That

CHAPTER 1: The Bus

The sight almost hurt my eyes. All our hard work, our sweat and bleed, all was gone. Ashes, just ashes. The fireman said the fire started an hour ago. We were having lunch, celebrating, we could have never known. Joel walked to me, phone in hand, probably talking to the people of Warped and Equal Vision, telling them how Animal Farm was going to miss big part of the tour. He looked sad; I know we're his favorites, along with Dirty Mind. He put his hand on my shoulder.

-I'm sorry babe, we can't get you guys a new bus that fast, you'll have to miss some dates.

-It can't be that hard! You're Joel Madden, someone HAS to give you a bus! – I was desperate. We couldn't miss this tour, not after all we've gone through.

-It doesn't work like that, Chloe. The bus has to travel the whole country, we can't send you guys on something that doesn't have been tasted before. Every little detail needs to be checked. Something fails and you're all severely injured or worst, dead. It's final, you have to wait. I'll ask the other bands if they can take you guys with them, but I'm not sure if any of them can. Luckily you're just four so you may be able to share bunks. Pretty hard since you are the only girl on Warped this year...

-I'll share a bunk with a guy if I have to. I'll sleep on the bathroom if you need me to, but please, please Joel, we have to go on this tour – I'll do whatever's need to go on this journey.

-I'll call the guys and see what can we do, but don't get your hoped too high.

A tear rolled down my face. We worked our ass off for this. This was supposed to be our year. We've been waiting for this for years. We were touring with Sleeping With Sirens, Dirty Mind, even Pierce The Veil was on Warped this year. It was our dreamed tour. I watched Joel talking on the phone with his brothers and remembered how we've met. Matt, our drummer and my boyfriend at the time, got us into a private party. He was a cop but started working at a bar as security guard, it was less dangerous. I know what you're thinking, is he that old? Well, he's five years older than me. We started dating when I was 18 and he was 23. We broke up a year ago after 6 years dating. It was really hard, he's still mad at me for braking up with him, I think. Anyways, he got us into that party and Joel and Benji were there. Me, as the pain in the ass I am, got wasted as fuck. On that state I decided it was a good idea to get on stage and show my guitar skills. Long story short, I'm not that bad at playing guitar drunk because after my hangover got better I got a call from the Maddens, they wanted to check my band out. To this day it remains unknown to me how they got my number, but hey! I'm not complaining about it. Our band got bigger since that, two years ago. Last year we played on San Diego's date and now we're on the full tour. Well, we were.

I saw the guys coming on my way. Sam was crying, he worked double shifts to buy his bass, it was on the bus. We had everything in there. Our instruments, clothes, drawings from our fans, money, computers, pics of our families and things they gave us for the tour. Everything went to ashes. Michael sat next to me and learned his head on my shoulder, just then I noticed he was crying too. He dropped one of his drum sticks, the only thing that survived from this drum kit, thanks to his weird needing of carry those goddamned sticks with him wherever he goes. I tried to grab it but Jasper got it first. He was silent, sad but not crying. He's always been the strong one. The leader, the one who pushed us further. He started all of this back when we were on senior year. I was the rebellious, kind of whore, badass girl. He, on the other hand, was the cute, athletic boy. He got a scholar ship but denied it, he wanted to start a band, not become a lawyer. Michael's his older brother; he's two years ahead of us. He's energic and passionate. The opposite of Sam who's shy and quiet. Sam used to hate them. They were too loud for his liking. I think they are like the yin and yang. We all are, we keep ourselves on a perfect equilibrium. I heard Joel laughing and we all turned around. He had the biggest smile on his face, he said 'goodbye' and hung up the phone. He walked to us and clapped his hands together.

-You are back on the road kiddos – He was smiling really big. Before any of us could say something a big bus appeared on the parking lot. Out of it came Josh, Dirty Mind's tour manager, followed by Dirty Mind itself and the photographer, Kyle. They walked straight to us and Aaron, the lead singer, put his arm around Joel's shoulders. His hair was bright green and he had creepy smile on his face.

-So J, are they the ones? – He asked with his face so close to Joel's they were almost kissing. Joel just nodded. Aaron looked at us and let go of him – Then guys get your ass on our bus, you're coming with us – He looked at me and added – Don't worry, not in a pervert way. We are not a problem, all taken, just for Mark, 'cause no one likes him – He laughed and punched Mark in the arm and whispered a 'just kidding babe, ya'know I love ya'. Mark just laughed him off. Aaron looked at us – C'mon, y'all get on the bus or we all will be late. You can borrow some of our shirts if ya want.

And just like that, we got into the bus.

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Note: Okay, after everything, here's the first chapter. 

The bands, the tour, Equal Vision and real people (like the Maddens) are NOT characters/creations of mine, they are real people/agencies and they were never involved on something like this, they're just here to give the story some kind of accuracy and context. You'll see, the Maddens work with Equal Vision producing bands who are starting their career; and Pierce The Veil and Sleeping With Sirens are some of the bands that actually performed on Vans Warped Tour at some point. 

Chloe's band's name was taken from the book "Animal Farm" by George Orwell. The idea of the name coming from a book came from My Chemical Romance since Mikey Way (the bassist) took the name from "Ecstasy: Three Tales of a Chemical Romance" 

I hope you liked the first chapter. I have the whole story already written since I created it last year, so I'll publish the whole First Part now and, maybe, I'll publish the Second Part later.