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lovesosweeet · 9 months

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KNOW IT ALL x THE BAND CAMINO

part 3

a calum hood songfic

read part 1 / 2

two years ago

Michael’s birthday had come and gone, but the whole thing had been planned by his fiancée. He loved her and he loved the weekend that she’d planned for them, but he wanted a proper weekend of being an idiot with his friends, rather than being on his best behavior and having a picture-perfect weekend that Crystal could share on social media.

Cal could tell that Mike wanted a chance to be a blubbering idiot for a night or two. He knew that they’d all have to grow up eventually and stop doing the dumb shit at some point, but this year wasn’t the year that they grew up. They all knew it, but Cal was the only one who took action.

He booked an AirBNB in downtown Montreal and found a ski resort about 30 minutes outside of the city to spend a day or two on the slopes, knowing they’d spend the better part of the weekend drunk and acting like fools with each other at dive bars and singing karaoke.

The place he booked was huge, so he told Michael to invite anybody he wanted. Because it was a bit last minute, not a ton of people were able to join. It ended up being the band, Roy, Brian, Tillie, and Tillie’s guitarist that they’ve all befriended over the past year and a half, Marco.

Even though they were all flying in from LA, they all arrived at different times of the day. Cal had flown in last night to make sure everything was ready to go. He stocked up on booze, went grocery shopping, and scouted out the ski resort to make sure it would be suitable for a few “celebrities” to spend time at.

Mike and Tillie had flown in together, of course, and it made Cal jealous. He’d been a sucker for Tillie since the night they met, but she was either entirely oblivious to it or simply uninterested. He hoped she was just oblivious, but he tried not to figure out which it was, too scared to truly consider the possibility that she wasn’t into him at all.

Tillie’s contact photo lights up his screen as she calls him, and he answers instantly. He hopes it comes off as just being expectant of them, rather than someone who’d pick up as soon as humanly possible whenever she calls. Both are true.

“Hi, Matilda,” he answers, smirking at the use of her full name, knowing it would make her annoyed. Tillie was fun to tease, but only if you weren’t faint of heart. You had to be ready and willing to be met with twice the amount of insult that you doled out if you wanted to talk shit to Matilda Beckett.

“Shut the fuck up, Thomas.”

“Nice to hear your voice, too,” he dryly says.

“We’re here. Come let us in or we’re gonna go have fun without you.”

“Coming,” Calum answers, already halfway to the door. He wants to spend the whole weekend by Tillie’s side.

Calum makes his way to the front door of the condo and then rides the elevator down to the lobby, where he finds Michael and Tillie dressed in nearly identical outfits. Both are wearing black joggers with black sneakers, along with black hoodies layered over turtlenecks. Tillie’s currently blue hair is partly hidden under a red beanie, whereas Mike’s blonde hair is topped off with a black baseball cap.

The only other difference in their outfits is the white satin sash across Michael’s body that says “bride to be.”

“What the fuck is that?” Calum asks through laughter, his eyes focused on the sash.

“This idiot isn’t planning on having a bachelor party, so I’m forcing him to make this a bachelorette weekend.” Tillie says it so matter of factly, as if Calum should’ve known the reasoning without her explaining it. She’s already stepping into the elevator with her black suitcase rolling behind her and Michael following suit.

They ride up to the floor they’re staying on and while they walk, Michael is on the phone with Crystal, talking about some “emergency” with their wedding planning. Tillie side eyes Calum, trying not to laugh at how little Mike obviously cares about the satin tablecloths Crystal wanted that are unavailable.

Michael retreats to the balcony when they get to the AirBNB, leaving Tillie and Calum in the living room with their luggage. Tillie reaches into her hoodie pocket and pulls out a baggie of colorful candy.

“Brought eddies. Want one?” She asks and pulls out a small gummy to offer it to him.

Calum eyes the candy. “Maybe later? Once everyone is here.”

Tillie rolls her eyes. “You’re no fun.” She doesn’t say anything else before she heads toward the bar cart in the corner. She grabs the bottle of Casamigos from the top shelf, pops the lid off, and then takes a few gulps of the tequila. Wordlessly, she holds the bottle toward Calum.

He’s already turned her down once, and he fears that, if he turns her down again, she’ll stop offering things. Thus, he takes the bottle from her and swallows a mouthful before handing the bottle back to Tillie.

