Chapter 1
It was 3:24 pm on August 12, their first official day of touring, that Sara's world as she knew it came crashing down.
Sara, her identical twin Tegan, and the rest of her band mates had been practicing the songs on their set list for what seemed like the millionth time even though they had every song down pat. They wanted the first show of the tour to be perfet. The Quin twins, as they were affectionately called by their fans, wanted to prove to their fans that they could get through a concert without making any major mistakes such as forgetting the words to their songs, or worse forgetting how to play a song, both crimes they had been guilty of commiting more than once.
They finished playing the last song on the list, Call It Off, and happy with their performance they put their instruments away to rest until that night's show.
Ted, the guitar player, Shaun, the bassist, and Johnny, the drummer, decided that they'd go sight-seeing. It's not every day you get to visit Paris. Sara was tempted to join them, but she knew two things; one, she was tired as fuck, and two, they were playing another show here tomorrow night.
She hadn't gotten much sleep last night due to the fact that she had to wake up at 4:00 this morning to catch their 6:30 flight, which of course had ended up being delayed for two hours. She would've slept on the plane if it hadn't been for Tegan. She'd had the misfortune of sitting next to her sister. If only she could've sat next to Ted, who was asleep himself the whole trip. But no, she got the job of comforting the only person in their band scared of flying.
As always she tried to convince Tegan that if she slept through the flight, she wouldn't have anything to be scared of, but Tegan flat-out refused to sleep on an airplane. Something about if it was going to crash she wanted to be awake, so she had at least a small window of opportunity to think of a plan to save herself before the plane finally hit the ground, or water in this case. So instead of getting some much needed rest, Sara did everything she could to distract Tegan and make her forget they were flying at all. She'd taken the window seat, so Tegan couldn't look out at the clouds or down at the water, she'd conversed with her, she'd watched a movie with her, and she played mindless games of hangman and tic-tac-toe with her. None of it had really been worth it until they got off the flight and Tegan told her how grateful she was to have such a caring younger sister and then hugged her.
Sara felt a warmth in the pit of her stomach as she recollected the memory of the hug. Sisterly love she named it. It was an emotion neither twin hardly ever felt. They weren't the closest sisters in the world, and they rarely showed any affection towards the other. A lot of they time they did the opposite, arguing over stupid little things, getting into fist fights, and making death threats. But despite the occasional tiff, they did have each other's backs.
Sara made her way back to the hotel and almost immediately began to fall asleep. It was during that surreal moment when she was awake, but asleep at the same time that her phone beeped alerting her that she had a new text message.
She debated ignoring it and going back to sleep, but there was always the small possibility that it was actually important, so she took her phone out of her pocket and read the text.
Tegan had stayed behind and offered to help the stage crew with getting the lighting set up.
She received a text at the exact same time Sara did unbeknownst to her then. It was from Emy. It wasn't uncommon for her sister's girlfriend to call her. Emy did artwork for their albums among other things, and Tegan had more authority over those things than Sara who had less interest in them. But as soon as Tegan read the text she knew it hadn't been meant for her. She looked to see who it was sent to and found that it was addressed to everyone in Emy's contact list. The idiot had accidently hit the 'reply to all' button.
She had to get to Sara.
I think we should break up, the six most life-changing words Sara Quin had heard since 'Neil signed you to his label.'
How could Emy break up with her? And so suddenly. Maybe they weren't the perfect couple, but they were making it work. Their only problem was that they occasionally fought, but didn't all couples? Their most recent fight had been pretty bad. Sara had wanted Emy to come on tour with them again, but Emy had wanted to stay in Montreal because she had a job of her own to do. Ultimately the latter is what had ended up happening. But that fight shouldn't have been big enough to cause Emy to break up with her, especially since Emy had gotten her way. Why would she do this?
A tear rolled down Sara's cheek as she realized that the woman she loved and the last two years of her life had all been thrown away, just like that.
She laid back down on the bed and closed her eyes. 'This must be a dream,' she thought. 'This has to be a dream.' But as nothing happened, she soon realized that it wasn't.
She sat up in a fit of rage and threw her phone aross the room. It hit the floral print-covered wallpaper of the wall, shattering it into a million fractured pieces of plastic and microchips.
Her anger had disappeared as fast as it had emerged, and she went back to crying.
Tegan heard the thud that resulted from Sara's phone smashing full force into the wall from her place outside Sara's room. The sound startled her for a moment then quickly caused her to bang on the door and yell at Sara to open it and let her in.
