Down Memory Lane
Robbie’s point of view – January 2026
Mark came up behind me, and I felt his arm slide slowly around my waist, his fingers brushing teasingly against my skin as I fixed drinks by the outdoor bar for a couple of our friends. I was barefoot and wearing nothing but a pair of navy speedos.
“You forgot your cap by the pool,” he laughed, dropping it onto my head. A fan had thrown it onto the stage. Rainbow stripes across the front, ‘Sounds Gay, I'm In’ stitched above the brim. It wasn't exactly subtle. I loved it.
Like usual when we were in Turks and Caicos, the villa was full. Between our band family, our actual families, a few close friends, and the kids, the house was packed with people we loved. All six bedrooms were occupied, most with extra beds squeezed in or sofa beds pulled out. There were inflatable mattresses scattered everywhere for whoever needed one. A few friends had basically taken over the living room too.
Music was playing inside, loud enough that we could hear it clearly out on the terrace, people were laughing in the pool, and kids were screaming as they played in the water.
It was complete chaos, basically, the kind of chaos I liked.
“Listen, I have a problem,” Mark said against my neck.
I smiled because there was something playful in his voice. I turned slightly, though I kept pouring the drink.
“Oh yeah? What’s wrong?”
He leaned in until his lips brushed my ear.
“J’ai grave envie de toi,” he whispered.
Then he pressed himself against me just enough for me to feel exactly what his problem was through the loose shorts he was wearing.
“Oh, that's your problem?” I laughed, turning to face him, still holding the first drink I’d made.
His eyes were bright and warm, and there was absolutely no mistaking what he wanted.
“I’ll be in our room. Don't make me fix this by myself.”
“You know me better than that,” I said as he walked away with a mischievous grin.
I stood there for a second, aware of the rush of blood he’d sent through my body might become a bit too obvious through my speedos. He knew exactly what he was doing, whispering that to me in French.
That was still new. He had started doing that more often lately, and he knew exactly how well it worked on me.
Bastard.
Because fuck, that was hot.
I watched him wander back into the house, stopping to chat to a couple of people on the terrace before disappearing inside, completely unbothered by the fact he'd just teased me in broad daylight while half our friends and family were barely twenty feet away.
And I think part of why that got to me so much wasn’t just because it was hot.
I was just… grateful.
Grateful to see him like this. Happy. Playful. Comfortable enough to just be fully himself.
And lately, that included French.
He had started using it with me, little comments, random phrases he knew I’d understand, things he whispered in my ear when he wanted a reaction out of me.
And every single time... It worked.
For some reason, French had always been weird for both of us. Mostly because it had been weird for him. He associated it too much with James, and I think over time I kind of did too. I hated that man enough that I ended up carrying some of that baggage with him.
He just hadn’t associated French with enough good things to really bring it into our love life.
Hell, he’d never even say ‘Je t’aime’ to me. He never seemed comfortable saying it, even when I tried to tease it out of him. It made sense, of course, because those weren’t words he’d grown up hearing at home. Still, I’d tried plenty of times to get him to say them, but he always got awkward about it.
So, yeah, I know what you’re probably thinking … He used those words in the song he wrote to propose to me on stage. And yes, that hit me hard, because I knew exactly what it meant for him to say those words. To sing them.
It wasn’t like he had stopped speaking French once we left Dublin though. Far from it. He had French-speaking friends in Paris, and plenty in London too. London was full of French people, especially in music. Artists, producers, journalists, label people. Some were close friends, others were people he liked and kept in touch with, people he’d call or have dinner with when he had time. And now there was his family in France he called often. And Amy too, he talked to her all the time.
He’d always kept French in his life.
I remembered how on our last big tour, he’d sometimes go hang out with the few French-speaking people on the crew, just to speak with them. That always made me laugh. He’d just show up and start chatting with them like he was one of them, like he’d known them forever. The first time, they looked completely confused, a bit starstruck too, like they had no idea why Mark had suddenly decided to hang out with them. But they got over it pretty quickly once they realized he genuinely just wanted to talk.
So, it wasn’t that he disliked French, he liked speaking the language, he just didn’t really think of it as a language for intimacy or love. Not for us, anyway. Not in a sexy, playful way like he was doing now. It’s not like French words never slipped out when he was with me, but it was always when he was annoyed or complaining about something, or talking to himself, never like this. Although the occasional ‘putain’ would sometimes slip out during sex instead of ‘fuck’ too, but only when he was bottoming and things got a little too intense for him.
But after the French songs, after all the work he’d done on himself to record them, after everything that came with that, something changed. He let go of all that, and honestly, I loved seeing that. I loved seeing him embrace that part of himself so freely, not just in music but in his private life too, because that was part of who he was.
And hearing him whisper in French against my skin… yeah, that definitely did things to me.
So I made us a couple more drinks and joined him in our bedroom.
I laughed as I walked over to the bed to set the glasses on the nightstand, stealing a glance at his naked body.
The room was still a mess. At that point, Magie and Callum were basically rotating between us and Damon and Rachel depending on the night, so we never really knew where they’d end up sleeping. There were mattresses on the floor, blankets, toys and random stuff all over the room.
“Mag’s still with Rachel right?” I asked.
“Yeah, she is.”
“So…” I glanced back at him. “I thought I’d make us a drink. Do you want it now?”
He shook his head.
“No, later.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“Are you sure? It’s gin and tonic, your favourite.”
His eyes stayed locked on mine as he stepped closer, his hand slowly sliding around my waist.
“No. C’est toi que je veux.”
He sounded completely serious, which made it even hotter.
I grabbed his arm and gently pushed him down onto the edge of the bed.
Then I moved in front of him and smirked.
“Yeah?”
He just smiled, looking gorgeous. Tanned. Completely fucking perfect.
And I was hard as fuck.
“Go on,” I said as I pulled my dick out of my speedos. “Tell me what you wanna do.”
He smiled naughtily.
“Je veux te sucer,” he said before going for it, swirling his tongue around my cockhead and slowly taking me in his mouth.
“and after?”
“After?”
I nodded.
“Après tu verras.”
So, we made love in that room for over an hour, rimming each other slowly and sucking each other’s dicks for a long time, Mark sometimes moaning in French, saying things like ‘c’est trop bon’ and fuck, that only made me want to devour him more.
Then he slowly rode my dick, my back against the headboard and him facing me. He stayed in control for a while, moving at his own pace, deciding how much he took and how fast he took it.
He moved slowly up and down for a while and I just watched him as he lost himself in his own pleasure, as he almost made himself cum.
He didn’t though, he stopped … his breathing was a little uneven and when he looked down at me, I saw it in his eyes, he wanted more.
I could feel a smile spread across my own face, because I loved that look in his eyes so much. It didn’t show up that often so whenever it did, I took full advantage of it because I knew he was about to let go, really let go, and I loved it so fucking much when he did.
I loved watching the exact moment when he would let me fuck him, really fuck him and completely let me take over. He always felt things deeply and there was a part of him that liked to stay in control, so when he gave himself over completely, fuck I loved it.
I would often let him take control first, partly because I loved to watch that moment when he would, maybe, become more vulnerable. There was something incredibly intimate about the way he trusted me like that.
I slowly changed our position, guiding him until I had him exactly where I wanted him.
“Let’s fuck properly now,” I said, holding his jaw and not breaking eye contact.
He nodded, breathing hard.
