk. I had forgotten that he was below me.

“Nightey night!” he said and pulled my drapes closed. I lay in bed for a few minutes, thinking about my current situation. I only got as far as my first encounter with Ricky when I fell asleep.



*****



I felt someone shaking me at the shoulders. I wanted to know what the hell was happening, but my eyes refused to open. I finally pried my eyes open when I heard Nick say “Well, I guess we’ll just have to leave her here if she doesn’t get up.” I remembered right then where I was, and my eyes shot open.

“Come on dear, you have fifteen minutes. There’s a blueberry muffin out here with your name on it.” If I wasn’t blessed with hair that only needs to be washed once every three days, I would be screwed. I clambered out of bed, grabbed my suitcase and went into the bathroom. I changed my clothes and ran some of that spray shampoo through my hair. I was out in ten minutes, a new record, and I sat down to eat my muffin.

“How’d you sleep love?” Ricky asked, sitting down next to me and kissed me on the cheek.

“Very well. I was out like a light. Hey, what time is it?”

“Umm,” he said and looked at his watch. “It’s one thirty.”

“In the afternoon?” Ricky nodded. “I thought we had a long day today.”

“We did, until the venue called us and said the man with the keys to open up was in a layover at the airport and was going to be a few hours late.”

“Oh, poor man,” I said and took a bite of my muffin.

“Well, he’s here now, which is why we have like five minutes before we’re due for soundcheck. We’re so far behind.” I nodded.

“Wait, what am I going to do?”

“The execs said that all you guys have a meeting while we do soundcheck to go over what your duties are on tour.” I finished the muffin and crumpled up the wrapper.

“Ok… it’s business time.”



*****



“Come with me you guys,” Jim, our head PTB said and led us off to a side room. We were in Hartford, Connecticut, for the first spot on this tour. We were being corralled into a little office room and put into chairs. He went through all out jobs and gave us all enough paperwork to wrap all my Christmas presents. The two camera people were supposed to film a specific song at each show, to be determined by the writer. These songs would then be given to the editor and edited together, the order determined by the writer. The camera people would also be filming B-Roll, or random shots, of the boys off stage. When it all gets assembled, then my job comes into play. I tell the editor what shots go where, which to use, and how the final product will look. So basically, my job comes at the very end of the production. I pulled Jim aside and asked him if I basically got to rest for the whole tour, only doing the occasional odd job. He said yes, but not to tell the others in that exact wording.

I went back to the stage to watch the boys play. It put a huge smile on my face to know that the man up there bouncing around, belting out indie floor-fillers was my boyfriend. I knew that girls would try to get him on tour. Hell, I was even a groupie once. It didn’t bother me, though. I knew that he would always come back to me. This thought was solidified when they finished the song and Ricky bounded off the stage to me. The rest of the band took off their instruments at a leisurely pace, except Simon who seemed to be reading Ricky’s book of dating. He, too, bounded off the stage to Alison. Ricky beat him to his own girl, though, and pulled me on to my feet.

The sound man put on Franz Ferdinand’s most recent cd and Ricky started dancing with me. The first track, The Fallen, was a sure way to make anyone dance. As Ricky pulled me into a dip, and his lips passionately landed on mine, I knew that I had finally hit the big time in my book. I didn’t need to be rich, I wasn’t a materialistic person. I was a different kind of rich, I was rich in my friends, my art, and love from my wonderful boyfriend, Ricky Wilson.



*****



That night, I was supposed to watch the show from the wings. However, someone had messed up the paperwork and the security didn’t know that I was actually supposed to be there. So, naturally, I got kicked to the curb by a big, burly, security man.

“But I’m Ricky’s girlfriend!” I shouted as the guard closed the door.

“Sure you are,” he said sarcastically. “Now just go wait at the top of the ramp with the other girls.” He closed the door in my face, echoing the cold metallic bang all the way through the parking lot. I looked behind me to find a legion of slutty looking girls gathered in a huddle at the top of the loading ramp. I pushed the buzzer on the door and it was promptly opened by the gurard.

“What do I go when I get to the top of the ramp?” I asked, but the door was shut in my face before I was able to finish my question. I heard the girls giggle loudly and I figured that since I had three hours to kill, I would see what they were up to. I figured I could call Ricky’s cell when the show was done (he gave me it earlier in the day, I knew there would be a reason to have it later on).

