A/N: second installment, people. This one's special because this was the first scene I ever wrote for 'Don't Let Go of the Small Town Boy' and I thought that I was creative enough and had enough time and patience to write something extraordinary to lead up to this… but sadly, I had no such luck.
So here's the original 'Never Never After' of all time. Enjoy.
Disclaimer: don't own anything widely known.
XXX
Brandt and I had just thrown our bags down in my front foyer, laughing hard when I noticed…
He was here.
In my house.
Sitting on my couch… that is, until he noticed we were there too; then he stood.
I felt the smile of laughter fall from my face until my lips fell into a flat line and my breathing go shallow.
"Aura?" Brandt asked, his hand going protectively to my shoulder.
"Beau, now's not a good time…" I murmured, turning to face him.
His green eyes were dark with worry and confusion. G-d, he was beautiful… it didn't help that a pair twice as stunning were boring into the back of my head.
"You sure?" he asked, his brow knitting in concern.
At a loss for words, I just nodded.
He folded me into his arms and planted a kiss on my forehead before grabbing his bag and heading out, his eyes skeptically scanning the other body in the room.
I remained with my back to him until I heard the engine of Brandt's car wander out of vicinity.
Only then did I whip around, make my way in his face quickly as possible, and snap, "What the hell are you doing here?"
He promptly fell back onto the couch and I stared down at him.
"Well?" I asked, my voice laced with venom as he just sat there, looking down at his hands.
"Kevin…" I muttered.
He lifted his face and our gaze held for a second before I reached out and slapped him.
"Aur, what the hell?" he asked, grabbing his cheek.
"Oh look, the good seed curses," I chuckled, "What the hell are you doing in my house, Kevin? Why are you here?"
He didn't answer.
"WHY ARE YOU HERE?" I yelled.
"I'M HERE BECAUSE YOUR SHITTING RIGHT!" he screamed, jumping to his feet to get as much in my face as I was in his.
"What? Kevin, you make no sense!"
"It's your stupid sketch, Aur! It's been haunting me for months!" he yelled, his eyes blazing.
My mind flew to the exact drawing he was talking about.
The one I'd drawn when I dreamt of Arizona… and him… standing on a cliff of one of those amazing red mountains with the desert and the setting sun behind him… the close up of his profile in the corner aside from the rest of the drawing…
Despite all feelings, it had to be my favorite I'd ever drawn.
"What of it?" I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.
The flare in his eyes cooled, but the terseness remained.
"The little note you jotted on the edge of the cliff… those eight little words that won't leave me alone…" he muttered.
"Don't let go of the small town boy…" I murmured.
His hands flew to his temples, "Yeah…"
"Well? What about them?"
His eyes flew to mine as he raged, "I've read into it, Aur… and now, I just… I just can't do it anymore, ok?"
"What're you talking about Kevin?"
"Me! Living this… this… this media influenced, press-in-your-face, can't get a DAMN moment of privacy piece of shit that I've been living for the past three and a half years! I can't do it anymore!"
I closed my eyes for a moment and remembered something…
"Kevin… y-you're supposed to be in Syracuse now, for a concert…"
"The key words being 'supposed to'"
"You're four hours away from a concert taking place in one… you come all this way just to tell me that you're sick of living the life you're trapped in?"
"No… I came all this way… because I'm done with it, and I wanted you to be the first to know…"
"What do you want me to say, huh? That I'm PROUD of you? That I'm HAPPY for you? G-D, KEV, YOU'RE SO RETARDED!! Do you realize what sort of damage you're doing for yourself right now? For your brothers?"
"IS THAT ALL THAT DAMNING MATTERS? THE BAND? NICK? JOE? I'M SICK OF IT ALL! MUSIC USED TO BE A PASSION FOR ME! NOW IT'S JUST WORK! SONGS THAT NEED TO BE WRITTEN AND RECORDED! GUITAR PARTS THAT HAVE DEADLINES! I WANT OUT!"
"You can't afford out!" I shouted, "The world wants the Jonas Brothers, and it's not that without you, so haul your selfish ass out to Syracuse and move on with your life!"
He stared at me for a moment before saying in a level tone, "You're such a hypocrite, you know that?"
I stared blankly at him.
"You tell me in this… outrageously amazing drawing that I should hold onto who I was in Jersey… and here I am, trying to do that, and you're telling me to go back to the high life?"
"I'm looking out for the lives of half the teenage female population of the US here," I chuckled.
"Screw it… all the girls love Nick and Joe. I'm just there for the guitar and background vocals…"
"Stop being such a selfish ass, Kev," I smirked, sitting down beside him.
