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Post by barbt on Dec 22, 2013 22:07:00 GMT -5
Keith made them a wonderful meal of grilled fish and vegetables and during dinner they talked about a variety of things. Dave was easily the quietest of them, rarely speaking unless he needed to answer a question. Lisa was determined to get him to talk more. "Where are you from, Dave?" she asked. "You sound sort of like Keith and Damian, but not at the same time. Are you Irish?" "No," he said quietly. "Actually, I'm from New Jersey, but I live in Philadelphia now. I just spent 3 months with a bunch of people who are mostly Irish and a few Scottish - I think there's only 3 or 4 of us who are American, mostly in the crew - so that's mostly what I heard all the time." "Yeah, " said Keith, "You, Candice, Angie, and Josiah are about it. We know that you're just tryin' ta pick up the accent 'cause you know the ladies love it, anyway!" Dave ignored him. "Since the Irish ones never shut up, that's mostly what I picked up," he said with a sly look at Keith and the faintest of grins. "Hey, now," Keith protested with a grin. "Just 'cause you never open your mouth unless ya have to..." "Why should I? You guys talk enough for me and about 6 other people!" "We're just havin' the craic, and you know it!" Keith shot back. Lisa and Sherry looked at each other. "I hope you didn't just say what I think you said, because if you did, we're leaving now," Sherry said. "Neither one of us associates with people that do drugs." Keith and Dave shut up and stared at her. Damian started laughing. "You mean you guys are still makin' that mistake?" he said to Keith. "After 6 years of interviews gettin' messed up with it?" He looked at the girls. "'Havin' the craic' is an Irish expression that means 'having fun'. Has nothin' ta do with the kind of crack you're thinkin' of. I don't know how many times we had to explain to interviewers that we weren't talking about that junk. But at least you got them ta stop slaggin' each other." "What?" said Lisa. It was Keith's turn to start laughing. "Only Damo would explain Irish slang and then throw more Irish slang in at the end of it. 'Slagging' is making fun of somebody, teasin' them or pickin' on 'em, I guess you'd say here." "Which is constant around the whole CT crew," Dave said. "If you can't take slagging and pranks, you won't stay long." Rosemary and Jerry had been watching the conversation with amusement, having heard all of it before. Now Rosemary stepped in. "You guys didn't tell us much about pranks this tour, other than you stealing that forklift, Keith. I know there had to have been some good ones." "You stole a forklift?" Lisa said, looking at Keith with a bemused expression. "I was bored," he said simply, as if that explained everything. "So you stole a forklift?" "I didn't really STEAL it," he said. "Just borrowed it and drove it around inside the venue for awhile. It was right before the first show of the tour, and I didn't have anything to do." "Didn't you get into trouble?" "He almost never does," Damian said disgustedly. "Any of the rest of us would, he just charms his way out of it." Keith just grinned. After dinner, they got out their guitars and went out on the deck. Sherry looked at Dave's and Keith's guitars and said, "What kind of guitars are those? I've never seen ones with the sounding hole at the top like that!" "McPherson's," Keith said. "Best guitars in the world. Dave and I are both sponsored by them." "Really?" Sherry said. "How'd that happen?" "For me," Keith said, "They saw the first PBS show we did and called Sharon, our producer, and told her they wanted to sponsor my guitars. They sent me one during that promo tour. I'd never even seen as nice a case as the McPhersons come in, I was on the phone to my dad before I even had it out of the case 'cause I was so excited. Spent the next hour and a half in Sharon's hotel room with my ear on the body, just playin' single notes and chords, listenin' ta all the ways the sound moved through it. She finally threw me out of the room when she got tired of it." "Yeah," said Damian, "Then he came and showed it to the rest of us for the next few hours. The only one who really wanted to hear it all was Neil, since he's just as nuts about guitars as Keith is." Keith ignored him. "Then when we were doin' my tour for my solo album this spring, we stopped at the McPherson factory, and once they heard Dave play, they handed him one on the spot. Which means he's at least stopped borrowin' mine most of the time." "Yeah," said Dave, faintly embarrassed. "Unless I want to use the 12-string." "How many guitars do you have, Keith?" Sherry asked. She wasn't prepared for the shout of laughter than came from everyone except Lisa. "Ok, obviously that's a loaded question," she said, grinning. "Five McPhersons," Keith said. "And about 60 others," put in Damian. Sherry and Lisa gaped at him. "Sixty?!" Sherry said, shocked. "You can't have them all on this boat, you'd be tripping over them." "Nah, most of 'em are in my music room at my parents' house in Ireland. A few of 'em