Struggled to reach for the couch in the living room after taking a night walk, I stumbled upon a ringing cellphone on the table. Damn, I forgot to bring it earlier. I can’t run that fast so on the tenth ring I could have sworn that the caller gave up already. But I caught a glimpse of a name that I haven’t seen on that screen for two months. I battled with myself whether I should pick it up or not.
I picked it up. But not because of anything. I picked up because I was curious to know what he wanted.

“Hello?” holding back the tears, I tried to sound really normal and cheerful. Like I didn’t care at all. The line on the other side was silent. Not even a single sound of breathing. Why did he call if he refused to speak?

“Hello? Brian?”

Shit Brian, talk! I need to hear your voice! I need to know if you’re okay!

“Brian if you have something to say to me then speak up.”

Still he remained silent. Once in a while I would hear a faint sound of barking in the background. I kinda missed that small furry dog too.

“I guess not. Well, goodbye then. Be happy. And please, eat.”

I hung up the phone and can’t hold back my tears any longer. I mean, what was the purpose of him calling me in the middle of the night if I was just gonna hear nothing? Fuck it, he must be calling me to feed him or something.

I gave up lounging in the living room and moved on to my bedroom, slow and zen. I was going towards my bed when my foot suddenly bumped to my backpack. My untouched agent backpack. It reminded me of everything at once when I stared at it. Brian’s hidden cameras! I hadn’t got the chance to remove them because I was deployed straight from New Mexico because of this fucking gunshot. I bent over, slightly crooked to the side and reached for it.

I brought out a working laptop from it and started it up. The first thing that popped on the monitor was the four panel view of the camera. Man, I don’t need to watch Brian’s intimate moment with Michelle! I gotta ask Andy or Joe to remove those cameras from his house as soon as possible.

When I was about to turn off the laptop, I saw a glimpse of a person walked up to Brian’s front door. I zoomed in, and rolled my eyes. It was Michelle. She paced towards the front door and stopped. She stood in front of his door for a while, her hands fidgeting, like she was fighting a decision whether she should knock on the door or not.

I glanced at the watch on my taskbar. It was 1.28 am. What was she doing outside? She lived there with him right? Why didn’t she get inside?

I saw her bending down and slipped something under his door. Then she turned away and left. What the hell was that? Did they break up already? Was this the reason to why Brian called me? To get me into being his pleasure toy again?

Shit I gotta stop thinking too much and just go to fucking sleep. Yep, right now that’s what I need. Just sleep. I downed my painkiller in one go and took a sip of water before my phone rang again, this time to a ringtone of Avenged Sevenfold’s Unholy Confessions.

It wasn’t Brian. It was Andy.

“Andy, what’s up?” I yawned.

“Shit, Addie. How do I break this to you…”

“What? What?”

Andy grunted and sighed heavy on the other line. It was making me even more curious.

“What, Andy?! You’re killing me!”

“Yeah. Your shooter. He’s been murdered in prison today.”

“WHAT?!”

~*.*~

The doorbell rang for the fiftieth times. Groggily he went downstairs and reached for the doorknob, ignoring the rustling white fur from Pinkly who kept barking for food and attention.

“Outta my way Pink..” he mumbled, still half asleep.

His foot stepped on something coarse and he halted at once. Widening his brown eyes, he looked down.

“Just wait a second, Jesus!” he picked it up and noticed that it was a letter. As he started to get annoyed by the constant doorbell rings, he walked further to open the door.

“There you are, your majesty! Wake the fuck up! We’re writing today!” Matthew was standing in front of his door, with a baseball cap turned backwards covering his long hair and a pair of aviator on his eyes.

Brian scratched his head and yawned. “Fuck you, Shads. Do you really have to be so fucking loud in the morning?”

“Get your ass up dude. I’m inspired!”

“Yeah yeah. It’s only day one. Where are the others?”

“I’m alone. They’re probably at the studio already. Come on, Gates!”

“You go first. I’m gonna take a shower.” He slapped Matthew’s ass and slammed his door on his face. As he was left alone, he stared at the letter in his hand. Wondering curiously, he went to the kitchen and sat on the island stool, starting to rip open the letter.

Dear Brian,
When this letter reach your hands, I’m already far away from you. I’m sorry for all the trouble I’ve caused. I’m sorry that I failed to notice that your heart doesn’t really belong to me. I’m too stupid to see that. Blinded by the love I have for you, and only you.
I wish nothing more than for you to love me back. But you didn’t. You never do.
I tried not to lose you. God knows I tried so hard. But now you leave me no choice.
Goodbye Brian. See you on the other side.
Your Michelle.

Brian was rendered speechless and in utter confusion. What the fuck happened? Just yesterday he ignored Michelle at Warner Bros Meet & Greet - the last event they had before they enter the studio – and he thought she was getting used to it. He avoided taking pictures with her but sometimes when the fans requested them, he couldn’t say no.

And now what? She ditched him? See you on the other side? What the hell does that even mean? He refused to linger on that letter and just moved on to take a shower.

~*.*~

“I can fucking drive you know.”

“No, Mr Gates. I have to be by your side 24/7.”

Brian rolled his eyes. “I’m only going to the studio, no need for fucking protection!”

“Negative, Mr Gates.”

“You listen here, punk. Don’t fucking tell me what to do, and don’t make me beat up your ass right here, right now.”

Joe pursed his lips, but nevertheless he didn’t feel intimidated at all by Brian’s threat. He was used to it during his ‘babysitting’ job for this rock star and though he certainly didn’t want to. He used to be a bodyguard for Bill Clinton but that was nothing compared to this so called Synyster Gates.

“Get in, Mr Gates.”

Brian let out a heavy sigh and had no choice but to get into the black SUV as Joe was blocking his way to his own BMW.