“Yeah, fuck me, vas-y,” he said and looked at me with that expression I had been waiting for, the one that meant he was completely done holding back, done thinking, done being in control, he wanted me to take over and give him exactly what he wanted, and what he wanted was for me to go real deep.
So I did. I motioned for him to roll onto his stomach. He did and slightly turned on his side, one leg straight, the other bent and close to his chest.
I started slowly, but it didn’t take long for the intensity to build, I gave him long deep thrusts, knowing what I was aiming for … the kind of fuck he loved when he was in the right headspace … and hopefully, in the right position.
I used plenty of lube and I could tell by the way my dick slid in and out of him that it was going to be a good one so I gave him harder, deeper thrusts, picking up my intensity.
“Putain,” he eventually let slip.
Yeah, There we go, I thought as I buried myself balls deep inside him.
Finally … that was it …. He was where I wanted him.
I loved hearing that word. Because I knew what that word meant. It meant he no longer controlled how intense it felt. It meant I was deep enough to make him lose control and that felt so fucking good for him.
I could feel it now, I was in just the right position to hit that second hole, that curve deep inside at the end of his rectum, maybe even straighten out a little and really push deeper inside him. I loved it, that extra tightness around my cockhead when I managed to push through, damn, that feeling of going through it then back out, it could easily make me cum. Mark loved it when I did this to him, it brought a whole new level of pleasure but it was a feeling he couldn’t really get to if he was in control, he had to relax and let go.
“Fuck, yeah, fuck,” he breathed. I knew exactly what he was feeling as my dick very slowly teased that bend. He’d sometimes push himself that deep inside me too, if we found the right position for it.
I stayed there, buried deep and slowly moved, I let my dickhead gently massage that spot and begin to penetrate deeper and I knew I really had him. I could hear it in his moans and groans. He’d surrendered.
As I pressed a little harder, a little deeper with each slow thrust, I leaned down to talk dirty to him.
“Breathe, come on, relax, take my dick.”
“Mm mm,” he groaned.
“Yeah, enjoy it, baby, come on, take it,” I moaned as I withdrew just a little and pushed back in, just gently pressing to go just a little deeper, I could feel the pressure on my dickhead and that was doing amazing things to me, like the head of my dick was being sucked.
“Oh god,” he breathed.
“You feel that?”
“Yeah, putain,” he groaned and said it again, followed by something in French I couldn’t quite make out, but I definitely caught the word profond. And then he said it again, and this time I caught it.
Mets la bien profond.
So I did, straightening that curve a little with my thrusts, pushing just a little deeper.
“Oh yeah,” he moaned again. “Vas-y, enfonce-la bien, oh yeah, fuck.”
“Oh, yeah, baby,” I groaned. “Take it real deep, just like that, fuck, you feel so good,” I moaned, genuinely worried for a second that I’d cum right then and there.
“Holy shit,” he moaned and seemed to relax even more.
Fuck, it seriously couldn’t get any better than this.
I fucked him very slow and very deep for a while longer, until he was fucking losing it, completely gone, stroke after stroke. I knew it felt overwhelmingly good for him, and honestly, It was so fucking intense for me too.
When I heard it in his moans, that he needed a bit of a break, I eased back. I grabbed his hips and pulled him back against me, taking him doggy.
After fucking him for a few moments, I pulled out completely, then pushing my whole length inside him again, repeating the action several times, making Mark whimper every time I buried myself inside him.
He started jerking off and I pounded his ass again, hard and fast. It didn’t take long for me to unload inside him, of course pushing myself extra deep one last time as I did.
“You’re okay?” I whispered in his ear after I’d come down from my orgasm.
I placed small kisses on his face, half my length still inside him.
He nodded, a little breathless a little euphoric.
“You made me cum so hard, baby,” I said.
“I know,” he chuckled. “Fuck, you fucking wrecked me.”
I slowly pulled out of him completely and he turned around. I wouldn’t have minded getting fucked too but yeah, I’d absolutely wrecked him. He had soaked the sheets.
“Thanks, I really needed that today,” he giggled.
I kissed his cheek again. “Oh babe, I love it when you let me fuck you like that.”
“I do too,” he said with a smile. “It’s so good … almost too good.”
“I know.”
I laid my body on top of his and we held each other for a moment.
“You wanna know something?” I asked.
“What?”
“Je t’aime,” I whispered in his ear.
He let out a short laugh.
“Come on, say it back,” I said playfully, trying to tease it out of him again.
He shook his head, smiling. “Fuck off.”
Yeah, no. That didn’t work.
I was definitely pushing my luck.
So I gave up and we showered, had the drinks I’d brought, took a quick nap and then left the room to rejoin everyone downstairs.
As we walked to the stairs, music was still playing loudly, so we instinctively moved closer. Mark leaned into me and playfully sang the line from his song Mis à Mort - laisse-toi tenter, dansons collés serrés - and for a few seconds we just moved together, our bodies pressed close, completely wrapped up in our own little world. He kissed me, and I smiled against his lips.
“Hey,” Damon said as he stepped out of his room.
We both turned.
He looked at us for a second, then raised an eyebrow.
“What are you two doing?”
“Nothing,” Mark said immediately.
Damon snorted.
Rachel appeared behind him a second later, holding Hannah, their three-month-old daughter, and took one look at us, then looked straight at Mark.
A slow smile spread across her face.
“Did you use French on him again?”
“Shut up,” Mark laughed.
Rachel shook her head, still smiling.
“Come on, we’re getting everything ready for tonight.”
Then she looked at Mark again.
“And Magie’s asking for you.”
The teasing faded from his face, replaced by that look he always got whenever it came to our daughter.
He was the best dad, of course. I’d never had any doubts about that.
The only thing he’d really worried about was whether he’d be able to be the disciplinarian, and yeah, that turned out to be true. He was terrible at it. I already knew I’d probably have to be the stricter one as she got older because Magie could get pretty much anything she wanted out of him.
But who cared? they had a great relationship, and that was all I wanted for him. For us.
Mark spoke French with Magie sometimes too, but never in a forced way, and I think that mattered to him. French had been complicated for him growing up, so with Magie, he never pushed. He’d say a few words here and there, small things. She spoke English with us, but she definitely understood a little French.
We had talked about it, but now that she was almost three, and knowing how long the whole process could be, we didn’t really think we’d have another one.
Honestly, we were really happy with her. We wanted to experience having a child, and we had. But two felt like a lot. I mean, I was an only child myself and I’d never really had a problem with that. Mark had told me more than once that if I ever wanted another child that’d be biologically mine this time, he’d be okay with that, but I truly didn’t care about that. I really didn’t.
Plus, knowing Magie, she’d probably never ask for a sibling anyway. She wasn’t exactly growing up alone. Callum was basically like a brother to her, and so was Luca, Dylan’s son. Then there was Maeve, Jordan’s daughter, who she adored, and now Hannah. Damon and Rachel said they were done after her. With Jordan and Gráinne, I wasn’t sure. There might be another one at some point, but they weren’t talking about it yet. Dylan and Alicia wanted two. So that meant Magie was growing up with four kids who were basically like siblings, or cousins at the very least, and maybe two more eventually. That felt like more than enough.
***
A few hours later, we were all back in the living room, helping ourselves to whatever food we'd thrown onto the table.
Tonight was weird.
