10 Things to Do Before I Die (12 page)

A Really Huge Favor

The sidewalk veers sharply down to the left as I hurry back around the corner toward the club entrance. But I’ve grown accustomed to such hallucinations. I can compensate by leaning in the opposite direction. Good for me.

I’m a real champ.

This is it. I’ve sunk far below sniveling cowardice. There’s no term for What I just pulled back there. It Wasn’t just “escape.” It Wasn’t just my usual MO. It … Christ. Forget it. I can’t think about it anymore. It’ll ruin my last twenty poisoned hours on earth. Which deserve to be ruined. I Will say this: I definitely have embraced the Dark Side. Well … maybe not so much Dark as Slimy, Cruel, Selfish, and Shallow.

The crowd outside the Onyx has grown exponentially, like a virus, just during that brief minute or so. It fuels my depression, in a Way. It tells me that Shakes the Clown is no longer strictly underground. They’ve moved up. They’re trendy now. I doubt all these people really love them. Not the Way I do. I have the bootlegs to prove the love, going all the Way back. But I can’t think about that now, either. No, I need to focus on putting as much distance as possible between me and Rachel Klein and, by extension, between me and Lou and Frankie Klein as Well.

Thankfully, the twins are nowhere to be seen.

I squirm into a mass of bodies. I also try my best not to anger anybody. It doesn’t Work. Under normal circumstances I can be invisible but not here: I’m sweaty and stinky and I’m the only one Who doesn’t have a tattooed neck or pierced eyelid. I catch a few elbows, some glares, snippets of threats, a gathering storm of outlaw viciousness directed solely at me. But I console myself once more With the knowledge that if I’m beaten to a bloody pulp, I’ll have escaped. I’ll have escaped it all.

“Burger!”

Oh God, no.

“Burger! BURGER, dude!”

The color drains from my face. If Mark is here, it’s only a matter of time before he draws attention to me and Rachel finds me, too, and the truth gets spilled… . How did he get here so fast? I squeeze my eyes shut in a last-ditch effort to flee reality. But there is no fleeing. When I open my eyes back up, Mark is standing right in front of me. He’s also as Wild-eyed and sweaty as ever. His GIVE THIS DAWG A BONE T-shirt is practically soaked through.

“What’s up?” he says, gasping for breath. “Where’s Nikki?”

“She … uh—she Went to get tickets.” I swallow, glancing over both shoulders. A couple of people jostle him. He doesn’t bat an eyelash. “It’s a pretty crazy scene here, huh? You know, it cost me thirty bucks to get here by cab.”

“Me too. So What happened With Joy?”

“She split maybe ten minutes after you guys did. It Was tough getting her out of the apartment, but I forced the issue. I cleaned up a little bit, too.” He starts grinning. “Well, not so much. But a little bit.”

“Oh.” I chew my lip. “Listen, Mark, I need you to do me a really huge favor.”

He laughs. “I just spent four hundred bucks to get you laid. That doesn’t cut it?”

“I’m serious!”

“Okay, okay. Hey, look, I’m sorry if I bummed you out With the hooker thing—”

“It’s okay,” I interrupt. “But look, I need to split. And I need you to find Rachel. She Was right around the corner the last time I saw her.”

“Whoa. Wait. Rachel is here?”

“Yeah.” I cast another anxious glance over the crowd. “But When you find her, I need you to tell her that you and I came here together, all right? And that I Wasn’t feeling Well so I had to go home. Right away. I couldn’t Wait around for her car service. And that even though We Were drinking earlier today, I really am sick. Got it?”

Mark blinks at me a couple of times. “No. I don’t ‘got it.’”

“Just do it.”

“Do What? If Rachel is here, Why don’t you just talk to her?”

“I tried! But she Wouldn’t let me break up With her, all right?”

His eyes start to narrow. “She Wouldn’t … let you?”

“No! She Wouldn’t!”

“Burger, I think We should all leave. I think We should forget about this show and get you to the goddamn hospital. I think …” He doesn’t finish.

“You think What?”

At that moment his face goes slack—the Way it often does When he thinks he has a stroke of genius—and his gaze fixes squarely on something (or someone) behind us. I spin around.

It’s Nikki.

“Hi, Mark,” she says.

“Hi, Nikki,” he says.

There’s nothing between them. No long, meaningful exchange. They hardly even look at each other.

“Ted, you’re coming With me,” she announces. She grabs my arm and yanks me away from him Without so much as another glance in his direction. Her ringed fingers dig into the flesh above my elbow. She slices through the mob, fearlessly, toward an unmarked door several yards from the entrance.

“Where are We going?” I ask her.

“To meet Shakes the Clown,” she says.

The Indescribable Feeling You Get When Your Real Life Exceeds Your Dreams

The Words don’t register at first.

“Sorry, What Was that?”

