It's The Rush That You Get
By: Riley
.:Chapter One – When You Need Help:.
"We can't help everyone, but everyone can help someone." ~ Loretta Scott
"Boys, get up, you're going to be late!" Mrs. Knight called as she bustled around the kitchen, putting plates and silverware on the small table that was part of the 'kitchen' of apartment 2J. She then picked up bowls of steaming food off of the counters and moved to place them in the middle of the table.
Not hearing any of the bedroom doors being opened, she let out a sigh and turned to her daughter, Katie Knight, who was sitting on the couch, watching something on the news. "Katie, would you mind to go and wake up the boys for me? I don't want them to be late for school."
"Sure mom," Katie replied and got off of the couch and started towards the rooms.
Mrs. Knight thought for a moment and then turned to Katie, placing a hand on her hip. "Katie, drop the Nerf gun!" She declared.
Katie turned and looked at her mother with wide, innocent eyes, but when Mrs. Knight narrowed her eyes and continued to look at her, Katie sighed and moved her arms out from behind her back, dropping a large Nerf gun onto the counter.
"Oh come on, mom, you're not letting me have any fun," Katie declared, rolling her eyes as she walked closer to her mother. "I mean, what's the point of having the other guys living with us if I can't mess with them a little?"
"Uh, so they can live out their dream of being Big Time Rush?" Mrs. Knight replied. She then gave a soft smile and reached out a hand, gently smoothing Katie's hair out of her face. "We've only been here for a few months and Gustavo is working the boys really hard. They have never been worked this hard before, not even when they were playing hockey all the time. Just give them some time to get used to it."
"Ok," Katie pouted for a minute. But then the mischievous glint reappeared in her green eyes. "But the minute they're not so tired, they're mine!"
"Alright," Mrs. Knight laughed and kissed Katie on the forehead. "Just go wake them up, please."
Katie gave a salute and then disappeared around the wall that concealed the bedrooms. Mrs. Knight went back to setting the table, basking in the few moments of silence, but then jumped again when her son, Kendall, and his friends James Diamond, Logan Mitchell, and Carlos Garcia stumbled out of their rooms, screaming and shouting at the top of their lungs, fully dressed, and dragging their backpacks behind them.
Katie calmly walked out after them, smiling smugly.
Mrs. Knight looked over at her and shook her head for a moment. What could she have possibly done this time? She took a deep breath before speaking. "Katie," Mrs. Knight was starting to lose her patience. "What did I just say about leaving them alone?"
"What?" Katie shrugged innocently. "I didn't hurt them or anything."
"Then what did you do?"
Katie just smiled and looked over at the four teenage boys, who shuffled backwards away from her, and slid into her seat at the kitchen table. She started to pile her plate with food as Mrs. Knight continued to look hard at her.
"Nothing," She replied simply and smiled as the four boys slowly took their seats, eyeing her warily. "Nothing at all."
Do I even really want to know? Mrs. Knight looked at the ceiling and then shook her head, deciding that it wasn't worth her time. "So why were you late to waking up, Logan?" Mrs. Knight asked as she took her mug of coffee and sat down at the head of the table, waiting for the guys to finish grabbing their food before filling her own plate. No use trying to lose some fingers when food was involved.
Logan held up a finger, to show Mrs. Knight that he wasn't done chewing, before he spoke. Mrs. Knight couldn't help but smile at him. He was always the most polite of them all and it was a fresh change James hogging the bathroom to fix his hair, Kendall hogging the TV to watch a hockey game, or Carlos just running around, screaming in everyone's faces. For years, Mrs. Knight had told Kendall, completely joking of course, that he needed a friend that could teach him manners, and then Logan moved to Minnesota in 3rd grade and he got just that.
It wasn't that the other boys weren't great. Kendall was the best son she could ask for, he constantly took care of her and Katie, he looked out for his friends, and he even got a job to help her with pay the bills. (Being a single mother wasn't always as easy as she made it seem). Carlos was such a sweetheart, sensitive to the point that he cried whenever someone else was crying and worried about other people to the point that he could make himself sick. And of course there was James, he could be narcissistic at times; but he had a heart of fold and was willing to do anything for any of his friends. All together, the four of them just worked, and Mrs. Knight often wondered how they had gotten through life without each other before Logan moved there.