are with the Celtic Thunder stuff, since I mostly use them on the road with them. That's the electrics, mostly." "So you play both acoustic and electric then?" said Sherry. "Yeah, as well as electric bass, banjo, and ukelele. And a little piano." "What about you, Dave?" Sherry asked. "Acoustic and electric guitar, electric bass, banjo, and mandolin," he said. "Damian?" "Nothin' really," he said. "I've learned a little guitar, but I'm not very good. I just sing." "Just sing," Keith said teasingly, ruffling Damian's hair. "Right. When I first walked into rehearsal to work with Celtic Thunder, I almost walked right back out again as soon as I heard Paul, and then Damian, sing - and Damian was just a kid! Thought I was in the wrong place for sure. If Ryan and George hadn't been as freaked out as I was, I probably would have left." "What was so special about Paul?" Lisa asked. "Operatic tenor," Damian said. "The only one of us with any professional stage experience at all." "OK, now I'm confused," Sherry said. "Your group - Celtic Thunder, you said? - started out with an operatic tenor, a kid, and three other guys who were freaked out by the tenor and the kid? Lisa told me it was open auditions that got you guys together, what did the rest of you do?" "Ryan was an accountant doin' amateur musical theatre at night for fun, George worked in a factory building buses and sang folk music on the side, and I quit school at 17 and played in every pub and music festival I could get into, doin' any odd jobs that would pay the bills," Keith said. "How the heck do you make a musical group out of that combination?" Lisa asked. "That's exactly what we all thought," said Damian. "We were all hired as soloists who would come together to do ensemble pieces, and none of us, not even Paul, could see how it could possibly work, but it did, and here we are." "All of us livin' our dreams," Keith said. "So what about the other guys? Jerry said there are two new guys who are closer to Damian's age?" Lisa said. "Well," Damian said, "first Paul left to start a solo career. Emmet had been hired to replace him, he's got classical training as well. Then we thought Ryan was going to have to leave for a while because of some personal issues he had going on, and they pulled up Neil, who started out as our lead guitarist and back-up singer, to be a principal singer. Ryan was able to come back, but Neil stayed up because I left." "Why?" asked Lisa. "I got a spot on The Glee Project," said Damian. "Couldn't do that and tour." "The Glee Project? Really? How'd you do?" Lisa asked. Damian looked embarrassed. "He only won it," said Keith. "WON IT? So you were on Glee?" said Lisa, surprised. "Yeah - well, I tied, really with another guy, so we both won it. I did about half a season and a few holiday specials." "What about the other new guy?" Sherry asked. "Colm," Keith said. "He has a degree in music, he was hired because they wanted 6 guys for the newest show we were going to record, and then the poor guy had to jump in with both feet when Ryan got hurt." "Oh, Lord, I forgot to ask, " Rosemary said. "How is Ryan doing?" "Perfectly fine," said Keith. "You'd never know anything had happened to him. We spent a lot of the tour slaggin' him about steps, though. Now that he's OK." "What happened?" said Sherry, her nurse's curiosity getting the better of her. "Fell down the stairs a year and a half ago, cracked his skull, and had bleeding in his brain," Keith said. "He was in a coma for 3 weeks." "Oh, no!" Sherry exclaimed. "You said he's fine, though, how long did it take before he could come back?" "He was back in rehearsal with us less than 2 months after he fell. Took him a while to get his strength back, but by the end of that tour, it was like nothing had ever happened." "Two months? " Sherry said incredulously. "I would have said that was impossible." "Well, we didn't expect it either," Keith said. "We really figured he'd be out for months, probably not be able to tour with us that year. Miracles really do happen, I guess. Even the doctors couldn't figure out how he came out of it as well as he did. We were sure we were gonna lose him for a while, it was awful. We're basically a family after bein' together so long, it was like havin' a brother that sick."
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Post by onyxfyrefly on Dec 23, 2013 13:36:23 GMT -5
I'm so behind with my reading! I love this!
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Post by celticbear on Dec 23, 2013 19:33:21 GMT -5
Love this update! The best part was Damian explaining to Sherry and Lisa Irish slang using Irish slang! FYI back in 09 Keith bought his own place in County Donegal near the town of Muff,which is just 20 minutes from his parents place.
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Post by barbt on Dec 23, 2013 23:37:33 GMT -5
Throughout all the talking, Dave had been quietly tuning all the guitars. He glanced at Sherry for permission to tune hers, and she nodded. When he was done, he handed it back to her. "Nice guitar," he said. "Thanks, I like it," Sherry replied.
