The next couple of hours raced by in a blur of snores (Rem’s), farts (Clive’s), and the muted moans of amateur porn (Cade and Lash never took their eyes off Lash’s phone). As tempted as I was to slink to the back of the van under the pretext of filching a Coke from the cooler—and then peer over the BFFs' shoulders to see what had gotten them all giggly—I was too proud to let my loneliness and desire for inclusion show. Instead, I settled for alternately live-streaming a Japanese pickle-eating contest and pouring over Rim Shot’s TikTok comments. There was a hullabaloo about my live Cade-centric “I Want to Make You” fanservice. Some were for (mostly the gals, particularly the shippers) and some against (largely the dudes, though a few expressed their delight over my “kickstand for Cade”—pretty catchy, NGL) the public spectacle of my wandering hands and undulating pelvis.

Plunging down the comments rabbit hole, I came across a couple of users had taken the time to make slow-mo videos of my humping action; in one case, there was an eyewitness, play-by-play, frame-by-frame analysis leading up to the alleged moment my dong started to rise. I laughed myself silly at that one, but none of the bros bothered to ask what was so funny. And what would I have said? “Banana—you had to be there?” No point in reminding the guys about why they were mad at me in the first place. Then it dawned on me: maybe Lash had seen the vid? Big yikes. But it’s not like he didn’t know about my boner for Cade. Still, seeing the visual evidence on social media might send him over the edge. He was already moodier than a menopausal shark.

After watching the video ten times too many, I fumbled around in my backpack for my emergency flask … but it was empty. I must have drained it yesterday. Luckily, I'd stashed a couple of airplane-sized shots in my toiletries bag. When I was certain Dill’s eyes were on the road, and verified Rem was still snoozing, I drained two mini bottles of cheap poison. The sting of liquor hit the back of my throat and I succumbed to the addictive numbing.

After a minute or two, the fan-made video analysis seemed less threatening, less real. I questioned whether I had seen it at all. Of course, I was aware this was a form of self-gaslighting, but someone famous once said, “You create your own reality,” or some shit like that, so I adopted that as my motto and called it a day. The two shots didn’t do more than take off the edge—it would time to make another liquor run once I’d unpacked at the next hotel. Tomorrow was our first of three gigs; the last night, we were supposed to play at my cousin’s release party. Apparently, the theme was “whipped cream and Jell-O shots” (Lord help us). Rem had the bright idea to dress us all in white, with candy-colored accents via various accessories—I’d have a lime-green tie, Cade a blue-raspberry bandana, Lash a cherry-berry oversized belt, Clive a lemony-lemon pair of boots, and Rem an orange-crush bowler hat. I could already hear the jeers of the haters: “Candy asses!”

Out of nowhere Dill yanked the wheel to the right, narrowly missing a collision with the Prius he cut off to change lanes. The van careened to the side; the tires squealed like calves in a slaughter line.

“Motherfucker!” I hollered. “This isn’t a simulation!”

“If it were, you’d already be KO’d,” Dill deadpanned.

Rem woke up like he’d come out of a deep-space induced coma too early and temporarily forgot he was on a mission to save the earth from aliens. “Where’s home?” he asked, wiping drool from the corner of his mouth.

“Apparently you’re from Boston,” Clive said, outwardly unruffled by our brush with death, “but sometimes I wonder if that’s just part of your founding-father mythology.”

In the rearview mirror, I saw Lash gasp and clutch his imaginary pearls. “Why did you swerve?” he directed at Dill.

“Almost missed the ramp” was Dill’s unconcerned reply.

“Bro …” Cade failed to come up with anything else to add.

Shaking his head back and forth, Rem said, robot-like, “I’m operating low frequency. The cause of my confusion is unknown.”

Frowning, Clive said, “Are you sure that psycho waitress didn’t drug you?”

“Don’t pretend like it’s not your greatest wish to wake up in your underwear tied to a chair while a hot chick with a saw threatens to dismember you.” I craned my neck to look at him. “It'd be your meta fantasy come true.” Widening my eyes, I did what I thought was an accurate impression of Clive during the credits of a horror movie and lowered my voice to match his surfer-dude timber: “Not sure if this sounds gay but I always imagined myself as the final girl.” Slapping my knee, I looked around the van for approval and was met with stony silence and Rem’s half-force glare.

