Their new bus was seriously snazzy.

"You mean it's coming right here to the loft to pick us up?" Dane had asked when they heard they were getting a brand new tour bus.

"Apparently so," Momoko answered, reading her email. "We just have to have all our gear packed up and ready to go tomorrow morning at nine o'clock sharp."

"And there's going to be crew coming with the bus to load the stuff, we don't have to lift a finger?" Jude queried for the third or fourth time.

"Yes," Momoko responded with a laugh, looking through the email again.

So Dane had been watching from the window, and had called out to everyone when he'd seen it turn off Bleecker onto their street. "It's here, you guys, and it's huge!"

They piled down the stairs with their luggage, leaving the instruments and gear for the crew, and boarded the bus, looking at each other with wide eyes. Obviously the bus wasn't new or anything, but it was new to them.

The seats were wide and plush, and reclined nearly all the way back, and there were even a few bunks in the back, next to a bathroom, refrigerator, and a seating area.

"Neat!" Momoko declared, hugging Sullivan, who was closest.

"This is ace," Jude agreed with a grin.

They went back up front, and Momoko introduced herself to the bus driver, whose name was Adam.

"A pleasure to meet you, Adam," Momoko said, holding out her hand. She introduced the boys, telling him, "Don't worry if you can't keep them straight at first, I'm the important one."

"Agreed," Adam said, smiling at her. "In my house, my mother rules the roost, my brothers and I don't matter at all."

"You know what?" Momoko said to Tommy, who was closest. "We should buy everyone coffee and donuts, what do you think?"

"Oh, yeah, good idea," he agreed.

The business on the first floor of the building where they lived was Dick's Donuts, and Momoko and the boys were very well known there. Tommy, Dane, and Momoko dashed in and bought two dozen donuts and a large cardboard to-go carton of coffee. As far as Momoko could tell, there were three guys hauling equipment from the loft, Adam the driver, plus Kay, so she figured two dozen would do it.

Two dozen didn't do it.

"Hey, cool, thanks!" one of the roadies said when he walked by and saw the box and carton. Dane had set them on the cement next to the stairs between the donut stop and their gate, which stood open.

"Help yourself," Momoko said, holding her hand out. "I'm Momoko, by the way, singer for the band."

"Bill," the roadie said, swallowing her slender hand in his beefy one. Bill was bald, and had a huge mustache. "Pleezetameetcha." He grabbed a donut and bit off half of it on his way up the stairs. He spoke to another roadie who was coming down holding an amp.

"Look, Ken, breakfast!" He gestured toward the donuts.

Ken was so skinny it seemed impossible that he could lift anything heavy, but apparently he was stronger than he looked. He lugged the amp over to the bus, and returned, grabbing two donuts on his way up the stairs.

"Thanks, guys! I'll grab some coffee when we're finished! And I'll catch your names on the bus, okay?"

The third guy was named Ronny, and he had a black pony tail. He, too, grabbed two donuts on his way up the stairs after thanking everyone.

Adam took three donuts to eat on the bus, along with a cup of coffee.

"You guys just made three friends for life," he told everyone. "It's always a good idea to be nice to the crew, they'll save your ass too many times to count."

Kay, who'd heard his words, smiled as she poured herself a cup of coffee and grabbed a donut. "He's right," she told the boys and Momoko. "And did you get a receipt for this stuff?"

"Oh, we usually run a tab at Dick's," Jude replied. "We just pay him at the end of the month."

"With what?" Kay asked, taking a sip of her coffee. "Wow, this is good."

"With money?" Jude answered, confused.

"I mean, which money? Yours? Sullivan's? You each have a per diem during this little road trip. Or is it the food allowance? Miscellaneous?"

Jude stared at her, nonplussed.

Kay nudged him playfully. "Relax, Jude. I just want you guys to start thinking about things a little bit, okay? Think of this as a mini tour, like practice for how things will be in the future." She looked around. "That goes for all of you. This will be good practice. I meant it when I said I believed big things were going to happen for you, but that doesn't mean you're going jump right to becoming the next No Doubt. This is a business, and you're going to have to think of it that way." She gestured toward the donuts. "And part of that is thinking about how you spend your money." She smiled. "I don't want you to stop doing nice things for the crew, don't get me wrong." She took a bite of her donut. "Jesus, these donuts are the bomb, aren't they? Just adjust your thinking a little, all right?" She turned and boarded the bus after grabbing another donut.

The whole time she'd been talking, Bill, Ken, and Ronny had been going to and fro, grabbing donuts each time they passed, and between them and the boys, the box was already empty.

"Hey!" Momoko put her hands on her hips. "I haven't even had one yet, you guys!"

