Becoming

Flash Of The Blade

Dave and Ade enjoyed a quiet flight to Cincinnati, where Rod said he'd meet them at the airport with a hired car and driver.

"Good to see you two, how was your break?" the manager asked.

"Not bad, aside from hearing the news about Rick Allen," Ade said. "Yours?"

"Terrible news, that. And I was fine until about three hours ago," Rod said. "The plan was for all four of you to get here within half an hour of each other, but Bruce's plane from London was the last one allowed to land in Boston, they're having a snowstorm, so he doesn't know if he'll get here today or be stuck there overnight and have to fly in at the last minute. Anyway, Nicko ought to be here at any moment, so I'm sending the three of you off to the hotel as soon as he arrives. I'll be along in a bit, once I know if they think the storm will taper off early enough for Bruce to get a flight here today, so I can arrange to have him picked up as well." He gave a wry smile and added, "I expect the weather forecasters here at the airport, where lives actually depend on them getting it as accurate as possible, probably can give me much better information than if I was to simply watch the telly for a weather report."

Dave chuckled. "Yeah, s'pose you're likely right about that! So, do we just stand about awkwardly until Nicko shows up or what?"

"Well, since Nicko's here, we can all three stand about awkwardly if you want," Nicko's voice boomed out, chuckling as he approached the group. "Or we can take our arses to our hotel and get some food. Good to see you, mates!"

"Good to see you, too, Nick," Ade said with a quiet smile.

Rod herded them over to the area roped off for hired drivers to wait for their incoming passengers, where their driver greeted them politely. Rod then directed them out to the pickup zone while the driver fetched the car. Fifteen minutes after that, they unloaded under the portico of the hotel they'd be staying in that evening. They checked in quickly and ran their bags up to their rooms before heading back down to the hotel restaurant for lunch.

Steve greeted them in the restaurant. "Good to see you blokes. Everyone have a good break, I hope?"

"Yeah, we did," Dave said.

"I met a real sweet lady," Nicko commented. "I'm a little worried about the whole, she's there and I'm touring thing, but I hope things work out with her."

"Well, I wish you all the best with that," Steve said with a smile, his voice sincere. "Hopefully you'll end up as happy with her as I am with Lorraine."

Ade grinned. "Davey played knight in shining armour."

Steve and Nicko both turned to look at the blond guitarist, who blushed. "Oh, sod off, Ade," Dave said, flipping two fingers at his partner.

"Oh, but I gotta hear this," Nicko declared. "C'mon, Ade, start dishing!"

"Right, well, do you lot remember that absolute wanker who kept trying to tell me how to improve my technique at that last meet'n'greet?" Ade asked. "Dave chatted a bit with that bloke's girlfriend whilst he was busy arguing with me and mentioned to me later that she told him she was going to meet her bloke's parents and all for the first time over Christmas. We spotted the two of them at the restaurant our first night in Chicago, and we both thought from the way they both acted that there was trouble brewing between them. We both thought the bloke seemed like a bit of a bully, so Davey walked over to say hello and gave her our number at the hotel, in case she found herself in need of a friend."

"And did she ever," Dave said, resigning himself to telling the whole story. "Got a call at two in the morning a couple of days after Christmas – the bastard chucked her out, didn't even give her enough time to put proper clothes on. Tamar said she had traveller's cheques for safety and didn't know if she had enough cash on hand for a taxi, cos she's from Hawaii and didn't know how far the phone booth she'd found might have been from our hotel. So I took a taxi out to collect her, and the poor girl was out there in her coat over her nightgown and bare legs with only high heels on her feet. And mind, it had to have been at least ten below that night. Ade had hot drinks and warm blankets waiting for her by the time we got back to the hotel, where she cried on our shoulders for a bit. Since we had a suite anyway, we said she could stay if she wanted to, at least until we were scheduled to leave. Turned out she was scheduled to fly home this morning as well, so that worked out well enough."