( gif by hazzawckd <3 )

word count: 3233

For as long as I could remember, Hobie never lived in the same house as me until we got married. He was the perfect husband. Very kind, intelligent and thoughtful. He was the no nonsense kind of guy. Because being childish and trying to scare me was something he didn't do anymore.

We don't even watch horror movies together because I have such deep rooted PTSD with what he put me through, extensive therapy and long talks kind of helped the healing process; but on occasion I'll sit next to him on the couch with The Conjuring playing in the background just because I knew he loved scary movies. I was so scared I couldn't make it through the whole movie though—at least not anymore. Except Hobie loved them, which made this all too weird on how he started acting.

"Come on, Elvis. I just fed ya." I grumbled with my back leaning against the counter with a bowl of cereal in my hands. I was dressed in the normal work attire at the new firm Karl opened up. Deja and June were head of the
company, I was the Executive Officer and times were fun.

"Fine, just give me a second". I turned around to place the bowl in the sink when my heart almost jumped out of my chest when I happened to notice Hobie staring at me from the corner entrance of the living room. The rest of his body was concealed behind the wall, nearly dropping the bowl on Elvis as he barked behind my legs.

"Fuck, Hobie." I said, placing the bowl in the sink. "You scared the fuck out of me."

He immediately moved his head back behind the wall and scurried out of view after being caught. By the time I got to the entrance of the living room, he was already out of sight.

The next incident happened just two days after. I was tired from work and wanted to get some food after coming home late. 2am to be exact. Hobie texted and let me know that there was food in the fridge he cooked for me, wrapped up on the second shelf to the left. The light from the fridge was the only thing that kept a consistent low glow, it didn't hurt my eyes either.

I had this sudden strong urge I was being watched, the only reason I knew my thought was right was because I heard a faint hushed laughter from behind the counter, right near the table. I slipped out the biggest knife there was in my knife holder, holding it out in front of me.

I wholeheartedly expected to see an intruder hiding behind the island, not my husband hiding under the table with his smile spread out wide, grinning like the Cheshire Cat. He was peeking at me from between the chair legs, then he took off crawling at me at such a fast pace that I had no time to react, falling to my ass. I watched as he crawled at me with that possessed smile on his face like a spider. When he was right in front of my face, he stared right into my eyes and turned to crawl the other way. His hands and feet smacking against the floor.

I took a couple minutes to regain my body and mind back, just trying to figure what the fuck I with before I went back upstairs, but I finally did. When I did, Hobie was there in the bed with the blankets covering him like he wasn't just downstairs five minutes ago. HIs breathing was short, slow like he was asleep; but maybe he wasn't asleep.

The next morning I asked him what the fuck was up as we sat together on the couch, his arm draped over my shoulders. He gave me a confused look, leaned down to my ear and whispered I was going to die and he would be the one to kill me.

I screamed and shot out of the bed, hitting my forehead on the top bunk as I hissed. I fell back against my pillow with my hands holding my forehead. I brought my fingers up to my skin to rub the small cut that was now forming from the little nail that hit me. I realized I wasn't in a shared home with him of all people, I was on the bus to Atlantic City.

Sweat soaked my body and dripped down to my blanket, head pounding as my phone lit up from a notification from an app I had on my phone. My stitches were slightly throbbing from how fast I moved my head, chest rising up and down from the dream I had. It wasn't that I was married to Hobie that freaked me out, which was kind of weird, but it was weird that everything was showing towards a spider. How easy he said in my dream he would kill me. Why is everyone trying to kill me?

I checked my phone for the time, seeing it was only nine in the morning and we had another two hours to. A few pit spots woke me up just briefly and that caused us to be behind. I knew we were behind because I heard Ares yelling at the gas station about it.

"Are you okay?" A voice from below my bunk asked, the curtain disguising whoever it was.

"Obviously not! You heard her scream."

Another voice, a woman and a man.

I froze for a moment, turning my head to look up at the bottom of the bunk above me and then to the closed curtain.

"Yeah, sorry." I opened the curtain, my eyebrows furrowed together embarrassed I might've woken someone up.

When I pushed back the grey curtain and saw no one there, I was starting to feel like I was in the twilight zone and going crazy. I swore someone was outside my curtain talking to me, I didn't see a shadow but I heard their voice. I spoke too soon when two heads popped down from the bunk on top of mine, and the other from below me.

"Did you have a nightmare?"

"I would too, this bus is sca–"

"What the fuck?!" I yelled out, grabbing my chest at their sudden pops of their heads out of nowhere.

"Oh shit, Pavitr I told you that you can't get that close to someone or else they would get scared." The girl said immediately, my eyes closing to calm my heartbeat.