“Have you been boozing?” he asked me as the van weaved in and out of city traffic.

“Did we make a booze run during this road trip?” I asked the rest of the bros. When they didn’t answer, I added, “Not a rhetorical question.”

“Let me see your flask,” Rem said, Dad mode fully activated now that the sleepiness had worn off.

I gave a nonchalant shrug. “Fine.”

Casually I tossed him my backpack. When he caught it, I pushed the bag containing the empties further under my seat. Slick, right?

After riffling through my stuff, Rem came across my flask and opened it. Sniffing, he grimaced when he caught a whiff of day-old Beam. “You’ve been drinking.”

“Dude!” I protested. “Any seasoned alcoholic would realize that’s the scent of stale booze.”

There was an awkward silence while Rem formulated his response.

Speaking more gently than necessary, he replied, “I guess I’m not a seasoned alcoholic then.”

“Fact!” I snorted, hoping my cheeks weren’t the color of Dawn Littlestar’s tush when I (consensually) smacked her with a paddle (she provided) after the Awanis barbeque (she dragged me to) during our sophomore summer in high school.

“Where’s your toiletries bag, Ede?” Lash asked in a traitor-smooth tone. Jerking his chin at Rem, he suggested, “You should check out his fanny pack.”

“It’s not a fanny pack,” I contradicted, willing my voice not to shake. “It’s an ablutions caboodle.”

“We’re here,” Dill announced, unwittingly saving me from certain doom. Parking in front of Sunshine Suites, a dilapidated hotel that had probably peaked in the eighties, he moseyed out of the van. “You don’t have to wait for permission to get out!” he barked from the rear, already opening the trunk.

“I hope we haven’t offended him,” Rem worried, “If word gets out that we’re poorly behaved passengers, it could be a PR potty-word storm.”

Clive clapped him on the shoulder. “I’ll tip Dill an extra twenty so he doesn’t lose his potty word.”

I giggle-snorted despite not wanting to give him any positive attention.

“Twenty? In this economy?” Lash scoffed.

“Yeah, that’s kinda tone deaf, bro,” Cade concurred, letting Ashley go in front of him so he could exit the van first. “These days a twenty’s the equivalent of a penny.” As he waited for Lash to climb out of the van, Cade stretched his arms over his head, revealing a lickable stripe of light-brown-sugar flesh at approximate tramp-stamp coordinates.

Yowza.

I stood up to follow him out, but nearly fell backwards when I got a closeup of his lower-back incidental peepshow. Imagining my tongue (or better yet, my cock) grazing that mouthwatering skin would have made me feel buzzed even without the aid of booze. Most unfortunately, I overcompensated for my lack of balance and leaned too far forward—straight into Cade. In turn, he stumbled into Lash, who had one foot in, one foot out of the van. I watched them take the slowest, seemingly most preventable fall ever, Lash crash-landing onto his butt, Cade flouncing on top of him like they were playing opposite each other in a rom-com for gay softies.

Did it hurt when you fell from heaven? I internally scripted for Lash.

“Sorry!” I called to the groaning guitarists. “You know how much of a fucking klutz I am.”

Heaving himself off Lash, Cade brushed his dirty palms on his jeans before offering a gallant hand to my former fuckbuddy. “Sorry, bro.”

Lash accepted, wincing as Cade hauled him off the ground. “It’s not your fault.” He glared death-by-immolation at me over Cade’s shoulder. “Maybe if you weren’t so drunk all the time, you’d be able to walk in a straight line.”

For once I didn’t have a response, probably because I was too busy bolting back to my seat to retrieve my hidden ablutions caboodle. I’d need to trash the evidence of my icebreakers before Rem remembered he hadn’t finished checking my belongings for empties. I could've refused his unwarranted search, but then we’d have a Panhandle Scramble, Part 2 (one word: willful beach littering to avoid charges for illegal boozing)—and no one wanted that. I’d already been warned a fair number of times I was not to drink and drive, let alone whet my whistle as a passenger. (“This isn’t Hawaii,” Rem had scoffed en route to Tallahassee. “You can’t drink and ride.”) Getting a DUI wasn’t really a threat, especially since I didn’t have a car, but if you asked me to name how many days I’d been sober on this tour, I’d have to plead the fifth (of Jim).