I could tell Mark was a bit on edge. Maybe that was part of why he’d needed me earlier.
The thing was … we had a Netflix documentary coming out.
Four episodes, each a little over an hour long, and we were about to watch them together before they aired. All of us. Because if we were going to suffer through seeing ourselves on screen for four hours, we were doing it together.
We’d never done anything like this before. Sure, there had been documentaries about us. Books. Articles. Other people telling our story from the outside. But this time it was different. This was us telling it, in our own words, and there was something almost surreal about that.
I hoped it’d be fun. Maybe not always fun, considering some of what we’d lived through, but hopefully fun.
They’d pulled together years of footage nobody had ever seen. Private moments. Backstage. At home. In studios, rehearsals, tour buses, planes, hotel rooms, on stage. Hours and hours of our lives, from when we were seventeen to now, after the biggest shows of our career so far, somehow condensed into four episodes.
There were plenty of interviews too. People who’d known us for years, people who’d worked with us over the years, and us.
We were obviously involved. We’d sat for the interviews and talked about things we’d never really talked about publicly before. But when it came to putting the whole thing together, we didn’t want too much control over it. We trusted the producer.
It helped that most of the footage came from Matt, who’d been around almost from the beginning. He’d been filming us for years, the big moments, the smaller ones, and everything in between. We'd got so used to having him around that we barely noticed the camera anymore.
We had a few requests, but not many, because if they’d let us decide everything, we probably would’ve talked ourselves out of doing it altogether.
One of those requests was to open the documentary with that club concert.
It wasn’t the beginning of the band. But it was the beginning of everything.
So, now here we were, all spread across the big sofas around the huge screen in the living room, ready to start the documentary. The plan was one episode a night and make it last four nights, maybe more if we skipped one, assuming none of us immediately insisted on watching another.
“You okay?” I asked as Mark settled beside me, well, more half behind me. There was something different in his eyes.
He smiled but didn’t speak right away.
“What?” I insisted.
“Nothing. Is it wrong that I still can’t stop thinking about earlier?” he murmured. “Because I’m trying really hard not to pop a boner right now.”
I couldn’t help laughing.
“Shut up,” he muttered, though he was laughing too. “Fuck… it still feels like you’re inside me.”
“Wait…?” I pulled back slightly to look at him. “Does it hurt?”
“No, it’s just… a feeling. Like you’re still there.”
I smiled and gave him a quick kiss.
Just then, Magie ran over and climbed onto my lap, and as she did, I spotted Damon reaching for a huge pack of crisps. He pressed down on one side, which was always how he opened them, and I swear I knew exactly what was coming.
I wasn’t the only one.
“Dammo, no, … ” Alicia warned.
But it was too late. The pack blew open with a loud bang. It literally exploded, all the crisps flying straight onto Dylan, who was sitting beside him.
Dylan just sat there, stunned, crisps in his lap, in his hair, everywhere, trying to process what had just happened.
“Oh my God,” he said flatly. “I literally thought I just got shot.”
We all lost it.
Damon was bent over laughing.
“I’m sorry, fuck, I didn’t think it was gonna make that much of a mess,” he said through fits of laughter.
Dylan laughed and slowly turned to look at him.
“Why do you always do shit like this?”
Rachel and Alicia helped pick everything up and dumped what they could salvage into a bowl.
“Plus, I was about to tell you not to open that one,” Alicia complained, “we don’t even need that many.”
Then Joe, a friend of ours, from school actually - honestly, he could’ve been in the band if he’d had any musical talent - started the documentary. These days, he worked with us on and off too, on tours and other projects, so he was around a lot. He’d basically appointed himself in charge of the remote and commentary.
We were still laughing when he pressed play.
“Come on, everyone, quiet!” he ordered.
The documentary opened on a black screen. We all went quiet almost straight away. Then we heard noise coming through the speakers before the picture slowly came into focus.
“Woooo!” Jordan shouted. “The Academy 2. Jesus Christ. Remember that night? Fuck me. Feels like about fifty years ago.”
Yeah. I remembered that night alright.
Jesus. Did I remember that night.
“It does, yeah,” Mark said behind me, sliding his arm around my shoulders.
There was crowd noise coming through the speakers. It was distant and muffled, and then my voice came through.
“We get asked this all the time,” I said. “When did our relationship actually start? And we’ve never really answered that. Ever.”
The crowd in the club came into view.
“The truth is… it was twenty-four hours before that night.”
Then old footage appeared of the five of us walking onstage.
Mad, really.
“Twenty-four hours before that, we finally told each other how we felt. And once we said it out loud … that was it, there was no going back. Everything changed.”
Soft piano notes came in underneath.
“And so the next night, we played The Academy 2. And for the first time, it felt like a proper gig, not a pub, a real gig, people were actually there to see us.”
There were maybe two to three hundred people in that club. To us, it may as well have been Croke Park.
Jordan groaned the second his face appeared.
“Oh no. No, no, no.”
“Look at you,” I exclaimed.
Damon snorted. “Jesus.”
“What?” Jordan said, already defensive.
Damon pointed at the screen.
“Your hair.”
Jordan narrowed his eyes.
“My hair was class, actually. It was just 2008.”
We all laughed.
“What we didn’t know,” I continued, “was there was someone from BMG standing in the crowd. He’d come to see us. And by the end of the night, a record deal wasn’t just some mad dream anymore, it was suddenly real, right there in front of us.”
Mark laughed softly in the voiceover.
“I think sometimes life just decides for you,” he said. “And when it does, maybe all you can really do is trust it … I’ve always felt some things come from somewhere else, music does for me, it doesn’t feel like something I force. It just comes. And with us.... I think, deep down, I always knew I was feeling something I couldn’t fight.”
The screen stayed dark for another second. Then my voice came in again.
“That’s when the parallel universe opened up,” I said. “I’m sorry to break it to you all, but you’ve all been living in a parallel universe ever since.”
Jordan pointed at the screen.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake. The parallel universe shite you keep banging on about.”
“You weren’t wrong,” Mark said and I turned to look at him.
He was still watching the screen, but he reached for my hand and squeezed it.
Then my voice carried on over the footage.
“I don’t think I realized it was happening,” I said. “Not properly. I’d spent so long convincing myself that what I felt for him was something I just had to live with… not something I’d ever get to have. Because the truth was, I’d loved him for years. And saying that out loud was terrifying, because suddenly everything was on the line. Him. The band. All of it.”
A small pause. You could hear me breathe.
The image shifted to backstage footage right before we went on.
I frowned.
“I had no idea they had this footage.”
The screen showed us hugging right after coming off stage.
“Jesus,” Mark breathed. He tightened his arm around me and rested his chin closer to my neck.
“I think you can feel it,” I said. “The adrenaline. The pure madness of it. The rush of blood to the head, right?” I chuckled. “Just… everything hitting me all at once. That night wasn’t just the start of our career, it was the moment everything I thought was impossible… suddenly wasn’t. And I remember thinking… right, fuck it, whatever happens next … I’m all in. I’m fucking all in.”
The music swelled and the screen faded to black again.
Then a new piece of audio came in. You could hear the room tone, the quiet hum of equipment. Something recorded between takes.
“What would you say to your seventeen-year-old self?” I asked and then Mark’s voice answered.
“That this is a massive fucking reminder that I did not go through all that shit for nothing. Good things are about to start happening… and I fucking deserve it.”
