Authors: Kyra Lennon
“Everything okay?” I asked, as Drew leaned over and pulled out two bottles of water from under the counter.
“Yup.” He handed one of the bottles to me.
His eyes told a different story. He hadn’t been himself since his television appearance. I heard the frustration in his voice when we spoke on the phone, and I saw it on his face now.
Drew gripped his bottle with a firmness that made me want to trade places with it. Instead of uncrewing the lid, he pulled at the label, his fingers tugging until it peeled away.
I swallowed hard, glad he wasn’t looking at me, and to take my mind off the way his strong hands deftly stripped his water bottle naked, I said, “How come you were hiding outside?”
“I wasn’t hiding.”
Heaving an impatient sigh, I jabbed a finger into Drew’s side. He almost fell off his stool when he jumped away. “I came a long way to be here tonight. The least you can do is answer me in more than monosyllabic grunts!”
A smile tugged at the corners of his lips and the perma-wrinkle on his forehead disappeared. “Sorry. I had words with Derek and he pissed me off.”
“He’s here?”
“He’s here. He wants to make sure we keep this feud going. He says we can’t talk in public, and when we’re playing, we have to ignore each other.”
With Drew on drums and Jason on the mic, they never engaged much while on stage anyway, so that wouldn’t be a problem. Having to avoid public conversation was asking a lot since they usually spent so much time together, though.
I opened my mouth to speak but Drew held up his hand. “Yeah, yeah. Before you say ‘I told you so,’… don’t.”
“I wasn’t-”
“Ellie. I know. You think we made a mistake and we never should have started this. I get it.”
He turned away. One of Drew’s best skills was shutting down from conversations he didn’t want to have. I visualised one of those signs that hang on shop doors saying,
We are now closed for business.
His eyes seemed to do the same thing.
Go away, come back tomorrow.
Placing my bottle of water on the bar, I said, “I’ll be right back.”
I hopped down from the stool and headed to the ladies room. Leaning against one of the clean white sinks, I let out a frustrated sigh. Drew’s refusal to open up didn’t come as a shock. He’d always been that way. His “keep quiet and hope the bad stuff goes away” approach had never served him well, though. There was only so long he could hold years’ worth of pent up frustration inside before he exploded, cascading into a shower of rage and pain that threatened to drown us all.
It never used to hurt; Drew’s unwillingness to talk about his problems. Another new, unfortunate side effect of my feelings. Another indication I felt way more for him than I allowed myself to admit, but I had to keep it inside my head.
Neither of you need the complication of a relationship right now. Get. Over. It.
I cupped my hands under the cold water tap and ducked forward to splash my warm cheeks. The great thing about alternative clubs was that nobody took much notice of appearances anyway, so it didn’t matter that I now had a make-up free face. I grabbed some paper towels to dry off, and then went back out to the bar.
As I passed the open front door of the club, the same group of people still waited outside crowded together, shivering. Three girls dressed in skinny jeans and flimsy tops, and two equally under-dressed lads jumped up and down to keep warm. They’d obviously been out there a while in the below freezing temperature and biting wind.
Hardcore fans.
When I rounded the corner, the band was preparing for a sound check, and instead of sitting down to listen, I stepped up onto the stage with them.
“Guys, there are some people outside, freezing their genitalia off. Can’t we let them in early?”
Drew shrugged. “I don’t mind if they come in. You might want to check with the owner.”
His gaze held mine, full of apology. I smiled, but before it fully connected with him, a pair of hands gripped my waist, causing me to spin around.
“Ellie, Ellie, Ellie! Lovely to see you!”
The feeling is not mutual. At all.
“Hi Derek.” I faked a grin. “I wondered if we could let the fans come in early since it’s colder than a penguin’s arse outside.”
“Absolutely. Anything for my favourite groupie!”
Urgh. He’d called me a groupie since he first met me four years ago. Twenty years old and shy, I hid behind Jason a lot back then. I’d explained numerous times I was a lifelong friend, not some random hanger-on, but he still continued to slap the label on me.
