Better Left Unsaid (Standalone)
“Okay, this is 103.7 Rock Radio and we’re here with the band....All Time Low!” the interviewer cheers, shooting the camera a smile before turning back to Alex and I.
“Half of All Time Low,” Alex corrects, mirroring her actions and turning to the cameraman. He shoots the lenses something that resembles a smile, but I know it’s not. He really didn’t want to do this interview today but Nano talked him into it. He whined that Zack and Rian rarely ever do interviews by themselves anymore and everyone on the bus just gave him that look. That, ‘Alex, shut up and live your glamorous rock star life’ look.
“The better looking half,” I joke, with a wink. I don’t really mind interviews, I usually just have to sit here and look pretty. But today I’m hoping that if I make enough funny faces in this clip no one will notice how glum Alex looks. I swear he hasn’t even styled his hair properly. It is way too hot out to be wearing a beanie.
“How about you introduce yourselves,” the woman suggests. She ruffles her question sheets and nods her head to the microphone Alex is fiddling with in his hands. He can never sit still when he feels uneasy.
“Hi, I’m Alex and I sing,” he explains before putting the microphone under my chin. I can hear the static as the sensors rub up against my beard and I try not to wince.
“And I’m Jack. I play guitar,” I summarize with a shrug. Or maybe it’s best if we both look nonchalant? Though there’s a difference between playing it cool and not bathing. He’s been wearing that same shirt for four days now. It’s actually really gross, even by my standards. The stench of sweat and staleness is masked by all the cologne he put on five minutes ago. That of course did more damage than repair; the scent was so overwhelming his eyes started to water.
“Though he isn’t very good at it,” Alex can’t help but add in, nudging me with his shoulder before turning back to the interviewer. I fake a pout at the camera, a pudgy forty something year old man swivelling it left and right so he can follow all our movements. I can tell it’s freaking my best friend out. He hasn’t added in scripted lines like that since we first started interviews. Usually he’s a babbling fool who never shuts up about the process of recording and the dedication of our fans. I mean, he loves that stuff. But today is not his day. Hell, it hasn’t been his week.
The interviewer seems to be as scripted as Alex and she lets out this really nasally laugh. I turn my full attention to her, contemplating on whether she’s ever interviewed us before. After a while, all interviewers kind of look the same. She’s wearing this all black outfit, and has really long blonde wavy hair. She’s dawning one of those pencil skirts that reach to her skinny thighs, with some stupid promotional shirt tucked into it. It actually looks ridiculous. But she probably thinks she fits right in with our screen tees and skinny jeans.
“Alright, so, first question,” she begins, biting her lower lip out of nervousness. I wonder if she’s ever even heard of us before. Most interviewers do their research right? But then again, sometimes they confuse us with that one band, ‘The Wanted,’ who borrowed the band name and made it into a song. “The name, ‘All Time Low,’ where did that come from?”
I do my best not to roll my eyes. I’m pretty sure ninety-nine percent of the kids that will bother watching this video on Youtube know the name comes from a ‘New Found Glory’ song. If not, you can look it up on our Wikipedia page. Yet Alex answers the question, his voice slow and steady. He’s been taking extra care of his vocal cords lately. He’s even replaced his wine with hot caffeinated beverages and somehow still stays up late partying. Then again, even when the rest of us have fallen into that typical drunken stupor I can feel him shifting in the bunk above me.
“Oh, cool, okay, so, what about your new album. It’s finally out now... ‘Dirty Work’?” It’s probably not in the camera shot, but Alex has his legs crossed at his ankles. He’s twisting his feet around one another and it’s making the couch shift. I do my best to look like I’m not twitching and settle one arm behind the couch, gripping at the siding. Alex’s caramel eyes dart into my chocolate ones for a second. Then he turns back around, explaining how the title was inspired by the sleaziness of the touring band life. He’s subtly leaning into my arm now, and the static electricity from his beanie is making the hairs on my arm stand on end.
