Here's the second of three updates... the third one will be out shortly!
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The first time TK went to one of his concerts, Matt had been a wreck. The whole week leading up to the event was filled with incessant practice—it had to be perfect, dammit—so much that his band mates couldn't stand to be in that same room for the rest of the month without feeling like they were trapped.
His nerves had gotten the best of him this time, it seemed. After all, it wasn't just anyone coming to his concert. This was his brother, and that made it just that much more important than anything else.
Five hours away from show time, Matt had a panic attack while trying to get some food into his stomach, which caused a scene at the restaurant as a horde of old ladies converged on him and tried to perform abdominal thrusts to his person while still carrying around their little handbags full of cat food. Matt had only just escaped by roughly swallowing down the piece of burger that'd been choking him with some water and then rushing out of the restaurant in a hurry. A scary time in his life, and one he had no reason to want to repeat. Ever.
Now it was time to put on his game face, and he wasn't sure if he'd be able to do it. It was ridiculous, getting this worked up over something as small as having his brother come to one of his concerts, but he just couldn't help himself from sweating nervously and jittering constantly. If he'd had his way, he would've sat on that chair all night long, but his generous band mates pushed and shoved him out onto the stage, where the bright lights blinded him and he couldn't see a damn thing anyways.
The concert went on as planned and only when he was exiting the stage did Matt's nervousness come back and hit him like a ferocious blow to the stomach--and he'd had enough of those from the old ladies, thank you very much—so it wasn't unexpected for him to book it out of there like a hot little potato and go hide out in his car until TK showed up.
And show up he did. The passenger door opened and TK climbed in, smiling in his usual fashion. Matt wasn't sure if that was a good or a bad thing at this point. He tried to smile back, but failed even at doing such a simple thing.
"What's wrong?" TK asked him, with a slight worried frown adorning his face.
Matt replied, embarrassed by his emotions, "I just… um… wanted to know what you thought of the concert. You know, if it was lame or whatever. That's okay if you think that 'cause you're my brother and all, but you'd better not tell anyone otherwise I'll kick your ass. I can't have you going around telling everyone that it was crap, you know?" Matt trailed off, a growing concern blooming as he took in the utterly confused and frustrated look TK was sporting.
The younger of the two was frowning now even more, staring at Matt. Just staring. It was rather unnerving, truth be told. TK then rummaged around in the glove box, pulling out some paper and a pen. He carefully wrote something down, then passed it to Matt, who read:
I didn't hear a thing you just said. I think the music was too loud...
Matt groaned and hit his head against the steering wheel. This was the outcome of spilling his guts, was it? It had to be a joke, it just had to. There was no way he got emotional and mushy for the first time, only to have it count for nothing.
TK stole the pad of paper back and carefully wrote something else, then threw it in Matt's lap. Matt's heart thumped happily and he almost passed out from the relief he felt when he read:
By the way, I really liked the concert.