Mark let out a soft laugh beside me, and on screen you could hear it too.
“There you go,” I said. “I think my seventeen-year-old self’s head would just explode if I told him everything that’s happened. Where he ends up. Where we end up.”
There was warmth in my voice when I said we.
I glanced around the room. Rachel wiped at her eyes and I nudged Mark.
“You crying already?” he asked as he looked at her.
“Shut up, it’s the hormones.”
We laughed, then I looked over at my mum and caught her wiping her eyes too.
“What’s your excuse, Mum?”
She looked at me completely deadpan.
“Menopause.”
That made everyone laugh again.
And the documentary kept moving, showing us walking onstage before the massive shows we’d played the previous summer in front of tens of thousands of people. And then, right back to the beginning. The first gigs. The first album. The early days, back in our old neighbourhood, and then moving to London, buying the building before our second album was even released.
I think it hit everyone just how young we were watching our lives replayed on screen, especially our folks. One minute we were kids in Dublin, and the next people in London knew who we were. Before we'd even had a chance to process any of it, we were already recording the second album.
Everything got bigger after that. The pressure. The expectations. The crowds.
Us too, probably.
Jordan's dad was still staring at the screen, eating crisps straight from the bag without taking his eyes off it.
“Hang on,” he said and Joe paused the film.
“How old were you then?”
We all did the maths but Dylan answered first.
“Around twenty, barely twenty-one.”
Jordan's dad slowly shook his head.
"My God, I don't remember you looking that young. I mean, I knew you were, but... Christ. I remember when you told us you wanted to buy this place. I swear to God, I was worried sick, ask your mum.”
Jordan laughed.
“He was?” he asked her.
“Yeah. And there was no talking any of you out of it either.” She looked across at my dad. "Wasn't it the same for you, Ed?"
He looked thoughtful for a second.
“No, not really.”
Jordan’s dad frowned. “No?”
My father shook his head. “I remember thinking if it all went wrong, they could always sell it. And Mark had clearly thought the whole thing through.”
Jordan snorted.
“That’s one way of putting it.”
I laughed. “You mean the PowerPoint?”
Damon shook his head. “Oh my God.”
“The PowerPoint,” Jordan repeated, grinning.
“With graphs … and projections,” Dylan added. “How long did you spend making that thing with Tom?”
Mark laughed.
"An afternoon, maybe."
He shrugged.
"We had a plan. We wanted to stay together. We'd seen it happen to other bands, you know. Everyone ends up living in different places... before you know it, you've got separate lives."
Dylan nodded. “Yeah, we didn’t want that.”
Mark glanced at the screen. “Yeah, we wanted one place. Somewhere that was ours ... And a studio.”
Damon laughed. “The studio was what sold it, I remember.”
“So yeah,” Jordan’s dad said. “Basically Mark, you had a grand plan to make sure none of them could escape.”
Mark looked at him. “It worked.”
Damon smiled. “Best decision we ever made. I don't think any of us has ever regretted buying this place.”
As the first episode started drawing to a close, there were clips of us over the years. Recording. Touring. Laughing backstage. Arguing. Growing up together.
Then Bono appeared, since we’d first met him after our second album was released, promoting it.
"Oh, Bono..." Joe sighed dramatically. "Dear godfather..."
He looked at my dad.
"Ed, cover your ears, please."
Everyone laughed.
Bono smiled at the camera.
“You know, first time I heard these guys, I heard something special. And now I can tell you, I’ve known them for over ten years now. I’ve worked with them, laughed with them, spent time with them, and I can tell you this, they’re a unit, just like U2 is.”
He paused for half a second.
“But at the heart of that band, there’s this push and pull between Robbie and Mark … One burns outward. One burns inward. And somehow… that creates light.”
He let that sit for a beat.
“And when you see that kind of connection, you know, musically, emotionally, creatively, it raises the bar… And suddenly bands like ours have to keep up, and that’s not a bad thing.”
Then Joe paused the documentary and started clapping loudly.
“Come on,” he laughed. “Ed”?
Almost immediately, we all joined in. All but my dad.
“And as always,” Jordan added with a grin, “Bono wins. Best line of the documentary.”
My dad snorted. “It’s only the first episode.”
Jordan shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. He’s won. You’re just jealous, Ed.”
My dad took it like a gentleman.
“I know. We’ve established that.”
From the first episode, we also wanted the documentary to be unapologetically clear about who we were. LGBT representation mattered to us, and we didn't care if some people didn't like that. Nobody was forcing them to watch it.
So right from the beginning, there were little moments Matt had filmed over the years, even before we'd come out publicly. Just ordinary moments between Mark and me. A look, a smile, a hand on the back, a hug… The kind of thing most people wouldn't think twice about, but if you knew... you knew.
There were plenty of jokes from the lads too, especially Jordan. He'd spent years taking the piss out of us the same way he took the piss out of everyone else. That was just how he showed affection.
One of the clips that all made us laugh was Jordan turning to Mark after he’d said something and going,
“You know, you look more gay now, I’ll give you that.”
We were nineteen, I think.
“Like, in a positive way or in a negative way?” Mark asked.
Jordan laughed. “No, Mark, there’s no negative way. I just mean you look like you fit more into your gay personality now, like in a good way, it’s like you’re embracing it more.”
Mark nodded with a laugh. “Okay. Alright. That’s good, man. Now, give me a hug.”
“Oh, don’t be weird.”
Mark hugged him anyway.
Behind me, I felt Mark move.
“I’ll give you a hug later,” Jordan called over. “Hang in there.”
A few clips later, Jordan was doing one of his ridiculously camp impressions of me.
“You love doing this gay voice that I don’t have,” I said, laughing. “Whenever you imitate me, you always do this gay voice thing that I literally don’t do…”
I turned to him.
"That's still a thing!"
Jordan just grinned.
"Yeah, as long as it annoys you, I'll keep doing it."
Or one showing Mark, Jordan and Damon sitting in an airport, eating the muffins they'd been given on the plane.
Jordan looked at Mark.
“Since you've cut your muffin in half... are you gonna eat the top or the bottom first?”
Mark froze for a second, then slowly turned to look at Jordan.
“Are you twelve?”
“Just answer the question, it’s not rocket science.”
“I’m just trying to eat a muffin.”
Jordan waited so Mark looked at the muffin for another second, sighed, put the two halves back together, and took a bite out of the side instead.
Damon burst out laughing.
In the living room, everyone did too.
“I can't believe they put this shit in the documentary.”
Jordan grinned. “Now everyone knows we're just a bunch of idiots.”
"Speak for yourself," Mark said.
Actually, I like those clips. They weren't trying to make a point. They were just... us.
We'd always taken the piss out of each other. Being gay was never the joke. One of us was. Usually it was me, and sometimes it was Mark. That was just how we'd always been. Nobody ever treated us differently. They never had.
And the documentary didn't pretend everything had always been perfect either.
There were arguments too. Usually in the studio. Mark would be convinced a song had to make the album, Damon would tell him he wasn't feeling it, and we'd end up going back and forth until all five of us agreed. Because, well... if the whole world was going to judge our songs, it was probably better if all five of us agreed first.
There was footage of us getting on each other's nerves after weeks on the road too.
But then, five minutes later, somebody would say something completely ridiculous and we'd all be laughing again. That was pretty much how we'd always worked.
We argued. We apologised. We moved on.