I made my way up to the ramp, pulling my light trench coat tighter around me. I definitely didn’t have the groupie look, anymore. I had my tight, but not too tight, blue jeans, beatle boots, grey long-sleeved square-cut shirt and my black trench coat. I approached these girls with short skirts and high-heels and tight shirts feeling more than just a little out of place.

“Umm, hi,” I said once I reached their little blob.

“Umm, hi to you too,” one of them said to me. The rest of them were too preoccupied with looking me over to offer any human-esque greeting in my general direction.

“So, who are you with?” one in the back asked me.

“Oh, the Kaiser Chiefs.”

“Yeah? So are we,” another said quite aggressively.

“Oh, how nice,” I said and shuffled my feet. I had a bad feeling about this; you could have cut the tension in the air with a butter knife. Not just any butter knife, mind you, but one of those ones that have been used so much for things other than butter that all the serated edges have worn off.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” one of them asked.

“Umm,” I said looking around. “I don’t know, it just kinda came to me? I really didn’t mean anything, I was just responding to you.” I erally didn’t feel like getting my ass kicked by a bunch of groupies tonight. As a matter of fact, I didn’t feel like getting my ass kicked by a bunch of groupies ever.

“Oh. Well, since us five are with the Kaisers, and there are five Kaisers, that leaves you out to dry.” One said and folded her arms in front of her.

“And don’t even try to get one of them before us,” another said. “Otherwise, you’re not going to like what we’re going to do to you.” They started to move in a little closer to me. Naturally, I moved backwards. And, naturally, I tripped over something and went flying backwards, landing on my butt. My cell phone went flying out of my pocket and landed about five feet from me, where it proceeded to ring. Now, it wasn’t just any old ringtone, it was “Na Na Na Na Naa”, and that could only mean one thing: it was Ricky. I scrambled over to my phone, opened the cover and saw that it indeed was him, and I answered it.

“Hello?”

“Where the devil are you?” he asked in a panic.

“Why aren’t you playing?” I asked and I heard the girls murmur.

“Well, the opening act’s guitarist broke a string before he even played, nerves I guess, and they couldn’t find a replacement…but that doesn’t matter right now. Where are you?”

“Security kicked me out!” I said, looking back at the girls. “They didn’t believe I was your girlfriend, so they sent me up to the ramp.” I saw the looks on some of their faces change to osmehting I still can’t describe.

“I’m coming to get you. See you in a sec.”

“No, wait – ” I started to say, but he had already hung up.

“Who was that?” one of the girls said.

“Oh, no one, just my boyfriend Ricky.” One of the girls gasped.

“Ricky Wilson?!” she exclaimed, but another girl held up her hand to silence her.

“It couldn’t be. She just had one of her stupid friends call her and pretend to be –” she was cut off by the stage door opening and Ricky poking his head out.

“Ruby! There you are! Now come on inside and stop my worrying!” I looked back at the girls who were now staring at me open mouthed.

“Come on!” he said and waved me his way.

“Bye ladies,” I said and walked away. As soon as I made It halfway down the ramp, I could hear the girls throwing out insults at me, but only loud enough for me to barely hear them. When I reached Ricky, he grabbed me and kissed me. It wasn’t in my plans, but it did help in making the groupies mad. When we parted, he took my arm and pulled me inside.



*****



I spent the opening acts in the Kaiser’s dressing room. Nick had managed to get a television set in the room with proper cable. We were watching reruns of Mad TV, and the boys though that it was the funniest thing. Of course, I told the camera people to film all this; we could probably use it for something. The boys were rolling on the floor laughing, saying that they had never seen anything like it before. This was obvious, seeing as they were from the UK and Mad TV hadn’t quite broken ground over there yet.

As if by clockwork, the stage manager came into the dressing room as soon as the credits came on the screen. He told us that the band had just finished and that they had about twenty minutes to show time. The buys shut the TV, the cameras went off, and everyone went to get ready. I went with the editor to the side of the stage to watch the show. We didn’t have anything to do since the camera crew was obviously filming and the producer was by the sound board commanding to the camera people what shots to get.

“Enjoy the show, love,” Ricky said as the house lights dimmed and the band made its way on the stage.