“Sounds like lots of fun,” the woman enthuses, and I can’t help but chuckle. Most days it is fun. I mean, we’re living our dreams here. We tour to different parts of the world where food and language is completely foreign so we manage to get away with some much shit. We mess around every night on stage with our best of friends; playing songs that get back at the bitch we call life. Then afterwards, when we’re still kind of feeding off that buzz, and the alcohol, we meet those overexcited and perverted nuggets we call fans. God knows why they like us, but they do as we do them.
But every up has its down. Living on a bus for three hundred days of the year gets old fast. Sometimes we mess up the notes to our songs, and even though the audience doesn’t notice we certainly do. There are days where we’re really tired or in a rush to avoid jetlag and can’t do a meet and greet. When we go online all we see are embarrassing pictures we don’t remember posing for and haters tweeting about us selling out. It’s almost as bad the slash they write. “You’ve already filmed a music video for it too, no?”
“Yeah, for ‘I Feel Like Dancing,’” Alex nods, his lips just a thin line now. The last thing he wants to talk about right now is the reasoning behind why he got naked on a cotton candy cloud for a music video. It’s not that he’s regrets it or anything, because Alex intentionally pokes fun at society’s ideology of what personas we’re supposed to be playing. He just has those days, like today for example, when he seems to...realize people’s expectations of him when he’s already achieved so much. It kind of overwhelms him. And so he seeks refuge in his mind. I’ve come to learn that’s a really disorientating place to be.
“And how was that?” she presses, looking over at me now.
“Awesome,” I supply, “It’s kind of like a parody of really popular music videos. It goes along with the whole idea behind the song.” This time, Alex visibly shifts his weight so he his shoulder is settled underneath my arm. For some reason the interviewer thinks that if she leans in closer to the guy she can get him to talk more. That’s basically the worst thing she can do. I mean, even though Alex spends a large amount of his day to day life crammed up in a tour bus with a bunch of other dudes, and gets hugged by fans all the time, he really likes his personal space. He’s got this bubble outlined, and only certain people are allowed to cross the threshold. He’s careful when choosing who he touches and who he trusts.
“It was your first video with your new record label right?” she continues, oblivious to how Alex’s breathing rate is increasing. Not many people know this, but Alex was actually was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder a year after we signed our first record deal. The doctor assured him that it was just from the change in lifestyle and the amount of responsibility he took on at such a young age.
Basically, what happens when someone has anxiety is that every little worry is magnified, but by a million. So anything that irks a normal person, stresses Alex out beyond belief. It consumes him both physically and mentally. The worrying causes his breathing to lose rhythm and his hands to shake. There’s medication for it, to stop the uneasiness, but it’s not really all that healthy to take long term. Alex stopped taking it awhile ago, and it left him with a bad case of insomnia. Most of the time he’s fine, and if he’s not, he’ll just have some red wine to loosen up the muscle tension. But as classless as the guy is, he can’t just stop this interview to pop a bottle now can he? So he has to distract himself as much as possible from his own thoughts.
As his best friend, that’s when I come. Gaskarth pulls his mouth away from the microphone and starts jabbing me in the ribs with it. “Ow, that hurts,” I mutter under my breath, using the hand that isn’t around his shoulder to tug at his wrist. His limbs are so much thinner these days. I don’t know if it’s because he started working out with Zack or isn’t eating as much. It’s probably both. “We’re with Interscope now.”
“That’s a big time record label,” she commentates, kind of frowning at Alex’s lack of focus.
“A lot of our favourites are on there,” he replies finally. He stops poking me and just lets one hand settle on my knee. I feel a tight squeeze. “Like Gaga.”
“Lady Gaga?” the woman asks, like there are a lot of musicians with that name or something.
“Mhmm,” he hums, it’s kind of annoying that people assume just because we’re in a pop punk band that we can’t like other genres of music, “She’s quite the woman.”
“Quite,” the interviewer agrees and I can tell she probably thinks Alex is flat out messing with her. Her is a job is on the line here, so she just goes with it.
“Alright, so now I have a few questions from your fans....” She sorts through her cue cards until she finds one. “Okay, if you were stranded on a desert island...”
I let out a fake cough to restrain myself from groaning. Really? The desert island question? They might as well ask me what my favourite colour is.
“...which band member would you take with you?”
“What?” I snap. That’s not how the question goes.
