Fic: Find My Place in the World Symphony, 1/5
Name: Find My Place in the World Symphony, Pt. 1
Author: missmarie9
Rating: R (mostly for swearing)
Pairing: Kris Allen/Adam Lambert
Summary: 100 glimpses into Kris and Adam's lives as they become more than friends.
Length: This part is ~6,500
Warnings: Angst and powerful fluff. And all mistakes are mine; I don't have a beta.
Disclaimer: I do not own these people, obviously. I respect them and turn no profit from this, which is merely for fun. I also do not own any rights to quotes or lyrics featured in this piece.
Authors Note: Many special appearances and the tweet photo link doesn't go anywhere so don't click on it. Also, this is purposefully not in order; hopefully by the end the timeline of events will be clear.
1 - Limit
“True genius does not fulfill expectations-true genius shatters it.”
Adam is power, incalculable. Adam is the infinity of the sky and the depths of the ocean, the bluest of blues and the farthest line of space. There isn’t a limit he cannot surpass or a realm he cannot breach.
When Adam reaches for those stars outside their galaxy, corona behind like his own personal halo, Kris’ finger goes skyward with him, knowing that only the heavens are holy enough to house such splendor.
2 - Introductions
She saw it the first time she met him. She’d deny it to its peak, deduce that it was something that had evolved over time but stayed dormant as the repercussions of its existence were sour. But each spurred parry was more a lie than the last one.
Because, no matter which way it was spun, the inkling, the first dribble, the potential, had been there from the day she was introduced, wonderfully before that. The sheepish grin was a tell, the natural ease another, as was the magnetism and the steadiness to which they held each other’s gaze.
They were so…conscious of one another.
“What are you doing?” she wondered aloud when she and Kris were alone in the foyer, purse on her shoulder, arms crossed over her chest.
Her husband shrugged, open mouth crinkling into a saccharine smile. “I’m just hanging out with him. It’s nothing.”
He always had been a terrible liar. The disadvantage was even more prominent where it concerned Adam Lambert.
3 - Insomnia
After two weeks, what surprised them the most was that they developed a routine in their down-time; in a competition where the contestants were supposed to remain alert and constantly on their toes, the band had their ways of inseminating sanity into the insane run of their lives.
Monday and Tuesday nights were spent with everyone preparing with a shared tantamount anxiety, flitting and fretting around the rooms. Wednesday’s were the nights when they didn’t return until close to the new day so there was little time for anything but crashing. Thursday was Movie Night and Friday was Game Night (yet another thing that would surprise the outside world); it somehow always turned into boys vs. girls, even when the boys outnumbered the girls, even when Adam took the dark side.
Saturday, if permitted, was the one part of the week where they were released from their handlers and let out of their pen, though the contract permitted that no debauchery was to be had, thus madness was merely a downtrodden simmer as opposed to a delightful inferno. And Sunday, the night before it all started over again, the posse unwound by congregating in the kitchen and fixing a meal that lasted well over hours.
As untraditional as it sounded, as it appeared, as it was, after two weeks it was completely normal.
And so much different than fait accompli.
The only thing that had survived the hurricane that was American Idol was the disparaging fitful sleeps and bouts of insomnia, so perpetually on the cusp of it all that it took more effort than he cared to admit to keep from letting his frustration get the better of him. He was gratuitous that most of the time he was so exhausted and drained from the day’s activities that he bared no ire with sleep, that it came naturally and swiftly, but some nights-much like tonight-Queen Mab whisked on by without a helpful dose.
He tossed as he did, turned as he pleased, fluffed, shoved off, recovered, sighed and shuffled, to no avail. Lying on his back, body lax and limbs limp as if in final relaxation of a yoga practice, he stared up at the ceiling, eyes rolling with the fan’s cycle.
Kris fidgeted in his sleep from across the room, the restlessness apparently contagious, tossing as he did and turning as he did, in the same boat and on the same train. Sighing, Adam kicked the sheets away, detangling his legs, and swung them overboard, walking to Kris’ bed, thinking, hell, might as well resort to old habits.
Shaking Kris’ shoulder, he flicked on the lamp beside the bed, squinting in the sudden luminance. Kris stared up at him, not solemnest in the slightest, just as Adam had suspected.
“Feel like going for a drive?” he inquired softly.
Kris didn’t hesitate, pushing back his own covers and stepping into shoes while Adam fetched a shirt from his suitcase. Ten minutes later they were creeping down the hall and another five saw them climbing into a car in the garage, cruising onto the angel’s streets.
4 - Wreckage
His small existence derails from its axis when Kris slides into him, choking on a gasp as pop rocks burst behind his eyes, clenching the sheets underneath him, staring up at his friend as they breathe onto one another’s lips.
All the lovers before, all the men and the sweat and the hunger, don’t compare to this-none of those fast fucks compare to this, to feeling this whole and fitting like a puzzle piece he hadn’t known was missing. It overwhelms ever emotion in his body and he kisses Kris with the same tenderness expelled from the fingertips caressing his cheek.
Whispering the man’s born name, Adam places Kris’ hand over his heart and rasps, “Feel you, right here.”
5 - Do You Love Me?
If there was ever a person that personified the fish-out-of-water label, it was Baby as she cowered awkwardly to one side of the servant’s cabin, hands wringing uncomfortably in her lap, inspecting the hodgepodge around her. The bodies moved feverishly against one another, sliding and grinding and liquid, coalesced circles that left sweat sheeting skin and labored breaths sharing the same air.
It was the first time Baby had ever felt like she was the girl she was raised to be: clean, timid, and proper.
Unexpectedly the rhythm altered, shifting into faster, headier. And through the doors burst the queen and king, she swishing her long skirt and he grabbing at drinks. After a round of perfunctory greetings, Penny tugged at Johnny’s hand and together they traipsed onto the dance floor, dominating, a ring forming around them as they proceeded to dance. Hips connecting in tangled thrusts and feet kicking in intricate steps that dizzied Baby, Johnny twirled Penny, her hands delving in her blonde curls, and swiveled his pelvis (and she by attachment).
Adam moaned appreciatively on the couch, grandly gesturing with a sweep of the hand. “Now there’s a man I could get behind.”
“Literally,” Kris muttered.
Six pairs of eyes whirled around to look at him, he perking up at the sudden attention. Danny blinked, eyebrows shooting to his hairline, while Lil and Megan giggled behind their fisted hands.
“Did Kris Allen just make a dirty joke? I think he did!” Adam grinned, grasping Kris’ knee and throttling it teasingly.
Kris shoved him away good-naturedly, whispering against the back of his hand, “Shut up. Watch your movie.”
Swatting him one last time for good measure, Adam smirked.
6 - May 22nd
Today was the day from hell. As cliché as it sounded, everything went wrong. First your alarm didn’t go off as scheduled so you were rudely woken from a coma of a slumber by Neil throwing a Nerf ball at your head, which didn’t put you in a stellar mood (stupid little brothers). That, of course, almost made you nearly miss your flight, meeting a fuming Lane and irate band members, each impatient by your tardiness.
The airport food was horrendous and the plane ride long as it crossed country then Monte lost a bag and the airline misplaced Tommy’s guitar. And then there was the whole security situation once you finally got to the venue (you’re on the goddamn performers list; why the fuck wouldn’t you be permitted onto the property?).
Add in three hours of mindless interview after mindless interview with the same stock questions you’d heard for the past year and the belated inquiry as to where originality in journalism vanished to and you were about ready to walk. The last thing you needed was Neil to literally yank you off a stool in between interviewers to announce without preamble that he had just arrived, but, evidentially, awesome baby brother didn’t see it that way.
He was there. He was somewhere close by. The same he who was once your best friend who you hadn’t spoken to in a succession of months since, what, the turn of the new year, all because of crossed signals and misconceptions and executive influence.
It was only by the grace of God that you were put on deck without a distant glimpse of him (a hallelujah moment if you ever participated in one). The crowd was riled and energized and thrashing manically, voices just as clear and lead-heavy as when it all started six hours ago, the echo rattling when the lights dimmed on the current performer, signaling the end of her set and the transition into yours.
You swallowed and for the first (and only) time you beckoned the three milling around in anticipation into a tight circle, grasping hands and huddling together. You’re eyes on Monte, you asked him to say a short prayer. It was the most right thing you could think of to do to exorcise your jitters.