Because underneath all of it, we genuinely liked each other. Loved each other, really.
When that first episode ended and the credits rolled, Life Is for Living began to play. It was the first time anyone outside of us would hear it, it was the song I’d played for Mark when we got home after the last date of the tour back in 2020, when we first started talking about having a child.
He’d wanted to record it in the days that followed, layering in piano, building a powerful guitar riff, shaping it around my voice. It had turned into something special. Something we couldn’t wait to share.
It would play at the end of every episode, with a little clip in the corner of all of us in the studio, recording it together.
None of us spoke until it faded out.
Joe was the first to break the silence.
"I think ... people are going to fall in love with you lot all over again."
"That was weird," Dylan admitted. "Watching your own life back."
Jordan's dad shook his head.
"You were all babies. I still can't get over how young you were. How the fuck did you manage to do all that?" He looked around the room. "I've no idea."
A few seconds passed while everyone carried on eating.
"So..." Joe said eventually. "We're watching the next one, right?"
Nobody answered … except the kids.
"Yeeees!" they shouted.
Joe looked at each of us in turn.
"...Right?"
Still nothing so he sighed dramatically.
"Alright then. Who wants to watch episode two?"
He immediately raised his own hand.
We all raised ours.
***
The second episode was where everything exploded. The third album. Selling out arenas and stadiums. Touring the world. Collaborating with artists we'd grown up listening to. It all happened so quickly. It also covered us coming out, everything that followed, and the period when Mark found out the truth about his family.
We'd talked a lot about whether he wanted to include that part of his life. It wasn't an easy conversation because it wasn't just another chapter in our story. It had shaped who he was. It had found its way into some of U-N-I's songs and, later, into the French album too.
In the end, we all agreed it was time. Not because he owed anyone an explanation. He didn't.
But because people had been asking what Monsieur, Madame was about ever since he'd released it. He'd never answered. He'd always let people make the song their own. Now, though... It just felt like the right time to finally talk about it publicly.
Besides... It was exactly the kind of drama Netflix loved. The documentary would come back to the French album in the last episode. It would've felt strange not to. It had become such a big part of his journey, even if it had happened outside of U-N-I.
The concert footage faded away. The roar of seventy thousand people disappeared, and suddenly it was just Mark, sitting alone in a chair. No music. No audience. Just him.
"I think I need the bathroom," he said, standing up.
"Mark, mate, I'll pause it," Joe said.
"Then I'm not coming back."
"Sit down," Joe replied.
"Sit down," almost everyone echoed.
Jordan looked up from his plate.
"You're literally the main character. Sit down. What are you gonna do when we get to The Mark Emery Show?"
I laughed and Mark looked towards the pool.
"Go for a swim."
"Fair enough," Jordan nodded. "We'll call you when U-N-I comes back."
Joe shook his head, smiling, and pressed play again as Mark dropped back onto the sofa behind me.
On screen, he sat there for a few seconds before speaking. Behind me, I felt him reach for Magie and pull her onto his lap. He was very obviously trying to distract himself.
"You know... people think success fixes things."
A small smile crossed his face.
"It doesn't."
He looked down at his hands before taking a slow breath.
“The day after we came out publicly...” He laughed to himself. “Honestly, that was insane timing. You really couldn't make this stuff up.”
He let out a short breath.
“I found out the man I'd grown up believing was my dad... wasn't my biological father and they'd kept it a secret to keep up appearances. And suddenly... everything made sense, I finally had an explanation.”
He searched for the words carefully.
"It's hard growing up feeling like you're just... tolerated. Not loved. Not cherished. Just there. Like your presence is too much. Like you're always in the way. No matter what you do, it's never enough. Everything becomes a criticism. Eventually... you stop questioning them. You question yourself. You start believing you're the problem because the people who are supposed to love you the most make you feel like you don't deserve to be loved at all."
He looked away from the camera for a moment.
"You end up being bullied by your own family. And when you grow up like that... of course those dark thoughts creep in. You wonder whether anyone would even notice if you disappeared. Whether anyone would care."
Without really thinking about it, I slipped my arm around him. He didn't look at me. He just leaned into my side a little, his eyes still fixed on the television.
"But... I love life too much. I love music. I love my friends. I love Robbie. I love everything life has to offer. My real family..." He smiled to himself. "...the family I chose... they matter too much. And I have dreams. I want to create. I want to leave something behind. I want to matter."
He paused again before continuing.
“I was twenty-three when I found out. And it hurt... not because it changed my life overnight, but because I suddenly realised they were never going to become the parents I'd needed. So you have to let go. Really let go. Even that tiny little piece of hope you've been carrying around your whole life.”
He was quiet for a few seconds before a small smile returned.
"But it's okay. Because pain gives you something too. It gave me songs. ‘A rush of blood’, ‘fix you’, ‘Mr/Mrs and they’re only a few examples. You know, it pushed me to write, to create. It taught me how to say things I'd never been able to say out loud."
He smiled faintly.
"Like, you know... a lot of people think Monsieur, Madame is about my family rejecting me because I'm gay."
He shook his head.
"It isn't … They didn't even know, they found out at the same time as everybody else. I mean... they probably knew I was different, but that wasn't really the problem."
He paused.
"The problem was being rejected simply because I was born. Because I existed. That's what Monsieur, Madame is really about."
For the first time since he'd started talking, he looked straight into the camera.
"I wouldn't wish that childhood on anyone. But I can choose what I do with it. I turned it into music … I turned it into this life."
He glanced down one last time before looking back at the camera.
"If that's what came out of it..." he smiled, "I think I did alright."
Nobody said anything for a moment.
Then Rachel got up.
"Oh, come here,” she said, wrapping her arms around Mark.
"Rachel, come on ..." he laughed.
"You deserve a hug."
Before long, pretty much everyone in the room had given him a hug or at least squeezed his shoulder as they walked past.
Callum looked up at Damon.
"Why's everybody hugging Uncle Mark?"
Damon smiled. "Because sometimes grown-ups need hugs too."
Callum seemed to consider that for a second. Then he walked over, wrapped both little arms around Mark's waist, and wandered off again without saying a word.
Mark laughed quietly.
"Well... That one's definitely going to make me cry."
***
The following evening, we all piled back into the living room for the last two episodes.
The third episode was probably the hardest to watch.
It didn't try to make us look better than we were. It showed the pressure, the expectations, the mistakes we made, the drugs, the arguments... all of it.
Looking back, I think we'd just got completely lost. After the third album, we'd started writing what we thought people wanted from us. We kept thinking about what the next U-N-I album was supposed to sound like instead of just writing songs we actually cared about. We weren't feeling any of it, and I think people would've known that if we'd released it.
We spent months writing songs that never quite got there. Every time we thought we'd finally cracked one, we'd listen back and go... "Nah."
Mark especially hated it. He kept saying something was missing, and he was right. The songs weren't bad... they just weren't us. Not by our standards anyway … and the more we pushed, the worse it got.
Eventually everything else started falling apart too. Funny thing is, I don't think we'd have written the fourth album people ended up loving if we hadn't completely fallen apart first.
Jordan shook his head. "God, that album was bad. Thank god we scrapped that first version."
"It wasn't that bad," Mark said. "It just wasn't finished."
Dylan smiled. "I'm glad it all went downhill. We'd have probably released it otherwise."
