7
Olivia wasn’t an idiot. She was exhausted from performing while jetlagged, but she wasn’t stupid. She knew there was something up with Rick, and it wasn’t just certain appendages when they were in the same vicinity.
She believed him at first when he said he was grumpy because of his physical state. “Plus,” he said on the plane from London to Berlin, “the label is pressuring me to come up with songs to make demos of already. Once we get back to America it’s to the recording booth for me.”
“Isn’t that a good thing?” Olivia naively asked. “It means they have a lot of faith in you. Your tour has done fantastically, even if they’re not promoting your fourth single.” He had told her all about that mini-drama after one of their liaisons.
“I’m tired. It would be nice to get a week or two off to recharge.”
Likely. Rick didn’t like being idle. “A week off” meant partying and renting studios under assumed names so he could do what he wanted. “A week off” meant a vacation from the suits telling him what to do. Rick seemed to love everything about his career but the business end of things. He was absolutely that type. Let other people deal with that while he sang and danced like he wanted. Too bad this business doesn’t work that way. He was still young and inexperienced enough that he had to jump every time the label told him to. If that meant jumping into a recording booth, then so be it.
Olivia let it slide while they were in Europe. She was too distracted by the sights of Britain and Germany to care about how moody Rick was. He’s still a tiger in the sack. Since she wasn’t a heartless wench who only cared about his wallet and cock, she did remain concerned that he wasn’t feeling so hot.
Things only got worse in Madrid, their final stop in Europe. The concert there wasn’t canceled even with lackluster ticket sales, so when they got on stage and saw everyone moved to the front of the venue, Rick said, “I’ll be glad when this is over.”
He wasn’t on his best game that night. His lifts only went up halfway and he almost dropped Olivia twice. The next day, the local newspaper gave him a scathing review. Then they were off to Japan.
The whole crew was both excited and dreading Japan. Nothing to do with the country, but the fact that the last two concerts were in Tokyo. The whole thing was bittersweet. On one hand, it meant the end of their journey together across the world. On the other, they were tired and ready to see their families and rest again. The subsequent shows for those past weeks had taken their toll on everyone, including Olivia, who was joining Rick in icing various muscles after every show.
However, the one thing she wasn’t dreading was what their relationship would be like when they got back to America. I’ve made the decision to stick this out a while longer. Rick had proven himself to be a good lover and a good person. She would be stupid to not take a chance on dating him on a regular and even somewhat serious basis. Sure, she had no idea what it would be like if they went public, since she had never been in the spotlight like that before, but she would cross that bridge when they got to it. She tried to not let the fact she was pretty much in love – if she believed that’s what it was – cloud her judgment. One step at a time.
First, Tokyo.
None of the talents had been to East Asia before, let alone Japan’s illustrious capital. There was one guy who studied some Japanese in college, but for the most part he was as ignorant as everyone else. Well, the most knowledgeable one in the group – aside from the assigned interpreters – was surprisingly Thomas. The moment they stepped off the plane he was bowing, making requests, and telling people what their food had in it. “Where the flying hell did you learn Japanese?” Rick asked in their van. “How many languages do you speak?”
Thomas checked messages on his phone while their local driver seamlessly blended in with highway traffic. “More than you, that’s for sure.”
“You speak Russian too? How about Farsi?”
“Now you’re being a dick, Rick.”
“Sorry I only know two languages. You know, one more than the average American.”
“Let’s be real,” another male dancer interjected from the back row of the van, “that’s two more than most Americans. Or at least the ones back where I’m from. I don’t know what language those people speak, but I’m pretty sure it’s not documented by any anthropologist or whoever does that stuff.”
“The man speaks English, Portuguese, and Japanese. What else can he speak? Parlez-vous français?”
“Knock it off. Don’t make me turn this van around.”
“You’re not even driving!”
Olivia rolled her eyes and tried to take in the sights of Japan, but the concrete highway walls blocked out everything but the overcast sky. They all sound like his children. She had gathered over the months that Rick saw Thomas as a sort of father figure. How often does stuff like this happen? Probably too often for Thomas’s already thick blood.