Suddenly Tommy retracted on your right, leaving a cold space and empty air; you blinked and there was Kris at your side, filling the void, caught as he passed by. The heat of his body was extraordinary, his eyes blazing even more, and you barely repressed a shudder, keeping your eyes locked on the black abyss at your feet.
Never the less, you bowed your head and took his hand, customarily twining your fingers. “Dear heavenly Father, we ask that you bless us-”
And it was like you were sucked through the riptide of time, this motherfucking black hole, back to when it wasn’t you and him and this tension and a stupid argument to blame it on. Back to when it was good and solid and, god. The nook in your heart that Kris had claimed forever plus ago swelled.
“-and the rest of the performers here tonight. Keep us all safe-”
You ignored the way his calluses scratched when he lifted your conjoined hands. You ignored the way his eyes were on you and how it made you zone out so all else around you was obsolete. You ignored the way you clenched tighter onto his hand unintentionally. You couldn’t, however, ignore it when he pressed his lips to the back of your hand, lingering and soft and so damn tender that you bit the inside of your lip to keep from crinkling.
“-and give us strength to perform to the best of our abilities.”
The breath you exhaled was shaky, unstable. Kris squeezed your hand and, fuck, you’ve missed this, your anchor, all symbolisms of feet on the ground and total intimacy of the inner ring. You dropped the shield and sword you were fighting with and kissed him between the eyes, his eyelids closing with the contact. Your mustered me too was an answer to his woeful pretense of I miss you.
Damn the label, damn the girl, damn anything and everything that said you couldn’t be there and then. Maybe you could be stronger for it, build your friendship with bricks instead of straw, untouchable to the gusts and wolves of retaliation. All you could do was try.
“Amen.”
7 - Nothing Ever Could Compete
“Kris!” the harmonious voices sang on the minute screen of his cell, two shimmering faces squished together in a box, ebullience radiating from their dizzyingly bright smiles.
Kris’ heart swelled at the side of his two friends: Allison’s riot of tangled red locks rested on Adam’s shoulder, the top hat canted atop his own pompadour shadowing the white paint faintly around her eyes although it didn’t quite disguise Adam’s usual theatrics of feathers and chains. They both waved enthusiastically at the camera, Allison melting into a fit of giggles that she muffled in the sleeve of Adam’s jacket.
“We miss you,” she cried, belittled by Adam’s harangued, “You should be here, you B! You’re missing one hell of a party.”
Kris laughed, knowing full well that he indeed was for there was never a dull moment where Adam resided even temporarily. The exuberance from hundreds of thousands of miles away cracked and splintered the silence of the hotel lobby around him, even the night bustle outside silenced by the tinted Plexiglas windows. A man in the far north corner glanced at him, eroding himself from the paper in his lap with sharply narrowed eyes, and Kris hastily lowered the volume of the pre-recorded video.
“You better be here at the next shoot, little bug,” Adam stated.
“Or we’ll crash yours.”
“Don’t think we won’t. We know people.”
Their eyes shot to the right, on something out of frame, and a line deepened on Adam’s face, the contrast stark and unpleasant against the glitter dusting his cheeks.
“We gotta go, little bug,” he explained morosely. Allison waved once more, bidding him fairfallen before escaping from under Adam’s arm and lolloping away. Adam rolled his eyes then, with an effusive kiss on the lens, “Love you much. I better get to see you soon. Don’t go breaking your promise.”
The video blurred to a halt on his smile; no graceful fade-to-black, no credits rolled, just freezing the metronome. Scrolling through the other media messages Kris had received from Allison over the course of the last few hours, he longingly espied their video shoot through a potpourri of hazy images-everything from Allison with dancers to Adam getting his make-up retouched-and two more videos of Adam performing on stage, twisting and thrusting with that high-intensity energy that Kris was wont.
Slouching in the arm chair, he slipped the phone back into his jean pocket and sighed, extrapolating his chances of sleep when his mind was a hop, skip and a jump across the Pacific and in a California forest.
8 - Cruelty of Reality
“Not everything and everyone in this world are going to be good, baby. We just got another taste of that tonight.”
9 - Tour Story
If there was anything to be said for certain about delirium, it was that all the systematic suspicions and stories were true tenfold. The high of deprivation and the last desperate sputter of an empty engine were the lone glories of nights such as these; shows concluded, but still breaking ground with the adrenaline, the body vaulted into a stage of humor and antics that could only be possible in this twilight time before awareness and dead as a doornail.
It made a person do strange things, exhibited by the two men stationed in front of the webcam as they emitted horribly-stereotypical hick imitations in incredulous cries of, “New York City!” and then the resulting spools of laughter during their requested “bubbletweet.” The prices they slaved for providing fans with candid home videos of the dysfunctional and unconventional family of theirs.
Adam sobered the quicker of the two, continuing his monologue with a last huff and, “We’ll see you guys at the concerts this week-”
“Yeah,” Kris assented, barely audible even in the scarce-but-two bus.
“-and, um…” They passed a look over Adam’s shoulder as he visibly deflated, languidly reclining on his arm against the window panel. “I’m a little tired, so…”
Kris slapped his back, supplying, “Yeah, let’s go to bed, Adam,” though the last words were lost under Adam’s acquiesced grunt. That was, until, with an all-too-serious inquisitive expression directed towards his friend, he wondered aloud, “Who’s on top?”
In a near-perfect reproduction of his partner’s pulled expression from the source’s origin, Adam stilled immediately, lips mashed together as a pregnant pause stifled the air between them. “Yeah…you just did that.”
Adam stared at the screen, inconspicuously watching the recording reflection as Kris slowly drifted out of the camera’s view, mimicking an air traffic controller with the slighted, “beep, beep, beep” puttered from his lips. Adam shook his head, thinking, yep, these are my people, before shutting off the camera. The red light extinguished just in time to catch the aftermath of Kris tripping over his own feet and finding himself face-first on the carpet.
The squeal of laughter that fizzed from within Adam was too comical in and of itself to not further cackle over, even if Kris glared at him from his starfish place on the ground.
“You are such a dork,” Adam declared.
"You love me,” Kris countered, turning his bottom lip inside-out in puerile stubbornness.
“Do not.”
“Do too.”
Adam snorted, planting his forehead on the table surface, because, goddamn, did he.
10 - Insecurity
He’s been searching for his identity since his first day of the crowning; he signed away his life and everything in it for fifteen minutes that stretched longer than he originally bargained for. What’s more, he lost any freedom he previously obtained.
Somewhere between selling his soul and crafting the boy-next-door paragon he lost himself.
“I don’t know what I am.” Who I am, why I am.
He tries not to accommodate this scenario under the telltale excuse, but things like that get a little harder to navigate and catalogue with time.
11 - Limelight
He is, unfortunately, the type of person that tends to learn things the hard way. Road less travelled, life lessons, act by example; whatever one wished to label his unorthodox yet unconscious decisions to discover things, only his curiosity can be blamed. Even with people advising him against it, with people portending of the consequences, he generally goes ahead and does as he sees fit for himself.
He should’ve believed them (agent, manager, family, friends, the whole damn congregation) when they said unanimously that crashing his best friend’s concert in Bean Town unannounced and sans wife-you-just -separated-from was a bad idea. A very bad idea. He should’ve known then that they were right.
But no. He’s realizing it right now, strolling idly out of the Russian Tea Room after dinner with aforementioned best friend (and only with aforementioned best friend, he expounds) and abruptly encircled by white light.
He isn’t quite used to being accosted outside a restaurant, but, by example, Adam is; like a chameleon, he blends with his situation, face devoid of emotion as he soldiers through the blitzing flock of photographers. Eschewed from the voices crying and shouting at him (them), Kris and Adam hasten down the boulevard, the latter a microbe step ahead, fondling car keys, so close, right there.
Kris, simply, is awed by the man. To handle all of it calmly and courteously. So much of the fame bubble is more like being trapped between the lens’ of a microscope, critiqued and analyzed, poked and prodded, and it’s enough to render an annual break, where he splits and goes incognito for a few days if just to have momentary disquiet. And here he thought attention and media straight out of the Idol gate had been overwhelming.
Tomorrow there will be photos and with each photo a headline plus caption mistaken in context and it’ll be cliché yet equally catty: Adam Lambert’s Secret Date! Kris and Adam Step Out! But it’s all a small price to pay (a price he’d continue to pay. Their visits are becoming too infrequent for his taste).