"Guests first," said Keith. "You're on, Sherry." Sherry thought for a moment, and then started to play "House at Pooh Corner". The guys grinned, Rosemary and Jerry joined in on the choruses, and Dave added a quiet backing rhythm. When she was done, Keith said, "That was good!" "Thanks," said Sherry, "it's one of my favorite songs. I learned it at camp from another girl who played the guitar, and that's what started me wanting to play." "Cool," Keith said. "Damo, you're next, what are you gonna do?" "What do you think?" asked Damian, grinning at him. He spouted what sounded like some nonsense syllables to the girls. "Buachaill ón Éirne." "Are you still stuck on that for your opening number?" Keith groaned. "I'd think you'd be sick of it by now." "It just feels right," Damian shrugged. "Did you learn it yet?" "Nope," Keith said. "Never needed to. Dave knows it though, Colm sings it sometimes." The girls were confused again. "It was my first solo in the very first Celtic Thunder show," Damian said. "When I'm around any of them, I have to start with it." "Then why doesn't Keith know it?" Sherry asked. "If he was the guitar player." Keith laughed. "I was never THE guitar player." he said. "That was Neil and Brendan or Barry, and now Dave. I'm one of the principal singers, too. I play for some of my own solos, and for some of the other guys, but I've always been a singer, not part of the band." Meanwhile, Dave had been playing the same phrase over and over. "Would you stop yapping and get to singing before I get stuck in this, please?" Damian laughed and then, following Dave's cue, started to sing in a rich, deep baritone. "Buachaill ón Éirne mé 's bhréagfainn féin cailÃn deas óg. Nà iarrfainn bó spré léithe tá mé féin saibhir go leor..." At one point he stumbled on the words and Keith quickly supplied them, rattling them off easily. Damian nodded at Keith and finished the song, then said, "Thanks, Keith-o, been a long time since I sang it in Irish." "Wow, Damian, you've got a fantastic voice!" said Lisa. "Keith, how do you know the words if you never needed to sing it?" "Well, I only heard him sing it about a million times, for one thing, " Keith said. "The other thing is, my Irish is better than Damo's - or at least it used to be. I don't have much chance to speak it anymore, but with something like that, I can find it pretty easily. I can still understand people speaking it, but it's really hard for me to come up with an answer on my own. I really want to get back to being able to speak it fluently."
"Doesn't anybody else in the group speak it?" asked Sherry. "Colm has a degree in it, " Keith said, "but he speaks southern Irish, and university Irish on top of it. What I learned as a kid was northern peasant Irish. They're similar, and we do speak it to each other once in a while, but the pronunciation's different so it messes us both up. If we're doing an ensemble piece in Irish and we have solo lines, I always sound different from everybody else, I can't help it. And if I'm singing with somebody else, we have to agree on which way to pronounce it and both learn it that way." Jerry said, "Is it really that different? I mean, there's different pronunciations all over the US, and we seem to get along OK." "Well," Keith said, "just to take one word, one of our songs this tour is called Dearg Doom. The first word is spelled D-E-A-R-G. In southern Irish, it's DARE-ig, kind of like the name Derrick, but in northern Irish it's JAHR-ik, more like the first part of the name Jared."
"I see what you mean," said Sherry. "The rhythm's even different." "Yeah," said Keith. "Anyway, I guess it's my turn." He picked up his 12-string and started to play and then started to sing "Nothing But You and I"- in a high, clear voice very different from his speaking voice, which made the girls' jaws drop. He grinned at their reaction as he sang. Over the course of the song, his voice lowered a bit, but it was still higher than his speaking voice. Dave was playing along with him, and at times he and Keith would look at each other and one or the other would set something up for the other one to match or copy, like a game. At the end of the song they were both grinning, Keith like a delighted child, and even Dave had a full smile on his face. Lisa was speechless. "Wow," Sherry exclaimed, "you're amazing, Keith! And you and Dave obviously love playing together. I've never heard that song before, where'd you find it?"
"I wrote it," Keith said, still grinning. "No way! You write music, too?" Lisa said, stunned. "Yeah, I told you he's disgusting," said Dave. "But at least he has somebody who can challenge him playing." "That's the fun part, " said Keith. "Until I met Dave, Neil was about the only person I ever worked with who could make me work to keep up with him. Sometimes the three of us just sit around and try to outplay each other for hours, it's great."
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Post by celticbear on Dec 24, 2013 19:26:39 GMT -5
Love how Keith,Damian,and Dave blew the girls away with their amazing talents! Love how Keith helped Damian with singing come by the hills!
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Post by barbt on Dec 28, 2013 22:36:06 GMT -5
They kept on singing and talking and laughing for hours. Sherry and Lisa learned that Damian loved swing and big band music and was very good at it, and that it seemed Keith could sing or play almost anything well. Rosemary and Jerry headed home around 11:30, leaving the younger people to continue. Finally, somewhere around 12:30, Keith said, "Probably time to call it a night, I wanna try ta get a surf in in the morning. Been nearly 4 months since I had a chance to. Sherry, want to come along?"
"What time?" Sherry asked. "I work at 11." "I like to get out early when it's not crowded - half seven or 8 at the latest," said Keith. "Half seven - is that 7:30?" Keith nodded. "Yeah, I can do that," Sherry said. "You coming along, too, Lisa?" "Sure!" Lisa said, "I might get some ideas for some drawings." Keith and Damian gave both girls hugs, and Dave shook their hands. The girls headed off to their boat, arm in arm. "Well," said Lisa, yawning, "Now I know why Rosemary wouldn't tell me the name of the group or even Keith's last name - if I'd looked them up on the Internet I'd really have felt out of place! I certainly do want to look them up now - at least to see if I can find out what Damian was like at 14!" "Not tonight!" said Sherry firmly. "If we're getting up to go surfing tomorrow and I have to work from 11 to7, I need some sleep!"