"No, no. I just didn't expect to see you both pop up out of nowhere." I shook my hands to show I wasn't mad, just startled.

"So you copied me!" Pavitr said, ducking back down to his bunk so I couldn't see him anymore. The girl doing the same. I heard shuffling from both top and bottom of me, her legs dangling over the bunk before she jumped off from her spot so I could see her right side up.

"We haven't met." She says sweetly. "I'm Gwen."

Now that I could see her fully, I remembered her from a few days ago; she was with Hobie as they left his hotel room and Ares told her to get back with the production team. She looked so much younger than from the few glances I could see in the elevator. Her half shaved head with pink tips fit her face very well. Pav jumped up at the same time Gwen came down, his grin staying on his face as he smoothed back his hair.

"And I'm Pavitr."

I sat up, draping my legs out in front of me with a yawn escaping my lips and my eyes rubbing away the sleepy seeds. I was still shaken up from my dream, not being able to write it down and pick it apart for any clues.

"Hey.. I'm (Y/N)."

Pav let out a small gasp, turning to Gwen with his finger pointed directly at me with wide eyes. Gwen pushed his hand down, an embarrassed look on her face for his actions. "Yes! That's the one who fainted. You're the stylist right? The one who fainted in front of thousands of people?"

I felt my mouth open slightly at his comments, rubbing the back of my neck to ghost my fingers over my stitches and nod. "That's me alright. Does like.. everyone know about that?"

Gwen nodded as she tucked a few strands of her hair behind her ear. "Yeah, not like in a bad way we are all kind of worried about you."

"Fantastic.."

Gwen was dressed in a black onesie that covered her from shoulder to toes, I noticed she had headphones draped over her shoulders and a small musical note on her collarbone.

"Why haven't we seen you around?" She asks.

"Oh, I have had the worst of luck since the tour started and decided to stay in the hotel room mostly." I shrug.

"That's no fun, especially for the stylist!" Pavitr shakes his head, his arms crossing one over the other in front of his chest.

"Can I ask how old you two are?"

"Personal." He dramatically says, his hand coming up to stop me from further interrogating the two but Gwen rolls her eyes, swatting it down.

"We are both sixteen."

"And what do you two do?" I ask out of curiosity. This has to be breaking so many child labor laws.

"I'm the sound tech and Pav is the photographer, we're managers technically. But if I'm lucky enough on a good day, Hobie let's me be the stand in drummer."

"Oh wow. No offense, but you two are kind of young to be on tour aren't you?" I couldn't help but sound shocked, they were younger than I was and had such an important job on this tour. "Isn't that like breaking some sort of law?"

"It isn't when you are best friends with the lead singer and your parents signed our lives away to Ares." Gwen said with her hands held in a prayer like motion, fluttering her eyelashes in a sarcastic tone. "All jokes aside, we just got lucky."

"That's badass."

"Thanks." They both say in unison, their smiles showing with their perfect teeth and non blemished faces. There was an almost need to become their older sister figure on the tour now that I met them, seeing as Ares was rarely around when I needed her and to be away from your family must be hard. It's hard for me and It hasn't even been two months. They were nice, I needed people like that in my life right now.

"Did I wake you two up by the way?" I asked out of courtesy.

"Nah, I was awake texting Pav and Miles. But let's go into a different room in case we wake the others." She looks around at the bunks of the other members of the team that probably had some people asleep.

I nodded and followed the two to the back door of the tour bus, opening up to an empty lounge area that had opened windows that panned around the bus. I shut the soundproof behind me, watching as Pav turned on the tv that was directly in front of us on the wall and Gwen hopped over to the black leather couch.

"So," She drags out the syllabus as I sit opposite of her on the other couch. "How you liking the tour so far?"

Most amazing experience of my life. Note the sarcasm.

"It's interesting." I pulled a smile with the lie, flushing the pillow to my chest for some sort of comfort.

"Homesick yet?"

"Kind of? I haven't had time to really register I'm here."

"You get used to it."

"Have you done this before?"

"Leaving my home for long periods of time? Yes. Touring? Not really. I would go with the band to small events here and there, Pav would come when he had the time; but this is our first time on a full length tour."

"Wow, so you two basically gave up your whole school year for this?" I murmur.

"Yeah, well my sister kinda put me into it." Gwen shrugs again.

"What do you mean?"

"Ares is my step-sister." She states to my surprise.

I widen my eyes, choking on air.

"Lightskin, braids, always yelling, possibly has something going on with Ozzy and best friends with Ciera. That Ares?" I laughed out loud, her face turning red as she nodded.

