Struts & Frets (6 page)

Rick and I knew better than to just open the door like we did at each other's houses, so we stood and waited until the shouting match was over. Then we heard several deadbolts unlock and a chain slide, and the big heavy door creaked open.

On the other side of the door, Jen5's father glared down at us. He was really good at glaring, probably because he had to do it a lot with his students. And he wasn't one of those flustered, stuffy, egghead-type professors. He was more like some old English lord, except dressed in preppy clothes that Jen5's mother had probably picked out. He was tall and really thin, and he had these intense, piercing eyes that didn't miss a thing.

“Good evening, Mr. Russell,” said Rick. “We'd like to kidnap your daughter and sell her to the gypsies. We'll give you twenty percent off the top.”

Unless it was humor. Mr. Russell
never
got humor. He continued to glare down at us, but one of his bushy white eyebrows twitched a little.

“Gentlemen,” he said. “Come in, please.” As we walked dutifully into the foyer, he called up the staircase, “Jennifer, your friends have arrived.”

“Where are my pants?” she called down from somewhere upstairs.

“Which pants?” he called back up.

“The ones you hid from me because you said they looked like they were owned by a bum.”

“Homeless person,” he corrected her. Then, “I threw the pants away.”

“Liar,” she yelled down. “You never throw away anything.”

He paused for a second, his face totally expressionless. Then he said, “You might find them in the attic, then. In your keepsake chest.”

“In my . . . ,” she began, but her voice trailed away as we heard her stomp up a second flight of stairs.

Mr. Russell turned back to us, still completely dignified.

“Jennifer will be down momentarily.”

We stood there for a little bit, all three of us uncomfortable. But Rick couldn't take all the seriousness, so he said, “Say, Mr. Russell. Your rose bushes are looking splendid.”

Mr. Russell glared down at Rick, but Rick held on to his earnest expression of innocence.

“Thank you, Richard,” said Mr. Russell.

Then Jen5 came down the steps, skipping half of them on her way.

“Let's get out of here,” she said.

“When will you be home, dear?” asked Mr. Russell.

“Before Mom is,” said Jen5.

“Ah,” said Mr. Russell. Then he turned to me. “Samuel, I trust you will have my daughter home at a reasonable hour.”

“Sure thing, Mr. Russell,” I said. I couldn't bring myself to make fun of him like Rick did. There was just something kind of sad about him. I imagined him sitting in the big stuffed chair he had in his study, drinking tea or sherry or something, reading depressing poetry for hours and hours while he waited for his family to get home. I don't know. I just can't be mean to someone like that.

As soon as we were outside and the door was shut behind us, Rick called, “Shotgun!”

“Chivalry,” said Jen5, “is so dead.”

Monster Zero was playing at a local venue just off the OSU campus called Saul's Subs. It was supposed to be a deli, and they did serve sandwiches and stuff, but there was also a bar attached called the Brewery. Since they were technically two places that just happened to share a wall, they could do all-ages
shows. That combo made it popular for both high school kids and college kids, so it was usually pretty hopping. In fact, it was probably the best venue in town for local bands. It usually had just the right amount of space.

But not tonight. I guess the hype from the stupid music magazine had brought in a lot of people who didn't usually see local bands, so the place was completely mobbed. Rick, Jen5, and I pushed our way through the crowds of sweaty jock and cheerleader types who normally wouldn't be caught dead in a place like this. I felt like we had been invaded and the place didn't have its usual cool vibe at all. Instead, it felt weirdly tense, like a school dance, with lots of people sizing each other up.

“This sucks,” I told Jen5.

She shrugged. “Price of fame, I guess.”

“Fame sucks,” I said.

“You'll keep saying that right up to the point when you're discovered by a record label.”

“Let's find a place in the back to hang out,” Rick yelled over the noise.

“We have to find TJ first,” I said. “He's here by himself.”

Rick looked around at the mass of shoulder-to-shoulder people. “That won't be fun,” he said. “Why can't TJ find us?”

“Jesus, Rick,” said Jen5. “Come on, let's at least try to look around a little.”

We made our way through the crowds, scanning the top for TJ's mop of brown hair. While we were looking, I spotted Joe and Laurie in a dark corner making out. Rick followed my look.

“Shit!” he said.

“Come on, guys,” said Jen5, pushing us on.

“Did you see that, Fiver?” asked Rick. “Joe's totally grabbing her tit.”

“Yeah, yeah,” she said. “Keep it moving.”

We found TJ backed up against a wall looking lost and bewildered. Like he couldn't even comprehend all the trendy people swarming around him. The look of relief in his eyes when he saw me wave to him made me feel like I'd just thrown him a life preserver. But by the time we worked our way over to him, we didn't really have any time to talk because Monster Zero was onstage.