“You heard me.” She drags me the last few feet to the door, then turns and flashes a quick smile. “Are you psyched?”

“Am I …”

“Don’t answer.” She knocks in a deliberate, even rhythm, as if she’s tapping out code. Several of the more heavily pierced crowd members Watch her. My pulse skips a beat. These people could do anything right now: stab us, pull a gun—anything. And I’d be powerless to stop them. Then again, What difference Would my murder make? It Would only hasten the inevitable. I stand there, mute in Nikki’s clutches, feeling vaguely like a convict Who’s being transferred from one penitentiary to another.

“Who is it?” a muffled voice asks from inside.

“Nikki,” she says.

The door swings open. A pale arm slithers out of the darkness and latches on to her, dragging us both inside.

Slam!

For a moment it’s pitch-black.

Then a lightbulb flickers.

I find myself standing beside an emaciated kid With spiky black hair and dead green eyes. Eyes that are almost as familiar to me as my own. He’s Wearing leather pants and a White Wife-beater undershirt, on Which he’s scrawled I’M WITH STUPID in red marker. Below these Words he’s drawn a sloppy arrow, pointing straight down to his crotch.

Wes Levitz. Aka Hip E. Shake.

My hero.

Okeydokey, Artichokey?

“So, Who’s the skirt?” Hip E. Shake asks Nikki.

The skirt?

He turns to me and bursts out laughing.

The vortex inside my head swirls at full throttle. Thoughts bounce around like popcorn in a microwave. He and Nikki know each other! (How did that happen?) Nikki must have told him about me! (But What did she tell him?) He already hates my guts! (He called me a … skirt?)

“Well, he’s not much to look at,” Hip E. Shake says.

Nikki doesn’t react.

I try to smile. I can manage only a sickly grin.

“Ah, I’m just clowning you.” He punches me on the arm, hard. Then he smiles, revealing a mouthful of gold teeth. The top row spells $I$$Y. This is new, as far as I know. “So, you’ve been poisoned and got twenty-four hours left. Is that right?”

My grin fades.

“Yeah,” Nikki pipes up, assuming the role of spokesperson. “Did you see it on the news today? It Was the fry cook at the Circle Eat Diner.”

“I don’t Watch the news,” Hip E. Shake says. “I only Watch porn.”

“Oh.” Nikki frowns. “Well. Anyway, like I said, you guys are his favorite band. So he Wanted to meet you before, you know, he …”

“Before he croaks,” Hip E. Shake finishes.

Her frown hardens. “That’s right.”

“And your name is Tad, right?” he asks.

I nod, unable to speak.

“Actually, it’s Ted,” Nikki snaps.

Hip E. Shake nods thoughtfully. “Hey, sister, I understand Where you’re coming from.” He lowers his voice, breathing the same stale beer stink into my face that Lou and Frankie did. “You see, I Was born into poverty. My mother named me Lester. Les for short. You know, since We had ‘less’ than most people. But she has a speech impediment. It came out sounding like ‘Wes.’ Sadly, it stuck. And I’ve been a Widdle ang-Wee ever since. So I’d like you to call me Wes. Or Wester. Nothing else. Otherwise I’ll cut you up Wike the Wox at Zabar’s. Okeydokey, artichokey?”

In Order of Importance

What happens next is a little foggy.

Hip E. Sha—sorry, Wes—leads us down a long and dimly lit cement corridor, but that’s basically all I’m conscious of. I’m still grappling With a variety of issues and unanswered questions. In order of importance (at least, for the moment):

How did Nikki arrange for me to meet Shakes the Clown?

My hero is a psychopath.

Mark and the three Klein siblings are outside, separately Waiting to see the show. Have they run into each other yet?

Has Rachel found out about What Leo did to me?

I’m hungry. I haven’t eaten all day, except for poisoned fries.

What if I puke again?

The show Was supposed to start at 9 p.m. It’s already 9:17.

Myself, Ted Burger

If there’s an appropriate Way to behave around famous people, I haven’t seen it yet. Granted, the members of Shakes the Clown aren’t exactly famous. (And granted, I’ve never hung around famous people in the first place.) But from What I’ve gleaned off TV, there are generally three types of behavior. (1) There’s the sycophantic: “Yes, Mr. Rock Star, I’ll be getting those slippers for you right away!” (2) There’s the inner circle Wannabe: “So, Mr. Rock Star, after the show tonight let’s ditch these hangers-on and go to that bar We snuck into in the eighth grade because I knew you before you Were famous and We’re lifelong buddies, right?” (3) There’s the purposefully aloof: “I’m going to ignore you, Mr. Rock Star, because you’re just another human being, and I could easily do What you do, so the truth is, you make me sick.”

