Rob watched with conflicted thoughts and feelings as Jane disappeared from the three of them, down the hall and out into the open Minneapolis air. To be frank, the reason he had asked the question was to see how Jane was feeling—for some selfish reason, it never occurred to him that she would simply say she wasn’t feeling up to doing much. Perhaps this one of those tests? Perhaps Rob needed to slip back to the apartment, join Jane and embrace her. But…that couldn’t be right. Jane was not one for games. Jane seemed to be the kind of girl that made [i]fun of[/i] women who toyed with men. And besides—it was one of Rob’s absolute rules. His desire and ambition for honestly always turned angry when seeing or interacting with a person trying to test or examine him. So, no. Most likely Jane was completely serious in her intentions, but Rob wasn’t going to chase after her. For better or worse, he was very drunk, very driven to stay true to some part of himself, and wasn’t going to head back to the apartment. This is something he was going to choose for himself, regardless of the consequences. “What time do we leave tomorrow?” He asked his bandmates. The response was a flat “nine-thirty,” from Sam, followed by: “We’re meeting up with Harold at seven in Kansas City. Hopefully we’ll be ready to record something by then.” “I’ll catch you then,” Rob said, slipping out of the room and eyes locked onto the screen in his hand. He shot a text: [i]7:02, Rob:[/i] [b]Where are you?[/b] [i]7:06, Zoe:[/i] [b]In the bus, duh[/b] [i]7:07, Rob:[/i] [b]Want to get out?[/b] … The next hour was a blur. Rob made his way over to Vicarious’ tour bus, made small-talk with the bandmates, and was back away as quick as he came. He, Zoe, and Trent all rode up to a National Forest about thirty minutes outside of town. Armed with cheap flashlights from a convenience store and piles of Trent’s supply, the three headed down a dark forest path—smoking as they went. Rob loved the air out here. Minneapolis was a large city, sure, but just miles away was all of this clean air. No musky humidity of the south or dry heat of the west around here. Just calm, greenery all around. His company was as fresh as the air. Without the years of knowledge, without being aware of their own perfections or imperfections, there was no need to mince words or really alter who he was to them. Rob felt so liberated here. The stresses of creating another single didn’t exist. Being acutely aware of how Jane was feeling wasn’t necessary out here. In fact, there wasn’t even signal out here. Complete disconnection. Complete bliss. Sometime during that evening, the three stumbled upon an old shelter off the beaten path. It was just down, past a creek and over another ridge. It was a wooden shelter, littered with trash from previous occupants and stylistic, sharp graffiti. But inside was dry, and nice, and the three sat inside, laughing and joking about everything from tour life to stories of their own past. On the bluetooth speaker Trent had brought, a familiar song came on: [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGzT4sCgZxo]I Think I Lost My Headache by Queens of the Stone Age.[/url] And while it’s sound and the record it came on were quintessential for the type of band Vicarious was, Rob couldn’t help but think of Jane. Earlier this tour, she had bought him the record this track had come off; possibly as retribution for something she had done or outreach to Rob for something he had done. The time had passed and his mind was left so clouded by the surrounding smoke, Rob could no longer fully remember. The thought of her laying in a bed in this moment crossed his mind—her small body held by no one, left alone to her own thoughts, in a room alike the surroundings. In a city she had never been to before. And as the song so subtly faded to it’s extended, melting outro of horns and squealing trumpets, the thoughts he had repeated as endlessly as the motif he heard. By the track’s so sudden conclusion, Rob has lost himself, within himself. “Hey,” he heard. Turning, he could see Trent’s quite-concerned face. “You still with us?” He joked, passing another beer to him. Rob tried to let out a loose smile and play it off. “Yeah,” Rob said. “I’m alright.” Shortly afterwards, Trent excused himself from the little hideout (something about needing to find a decent restroom, or something of the sort), and it was just Rob and Zoe once again, alone in the small, enclosed space. “I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Rob started, once the timing felt right. “What, uh, what was all that back in the bus?” “Oh,” Zoe said, flat. “You wanna have [i]that[/i] talk.” The way she had approached her words—the way it seeped from her mouth like some overused mantra—threw Rob straight