Rockoholic (6 page)

Another roar from somewhere. Another figure appears, this time from the back of the stage. Where? Who? What?! It’s Jael Dennehy. Oh my sweet Lord Cobain on High, it’s Jael Dennehy and not only is he here, he is not wearing a shirt. He’s just as V-shaped and tanned as he is in all my pictures but just as shy as he seems in interviews. His upper body ripples and bumps in all the right places but his head is dipped and covered with a straggly mass of hair. The screams around me are unspeakable. He has white board shorts on, high-top Nikes, and a mask on the top of his head. He lifts up one extremely toned arm to acknowledge us, gets himself comfortable on his stool, and pulls his mask down onto his face. He then starts banging away to a constant marching rhythm.

He is the Clown.

Everyone’s going ballistic. Jael’s drumming is so loud I swear the fillings are jumping out of my teeth. Strobe lights flash white-hot then orange, red, green, purple, pink, blue on the stage. All my internal organs quiver to the wheedling of Lenny’s guitar. My legs shake to the timbre of the bass line. The air is sweaty and sexy, and grown men around me are shouting and screaming, and the stink of stale beer and eggy sweat is thick in my nose and my mouth.

And all at once it goes completely black. Lenny, Pash, and Jael stop thrumming and drumming. There’s near silence onstage. Near glass-breaking noise in the crowd. OMG.

A single white spotlight beams down at the top of the staircase. OMFG.

And he’s there.

He’s standing there, his arms folded across his chest. His arms bound by his sleeves. He’s wearing a white straitjacket. Skinny white jeans. White DMs. He is Jackson.

He is the Madman.

They’re all here now. The Punk. The Priest. The Clown. And the Madman.

The crowd noise goes up ten decibels even though Jackson’s just standing there, completely still. I don’t move either. For at least a minute he doesn’t move and I don’t move. Every pore on my skin is a goose bump. The crowd chants.

“REGS! REGS! REGS! REGS! REGS! REGS! REGS! REGS! REGS! REGS! REGS! REGS!”

I start crying uncontrollably. He’s here. They’re all here. Pasha John Fredericks, bass player, birthday 17 February, strawberry blond, chain-smoking, E-string genius. Leonardo Joseph Mortiro, lead guitar, birthday 6 July, quarter Italian, Mohawked, kilt-wearing, maestro wheedler extraordinaire. Jael Matthew Dennehy, drummer, birthday 10 March, mute, birthmarked, board shorts–wearing, sushi-loving, tub-thumper.

And Jackson James Gatlin, singer, birthday 3 September, beautiful, big blue eyes, messy brown hair, teetotaler, vegetarian, Stephen King–fanatic, broken-homed, bookish, bliss on legs.

Jackson has a head mic. He screams and it’s like the twisting of a thousand knives. It’s really Jackson. It’s really him. Oh my God, he’s there. He’s here. I’m so close. Not close enough but still closer than I’ve ever been before. He starts to sing but the crowd noise is a wall. I can barely hear him. I’m crying so much I can barely see him. Then the amps are turned up and his voice runs up and down my body like fingernails.

I push and shove to get an inch closer, try and hang on to my place near the front, but you give a Regs fan an inch she’ll take two and the second I move to make the break to get closer, bodies close in and I lose it, and suddenly I’m an inch farther back than I was.

“Jaaaaaaaaaackssssssonnnnnnn!!!!!!!!!!!!” I yell, but it’s like nothing has come out of my mouth. He’s not going to hear me, anyway. He’s in the moment. There’s about ten thousand people all screaming the same thing. Why would he hear
me
?

I’m up on tiptoes, trying to see as much as I can. He stamps down the stairs, his hair gelled up in a forest of spikes, and sings the whole first song with his arms bound across his chest. It’s their slow love song, “Tortuous,” from the new album
The Punk, The Priest
. . .
That means they’re going to do it in CD order. Jackson disappears from the stage for a couple of minutes as Lenny shreds through a solo. Nobody around me seems to know what’s happened to him. And as “Tortuous” comes to its slow, melodic end, he reappears at the side. His arms unbound. His eyes wild. And I know what’s coming next. And it’s not going to be pretty.

It’s gonna be “Bedlam.”