Derek scurried away to tend to my request and I stepped down from the stage and stood far back near the technicians, bracing myself for the explosion of noise. The sheer volume of a rock band playing to an almost empty room is enough to make a person’s internal organs vibrate; I’d quickly learned not to stand too close to the stage or the speakers – oh, and to always have ear plugs. At my first sound check I’d felt as though my insides had been jolted with several thousand volts of electricity, and I’d spent the rest of the evening backstage trying to shake the ringing from my ears. Three days later, the ring decreased to a dull hum and vanished completely somewhere around day five.
Drew sat at his drum kit, and the other guys took their places too. In turn, they checked their sound levels and asked for adjustments when necessary.
My eyes focused on Drew when he played. Being mesmerised by his talent wasn’t new. The way he got caught up in the music always left me awestruck. Day to day, he was gentle and quiet; the second his drumsticks were in his hands, he transformed into a rock god, pounding the drums as if his world would stop turning if he didn’t smash out every beat.
Passion. Drew had
passion
. Music was his biggest love, and fans who didn’t bother to read the liner notes in their Razes Hell CDs had no idea he wrote most of the lyrics they loved. Drew never sought out the spotlight, but it irked me that he didn’t get the credit he deserved.
The guys finished their sound check within fifteen minutes, and just when I thought they were done, Mack leaned into the microphone. “We need Jason back for the vocals.”
“Nah,” Joey said. “Everything’s fine.”
“Fine isn’t good enough.”
“We haven’t got a vocalist to check how we all sound together. This will have to do.”
“Derek will lose his shit if everything isn’t perfect. Ellie.” Mack turned his attention to me. “Tell him we need to do this right.”
I glanced at Drew, who remained silent while the other two bickered, twirling his drumsticks between his fingers.
“Oh, for God’s sake.”
I didn’t have any inner desire to be a rock chick, but my gut had started to growl with hunger, and Mack and Joey could squabble for hours so I jogged across the room, perched my bum on the edge of the stage and swung my legs round then stepped up to the microphone. “Play that funky music white boys.”
The guys exchanged looks of amusement, probably because I’d never done anything like this before. I sang in the shower, and in my work room at home. Those were my limits.
The opening bars of Def Leppard’s
Pour Some Sugar On
me began. Razes Hell’s cover was one of my favourites in their set, and their only cover amongst incredible originals. While the shy girl in me demanded to know what the hell I was doing, a small buzz of excitement shot through my veins.
I soon got into my groove, belting out the lyrics and I hammed up my performance, wiggling my hips and shimmying my shoulders. Not normal Ellie behaviour, but we pretty much had the place to ourselves, aside from some bar staff who weren’t taking any notice of us.
Drew chuckled at my little show, and a moment of self-consciousness was followed by a moment of supreme, slightly bonkers confidence. I sidled towards to him and ran a hand softly down his cheek and along his jawline as I sang. My fingertips tingled from the sensation of his stubble and he laughed harder, one of his drumsticks dropping to the floor.
“You’re such a dork,” he said, shaking his head.
I gave his shoulder a playful shove, and he caught my wrist, his touch igniting a burning sensation on my skin.
Whoa.
Our eyes connected again, and he smiled. It had been so long since he’d smiled like that - genuine, and without a trace of worry or stress – my heart flipped.
When Mack and Joey realised Drew and I had given up, they stopped playing, and a loud round of applause erupted from across the room. Derek had managed to let in the fans from outside, and to my embarrassment, they’d witnessed my horrendous singing. I gave a rushed curtsy, cheeks flaming, and hid behind Mack while Drew came out from behind his drums.
“Oh God,” I whimpered. “Nobody was meant to hear!”
“Ah, you were great!” Mack said. “If we ever have to kick Jason out, we’ve got an instant replacement. You ready to get some food?”
In response, my stomach let out another rumble, and I nodded. “I think it’s time.”
I watched the gig with as much enthusiasm as ever. I’d heard the songs over and over, but no two performances were ever the same. The crowd made every show different, and the Glasgow kids were wild. Hands in the air, shouting out the lyrics, and girls trying to act cool in case Jason noticed them.