Japan felt more foreign than any of the other countries so far. Olivia didn’t know if it was the food, the Chinese characters everywhere, or the closed off nature of the people, but it was such a culture shock from Latin America and Europe that she often froze up in restaurants, shops, and even on the street when she was trying to walk a mere three blocks to the concert venue. The sheer swarms of people flooding Tokyo could give anyone claustrophobia, but it was even worse being with a celebrity. Rick was one of the best selling foreign artists in Japan that year. Although the fans who waited for him at various places were polite, orderly, and courteous, they were still in massive numbers and a public safety threat. The paparazzi were also as ruthless here as they were anywhere else, so Olivia and Rick had to keep their affair to the hotel.
Not that Rick seemed too interested in that. The first night there Olivia went up to his room to find him staring at something on his phone. He wouldn’t tell her what it was, but it made him sour enough to forego sex that night under the guise of resting up for back to back concerts.
Since the final night of the whole tour was happening that week, the crew went out for a party put on by the label in a rented restaurant, where alcohol flowed and food from all over the world was served. Nobody could find a decent Latin American dish in Japan, so they made do with steaks, sushi, grilled vegetables, and enough rice to end world hunger. Olivia sat across from Rick at the table, the conversation so loud that she had to ask people to repeat themselves multiple times.
“I said you were really great on the tour!” shouted one of the female dancers, who currently had a piece of asparagus stuck in her teeth. “If Clara couldn’t make it, then you were more than enough to take her place!”
Olivia glanced across the table and caught Rick’s eye. He smirked, his attentions going back to José, who was half-drunk and rambling about his ex-girlfriend the prima ballerina who refused to eat his home cooking because, “Ew, carbs. Ew, cheese.”
It was the most fun Rick had allowed himself to have since they left Spain. Hell, Germany. Olivia told herself he was tired, maybe melancholy about his first world tour coming to an end, but there seemed to be something else lingering beneath the surface that was Rick Rodriguez. Olivia wished he trusted her enough to tell her what it was.
Both shows in Tokyo were sold out, and the crowds, while humorous in the way they unified their chants and glow stick waving, showed the amount of energy everyone was used to seeing. The girls in the front row especially screamed a lot every time Rick came by them. Even when Olivia had her solo routine center stage they screamed and waved their banners.
“WE HEART OLIVIA” one sign said. Olivia nearly lost her footing and fell onto the girls screaming her name. “Oribia! Oribia!” they shouted, their voices louder than the thumping beats in Olivia’s earpiece. When she next went on standby backstage she had someone say to her, “Since when do you have fans? How do they even know who you are?”
Indeed, how had that happened?
“I guess it’s because of the video and the fact you’ve been on tour so long now,” Rick said as they waited for their transportation after the show. “Clara would probably have signs in Latin America if she came along. You’re a good dancer, and people remember you.” He shrugged, as if that were not unusual. “Hey, it’s good for your career. Maybe the label will even sign you as a permanent dancer on staff.”
Permanent dancer? On staff? That meant Olivia would have first choice for certain music videos and performances. If she played her cards right, she could make good money as a dancer for a few years. If she took the right classes, she could become a choreographer like José when she was too old to dance regularly or otherwise too injured or over it. Olivia didn’t often think beyond “I want to be a full-time dancer” but that possibility was too real to ignore. Her mother would be proud of her for thinking ahead.
Their last night on tour – and the night before they returned to America – Olivia went to Rick’s room for a quick romp. Surprisingly, he almost turned her away. “I don’t feel spectacular,” he said, his bags packed and his stubble thicker than usual. “Might be coming down with something.”
Olivia didn’t want to go. Partly because she knew when they got back to America things would change between them. They wouldn’t see each other as often… if at all. Olivia didn’t want to bring that up. She would rather make the most of the here and now.
In that night’s case, it meant curling up in bed with Rick, clothes on but no farther apart than usual. She wrapped her arm around his torso and fell asleep with her cheek on his chest, wishing she could savor this moment a bit longer. Just as she seemed to fall asleep, however, Thomas shook her shoulder and told her to get out before anyone else saw her in there. Within five hours they were on a plane to California. The tour was officially over.