He looked up at me and I looked away.
He chuckled.
I arched an eyebrow at him.
"You know I love your new sense of humor…" he smirked.
"Fuck off, Jonas…" I smirked back, shoving his shoulder roughly so he fell off the couch.
"Not to mention your perfect manners and language too," he laughed, sitting back against the coffee table.
"Stop getting me off track…" I chided, "You can't just… up and leave this thing you have going, Kevin; you don't have the rights."
"I'm a free man of twenty; legal adult; I have all the rights I want…" he argued.
"You're not a free man, Kev! You're bound by contracts with so many people, you don't even know. For all I care, your little manager people could be sending a police car down here by location tracker on your fancy little iPhone to arrest you for violating some sort of vicinity deal."
He laughed at that, but then said, "I'm so done with it, Aur… this thing I've been hauling off with Nick and Joe for the past three years… it's not me…"
"And it took you this long to figure it out?"
"No… I liked it at first; the fans, the music, the fame… but then press and media got involved… we couldn't go out on the streets without being mobbed or without a body guard… people took our pictures everywhere and had to know everything that was going on every second… Frankie's become some little decoy to pull in more fans… the three of us have been labeled by how we appear in public… we can't be ourselves anymore; we have to be who the people have made us; who our managers have made us; we have to be what the people want, or we're done…"
"And you think it's just going to come easier if you up and leave?" I asked.
"Damnit, Aura! The pampered little pop star you see me as in the magazines isn't me!" he cried.
I looked down at my nails nonchalantly and informed him with a smirk, "I don't read your silly little magazines."
"You made me realize it, Aur," he said, ignoring my comment, "YOU! I was a good kid who liked bowling, cross country, and pole vaulting growing up in New Jersey far longer than I've been part of this band… and YOU made me realize that THAT'S who I want to be… not who I am now!"
"Well, we can't really change that now, can we?" I asked, looking up at him coolly.
"What happened to you?" he asked after a long moment.
"We're not talking about me here, Kevo; we're talking about you."
"You're not Aura anymore…"
"Kevin, stop."
"You're moody… distant… G-d, why're being such a bitch, Aur?"
"I said stop it…"
"What happened to Aura?"
"THE SAME THING THAT HAPPENED TO YOU!"
I couldn't take it anymore.
"You didn't HAVE to change, Aur! You didn't HAVE to CHANGE!" he raged.
"You really think that?" I hissed, "You really think that after three of my best friends just up and left our little small town lives, I didn't HAVE to change? You boys were practically part of me, you know that? Like brothers, but closer! And when you left, you took some of me with you… you took the part of me that was the innocent little Jersey girl that loved Valentines Day and the Summer and left… if that's who you thought you'd be coming back to, you were dead wrong… if THAT'S who you think I'll EVER be again, YOU'RE DEAD SHITTING WRONG!"
My fingers absentmindedly flew to the pick around my neck in my rage, a stupid old habit.
"You still have that old thing?" he asked tentatively after a long moment; after my shoulders stopped heaving and the icy fire dwindled out of my sea storm eyes.
I wanted to rip it from my neck, fling it at him, and tell him to get out and never come back. Prove to him that I didn't need him or Nick or Joe anymore…
…but in sick, twisted, downright fate-crueling truth…
…I did…
I sat down on the floor where I stood and ran my thumb over the smooth surface of the pick again and again, the shiny surface worn away from such.
"You see?" he asked, crouching down next to me, "You still need us as much as we need you… or right now, as much as I need you."
"Shut up…" I muttered, "And get your ass out to Syracuse."
He shook his head at me, "I told you, Aur, I'm not going back."
"Well you sure as hell aren't welcome here," I spat.
"That's fine," he shrugged after a long moment, "My Commander is still in the garage of the old house from winter and I have money. I was thinking of maybe just driving around the country for a while… you know, relax after all this time."
"And what're you going to do when people recognize you?"
"You really think I'm going to keep this look? G-d, Aur, you should know I hate tight jeans. I'll cut my hair and wear real clothes again and just… live."
"Good luck with that," I muttered.
"Thanks," he said, and then he rose from his crouch and headed for the door.
"Hey, Aura," he said.
I turned my chin just over my shoulder and something caught the light coming in from the windows before there was the clack of it hitting the ground in front of me and he slipped out the door.
After a long moment of staring at the spot where he had just been, I looked down to see a hammered silver band sitting on the floor by my foot.
I lifted it into my hand and quickly added it to the leather cord around my neck and feeling it there along with the ancient pick.
A/N: there you have it. The big picture of 'Don't Let Go of the Small Town Boy.'
Review if you will.
-Reigh