When they got over to Keith's boat the next morning at 7:30, they could hear movement inside. He stuck his head out, his hair standing up all over his head, and said sleepily, "Be out in a few, make yourselves at home." He closed the door and Lisa and Sherry looked at each other and burst out laughing at the way he had looked. "Oh, God," said, Sherry, "what the heck did he do to his hair?" "I have no idea," said Lisa, "It looks like he stuck it in a blender!" While they were waiting, Lisa got out her phone and searched "Celtic Thunder" and found the group's webpage. She and Sherry were checking out the Artists page, reading about each of the guys, and were watching the video of Ryan singing "House of the Rising Sun" when Keith came on deck. He'd pulled his hair back into a short, doubled-up ponytail and was wearing a pair of faded red, white, and blue board shorts and a red swim shirt and carrying his surfboard. "You awake now?" Lisa grinned at him. "It looks like you tamed the hair monster, anyway!" "Mostly," Keith said. "My hair's always like that when I wake up. Colm found this guinea pig that had hair that stuck up all over it and posted a picture of it on Twitter, sayin' it reminded him of me in the mornin'." The girls burst out laughing again. "What'd you do?" asked Sherry. "Told him it WAS a picture of me." Keith grinned. "Really?" said Lisa. "You weren't mad at him?" "Why should I be? It's the truth, and anybody who follows my Twitter or Instagram knows it, I've posted plenty of selfies with my hair like that long before he got into it. It's fun reading the responses I get to'em. I see you were checkin' us out, huh?" "Yeah," said Sherry. "Ryan's the one who fell, right? Did he do this video of 'House of the Rising Sun' before or after he fell?" "After," Keith said. "That concert was recorded about 2 and a half, 3 months after he fell." "Well, I can see an after-effect from the injury," said, Sherry, "The lopsided way he's singing." "Nah," said Keith nonchalantly, gathering things, including a guitar case which he handed to Lisa to carry, and stepping off the boat. "Ryan's sung like that as long as I've known him. He smiles like that, too, sometimes. Sorry, but we've got a little bit of a walk until we get to the garage where my truck is." They headed off up the ramp and walked down the street for a few blocks. They turned into a garage and Keith stopped by a vintage red pick-up truck. "This is mine," he said proudly. "Whoa, " Lisa said. "That is a seriously cool trunk!" "Thanks, Keith said, stowing their gear in the back. "I love vintage cars - well, vintage anything, really." They stopped at a Starbucks on the way. "My treat," Keith said. When they'd ordered, Keith handed a gift card to the cashier to pay for it. "You don't have to use a gift card on us!" Lisa said. "Use it for yourself!" "I almost never pay with anything else," Keith said. "I've got tons of them, the fans know we're all addicted to Starbucks and they're constantly givin' us cards." "Your fans give you gift cards?" Sherry said, puzzled. "I don't think it would ever occur to me to give a singer a gift. How do they get them to you?" "They give us all kinds of stuff," Keith said. "Fan mail - not that I really have a functional fan mail address at the moment, since I haven't been in one place long enough to pick up mail on a regular basis - during Meet and Greets or when we meet them before or after a show, give them to our tour manager to give to us, you name it. Everything from clothes to mugs to food or drinks, iTunes cards, whatever. Didn't make any sense to me at first either, but I kind of get it now, they feel like we give them a lot more than just a concert, so they feel like they want to give back. Here, put your drinks on the table for a minute." He pulled out another gift card and put it on the table as well, took a picture with his phone, and uploaded it, captioning it 'Pre-surf wake-up for me and some friends - Thanks! K x'. "That just went out on Twitter and my Instagram account, by the time we get to the beach there'll be a bunch of replies." He was right. By the time they got to the beach 15 minutes later, he had over a hundred "likes" and 50 or so comments, everything from "Good morning, Keith" to "Glad you're getting a surf in" to "Have fun with your friends". "Wow," said Sherry, "they treat you like they know you." "They kind of do," said Keith as they unpacked. "We've got some amazin' fans, they're always behind us 100%. Some of them come to so many concerts we recognize them and even know their names, and we're always sendin' out little notes or pictures or even little videos to them. When Ryan was hurt I think there were a couple of hundred Masses said for him, and a lot of 'em were timed to coincide with one that was being held in his hometown - although we never figured out quite how the fans knew about that one. They know where he lives, but none of us posted the time of the Mass anywhere, we were under strict orders not to talk about his injury on any social media at that point, any information that went out was comin' straight from Ryan's family through our producer. Now, I wanna surf. Sherry, you comin'?" "Yep," she said, giving Lisa a kiss and following Keith running down the beach. Lisa got out her sketch pad, trying to process the kind of relationship Keith seemed to have with his fans. They knew where Ryan lived, and Rosemary had said they sometimes had to turn away people looking for