#the US tour

[zilabee]

Neil arrived at his door late at night with a carton of 12 boxes of cigarettes, a chunk of marijuana and some roll-up papers. “He asked me to make up some joints for the tour. To be honest I didn't really think about the consequences. Had I known how serious this was then, I'd never have agreed. Can you imagine what would have happened had I been caught?” Alf had his work cut out for him. He'd take each pack of 20, split open the cigarettes, add the hash and re-seal them into joints. For each pack of 20, an industrious Alf would replace the contents with 25 marijuana cigarettes. “I sat up practically all night rolling joints for the American tour. I made them all and then carefully placed them in the cartons. Then I got the cellophane I'd peeled off and wrapped it back around the packs. Then I'd use a warm iron to seal the packs, as if they hadn't been opened. “The next day I carried it to the airport under my arm. Neil had asked me to do it. I suppose in my own naive way I was happy to do it.” It was just another little Beatle chore. Little did he know that as a drug courier - carrying around hundreds of joints - he would have faced a lengthy spell inside if caught. In hindsight he is still a bit peeved that Aspinall didn't warn him of the terrible consequences, if he'd been busted. “In the 60s, can you imagine? I'd have probably been put away for 10 years," sighs Alf. "That's what always bugged me. He never said a thing. I'd have been in serious trouble. I've often wondered if he thought that was funny in a perverse way.”

On the way back into England Alf's case does get searched and contains the remaining few joints: “I'll never forget it, [the customs official] started flicking through my shirts and all these bits of joints were popping out everywhere. To my amazement he just looked at me for a second, flipped the case shut again and said 'OK'. There's no question about it, he knew what I was carrying but he let me go. To this day I'll never know why, but boy was I grateful.”)

Ticket to Ride, by Alasdair Ferguson and Alf Bicknell

[vaggieslefteye]

VEROSIKA MAYDAY, Succubus Pop Star | 2x09 - Apology Tour

"Blitz, there is a crowd full of people here who cared so much they throw an entire fucking party about hating you every year! Do you know how much you have to care to do something as stupid as that?"

[blossoms-phan]

whatever. whatever

[k4pp4-8]

FUNK TROLLS SAVE ME

[lossisyours]

are you not entertained?

[maru666x]

i keep my promises

[notchemicallybalanced]

Happy mother’s day to the cuntiest bitch i’ve ever seen

[julijbee]

in awe of the beauty of the world

[baby-girl-aaron-dessner]

Swifties react to Taylor Swift’s decision to stay friends with Trump supporters.

[ncutii-gatwa]

A full gold two piece "I Can Do It With a Broken Heart" outfit (which she hasn't worn on the tour yet)

[uptownhags]

I was eating sweet potatoes, salmon, and lettuce 3 times a day for 9 months. And that’s it. You know, sometimes cubed, sometimes in a strip of salmon, but that was it. That was tough.

[reunitedinterlude]

without the internet, we never would've met

[breakbleheavens]

GRACIE ABRAMS and TAYLOR SWIFT perform US for the first time ▸ The Eras Tour — London, UK (Night 3) | June 23, 2024

[protagonist-art]

hey girl did u fall from heaven cuz u look like Delta Dawn from trolls

[blossoms-phan]

owe this queen my life CATBOY PHIL????

[livwritesstuff]

for @steddie-week day 3 | long (and a little bit of mutual pining but the kind when they're literally dating which i think is even more pathetic)

tags: modern day, famous au, actor!steve, rockstar!eddie

Eddie stayed longer than he should have. 

He was supposed to leave Chicago with the rest of the band yesterday after their show at Credit Union 1 – opening night for a year-long national tour.

Eddie didn’t leave yesterday though. Instead, he insisted on spending one last night with Steve, one last morning pretending like they would actually get up and go to that breakfast spot they like even though they both knew they’d be spending the time wrapped up together in their bed, in the home they share, refusing to disentangle themselves until they had no other choice.

No other choice meant Eddie waited so long to leave that he ended up on a flight which would get him into Ohio with barely enough time to make it to the venue in Cincinnati before showtime (and he was missing soundcheck completely – sorta shot himself in the foot with that one, in Steve's opinion, though he won’t be caught complaining).

He won’t be caught doing anything – not publicly, anyway.

Steve and Eddie’s relationship is kind of in the halfway-stage between secret and private, where Steve posts vague, faceless photos of the two of them every now and then but still deflects questions about his romantic life during interviews because – look. He and Eddie are both at weird high-points in their careers at the moment, and that means there’s a lot of eyes on them whether they like it or not. Steve had a public relationship turn sour years ago and there is no way in hell he’s letting it happen again.

Not with Eddie. Not when it counts.