"Yeah,” I agreed. “And people would've absolutely slated it. And guess who'd have taken the flak? Me. Fucking nightmare, pretending I cared about songs I didn't even believe in."
“Yeah,” Mark said, “and when you think of the album we ended up writing, fuck, not even close. Those songs were honest. People could tell.”
"Yeah," I replied. "So could we."
***
Finally, the last episode felt different. Lighter. Hopeful. It followed Mark's French album a little and what that journey had meant to him, all of us becoming dads, and our return to the stage. It ended with footage from our summer 2025 tour before looking ahead to the massive world tour we'd be starting in 2026.
Tom appeared throughout all four episodes, usually talking about the business side of things. The touring. The pressure, the constant travel, all of it. What it was actually like managing five idiots who happened to become one of the biggest bands in the world.
But in that episode, he talked more about us.
“You know, I’ve been with them since the beginning, and they were just kids when we started working together. Just kids.” He shook his head, smiling to himself. “And I kind of took over from their parents in a way. I think they trusted me to look after them. Even today, I still feel, and I think they do too, like I’m more of a parent than a manager sometimes. I think they see me more as family.”
He let out a small laugh. “And I do feel that way. Because this job… it’s not a normal job. It’s twenty-four seven. Day and night. If one of them calls me at three in the morning, I’m there. And honestly… I want to be there. So yeah, I do feel like I’m more than just their manager.”
Tom looked down for a second before continuing.
“With Mark especially. Yeah, especially with Mark. Because… it’s hard to explain, but Mark and I have always had a bit of a special connection. From the very beginning, he’s always told me everything.” A small smile appeared on his face. “Well… almost everything.”
That made Mark laugh behind me.
“He comes to me first for advice. About work. About life. And I think, especially in the beginning… he needed someone. Someone in his corner. Someone who’d tell him the truth, but still have his back. Someone to … you know… hold his hand.”
He was saying that because of the lyrics to Monsieur, Madame. We all knew that. We didn’t talk, just listened.
Tom let out a slow breath. “So yeah… I think, in some ways, I became the parent he needed back then. And now … I just love what he’s become.” He smiled again. “What they’ve all become.”
“That said, it’s not an easy job,” he said. “It’s challenging. Sometimes I have to tell them off.”
He shrugged.
“That comes with the job. You’re not just there for the good moments. Sometimes you have to step in and make the hard calls. And sometimes you have to tell them things they don’t necessarily want to hear. Because I’m also here to make decisions for them. But what I love, what I’ve always loved about working with them, is that I think part of why they’re still here … why this still works after fifteen years …is that they haven’t really changed. Obviously, they’ve grown up. Their lives are different now. They’ve got families. Kids. Responsibilities. But at the core? They’re still them. They’re still the same five lads I met all those years ago. They still take the piss out of each other. They still annoy each other. They still laugh like idiots half the time.”
Tom laughed softly. “And they’re still best friends. Brothers, really. Like family. And I think people feel that because you can’t fake that kind of connection. Not for fifteen years. Especially not in this industry.”
He smiled again. “And weirdly, a lot of them are still exactly the same. Jordan’s still a bit mad. Still talks too much.”
“Oi,” Jordan exclaimed.
“Rob still acts first and thinks later.” Tom laughed, shaking his head. “He still gives me cold sweats. I still feel like I have to keep one eye on him all the time. Exhausting, really.”
That made me grin. Fair.
“The manager-frontman relationship is a tricky one,” Tom continued. “He's the one everyone looks at. Everyone wants a piece of him and people often forget he's just a person at the end of the day. Sometimes, my job is just reminding him he doesn't have to say yes to everyone, and that he doesn't have to carry the band on his own.”
He smiled.
“I think that's one of the reasons Mark's so important. He's the one place Rob doesn't have to be the frontman.”
He chuckled.
“That said... Mark's not exactly low maintenance either. He still overthinks everything. Still the ambitious one. Always chasing the next idea. The next project. I genuinely don't think he knows how to stop creating. More than once I've had to tell him, 'Mark... just go to bed.”
Mark laughed. So, did I. It wasn't exactly news to either of us.
“Dylan still quietly manages everyone alongside me. He’s everyone’s best friend...while silently judging every single one of them."
We all laughed and Dylan looked at us.
"You're all idiots … and you know it.”
“And Damon’s still the steady one,” Tom said with a smile. “The calm in the middle of all the chaos. Keeping the beat going, on stage and off. Every band needs someone like that.”
“Aw, bless him,” Damon said.
Jordan laughed. “He's getting all emotional… and we’re not idiots,” he said to Dylan.
Dylan raised an eyebrow. “You and Mark were fighting over the blue M&Ms by the pool this afternoon,” he said, giving Jordan a judgmental look. “Two grown men.”
“Dylan, they’re the best ones,” Mark said. “And he knows if he doesn't share them with me... he dies.”
“You weren’t even going to eat them,” Jordan said. “You literally said so yourself.”
“Yeah, I had other plans, but those are the rules,” Mark replied.
He glanced at me. Rachel snorted and I tried very hard not to laugh. Of course she'd got the joke, those two had no secrets.
“Have you eaten them yet?”
“What happens to the M&Ms after that is irrelevant.”
“You hear him?” Jordan said, looking at the rest of us.
“For fuck’s sake,” Dylan muttered.
“You two really are idiots,” I said.
Mark just laughed.
“Why the blue ones?” Gráinne asked.
Rachel smiled. “Because they make your tongue blue.”
“Do they?”
“Yeah... if you lick them first,” Rachel said.
Jordan looked at Mark.
“Yeah, you do like licking things first, don’t you?”
Everyone laughed.
“You made that far too easy,” I chuckled. Mark just grinned. Half the time, he was worse than Jordan.
***
When the documentary started focusing more on Mark, it wasn't really about the French album. Well... it was. But the album was really just the excuse. It was about watching someone who'd spent years hiding from a part of himself finally stop hiding.
The documentary cut to one of my interviews.
"After I played Les étoiles on French TV, he joked about recording Monsieur, Madame.”
I paused.
“And I remember thinking... that's not really a joke … I know him too well. I mean, Recording Les étoiles was definitely a joke. You know, it was daft, it made him laugh, it didn't have to mean anything. But I think in a way, it was probably the safest way he could've approached French."
I shrugged.
“You have to understand, French wasn't just another language to him. It came with a lot of baggage. So, writing in it, singing in it... it meant using that language to talk about things he'd spent years keeping to himself. I honestly don't think he'd ever planned on doing that. But Les étoiles... it was almost like he was testing the waters."
The screen switched to clips of Mark recording vocals.
"The funny thing is, singing in French almost became easier for him than singing in English. With the band, he'd never really wanted to sing. He was always happy leaving that to me. But French wasn’t about becoming a singer, it was about saying things he’d never managed to say before. Most of those songs had been sitting in notebooks or on old demos for years. He'd written them for himself, not because he ever expected anyone else to hear them. And I think that’s what makes them so special."
I smiled.
"And god... Seeing him finally express himself like that... That's all I'd ever wanted for him."
“Well,” Mark whispered, “you got what you wanted.”
I glanced at him and smiled.
“Yeah,” I whispered back. “Worth the wait.”
The documentary kept jumping between studio footage and interviews.
Then Mark appeared again.