12 - Sunshine
Sometimes, it felt as if they had arrows hanging over their heads, as if they were the lodestars that others were supposed to be drawn to fatalistically, without rhyme or reason, the higher powers singling them out as what the world was first to call on when the time arose.
It started with one sign, then another, and then another, scraps of paper waved in the air that caused him to reel back inexcusably and laugh, if only to manhandle his thoughts from wandering. He had all but forgotten about the overseas lost in translation incidences, until a domestic reporter backed him into a wall to discuss the handy work of misheard lyrics without a sliver of space to escape.
It sounded like I’m a little punk stealing your gay and he had to wonder, again, if it was the nimbus over his fate.
“The lyric is actually ‘I’m a little pawn stealing your game,’” Kris enunciated, matter-of-fact, to the gleeful snickers of his two friends.
Jim Cantiello, quite the Energizer bunny as he sat with a mini-dream come true, leaned towards him, commenting in a hush, “I want to tell you my favorite misheard lyrics, but I feel bad since Allison’s under eighteen, but…”
Kris snorted. “Oh, she’s…” he dismissed with a shrugged-off swat of the hand.
Allison, however, twitched in her seat, looking at the man earnestly. “I don’t-no, don’t feel bad.”
“She’s…” Adam, sharing Kris’ rebuttal at the feared usage of innuendo, chuckled and shook his head; please. If the girl didn’t already know things from being around twenty-something-year-olds all day it wasn’t like she wouldn’t in the very near future. “It’s fine.”
“You’ll never believe it,” Jim exclaimed, nervousness thwarted and gong-ho ahead. “’Anal sunshine when she’s away.’” Kris audibly groaned; oh, right, that one. Once again, unavoidable beacon. “Have you heard it?”
Adam and Allison hollered, citing for a repeat, but Kris merely sighed heavily in surrender. Damn it. “I’ve-there was a sign!”
Jim gaped. “There was a sign?” he cried, astonished.
Kris relayed the anecdote to the man, how it was a girl holding up a sign in Singapore, with Allison pitching in that it wasn’t that hard of a song to know, this Bill Withers ballad, but people heard what they wanted to hear. Kris glanced at Adam from behind Allison’s back and the older man tipped his head, chest rumbling with his guffaw.
Lodestars for innuendo they were, forever it seemed they would be.
13 - Grazed Knees
I’m trying not to stare, it’s too late
The blankets over there, if you like
I’m broken and colder than hell
I should’ve said I’d not come back
In all his years, he’s never had been good at keeping mum and out of the way. He’s outspoken, doesn’t stow anything in a cache, and has never been shy about making his presence known. Anyone who knew him for more than five minutes could attest to that.
He, likewise, isn’t especially good at staying away from certain things; the things that matter, that are important to him, that are worth fighting for. Stubborn as he is, his almost reticent nature demands action. Comes with the territory, he supposes.
The kitchen is near pin-drop silent, save for the occasional gurgle of the coffeemaker behind him and the distant lawnmowers. Kris stands across from him, hands braced on the island tile, leaning against it, the two in parallel stance with one another (an unintentional happening, though it tends to manifest subconsciously). Except Kris has his chin tucked into his chest and is shuffling his feet blithely whilst Adam stares at him, none-too-fondly remembering just why Kris isn’t supposed to be here.
“I’m supposed to stay away from you,” Kris starts in one fell swoop.
“Yeah.” If you care for him, please take a step back. “I’m supposed to stay away from you too.”
He isn’t thinking clearly right now. “I don’t like it.”
“Me either.”
Just until Kris figures himself out. Things could change. Adam steps forward, easily treading across the room in three strides (though more cagily on the eggshells), and sidles up beside Kris, matching his stance with arms crossed over his chest. Neither man looks at the other; the talk is pretty much happening by itself.
This’ll get bad, Adam. You know that. “Maybe…maybe they’re right. Maybe we should cool off for a little bit, take some time,” Adam stammers. Kris rounds on him and he holds his hands up defensively. “You know they’re right, Kris. We were careless and look what happened.”
“A little bad press and you want to call it quits?” Kris exclaims, flustered. It’s going to blow up before it blows over.
And who knows how long that will go on. “I don’t-no. But…” Frustration rising, Adam breathes deeply, clenching his fists. “This is really going to hurt your career. What about your fans, Kris? Who knows how many of them are going to walk. Who knows how many of them will still support you after this.”
Shaking his head, Kris rebuts, “Both of our fan bases know that we’re friends-”
Everything before this will feel like a cakewalk. “We’re not just friends anymore-”
“-and if that’s not okay with any one of them then I don’t want them as a fan.”
Adam sighs, turning away. “Kris…” He won’t agree with this.
“If my fans can’t accept someone that I love, really love, then I don’t want them listening. Then I don’t want them to buy my albums. I don’t want that negativity.”
Don’t give him a chance to. “It can’t work that way.”
(Maybe he had it all backwards. Maybe he could stay away from something if it meant saving it.)
14 - Tweet-tweet
Headed to see Paranormal Activity 2 with @DavidArchie, @KrisAllen & @adamlambert. Wishing you was in my place?
1:12 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for iPhone
Why do I feel like I’m really going to regret agreeing to this?
1:15 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan
Movie with @thedavidcook, @KrisAlen & @adamlambert. A little nervous about what Cookie chose.
1:15 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for iPhone
So excited for PA 2 with @adamlambert, @thedavidcook & @DavidArchie!
1:15 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan
@adamlambert I’ll be there to keep you safe <3
1:15 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan in reply to adamlambert
@KrisAllen Whatever. I better get a pretzel.
1:15 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan in reply to krisallen
@adamlambert I’ll buy you a pretzel. And Twizzlers. And anything else you want.
1:16 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan in reply to adamlambert
- - -
No one’s recognized us yet. : D Now Archie and I just have to keep Adam from using Kris as a pillow.
1:24 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for iPhone
Me, Cook, Kris & Adam. http://tweetphoto.com/91638522 Don’t we make an odd bunch? Love these guys
1:27 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for iPhone
- - -
@KrisAllen I hate you so much right now, Kristopher Neil Allen.
2:31 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan
- - -
The first one was so much better.
3:51 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan
@DavidArchie When did you get so strong???? I can’t feel my arm.
3:51 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for iPhone
@KrisAllen What are you talking about?!? That was fucking scary!
3:53 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan in reply to krisallen
@thedavidcook That’s the last time you get to pick the movie.
4:09 PM Oct 25th via web
15 - Disrepair
In the twenty-nine years worth of opportunities where she’s seen her son cry, it’s been constitutionally the same thing. Her son is a strong man who carries himself a certain way, much like a closed book cuts itself off from its readers until the time comes to split back open. He isn’t for natural expression so when theater entered his life like a high beam, the corollary was that he learned to fake the necessary emotions, hoodwinking them all.
Her son is a strong man of replicated emotion until he isn’t any longer.
Until something so vile and earth-shattering collapses his world from the inside out and she’s there to stitch back the pieces. She always is and forever will be, today and tomorrow and the perpetuity after that. When he shows up at her door only a lonely Tuesday morning, it takes one look to know that the earth has just shattered and maybe this time it’s to a degree of disrepair.
“You’re in love with him,” she observes what feels like hours later, sitting against the bathroom tub, after Adam has stumbled through and left her to interpret the fray inside of him.
He tilts his head, wet eyes beseeching her to please understand, please don’t worsen the wound, and drags a ragged breath through parted lips. “Heartbreakingly,” he exhales. “I, I tried…I don’t want to be, but…Mom…”
The tears overwhelm and he crumbles in on himself, she wrapping her arms around her child, stroking his hair and rubbing his back soothingly. He can break and she’ll be the strength putting him back together.
16 - Law of Gravity
The rain began out of nowhere and it was soon pouring mercilessly, layer upon layer of sheets, swept northbound, whistling through the trees and sending the sun retreating behind the clouds. Cumulous black mountains that invaded from the south and reigned over the city, forcing the smarter parts of her to an absolute standstill, awaiting her next course of action.