Sara chose to ignore her older sister's urgent pleas for access to her room. The last thing she needed to deal with now was some trivial problem of Tegan's.
After a solid minute of knocking with no response. Tegan was forced to unlock the door to her own room and enter Sara's room through there. Good thing they had gotten conjoined rooms.
Tegan wasted no time in giving into her sisterly instincts, sitting down on the bed next to Sara and wrapping her arms around the younger twin just as Sara had done to her so many times before. Sara's always been the stronger of the two and for her to be this upset the situation had to be bad. So Tegan's only option was to return the comfort Sara had given her.
Despite having wished Tegan would disappear a few moments ago, she was thankful that her sister was here now, and the only reason she was here to comfort her. She welcomed the feeling of those strong, inked arms around her slim shoulders bringing with them a sense of security and the ever so important words 'it's going to be okay.'
Normally she'd never allow herself to cry when there was anyone else around, even if it was just her sister. She liked to live up to expactations as the stronger twin, and that meant showing very little weakness. But most of the time when she was forced to hold back her emotions she was only upset about little things. Usually it was just that someone had offended or upset her. Sometimes the problem was a breakup, but she never cared too much about the girl whom with she had broken up. But this time was different, it was Emy, the woman she was practically married to. She couldn't keep her emotions withstrained this time. This wasn't something she could get over easily. It would take time for her to recover. Then it finally dawned on her that she was in no condition to play a show tonight.
Amidst the tears she managed to inform Tegan of this. "I don't think I can go onstage tonight."
Tegan tightened her hold on her sister. "I beg you to reconsider that, but we'll cancel if we have to."
They hadn't canceled a show in years, and Sara really didn't want to do it again now. Could she really bring herself to dissapoint the fans like that? No.
"I don't want to cancel the show."
"It's not a question of whether you want to; it's a question of whether you need to."
At least Tegan cared about her sanity. Most other people wouldn't have gave a second thought about her ability to play tonight's show.
"I don't know if I can," she admitted. "But I'll try."
She could tough it out. Maybe it would be easier to forget about Emy while at center stage completely focused on the fans and the music. Of course, it didn't help that most of her songs were about Emy, and it was likely that she wouldn't be able to stop thinking of her while singing them, but she could get through it as long as Tegan did most of the talking and no one mentioned Emy for the rest of the night. If worse came to worse, she'd have a small break down on stage, shed a few tears, have every girl in the audience feeling sorry for her, and get more gifts and phone numbers than usual out of pity.
Fortunately, it hadn't been too hard for Sara to avoid having an emotional breakdown on stage that night. The crowd had been one of the best in a while, and she and Tegan both had a good time joking around with them.
She even felt good enough to go to the after party at a club just down the street from their hotel. She hardly ever came to these places with Tegan and the guys because she didn't feel like she belonged to the whole party scene, but tonight with her only other option being going back to the hotel and crying herself to sleep it sounded like a good plan.
When going to these places on the occasional whim, Sara liked to stay sober, but tonight she had a couple of beers. It wasn't like she was drunk, just a little tipsy.
Maybe it was just because of the alcohol, but she had to admit that going out like this was pretty fun. It took her mind off of Emy, and she even got a few laughs out of watching Tegan hit on girls and then get rejected because of the language barrier.
After a little over an hour and a half of being at the club it occurred to Sara that she wasn't willing to stay here as long as her sister and the guys wanted to. She was getting a little tired despite her nap from earlier, and she didnd't want to get to bed too late considering she wanted to spend the next day sight-seeing.
She figured it would be rude to just leave, and she didn't want Tegan to freak out when she noticed her absence, so before leaving she wanted to find her sister and inform her that she was going back to the hotel.
The two met up in, of all places, the ladies' room, which Sara had actually been thankful for. They could have a conversation in here without having to scream at each other.
Tegan was surprised to exit one of the bathroom stalls and see her twin standing there. The last time she had seen Sara she had been sitting at the bar all alone. She was shocked to see that no one was hitting on her. The two of them usually get hit on the second they walk into a lesbian bar whether they were in a foreign country or not, and why tonight was any exception for Sara she didn't know. Sara looked good as always in her signature black and white striped shirt and black skinny pants. Of course looks weren't the only thing that mattered. Tegan knew she looked good herself. She had received a few flirty looks and longing glances, but when she went to approach the girls she was unable to keep their interest because they couldn't understand a single word she had been saying. (Why do hot French girls have to speak French?) But Sara wasn't even getting any looks. Maybe she was giving off the 'I've just been dumped by my girlfriend of two years, and I shouldn't really be here right now because I'm not ready to move on yet' look. Girls seem to have a sixth sense for reading that look.