"You snooze, you lose," Sully teased, popping the last bite of his second donut in his mouth.

"Greedy assholes." Momoko grumbled, pouring herself a cup of coffee, which, though it wasn't nearly as good as what she made upstairs, was decent enough.

They, too, boarded the bus, and were just settling in when Dane leapt aboard, carrying a bag, which he handed to Momoko.

"Here, Peaches," he said, kissing her forehead.

"What?" she said, accepting the bag.

"Donuts. From Dick's," he elaborated, gesturing at the shop behind him. "Well, cronuts, actually. Your favorite. I splurged," he confessed, smiling his beautiful smile. "We didn't leave you any, and I felt bad," he explained.

"Aww," Momoko said, touched. "Thank you, Dane, you're a true gentleman. She gestured to the seat next to her. "Please, honey, sit next to me."

She leaned her head on his shoulder and opened the bag, pulling out a cronut post haste.

Kay, who was sitting next to Tommy, leaned over and asked, "Are they a thing?"

Tommy shook his head. "No, we're all just really close."

Kay looked at him in surprise. "But didn't you all just meet a couple months ago?"

"Yeah, but it was just, like, kismet, you know? We just all hit it off with her right away. The chemistry was just there."

"It really shows in your music, I must say," Kay answered, nodding. "You can't tell she just joined the band."

The roadies boarded the bus and sat down, announcing that everything was stowed.

"Okay, Peppermint Silk, we're off!" Adam called out, putting the bus in gear.

The members of the band whooped and hollered and high-fived each other.

As the bus headed north up the FDR Drive, then crossed over the George Washington Bridge, everyone settled down for the four hour drive to their first stop in New Jersey.

Sully and Jude looked at each other and grinned.

"Man, can you believe this is happening?" Sully asked.

Jude shook his head. "Remember when we'd be sitting around in our dorm back at Princeton, just absolutely pissed on Cuervo, and talk about what we'd do if we could just, skive off uni and make music all the time? Remember that? And here we are."

"Yeah, here we are," Sully repeated. "You guys are the best, the absolute best friends a person could ever have. I mean it, man. I love you."

He looked at Jude, then leaned in as if to kiss him, puckering up and laughing.

Jude leaned back just in time, shoving Sully's face away. "Piss off, you wanker!" he gasped.

"I thought we were having a moment!" Sully protested. "Momoko would've let me."

"Yeah, well, Momoko has notoriously low standards," Jude retorted, sitting back up.

"That's true, she lets you have your way with her," Sullivan quipped.

"What? Did I hear my name?" Momoko asked, wandering up the aisle of the bus to stand next to them.

"No, nothing, I don't know," Sully said guiltily, punching Jude in the arm.

"Oh my god, I can't wait to play poker with you, Sullivan Palmer," Momoko said, shaking her head. "You're the most terrible liar I ever met."

She stepped between the two of them, wiggling her bottom to make room for herself. "I don't even care what you were saying about me, because you're both so handsome," she said, leaning back.

"What happened to your cronut bearing prince? Dane?" Jude asked.

Momoko shrugged. "He fell asleep, can you believe it? And Tommy's talking to Kay. So I came to see you," she chirped, putting a hand on each guy's knee.

"Hey, Peaches, are you ticklish?" Sullivan asked casually.

"No, why?"

"Wow."

"What?"

"You're a pretty terrible liar, too."

"No! No, Sully, no, please!"

"How could I resist?" Sullivan said these words as he attacked her midriff with his fingers, puling her tank top up for unfettered access to her tummy.

Momoko shrieked and kicked out, catching Jude in the chin with the top of her head as she tried to escape.

"Oi, Momoko, that hurt!"

"Sorry, but if you'd try to help me instead of helping him, maybe it wouldn't hurt so much!"

"Are you kidding? Your laugh is the cutest thing I've ever heard." Jude joined in the tickling fun as Momoko gasped for breath and begged for mercy.

"Hey, Sully, you reckon we should stop mate?" Jude asked after a couple of minutes. "She might wee all over the seat in a bit."

"Ah all right," Sully relented, hauling Momoko up and straightening her out, brushing her off and patting her all over, which was a whole other kind of fun.

"Stop! Stop, you animals," Momoko said, laughing as she made a half-hearted attempt to push their hands away. "Honestly, I came to sit with you to talk and maybe have a little cuddle, and you start acting like horny frat boys."

"But we are horny frat boys," Sully told her, planting a kiss on her mouth.

"Whatever," Momoko responded, sitting down with a flounce. "Can we just sit normally for a while?"

"Sure," Jude said comfortably, scooping her into the curve of his arm.

And within minutes she was sleeping. She didn't wake up until the bus pulled into the parking lot of the hotel.