The mansion was of little difference, the contestants roaming around in the die-hard habit of pajama pants and sweat shirts, bare feet and bed blankets draped over laps. Being that it was Friday and their rooftop photoshoot had been rescheduled for an undetermined date, the pack was assembled in the living room and arguing, again, about the next film in the day’s lounging marathon line-up. Kris was camped out with the rest, having abandoned all attempts at writing when drawn in by the insatiable shenanigans of one Mr. Ferris Bueller.
Except it was becoming more and more clear that the day’s 80s throwback was being replaced, what with Megan’s Phantom of the Opera up against Matt’s Quantum of Solace, and Kris just wasn’t a Bond fan. Excusing himself from the site, he shambled off, venturing through the back halls to his room, only briefly wondering where his roommate had run off to as he hadn’t been among the anointed group when he’d departed.
It was upon pushing his bedroom door open that he received his answer. Hoodie-encased back to him, Adam stood on the near-side of his bed, wicker basket to the head and a growing pile of folded laundry at the foot; he didn’t acknowledge Kris’ entrance, who was admittedly floored by the utter silence in the room. Not once in the five weeks the two had been living together had Kris ever witnessed a lack of some noise, be it iTunes or Adam’s humming. There was always a surround sound, a seam of something.
With that weighing on his mind, Kris cleared his throat, feeling every bit the unsociable buffoon at a school dance. “We’re about to watch another movie if you want to join. I think Megan’s going to win so it’s Gerard Butler in a cape for the next few hours.” Wait. Nope, nothing. “Just letting you know. If you’re interested. I know no one’s shirtless, but at least they can sing.”
“He’s not really my type,” Adam retorted without even turning his head, continuing to fold a David Bowie shirt.
Kris tried not to notice the mechanic way in which his hands worked so instead he chuckled. “Yeah, he’s not much my type either. Can’t really understand him half the time. Did you ever see RocknRolla?” He stepped forward, unhurried, and stood shoulder-to-bicep with the older man though, if he noticed, Adam didn’t give any indication. “Are you okay?”
Adam glanced over at that, the corner of his lips just barely twitching in amusement. “I’m okay. Why?”
“You’re quiet,” Kris offered by way of explanation. And it was a valid one because this was a first. Loquacious Adam, mum; he wasn’t sure he liked this; it was weird.
“I get like that with the rain,” Adam replied with a snort. “As the law of gravity says, what goes up must come down.”
Ah. “Quiet time.”
“Something like that.” A smirk twisted onto his lips, mischievous and wiry, ricocheting onto the surface and bringing forth the connotations that Kris had come to recognize and deem with an ungraceful ease. “Would you prefer me up and happy?” Kris shrugged; Adam bumped his hip against his roommate’s, slowly and suggestively. “How do you want me, baby?”
Adam’s persuasion for reedy implication was another thing that Kris had become accustomed to; while adhering to inopportune times and generally without registry or consent, it was one of the older man’s more irritating attributes. And, more often than none, the most thrilling.
Kris snorted and collected the socks strewn about into one pile, six pairs in all, matching them accurately then rolling them, situating them in their own pile when done, before snatching up a black wife-beater. “You’re dirty, you know.”
“You wouldn’t have me any other way.” And he really, really wouldn’t. Life would be too dull. “Besides, it’s one of the few things I’m good at.”
“You’re good at more than a few things,” he corrected, casting a side look at Adam.
Adam smiled, diminutive but wispy, dotting, affectionate. “You’re sweet.”
“That’s what I’m good at.”
17 - Espy
He hadn’t been lying when he said one of the first things he noticed about Kris was how attractive he was, how boyish and wholesome and supremely out of his league (because since when has he deserved any of that?). It’d been the smile, he now knew. Slightly introverted and guarded, it read of a nervousness Adam had long since stopped feeling but envied, for nerves made a person an uncanny perfectionist.
But he had been fibbing just a smidgen because Kris’ looks hadn’t been what sealed the deal for him, no, sir’ee.
The moment Kris opened his mouth, Adam’s life had gone straight to hell.
18 - King of Pop
On June 25, 2009, a little piece of the populous’ soul died.
“If you’re just now tuning in, it has been confirmed. The King of Pop, Michael Jackson, has died from a supposed accidental overdose at the age of fifty.”
There was a palpable shudder felt through the assembled group as the words were spoken, putting a voice to the marquee truth on the screen and augmenting an elegiac tone to the collective mourning. The fourteen froze like deer caught in the headlights, too shocked to move, every sense in their bodies shutting down and every thought in their minds vanishing.
Lil was the first to break rank, her hand flying up to cup her mouth as tears pooled in her eyes, and the rest gradually followed suit; Scott ran a hand through his hair, the tour director turned away, and Anoop dropped to the concrete floor. Adam slowly sank onto the arm chair off to the side, moving backward until the back of his knees felt the cushion and falling, eyes still fixated like a car crash on the television.
“All attempts to revive Mr. Jackson have failed and, as you are seeing now, his body is being transferred to a nearby medical hospital.”
On the screen a sheet-covered gurney was loaded into the back of an ambulance, roped off and given breathing room, the two paramedics clamoring into the back and closing the doors with a silent clang. The footage broke away unceremoniously and was replaced by shots from around the world of crowds gathered to watch. Times Square, the Mall of America, bars in Paris and Milan, all faces stoic and impassive. The reality had yet to sink in; such a thing would take hours before the ripple hit home.
The reel wrapped and the journalist began to list the facts as they were known: Conrad Murray refused to let anyone call for an ambulance, suspicious pills located in the house, children taken to an undisclosed house. All whilst broadcasting footage from the musician’s upcoming documentary.
Adam subconsciously reached out to Kris and wrapped his fingers around the man’s wrist, gently guiding him over until the stunned man sat on the chair’s armrest, an anchor in the fog. With the others incapacitated by the deafening blow in front of them hardly anyone noticed when Kris twined his and Adam’s fingers together and was given a comforting squeeze in return.
19 - Scratch Sketch
Take it away, fix your mistake
I’ll be right here when you come back home
Come back home
Kris reclined against the couch’s back, allowing his hand to fall limply into his lap and fingers to loosen on the stranglehold around the guitar’s neck, breathing deeply, quelling all the ticks that were oh-so-common during his writing process. Did that sound right? Did this chord work with the lyric? A litany of the same.
In one of those rare moments, the living room was near silent, nearly all the contestants retired to their own rooms for the evening save for the two rolling a round of bowling downstairs. Desired atmosphere, same meddling.
Sitting up, Kris handled the guitar carefully once again, poising his pick over the strings while twisting the pegs with his left hand. Then, experimentally, he strummed into an open D. “I will be…I’ll be…I will be your last, crap.”
Clearing his throat with a shuffle onto the closer edge of the cushion, he began again, singing softly, “I will be your last catch, I will be,” with a decrescendo of, “everything you need.”
I will be
your last catch
I will be
everything you never thought you’d need
You’ll have me
till your heart stops beating
20 - Wishes
Allen-Lambert Tour Kicks Off in September
By: Noah Macht
May 9, 2011, 8:57am
After two months of speculation due to hinting remarks from both parties, American Idol alums Kris Allen and Adam Lambert confirmed this morning the news every Kradam fan has been waiting two years for: the duo will be co-headlining a tour together towards the end of the year.
“We’re doing it for the fans,” Allen told E! News. “And it’s a little for ourselves too. Adam and I have missed each other and doing this-which was something we talked briefly about doing someday-gives us an opportunity to hang out. I’m just praying Adam’s glamily takes me in.”
“Oh, I’m super excited,” Lambert gushed at last night’s People Magazine bash for their Most Beautiful People issue. “Super, super excited. We’re going to have a great time and I know we won’t disappoint the fans. Or at least I hope we don’t. I hope they like what Kris and I have decided to do.”
The currently untitled tour will kick off on September 4th in Los Angeles, California and will make a total of forty-eight stops around the country before finishing in Portland, Oregon on January 13, 2012. Pre-sale tickets, which go on sale June 14th at 10am, are expected to go fast, as this marks the first tour the two have done together since the Idol Tour in mid-2009. It is rumored that fellow Idol finalist, Allison Iraheta, will make a cameo at a few select shows.
Allen, who was crowned the season 8 winner, and Lambert are both expected to debut new material, but Lambert’s can be heard first when his sophomore album, J. Burdo, drops tomorrow. Allen’s second CD, Rubberneckin, is posited to be released in early August.
Lambert is on the roster to perform at next month’s World Music Awards in Berlin.