unto defense. “What do you mean?” Rob asked. “You’re going to ask me what I want, or what I’m trying to get. You’ll use words like ‘from [i]this[/i],’ like it’s supposed to mean anything.” “Well,” Rob said, “I guess I just like to clarify things. I don’t want to give anyone the wrong idea.” Zoe laughed. “I uh, I don’t know you too well man, but you think too much, you know that?” “Yeah.” The two dropped to silence for a bit. “I’m not the kind of person that’ll go out and drown my sorrows in drugs or whatever,” Zoe started, no doubt referencing people Rob knew. “And I don’t claim any high moral ground about it, either. I’m just living for me right now.” “I can understand that,” Rob said. Her words echoed in his mind, he and tried to hard not to overthink them, but before long, she continued. “But I’m also not the kind of person that second-guesses herself. When I want something, I go get it. When I feel like staying, I’ll stay, or going, I’ll go. Honest to God, if tomorrow I felt like Vicarious wasn’t going to be any fun for me anymore, I’d catch the first flight back home. Ask Trent. I’ve done it before.” “When?” Rob asked. “Like a year or so ago,” Zoe said, “me and Andy were dating. Well, I guess we weren’t ‘dating,’ per se, but we were pretty much exclusive for a bit. And, one day, I found him fucking some other girl. In the bus, too. So, I bailed. Called my folks, told them to get to the airport, because I was coming home.” “Then what happened?” Rob asked. He found himself leaned off of the back wall of the fort they had found for themselves. His elbows rested calmly atop his crossed legs, intent. “I mean, Trent called me when I got back, begged me to come back. And I did, after about a week. But it wasn’t really because I felt like I left them or anything. It was because I realized that I was having too much fun with playing music to leave it behind because Andy cheated. And, I mean, fuck, I can’t even really [i]say[/i] he cheated. We never even talked about being exclusive. As much as I felt like we were, there was no statement about it. Which is actually a good thing. Me and Andy became friends again because we weren’t labeling shit all the time. Or overthinking it. He got bored with what we were, I got over it. No problems. No mess.” A cold gust of wind swung into the inclosed space, and Zoe sat herself, up, sliding over, next to Rob, and learning against him. He felt her cuddle up beside him, and while it was only shoulders, arms, and legs that were touching, everything felt wrong about it. “We, uh,” Rob stammered out, “me and Jane agreed to be exclusive. I asked for it, too.” Zoe seemed completely unfazed. “Why’d you say that?” “I, uh—“ “Are we fucking?” “…no.” “Then don’t worry about it,” Zoe said. She slid in closer, leaning a head against his shoulder and closing her eyes. “Always talking,” she breathed, “always thinking.” Rob leaned his own head back, and closed his own eyes. In here, in the silence, with the warmth of Zoe pressed up against him, he felt the fine line of his own rules and regulations cry out in terror. Where was the line? What was cheating? Should he be here? Could he even be friends with another woman like this? But then, he thought next of Zoe’s thoughts and statements. And in truth, they were completely accurate. Rob had become a slave to himself some time ago. And no matter how many times he tried to put up a front for others to see, it would always collapse back down on top of him. Expectations and worries and fears and failures all emancipated in endless fickle speeches. Rob remembered the rooftop moment he had shared with Jane—perhaps the best memory of the entire tour. Maybe of his whole damn [i]life.[/i] He rarely had a moment with anyone that involved nothing. That let him be completely free. That rooftop was one of them. And this small shelter in Minneapolis—this was another. Sure, one was romantic and the other platonic, but the honestly was still the same. And each time his mind wandered to Jane, her photos, the band, and the single, Rob worried he’d never have this feeling with Jane ever again. … About half an hour later, Trent returned, slipping over to Zoe’s free side and leaning against her. The three talked for a bit, before calling a cab, climbing out of the enclave, and returning to town. Rob wished a goodnight to both of them, before stepping out of the cab and entering the hotel lobby. And while the worst he had done that night was lean against another woman, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he had done something truly terrible. But the night was old and as weary as himself, and his mind could no longer manage thinking of these things any longer. Rob made his way to the room, climbed into bed with Jane, and was out in three minutes flat.