“Which band member?” Alex repeats, a ghost of a smile tugging at his face as he watches my confusion.
“Oh.” I state dumbly. It’s hard to focus on both Alex’s body language and the interview. I think a lot of people assume I’m somewhat of a space case because of how much attention I pay to a person and not their speech. I usually play it off as a loss of hearing from my day job. “I, uhh, would probably take Alex.” I admit.
My best friend’s bushy eyebrows rise up in surprise. “Really?”
I nod quickly, adjusting my hat on my head so the flap covers my face, “Yeah bro.”
“Awh,” coos the interviewer, but Alex completely ignores her as he leans in closer to me, trying to get a proper look. I don’t bother flinching. It’s not like I’m blushing or anything. I don’t get embarrassed easily, especially not in front of someone who sees my dick on a daily basis.
He says nothing, just kind of looks at me, and finally gives a real smile. “I’d probably take Rian.” He says. I pretend to look of hurt. There have been plenty of jokes of how our ‘bromance’ has been ruined with this whole ‘Rilex’ thing. But we both know that’s not true. I mean yeah, Dawson has finally gotten over the fact Alex was this huge douche bag in high school with the hot dates while he was the chubby magician , but nothing has happened to ‘Jalex’. The fact we can spend time apart and still be as close as we are is a testament to how strong our friendship actually is. We’ve always been so wrapped up in one another that it almost stifled our growth. Our time apart has let me realize what kind of person I want to be, and what kind of person I need to be with. It just so happens it’s Alex.
“Rian?” the interviewer questions.
“Our drummer,” he clarifies as he presses his face onto my chest, losing all eye contact with the camera. “We already kind of live together.”
She merely blinks in surprise, “Oh.” She clearly hasn’t done her research when it comes to us.
“Rian is a babe,” I sigh jokingly, “I can’t compete with those teeth.” I feel Alex chuckling against me even though no sound comes out of his mouth.
“You really can’t,” he agrees.
“There is a fourth member to your band, right?” the interviewer tries gathering the attention back on her but its too late.
“Zack,” I pipe up, “Our bassist.”
“Zack’s a really good looking guy too.” Alex inserts, “Pretty sure his nudes are on still online somewhere.”
“They are,” I confirm without actually knowing, “I checked this morning.”
At this point the interviewer is beyond help and just chuckles awkwardly. I can’t actually tell how disgusted the cameraman must be, but he takes to zooming in on the interviewer. In the five seconds that no eyes are on us, Alex strains his neck upwards and kisses my left cheek. His nose grazes up against my jaw, and he wipes the wetness from his eyelashes against my face. I restrain myself from frowning at the feeling, because I know Alex likes to pretend I don’t know what’s going on.
It’s not like he has to say anything for me to know that was a ‘thank you.’ I know my best friend well enough to understand when he needs me. It’s kind of touch and go. He gets bummed out, and it’s my job to cheer him up. I think it’s the only reason we’ve managed to stay so humble. Alex is this crazy over analytical asshole and I’m the guy who reminds him to relax. The other night we trashed a hotel room and in the morning he questioned me about the ‘impact’ we have on people’s lives and whether our own lives can even still be considered ‘relevant’. Like how would I know that? I was still hung over so I just gave the oversensitive lyricist a hug and Redbull.
Later on though, when my head was a little clearer, I realized he is the one who keeps us relevant. Alex is constantly reminding us of why I wanted to start this band in the first place. It’s not just the perks and hot chicks. There are kids out there, kids who think they’re fucking up, when really, it is society that fucking us over. Teen angst kills you from inside out. If it weren’t for friends and music, none of us would be alive right now. We’d be breathing, but not alive. You have to feel things, really strong and sometimes bad emotions, to know you’re functioning properly. So really, it’s not his fault his mind works like that. I probably wouldn’t like him as much as I do if he was any other way.
Not that I would ever admit that out loud.
I mean, you can’t quote me on this stuff.
A/N: Just wanted to clarify that though I alluded to a lot of ‘real life occurrences’ within this standalone, I have no idea as to whether Alex suffers from any sort of anxiety disorder or not. I have no proof that he does, this is not some theory of mine; it’s just fiction.