"The one and only. Her mom married my Dad, her mom travels a lot for work and my Dad is chief of police so he isn't home much. That's one of the many reasons why I am even allowed on the tour. Internship is just a plus." I would never have guessed they were related by marriage from how they act. Ares is very uptight and holds herself to a high standard, always making sure everything is in order and loves to hear herself scream; while Gwen is quiet and keeps to herself. They may not be blood related, but I could spot small similarities between the two. Like how they love to stare at you with wide eyes trying to figure out what is wrong with you.

"So, you are related to Ares by marriage and you said your families are close. How does that make Pav involved in this?"

"She babysat me for awhile, my parents loved her the moment they met. Something about how she had that charm that made every person who she babysat want to hire her as a nanny. She was really attentive, maybe that's why she is so uptight about her job." Pavitr comments from his seat on the floor, his back leaning against a couple pillows as a tv show I never heard of plays.

"Well, at least you have some sort of family nearby. Maybe not by blood, but close enough to it, yeah? And you get to see the world when we travel." I cross my legs, propping one knee up as I rest my chin on my knee.

"Not really, we are so tied up in our work and meeting deadlines with her that we hardly have time to actually explore. We are responsible for the little things, like for example I have to spend the whole day setting up and the second day packing up. Pav has to make sure all his equipment is working, as well as checking the lightning in the stadium with certain lights, then he spends the second day digitally editing the photos."

"Oh.. that sounds like a lot. Aren't there teams in each city that are on standby?"

"Yeah, but you try having Ares as a sister and see how far that gets you. We get breaks though, just not as often as we want. I heard you lucked out, got that fancy ipad that sends all sorts of wardrobes to each city we are at with stylists there already waiting on their hands and knees for you." She laughs, holding her stomach.

"Yeah, it's still so weird. Especially since I moved to New York to work under Karl and then he sent me to work with Spider-Band. Maybe I sucked."

"You said it, not me." Pav replies, a hiss following when Gwen pretends to swat at him again.

"Hey, isn't that.."

I furrowed my eyebrows and turned my head behind me to see what she was looking at, instant confusion dawning on me only to be replaced with a wide eye. The long window was viewing the open freeway where not many cars were at that we were traveling on, but what stood out the most and was hard to miss was the band on crotch rockets riding next to us.

It wasn't hard to tell who it was, their crazy stunts and horrible lane change was enough to pick apart who was who.

They all had looks of amusement on their faces, weaving through the cars that did manage to catch up to us, cutting each other off like it was a big game that they were dangerously playing. The only person wearing a helmet was Rico, and I knew it was her because she had her name painted on the bright, pink helmet with small horns sticking out the top of it. They didn't care at all that they could potentially end up on the internet, their faces were shown to be laughing like they had nothing to lose.

Pav, Gwen and I all levitated to the window, kneeling on the couch like we were children watching a parade pass by their home and we couldn't go out and see. My eyes fell to Hobie who stood out the most amongst the rest of them, only because he was the only one who was lifting the front of the wheel off the ground and then picking up the pace when the wheel slammed back down to the ground.

He wore an open ripped, black flannel that gave his muscles no justice whatsoever since he was shirtless underneath it. But his beautiful chocolate skin was almost glistening from the sun with his sweat dripping down his body, he had little jewelry on than he normally would, it was like he was a different person.

He weaved through the cars at a calculated time, speeding up and flying in front of them which caused many honks from aggravated and annoyed citizens. He didn't seem to care, none of them seemed to care that they were sharing the road with traffic now and one wrong move could end their life, an innocent person's life.

The rest of them were a little more tame, still going very fast but also knowing that they weren't the only person on this road. This seemed to be an idea that Opium would do, but Hobie was the only one standing on business with it.

"Oh brother, he always does some stupid shit before a concert. Remember a few months ago he tried to steal that hot dog stand because he just felt like it." Pav complained, turning back around to finish his show. Gwen followed, laughing with Pavitr as she recalled the said incident and only briefly mumbled that she tried to help him too if it meant free hot dogs for the week.

"They can't see us, right?" I asked, watching Hobie slow down his speed to come side by side with the bus and the rest of the group as I watched him yell across to Crass about something I couldn't make out if I wanted to.

"Nah, the windows are made so only we can see out of, no into." Gwen replied, hearing her fall onto the couch.

"Interesting." I murmur to myself, my eyes making eye contact with Hobie who seemed to be looking right into mine. With one final wink, he picked up the pace and sped off again away from the group and us. It was like he knew I was watching.

From him almost throwing himself off the edge of the building, dangling his legs over the side and talking so freely about death like he could escape it; he had the biggest death wish known to man I ever met.