I've been working on this one for a few days. You may need to schedule bathroom breaks for this one, folks.

Touring is a strange thing. Personally, I love it. But I realize that there's a risk involved. Some of the social situations encountered on tour can turn out awesome, or terrible, with no middle ground. I knew this going into everything, based on all of the zany stories I'd heard from Boyfriend about tours past. There were people scattered all over the country that I'd heard Boyfriend, G and D talk about; people they were hoping would come to the show, bands they were looking forward to playing with, new friends they were anxious to hang out with. I've also heard the horror stories about people that they crossed paths with, or worse, accidentally gone home with. I don't mean that in a sexual way at all. (Those are entirely different stories, which I won't be posting. Ever.) When you live in a van, if you meet someone cool at a bar, and they offer to let you sleep on their floor or use their shower, you almost always say 'Yes!' So far, we've only declined one offer of hospitality because we had too far to drive for the next show and had to get started immediately after the we left that night.

I guess it is a lot like going home with someone in a sexual way. I've never had a one night stand, but imagine it might be a lot like this. Usually, we go home with someone, sleep over, and leave the next morning. We thank them profusely, and if things were swell, we exchange contact info. If things were super swell, we exchange contact info and stay with them again on the next tour. So far we've had a few repeated sleepovers, and met a few really cool people that we hope we can stay with again on the next tour.

But this blog is not about them. Those cool people have drafts of blogs being written about them. No, this entry is about my first encounter with a crazy person. The kind of one night stand that turns terribly, terribly sour. The kind that wakes you up in the morning talking about what your kids will look like and wondering when you'll move your things in. The kind that has a disturbing collection in their closet, like severed kitten heads or jars full of their fingernail clippings.

The show in Indianapolis was not a great one. It was the first show after spending three days down time with friends in Columbus. We were all excited to get back on the road and out of the Cigarette Depot (as Boyfriend and I nicknamed it.) The show, however, didn't really pay off. It was another example of the economy really beating the crap out of the South and Midwest. People just aren't coming out to shows as much as they used to. We did meet a few awesome people, however. Unfortunately, none of them offered us their floor as sleeping space.

There was one guy there who did offer, however. Earlier in the evening, when everyone was sober, he had interviewed G for the magazine he runs. Seems cool, right? Later in the evening, after everything was packed up, and the guys had milked the bartender for all the free beer and whiskey shots they could, this guy was one of the few left in the bar with us. He asked us where we were sleeping that night, and when we replied that we would sleep in the van, probably in a rest area, he offered to let us stay with him. He said he lived within walking distance of the club. He bought a bottle of whiskey and a bottle of vodka, and promised the guys and me sleeping space and food in the morning. I offered to cook breakfast and do the dishes. I figure if someone is providing room and board, literally the very least I can do is the work involved.

So Band Nanny went to work. I gathered up the boys, made sure everyone had their cell phone and wallet, and we clambered into the van, with the Creeper sitting up front so he could give us directions. In the bar he had given me a strange vibe, but I just chalked it up to the fact that he seemed like a pretentious music snob and was inebriated. Still, when G agreed to stay over at his place, I was a bit disappointed. Which should have been a red flag for me. That I would rather sleep in the van in a rest stop, than stay on this guy's floor. Only a minute or two into the drive, however, I knew something was way off. He and the three drunk bandmates began discussing hip hop. The guys like it ironically. They like it because it gives them an opportunity to make fun of rappers. This guy likes likes it. He loves it. In fact, he's a promoter, and deals mostly with hip hop and rap acts. Let me clarify; the fact that a middle aged white guy likes rap is not what set off my creepy vibe. It's the fact that when any of my three guys said they liked it, he would counter with something that sounded like he'd taken offense to whatever they'd just said, but was actually agreeing with them. He would repeat what they had said to him, but in such a way that it was both contradictory and condescending.

Before we'd even gotten out of the van, he was already reminding us what a favor he was doing for us. We would all thank him profusely, and reassure him that we knew he was under no obligation. This he seemed to not acknowledge at all.