She’s smiling at him, a glint of cockiness in her eyes. “Didn’t expect you to be one to give into peer pressure so easily, Hood.”

Truthfully, he wasn’t, but something about Tillie has him completely willing to do whatever she says. He’d jump off a cliff if she told him to.

“C’mon, Tills. You know me better than that. A shot of tequila is nothing for me.”

She raises an eyebrow and then holds the bottle back out to him. “Okay, then take another.”

Calum hesitates before doing what she says.

He’s practically squinting under her intense gaze, her blue eyes piercing into his skin in a way that’s painfully pleasant to Calum. He’s grateful when Mike reenters the room, hanging up his call with Crystal.

“Okay, crisis averted. I’d like to go get a beer and a snack, if you guys are up for it,” Michael says. He notes the bottle of tequila in Calum’s hands but doesn’t question it. When Tillie is involved, substances are involved, and she’s known for being a bad influence.

Calum doesn’t get a chance to speak before Tillie does.

“Whatever the bride-to-be-slash-birthday-baby wants!” Tillie cheers.

Michael rolls his eyes. “Tillie, you’re younger than me. Why do you always call me a baby?”

Tillie smirks her classic smirk that makes something in Calum’s chest tighten. “Because you act like one. You’d all be so fucking lost without each other like babies are without their moms. Don’t worry, Mike. It’s cute.”

Calum watches as Michael’s eyes roll again.

“Don’t test me, Matilda. This is my weekend, remember?”

Tillie cackles and shakes her head. “Yep, I know. Bachelorette trip in Montreal. Let me get changed and then we can head out?”

Calum and Michael wait in the living room while Tillie goes into a bedroom to get dressed and freshen up. Calum uses the time to text the rest of the gang for the weekend how to get into and out iof the AirBNB and shares his location with them so they can find the trio wherever they end up.

When Tillie re-enters the room, she’s still wearing all black, but this time she’s wearing a long sleeve, black corset style top that has the tiny tattoos on her collarbones exposed, and tight black jeans cover her legs. She’s kept on her black sneakers and taken off the beanie, her hair now just laying straight over her shoulders. She threw on some makeup but not a ton, but, if you ask Calum, she’s the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen.

“Close your mouth, Thomas. Let’s go.” She walks up to him and lightly smacks his face, headed straight for the door without looking back.

Michael snickers as Calum blushes, both of them following the sassy girl out of the condo once more.

Countless shots of tequila, beers, and a few bites of Tillie’s edibles later, the whole crew is now in Montreal and well intoxicated at a dive bar. Tillie had coordinated with Ashton to bring more “bachelorette” items with him, so everyone is now wearing satin pink sashes that say “bride tribe” to match Michael’s. Some of the boys are wearing sparkly pink headbands that have penises attached like antennae while Michael has a veil clipped onto his baseball hat. They all look like fools, but Calum is happier than he’s been in a long time.

Tillie is standing on a booth bench with Luke while they scream along to “Everytime We Touch” by Cascada. Calum is just staring, the weed gummy hitting him hard and he feels like his head is floating, smiling contently at the girl he’s been crushing on, hard, for so long.

“Tommy!” Tillie yells. She’s incredibly high, but not too drunk. Drunk Tillie is talkative, whereas High Tillie is smiley and goofy. She’s had a cheesy grin on her face for the last 30 minutes.

Calum waddles over to her, feeling like he’s wading through a pool. He used to hate that she almost exclusively calls him by his middle name, but now he loves it. She has a nickname for him, even if it’s not all that creative.

“What’s up, Tills?” He asks. He barely has to look up at her, even though she’s standing on the bench. She’s so tiny.

“If you’re gonna stare, you might as well do it up close,” she says, only loud enough for him to hear her. It makes his heart thud quick and hard in his chest and he blushes, but he doesn’t look away from her blue eyes.

Tillie holds her hands out to him, offering to pull him up to stand next to her and Luke. He takes them, feeling on cloud nine because of the way she just flirted with him. When Calum is standing with Tillie, she doesn’t let go of his hands and moves them around while she continues to scream the lyrics of the song.