"I didn't hear my alarm go off," Logan finally said after he finished eating. "But then again," his eyebrows lowered, his brown eyes darkened, and his eyelids fell as he looked over at Katie. "It could have been turned off on purpose." Katie just smiled sweetly as she reached out to gulp down her orange juice. "But it stinks because I don't have any time to do my project and-"
"What project?" Carlos asked, his eyes growing wide with alarm.
"Wait a minute," Kendall lifted an index finger before pointing it across the table to Logan. His green eyes widened incredulously. "This couldn't possibly be that project that Miss. Collins just assigned yesterday." Logan gave a smug smile. Kendall continued to stare at Logan and then gave a short, sarcastic laugh.
"Kiss up!" James fake-coughed into his hand and Kendall laughed in agreement.
"It wouldn't hurt your grade to try and get a head start on your project, Kendall." Mrs. Knight commented with an amused smile as her son shot her a pained look.
"Way to be on my side, mom." Kendall mumbled.
"I'm not on anyone's side, sweetie." Mrs. Knight leaned forward and kissed Kendall on the cheek, causing him to blush in front of his friends. "But I do care about all of your grades, and they could be higher."
"You don't know how hard it is to do schoolwork though, Mama Knight," James quickly defended himself. "I mean, take me for example; I have to do my hair, make sure my clothes are cool enough to leave the apartment in, make sure I smell good for the ladies," he continued to count off on his fingers. "Then I have to go to school which we all know is boring-"he ignored Logan's indignant cry of 'hey' and continued. "Then we have to go to Rocque Records and get worked into the ground, and come back here." He slapped his hands down on the table and leaned towards Mrs. Knight, his eyes wide. "I barely have time to do my nightly facial regime, let alone do my homework! Do you know how important my nightly facial regime is?"
"I haven't the foggiest," Mrs. Knight replied with a tight-lipped smile. Don't lose your temper; you'll only regret it later. Mrs. Knight let out a sigh and looked at her watch and then set her mug of coffee down onto the table. "Hey, you guys are really going to be late!" She got up and went over to the refrigerator as Kendall, Logan, Carlos, James, and Katie hurried to finish their breakfast. "Here are your lunches," Mrs. Knight turned from the refrigerator with 5 marked brown bags in her hands.
"Thanks mom," Katie took hers before quickly rushing out the door.
"Thanks Mama Knight." Logan said as he took his lunch bag and put it in his backpack.
"Thank You!" James flashed a charming smile as he took his.
"Yum!" Carlos licked his lips as he opened his bag and looked inside of it. He reached his hand in and pulled out a sandwich, starting to unwrap it as he walked out the door.
Mrs. Knight shook her head as she handed Kendall his bag. "Thanks mom," he grinned and leaned over, giving his mother a kiss on the cheek. "Have a great day," he then placed a hand on her shoulder, giving her a concerned look. "And try to relax; you seem pretty tense this morning."
"I'm yours and Katie's mother, the boys' surrogate mother while they're out here in Los Angeles, and I'm your guys' momager," Mrs. Knight replied as she raised an eyebrow. "So, yes, I'm going to be a little tense every now and then." She lightly patted Kendall on the back. "Try not to let Gustavo push your boys around."
Kendall shot his mother a knowing look and left the apartment, jogging to catch up with his friends and sister.
"Bye," Mrs. Knight called after him as the door closed. "Have a great day!"
"Finally, school's over." Carlos grinned as he walked out of the Palm Woods School. "I don't know how much more of that mumbo jumbo I was going to have to listen to." He let out a sigh and slid his backpack off of his shoulders and tossed it over to Logan. "Here, carry this for me?"
Logan let out a shriek as the backpack hit him in the chest, causing him to stumble back a few spaces, but he didn't fall to the ground. "Carlos," Logan snapped and tossed the backpack over to his short friend. "Watch it! You nearly bashed my nose in!"
"Hmm," James placed his index finger to his chin and moved in front of Logan, being obvious about looking him up and down. He then moved his hands up to mimic the look of a camera and tilted them up and down. "With our facial features, having a broken nose may actually help you."