- - -
TBA...
Author: missmarie9
Rating: R (mostly for swearing)
Pairing: Kris Allen/Adam Lambert
Summary: 100 glimpses into Kris and Adam's lives as they become more than friends.
Length: This part is ~6,500
Warnings: Angst and powerful fluff. And all mistakes are mine; I don't have a beta.
Disclaimer: I do not own these people, obviously. I respect them and turn no profit from this, which is merely for fun. I also do not own any rights to quotes or lyrics featured in this piece.
Authors Note: Many special appearances and the tweet photo link doesn't go anywhere so don't click on it. Also, this is purposefully not in order; hopefully by the end the timeline of events will be clear.
1 - Limit
“True genius does not fulfill expectations-true genius shatters it.”
Adam is power, incalculable. Adam is the infinity of the sky and the depths of the ocean, the bluest of blues and the farthest line of space. There isn’t a limit he cannot surpass or a realm he cannot breach.
When Adam reaches for those stars outside their galaxy, corona behind like his own personal halo, Kris’ finger goes skyward with him, knowing that only the heavens are holy enough to house such splendor.
2 - Introductions
She saw it the first time she met him. She’d deny it to its peak, deduce that it was something that had evolved over time but stayed dormant as the repercussions of its existence were sour. But each spurred parry was more a lie than the last one.
Because, no matter which way it was spun, the inkling, the first dribble, the potential, had been there from the day she was introduced, wonderfully before that. The sheepish grin was a tell, the natural ease another, as was the magnetism and the steadiness to which they held each other’s gaze.
They were so…conscious of one another.
“What are you doing?” she wondered aloud when she and Kris were alone in the foyer, purse on her shoulder, arms crossed over her chest.
Her husband shrugged, open mouth crinkling into a saccharine smile. “I’m just hanging out with him. It’s nothing.”
He always had been a terrible liar. The disadvantage was even more prominent where it concerned Adam Lambert.
3 - Insomnia
After two weeks, what surprised them the most was that they developed a routine in their down-time; in a competition where the contestants were supposed to remain alert and constantly on their toes, the band had their ways of inseminating sanity into the insane run of their lives.
Monday and Tuesday nights were spent with everyone preparing with a shared tantamount anxiety, flitting and fretting around the rooms. Wednesday’s were the nights when they didn’t return until close to the new day so there was little time for anything but crashing. Thursday was Movie Night and Friday was Game Night (yet another thing that would surprise the outside world); it somehow always turned into boys vs. girls, even when the boys outnumbered the girls, even when Adam took the dark side.
Saturday, if permitted, was the one part of the week where they were released from their handlers and let out of their pen, though the contract permitted that no debauchery was to be had, thus madness was merely a downtrodden simmer as opposed to a delightful inferno. And Sunday, the night before it all started over again, the posse unwound by congregating in the kitchen and fixing a meal that lasted well over hours.
As untraditional as it sounded, as it appeared, as it was, after two weeks it was completely normal.
And so much different than fait accompli.
The only thing that had survived the hurricane that was American Idol was the disparaging fitful sleeps and bouts of insomnia, so perpetually on the cusp of it all that it took more effort than he cared to admit to keep from letting his frustration get the better of him. He was gratuitous that most of the time he was so exhausted and drained from the day’s activities that he bared no ire with sleep, that it came naturally and swiftly, but some nights-much like tonight-Queen Mab whisked on by without a helpful dose.
He tossed as he did, turned as he pleased, fluffed, shoved off, recovered, sighed and shuffled, to no avail. Lying on his back, body lax and limbs limp as if in final relaxation of a yoga practice, he stared up at the ceiling, eyes rolling with the fan’s cycle.
Kris fidgeted in his sleep from across the room, the restlessness apparently contagious, tossing as he did and turning as he did, in the same boat and on the same train. Sighing, Adam kicked the sheets away, detangling his legs, and swung them overboard, walking to Kris’ bed, thinking, hell, might as well resort to old habits.
Shaking Kris’ shoulder, he flicked on the lamp beside the bed, squinting in the sudden luminance. Kris stared up at him, not solemnest in the slightest, just as Adam had suspected.
“Feel like going for a drive?” he inquired softly.
Kris didn’t hesitate, pushing back his own covers and stepping into shoes while Adam fetched a shirt from his suitcase. Ten minutes later they were creeping down the hall and another five saw them climbing into a car in the garage, cruising onto the angel’s streets.
4 - Wreckage
His small existence derails from its axis when Kris slides into him, choking on a gasp as pop rocks burst behind his eyes, clenching the sheets underneath him, staring up at his friend as they breathe onto one another’s lips.
All the lovers before, all the men and the sweat and the hunger, don’t compare to this-none of those fast fucks compare to this, to feeling this whole and fitting like a puzzle piece he hadn’t known was missing. It overwhelms ever emotion in his body and he kisses Kris with the same tenderness expelled from the fingertips caressing his cheek.
Whispering the man’s born name, Adam places Kris’ hand over his heart and rasps, “Feel you, right here.”
5 - Do You Love Me?
If there was ever a person that personified the fish-out-of-water label, it was Baby as she cowered awkwardly to one side of the servant’s cabin, hands wringing uncomfortably in her lap, inspecting the hodgepodge around her. The bodies moved feverishly against one another, sliding and grinding and liquid, coalesced circles that left sweat sheeting skin and labored breaths sharing the same air.
It was the first time Baby had ever felt like she was the girl she was raised to be: clean, timid, and proper.
Unexpectedly the rhythm altered, shifting into faster, headier. And through the doors burst the queen and king, she swishing her long skirt and he grabbing at drinks. After a round of perfunctory greetings, Penny tugged at Johnny’s hand and together they traipsed onto the dance floor, dominating, a ring forming around them as they proceeded to dance. Hips connecting in tangled thrusts and feet kicking in intricate steps that dizzied Baby, Johnny twirled Penny, her hands delving in her blonde curls, and swiveled his pelvis (and she by attachment).
Adam moaned appreciatively on the couch, grandly gesturing with a sweep of the hand. “Now there’s a man I could get behind.”
“Literally,” Kris muttered.
Six pairs of eyes whirled around to look at him, he perking up at the sudden attention. Danny blinked, eyebrows shooting to his hairline, while Lil and Megan giggled behind their fisted hands.
“Did Kris Allen just make a dirty joke? I think he did!” Adam grinned, grasping Kris’ knee and throttling it teasingly.
Kris shoved him away good-naturedly, whispering against the back of his hand, “Shut up. Watch your movie.”
Swatting him one last time for good measure, Adam smirked.
6 - May 22nd
Today was the day from hell. As cliché as it sounded, everything went wrong. First your alarm didn’t go off as scheduled so you were rudely woken from a coma of a slumber by Neil throwing a Nerf ball at your head, which didn’t put you in a stellar mood (stupid little brothers). That, of course, almost made you nearly miss your flight, meeting a fuming Lane and irate band members, each impatient by your tardiness.
The airport food was horrendous and the plane ride long as it crossed country then Monte lost a bag and the airline misplaced Tommy’s guitar. And then there was the whole security situation once you finally got to the venue (you’re on the goddamn performers list; why the fuck wouldn’t you be permitted onto the property?).
Add in three hours of mindless interview after mindless interview with the same stock questions you’d heard for the past year and the belated inquiry as to where originality in journalism vanished to and you were about ready to walk. The last thing you needed was Neil to literally yank you off a stool in between interviewers to announce without preamble that he had just arrived, but, evidentially, awesome baby brother didn’t see it that way.
He was there. He was somewhere close by. The same he who was once your best friend who you hadn’t spoken to in a succession of months since, what, the turn of the new year, all because of crossed signals and misconceptions and executive influence.
It was only by the grace of God that you were put on deck without a distant glimpse of him (a hallelujah moment if you ever participated in one). The crowd was riled and energized and thrashing manically, voices just as clear and lead-heavy as when it all started six hours ago, the echo rattling when the lights dimmed on the current performer, signaling the end of her set and the transition into yours.
You swallowed and for the first (and only) time you beckoned the three milling around in anticipation into a tight circle, grasping hands and huddling together. You’re eyes on Monte, you asked him to say a short prayer. It was the most right thing you could think of to do to exorcise your jitters.