So When Wes crashes through a door marked AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY (protected by a mountain of a bouncer Who makes the obese security guard at St. Vincent’s look like a famine victim), I make a mental note not to behave in any of those Ways. I’m just going to be myself. Ted Burger. Appropriately sycophantic. Not part of the inner circle. Too sycophantic to be aloof.

It should be easy. All I have to do is stand there like a dope. I’ve had plenty of practice doing that.

Human Sacrifice

The AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY door opens on a stuffy green-tiled cell. It’s approximately the size and shape of a gas station restroom. It smells like a gas station restroom, too, except there are no toilets. There are no furnishings at all, aside from a battered vinyl seat, Which appears to have been torn out of a van or minibus.

In my Wild daydreams I’ve always imagined backstage areas to be glamorous and over the top—loaded With catered sushi and lighted mirrors, beautiful groupies, rampant sex … a seething den of iniquity and mayhem, dripping With unseen cash. Was I Wrong? Where’s the champagne? The hors d’oeuvres? Spreadwise, I see only a rusted bucket full of canned Budweiser. And there are no groupies, aside from a pasty guy in a flannel shirt. He’s standing over the other band members, Phurm Hand Shake and Sheik Down, Who slouch together on the vinyl seat, silently nursing beers. That’s it. There aren’t even any other people in the room.

Phurm Hand Shake is squirrelly. Literally. Much more so than I remember him in the photos on their official Web site. He’s got the same frizzed-out dull brown hair, and he’s hunched over his beer the Way a squirrel Would hunch over an acorn, picking at the label. His yellow buckteeth hang over his lips. He has no neck, either—just a long, flaccid chin that seems to extend from the bottom of his face to the top of his tattered AC/DC concert T-shirt. He’s also Wearing a kilt.

Sheik Down is a lot more imposing in person than she is on the site. She’s easily a foot taller than Phurm Hand Shake, even sitting down. She sports big bug-eye sunglasses and a gaudy denim suit: lots of silver snaps and Nashville-style embroidery. In fact, she reminds me a little of Lenny Kravitz, but only if Lenny Kravitz decided to turn country and get a sex change.

The pasty guy starts running his mouth: “What I’m saying is, Wicked Records gets you. We understand your thing. You’re smart-stupid. Am I right? You know? Like sexy-ugly? Like if I could sum you up in a gag, it Would be When a piano drops on a guy’s head, and the guy turns out to be a piano tuner? Smart-stupid, right? You think a major label Would get that? And if you sign Wicked Records, as in now, tonight, We can guarantee you distribution that no other independent label can… .”

“How did this happen?” I Whisper to Nikki.

“How did What happen?” she Whispers back.

“How did you get me backstage? How did you meet these guys?”

She lifts her shoulders. “It’s not that hard to meet a band if you’re a chick. I flirted With the bouncer. I gave him my number.”

“You did?”

“Actually, I gave him Mark’s number.” She Winks at me. “But the bouncer doesn’t know that.”

“… With the proper marketing—”

“Twig?” Wes calls, silencing the guy in the flannel shirt. “Can you come here for a minute, please?”

An instant later the bouncer appears in the doorway. (Nine hundred pounds and his name is Twig?) He’s so huge that he practically has to ooze into the room, as if via osmosis. “Yeah?” he grunts.

“Our little flannel friend has had too much beer,” Wes says. “It’s making him talk funny.”

Twig grins. “You Want me to dismantle him?”

“Yes, I do, please,” Wes says. “I’d go With a Mayan flavor. Human sacrifice.” He turns to the guy in the flannel shirt. “Or is that not ‘smart-stupid’ enough?”

“Hey, What’s your problem?” the guy says. He backs away, glancing around the room. “What did I do?”

“You have a severe case of diarrhea of the mouth,” Wes says. “Now it’s time to get constipated.”

“I’m your one-ton barrel of Imodium,” Twig says, stepping toward him.

The guy’s face turns paler. Suddenly he hightails it straight past Twig—down the hall, through the door, and out into the street.

“Mayan Imodium!” Twig yells after him.

Wes giggles. So do his bandmates.

Nikki is starting to look antsy. I’m filled With anger. Not at her, of course, but at these morons. I’m no longer feeling detached enough to appreciate their absurdity. I feel like asking them a few questions. Like, oh, say: Why are you so violent and immature? Why Would you threaten a guy Who Was trying to offer you a record deal, even if he did talk too much? A deal With an independent label, no less? It Wouldn’t even be selling out! True, the guy Was foolish and annoying. But he Was right. He articulated exactly What I’ve maintained from the moment I discovered you: You are (for lack of a better term) smart-stupid. So Why didn’t you recognize his gibberish for What it Was? Namely: a huge compliment? Why don’t you care? Most important, Why are you deliberately trying to freak Nikki and me out? Forget the questions; I Want to slap all of you.

But I don’t say a Word, of course. I just stand there like a dope.