"Ha ha ha," Logan laughed sarcastically and shoved him on the arm.
"Cool it guys, you don't want to do Gustavo's dirty work for him," Kendall stated with a half smile, hitching his backpack up his shoulder. "You know, with his constant screaming and yelling and tearing down our self-esteem, it's only so long until we want to commit suicide, don't speed up the process."
"Kind of morbid conversation for going to rehearsal don't you think?"Kelly Wainright, Gustavo's assistant asked as she walked over to her boys, her eyes glued to her Palm Pilot, like usual. "And Gustavo's not that bad, he's just…"
"Horrible?" Kendall offered.
"Loud?" James added, wiggling a finger in his ear.
"Bossy?" Logan guessed.
"…Mean!" Carlos smiled and nodded enthusiastically.
Kelly couldn't help but smile a little bit as she shook her head. She had to admit, these guys were definitely what Gustavo needed to keep him on his toes with Griffin. And she couldn't say that Gustavo wasn't all of those things, but he had gotten better at managing his anger and stress. To anyone that had just met Gustavo (like the boys had only four months ago) they would say that it was a joke. But Kelly had been working with Gustavo for years and had been by his side with every successful or failed music group that he created along the years and she knew what she was talking about.
"Let's just get to the studio guys," she instructed and turned on her heel, to leave the PalmWoods, giving a bright smile to Mr. Reginald Bitters, the PalmWoods manager as he watched them leave with a glare. "Today you have to work really hard, Gustavo has a lot riding on you. Griffin has really been breathing down his back lately."
"About what?" Kendall asked, looking a tiny bit concerned for his music producer. "What does he have to bother Gustavo about? We just made our demos, Griffin just chose them, and we're making our first CD, what's so bad about that?"
"We'll talk about it after Gustavo and Griffin see if you guys have improved," Kelly replied after a moment. She then noticed the guys' expression as they stopped at the van that drove them to and from Rocque Records every day. "Which you guys have, you've improved so much in such as short time it's phenomenal."
"But," Logan prompted, raising an inquisitive eyebrow.
"But," Kelly agreed with a sigh. She sucked on her tongue, and then shook her head, giving a bright smile. "But nothing, just don't worry about it right now; I shouldn't have even worried you guys. Just go to practice and do a great job and things will go from there." She then opened the passenger side door to the van and gracefully slid inside as the boys clambered into the back.
The four boys pushed Kelly's comments out of their minds as they got into a conversation, or more of a fight, of whether or not playing ice hockey in real life was better than playing it as a video game. When they had arrived at Rocque Records, all of their apprehension was gone and they were even laughing and joking as they went into the dressing rooms to change before going to the dance studio to get some work done.
"Hey Gustavo," Kendall greeted cheerfully. "What do you have for us to-"he stopped short and Carlos, James, and Logan crashed into him.
Gustavo Rocque was standing at one side of the dancing studio glaring at them. But that wasn't different; he was always glaring, grunting, or shouting at them for something, even if they were doing something right. Mr. X was in the room as well, he was Big Time Rush's very eccentric choreographer, and even he seemed nervous. But Arthur Griffin, the CEO of Rocque Records (and Gustavo's personal tormenter) was in the room as well, his arms behind his back and giving a peaceful smile. Kelly had warned them about this, but it was still odd to see him there. And when Arthur Griffin was around, there was usually bad news that came along with it.
"What's going on?" Logan asked, looking back and forth between Gustavo, Mr. X, and Griffin.
"Yeah," James turned to Kelly. "I thought you said that Griffin wasn't going to be here today." Kelly gave a slow shrug, the stunned expression on her face showing that she absolutely had no idea what was going on.
"Boys," Griffin spoke up and slowly walked across the room to the four friends. "Lately, I have been wondering, how is a new boy-band going to help Rocque Records make me money?" He didn't wait for an answer. "I mean, they aren't well known, so how will I drum up interest in them?"
"A lot of advertisement?" Logan guessed.
