Page 2 of Rock Giant

She nodded.“Sorry.”

“Nah, you didn’t wake me.”

“But we did get in the way.”Alle was very much about not getting in the way.“Spook’s making breakfast.He said to ask if you wanted anything.”

“What’s he making?”

She peeped up at him through pale eyelashes.A wild mass of freckles decorated her nose and cheeks.“Pretty much whatever you want.He’s in a good mood.”

“And you too, by the sounds of it.”

“Yeah.”She flashed him a dimpled grin.“A few orgasms before breakfast will do that for a girl.”

“Even when you earn yourself a sore arse in pursuit of them?”

She put her lips together, smirking.“Silly.Those are the best kind.”

And that was why she was hooked up with his bandmate, despite him considering her a very good friend and deliciously sexy.“You don’t need to kiss me better, Paul.I’m good.He’s good to me.He gets me.You can have a hug though, if you need one.”

“Away with your flirting,” he said, removing his arm from her shoulders and giving her a gentle push back towards the steps.

“Jealous that you didn’t get two orgasms before breakfast?”

“Profoundly.”

“Give it a few hours, and I’m sure you’ll have no trouble getting laid.”

“Aye, maybe.”Likely true, if he wanted a random hook up.Black Halo were one of Equinox’s headline acts, and while he might only be the lowly bass player, he was also the only remaining single original member of the band.Not that fans ever gave a shit about relationship statuses.The thing was, increasingly, he didn’t want that.Fun in the moment didn’t counterbalance the post-release emptiness.He needed to find himself a partner in crime.One who was up for madcap adventures, was undaunted by his towering height and other quirks, and preferably had curves for days.The first two, their keyboardist had more or less covered, but Ronnie was skinny as a rake, and in the immortal words of Brian Molko, did not have breasts and all the rest.

“So, full English?”Alle prompted.

“Sounds great.So long as he’s not using the same spoon to cook with that he used on your arse.”

She laughed, and about turned to the steps again, pausing one foot on the bottom one.“We vegan this week or not?”

“Ish.No faces, and lots of mushrooms, please.And absolutely no pussy juice.”

She shook her head at him, prompting him to offer her a salute, but she was snickering as she closed the door between them, leaving him to the mist and dew and the bird calls, and she was no doubt inside repeating his request verbatim to Spook.Who was probably contemplating adding a side of pussy juice to breakfast, but ultimately wouldn’t because he wasn’t an arse, just a sadist.

Thank God he and Alle had worked out a way to be happy together.

Maybe a hook-up wasn’t such a bad idea.It’d beat wanking in the bus’s miniscule shower in which he regularly bruised his elbows attempting to shave.

Paul had finished his tea by the time Spook knocked on the window to let him know that food was ready.The three of them sat down together around the tiny kitchen table Alle had previously been bent over.He didn’t ask about sanitiser.Spook was a stickler regarding consent.He appreciated that Alle sat next to him too, rather than them both sitting opposite like some sort of symbiont.He followed the conversation for a while until they drifted into a discussion about tech stuff.Ulf, their usual sound guy, had taken a leave of absence to deal with some sort of family crisis at home, so Alle was filling in during the festival, and for a couple of the subsequent tour dates.

“You okay, big guy?”Alle nudged him with her elbow, having caught him staring out of the window.

The mist had already lifted some.

“Yeah.Fine.”He offered her a smile until she tucked into her food again.Her boyfriend took more convincing.Spook wasn’t looking directly at him, but Paul sensed his attention.Insightful bastard never missed a trick, but he didn’t probe.He knew how to be circumspect and respect privacy.

“We’re celebrating tonight, right?”he said hoping that’d dial back the scrutiny.

Spook gave a nod, followed by a head toss to send his swathes of blond hair back over his black T-shirt-clad shoulders.

Paul scratched his scalp.The summer had been brutally hot, so he’d buzzed his scalp short and decided he kinda liked it, both from an ecological perspective and a less stressful personal grooming one.He didn’t want to be contributing to the hole in the ozone layer every show.Well, he still was, just not as much.They all were, just by virtue of existing and being part of modern society.It was fucking hard to avoid it, but if they all at least tried to minimise their impact, maybe the planet would stay green and blue a wee bit longer.

“Celebrating?What are we celebrating?”Alle put down her knife and fork and pushed away her plate.“Shit!It’s not someone’s birthday, is it?Whose?I still haven’t recovered from Xane’s.That was frickin’ wild.Not helped by the fact that someone forgot to mention that we were supposed to bring gifts.”