Having his wife and son on the road with him definitely was a benefit. It was nice to have Sarah close to him and he didn't have to miss out on time with Daniel. He didn't want to miss any time of him growing up. When Ava had been this small, he had spent a lot of time at home with her as well. Besides his short solo tour in '98, he hadn't really gone back to work until the year after when they started working on Sex Sells. Until they changed it to Crush anyway. That was a good album title though he thought to himself.
The only struggle of having his family on the road for an extended time instead of just a show here and there was messing with Daniel's bedtimes and lugging around a car seat from place to place but that was absolutely worth it. How was he supposed to leave that precious little face at home?
His thoughts dispersed when the door to the lounge opened up, Jon finally walking into the room. He frowned down at him. "You're already here?"
"You're late." Richie pointed out to him. "We leave in like half an hour."
Jon still frowned. "We got pushed back, we've got another hour."
That made Richie confused in return. "Thanks for letting us know." He said sarcastically, not appreciating that at all.
"I texted you last night." Jon said, dropping his bag and sitting down on a chair across from Richie.
He did not remember that. "I didn't get that."
"Have you been here long then?"
"Not really, twenty minutes or so." He said. "It's alright, at least Daniel gets some time to play before being cooped up in an airplane."
It wasn't much longer before they were boarding the plane and finally on their way to Toronto. He knew as soon as they'd land there would be more rushing. Unless plans had changed, they'd be going straight to their venue for tonight to start soundcheck and prepare for the show tonight. He wouldn't get to see his hotel room until after the concert. In about a week, he'd see his own room again.
The next morning, he happily woke up next to his wife, the bed they were in was so comfortable he didn't want to leave it just yet. Instead, he pulled her closer and possessively put his leg over hers as he held her close.
"Glad to be back in Canada?" He asked her.
Sarah shrugged shortly. "I don't know, I haven't been here before."
Richie frowned at that. "I thought you had. Your family lives here."
Carefully, she turned around in his embrace. "My family lives in Alberta. I haven't been to the East Coast before. For that matter, I haven't even been in Vancouver."
"How have you not been in Vancouver baby?" Richie asked surprised.
She looked up at him, trying to figure out if he was serious or not. "Because I lived in Montana and Vancouver is probably over 12 hours away if we drove there."
He considered that for a moment. "Yeah, I guess you're right."
"I'm not even sure if I've even been outside of Alberta so Ontario is entirely new to me."
That got him a little excited. "Does that mean I should plan some sightseeing around here? There's some good places I can show off to you. Want to see my name in the hall of fame?"
"You're in a hall of fame in Canada?"
He shrugged at that. "Why not? We sold out like 10 concerts or something when they inducted us into that."
"Do we have time to sight see?"
He would make time to sight see, that was the whole reason he was taking Sarah on the road with him. Getting her "to see" list of places and countries shorter. There were still so many places he needed to show her so if he had a chance to do, he would make the time to ensure she got to see something new.
The next day was a day off before they'd be travelling to Philadelphia and have a day off there as well before having two back to back concerts and heading Canada again. It'd be hectic but he would make sure Sarah was his priority.
He tried his best to not sleep in as late so they'd have more time to explore Toronto but when his alarm rang at 8am, he remembered going to bed at 3am. Thinking he had pressed the snooze button, he put his phone back on the nightstand and pulled the sheets up to his chin again, snuggling into them to sleep.
Three hours later he was cursing hotel beds for being so damn comfortable. He noticed Sarah wasn't in bed anymore, which made it much easier to get out of bed. He stretched as he sat up and looked around for some clothes. At least he'd still have most of the day.
"Good morning." Sarah said happily when he walked out of the bedroom into the main room.
"I'm sorry I slept so late." He apologized when he walked over to join her on the couch with Daniel.
Sarah frowned at him for a second. "Why are you sorry? I thought you were tired so I'd let you sleep, it's your day off after all."
He picked up his son to cuddle him. "Yeah baby, but I had plans for today. So many things to see and do."
"I didn't know. I would've woken you up then." Sarah apologized in return. "Do you still want to go out? Do we have time?"
"Yeah, let's go." Now eager to go and hopefully still fit everything he wanted to do into their time. "We can get something to eat on the way."
It had been hard to pick out what to do but he knew the essentials they had to see. Most of the things he had shown Sarah, had been entirely new to him as well. Without her, he would have stayed in the hotel most of the time, hanging around, bugging Jon and David. With Sarah, he had had a lot less downtime but it had been much more enjoyable to go out and about to see and explore places than sit around or sleep most of his days away before a concert. So far, this leg of the tour had had a bit more of a routine than he usually had. Then again, Daniel made sure they got up.
Around noon he got his first text from Jon but ignored it, it wasn't anything important, just asking what he was up to. He decided he was too busy to reply and turned his phone off for the rest of their day trip.
Once in the car on their way back to the hotel after dinner, he turned his phone back on to text Ava and ask her how her day had been. Before he was even able to do so he, he noticed the half a dozen texts he had gotten from Jon throughout the day. It didn't seem like Jon got the hint when he didn't get a reply to a text. He looked over to Sarah who was trying to keep Daniel awake, before he texted Jon back, not wanting to impede on their time off together if she wasn't occupied.
He rolled his eyes when he locked the screen. It was his day off, he should be allowed to have some time to himself without his boss wanting to know where he was all day. He wasn't going to let that make him angry and unlocked the phone again to send his own snarky reply.
The next day he was knocking on Jon's hotel room door an hour after they had arrived at the hotel. Did he need more time to settle in? Considering it, he didn't really care. He had made plans for him and Sarah, if Jon wanted to join in, it'd be on his terms.
Richie had already picked out most of the places he wanted to visit today and show Sarah, the places he had been before and actually knew. At least Philadelphia wasn't a strange city to him, he loved when he was able to show her around to places he had visited before and where he had some memories he could share with her. Now that Jon was joining them, it was handy to have an extra adult, even better when he was able to convince him to push Daniel's stroller so he could walk with Sarah and hold her hand instead. In return, he was a good model when Jon wanted to take photos. He knew he'd get those photos in the end anyway, even if Jon didn't prefer taking photos of people, there surely would be a couple cute ones of Daniel.
Before they even knew it, they were back on their way to Canada. One more show, Montreal, before going home for a while. Thanksgiving would be in a few weeks and he was more than ready to just be dad again for a few weeks before heading off to Japan and Australia. Soon enough it would be Christmas again and a new year would start.
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