Calum is over the moon at the physical contact and relishes in the moment, singing and dancing along with her. The bar plays “Dear Maria Count Me In” next, then “What’s My Age Again,” and then, as soon as the opening notes to “Sweet Caroline” start playing, Tillie scrunches up her face in disappointment.

“I’m not white enough for this shit,” she says, craning her neck to make sure Calum hears the words she says. “Wanna go to the patio?”

Calum, bewildered by her suggestion that they step outside, just the two of them, just nods quickly. “Yeah, sure, that works.”

She looks up to him with her eyes wide and a smile tugging at her lips. “Go get me a PBR and meet me out there?”

Once more, he’s stunned, but wordlessly nods, stepping down from the bench before helping Tillie down to the floor. She mumbles something along the lines of ‘see you out there’ before she disappears, and Cal hurries to the bar to order her beer and another for himself. He also orders a shot for himself, needing an extra boost of liquid courage.

As he’s walking out toward the patio, Ashton stops him. “Where are you going?”

Cal’s cheeks flush. “Tillie and I are going to the patio.”

Ashton widens his eyes in surprise. “Oh, that sounds nice, I’ll join—“

Calum cuts his best friend off with an expression that begs him to shut up.

Ashton then smiles and shakes his head. “Fine, I’ll give you your moment.”

“I’ve only been trying for two fucking years,” Calum mumbles while grabbing the two beer cans from the bartender. “It’s under Hood,” he say to the bartender, who nods.

“Good luck, Cal. She’s a tough nut to crack sometimes.”

Cal glares at Ashton. “No shit.”

He’s walking out toward the patio before Ashton gets a chance to say anything else, a smile reforming on his lips when he sees Tillie outside, taking selfies with the city lights behind her.

“Need a camera man?” Calum asks as he approaches her. She rolls her eyes and takes the beer from him, gulping down a few sips.

“Nah, just wanted to post a picture to my close friends story.”

Calum nods. He sips from his own beer can. It’s not silent, since he can still hear the music inside, but now that it’s just him and Tillie, he doesn’t know what to say. She makes him so nervous, but he’s so excited to have her to himself, even if it’s just for a moment.

“Mike’s really glad you threw this whole thing together,” Tillie says, filling the air with conversation easily.

Calum smiles. “He’d do it for me, so it’s only appropriate.” He gazes at Tillie, noting that her hair is now pulled up into a ponytail, a little sweaty from her dancing and being surrounded by so many warm bodies. Her lipstick is faded, almost completely gone, and her eyes are tinted pink. “I’m sure he loves the bachelorette shit you’re pulling, even though he’s being grumpy about it.”

Tillie smirks at him. “Yeah, well, can’t let you steal the best friend title from me.”

“Excuse me! You stole it from me first!”

“Can’t help it that I’m cooler than you, Calum.”

Calum frowns. She called him Calum, not Tommy and not Thomas and not Hood. He can’t disagree with her though. She’s far cooler than he’ll ever be.

“Maybe we can just share?” He asks.

Tillie smiles. “I don’t share, Thomas.”

Something comes over Calum and the words he says shock even himself. “You’d never have to share me, Matilda.” When he realizes what he’s just said, his whole face turns bright red.

Tillie doesn’t say anything, she just nods. She keeps drinking her beer, but when she pulls the can away from her mouth, Calum realizes she’s smiling.

“You know,” she starts, “I thought you were scared of me for a very long time.”

Calum laughs. “I was. I mean, hell, I am.”

She grins. It’s a wicked grin that makes her eyes sparkle. “Good.”

Calum snorts before he and Tillie both fall into a fit of giggles.

“It’s a good scared, though, Tills. Makes me want to talk to you even more, even if it scares me.”

Tillie’s expression turns unreadable and she keeps sipping from her beer can. Her eyes focus on the metal tab, and her fingers follow suit, fiddling with the small piece of metal. Eventually, she sighs.

“I feel like you have me on this pedestal, Cal. And I haven’t earned it.”

Has Tillie always known I’ve had a crush? Calum thinks.

“I don’t have you on a pedestal, Tillie. I just…” he trails off. He wants to say he’s practically in love with her. He can’t say that, so he just doesn’t finish his sentence.

She shakes her head. “However that sentence ends, I don’t deserve it.”