Suddenly Tommy retracted on your right, leaving a cold space and empty air; you blinked and there was Kris at your side, filling the void, caught as he passed by. The heat of his body was extraordinary, his eyes blazing even more, and you barely repressed a shudder, keeping your eyes locked on the black abyss at your feet.
Never the less, you bowed your head and took his hand, customarily twining your fingers. “Dear heavenly Father, we ask that you bless us-”
And it was like you were sucked through the riptide of time, this motherfucking black hole, back to when it wasn’t you and him and this tension and a stupid argument to blame it on. Back to when it was good and solid and, god. The nook in your heart that Kris had claimed forever plus ago swelled.
“-and the rest of the performers here tonight. Keep us all safe-”
You ignored the way his calluses scratched when he lifted your conjoined hands. You ignored the way his eyes were on you and how it made you zone out so all else around you was obsolete. You ignored the way you clenched tighter onto his hand unintentionally. You couldn’t, however, ignore it when he pressed his lips to the back of your hand, lingering and soft and so damn tender that you bit the inside of your lip to keep from crinkling.
“-and give us strength to perform to the best of our abilities.”
The breath you exhaled was shaky, unstable. Kris squeezed your hand and, fuck, you’ve missed this, your anchor, all symbolisms of feet on the ground and total intimacy of the inner ring. You dropped the shield and sword you were fighting with and kissed him between the eyes, his eyelids closing with the contact. Your mustered me too was an answer to his woeful pretense of I miss you.
Damn the label, damn the girl, damn anything and everything that said you couldn’t be there and then. Maybe you could be stronger for it, build your friendship with bricks instead of straw, untouchable to the gusts and wolves of retaliation. All you could do was try.
“Amen.”
7 - Nothing Ever Could Compete
“Kris!” the harmonious voices sang on the minute screen of his cell, two shimmering faces squished together in a box, ebullience radiating from their dizzyingly bright smiles.
Kris’ heart swelled at the side of his two friends: Allison’s riot of tangled red locks rested on Adam’s shoulder, the top hat canted atop his own pompadour shadowing the white paint faintly around her eyes although it didn’t quite disguise Adam’s usual theatrics of feathers and chains. They both waved enthusiastically at the camera, Allison melting into a fit of giggles that she muffled in the sleeve of Adam’s jacket.
“We miss you,” she cried, belittled by Adam’s harangued, “You should be here, you B! You’re missing one hell of a party.”
Kris laughed, knowing full well that he indeed was for there was never a dull moment where Adam resided even temporarily. The exuberance from hundreds of thousands of miles away cracked and splintered the silence of the hotel lobby around him, even the night bustle outside silenced by the tinted Plexiglas windows. A man in the far north corner glanced at him, eroding himself from the paper in his lap with sharply narrowed eyes, and Kris hastily lowered the volume of the pre-recorded video.
“You better be here at the next shoot, little bug,” Adam stated.
“Or we’ll crash yours.”
“Don’t think we won’t. We know people.”
Their eyes shot to the right, on something out of frame, and a line deepened on Adam’s face, the contrast stark and unpleasant against the glitter dusting his cheeks.
“We gotta go, little bug,” he explained morosely. Allison waved once more, bidding him fairfallen before escaping from under Adam’s arm and lolloping away. Adam rolled his eyes then, with an effusive kiss on the lens, “Love you much. I better get to see you soon. Don’t go breaking your promise.”
The video blurred to a halt on his smile; no graceful fade-to-black, no credits rolled, just freezing the metronome. Scrolling through the other media messages Kris had received from Allison over the course of the last few hours, he longingly espied their video shoot through a potpourri of hazy images-everything from Allison with dancers to Adam getting his make-up retouched-and two more videos of Adam performing on stage, twisting and thrusting with that high-intensity energy that Kris was wont.
Slouching in the arm chair, he slipped the phone back into his jean pocket and sighed, extrapolating his chances of sleep when his mind was a hop, skip and a jump across the Pacific and in a California forest.
8 - Cruelty of Reality
“Not everything and everyone in this world are going to be good, baby. We just got another taste of that tonight.”
9 - Tour Story
If there was anything to be said for certain about delirium, it was that all the systematic suspicions and stories were true tenfold. The high of deprivation and the last desperate sputter of an empty engine were the lone glories of nights such as these; shows concluded, but still breaking ground with the adrenaline, the body vaulted into a stage of humor and antics that could only be possible in this twilight time before awareness and dead as a doornail.
It made a person do strange things, exhibited by the two men stationed in front of the webcam as they emitted horribly-stereotypical hick imitations in incredulous cries of, “New York City!” and then the resulting spools of laughter during their requested “bubbletweet.” The prices they slaved for providing fans with candid home videos of the dysfunctional and unconventional family of theirs.
Adam sobered the quicker of the two, continuing his monologue with a last huff and, “We’ll see you guys at the concerts this week-”
“Yeah,” Kris assented, barely audible even in the scarce-but-two bus.
“-and, um…” They passed a look over Adam’s shoulder as he visibly deflated, languidly reclining on his arm against the window panel. “I’m a little tired, so…”
Kris slapped his back, supplying, “Yeah, let’s go to bed, Adam,” though the last words were lost under Adam’s acquiesced grunt. That was, until, with an all-too-serious inquisitive expression directed towards his friend, he wondered aloud, “Who’s on top?”
In a near-perfect reproduction of his partner’s pulled expression from the source’s origin, Adam stilled immediately, lips mashed together as a pregnant pause stifled the air between them. “Yeah…you just did that.”
Adam stared at the screen, inconspicuously watching the recording reflection as Kris slowly drifted out of the camera’s view, mimicking an air traffic controller with the slighted, “beep, beep, beep” puttered from his lips. Adam shook his head, thinking, yep, these are my people, before shutting off the camera. The red light extinguished just in time to catch the aftermath of Kris tripping over his own feet and finding himself face-first on the carpet.
The squeal of laughter that fizzed from within Adam was too comical in and of itself to not further cackle over, even if Kris glared at him from his starfish place on the ground.
“You are such a dork,” Adam declared.
"You love me,” Kris countered, turning his bottom lip inside-out in puerile stubbornness.
“Do not.”
“Do too.”
Adam snorted, planting his forehead on the table surface, because, goddamn, did he.
10 - Insecurity
He’s been searching for his identity since his first day of the crowning; he signed away his life and everything in it for fifteen minutes that stretched longer than he originally bargained for. What’s more, he lost any freedom he previously obtained.
Somewhere between selling his soul and crafting the boy-next-door paragon he lost himself.
“I don’t know what I am.” Who I am, why I am.
He tries not to accommodate this scenario under the telltale excuse, but things like that get a little harder to navigate and catalogue with time.
11 - Limelight
He is, unfortunately, the type of person that tends to learn things the hard way. Road less travelled, life lessons, act by example; whatever one wished to label his unorthodox yet unconscious decisions to discover things, only his curiosity can be blamed. Even with people advising him against it, with people portending of the consequences, he generally goes ahead and does as he sees fit for himself.
He should’ve believed them (agent, manager, family, friends, the whole damn congregation) when they said unanimously that crashing his best friend’s concert in Bean Town unannounced and sans wife-you-just -separated-from was a bad idea. A very bad idea. He should’ve known then that they were right.
But no. He’s realizing it right now, strolling idly out of the Russian Tea Room after dinner with aforementioned best friend (and only with aforementioned best friend, he expounds) and abruptly encircled by white light.
He isn’t quite used to being accosted outside a restaurant, but, by example, Adam is; like a chameleon, he blends with his situation, face devoid of emotion as he soldiers through the blitzing flock of photographers. Eschewed from the voices crying and shouting at him (them), Kris and Adam hasten down the boulevard, the latter a microbe step ahead, fondling car keys, so close, right there.
Kris, simply, is awed by the man. To handle all of it calmly and courteously. So much of the fame bubble is more like being trapped between the lens’ of a microscope, critiqued and analyzed, poked and prodded, and it’s enough to render an annual break, where he splits and goes incognito for a few days if just to have momentary disquiet. And here he thought attention and media straight out of the Idol gate had been overwhelming.
Tomorrow there will be photos and with each photo a headline plus caption mistaken in context and it’ll be cliché yet equally catty: Adam Lambert’s Secret Date! Kris and Adam Step Out! But it’s all a small price to pay (a price he’d continue to pay. Their visits are becoming too infrequent for his taste).