His apartment was in a super nice gated community. As we were walking in, he turned to Boyfriend and I and said, "I've gathered that the two of you are a couple, right?" We confirmed it, and he said, "Well, I never sleep in my bed. I only sleep there when I have a lady, so I don't like sleeping there when I don't have a lady over." We thanked him, but grabbed our sleeping bags anyway, and said that he didn't have to give us his bed.

When we got into the apartment, G set up my sleeping bag (since the Creeper kept insisting that Boyfriend and I sleep in his bed, since he never did anyway) and plugged in his cell phone. He announced that he was going out for one more cigarette, but then said as an aside that he hated being alone outside while he smoked. So I left Boyfriend and D inside with the Creeper and went outside with G while he smoked his cigarette. (Although, half the reason I accompanied him was because he fell down while we were just standing at the door, waiting for the Creeper to get the it unlocked, and I didn't want G to pass out in the bushes. He looks dainty compared to Boyfriend and D, but he's still taller than me.) We talked again about the things he's worried about in his life. He confides in me whenever he's drunk. It's kind of endearing. He's all badass, tattoo boy while he's sober, but when he drinks he worries about things and wants to talk them over.

We went back inside after he finished smoking. He climbed into the sleeping bag and I went into the kitchen to find Boyfriend, D and the Creeper discussing music. All drinking whiskey and coke. They were all swaying already and their speech was slurred. Boyfriend's least of all, it seemed. After D finished his drink, he went in and collapsed on the Creeper's bed (the bedroom was right next to the kitchen.) I looked in and saw him, face down in his classic D-is-drunk-and-it's-time-for-sleep-now pose. I also noticed that the bed didn't look like a bed that was rarely slept in. It looked like it was slept in every night. Yeah, there was also a pillow and blanket on the couch. Honestly, it looked like a normal Bachelor's apartment. Sometimes he fell asleep on the couch in front of the TV, and kept a blanket there for when that happened. This raised a few more red flags for me. Nevertheless, the promise of bed sleep (I'd spent two of the last three nights sleeping on a cement floor in a basement in Ohio) overtook the alarms going off in my head, so I announced to the Creeper and Boyfriend that D had fallen into the bed, doing my best to make it sound like an 'Aw, shucks/Oh, well' kind of thing. This is one of the few girly ploys I use to get what I want. Usually I'm straight forward, I swear. This had the desired result of making them go move D from the bed. I set up the other sleeping bag for him but he stumbled into the living room before I could get it completely set up, and so he collapsed on the couch, where I presumed the Creeper would sleep.

The three of us still awake (of course, Boyfriend and I are always the last ones up, always have been) went back into the kitchen. The boys made themselves another drink, and made one for me as well, which finished off the small bottle of Jim Beam. We stood around in the kitchen talking, and whenever Boyfriend would mention something that the Creeper knew anything about, he would do that contradictory/condescending but agreeing thing. It was getting super annoying, but I stayed polite. Those of you that know me in real life, know how painfully nice I am. In fact, while I worked at the restaurant, one of my coworkers grabbed me by the shoulders, looked me dead in the face and said, "Stop being so fucking nice all the time." Boyfriend, however, was drunk. Not fall down drunk, but to the stage where he's completely over his natural shyness, and feels comfortable using his inebriation as an excuse to say what he normally wouldn't because he can blame it on alcohol. He doesn't really get belligerent or mean, but he loses his painful politeness. It's a trait the two of us really should work on overcoming. We're far too nice to people, and it usually only bites us in the ass.

We left the kitchen and sat down in the living room, D on the couch and G in the sleeping bag. The Creeper showed us a bunch of music on youtube that we hadn't seen before. It was all actually really good stuff. However, the drunker he got the more he mentioned his ex-wife, and how badly she had treated him. He also tried to rap along with the hip hop videos he showed us, but didn't know the words as well as he thought he did. He was also to the slurring stage of drunk, so it was funny.

But as we watched more videos, the creep factor just got dialed up higher and higher. He started being snarky towards me. Whenever I would say something, he would reply with biting sarcasm. Not the funny kind. The kind of sarcasm a High School bully uses. The kind that's completely uncalled for and disdainful. He also kept insisting that Boyfriend and I take his bed. About once every ten minutes. Every other time he urged us to sleep in there, he alluded to us having sex.

