Chapter 20: The One That Got Away

*Joe's POV*

I could already hear the crowd's lively energy throughout the whole stadium as our opening act performed their set. We were on in less than an hour, yet all I could focus on was all my text messages ignored the past few days, ever since the train incident occurred.

I was never given an update, nor had she been active on Instagram, her last post being three months ago of a selfie of her and her best friend I ran into at the bar that one night. I now knew her name was Jules, or that was at least her nickname she went by.

Unlike Natalia, Jules had a social media presence. She posted often, her profile bubble always lit up with a colorful circle around it with a public Instagram story teasing to be clicked. I never did, out of fear that I would've been outed on my creeping. But posts of her and Natalia together on her page stopped around the same time as Natalia's last post. Not even a recent like from Natalia, as if their friendship stopped then too.

Sliding my phone in my pocket, I walked out of my dressing room and headed into the common room. The second my eyes landed on them, a smile crept up that made everything feel like the world was only ever perfect.

Sneakily, I rushed up behind my eldest daughter, Willa, and picked her up from behind, "Gotcha, my little bugger!"

"Daddy!" she squealed in a giggle as her sister, Delphine, ran up out of fear of missing out on some family fun.

"What about me, Daddy?" Delphine looked up at me with her big brown eyes, her little hands reaching up towards me, "I want up too!"

"Oh, how could I ever forget you?" I leaned down to pick her up with my other arm, "What I don't remember is you getting so big so quickly!"

"That's the real reason you've been working out," JinJoo, our guitarist playfully teased by squeezing my bicep as she walked by, "So you could still pick them up no matter how big they've gotten."

"Sadly, I don't think you're wrong," I chuckled, adjusting them on my hips that definitely weren't built the same way as their mom's to hold them up comfortably, "I've gotta keep up somehow until I can figure out a way to stop them from growing anymore."

"No way, José!" Willa exclaimed, "You will never stop us from growing up taller than you!"

"Yeah!" Delphine copied her sister's phrase that they picked up from their older cousin, "No way, José!"

I fell onto the couch with them dramatically, careful that only I would get any brunt from it, and pouted, "Oh no! You can't say that!"

"We're going to be taller than you, Daddy!" Willa tested by repeating herself, the tip of her little finger pressing into the skin of my bare arm that had been holding her up.

"No, babygirl!" I held my hand against my heart, closing my eyes as I pretended to start to cry, "You're breaking my heart!"

"No crying!" Delphine climbed on top of me, smushing herself against my upper body, including my face to wipe my nonexistent tears, "Sissy, no more hurting Daddy's heart."

Our moment suddenly got interrupted by a crew member tapping me from behind, my eyes shooting back open as I looked over my shoulder.

"It's time to get changed," she informed me, her tone quiet but matter-of-factly, "You're almost up."

After a small nod to thank her, I turned back to Willa and Delphine, brushing their hair with my fingers, "Alrighty, buggers. I gotta go on stage, but I'll find you in the crowd. I always do, and I always will."

Willa scrunched up one side of her mouth, her face growing somber with a glance away, "Okay, but will you sing us a song?"

I stayed sat with them, purposely choosing to spend as much time as I could with them, even if it meant giving up changing in no rush, "What song?"

"'Little Bird'," she replied, glancing back up at me with sparkling hope.

"Because it's about us," Delphine chimed in, agreeing to the song request.

I smiled before kissing each of their foreheads, "Of course. I'll sing whatever you want me to."

If we hadn't already put that song on the setlist, I would've made sure it was added on or taking place of another song. At least for that day. I already sacrificed "Walls" for the show. My daughters' song of choice was in no question to be sacrificed as well.

After putting on their little pink headphones on their heads, I handed them to their nanny to go our separate ways. I gazed back while walking away, watching them turn the corner to head down a hallway out of sight.

When I turned around, I pulled my phone out from my pocket as it vibrated once. Clicking on the Instagram notification, I instinctively tapped on the tagged post our team put together on our band's page amping up our first show.

It was pictures that were taken from our numerous rehearsals over the past few months, as well as a recent photoshoot that defined all the muscle I'd put on to prepare my body for such taxing performances that only seemed to get more difficult with age. My body wasn't nineteen anymore, sliding and flipping around basically becoming impossible now.

I set my phone on the table and grabbed my clothes from off its rack, quickly changing in my matching custom denim pants and jacket. Here was praying I wasn't setting us back. Each minute mattered, hence why it was so important for me to spend it with my daughters.

After fixing a few strays of my hair in the mirror to perfection, I picked my phone back up and clicked on home button. My heart dropped to my stomach at the first post to pop up.

"Knock, knock," Nick's voice from the doorway twisted my head in his direction, "There's a change in the setlist. You might want to take a look at it."

I gulped down the few broken pieces of my heart that had been left behind and took the two pieces of paper Nick handed me. Scanning down each song that were printed in big black letters, my eyes paused at one right in the middle, "You put 'Walls' back on?"

With a small smile, he nodded, "It's our first show of the tour. Your favorite should be included too."

"Thank you," I handed back the papers to him, a smile almost reaching my eyes. Almost.

He tilted his head, observing my underwhelming reaction, "You're not excited about the change. Did something happen? Wait, is it because Elsa got cold feet?"

I raised my phone up, turning the screen to him to show him Natalia's Instagram post she uploaded just ten minutes ago, "Does this look like cold feet to you?"

"Well shit," his eyebrows raised at a kissing Natalia and Noah selfie, the post captioned: He's officially my forever.

To top it off, she included a hashtag that read "engaged" and a ring emoji. As if the sentence wasn't clear enough.

"I'm sorry," he pressed his lips together, squeezing my shoulder as a means of support, "Maybe we should start by liking a woman that isn't already in a relationship?"

"It's fine. It's whatever. So long as she's happy, right?" I pretended to brush it off, even liking the post to add to my fake merriment. That was the most I could do though, a private congratulatory text message not something that was able to be faked. It probably would've gotten ignored just like the rest of them anyways. 

"C'mon," Nick encouraged, gesturing with his head down the hall to the stage door, "I know there's two girls waiting out in the crowd to see their rockstar dad."

That was when my smile finally reached my glistening eyes, "You're right. I can't let them down."

I followed Nick, Kevin joining us after I knocked on his dressing room door to inform him we needed to head directly to the stage. Nick and Kevin were in their own conversation, walking just a little ahead of me. My mind was too busy with a burned image in it, tugging at emotions I closed out for so long with a giant wall around my heart.

It was stupid that I was giving it to someone that already gave hers to someone else, that chemistry between us possibly being a mirage from the flames our bodies made whenever we were around each other. Not the kind of flames that caused a catastrophic event, but the kind that lit up in a fireplace on a cold, winter night.

Suddenly, my phone vibrated once more in my hand right as I was about to walk out on stage, the lights already darkened with our intro music echoing the stadium with the sea of screams.

I remained dissociated as I read Natalia's text reply that was also too late: Hey! So sorry for such a late response! So much has been going on lately. Are you free to grab lunch soon to catch up? Oh, and good luck on your first day on tour! Wish I could've made it to celebrate, but I'm sure you know how crazy life can get. And, for the record, they didn't waste their money. It's one hell of a show. I should know.

If I had to wait three to five business days to receive a reply from her, so could she.

I locked my phone and handed it to one of our crew members that stayed on the side, mostly there in case any emergency came up that we were needed to be aware of. That used to include Natalia's desperate calls for help, "Here. If anything comes through, just ignore it. It's not important anymore."

Truthfully, it still was, but not enough to drag me away from my own responsibilities any longer. I had to accept that she'd always be the one that got away.