“Monsieur, Madame... it's mad, really. I never believed in that song, you know. I kept thinking it was too long. Like, who's going to listen to six minutes of me complaining? The melody never really changes. I just didn't believe in it. And it meant too much to me to put it out there, too. I didn't want people to judge it or hate it. And to me, releasing it almost felt like an ego trip … But then people heard it. And it just took off on its own. People just … loved it.”
“I still don't know how that happened,” Mark muttered.
Rachel turned towards him, ready to argue, but then glanced up at the television.
“Shh! That's me!”
She jumped to her feet, grinning, as everyone laughed.
Rachel was interviewed next, of course.
“For him, it was difficult because he was putting everything he had inside him out there for the whole world to hear … But Robbie pushed him. We all did, really. Because it had to come out.”
Amel, from The Voice, spoke next.
“Opening up may have been difficult for him, but he still dared to put his whole heart into a song that became a real anthem for an entire community of French-speaking fans. And that community grew incredibly quickly.”
Then there was the well-known French singer Lara Fabian, speaking in French as the subtitles read,
"Monsieur, Madame is probably the moment when everything comes together creatively. His instincts, his voice, his songwriting... and then there are the lyrics. There's something undeniably modern about them. It's the clearest expression of his artistry. There's a vulnerability in that song that's incredibly compelling, and you can hear it in every other song."
"Blimey... she's intense," Joe said.
"She is," Mark replied, and the documentary cut back to him.
“I wrote that song in... maybe ten or twenty minutes … But it was really strange writing it. It all came at once. I don’t know, I was alone. I was sad.” He shrugged. “Thankfully, there was a pen and notebook nearby, and the words just... came out. It honestly felt like I'd been … possessed.”
Lara spoke again, in French.
“When you're capable of writing a song that quickly, it's because you've become the antenna... the channel... for something infinitely bigger than yourself.” She gestured gently with her hands. “Yes, it belongs to you, but not only to you. It belongs to everyone who will one day hear that song, recognise themselves in its message, and carry it with them.”
“She lost me at antenna,” Joe admitted.
We all laughed.
“I make music to share emotions,” Mark continued. “… And this song does exactly that. In the end, it's the reason I do this job.”
It switched back to me.
“Monsieur, Madame was a real turning point for him. I cried. I genuinely cried the first time I heard it after he recorded it.”
“Hang on... you cried?” Jordan said, turning to me.
“Course I did.”
Rachel laughed. “Oh, here I am again.”
“I remember thinking... Bloody hell. He's finally let out everything he'd been carrying inside him for years. All that unhappiness … I knew how difficult things were for him growing up. We'd talked about it so many times … And I remember thinking... those words are powerful. People are going to hear themselves in that song. He's going to hit something very real.”
"Oh God, it's the French philosopher again," Joe exclaimed.
“Behave,” Rachel told him.
“I think hearing him sing in French allowed us to discover who Mark Emery really is,” Lara said.
“...Deep,” Joe nodded gravely.
We laughed.
Then it was my voice again.
"And the funny thing was... I genuinely thought that was it. I was just happy he'd finally recorded Monsieur, Madame. Whatever happened to the song after that almost didn't matter anymore.”
I shrugged.
"But he’d been writing in French for years. Little lyrics. Half-finished songs. Demos. But they were his. If he wanted them to stay in a drawer forever... then they stayed in a drawer forever … We'd done the same thing with plenty of U-N-I songs. Not everything you write is meant to be heard.”
I laughed quietly.
"But once he'd finished Monsieur, Madame, he started digging back through everything. Some songs, like Je t'haine, were almost finished already. Others were nothing more than a verse or a melody, but like, he wasn’t writing from scratch."
I smiled.
“I never expected him to write that many songs. And I don't think he expected it either. That didn't make sharing them any easier, though. Those songs were unbelievably personal, and I know part of him would've been perfectly happy if they'd stayed between him and the people who'd inspired them forever … But he just threw himself into it and started turning his favourite demos into finished songs."
I shrugged.
"And suddenly... We had an EP,” I smiled. "Now the big question was... What the hell do we do with it?"
***
The documentary showed a montage of the EP's release. There was no huge launch, no grand announcement. We just quietly put it out into the world one song after the other.
Then the screen faded to black.
There was no more music, no more interviews, no more footage.
Nothing. Just black. It lasted only a few seconds, long enough for everyone watching to realise something had been left out.
The mood in the room shifted, almost like the start of a minute's silence.
The documentary never mentioned August 2021.
Netflix had asked us more than once if we wanted to tell that story but every single time, we said no. Not because we wanted to pretend it hadn't happened. It had. It changed every single one of us.
But some stories stop belonging to everyone else. Some stories are only yours.
The next shot was months later. Mark was back in the studio, guitar in his hands, laughing with Dylan over something neither of them could remember anymore.
That was enough.
The documentary never tried to explain how we'd got from one moment to the next.
***
The documentary cut to the opening of the French shows. Thousands of people were screaming before he'd even sung a note. Then he appeared onstage, looking as confident as ever, serious at first, before that little smile I loved so much appeared.
The opening of Addictocrate started and, right on cue, Mark disappeared under the blanket.
Magie looked at him.
"Why are you hiding?"
"Because I'm singing on TV."
She immediately pulled the blanket off him.
"There! Look, Daddy, look!"
Mark groaned, but he didn't try to hide again.
There you go. Saved me the job.
I'd much rather it came from her than me. She was a lot better at getting her own way. Besides, I'd already done enough pushing.
Everything after that… and even everything after Monsieur, Madame, that was him. But after August, something changed.
He started writing again in French, funny songs, sexy ones, songs about the world and everything else rattling around in that head of his. Some of those songs... I honestly don't think he knew they were in there until he sat down and wrote them. They just... appeared.
And once again, he let them out into the world. And people got them again. Watching those crowds in France...
Christ. They understood them.
Maybe that's why none of what came next ever really surprised me.
The concerts. The Voice. Everything.
Then the documentary cut back to Salle Pleyel. Mark spoke about performing Monsieur, Madame.
“I do get a bit anxious before that song because I know I have to disconnect from my emotions a little. Because If I connect one hundred percent... I just won't make it to the end.”
He laughed softly.
“People say they can see it on my face, and they're right. I have to stay focused because the second I start singing, everyone starts singing with me... and somehow that makes it even harder.” He shook his head. “It's intense.”
Then he was filmed coming off stage.
“It's hard to talk right now because that was really intense, and there are just... so many things going through my head right now... but I feel good on stage … I really do.”
Watching him talk like that... He looked… I don’t know…. lighter.
Mark shifted a little closer to the table and reached for some food.
"I'd do it again in a heartbeat," he laughed.
"Careful," I said.
He frowned.
"Why?"
I gestured towards the screen.
"That's what happens when you make stupid comments like that around me … One minute it's, 'Maybe I should just release Monsieur, Madame...' and the next thing you know, all this happens."
Everyone around the table laughed.
Mark shook his head.
"Fair point."
He glanced back at the television.
"Oh... I love that thing," he laughed, clicking his fingers towards the screen.
The documentary showed a fan handing him a jumper she'd crocheted herself. Across the front, in big letters, was ADDICTOCRATE.
"I still wear it," he smiled. "So do you," he told Rachel.
She laughed.
"Only because you keep leaving it lying around."
"Yeah," he shrugged. "Because it’s so comfy."
***
There were some clips from the Voice too.
Like Mark and Hoshi spotting each other from opposite ends of a corridor.