"Exactly," Griffin turned to Logan and gave what was supposed to be a smile, but looked like a smirk. "Advertisement, promotion of your music and your image, that's what's going to make you big." He whipped his head around to Griffin. "Not a bunch of blind luck." He turned around completely and walked over to Gustavo. "I might not have to go with my decision, but knowing you, Gustavo, it might be a good idea." He nodded over to the large man.
Gustavo bared his teeth and glared at Griffin through his sunglasses before turning his attention to Big Time Rush. "Dogs," he barked, causing them to blink and stand at attention. "I need you to go through 'Famous' all of the choreography that we worked on over the weekend."
"But Gustavo, we haven't finalized it and-"
"Oh," Griffin cut Carlos off. "Talking back?" He turned to Gustavo. "Don't you know how to control your…dogs?"
Kelly winced.
Gustavo's face turned red and he gritted his teeth together. "DOGS, FAMOUS, NOW!"
Kendall made a face and looked at his friends as they moved into the positions that they had come up with when they first finished the song. Kendall in front, as he had the lead vocals for the song, James and Carlos staggered to the left and right, just behind him, and Logan in the back, but slightly off to the side so he could still be seen. The four waited as Mr. X walked over to the boom box and pushed 'PLAY' causing the first few notes to blare out of the tiny machine.
The boys went through the motions of the song as best as they could, and at first they were doing pretty well. But when they got to the part of the song that they had only just recently learned, adding in the fact that Gustavo was openly glaring at them as Griffin was staring at them, their nerves got the better of them. Logan quickly forgot the steps and lost his place. Carlos kept forgetting to bring his 'microphone' up to his mouth whenever he was supposed to be singing. Kendall fell behind the beat of the song and was half a step off for most of the song. James, although he knew all of the dance routine, was dancing so enthusiastically to cover up his friends' mistakes, just made everything look worse.
"Stop. Stop! Stop!" Gustavo stalked over to the boom box and jabbed and slapped at it until the music turned off. Kelly made a face and bit her thumbnail as she looked over at Griffin expectantly. That couldn't have gone any worse than she expected. "HOW HARD IS IT FOR YOU GUYS TO LISTEN TO WHAT I AM TELLING YOU AND DOING IT RIGHT?"
Kendall, James, Logan, and Carlos winced, but stayed quiet. Mr. X, who was standing in the corner, was sobbing quietly and muttering things like 'I'll never get a job again', 'I'm going to be fired', and 'Stupid boys that can't x-dance!'
"Gustavo," Kelly said quietly, her eyes still on Griffin. "Maybe you should explain to them what they had done wrong instead of yelling at them." She finally looked over at Gustavo, who was glaring at her. "We don't want another medical emergency do we?"
"Who's side are you on, anyway?" Gustavo snapped back.
"I'm on your side," Kelly replied, starting to become impatient. She waved a hand in Griffin's direction. "But-"
"But, this band isn't progressing as fast as I hoped they would," Griffin said, finally speaking. He walked over to Gustavo, his arms still behind his back. Through his blazer, Gustavo could see his arm muscles bulging. "You're doing a good job, Gustavo," his eyebrows rose for a minute. "If I do say so myself." He cleared his throat. "But you're going to need more help than I thought." Gustavo opened his mouth to shoot off a retort, but Griffin continued speaking. "I mean, you're the one that is trying to come back after 10 years of not having a hit song or a hit band-'
"9 years," Gustavo interrupted.
"And you're also the one that was saying that you could make a dog a pop-star," Griffin held a hand up in front of Gustavo's face. "And your dogs," his eyes moved over to Kendall, Logan, Carlos, and James. "Don't fit the bill so far. So I'm going to go with my plan; you bring them to the music video shoot tomorrow and you'll find the band that Big Time Rush is going to be working with."
"But they're representing two genres of music that are trying to make a comeback," Kelly jumped into the conversation, walking over to Griffin. As she was Gustavo's assistant, Griffin was also her boss, but unlike Griffin, she wasn't as scared of him as much as Gustavo was. "They're going to be rivals." She then snorted. 'Besides, Gustavo hates their manager."
"And with good reason!" Gustavo added, his face turning red again.
"Dude, calm down," James warned. He and his friends had been watching the exchange quietly, not sure whether or not it was a good idea to jump into the conversation. "The shade of your face so does not go with what you're wearing."
