A week later Lacie found her self standing in a parking lot in New York city surrounded by trucks, cars, vans, and busses. People were scrambling to put away last minute additions to the equipment and get in place to leave. They had to make it to their first concert in Albany with enough time to set everything up and do all the testing that came with a first show.

It had been an easy spur of the moment decision to say yes to Mr. Carelton. The next week was the longest of her life. explaining over and over to her family and her boyfriend, Rob, why she felt she had to do this. They didn't like it. The band had a bad reputation, a woman traveling alone wasn’t safe, she would miss her niece's birthday. If anyone had come closest to changing her mind it had been Rob. They had a five year plan, that did not include her spending several months traveling across the country with a Rock band.

Rob had decided a long time ago that he wanted a house, a wife and a family by the time he turned 30. He wanted them to work on their careers now, so they could afford a cute house in the suburbs. Then they would have 2 children, close together in age so they could play together in the back yard with their golden retriever. It was a good solid plan.

Lacie wanted kids some day. She wanted a house, a husband, and a dog (the breed didn't matter to her as much as it did to Rob). She had agreed to his plans, because they made sense. Rob wasn't drop dead gorgeous, he didn't make her swoon, and he had never managed to learn what a clitorus was. But he was a good man who had offered her everything she wanted.

Almost everything. She wanted more of a ten year plan. She wasn't sure she'd be ready to have kids in the next few years, and she needed more time to get to where she wanted to be in her career. So when Rob had tried to put his foot down the night before, and told her he was forbidding her to go she'd walked out of his Apartment and told him she'd call him from the road.

"You must be Cooper's babysitter lady." A man said walking up to her. He had short blond hair, pretty blue eyes, and a goatee. She recognized him immediately as the band's piano player, Brandon scott.

"Thats me." She put down her bag and held out her hand "I'm Lacie Peters" he shook her hand and picked up her bag.

"Cool. You'll be riding on the bus with coop and me. Follow me." He led her over to the two giant tour busses with the band's logo and name painted on the side. "The busses are pretty much identical. We're in bus two." He pointed to a small number 2 painted above the corner of the door. She was sure that information was going to come in really handy on this trip. She didn't want to walk onto the wrong bus and look like a fool.

She followed him up the stairs and looked around at her new home for the next few months. It was a very comfortable motorhome, with a small living area that had a large tv and several video game consoles.

Further back there was a small kitchen. Then there was a row of bunks, 2 on either side, about the size of twin beds with curtains that could be drawn shut for privacy.

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"Me and Coop already have the bottom bunks. But you can take your pic of the two top ones. There are some shelves and drawers in the bunk for you to put your stuff away. The bathroom is in the back. we cleared off a shelf forll you in there too." Brandon said, looking quite proud of himself for being the one to give her the grand tour.

"Thank you, I really appreciate it." She put her bag on one of the bunks and started pulling stuff out. At least she knew that one of the guys was tolerable.

"The other guys can't wait to meet the girl who is gonna try and keep coop in line." He said with a laugh. "Unfortunately we are running late and need to hit the road ASAP. So you settle in and we'll do the introduction thing later."

"Where is Cooper?" She looked around, not seeing any sign of anyone else on the bus.

"Right here. " he said as he climbed the stairs onto the bus. "Just can't wait to start babysitting me can you?" He threw his bag onto the bunk directly beneath the one she had chosen. She wondered if it would look cowardly to swap sides now.

"I just wanted to make sure you weren't out in the parking lot having an orgy with the groupies that are getting ready to follow us across the country."

"Most of them don't travel the whole way with us. We lose some and gain some at each stop." Brandon said unhelpfully.

"Good to know, considering one of them is probably your stalker we should pay close attention to who is staying the entire time. And which ones are acting creepy."

Brandon shuddered "to be honest, most of them are pretty creepy."

She nodded. "Noted. Since I'm ninety percent sure that you can't get into much trouble on the bus I am going to settle in and let my family know that we are leaving now." With that she climbed into her bunk.

Cooper snorted. "I think she just issued me a challenge." He told his childhood friend.

"What exactly are you thinking?" Brandon didn't sound too enthusiastic.

"I'm gonna go find some trouble."

"You do you bro. I'm gonna go play the new Madden." The two men headed in opposite directions.

The bus hadn't been moving for more than fifteen minutes when the commotion started. Horns were honking and girls were screaming. Lacie thought that maybe this was normal. Fans would react to seeing their favorite band's tour bus going down the road...wouldn't they? Then the bus swerved and she almost fell out of her bunk. That couldn't be good.

Her mind raced. the stalker might have escalated. she might have gone from the creepy letters, poems, and "gift" she had been told about, to cutting the break lines on the tour bus. Lacie climbed to her feet and went in search of answers.

It didn't take her long to figure out what was wrong. Cooper had popped the vent out of the bathroom ceiling and was sitting on the top of the bus waving to everyone and smiling. "Seriously?" She demanded, hands on her hips.

"What?" He looked down at her. " I wanted to make sure I lived up to my reputation for you. I am a bad boy after all." He laughed and waved at another passing car.

Lacie grabbed cooper's ankles and gave a yank. He fell back into the bus landing on top of her. "Ooof. If you had wanted me to get on top of you all you had to do was ask." He winked.

"What the hell man?" Brandon demanded. He pulled Cooper up and then reached down to to help Lacie to her feet.

"What?" Cooper asked. "I'm just playing my part. I'm the bad boy."

"Grow up man." He shook his head and turned his back on his friend. Leaving Lacie and Cooper standing together in the bathroom.

"Your uncle seemed to think all of this, every crazy thing you have done in the past year, was because of a break up?" Lacie wasn't pulling any punches. Maybe if they could figure out why he was behaving this way they could fix it.

"Don't try to get into my head." He snapped. "And that's not fair. It wasn't all my fault."

"Do you want to talk about it?" She asked, trying to to pry again. I'm a good listener." He walked away and disappeared into his bunk.