Luckily Rem was too busy wearing his boss hat to interrogate me. After paying Dill—who grunted in what could have been disgust as he peeled out of the parking lot, leaving us choking on a cloud of exhaust—Rem announced, “In the spirit of fairness, Clive, Cade, and I get to draw straws for first dibs of room choice, since we were three-to-a-suite last time. Then it’s rock paper scissors between Ashley and Edan to determine who gets fourth choice.”

Everyone agreed; after the three of them drew straws (pilfered from a McDonald’s coffee run), Cade emerged victorious, followed by Rem and Clive.

“Listen up.” Rem cleared his throat. “There are two hotel rooms just like last time, except this sleeping arrangement’s a little hairier—there’s a full-sized bed in one room, and two queens in the other. Oh! Has anyone seen our manager?” Rem shaded his eyes, looking around the parking lot. “He’s supposed to stay in a room by himself.”

“What’s his name again?” Ashley half joked.

“Brayden drove, remember?” Cade offered. “He probably made a pit stop at Taco Hell.”

“Gracias a Dios he’s rooming alone,” I said. “No need to subject us to the explosive aftermath of the combo pack.”

“My goodness.” Rem looked dazed. “I’m having trouble concentrating after violently awakening from my snooze.” Fanning his shiny face, he said, “It must be the caffeine—too much of it puts me out like a baby in a swaddle.”

I flared my nostrils at the image of baby Rem and mentally cooed at him against my will.

“Wait.” Clive scrunched up his carroty brows. “Back to the rooms—are you saying someone has to sleep on the floor?”

“Either that, or the winner will chivalrously decide to share his bed, but in such a case, it would be close quarters.” Folding his arms, Rem addressed Cade. “What’s it going to be, winner? Room alone, share a floor, or bed buds?”

(*groan*)

“Shouldn’t we see who’s the loser first?” I butted in. “Lash and I haven’t done rock paper scissors yet.”

“Given your behavior, it makes sense for you to forfeit,” Lash hissed. “And PS, there’s no way in hell I’m sharing a bed with him.” He jerked a thumb at me.

“Was I asking?” I snapped. “Do you really think I want to deal with your boner in my butt at four in the morning?” Before he could speak, I held up a hand. “I know, I know—water dog, not horn dog. But still.”

Lash’s eyes narrowed until they looked closed. “The audacity.”

Rem ordered us to settle down; we played rock paper scissors and I won fair and square—my paper covered his rock.

“In your face!” I shouted too enthusiastically. “I am the champion! Bow down to the victor!"

No one congratulated me.

Turning back to Cade, Rem prompted, “So?”

Cade stroked his chin. When he said, “Edan,” no one knew what he meant.

“Yes?” I squeaked.

“Since you and Lash obviously need space, I think you should sleep on the floor of my room.” Cade was pokerfaced. “The rest of you can figure out your sleeping arrangements with the two queens.”

“But the two queens are Lash and Ede,” Clive joked, earning the tiniest smirk from Rem.

“Hold up.” Lash blinked. “You want to room with Edan after he publicly groped you? After what he did to me? To us?”

Cade grimaced. “Did I say I wanted to, or did I say it makes no sense for you two to room together?”

“He’s right,” Clive agreed. “And honestly, if I room with Edan, I might accidentally kill him in my sleep.”

“Not if I kill you first,” I muttered.

“I can’t be held responsible for my body’s unconscious desires.” Clive tapped his chest. “The heart wants what the heart wants.”

“Cade’s decision makes sense,” Rem said, side-eyeing Cade. “As long as you can handle it.”

My OOA’s lip curled. “I’ve handled worse. Remember that time Lash and I roomed with six dudes, two dogs, and three cats in a one-bedroom apartment in Jersey?”

Shuddering, Lash added, “PTSD.”

“Back it up.” I was having trouble processing current events, so I asked Cade, “I’m not, like, hearing things, right? You did just say you’ll room with me? Voluntarily?”

Cade shifted his weight onto his heels. “Yep. We’ll be doing back-to-back shows anyway, so it’s not like we’ll have any time to squabble. But you don’t have a sleeping bag, so you better pray the front desk can provide extra comforters or it’s gonna be a long, hard night spent tossing and turning on the floor.”

Was it my imagination—or did Cade smize at me? Long? Hard? Night? Jesus please us, the plot fucking thickens.