"I still don't like you!" Gustavo snapped as he pointed at James in between the eyes.
James nodded simply, shoving his hands into his pockets. "Got it." He said.
"Come on guys, let's not get angry!" Carlos cried as he jumped into the conversation, lightly slapping the top of his hockey helmet in effect. "Why don't we all just calm down and think happy thoughts?"
Griffin looked over at Carlos and then turned back to Gustavo, pointing a finger at the boys. "Maybe working with them will toughen up your puppies a little bit." He concluded, causing Kelly and Gustavo to let out heavy sighs, their shoulders slumping. Griffin smiled and looked at his watch. "I'm going to be making so much more money; I think it's time to buy another llama." He raised a hand. "Good day to you all." With that, he turned on his heel and left the dance studio.
For a few moments, the only thing that could be heard was Mr. X's quieting sobs.
"What just happened?" Logan asked.
"I'll explain," Kelly replied said. "Long story short, Pop Music is back on the rise as well as Alternative/Hard Rock." She looked at Kendall, Logan, Carlos, and James, watching their faces. "So while you guys are new to the music scene and are representing the pop genre, a band that's very famous in Australia, New Zealand, and…a lot of other countries have just moved to LA and are trying to make it big here in America and they're representing the Alternative/Hard Rock genre." She ignored her PalmPilot as it continuously buzzed in her hand. "Griffin caught wind of it and warned Gustavo about them."
"So?" Kendall snorted. "Why is that so bad?"
"It's bad," Gustavo's loud voice caused them to jump again. He surged up off of his chair and stormed over to the guys, facing them again. "Because they're doing what I'm doing, but doing it better! They're a Rock band, who can play their own instruments, write their own songs, and can dance. And they've been doing it for years!" He shook his head. "The only good thing about it was that they hadn't come over to the US. But now that they're here, Griffin thought of the publicity that would come to Rocque Records if we worked together; so they could help you move through the music industry better and faster than other bands that are just starting out."
"And you think that this is going to hurt us because?" Logan asked as he shrugged, raising his eyebrows. "It sounds like a good idea."
"Trust me; there are a lot of things that are wrong about this." Kelly sighed. "One of which being that it seems to prove that Gustavo can't make a comeback with you guys, which is what he really wanted." She shrugged and then crossed her arms over her chest. "Look, this may not be a bad thing, just meet us here at Rocque Records on Friday and we'll take you to meet the band that you're going to be working with."
"Ok," Kendall agreement after a moment. "But is Gustavo going to sulk like that the whole time?" He pointed over to the grown man, who was now sitting on the floor, his arms crossed over his chest and his bottom lip sticking out. "And what are we going to do with Mr. X?" The choreographed was still standing in the corner crying.
"Mr. X we'll deal with later," Kelly stated. "And Gustavo, yeah, he'll probably still be sulking." She waved a hand. "You guys go; you can have the rest of the day off."
"Are you sure?" James asked as Carlos inched towards the doorway.
"Yeah," Kelly nodded. "I'm sure, see you boys later." She waited until they had grabbed their bags and left the dance studio before walking over to Gustavo. "You're going to have to stop sulking eventually, Gustavo. You can't change their minds."
"I hate that guy!" Gustavo snapped.
"Which one?" Kelly placed a hand on her hip. "Griffin or-"
"Both of them!"
A/N: To those of you that didn't get this before, this is the re-write of my first three BTR stories. That series is/was titled 'With Friends Like These' and they're still up so you can read them if you want. This is a re-write of all of those, so the chapters will have a majority of the same things, but written better. (At least, what I think is written better). But there will be a lot of things changed/taken out/extended as well as there being new scenes. Meh, first chapters are never really my forte, but I hope you guys liked it anyway. I'm not sure if I kept Griffin in character because...I haven't really written about Griffin before, but I think they make him a big too goofy on the show, so I thought about making him the kind of boss that people don't want.
For the readers that have…read my other stories…Elevate may take a bit longer to be put up, but it will be done soon. I hope you liked this.
Like with my other stories, if you guys give me constructive criticism, I'll go back and change everything that I can to make it better and more enjoyable for you guys to read. So please review.
Cheers,
-Riles