The Devil's Metal (21 page)

“I haven’t interviewed you,” I pointed out.
“And you’re the most important piece of the puzzle.”

“I’m the most broken piece of the puzzle,”
he spat out. He quickly composed himself and tried to smile. It
didn’t reach his eyes. “If I give you an interview soon, will you
think about packing it in? That doesn’t mean you’re quitting, it
just means you’re done.”

“Why do you want me to leave so badly?” I
asked, stung.

Silence swamped us like the thick
humidity.

Finally he said, quiet and husky, “I have
too many things to worry about. I don’t want to worry about
you.”

“You don’t need to worry about me,” I told
him. I smoothed down my hair and shirt and put on a sober face.

“You’re stubborn and you’re scared,” he
said, smiling just enough to make his cheeks rise, dimples found in
the scruffy two-day beard on his face. “It’s a dangerous
combination.”

“I hear the world’s a dangerous place,” I
replied.

He got to his feet and held his hand out for
me. I returned his smile and put my hand in his, relishing the
strength and warmth as he closed it over mine and pulled me to my
feet.

“Come on,” he said, pulling me along. He let
go of my hand when he was satisfied I would follow. “Let me go have
another word with Graham. I plan on breaking every bone in his body
except his arms and legs. Hybrid needs those.”

We walked back to the auditorium in a
comfortable silence. In my head I kept repeating what Graham had
said to me when he had me pinned up against the wall.

“
You can’t save him. You can’t save any
of them.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

I woke up to a weird slurping noise in the
middle of the night, followed by a shaking of the bunk. I had my
curtain drawn across, but even then I knew it was entirely dark on
the bus and that it was in motion. I heard Bob at the driver’s
seat, shifting gears as the bus climbed the hills that cluttered
around southern Virginia.

I held my breath, listening for that
slurping sound again, terrified of the monsters, real or imagined.
Then I heard a sucking noise, followed by a groan. I’d heard that
groan before. It was Robbie, in the bunk below.

I drew back the curtain and poked my head
over the side. In the dim light I could see Robbie. Well, I saw
parts of him. He was 69-ing with a rather porky-looking broad, her
giant ass pulled apart by his hands, the white skin of it shining
in the bits of passing light from the highway.

I gritted my teeth in anger and fell back
into bed, putting the pillow over my face. I was dealing with
Graham being an abusive asshole, potentially dangerous groupies,
and shadowy Sage, and yet Robbie was still Robbie and managed to
sneak some random chick on the bus for the journey down to the
Charlotte Music Festival. I wished I was so carefree and
clueless.

By 9AM, most of the people on the bus were
up, except for Graham, thank god, who slept in the latest since he
went to bed the latest. I knew Sage had given him a talking to last
night when we returned to the venue, and I was glad I got to bed
without having to face him. One look under the night sky and I
would have sworn he was turning into a monster again.

I hopped off the bunk and got my first look
at the smuggled groupie. She was sitting next to Robbie at the
table, across from Noelle and Mickey, drinking a cup of freshly
brewed coffee. She wasn’t as large as I had originally thought,
just soft and curvy, the type of body I could easily have if I
didn’t watch what I ate. She had honey blonde hair and green eyes
and a cherubic face that wasn’t very sexual or cunning at all. She
looked nice, and she was wearing one of Robbie’s t-shirts,
stretched across her breasts. She caught my eye as I walked over
and gave me a demure smile.

Behind the eating booth, Jacob sat on the
bench flipping through newspapers. He spoke to me without looking
up. “Someone better introduce Rusty.”

Sage was lying down on the couch with his
eyes closed, a book on his chest, his shirt raised enough so that I
could see trails of dark stomach hair snaking down toward his pants
and hand-tooled belt. I tried not to stare and looked back at the
new girl.

“I’m Dawn,” I said, trying to push both my
thoughts about Sage and my anti-groupie feelings away.

“Don’t listen to her,” Robbie spoke up with
a cheeky grin. “Her real name is Rusty. Rusty, this is
Emeritta.”

Over the next hour, as the bus rolled
through the trees toward the festival site on the banks of the
Catawba River, I learned that Emeritta was actually a pretty cool
chick. She was from Boston and was a huge fan of everything loud
and gritty. She loved MC5, Sabbath, Vanilla Fudge, Iron Butterfly,
and most of all, Hybrid. She gushed to Robbie about how his yapping
howls in “Freedom Run” made her think of a dog in heat, and that
the first time she saw them live, she almost came. She said it in a
fit of giggles, which was quite endearing, and her own face went
pink at her frankness. Most of all, Emeritta was kind and really
listened to you when you were speaking. It made me feel a little
ashamed for branding so many groupies a slut. I mean, yeah she
slept with Robbie and I had a feeling she slept with a lot of rock
stars, but a slut is a name you give a girl you don’t like. I liked
Emeritta and was happy she was coming with us to Charlotte…and any
other place after that, depending on how quickly Robbie discarded
her.