Keith. Did they know where he lived? Some of them must have a clue, she thought. It sounded like there was a fairly complicated balancing act going on between being open and saying too much. Watching, she could see that Keith was a very good surfer and that he and Sherry were having fun. She was able to get some good sketches of the beach itself and of the two surfing. After a while, they came in for a break and some snacks Keith had packed, and Keith got his guitar out and started playing. That drew a small crowd, and apparently a few fans, as after Keith stopped playing a few mostly older women came over to talk to him and ask for his autograph. Keith seemed to have no problem posing for pictures and signing hats and beach towels, and the women left after a short time, although the girls noticed that some of them moved a short distance away and sat down where they could watch the group. Keith came back and said, "Well, that's your first experience with fans. If you're gonna hang out with me, you'll need ta get used to it. I understand if you'd rather not be on display - and one of them asked if one of you was my girlfriend." He grinned. "What did you tell them?" Lisa asked warily. "Just told them you were friends of mine, " he said. "None of their business what your relationship is or yours with me for that matter. Some of 'em get a little nosy sometimes. Most of 'em are good about it, though, try not to bug me too much. But if any of 'em have decent cameras on 'em, there might be a new video of me surfin' on youtube later." "Don't you mind?" asked Sherry. "That they're putting stuff about you on youtube?" "You obviously haven't searched for me on youtube yet, " Keith said laughing. "There's already hundreds of videos of me out there, everything from me singin' at solo gigs to 30 seconds of me signin' somebody's program. Most of the time I don't mind, it's free advertisin', yeah? Found a few things there that I didn't appreciate it, but all I had to do was contact the fan and let 'em know I didn't want it there and they'd take it down. They want me ta like 'em, so if I tell 'em I don't want something they're doin', most of 'em stop." Looking out to sea, he said, "It's startin' ta get crowded, if we want another surf we'd better go now, yeah?" He and Sherry took off down the beach again. Lisa watched, and they were certainly having more trouble getting clear areas to surf. Then she gasped, and her hand flew to her mouth. Keith had just gotten up when another surfer crossed his path. Keith had seen him coming and tried to turn, but the other surfer didn't see him, and the nose of Keith's board hit the tail of the other surfer's. It was a spectacular wipeout and Lisa held her breath until she saw Keith's head come up. Sherry was paddling swiftly over to see if anyone was hurt. Both surfers shook their heads to her question. Lisa saw Keith speaking to the other surfer - he wasn't yelling, but he didn't look pleased either. Finally she saw Keith clap the other man on the shoulder and nod, and then he and Sherry paddled in. As they got out, she saw that the nose of Keith's surfboard was broken. "You OK, Keith?" Lisa said as they came up the beach. "Yeah," he said disgustedly. "Just a bunch of water in my ear. But let's get out of here so I can lose my temper in private." They packed up their things and headed back to the truck. Once they had gotten away from the beach area, he pulled over into a scenic lookout and got out of the truck, stalking away. They could hear him cursing quietly, kicking at the gravel. Sherry and Lisa looked at each other, not sure what to do. He came back quickly though, and motioned to the girls to get out. Slinging one arm around each of their shoulders he walked over to the edge of the lookout area and just stood there with them, breathing deeply and looking out over the ocean. They could feel him relaxing as they stood there. each with one arm around his waist. "Sorry, ladies," he said finally. "Stupid noob, didn't know what he was doin' or anythin' about surfin' courtesy. At least he apologized about a billion times. I had to keep it civil there, he didn't need me yellin' at him, and knowin' there were fans around I couldn't sound off the way I wanted to." "It's OK, Keith," Lisa said. "I suppose we can't really understand, but we're starting to get the idea. It's got to be awful sometimes, having to be careful what you say or do all the time." "Thanks," he said sincerely, looking from one to the other. "I've learned to trust Mother Rose's judgment; if she introduces me to somebody, I know it's gonna be somebody I like and can trust." Suddenly an alarm went off on his phone. "Sherry, we gotta get back to the marina so you can get to work on time."
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Post by celticbear on Dec 28, 2013 23:24:20 GMT -5
Onyx! Great update! Love how you included Keith's recent surfing accident! Glad the fans at the beach behaved themselves!
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Post by barbt on Dec 28, 2013 23:44:45 GMT -5
Onyx? Did I change my identity without knowing it? ;-) Just teasing!
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Post by celticbear on Dec 29, 2013 20:23:56 GMT -5
Sorry! Barbt! I was reading so much in Nox I forgot whose story I was reading!
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Post by barbt on Dec 30, 2013 10:08:47 GMT -5
I'm glad you think mine are as good as Onyx's, I love hers!