Calum is bewildered. Tillie, the confident, snarky, sassy girl that he’s spent countless days with, is insecure. How had he not seen that? How could she be insecure when she’s so… Tillie? Tillie is loud. She’s sure of herself. She doesn’t give a shit. She does what she wants and doesn’t care what anyone else thinks.

As if she can read his mind, Tillie continues. “I’ve done some fucked up shit, Calum. You’re too… nice for me.”

He raises his eyebrows. “I’ve done some fucked up shit, too, Tillie,” he counters.

Tillie snorts a laugh. “Yeah, sure.”

Calum shakes his head. “Tills, we’ve all made mistakes.”

Her lips press together, her mouth forming a straight line. She debates dumping all of her past on him, right then and there. She won’t lie. She’s wanted to pursue Calum. He was kind and funny and she’s never slighted the fact that she found him incredibly attractive. She just thought he was way too good for him. He should’ve been with a person with way less baggage than she.

“I’ve made too many big ones, Cal. Far more than it takes to disqualify me from being a good person.”

Calum wants to scream. He doesn’t care if she thinks she’s a good person. He knows she is. She’s a good friend, a wonderful companion. She’s thoughtful and he thinks she’s the funniest person he’s ever met. Her confidence is irritatingly high, but he loves that about her. It’s a quality he wishes he had.

“I don’t believe you.”

Tillie rolls her eyes. “Whether or not you believe me, Cal, it’s true.”

Calum takes the chance to roll his eyes back at her. “I don’t believe you. I have zero confidence that it’s true, Tillie. Your heart is too big.”

She has to hold back from pouting out her lower lip. “I’ve fucked up, big time, too many times—“

“Try me,” Cal says, cutting her off

“What?”

“Try me. Tell me one of these big bad things you’ve done and I’ll tell you if it makes you a bad person.”

Tillie looks like she’s on the brink of tears, and Calum suddenly feels horrible for pushing her to this point. She takes a big, deep breath before she speaks again.

“No judgment?” She asks. Her voice is smaller and more shy than he’s ever heard it.

Cal shakes his head. “I could never judge you, Tills.”

She takes a deep breath. “My sister got kicked out of our house because of me.”

When Calum doesn’t say anything, she takes it as a cue to keep talking.

“My parents found a stash of weed in our bathroom. It was mine. We both knew it was mine, but I was young and dumb and I said it was hers. I found a picture of her smoking with friends on her ‘finsta’ and showed it to my parents as proof. I didn’t think they’d kick her out. I thought they’d be pissed, ground her maybe, but I didn’t think she’d be kicked out.k”

She lets the words sink in for Calum, but he seems unfazed.

“And you were how old?”

“Like 15, but—“

“Tillie, you were young and stupid. You clearly regret it. Sure, it wasn’t a good thing to do, but it doesn’t make you a bad person.”

Tillie still looks upset, but she puts on a front and smiles. She’s good at faking it, and it makes him wonder how many times she’s done this around him and he hasn’t detected it.

“I haven’t talked to her since the night they threw her out,” she confesses. She’s staring at her beer can.

“Have you tried to reach out and apologize?”

“She calls me like every other month and leaves a voicemail. I just don’t answer.”

Calum’s eyebrows knit together in confusion. “Why don’t you answer?”

“I’m scared.”

“Tills, it sounds like she just misses her sister if she’s still calling you regularly,” Calum tells her, trying to reassure the girl that she has no reason to be scared.

Tillie doesn’t say anything in response. Her eyes stay trained on her beer. Calum wants to hug her or hold her hand, but he doesn’t know how she’d react, so he keeps his hands to himself. He’s already making leaps and bounds in his quest to pursue her by simply being alone with her. He doesn’t even care that it’s cold as shit outside. He’s with Tillie and she’s telling him things.

“I’ve never told anyone that,” she says to break the silence.

“That you’re scared?”

“No. Well, yes, but the whole thing. I’ve never told anyone what I did.”

Calum tries not to lose his shit. She trusts him. She trusts him enough to tell him something she’s never told anyone.

“It’s not good to keep everything bottled up, Tills,” he says. “Thank you for telling me.”

Tillie laughs quietly and shakes her head. “You’re just so… nice.”

He raises his eyebrows in response. “Thank you?”

She giggles then, and Calum is happy to hear the sweet sound. He’s not used to her being anything but lively and confident. The insecure and scared girl he just saw for the first time wasn’t the Tillie he knows.