They finished their drinks, and the Creeper said they should drink more, but he'd had trouble sitting down in the first place (he'd tried to sit on something, but kept falling off so just sat on the floor instead.) I offered to mix their drinks for them, since I was sober and they were wobbly. They both thanked me. This is a bit mean of me, but I decided to mix the Creeper's drink stronger than I mixed Boyfriend's, because I wanted him to fall asleep already. Needless to say, it didn't work. We stayed up for an extra two and half hours watching youtube videos. Finally, after he made fun of me for yawning periodically, he suggested we go to bed. We asked him again if he was sure about letting us sleep in his bed.

"Yeah, I'll crash in my chair over there," and pointed to an easy chair by the window.

"Really though, we're happy to just have a floor to sleep on. We don't need to take your bed," Boyfriend said.

"No! No! No! Take the bed. And fuck." He then turned his drunken gaze on us. "Seriously. Enjoy the bed. Fuck. I know you want to." Then he jabbed a drunken thumb in my direction, "I know she wants to."

As often as he was degrading and assumptive, you wouldn't think I would have learned to let his crazy bounce off of me. But it didn't. I was offended pretty much every time he said something to me or towards me. It was always mean spirited, and it was always an incorrect assumption. With the one exception being the fact that he guessed I was Irish. That was the only time he was right, and not offensive. Otherwise, he assumed things about my life and personality that he hadn't bothered to actually guess at. Maybe he saw big tits and blonde hair, and the company I keep, and assumed that I was a drug munching whore. That's sure how he treated me, or at least what he inferred. I'd blame it on living in the van with guys (cause I sure am used to people assuming things about me based off the tits and hair), but the Creeper was the first person to do such. Everyone I met in Tennessee correctly assessed my awesomeness. But not Indiacrapolis guy. He didn't bother to observe what I did or said throughout the course of the evening. And the drunker he got, the stranger he was towards me. With Boyfriend he was condescending, but it was plain to see that he liked him the best of the three. He even gave Boyfriend a backhanded compliment, when explaining why their band was not yet successful. 'D is old, and G is arrogant.' He never finished that thought, but I can only guess that by not including Boyfriend in this tiny tirade, that he meant he liked him.

We finally made our escape to the bedroom, and Boyfriend mumbled apologies for being so drunk and keeping me up so late. He took off his boots near the bed, then took his gun from his waistband and put it in one of his boots. I was massively relieved to see it. I readied for bed as well. The door had no lock, so I put an empty cardboard box in front of it. It wasn't big enough to prevent the door from opening, but it was small enough that it would make one hell of a racket should the Creeper open the door. It was almost six already, and I wanted to get some sleep, though I had a sneaking suspicion I wouldn't.

I snuggled up next to Boyfriend and listened as he quickly fell asleep. I also heard our Creepy Host moving around in his living room and kitchen, and still watching videos online. I heard him talking periodically, but I never heard D or G respond to him.

My paranoid brain, soaked in horror movies as a pre-teen, began to imagine the worst. I moved Boyfriend's boots so that I could reach the gun stuffed one just by sitting up and reaching over the side of the bed. Excessive, maybe, but it put my sleep-deprivation induced anxiety slightly at ease.

About an hour later, I heard the Creeper banging around clumsily in the kitchen. I hadn't slept a wink yet, though I had stayed comfortable and warm near Boyfriend's side. A moment later, the Creeper burst through the bedroom door, flinging the little box across the room and into a wall. He slammed his hand against the wall, somehow managing to turn on the light in the process. He looked surprised to see Boyfriend and I in his bed (he looked so drunk he probably would have been surprised to see any of us in his apartment.) I waved at him, partially amused, somewhat frightened, but mostly pissed the fuck off. This guy was so rude, so untrustworthy, so damn creepy that it was starting to piss me off. I'm sure the not sleeping part helped.

With his free hand, he made a dismissive wave gesture back, turned off the light, and slammed the door shut. In his other hand? I kid you not - the pictures of his children he had shown off to us earlier, a Costco box of mini eclairs, and a bottle of BBQ sauce.