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Post by barbt on Dec 30, 2013 22:24:22 GMT -5
Over the next few weeks, the girls spent time with Keith every few days. Dave had gone home to Philadelphia but they knew that he and Keith would be doing at least one gig in Philly right before the holidays, before Keith went home to Ireland. Keith was a merry, mischievous young man, full of music and laughter, and they never knew when they were going to wake up and find something on the deck that he had done during the night, without them ever hearing him. On the morning of Lisa's birthday they woke up to find balloons and streamers all over the boat as well as a hand-drawn card and a loaf of homemade bread. They couldn't figure out how he had managed to get to all the places he had put things. He was gone all day, so they couldn't ask him. After Sherry went to work, Lisa went over to visit with Rosemary and Jerry and ask them. They both laughed when Lisa told them what was going on. Rosemary said, "That's Keith for you. He does the same thing to us, we never hear him or even feel the boat move. I have no idea how he does it. I've seen him climbing all over his boat when he's playing with Damian or one of the other guys, but then he's not trying to be sneaky. If it was anybody but Keith, I'd probably be creeped out knowing that he could get on the boat like that, but the worst you'll get from Keith is some kind of harmless prank." Lisa said, "I understand what you meant about it being impossible not to love Keith. All he has to do is smile and you feel happy, too. I think it's because he's such a big kid at heart, like he's never grown up." Rosemary said, "That's true, but he can be very mature and very shrewd when he needs to be. He's working his way in the music business like he's been doing it for a lifetime already. One day he's going to be a fantastic producer or something in that line, I'd bet. I just hope he's really put together what's going to happen if he gets the super stardom he seems to want." "What do you mean?" Lisa asked. "If he goes the way he's going, he's going to be very famous, likely very soon. And that is really going to put an end to him being able to just be Keith and not have to be on display all the time. There's no way he'll be able to keep roaming around the cities he and the boys travel to, sightseeing or hanging out in parks playing music and stuff like they do now, he's going to have to have bodyguards and keep out of sight, and he'll hate that. It's already starting a little, he even showed up on a celebrity gossip page in one of the Florida newspapers during this tour. He thought it was cool at the time, but I doubt he'd enjoy it full-time." "I see what you mean, " Lisa said. "Have you talked to him at all about it?" "I did," Rosemary said. "And he listened to me, thanked me, and went off to do his own thing as usual, just exactly how you'd expect a young man to react to his mother's advice!"
A few days later, on the weekend, Lisa was sitting out on the deck when Keith showed up, unusually early for him. Lisa took one look at him and started laughing. She'd grown used to Keith's eccentric fashion sense, but this one took the cake. He was wearing a pair of one-piece, long-sleeved, short-legged pajamas, red with white stripes, and a matching nightcap. "You look like I ought to be trying to find you in a 'Where's Waldo' book!" she gasped. "Hey, now," he protested with a grin. "I was at a party last night, we were all dressed like this!" "Must have been some party," she said. "It was. Too good in some ways, though." He held up his right hand and she saw it was wrapped in a blood-stained towel. "Is Sherry around? I could use some help with this." "I'm sorry, I didn't realize you were hurt!" she said. Going over to the door, she went in. "Sherry? Keith's here, he's hurt his hand and says he needs some help." "Be there in a sec. Grab my first aid kit, would you, and have him come in?" Sherry said. Lisa grabbed the bag and called Keith in. He sat down at the kitchen table, putting his hand up on the table and starting to unwrap the towel. "I can only get so far before it gets stuck," he said. "I did this sometime last night, must have wrapped the towel around it and fallen asleep, and now the blood's dried. I didn't want to tear it loose, I'm not quite sure what's under there. I can move my fingers at least, so it's probably not anything really bad." "What were you doing when you got hurt?" Sherry said as she came into the room. She got a metal bowl out of the cupboard, wiped it out with an alcohol swab, and put clean water into it. "Here, let's see if we can soak that loose." She gently lifted Keith's hand into the bowl and began to pour water over the towel where it was stuck. "We were ridin' around on skateboards and scooters," he said, "only I was a bit too relaxed to be doin' that, if ya know what I mean. Anyway, I lost my balance and came off the board. Ya know how ya keep running, thinkin' you'll catch up with yourself, but ya keep gettin' closer and closer to the ground? That's pretty much what happened, but I can't remember actually hitting. OWWW!" "Sorry, Keith," Sherry said, easing up where she was working the towel loose. "That's what you get for drinking and skating, you know." "Yeah, I know, I'm lucky it wasn't my head or somethin'," he said grumpily. "That probably hurts enough as it is, anyway," said Lisa, handing him a glass of water. He took it awkwardly, left-handed, and drained half of it. "Aye, it does, and I couldn't open the painkiller bottle," Keith said, giving her the tilted head, lopsided grin he'd given Rosemary about the deviled eggs. "Oh, all right," Lisa said, shaking her head and laughing. "Sherry, what can he have?" "Tylenol only, until I know what's under here," she said. "It won't react if he needs any kind of medication to treat it." Lisa got Keith two pills and handed them to him, and he was able to awkwardly get them into his mouth and swallow them. She refilled his