“You’re so soft. I feel like I’ll break you if I look at you the wrong way.”

“I’d let you break me any day of the week, Matilda.”

That must’ve been the right answer because before he knows it, Tillie’s kissing him, her hands tangled in his curls. He’s taken aback but entirely happy about it, kissing her back instantly.

He has no idea what he’s just gotten himself into.

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taylorgraymoore · 10 months

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November 30, 2023

Well, I didn’t go to Avenue du Mont Royal. I felt like I was fading, as I finished dinner, and thought it was best to stick to close by where I was staying. This was one of these fateful decisions, or at least it was what shaped the night.

I started to walk back towards the AirBnb. Via Duluth, which has always been a favourite street to me—I thought I would go along it and then just end up back close to where I would fall to sleep. I had been meaning to stop at some place I’d passed on St-Laurent earlier, when I’d been dragging my bags up it, have a couple of beers and then go up to bed. But a couple blocks short of the Main, still on Duluth, I saw a second-floor-bar up inside on the building across the street. I stopped—because I was my first night in Montreal, so why pass by a fleeting inspiration? It won’t be this second ever again. So, across Duluth and up the stairs I went. Unlike the jazz place, there was still room. I got a seat at the bar, next to someone going over the draft of a story in French while sipping a wine. I got out the white sheets of my own draft, ordered a beer and set to get a head start on that project.

Got to the third page of what I’d brought to work on, while I was there. More than I expected to get done that first night, which was nothing. It got harder to work on it after I was done my second drink, but I was still more than satisfied. I sent my friend Matvey, who lives nearby in Vermont, a picture of the bar out of happiness, because we used to go to places like this.

Hey! Turns out Bar Suzanne (that’s the name of the place) is also Matvey’s latest favourite spot in town. Small world. He was quite happy when I sent him the picture, and he recommended I try the dumplings. I had already eaten, but what the hey, I’m in Montreal, so I tried them. They were good.

All this sounds silly and superficial, I know. but these things are draped in the emotions of a past. You have no idea what Montreal in general is draped in, for me. Everything in this city, down to the dust motes, is draped in all that for me. So I get a lot out of it past that layer I can put into words in a space like this.

I took his advice there and on where to go next—Big in Japan Bar, which is directly underneath where I’m staying—when I wasn’t even planning to go anywhere. This ended up shaping the entire night.

Big in Japan Bar looms large in memory. Nothing here is important but memory. I only when there once then, back in the Montreal phase of my life, but it does loom large. It’s important, is what I mean. Matvey showed it to me, that first and only time. How well do I remember it? I think he brought me there early one evening after we’d been on a long walk. The place would’ve had to have just opened that day. Matvey said you’d have to be early to avoid waiting in line outside. I listen to Charles Aznavour as I write this and something is thereby infused in it. La Boheme, if it matters, it is late and I am drunk.

Excuse the quality of this entry, because I wrote it drunk—even though I’m fixing it two days later, that is the context I found it in.

There wasn’t any line when I waltzed in this time: that might’ve been luck or it might’ve just been the eight years in between. That time, we sat down in the same seats I took this time. Or, roughly—but let me have the synchronicity.

Why is memory already so fragmentary? I want to remember details, but I have nothing I can call a narrative. I have flashes. I have snapshots.

But tonight: I order a champagne and the plate of artisanal chocolates, per Matvey’s recommendation, because he steers one in a good direction if you can handle the price tag. I finish that, get an impulsive martini, because the ingredient list is so odd (it has sake in it). It, unfortunately, just tastes like a martini. Something exotic on the nose, but still a martini. I would’ve left after that, except, as I was finishing it, the woman seated just across from me asked me what it was I was so intensely focused on.

I had had my nose in my notebook. Over the two drinks, I’d written a couple of little poems and the first notes of what became this entry you’re now reading. I tell her that. And we end up talking.

Justin and Diane: they were my company for the rest of the night. Sitting across from me, the two people other side of the flickering candlelight. The room fades to darkness as it passes behind them. I really had noticed them before—Justin was having beer, and seeing him have that made me aware of how much money I was spending on champagne and cocktails—but it hadn’t occurred to me that I might interact with them. I’m used to being an atom; it doesn’t occur to me that I’ll occur with anyone.

