“I’ll take a break.”
We’ve all heard that one before. My brother is out of control, is what it boils down to. And he’s only getting worse.
Vaughn has always walked a fine line. Like our father did, until it killed him. Kade and I can easily keep up with our younger brother when it comes to the whiskey—and usually do—most of the time. The difference is, we have downtimes. We lay off when we’re not touring. We clean up when we feel like it.
Cleaning up isn’t something Vaughn’s done in a while. I’m not sure he’s even capable of it at this point. Kade and Roxie and I have talked about it. We decided to finish the tour, then we’ll sit him down and talk it through with him. Get him some help or check him in somewhere if need be.
None of which is happening tonight.
We’re driving all night tonight so we can get back to Nashville in the morning. There’s no doubt this party will still be going when we get there.
This bus has been the hub of our non-stop bender all the way through. We all got into a groove of it for the first month or two, but after a while you find yourself getting more and more strung out from the total lack of sleep and peace and quiet. Even before we left, we were hounded like this. We have a loft warehouse we’ve converted into apartments, a recording studio and an office headquarters in downtown Nashville. We tried to keep the location under wraps but our fans found out about it, like they always do.
“That show was mayhem,” says Vaughn. Not that he minds. Mayhem might as well be Vaughn’s middle name. As if to confirm this, he blows a couple of smoke rings at me.
Tonight I’m not in the mood to fight my way through crowds of people just so I can go to bed.
What I need is some real sleep. Uninterrupted by banging and knocking and people trying to get in.
I need a quiet place to hang out for a while, I decide. A secret getaway. An old house out in the country somewhere, far from the city and the rabid fans and the never-ending parade of groupies, where there’s space and fresh air and days with nothing to do except write. I can’t remember the last time I was alone for more than a few hours at a time.
I’ll find myself someplace off the beaten track, where no one even knows I’m there. I’ll sleep and daydream and clear my head. Maybe Vaughn can spend some time there too, and dry out. And Kade, without the girlfriend. All three of us. We’ll work on our next record. We’ll write our masterpiece, uninterrupted.
I send a message to a real estate agent I sometimes use when I buy new properties. I have three houses: an apartment in Nashville that’s part of our headquarters, my own house in Franklin outside Nashville that I need to get a lot more security for because people have set up fucking camps around the peripheral fences, and a condo in L.A. None of them will be either empty or quiet. I have a lot of friends and an open-door policy for the most part, which I'm now starting to severely regret. All my houses have become magnets for hangers-on and their non-stop parties.
I’m looking for another house, I text him. A farm, maybe, at least a half hour outside Nashville. Something remote. Very private. Surrounded by a lot of land. Maybe with a barn or something I can soundproof and convert into a studio. ASAP.
Three girls surround me. One of them touches the top button of my shirt. I’m not in the mood to party tonight, go figure. I’m strung out. Burned out. I’m twenty-five years old and I already feel like I’m hanging on to the end of a fraying rope. I’ve been burning the candle at both ends for as long as I can remember and I suddenly feel a new urge for some goddamn solitude.
One of the girls touches my hair. Another whispers in my ear. “You’re so hot, Travis. I love you so much.”
I don’t even know her name.
One of the girls weaves her fingers through mine. “We want to show you something in one of the bedrooms, Travis. All of us.”
My phone pings with a message. It’s from my real estate agent. Damn, he’s fast. “Maybe later.” I don’t know, maybe I’ve become jaded. I