FicWad

After he was finished talking to Laurie, Axl headed back into the Starwood. Ignoring the fans, he went backstage and confronted Slash, Duff, and Izzy.

"I just invited Laurie to be our background singer on this leg of the tour."

Duff and Izzy exchanged oh shit looks.

"And what'd she say?" asked Slash.

"She said okay," said Axl. He stared down at the floor. He couldn't figure out whether or not he was really happy that she'd agreed to come with them. Outside, right after she'd left, he'd been the happiest he'd been in a long time. But now all the bad stuff that might happen was beginning to come into his brain and he was seriously regretting asking her at all.

"This'll be...interesting," said Izzy at length, for lack of something better to say.

"Yeah, it'll be cool to have her on tour again," said Duff.

Axl just nodded without replying. His brain was still stuck on that one perpetual question that he'd thought of outside: where was she gonna sleep? He told himself not to think of it but he couldn't stop himself. If she had to sleep in his room with him he wasn't sure what he'd do.

Knowing my luck, Axl thought with a sigh as he and the others headed off to sign more autographs and meet the chicks who'd be sleeping with them tonight, that's just what'll happen.

~~~

Two days later Laurie stood outside her apartment with a bag full of her things, waiting for the Guns N' Roses limo to come pick her up on the way to the airport. They'd be flying in their private jet this time, instead of using a tour bus, because for obvious reasons it was more convenient to use a plane when touring transcontinental. She'd been preparing for the past forty-eight hours but she was still nervous as hell. The worst-case scenario that she could think of would be that she and Axl would spend the entire tour degrading each other constantly, and at the end of the tour he'd drop her back here and they'd never speak again. Part of Laurie wanted that.

The other part (a much larger part) didn't.

For one thing, it would be exhausting to do nothing for six-something months but yell at Axl back and forth backstage and on the planes. For another thing, she couldn't quite make herself conceive the prospect of hating him that much. Even though they'd been separated for so long, even though it was mostly his fault she'd left, even though she knew that the logical thing would be to despise him with all her heart and soul, she couldn't quite make herself do that. When she'd seen him, it had been like all the bad stuff that had gone on between them had almost completely vanished, and the barriers had dropped, and for the first few minutes--before he'd started snapping at her and insulting her--she'd almost, almost been in love with him again.

The limo pulled up, and Laurie's heart leapt in her chest.

It stopped and Axl got out of the back door. He walked up to Laurie and grabbed one of her two bags. His eyes roved over her apartment and his upper lip curled slightly. Laurie felt a slight stab at her chest as she got up, picking up her other bag.

"Don't criticize where I live, Rose," she snapped. "I'm not as rich as you are and I can't afford the best."

"Whose fault is that?" muttered Axl, just loud enough for Laurie to hear.

"Hey," she said, stopping mid-stride. "If that's the attitude you're gonna adopt I'll just stay here. Got it?"

He stopped too and spun around to face her. "You trying to order me around, Laurie?"

"If you're gonna be a bastard like that to me I just might have to," she shot back.

His fists clenched against the rough cloth of her duffel bag but he didn't say anything, just stormed ahead and threw her things into the limo. Better to avoid confrontation with his ex-girlfriend on the first day they were together again than have an argument that could kill the rest of the tour.

Once inside the limo, Laurie snapped her belt buckle and looked around the interior. The two new guys, Dizzy Reed and Matt Sorum, looked friendly enough, and when she smiled at them they smiled back.

"Great to have you here, Laurie," said Duff as the limo wheels began rolling.

"Yeah," she agreed.

Axl shifted his feet against the floor into a more comfortable position and said, "You'll be meeting the other background singer once we get where we're going."

"Where are we going?" asked Laurie.

"Washington State," said Axl.

"Seattle hell yeah!" exclaimed Duff in a rare showing of state pride.

Slash and Izzy laughed.

Axl looked over at Laurie. The sunlight shining through the limo windows illuminated her face and she seemed to be glowing with an inner radiance. The lead vocalist swallowed hard. How could he have ever let her go?

How could he have ever done anything to make her want to?