We all—the two other people nearby, over my right shoulder, eventually get roped in—start talking. The conversation is good. Since it’s clear I’m staying for longer now, I order a Manhattan, the other retro-classy choice, the sound of Otis Redding and an electric organ. Diane goes to Vancouver often, and likes the food there, and we talk about sushi on Robson St to the sound of Charles Aznavour—that is why he’s still in my life as I copy this out. She asks for recommendations and I give her some, off the top of my head. Because it is identical to the one she’s drinking from and because I’m distracting her, she picks up the candle’s glass and burns her hand. She flexes her hand against the heat in it and reaches for the glass with the other kind of flame, the one she can drink.

Justin hands me a two-panel dubble-dubble comic that has been ripped in two. He says the bartender gave it to him, and he asks me to explain it to him. It’s “Pud.” I remember “Pud.” Let’s see if I can remember the comic: first panel has our Pud filling a bubble bath, and he says he wants more bubbles. The next panel shows the outside of a house and bubbles are pouring out all the doors and windows. I had the two halves back to Justin and explain the joke is that he fills the bath too much and it consumes the whole house. It’s not really much of a joke, but I don’t say that. Diana suggests that it’s a pun on the name of the gum: double bubbles.

Haha. Ahaha ha. Ha. It’s a better joke than the comic could’ve come up with.

The music in that place is very good. Half of any place like that is the music. While I’m taking a moment of silence listening to that, the other two I mentioned are roped in properly. Zach and Brian. They ask for a poem, I wrote one. Here it is:

Brian and Zach

Eavesdropping

Got roped into the night

And we introduced each other

Humanity accumulates this way,

It forms clumps of event

And grows like that

And the night endures as an imprint

In ink of itself

And reclines in immortality there

Like the chipped and fading youth

Who live on the side of an excavated urn.

There it is, with very minor edits. Forgive me if it isn’t any good, I was several more drinks in by this point.

Everything past that point is going to be in flashes and fragments. It’s already a memory to me now, see, and I only have these notes in front of me to work with to build the narrative of it back up. You never do realize how fleeting a present moment is while it’s still the present, but it does hit you over the head when you’re trying to copy it all out in black and white like you were still there.

I asked Justin what it was like being a lawyer: he said that sometimes you feel like you’re fighting for something meaningful, fighting the good fight as they say, and that is the part that makes it worth it, and things click then; the other half of the time it feels like fighting for nothing. Like everything in the world, those two halves. I know those halves too. I tell him so.

The night is vanishing into smoke, like the day Charles G.D. Roberts wrote about that one old poem I forget the name of that I read that McGill once. Night is the day here. The whole world is smoke except for what we put into words and maybe even that. (See how drunk I am, scribbling this down? Or was—it’s really two days later, I’m recalling the smoke as best I can—but don’t think about that.)

What do you see when you blink?

This is a blink. All this is inside a blink. Tomorrow this will have been a blink, but look at all the population in it.

Diana asks for my impression of the two of them. I am on the spot, but I tell them. I am unusually honest, blame the drink, but I have nothing bad to say. I like Justin and Diane. I’ll keep my exact words between the three of us, because it was for them and not for all of you--but I said, more or less, that I thought they were honest and human.

Excuse me, for I am drunk.

The place is emptying out around us, and we’re still here. Never let anyone tell you that isn’t a good feeling, having the bar empty out around you as your night endures: we’re going to get to see if we outlive the candles.

The chanson continues; therefore life continues.

(There is an absurd amount of ice in the urinals here. They’re like American glasses of coca-cola.)

We all settle up, and our bills all come to the exact same amount. The bartender gets roped into conversation too, at this last moment. I think I may have given him one of my cards. He writes his name down on a napkin, as I put my coat on, because he’s the last person there whose name I don’t know. “Majd”—it means ‘Glory,’ he tells me. The three of us who’ve just paid up blow out the candles in front of us. I pick up the glass around the dead flame, hold it like something is in there.

Then we file out into the street. A man stumbles over from across the street, stares at us like he’s never seen people before. I give him a nod. Say goodnight to Justin and Diane, walk two doors over to the building I’m staying in—so much for an early night.

#montreal #prose #writing #big in japan

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