12 - Sunshine
Sometimes, it felt as if they had arrows hanging over their heads, as if they were the lodestars that others were supposed to be drawn to fatalistically, without rhyme or reason, the higher powers singling them out as what the world was first to call on when the time arose.
It started with one sign, then another, and then another, scraps of paper waved in the air that caused him to reel back inexcusably and laugh, if only to manhandle his thoughts from wandering. He had all but forgotten about the overseas lost in translation incidences, until a domestic reporter backed him into a wall to discuss the handy work of misheard lyrics without a sliver of space to escape.
It sounded like I’m a little punk stealing your gay and he had to wonder, again, if it was the nimbus over his fate.
“The lyric is actually ‘I’m a little pawn stealing your game,’” Kris enunciated, matter-of-fact, to the gleeful snickers of his two friends.
Jim Cantiello, quite the Energizer bunny as he sat with a mini-dream come true, leaned towards him, commenting in a hush, “I want to tell you my favorite misheard lyrics, but I feel bad since Allison’s under eighteen, but…”
Kris snorted. “Oh, she’s…” he dismissed with a shrugged-off swat of the hand.
Allison, however, twitched in her seat, looking at the man earnestly. “I don’t-no, don’t feel bad.”
“She’s…” Adam, sharing Kris’ rebuttal at the feared usage of innuendo, chuckled and shook his head; please. If the girl didn’t already know things from being around twenty-something-year-olds all day it wasn’t like she wouldn’t in the very near future. “It’s fine.”
“You’ll never believe it,” Jim exclaimed, nervousness thwarted and gong-ho ahead. “’Anal sunshine when she’s away.’” Kris audibly groaned; oh, right, that one. Once again, unavoidable beacon. “Have you heard it?”
Adam and Allison hollered, citing for a repeat, but Kris merely sighed heavily in surrender. Damn it. “I’ve-there was a sign!”
Jim gaped. “There was a sign?” he cried, astonished.
Kris relayed the anecdote to the man, how it was a girl holding up a sign in Singapore, with Allison pitching in that it wasn’t that hard of a song to know, this Bill Withers ballad, but people heard what they wanted to hear. Kris glanced at Adam from behind Allison’s back and the older man tipped his head, chest rumbling with his guffaw.
Lodestars for innuendo they were, forever it seemed they would be.
13 - Grazed Knees
I’m trying not to stare, it’s too late
The blankets over there, if you like
I’m broken and colder than hell
I should’ve said I’d not come back
In all his years, he’s never had been good at keeping mum and out of the way. He’s outspoken, doesn’t stow anything in a cache, and has never been shy about making his presence known. Anyone who knew him for more than five minutes could attest to that.
He, likewise, isn’t especially good at staying away from certain things; the things that matter, that are important to him, that are worth fighting for. Stubborn as he is, his almost reticent nature demands action. Comes with the territory, he supposes.
The kitchen is near pin-drop silent, save for the occasional gurgle of the coffeemaker behind him and the distant lawnmowers. Kris stands across from him, hands braced on the island tile, leaning against it, the two in parallel stance with one another (an unintentional happening, though it tends to manifest subconsciously). Except Kris has his chin tucked into his chest and is shuffling his feet blithely whilst Adam stares at him, none-too-fondly remembering just why Kris isn’t supposed to be here.
“I’m supposed to stay away from you,” Kris starts in one fell swoop.
“Yeah.” If you care for him, please take a step back. “I’m supposed to stay away from you too.”
He isn’t thinking clearly right now. “I don’t like it.”
“Me either.”
Just until Kris figures himself out. Things could change. Adam steps forward, easily treading across the room in three strides (though more cagily on the eggshells), and sidles up beside Kris, matching his stance with arms crossed over his chest. Neither man looks at the other; the talk is pretty much happening by itself.
This’ll get bad, Adam. You know that. “Maybe…maybe they’re right. Maybe we should cool off for a little bit, take some time,” Adam stammers. Kris rounds on him and he holds his hands up defensively. “You know they’re right, Kris. We were careless and look what happened.”
“A little bad press and you want to call it quits?” Kris exclaims, flustered. It’s going to blow up before it blows over.
And who knows how long that will go on. “I don’t-no. But…” Frustration rising, Adam breathes deeply, clenching his fists. “This is really going to hurt your career. What about your fans, Kris? Who knows how many of them are going to walk. Who knows how many of them will still support you after this.”
Shaking his head, Kris rebuts, “Both of our fan bases know that we’re friends-”
Everything before this will feel like a cakewalk. “We’re not just friends anymore-”
“-and if that’s not okay with any one of them then I don’t want them as a fan.”
Adam sighs, turning away. “Kris…” He won’t agree with this.
“If my fans can’t accept someone that I love, really love, then I don’t want them listening. Then I don’t want them to buy my albums. I don’t want that negativity.”
Don’t give him a chance to. “It can’t work that way.”
(Maybe he had it all backwards. Maybe he could stay away from something if it meant saving it.)
14 - Tweet-tweet
Headed to see Paranormal Activity 2 with @DavidArchie, @KrisAllen & @adamlambert. Wishing you was in my place?
1:12 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for iPhone
Why do I feel like I’m really going to regret agreeing to this?
1:15 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan
Movie with @thedavidcook, @KrisAlen & @adamlambert. A little nervous about what Cookie chose.
1:15 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for iPhone
So excited for PA 2 with @adamlambert, @thedavidcook & @DavidArchie!
1:15 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan
@adamlambert I’ll be there to keep you safe <3
1:15 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan in reply to adamlambert
@KrisAllen Whatever. I better get a pretzel.
1:15 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan in reply to krisallen
@adamlambert I’ll buy you a pretzel. And Twizzlers. And anything else you want.
1:16 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan in reply to adamlambert
- - -
No one’s recognized us yet. : D Now Archie and I just have to keep Adam from using Kris as a pillow.
1:24 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for iPhone
Me, Cook, Kris & Adam. http://tweetphoto.com/91638522 Don’t we make an odd bunch? Love these guys
1:27 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for iPhone
- - -
@KrisAllen I hate you so much right now, Kristopher Neil Allen.
2:31 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan
- - -
The first one was so much better.
3:51 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan
@DavidArchie When did you get so strong???? I can’t feel my arm.
3:51 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for iPhone
@KrisAllen What are you talking about?!? That was fucking scary!
3:53 PM Oct 25th via Twitter for Echofan in reply to krisallen
@thedavidcook That’s the last time you get to pick the movie.
4:09 PM Oct 25th via web
15 - Disrepair
In the twenty-nine years worth of opportunities where she’s seen her son cry, it’s been constitutionally the same thing. Her son is a strong man who carries himself a certain way, much like a closed book cuts itself off from its readers until the time comes to split back open. He isn’t for natural expression so when theater entered his life like a high beam, the corollary was that he learned to fake the necessary emotions, hoodwinking them all.
Her son is a strong man of replicated emotion until he isn’t any longer.
Until something so vile and earth-shattering collapses his world from the inside out and she’s there to stitch back the pieces. She always is and forever will be, today and tomorrow and the perpetuity after that. When he shows up at her door only a lonely Tuesday morning, it takes one look to know that the earth has just shattered and maybe this time it’s to a degree of disrepair.
“You’re in love with him,” she observes what feels like hours later, sitting against the bathroom tub, after Adam has stumbled through and left her to interpret the fray inside of him.
He tilts his head, wet eyes beseeching her to please understand, please don’t worsen the wound, and drags a ragged breath through parted lips. “Heartbreakingly,” he exhales. “I, I tried…I don’t want to be, but…Mom…”
The tears overwhelm and he crumbles in on himself, she wrapping her arms around her child, stroking his hair and rubbing his back soothingly. He can break and she’ll be the strength putting him back together.
16 - Law of Gravity
The rain began out of nowhere and it was soon pouring mercilessly, layer upon layer of sheets, swept northbound, whistling through the trees and sending the sun retreating behind the clouds. Cumulous black mountains that invaded from the south and reigned over the city, forcing the smarter parts of her to an absolute standstill, awaiting her next course of action.