There are speculations, obviously (and after Steve dropped Eddie off at O'Hare, he posted a photo of the Kiss n’ Fly sign to his IG story with the caption i hate this place :( – mostly for his own amusement at the specific way his notifications implode afterward), and they’ll probably get around to an official hard-launch someday, but for now Steve likes that they’re keeping things to themselves, especially when they don’t get to make that choice with much else.

Steve gets a just landed text from Eddie a few hours after he boarded his plane.

(Steve knew. He’d been tracking the flight).

Before he could respond, Eddie added, miss you so fn much

i miss you too, Steve texted back, and before either of them could wallow in it too much, he sent, gonna make it on time?

probably, Eddie answered. Then, getting ready in the car lol

He goes quiet after that (the getting ready, presumably), which is fine.

Steve gets it.

He’s busy too. It’s why he’s not following along on Eddie’s tour like some glorified groupie, and it’s not like the distance is anything new. On the contrary, it’s been an element of their relationship since they met at an awards show after-party four years ago. It’s more that this time around, they were supposed to only have four-and-a-half weeks together before Steve headed off on a press tour for the movie he filmed last year, but then that got pushed out a bit further, and so that four-and-a-half weeks together turned into a glorious nine, the longest Steve and Eddie’s calendars had ever been aligned without some serious planning beforehand.

He just got used to it, Steve supposes.

He got used to having Eddie around all the time, under his fingertips, under his skin. He got used to saying goodnight in person, in their bed together instead of over phone lines, got used to waking up in Eddie's arms and hearing sweet nothings whispered in his ear rather than reading the texts Eddie would leave for him to wake up to when they were apart.

He'll adjust just like he always does, and the worst part will be over tomorrow morning – that moment right between sleep and wake when Steve will realize Eddie isn’t in their bed with him.

Like it or not, the distance is their normal and they make it work (except it’s not even making it work, because it’s not like that. Any situation, any set of circumstances will work without question because it’s Eddie).

The start time for the Cincinnati show comes and goes. A few minutes into the opening act and while Steve is mindlessly flitting between Instagram and TikTok waiting for the algorithm to fill his feed with clips from the concert (ones of Eddie, preferably), his screen lights up with a call.

“Hey,” he says the second he slams his thumb on the green accept button.

“Hey,” Eddie replied, his tone nothing short of grim.

“You geared up for the show?” Steve asked.

“No,” Eddie answered, “I’m quitting.”

Steve rolled his eyes.

“Yeah, okay.”

“I need you to come tuck my pockets in,” Eddie said, and it’s a goddamn wonder Steve didn’t break down then and there, because Eddie always managed to tug his pants on in a way that made the front pockets stick out just a bit, and throughout their years together Steve had gotten into the habit of tucking them back in for him, squeezing Eddie’s hips a little when he was done and pulling him in for a kiss.

“Yeah,” Steve manages a wet laugh, “I – fuck, man, I wish I was there to tuck them in for you.”

“I want you here so bad, Steve," Eddie says, "I really, really miss you."

“I miss you too,” Steve nodded, even though miss isn't a big enough word for the homesick feeling in his chest, “Only a week until the Indy show though. And I’m coming with you for the Michigan one after.”

“Yeah,” Eddie replied, and if he sounded a little morose about it, Steve was right there with him. Sure, it’s a comfort knowing he’ll be seeing Eddie again so soon, but when those two days are over…yeah, it’s gonna be a long goddamn while until next time, because Eddie will be playing the Midwest while Steve’s press tour is mostly on the East Coast this time around, and after that he heads up into Vancouver to shoot a period drama mini-series while Eddie plays the southern half of the US, and then…well, Steve could keep going. They’re both taking a short break for the holidays, but that and the rare weekend one of them can fly out to the other is about it for the foreseeable future.

Which, yeah, Steve loves acting, loves that he gets to make a whole career out of it, and he knows that Eddie feels the same way about his music, but…the love he has for Eddie definitely edges out the rest of it – enough that he feels the distance between him like a dull, ever-present ache whenever they’re apart.

Eddie only ends their call when his manager practically has to yank the phone out of his hand and shove him onstage, and then Steve settles back into bed, back into scrolling mindlessly on his phone waiting for his finely-tuned algorithms to do their jobs.

Sure enough, it takes less than thirty minutes for Steve’s FYP to start showing him TikToks from Eddie’s show, and amidst all the hair and leather and silver chains and chunky rings and eyeliner and manic energy, Steve sees something else, something that has the hurt of missing Eddie increasing ten-fold, something that has him seriously considering taking an ax to all his contracts and his career and his livelihood and getting on the next plane to Cincinnati.

Eddie left his pockets untucked.