Nobody noticed right away. The band just climbed up there, all casual, like they couldn't care less that this was the biggest crowd they'd ever played to. It wasn't until they started tuning up that people noticed and started to get quiet.

Eric Strom, the lead singer, looked more like a computer geek than a rock star. He had thick, square glasses and short spiky hair, and he always wore thin polyester button-up shirts.
He waited until the crowd was looking at him, then he cleared his throat.

“Wow,” he said into the mic, totally chill. “Listen, I just have one thing to say to you people: Don't believe everything you read.”

And then the band blasted into their first song. A wall of noise washed over the crowd, punctuated by Eric's howling vocals. Somehow, in a split second, he'd transformed before our eyes into a punk rock god. This was charisma. This was what I was talking about when people asked me why I wasn't the lead singer. Because I didn't have that.

Eric's energy, backed by the sheer power of the band, transported me, and suddenly the crowds didn't matter. Joe and Laurie groping each other didn't matter. An army of marketing minions and their bullshit magazines didn't matter. There was just this band doing their thing.

It's hard to explain. When I'm playing music, that's when I feel most alive. I escape from all the crap: no doubts, no worries, no fears. Just me. And when I listen to really good music, especially if it's live, it's the same thing. I'm transported and nothing else matters.

When Monster Zero finished their set, I came back to the real world and looked around. Half the people had left at some point. I hadn't noticed, and I didn't really care. Because I knew
that Monster Zero was for real. They wouldn't sell out. They had proved that to me. And I was so relieved. I almost felt like crying. Not cool, I admit. But at the same time, I didn't want that feeling to ever end.

“Sam,” said Jen5. “It's time to go home.”

“Yeah,” I said, and all the fears and doubts that I had escaped came flooding back, making me feel twenty pounds heavier. “I guess you're right.”

“That'll be you someday,” said Jen5.

“Most of the time I think so,” I said. “But when I see a
real
band play, as much as I love it, it makes me feel like we've still got a long way to go.”

“You
are
a real band, Sammy.”

“We've only performed twice, and we didn't finish our set either time.”

“Well, okay . . . ,” she said. “It wasn't your fault some neighbor called the cops on Laurie's birthday party. You guys weren't really playing that loud. That neighborhood is just full of old rich snobs who hate teenagers. And getting shut down by the cops is kind of cool, right?”

“What about the show in Heath?” I asked.

“Was that the one you did at the Union Hall with a couple of other bands that Joe knew?”

“Hey,” said Rick, breaking into the conversation. “Are you
guys taking about that gig we did where all those rednecks were heckling us?”

“Yeah,” I said. “It didn't help that Joe decided to do an impromptu version of that old Camper Van Beethoven song.”

“‘Take the Skinheads Bowling,' right?” He laughed a little. “That was pretty funny, you have to admit.”

“Right up until they rushed the stage and nearly beat the shit out of us.”

“We got away, didn't we?” asked Rick.

“The point is, we've never had a real gig,” I said. “One that went well.”

“Just believe in yourself,” said Jen5. “Don't give up.”

I smirked at her. “Thanks for the pep talk, Coach.”

She rolled her eyes. “Fine. You're going to work at 7-Eleven your whole life. Happy now?”

hallway at school and stared at a new poster for a long time. Somewhere in the back of my mind I was thinking that the bell had rung and I was going to be late for class. But still I looked at the poster.

It was glossy black with that messy “thrasher” font that had been designed to appeal to teenagers like me. The poster said:

I couldn't stop staring at the poster. It amazed me that the people who came up with this garbage thought they could get to us with this kind of stuff. A Battle of the Bands? How utterly lame. Music wasn't a competition like football. Not that I expected a poser radio station like KLMN to get that. On the other hand, free studio time to lay down a professional-sounding track . . . that sounded really nice. And how funny would that be to have one of our songs playing on KLMN? And maybe then Mom would lay off about the math and science stuff.

But who was I kidding? A station like that wouldn't even like our sound. And anyway, I wasn't sure we were ready for a big venue like that yet. But I still couldn't stop staring at the poster.

“That's right, Sammy,” said a low, gruff voice behind me.

Joe.

“We're going to enter this poser contest,” he said. “And we're going to kick all their asses and get a single on that wannabe radio station. And then they will all understand what real hardcore is about.”

The way he said it was so totally confident. Like there was no other way it could go.

“Seriously?” I asked. “You want to join a Battle of the Bands?”

“Why the hell not?” said Joe.

I looked up at him, into his hard, angry eyes and his perpetual sneer, and it made me feel better. Yeah, I thought. Why not? What did we have to lose? Sometimes it was really good to have Joe on your side.

“Joseph McConnahay and Samuel Bojar!”

We both turned and saw Ms. Jansen's head sticking out of her classroom door. She glared at us from behind her thick octagonal glasses. “Gentlemen, are you waiting for an invitation?”