“I could hear you from all the way down there!” he shouted to her in French.
She laughed, and immediately ran over, jumping into his arms. They'd had a break from filming and hadn't seen each other for a while.
Then she was on a couch, being interviewed.
“One of the things that fascinates me about Mark is that he didn't just decide to sing in French because it sounded different … He completely immersed himself in the language. You can hear the respect he has for it. He isn't trying to imitate French artists. He's found his own voice in French and you can tell every word matters to him, every sentence. That's rare. I love that.”
She smiled.
“And we've become great friends because he's one of the very few people I can talk to about the darker side of this job... and he understands.”
***
The documentary carried on. It showed more fans waiting outside the Voice studios and I could tell something had changed. Mark had always been the most creative one. Songs came to him in a way they never really came to the rest of us. The fans had always admired him. They loved his talent and everything he brought to the band. But it was different to what I got as the frontman. People screamed my name. They cried. They reached for me first. They wanted something from me.
With Mark... It had always been quieter. Almost reverential. And it was even more so now because they weren't just waiting for an autograph or a picture anymore. They weren’t coming to take something away with them, they were coming to give him something. Sometimes it was a letter, sometimes it was something they’d made, sometimes … it was just a story. They told him what those songs had done for them, they hugged him, they thanked him, they cried, too.
It was funny, really. Some of them had followed U-N-I for years. Some only knew him as the guitarist.
But now, they weren't just seeing the musician anymore. They were seeing him. Or for some people, they were discovering him for the first time.
And watching people fall in love with those songs... Then realise who'd written them.
Well... That made me happier than I can explain.
***
The documentary focused on him a while longer. The screen faded into one of Dylan's interviews, since he’d worked a lot with him on the songs, on the shows.
“He's not always the easiest person to work with,” he laughed and shook his head. “He's eternally dissatisfied. Sometimes it's not easy working with someone like that. But it also forces you to realise you can always do more, go further. And with Mark... that means controlling every aspect of the music we make, every aspect of the shows we put on.”
The documentary showed studio footage of the two of them arguing over an arrangement before bursting out laughing a few seconds later.
Then Mark appeared.
“People think they know who I am from what they see with the band... ” He shrugged. “But the truth is... they don't know,” he said, smiling. “Because even I don't know. I'm still figuring it out.”
Then the focus was on me again.
“I think one of the things people don't always see about him is how sincere he is. He's incredibly sincere in his friendships. In his emotions too. If he feels something, he doesn't really second-guess it. I know when it came to us, to our relationship, he never really questioned how he felt. He knew, in his heart, that it was right, so he gave us everything. He still does. And it’s the same with music.”
The documentary cut back to Mark.
“If I don't feel something, I don't feel it. And I'm not going to do it just because it'll make someone else happy. When it comes to making music, I'll just keep working until it feels right.”
He shrugged.
“I'm a bit stubborn like that.”
A grin spread across his face.
“But hey... after fifteen years, they're all still alive. I haven't killed anyone.”
He glanced towards the camera with that cheeky smile he always got.
“Even Rob. I'm kind of proud of myself for that.”
My laugh came in over the footage before I spoke.
“People always seem so surprised when Mark gets pissed off with me. Like they can't quite believe it because he seems so calm. But... that's pretty standard for us.”
I paused, there were footage from the tour.
“From the outside, people think we get on so well because we're so alike, but we're really not,” I laughed. “Like, people always go, 'Well, you were both born in May … Yeah... But Mark's a Taurus and I'm a Gemini. So basically, he's the brakes and I'm the accelerator … So, we've had a few scares ... gone off the road once or twice … But we've never really crashed. And yeah... He threatens to kill me fairly regularly,” I chuckled, “but he still goes along with my shit.”
The documentary stayed on the backstage footage of the two of us messing around as I finished speaking.
“I reckon that's love.”
Behind me, Mark leaned over, kissed my cheek, and I turned my head to catch his lips instead.
***
The second half of the episode focused on the tour.
We'd all thrown ourselves into it, obviously. But Mark especially, as always. He gave it absolutely everything, every note, every arrangement, every tiny detail. There was always another idea, another change, something else to make better. That part of him hadn't changed, and a few years earlier, watching him work like that would've terrified me because I'd seen where that kind of pressure could lead.
Back then, there were times I genuinely felt like the music mattered more than anything else. More than me. More than us. But this time it felt different. I knew him better now. I knew when to tell him to slow down, when to push back, but I also knew when to leave him alone because sometimes he needed to disappear into the work. That's where he found himself again. But he'd learned how to come back to me afterwards and I'd stopped feeling like I had to compete with the band for him. I'd stopped wondering whether I'd always come second.
One of the girls from the touring crew appeared on screen.
“Who is she?” my mother asked.
We all shrugged.
“Honestly, no idea. Never saw her before,” I said.
“I couldn't believe I got this internship, but I did, and here I am now. I get to travel the world, I get to see an awesome band, I get to be part of something I think is really great, especially everything they're doing around sustainability. I'm learning so much about what goes on behind the scenes. It's really fun, but there's a lot of pressure because it's such a massive show. You don't want to mess up the part you're responsible for … But I've realised I can handle the pressure, and I genuinely love what I do.”
She smiled.
“My favourite thing about touring is... I've never experienced such a huge place of worship. It's not even about worshipping the band. It's about what the band stands for. Accepting people for who they are. You can actually feel that during the shows. We travel all over the world and everywhere it's the same. People wanting to connect. People wanting to be accepted. People loving each other. People crying. People feeling like they belong somewhere. Just thousands of people in one place for the same reason. To listen to music. To hold onto each other. And I think that's really beautiful.”
“Aw, that was lovely,” my mum said. “Funny, isn't it? She's put that better than any of you ever could.”
She was right. Somewhere along the way, the shows had become something bigger than concerts. People weren't just coming for the music anymore. They were coming to feel something together. To belong to something. That was the story we’d wanted to tell all along.
The documentary ended exactly the way we'd wanted it to.
The five of us walking back onstage together. The lights going down. The crowd already roaring before we'd even played a note. Looking at us like that... it felt like we were at our strongest.
The credits rolled, Life Is for Living playing quietly underneath, but nobody moved.
Eventually everyone started talking again and getting up from the couch. Jordan looked over at Mark.
"Right... Still thinking about that swim?"
Mark smiled.
"A little bit."
"Come on then."
He looked at me.
"You coming?"
I nodded.
"Yeah... maybe. I don't know."
He didn't ask why. He never really had to. He just smiled and followed everyone else outside.
The room suddenly felt much quieter.
I stayed where I was.
My eyes were still fixed on the black screen. The documentary had told almost everything. The beginning. The success. The mistakes. The music. The love. The families we'd built.
Just not one thing.
August 2021.
A moment later, Mum quietly sat down beside me. She didn't say anything at first. She just rested her head gently against mine.
"You're miles away."
I smiled. "A little."
"That's a lot to carry."
I shrugged. "I suppose it is."
She looked at me for a moment.
"But you don't have to carry it on your own."
“No,” I said with a smile.
She smiled too and glanced through the open doors towards the terrace. Mark turned back for a second and caught me watching him. He usually did.
He smiled and I smiled back. We'd always been good at saying things without speaking.
Looking at him, I realised none of what came afterwards really makes sense without August 2021.
So...
I suppose it's finally time I told you what really happened.
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