glass for him. "Thanks," he said gratefully. "Ok," Sherry said, "now we're getting down to it. Looks like you did a good job on this." As she pulled the towel away, they could see gravel and dirt on the side of his hand, so much that it wasn't clear whether the hand was cut or badly scraped. "Keith, as much of a mess as this is, we're going to need to take you over to the Urgent Care to get this cleaned up properly. I don't have what I need here. Do you mind going like that, or should we get Jerry over to help you get dressed?" "I don't care," he said. "Won't be the first time I've been in the ER or somethin' when I'm not exactly dressed. If it hadn't been for my mates, I'd been in the ER in my boxers and my hair everywhere, last tour." "What happened?" Sherry said as she got out supplies to bandage his hand for the trip. He pointed to a triangular scar on his right wrist. "Put my hand through a window by accident," he said. "It was Halloween mornin', we'd had our party the night before. I got up in the mornin' and tried to open the window, but it stuck, and then it shattered. If Dave hadn't been in the room with me, I mighta bled to death, I just stood there like an idiot starin' at the blood. They called the ambulance and everything, I nicked a couple of arteries. The guys were nice enough to put a pair of shorts on me before we left." Sherry stopped bandaging to stare at him. "You are seriously lucky," she said. "You managed to hit arteries but no tendons or nerves?" "Aye, I was terrified I wouldn't be able to play, but they had a hand surgeon look me over and everythin' was fine. I had to wear a brace on it and wasn't allowed to play for two weeks until it healed though. Sharon took all my guitars away and put'em in the truck with the rest of the instruments so I couldn't get at'em." Sherry shook her head and finished the temporary bandage. "Come on," she said," we're going to have to stop at your boat for your ID and stuff." Fortunately, it was early enough that there weren't too many people around to see their odd-looking parade. Rosemary was awake, and she immediately came over to the side of the boat when she saw them. "Keith, are you ok?" "Aye, just messed up my hand skatin' last night," he said. "Sherry wants to take me over to her work to get it cleaned up." "All right, let me know how it is when you get back, OK? And if you need help with anything?" "Yes, Mother Rose," he said in the tone of voice all men use when they feel like they're being babied. Their luck held when they got to the Urgent Care, there was no one in the waiting room so Sherry was able to get Keith back into one of the treatment rooms and have them do the paperwork there while she got ready to work on his hand. It took over half an hour of using a water spray, soft brushes, and gauze to clean things up enough to see that, while he had a nasty scrape all along the side of his hand, there weren't any deeper cuts. "Your luck's holding," she said. "If we'd have had to stitch this, you'd have had to cancel your Philly gigs. As it is, it'll probably be stiff and sore, but you should be able to play. I want the doctor to take a quick look at it, and I suspect he's going to order some antibiotics for you; with as dirty as that was overnight, you'll be lucky if it doesn't get infected." "OK, " Keith said. They could tell the hangover was getting to him and all he really wanted was to be back on his boat. Sherry went off to find the doctor, and Lisa sat next to Keith, pulling him over so he could rest his head on her shoulder. He sighed, and hid his face against her neck to block out the light. He dozed off almost at once; by the time Sherry and the doctor came back, he barely twitched when the door opened. "Now wouldn't that be a picture to put out on his Twitter," said Sherry quietly, grinning. The doctor smiled too, seeing what looked like an overgrown little boy asleep on his mother's shoulder. "Oh no you don't," came a low growl from Keith. He lifted his head blearily and glared at her. "I thought you were asleep!" Sherry said. "I was, just about," Keith said shortly. "But anybody who hangs out with the CT crew has learned to wake up quick when they hear the words 'picture' and 'Twitter' when they're sleepin'. Puttin' embarrassin' pictures of each other on Twitter is one of our main pastimes, some tours." The doctor looked over his hand and agreed that he needed antibiotics, and that the hand would need to be soaked and re-dressed every day for a week. "I assume you have someone to help with that?" he said, smiling at the girls. Keith nodded. "Okay, you can get your medications and head home," the doctor said. "You look like you need a good sleep." Keith nodded again, almost asleep sitting up. "When you're more awake, Sherry can tell you what to look for in case it gets infected." Sherry called Rosemary and Jerry from her cell, so that Jerry could help get Keith back to his boat. He was so tall that the girls knew they couldn't manage it alone with him this out of it. Once they got him there, he was asleep before they left the boat, and Mother Rose went back on duty to check on him periodically.
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Post by celticbear on Dec 31, 2013 0:27:50 GMT -5
Love how you keep putting in things that Keith has recently done or posted on Instagram! What happened at Urgent Care was priceless!
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Post by sportygirl200 on Dec 31, 2013 2:12:26 GMT -5
I suspect mother rose wont leave him on his own
Sent from my GT-P5110 using proboards
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Post by barbt on Dec 31, 2013 9:27:02 GMT -5
Love how you keep putting in things that Keith has recently done or posted on Instagram! What happened at Urgent Care was priceless! The injury and how it happened is real, too. Keith still had his hand bandaged when he did the Philly gigs, and the story about how it happened is as close to a direct quote of what he told us as I could remember.