She had wanted to go over and talk to Sara to try and cheer her up just in case she was thinking about Emy, but her bladder had been yelling at her to go to the bathroom for quite a while now, and she finally gave in to it, thinking Sara would be right where Tegan left her when she finished. Finding Sara in the bathroom had only saved her a trip across the dancefloor.
"Sara! Whatever you do, do not use the bathroom. Hold it until we get back to the hotel. They have bidets! It's creepy. There's no toilet paper. I'll never get used to the French and their obsession with bidets. Thank God the hotel has normal toilets."
"Speaking of hotels," Sara started completely uninterested in her sister's rambling. "I'm going back there now."
"I'll come with you." Tegan hadn't been planning to leave just yet, but leaving with Sara would be better than leaving with Ted, Shaun, or Johnny, who were all shit faced. Tegan had drank a little, but she knew better than to drink herself sick the night before a show. She'd rather not babysit any of the guys for the rest of the night. It's never fun being the only sober one.
They informed the guys they were leaving, and none of them seemed to mind giving them uninteligible, drunken replies.
"Do you think they'll make it back?" Sara asked as they stepped outside of the club.
"I hope so. We don't have any replacements for them."
The two laughed and quickly made their way back to the hotel.
Sara was tempted to shower. She hated how hot and sweaty she got on stage, and the fact that they had gone to an equally as hot club afterwards didn't help. Her OCD was telling her she needed to get cleaned, but she was exhausted. She'd much rather sleep now then shower in the morning.
She changed into her version of pajamas which consisted of boxers and a loose-fitting T-shirt. Remembering she left her wallet in her back jean pocket she fished her pants back out of her suitcase and reclaimed the wallet knowing that if she didn't she would forget where her wallet was in the morning and have a panic attack while searching unsuccessfully for it.
She flipped open the fat, leather pouch to find everything the same as it had always been, the perfect contrast to her life right now. Her credit cards were hidden behind her money, and hidden behind her credit cards were her pictures.
Pictures.
She couldn't stop herself from pulling out the few wallet-sized photos she had. There was one of her and Tegan when they were younger, one of their mom, a more recent photo of her and Tegan, and one of her and Emy kissing and smiling at the same time. Tears quickly fell from her eyes spilling onto the photograph and staining it. Sobs soon accompanied them.
Tegan didn't have to strain herself to hear her sister's cries. The walls between them were paper-thin. Knowing this wouldn't be the last time she'd have to comfort Sara she quietly knocked on the wooden door between them to alert Sara she was coming in.
Once again Tegan's arms found their way around her twin. As Sara cried into her shoulder, Tegan whispered, "Shh. It's alright. It'll be okay." She did this and patted Sara's back until the tears and the sobbing subsidded.
It wasn't until Sara pulled away that Tegan saw she had a photo clasped in her fist. She took it out of her sister's hand. It was a photograph of her and Emy, probably at what most would've considered the height of their relationship.
"What do you want me to do with this? Rip it? Burn it? Bury it?"
"No!" Sara said urgently, taking the photo back. "I want to keep it. At least for a little while."
"Aliright." Tegan personally liked to burn most reminders of her exes, but if they had been really special to her, she usually kept a little something to remember them by. She understood why Sara didn't want to get rid of the picture. Her relationship with Emy was far more serious than any relationship Tegan had ever been in.
Sara adjusted herself into a more comfortable position with her back agaisnt the bed's headboard. She looked at the photograph of her and Emy once more before placing it facedown on the nightstand.
"Do you need me to stay with you tonight?"
"No," Sara lied, knowing she couldn't make it through the night alone.
Sara never was a good liar. She couldn't fool anyone, let alone her identical twin sister. "Yes you do. I'm sleeping in here with you tonight."
"Thanks," Sara said finally letting down the last wall of her tough girl facade.
Tegan pulled back the covers, climbed under htem, and then patted the space next to her motioning for Sara to do the same. Sara got up and turned off the lights before crawling under the covers next to Tegan her back facing her sister. Tegan wrapped an arm around Sara's waist and whispered in her ear, "Good night, Sasa."
"Good night, Teetee."
Sara was positive she wouldn't be able to sleep tonight, but Tegan snaking an arm around her waist reminded her of sleeping with Emy who always did the exact same thing. All she had to do was convince herself that Tegan was Emy, and she was out like a light.