Chapter 1

I stood at the side of the stage leaning against a short fence. They were playing now and they sounded great. Pete stood next to me and would look over at me every once in awhile and smile. ‘Loser’ I thought. We were both watching them perform intently waiting to see if it happened or not. Sooner than expected, their set was over. I jumped up and screamed triumphantly.

“Boo-yah, Pete! In your face!” I danced excitedly around him a couple of times. Then I pulled the ping-pong paddle out of my back pocket and quickly gave him a hard whack on the ass with it before running backstage to greet the guys.

You see, Pete and I had started this ‘slap bet’ thing one night after watching an episode of How I Met Your Mother and since then we’ve been betting our lives away and beating each other silly.

So the tour had started weeks ago and we spent most of the time ‘slap betting.’

Anyway, today’s bet was on whether or not Ryan (the guitarist) would trip while performing. I said he wouldn’t, Pete said he would. In the end, I won.

I reached the guys’ dressing room backstage and tucked the paddle back into my back pocket as I walked into it.

“Hey guys! Nice show!” I yelled.

They all mumbled thanks as I plopped down onto a couch.

“Where’s Ryan?” I asked.

“He’s in the shower.” Brendon answered while putting on a clean shirt.

“Oh. I owe him big. Isn’t that right, Pete?” I said smiling as Pete walked into dressing room rubbing his tush. "Isn’t that right, Pete?"

He looked a little confused. “You guys did great today.” He yelled with a big smile, ignoring me.

“Thanks.” I heard Ryan say.

I turned to see him entering the room shirtless.

“Hey. Put a shirt on.” I said turning back around.

“Lainey, didn’t you say you owed him?”

Ryan looked down at me with a questioning look on his face.

“Yes, you saved my ass. Literally.”

“Another bet?” He asked plopping down.

“Don’t you know it?”

He didn’t ask any more questions.