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Post by barbt on Jan 1, 2014 21:42:13 GMT -5
When Rosemary checked on Keith 2 hours after he'd fallen asleep, he seemed to be OK, but when she came back another 2 hours later, he was flushed and sweating. He was awake, but hadn't gotten out of bed. "Mother Rose?" he said sluggishly, "I don't feel very good, and my hand hurts like heck." He held it up, and Rosemary could see that it was red and somewhat swollen around the bandage. "Sherry was afraid of that," she said. "It looks like it is getting infected. You took your antibiotic before you went to sleep, didn't you?" "Aye, she wouldn't leave me alone until I did." "Some of not feeling good is probably still dehydration," Rosemary said. "Do you want to get up and get something to drink, or would you rather I brought you something?" "I'll get up," Keith said, and made it to the couch in the next room, but only by holding onto the wall. "There's some sports drink in the fridge," he said. Rosemary got it for him and then said, "I'm going to go get Sherry to check you out." When they came back a few minutes later, Keith had finished the sports drink, and Rosemary got him a glass of water. Sherry checked him over and confirmed that he did have some infection and was running a mild fever. She showed Rosemary and Lisa how to soak the hand and redress it. Then she looked at Keith sternly. "One of us is staying with you until you feel better," she said. "Oh, come on," Keith protested, feeling a bit stronger now that he'd had more to drink. "I'm a big boy, I can take care of myself!" "Oh yeah? " Sherry challenged. "When's your next dose of antibiotic due?" Keith looked away from her. "I don't know," he muttered quietly. "Would you have gotten up to get something to drink if I hadn't come over and made you?" Rosemary chimed in. Now Keith was looking at the floor. "No." "That settles it," Rosemary said firmly. "You asked me to be your American mom, now you're going to have to deal with a mom and two sisters watching you." He grinned at her sheepishly. "Yeah, I guess I did. At least I don't think you two," he looked at the girls, "will be as obnoxious about it as Rebecca would be. She loves it when she gets to pick on me for bein' stupid." Rosemary stayed with Keith until dinner time, and then Sherry until about midnight. They got two more doses of antibiotic into him as well as water and some food, but he was still running a fever and not feeling well. When Lisa came over to take over for Sherry, Keith was sleeping, but very restless. He woke up as they spoke briefly outside the door of the bedroom. Sherry said good night to him and left. "Keith?" Lisa said quietly. "Aye?" "I remember Rosemary telling me that you don't sleep well on the tour bus. Do you usually sleep OK here? You've been really restless." "I usually sleep fine here. On the bus our bunks are really small, and I hate my bed bouncin' around, that's why I can't sleep there." He got up and went into the bathroom. When he came back and crawled into bed again, Lisa went out of the room, but after a while she could hear him tossing and turning, muttering and moaning in his sleep. She went to the door and watched him for a few minutes, thinking that he needed rest and wasn't really getting any. She went in and sat on the edge of his bed, running her hand through his hair and rubbing his back. He sighed and calmed down. She stayed there for a while, and when it seemed he was peacefully asleep, got up and left the room again. But in less than an hour, he was just as restless as he had been before. She went back in again, and again he calmed down, but she didn't want to leave this time and have him get restless again, so she laid down beside him, outside the covers. Maybe if he could feel she was here, he'd stay calm. It seemed to be working, and she dozed off too, knowing she'd wake if he got out of bed. She woke up suddenly, startled, hours later after it had gotten light out. She was laying on her side, with Keith curled up behind her and his arm around her waist. He was calm, and she wasn't sure what had woken her, when suddenly she felt him kiss the back of her neck. She realized that was what had woken her. She turned so that she was on her back. "Keith," she said quietly. He didn't wake, but snuggled up to her and kissed her cheek. "Darn, " she thought, "I'm going to have to wake him up."
"Keith!" she said more loudly, blocking him as he tried for another kiss. "Stop, Keith, wake up!" He woke up with a start, looking at her confusedly. Then he blushed and rolled away, saying "I'm sorry, I was dreaming, I thought you were somebody else. I didn't do anything too awful, did I?" "No, it's okay, it was just a couple of kisses," she reassured him. Keith looked at her seriously. "You know I'd never try to get between you and Sherry, right? I'm not that kind of guy." "I know," she said. It seemed he felt worse about it than she did. "I knew you were asleep, it just took me a couple of minutes to wake you up." "Why were you on the bed, anyway?" he asked. "Not that I mind, I just didn't expect to find you here." "It was the only way I could keep you calm so you'd sleep peacefully," she said. "Every time I tried to leave the room, you'd start rolling around and moaning again." "I'm sorry you had to do that, but thanks," he said. "Actually, I feel a lot better now. That antibiotic must have finally kicked in." "I guess so," Lisa said. "I think your fever's gone, and your hand looks a lot better, too." "I'm going to get a shower," he said. "Will you wait and help me bandage this again afterwards?" "Of course," she said, getting up and leaving the room so he could have some privacy. Sitting out on the deck, she thought about how they'd woken up. She wondered if it would bother Sherry. Lisa knew Keith was telling the truth when he said he wouldn't try to come between the two of them, but she was a little worried that Sherry might be upset with Keith. "Penny for your thoughts?" asked Sherry as she climbed aboard. Lisa jumped. She was so lost in thought that she hadn't even noticed her approaching. "What's wrong?" Sherry asked, sitting down next to her and putting an arm around her. "Is Keith worse?" "No, better actually, he's in the shower and I think the fever's gone," Lisa said. "Than what's got you upset?" Sherry asked. "Did something happen between the two of you? I know you like him a lot..." "NO!" Lisa said. "Well, sort of, but not like what you're thinking." She explained what had happened. "I was just worried you might be mad at Keith." "Mad at him for something he did when he was asleep, and stopped and apologized as soon as you woke him up? Why would I be mad at him for that? You had me scared that something a whole lot more serious had happened." "If I didn't have you, it might have," said Lisa quietly. "I do like him. But I love you."
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