That
never changed. Without a doubt, he was always The One. Not Mack, with his shoulder-length blond hair and cute smile, or Joey with his deep blue eyes, or Drew with his intensity and sexy stubble. This amused me, because none of the girls who fantasised about Jason had any idea who he was. Truth be told, they probably weren’t interested, they just wanted attention from a hot rock star. The soft features of his youth had been lost. His slightly rougher appearance seemed to make the fans want him more.
“Ellie! Ellie, where are you?”
My head snapped towards the stage. The audience looked around as if they could help find me, even though none of them knew me. I attempted to duck but Jason caught my eye.
“There you are!” He turned his attention back to the crowd. “Raise your hands if you were in here early for the sound check!”
The small group cheered and jumped up and down.
“I heard you got to see beautiful Ellie perform
Pour Some Sugar On Me
,” Jason went on. When the students cheered again, he said, “Well, I’d like to see it too!”
I vigorously shook my head. Messing about in front of a couple of kids was one thing, but it was quite another to perform in front of people who actually wanted to hear a good singer.
“Come on up here, Ellie!”
He laughed as the crowd chanted my name. Everyone’s eyes fell on me.
Think, Ellie, think!
Y
ou’re an artist, create an excuse!
The blinding panic froze my brain. If I didn’t move, I’d look lame, and the chants around me grew louder every second.
Oh, Christ.
I downed the last of my Bacardi and Coke, and the audience cheered as I walked through the parted crowd. My legs shook with every step. My last time on stage was during a school play when I was eight years old. I’d gotten so nervous, I puked in the middle of a scene – and funnily enough – wasn’t invited to star in any production ever again. Fine with me. Live performances were
not
my thing. The teasing after throwing up in front of my friends and all their families didn’t stop until my first year of high school. I was labelled “Smelly Ellie” for three years. Jason had either forgotten about the incident, or assumed I’d gotten over it, which I definitely hadn’t.
He took my hand to help me onto the stage and I stood awkwardly beside him while he addressed the crowd. A sea of expectant rock fanatics stared up at me.
“Don’t worry,” he whispered. “When the lights go out, you won’t see them.”
As the beat kicked in, I reminded myself to breathe and lose myself in the melody. Not easy to do when my heart hammered louder than the music.
We only had one microphone between us and as I waited to sing I stepped left and right - in a less funky version of The Carlton.
I made the fatal mistake of looking out at the audience again. The lights didn’t make them completely disappear, and in my nervousness, it appeared as though they were grinning up at me, faces resembling clown masks, ready to mock me when I failed.
Nerves took hold of me half way through the first line. Sickness clawed at my throat, choking me so the lyrics died in my mouth. The pressure, the lights; so much focus on me when I didn’t belong on the stage, didn’t belong in this crazy world of rock ‘n’ roll. The people below blurred and I blinked to clear my vision. No change; in fact, the masses swirled before me, my knees weakened and I ran off the stage and bolted to the backstage area before my legs gave out completely. Breathing hard, I barricaded myself against the dressing room door.
Nope. Sixteen years is not long enough to conquer my stage fright.
I had no clue how Drew and Jason had the courage to put themselves up for potential ridicule for a living. Once, I overheard some people openly mock my work at a gallery and their words depressed me for weeks. I sure as hell couldn’t handle harsh criticism every day of my life. Being on stage made me feel exposed, as if my less-than-skinny figure was an invitation for people to criticise, and even a single out-of-place hair would lead to trash talk. I wasn’t particularly insecure about my appearance, but as someone who spent large amounts of time rocking a onesie while working on my next masterpiece, I couldn’t cope with a job that put me in front of a live - often judgemental - audience.
I waited in the dressing room, jumping up and down to rid myself of tension until the boys filed in. The sound of the crowd indicated they hadn’t been bothered by my freak out, but Jason pulled me into a tight hug the second he walked through the door.
Being crushed against a sweaty rock star didn’t ease my annoyance. Well, not
this
rock star. I wanted Drew’s comfort, his safety. His arms had been my safe place countless times; I never minded being crushed against
him
when he was sweaty after a show.