Tell Me When I'm Good Enough [Scrim Fanfic]

XXI

📍 Staples Center, California
August 15th 2017

The sounds of little feet entering the room and running towards me echoed off of the plain walls. I turned and instantly picked Cora up as she giggled, holding her up as she tried to stop me kissing her face. She was a year and four months.

Cora was growing into a polite little lady; her hair was growing longer, and her eyes were turning darker. She resembled her mother quite a bit, but my genes had also started to kick in, the eye color was overriding Lore's, and it was a rare genetic to have.

"Daddy will be back soon, you're going to stay with Uncle Kyle and Dana, okay?" Parenting was a hard job, and it was even harder keeping Cora out of the limelight.

"O...kay, daddy.." She was a shy child and I guess I had myself to blame for that. I didn't socialize her enough with young children her age, but she was recently on tour with us, bouncing from town to town. It gave my mom and pops a reason to come see us at shows, letting them see their granddaughter.

I had been raising Cora on my own for the last four months, I never stopped telling her how much her mom loved her and that one day she would get to see her again. My mom had been the biggest help in my life and my brothers too, my family had been my support beam from the beginning, and I couldn't ask for a better family.

"Give me a kiss." I told her, giving her a quick peck as I carried her towards backstage where Aristos was waiting with our sound tech, we were close to our team, most were friends that we had grew up with in New Orleans and some were people we had met in our journey to becoming suicideboys.

"Ducky!" She yelled, kicking her feet as she reached for Aristos. He took her and blew his cheeks out causing her to giggle. That gave me time to set up, placing my earpieces into my ears and the makeup team to fix the dreads that I had done months ago.

I had recently got a new tattoo across my forehead 'Do not resuscitate' something that I heavily stood behind; if the drugs were going to take me out at least don't bring me back. My mom wasn't the happiest when she had saw the fresh ink on the empty canvas.

"How's baby girl?" He asked, bouncing her before holding her against his chest. Aristos was Cora's favorite and sometimes it hurt when she would go into a tantrum, and I would have to call him up.

"O..kay."" She replied to him. Ari was a second dad to her, and he loved it, he would never have a child of his own after finding out Tallula couldn't have them, but raising Cora like his own gave him a little hope.

"You two need to be on stage now." Kyle came out of nowhere and Aristos handed Cora over to him. Kyle held Cora against his chest, poking her cheeks softly as he kept her smiling.

Kyle was against us bringing Cora on tour at the beginning, he thought the drugs and alcohol would be too much for a child to be around. Ari and I would smoke pot, but would never smoke it around Cora, we'd always smoke it outside to reduce the chance of her getting sick and the pills, I'd take before going on set and I didn't take as many as I wanted to unless someone else was there to watch Cora.

I'd never drink when we had her with us either, she'd share a bed with myself or with Ari on tour. That child was not even three foot yet and she would take up the entire bed so everyone else would sleep uncomfortable while she was peacefully sleeping.

"Be good." I told her, listening to the fans scream. I grabbed her small noise cancelling headphones and placed them over her ears to protect her eardrums from the music, I didn't need my daughter losing her hearing before the age of two.

We each high-fived Cora. "G59 to the grave." Ari and I said in time. Kevin was coming off stage and I really didn't want to be touring with him, I had fought with Kyle and Dana saying that this would be the last time I would tour with Kevin and his little friends. The allegations that came up about him throughout the years made my stomach turn.