Page 1 of Just Business

“Austin!”

Tyler flips on the lights and slaps the back of the couch, jolting me awake. The world comes at me too fast, too bright, too loud.

“The opener’s on their last song. You’ve got thirty minutes—max—to get your shit together.”

“Mmm,” I mumble stupidly, rising to sit. My limbs are heavy like I’m moving through molasses. The fluorescent lighting in my green room is bright as hell, and the relentless drum beat in my temple kicks up a notch. Squinting, I tilt my head, attempting to bring his face into focus, but all I see is the disappointment bracketing his mouth.

“You missed sound check. I tried getting you up but you were out, man. The band did it without you.”

I don’t respond. There’s nothing to say anyway. The last twelve hours are a foggy haze buried beneath an ocean of bourbon. You’d think I’d be used to the negative press by now. It’s my own fucking fault. But when I spotted the trashy gossip magazine I shut down. It wasn’t even the headline, just a side story with a grainy photo of me looking glassy eyed and wrecked, but it still made my blood boil. “Austin James Leaves Luxury Suite in Shambles. Full Story on Page 31.” Another nail in the coffin of this already miserable tour.

“Thirty minutes—I mean it. Don’t be late,” Tyler barks.

With a sharp exhale, he stalks over to the mini fridge in the corner and grabs a bottle of water, tossing it my way. It lands on the couch cushion and a bottle of ibuprofen lands right beside it.

“Thanks,” I groan, but he’s already stormed out. Tyler’s been the only person keeping me going these last few months. He isn’t just my manager; he’s also my cousin and best friend. My only friend these days. I know him like the back of my hand, and even in my current condition, I hear the edge of anger lacing his words. Honestly, I can’t say I blame him. He puts up with far more shit from me than anyone should have to, and I can tell he’s nearing the end of his very frayed rope.

This tour has been abso-fucking-lutely brutal. I’ve been on plenty of tours throughout my career and, up until this one, they were the greatest experiences of my life. The adrenaline high that performing gave me could go toe to toe with any drug out there. Every tour was different, but regardless, I’d loved every minute of them. But not this time. No, with this one I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve wished I’d never agreed to it. When my label first started planning it, it was half this size. But as arenas and festivals sold out, the greedy bastards kept tacking on one new city after another. The twenty-four seven schedule has pushed me to the brink—and I don’t know how much more I can take.

Two more cities, just two more cities.This has been a broken record playing in my mind to keep me going. All I can hope is when this ends, I’ll figure my shit out.

This self-destructive bender I’ve been on hasn’t done a damn thing to improve my mood, either. I’m drunk more than I’m sober, and according to the media, I’ve been with a different woman in every city we’ve stopped in. That wasn’t far from the truth at the start of this tour, but it didn’t take long for that to start eating away at my conscience. Despite what people think, drunken one-night stands aren’t for me. All they do is leave me feeling like a shitty, albeit lonely, human being.

My mouth feels like sandpaper, so I guzzle down half the water and throw back two ibuprofen. I sit for a few minutes before peeling myself off the pleather couch. My reflection stares back at me in the full-length mirror on the opposite wall, and I rear back, repulsed by the man I see who bears an unsettling resemblance to my father.

The dark purple shadows under my bloodshot eyes are a testament to the bourbon and energy drink diet I’ve been on, and my usual five o’clock shadow is creeping into a full-blown beard. Thankfully, the Whiskey Trail Festival—ironic, I know—is outdoors, and it’s the dead of summer in Kentucky. Nobody will think twice if I look like I’ve just rolled out of bed.

I attempt to jog toward the backstage entrance, but the motion turns my stomach upside down and I have to slow to steady myself. When I approach, a stagehand is standing waiting in the wings, holding my guitar out.

“Do you need anything, Mr. James?” She hands over my in-ear monitors and another bottle of water.

Exhaling sharply through my nose, I mutter, “A fucking lobotomy.”

With fumbling hands, I position the in-ears, grab my guitar, and step out onto the stage, leaving the confused stagehand blinking behind me. A sea of cell phones held aloft is all I see at first. Squinting against the glare of the spotlight, my footsteps falter and I sway. Fucking great. Social media will have a field day with that one. I can already imagine the captions.

My chord changes are a beat too slow, and in my periphery I catch the guys in the pick-up band shooting surreptitious glances at each other. One of them—is his name Fred? Flynn? I’m almost sure it starts with an F—gives me a quick slice across his throat, signaling that he’ll cover for me. Yeah, fuck you, whatever your name is. Thanks to my misplaced anger clouding my judgment I keep playing, no matter how terrible it sounds.

Somewhere around the halfway point of my set, I begin sobering up, and with the pain meds finally releasing the vice around my skull, I slip on the familiar mask I’ve been forced to wear. The mask of a man who isn’t drowning. My “I’m such a lucky guy to be up here” mask.

All my life my aunt has said I could charm the pants off a snake. Well, here’s hoping I can tonight.

“How y’all doin’ tonight?” I yell into the microphone. When I tilt the microphone toward them the crowd goes wild. Cupping my hand around my ear, I say it again. “We all know y’all can do better than that. Let’s try again. I said, How y’all doin’ tonight?” The roar of the crowd intensifies, vibrating in my chest.

Near the front row, I spot a woman waving a sign that readsIt’s My Birthday! Will you make me Mrs. James?

I point at it, smirking. “I like your sign, darlin’, but I’m afraid we don’t know each other well enough to make you Mrs. James.”

“I don’t care!” she yells back to me.

Her response pulls a small chuckle from me. “How ’bout you head over to my merch table and they’ll see to it that you get one of everything. Hope you have a happy birthday.” I give her a wink and toss her my guitar pick, while the group of women she’s with lose their minds, squealing. But I’m sure it's obvious to everyone that I’m completely off my game, and not just because of the hangover.

* * *

“Thanks for a great night, Kentucky!” The thunderous applause and wolf whistles vibrate the stage I’m standing on. “Best night yet! Thanks for coming out, and y’all drive safe.” It’s the same spiel night after night, so the lies roll off my tongue regardless how fuzzy my mind is.

I head backstage where the same stagehand waits. She’s speaking into her headset, eyebrows pinched, but when I approach she lowers it. I yank my in-ears out and drop them into her open palm.

“Tyler Kent said to give you this.”

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