And suddenly I’m tossed and pushed and pummeled around like a ball in a bounce house. Jackson flings his arms wide. He is feral. Possessed. Jumping off speakers. Snarling and screeching and kicking and spitting out at the crowd and they love it. Lights pulse green, red, white, flashing blue. The drumbeats smack us about the face and we just want more. We feed off him like vampires in a bloodbath. Vampire cows.

At the front, yellow-shirted security blokes stand as still as marble pillars, facing away from the stage. They’re watching us and chewing, occasionally doling out cups of water from large blue bins and handing them to us. Every now and then I get an inch in the bottom of a cup and drink it down like it’s the last water on Earth. Girls everywhere scream and cry, practically tearing their faces off. I recognize a couple from the queue. Team Gatlin and Small Redhead. I see Team Gatlin signal to a Yellow Shirt and he and another guy step up and reach over the front row to pull her out. Two songs in and she’s had it. She’s queued all day and they’re pulling her out already. One body closer to the front row I get.

Then the worst thing happens, aside from me dying on the spot: Suddenly I don’t know where the moon rock is.I don’t know why it occurs to me to notice at that moment, but I know it’s not in my cargoes — just the last Curly Wurly and some candy wrappers in there. It’s in my fleece pocket, tied around my waist, where it can easily fall out while I’m dancing. I stand still while everyone else is going nuts around me, and force my hand down to my waist to try and get it, apologizing again, even though they can’t hear me, to all those bodies juddering and shoving up against me. It takes me a little while to reach it and I’m still desperately trying to keep my eyes on the stage to see what Jackson is doing, but then I get to my pocket and reach inside. And it’s there. And I clasp it between my fingers and pull it out. I need to get it into my cargoes where I can zip it up safely. I can’t lose it. I made a promise to Grandad.

“Bedlam” ends and a cheer goes up again. The cow mass relaxes slightly to cheer and I raise my hands out to clap, but suddenly song three starts and it’s “Freaktasia,” the circus song, another fast one, and everyone starts jumping about again. Fireworks go off behind speakers to the left, to the right. Something explodes behind the drums. The stage goes dark and some midgets run on with sparklers. Jackson’s wearing a top hat and cracking a whip across the stage. A Goth girl beside me whoops and hollers and flings her arm in front of me, screaming “Yeeaaaaaah!” and as she does, her frantic arm knocks the moon rock clean out of my hand. It flies, I’m not kidding,
flies
toward the front of the stage and disappears down where the Yellow Shirts are standing.

It’s gone. Shit, it’s gone. Where the hell is it?

“Freaktasia” is in full swing and everyone’s loving it. But I can’t enjoy it anymore. I have to get the moon rock, I just have to. Aside from my grandad showing up at the front of the stage, it’s the only thing that will get me out of that pen. I have to get it, don’t I? I imagine it getting kicked about, or some security guard chucking it into the crowd farther away.

I catch the eye of one of the Yellow Shirts and make the universal sign of “Get me the hell out of here.” Everyone then guides me toward him and I’m like a baby being pulled out of a tight sucking hole. My body’s being dragged across people’s heads and I’m yanked out of there by my belt and arms. I’m plonked onto my feet and ushered to the left-hand side toward the St. John Ambulance people and a bin full of iced water. I’m handed a cup, but I don’t take it. I’m scanning the floor. There’s no sign of the moon rock, but I won’t leave the front of the stage until I see it. I feel a hand try to move me along to a Yellow Shirt, who then shows me the way to the side barrier. The drink is shoved under my nose again. I don’t want it — I just want to see the rock.

“Move it!” shouts the Yellow Shirt, right in my ear. “Go behind the barrier.”

“No, I have to find my rock!” I shout back at him, scanning the floor. “Oh God, where is it?”

I look back along the line of Yellow Shirts at the front of the stage. They’re all watching the cow pen. But then I see it, glinting on the floor in front of one of them. I’m sure that’s it. I make like I’m doing as I’m told and head toward the side barrier, then at the last second, I do a U-turn and peg it back toward the front of the stage. It’s like slow motion, every step is measured and I know each step could be my last before I’m taken down, but I make sure they’re big steps. I nearly get there. I reach out, I reach for the moon rock, and arms grab me around my waist. I’m thrown down
oomph
style to the floor, the rock just out of reach. I kick and shout, trying to wrench myself out of the Yellow Shirt’s grip, but it’s like being inside a tire. Another one jumps on top of him and the squeeze on my ribs is even worse than being in the mosh pit. I’m going to pass out.