The mansion was of little difference, the contestants roaming around in the die-hard habit of pajama pants and sweat shirts, bare feet and bed blankets draped over laps. Being that it was Friday and their rooftop photoshoot had been rescheduled for an undetermined date, the pack was assembled in the living room and arguing, again, about the next film in the day’s lounging marathon line-up. Kris was camped out with the rest, having abandoned all attempts at writing when drawn in by the insatiable shenanigans of one Mr. Ferris Bueller.
Except it was becoming more and more clear that the day’s 80s throwback was being replaced, what with Megan’s Phantom of the Opera up against Matt’s Quantum of Solace, and Kris just wasn’t a Bond fan. Excusing himself from the site, he shambled off, venturing through the back halls to his room, only briefly wondering where his roommate had run off to as he hadn’t been among the anointed group when he’d departed.
It was upon pushing his bedroom door open that he received his answer. Hoodie-encased back to him, Adam stood on the near-side of his bed, wicker basket to the head and a growing pile of folded laundry at the foot; he didn’t acknowledge Kris’ entrance, who was admittedly floored by the utter silence in the room. Not once in the five weeks the two had been living together had Kris ever witnessed a lack of some noise, be it iTunes or Adam’s humming. There was always a surround sound, a seam of something.
With that weighing on his mind, Kris cleared his throat, feeling every bit the unsociable buffoon at a school dance. “We’re about to watch another movie if you want to join. I think Megan’s going to win so it’s Gerard Butler in a cape for the next few hours.” Wait. Nope, nothing. “Just letting you know. If you’re interested. I know no one’s shirtless, but at least they can sing.”
“He’s not really my type,” Adam retorted without even turning his head, continuing to fold a David Bowie shirt.
Kris tried not to notice the mechanic way in which his hands worked so instead he chuckled. “Yeah, he’s not much my type either. Can’t really understand him half the time. Did you ever see RocknRolla?” He stepped forward, unhurried, and stood shoulder-to-bicep with the older man though, if he noticed, Adam didn’t give any indication. “Are you okay?”
Adam glanced over at that, the corner of his lips just barely twitching in amusement. “I’m okay. Why?”
“You’re quiet,” Kris offered by way of explanation. And it was a valid one because this was a first. Loquacious Adam, mum; he wasn’t sure he liked this; it was weird.
“I get like that with the rain,” Adam replied with a snort. “As the law of gravity says, what goes up must come down.”
Ah. “Quiet time.”
“Something like that.” A smirk twisted onto his lips, mischievous and wiry, ricocheting onto the surface and bringing forth the connotations that Kris had come to recognize and deem with an ungraceful ease. “Would you prefer me up and happy?” Kris shrugged; Adam bumped his hip against his roommate’s, slowly and suggestively. “How do you want me, baby?”
Adam’s persuasion for reedy implication was another thing that Kris had become accustomed to; while adhering to inopportune times and generally without registry or consent, it was one of the older man’s more irritating attributes. And, more often than none, the most thrilling.
Kris snorted and collected the socks strewn about into one pile, six pairs in all, matching them accurately then rolling them, situating them in their own pile when done, before snatching up a black wife-beater. “You’re dirty, you know.”
“You wouldn’t have me any other way.” And he really, really wouldn’t. Life would be too dull. “Besides, it’s one of the few things I’m good at.”
“You’re good at more than a few things,” he corrected, casting a side look at Adam.
Adam smiled, diminutive but wispy, dotting, affectionate. “You’re sweet.”
“That’s what I’m good at.”
17 - Espy
He hadn’t been lying when he said one of the first things he noticed about Kris was how attractive he was, how boyish and wholesome and supremely out of his league (because since when has he deserved any of that?). It’d been the smile, he now knew. Slightly introverted and guarded, it read of a nervousness Adam had long since stopped feeling but envied, for nerves made a person an uncanny perfectionist.
But he had been fibbing just a smidgen because Kris’ looks hadn’t been what sealed the deal for him, no, sir’ee.
The moment Kris opened his mouth, Adam’s life had gone straight to hell.
18 - King of Pop
On June 25, 2009, a little piece of the populous’ soul died.
“If you’re just now tuning in, it has been confirmed. The King of Pop, Michael Jackson, has died from a supposed accidental overdose at the age of fifty.”
There was a palpable shudder felt through the assembled group as the words were spoken, putting a voice to the marquee truth on the screen and augmenting an elegiac tone to the collective mourning. The fourteen froze like deer caught in the headlights, too shocked to move, every sense in their bodies shutting down and every thought in their minds vanishing.
Lil was the first to break rank, her hand flying up to cup her mouth as tears pooled in her eyes, and the rest gradually followed suit; Scott ran a hand through his hair, the tour director turned away, and Anoop dropped to the concrete floor. Adam slowly sank onto the arm chair off to the side, moving backward until the back of his knees felt the cushion and falling, eyes still fixated like a car crash on the television.
“All attempts to revive Mr. Jackson have failed and, as you are seeing now, his body is being transferred to a nearby medical hospital.”
On the screen a sheet-covered gurney was loaded into the back of an ambulance, roped off and given breathing room, the two paramedics clamoring into the back and closing the doors with a silent clang. The footage broke away unceremoniously and was replaced by shots from around the world of crowds gathered to watch. Times Square, the Mall of America, bars in Paris and Milan, all faces stoic and impassive. The reality had yet to sink in; such a thing would take hours before the ripple hit home.
The reel wrapped and the journalist began to list the facts as they were known: Conrad Murray refused to let anyone call for an ambulance, suspicious pills located in the house, children taken to an undisclosed house. All whilst broadcasting footage from the musician’s upcoming documentary.
Adam subconsciously reached out to Kris and wrapped his fingers around the man’s wrist, gently guiding him over until the stunned man sat on the chair’s armrest, an anchor in the fog. With the others incapacitated by the deafening blow in front of them hardly anyone noticed when Kris twined his and Adam’s fingers together and was given a comforting squeeze in return.
19 - Scratch Sketch
Take it away, fix your mistake
I’ll be right here when you come back home
Come back home
Kris reclined against the couch’s back, allowing his hand to fall limply into his lap and fingers to loosen on the stranglehold around the guitar’s neck, breathing deeply, quelling all the ticks that were oh-so-common during his writing process. Did that sound right? Did this chord work with the lyric? A litany of the same.
In one of those rare moments, the living room was near silent, nearly all the contestants retired to their own rooms for the evening save for the two rolling a round of bowling downstairs. Desired atmosphere, same meddling.
Sitting up, Kris handled the guitar carefully once again, poising his pick over the strings while twisting the pegs with his left hand. Then, experimentally, he strummed into an open D. “I will be…I’ll be…I will be your last, crap.”
Clearing his throat with a shuffle onto the closer edge of the cushion, he began again, singing softly, “I will be your last catch, I will be,” with a decrescendo of, “everything you need.”
I will be
your last catch
I will be
everything you never thought you’d need
You’ll have me
till your heart stops beating
20 - Wishes
Allen-Lambert Tour Kicks Off in September
By: Noah Macht
May 9, 2011, 8:57am
After two months of speculation due to hinting remarks from both parties, American Idol alums Kris Allen and Adam Lambert confirmed this morning the news every Kradam fan has been waiting two years for: the duo will be co-headlining a tour together towards the end of the year.
“We’re doing it for the fans,” Allen told E! News. “And it’s a little for ourselves too. Adam and I have missed each other and doing this-which was something we talked briefly about doing someday-gives us an opportunity to hang out. I’m just praying Adam’s glamily takes me in.”
“Oh, I’m super excited,” Lambert gushed at last night’s People Magazine bash for their Most Beautiful People issue. “Super, super excited. We’re going to have a great time and I know we won’t disappoint the fans. Or at least I hope we don’t. I hope they like what Kris and I have decided to do.”
The currently untitled tour will kick off on September 4th in Los Angeles, California and will make a total of forty-eight stops around the country before finishing in Portland, Oregon on January 13, 2012. Pre-sale tickets, which go on sale June 14th at 10am, are expected to go fast, as this marks the first tour the two have done together since the Idol Tour in mid-2009. It is rumored that fellow Idol finalist, Allison Iraheta, will make a cameo at a few select shows.
Allen, who was crowned the season 8 winner, and Lambert are both expected to debut new material, but Lambert’s can be heard first when his sophomore album, J. Burdo, drops tomorrow. Allen’s second CD, Rubberneckin, is posited to be released in early August.
Lambert is on the roster to perform at next month’s World Music Awards in Berlin.
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TBA...