Joe drove in pure calm and silence but alert at times. Brian couldn’t help but feel curious about their line of job – Joe and Addie – so he started to break the two months old ice on their way to the studio.

“Dude, what exactly is your job?”

“We protect, Mr Gates. Of the ones that we’ve been assigned for.” Joe replied, briskly.

“And do you have to be so fucking strict when you’re protecting someone?”

“Don’t want to get to attached, Mr Gates.”

“And Addie-”

“That was a mistake she shouldn’t have made. It was highly unprofessional for her to be involved with a subject.”

“A subject.” Brian repeated. “That’s me?”

“Yes, Mr Gates.”

“Dude, loosen up a little. And why do you call me Gates?”

“It’s a name of my subject that has been given to me. And it’s easier to differentiate between you and Mr Haner Sr.”

Brian sighed and crossed his arms on his chest. He wanted to find about Addie so much. But he didn’t want Joe to know. His mind fought whether he should ask Joe regarding Addie’s whereabouts or not. Then suddenly Joe’s phone rang, he quickly connected to the earphone and answered the call.

“Gonzalez,” he answered using his last name. Brian listened carefully to his one sided conversation.

“Murdered? How?”

Brian widened his eyes and leaned closer, but making sure that Joe didn’t notice.

“How’s Wayne doing?”

Wayne. Brian knew that it’s Addie’s surname. He needed to know so badly about this!

“I’ll check up on her later. Need to send Mr Gates to the studio.”

After that he just hung up the call and Brian sat up straight again, pretending to pay attention to his own iPhone. So, Joe’s going to meet Addie, huh.

They arrived at the studio in Burbank, and Joe looked rushed. He went out of the car and sternly looked Brian in the eye.

“Mr Gates, I need you to stay put in the studio until I get back here. Don’t go, I repeat, do not go anywhere out of your safe circle. Be with your band mates at all times. Understood?”

“Yeah, dude. Whatever.” Brian nodded and crossed his fingers secretly. After that Joe got in the car again and sped away. Brian quickly hailed for a cab with two whistles from his mouth and instantly a yellow taxi stopped in front of him.

“Where to sir – heyy!! I know you! You’re Synyster Gates right? God, I always hoped to meet a celebrity someday, here in LA. Never thought that I could actually-”

“Dude, fucking save it for later! Just follow that car and step on it!”

---

The television roamed with the news of a dead prisoner being murdered in his cell. My dead prisoner. Damn it, he was my lead. My clue to everything! I know I’m off the case but I’ve been working on it secretly because I need to know why he shot me, with smiles on his face. It was like he didn’t intend to shoot Brian at all, now that I’ve remembered!

I knew it, he was trying to get me. He figured I would jump in front of Brian for a bullet any time and he worked his way perfectly to that intention. Shit. I was really lucky that I decided to wear my bulletproof gear under my leather jacket at the time.

Why would he want to kill me though? What did I do? Gahh this thing made my fucking head hurts!

DING DONG!

The doorbell rang, I jumped a bit and startled at the shooting pain in my stomach. I swear to God if it’s Andy, I’m gonna rip his head off.

“What Andy-” I opened the door to find no Andy, but a guy wearing a black jacket with a white shirt inside and rough stubble adorned on his face.



Joe Gonzalez. My senior agent and also, my replacement for Brian.

“Joe?”

“Wayne,” he addressed me.

“What are you doing here?”

“Can I come in? I have something to talk about.”

“Sure. But didn’t you have to be by Brian’s side all the time?” I motioned for him to come in and he did, closing the door behind his back.

“He’s at the studio. Don’t worry about him. Worry about yourself. How’s your wound?”

“It’s healing pretty quickly. What is it that you wanna talk about?”

“Your shooter. He’s been murdered.”

“Yes I know that already. It’s all over the news”

“He’s after you.”

I clammed on the floor. I know I was just blindly guessing that the shooter’s after me. But now that Joe said the same thing too, I feel panicked – and scared.

“He’s not after Gates. I’ve been gathering some info during the time I was babysitting that god forsaken rock star and not once have I seen anything suspicious on his side. Everything was really calm. Then suddenly this news came up. It was his hearing yesterday, right?”

“Yeah…”

“He didn’t show up. Andy told me.”

I slowly walked to the couch and settled myself on it. Still couldn’t find the connection to why he wanted to kill me. And why did Joe have to be the one who broke this news to me?

“Andy has been assigned to keep an eye on the king. Somehow this Haner case has become more complicated than we ever think. Protecting the prince, this killing attempt. We have to deal with the authorities now.”

I stared at the floor and thought hard. Yeah, it was only a simple matter at first. Just a worried father trying to protect his son’s safety, but now it turned out to be a serious case and none of us had a fucking clue about the motive. Certainly not for the throne, as Joe mildly put it because no attack has been done during these couple of months. And suddenly the same shooter who was about to be forced a secret out of him got killed in prison.

Someone didn’t want us to know about something. But who?

“I just need you to be alert. Don’t go to work yet. As Andy can’t come here that often, I suggest you don’t go outside that much and maybe prepare your gun at all times. You know how to shoot right?”

I rolled my eyes. “Yes I know.”

“Good. I’ll get back to you later.”

Joe walked towards the front door and opened it himself, which I really appreciated so I don’t have to get up and do it for him.

“Wait, Joe.”

He turned. I got up from the couch and approached him.

“Thank you for filling me in. I was wondering why did you do this, I mean, for me? We didn’t know each other that well…right?”

He smiled, his eyes looked a little smaller when he did that. “I’ve always cared about you, Addie. You just didn’t notice me.”

What.

He went away just like that, leaving me baffled and once again, confused as hell. A senior agent had a crush on me?

Notes

A/N: tehehe...comments!! XD