I want to shout but I can’t. I can’t get enough air in my lungs. I’m just mouthing, “Let me go, I have to get it, just let me get it.” I’m crying now, though there isn’t enough air to even fuel each sob. I keep seeing my grandad’s face, hearing his voice in my head.

“It’s magic, Jody. You look after that.”

“I promise.”

“Let me get my rock. Just let me get it!” I scream. Two of them are on me now. Another stands on my hand. And at that moment, I feel all of them leave me. No one’s on my back. No one’s on my hand. My sweaty hair is clinging to my face like wet worms. I’m lifted to my feet. Jackson is there. He’s standing in front of me. All in white. And he’s handing me my moon rock.

“Here you go. That what you needed?” he shouts breathlessly. I take the rock quickly and look at his eyes. They are soft and his face is sweaty and pale. Then he turns to the three burly Yellow Shirts and points his finger — his eyes all wild and watery and his face furious. “You manhandle one of them again like that I’ll have you all fuckin’ fired, got it? Bunch of pricks.”

Some other security people, big burly men but in suits, dash in and maneuver Jackson back onto the stage, where the song, I don’t even know which one, comes to its instrumental end.

Robotically, I shove the rock deep inside my cargoes and zip it up. Then I’m ushered back behind the barrier at the side of the stage. I. Cannot. Believe. What. Just. Happened. My mouth hangs open like a trapdoor. “I didn’t thank him,” I mumble as I’m pushed along.

Someone is beside me and hands me a cup of water. It’s Scary
Shining
Twin, all sweaty, her T-shirt stuck to her skin like plastic wrap. I take the cup and pour the water over my head. I don’t even feel how cold it is but there are little lumps of ice in it.

She looks like she’s going to sink her teeth into my neck, but instead shouts something into my ear. I only hear her the second time. “What did he give you?”

I just look at her.

“Are you all right?”

And then she’s getting farther away. And farther away. And I’m at her knees, her feet. And I feel my head fall back with a snap. And it hurts. Then all the lights go out.

Bright white room. Heaven? Am I dead? Is this the “something good” I wanted? Shit. I don’t want to be dead! I’m not ready. I want to go to Italy. I want to swim with dolphins. . . .

Black uniforms mill around me. I’m soaked and freezing cold. Music thumps through the white walls. After a couple of blinks, I realize. I’m not dead. I’m still at the concert. I must be backstage. Hospital beds are dotted about the room. I’m lying on my side on one of them. Three songs. I waited all day in the freezing cold to hear a shit opening band and three songs. Now I’m proper bawling it. People in black uniforms look at me. It’s so bloody unfair! My phone judders in my pants pocket.

I roll onto my back and take it out. Message from Mac. I squint through my tears to read it.

PRKD OPPO PUB OUT FRONT. UNDER STREET LITE WIV ORANGE SIGN. WEN EVA UR READY. M.

It must be eleven o’clock. That’s when he said he’d text. I remember him saying it. The concert must be nearly over. I’ve slept through it!

I shove the phone back in my pocket. I’m still crying, even more hopelessly now, like a toddler who’s lost sight of her mum. I pat my zipped pocket. A lump. The moon rock’s there. I daren’t get it out in case it leaps out of my hand again. What am I thinking? Rocks can’t jump, can they? A tear rolls down my cheek, into one of my almost deaf ears. I see Jackson’s face as he gave the rock back to me. His shining, smiling face. I get the rock out and rub it against my upper lip. Pretty soon it’s wet with my tears. My head throbs all over. Two girls are carried in by some more Black Uniforms, one of them is the Smiley
Shining
Twin, who looks like she’s dying — not so smiley now. The other is the girl in the eBay shirt. She looks dead. Her headband has fallen over her forehead and her hair is stuck to her face. One of the sleeves has been ripped right off the T-shirt. That could have been me!