By the time the bus was pulling up to the
festival and lining up with all the other tour buses, the band had
found their newfound energy and everyone was getting pretty
excited. Graham only came out of the back room near the end, and to
his credit, he stayed as far away from me as possible. I caught
Sage shooting him wary glances from time to time but Graham took on
a very hangdog, meek appearance. I, however, didn’t believe it for
a second. I could still sense that black violence rolling around in
his soul…if he even had one.

I could tell this was going to be a special
show by the amount of whiskey and Bailey’s Jacob was pouring into
his coffee. The festival was still sleepy this early in the
afternoon, but the breeze of the river was deliciously cool and the
air was swamped with a sensual headiness, punctuated by the sun
that shone high in the sky and sparkled off the trees. The
backstage area wasn’t some dingy dressing room or cramped lounge,
but a bunch of mobile trailers scattered about in a pastoral
setting behind the big stages. All of us, including Emeritta,
walked through the grassy field now turned a miniature town of
musicians. We passed trailers marked for Earth, Wind & Fire,
Deep Purple, and The Eagles. We saw the wide-mouthed Steven Tyler
of the band Aerosmith having a beer on his trailer steps, and
spotted Bob Seger and Randy Bachman chatting up a few gorgeous
blonde women.

The Hybrid trailer was just as big as the
other ones, and our neighbor, who was playing an acoustic in his
doorway, was none other than Ted Nugent. Even Sage was impressed
and immediately went over to introduce himself.

Despite the ups and downs and nagging sense
of doom that permeated my thinking as of late, the festival was
turning me around. It was impossible not to smile, and I was glad
Emeritta, someone as star-struck as I was, was there with me. We
both took many walks together up and down that grass alley between
the trailers, trying to look into windows (subtly, of course) and
listen to what music was coming from what trailer. It was what I
imagined Hollywood was like.

While we did our rounds in the steaming sun,
squealing at the hello we got from a killer-mustached Jon Lord, I
got to know Emeritta a little better. Now that she wasn’t
surrounded by one of her favorite bands, she was more
forthcoming.

“So what do you think about the other
groupies out there?” I asked, trying to convey sincerity.

She laughed and tucked her hair behind her
ears in a nervous gesture. “First of all, we hate that term. I know
Zappa and Miss Pamela made it all cool and stuff, but I’m just a
rock lover. A lover of rock. I love with my ears and my body.”

I nodded, trying to figure out how not to
insult her further. “I guess groupie doesn’t have to be a negative
term though.”

“No, it doesn’t, but I know the way girls
like you say it.”

I raised my brow but let her go on.

“You seem to forget all about the women’s
movement. We’re free to love who we are and when we want to. A lot
of us just happen to love rock stars. It doesn’t have to be bad.
The bands love us. Everyone should be happy, don’t you think?”

“Sure,” I mused, seeing her logic. We sat
down at a splintered picnic table along the fence. You could hear
fans on the other side, trying to see over it or find a knothole to
look through. I felt immensely cool, a feeling I thought I had
lost. I relished it.

“See,” Emeritta said, beaming at me. “You
love too, just differently. I know how you feel because I feel the
same way right now. It’s far out. And when I’m with the men, I feel
far out then too. But ten times more. You haven’t hooked up with
anyone from the band?”

I hoped I wasn’t blushing. The last thing
Emeritta needed to hear was that I hooked up with Robbie. It was
something that made me feel dirty and ashamed, and though she
probably wouldn’t have cared,
I
cared.

“No,” I lied. “That’s against the journalism
oath.”

“They make you take an oath?”

“I took my own oath. Thou shalt not touch
rock stars.”

“Tough oath you got there. I’d last five
minutes. I heard that the first female journalist who went on the
road with Led Zeppelin got raped by Bonzo.”

“That’s just a rumor,” I dismissed, knowing
the fabled story. “Bonzo’s just a drunken teddy bear.”

She grinned, her teeth small and crooked on
the bottom.

I rolled my eyes but smiled. “Let me guess,
you slept with Bonzo.”

“No, I didn’t. And I know he didn’t rape
anyone. He just got super feisty with the journalist. He gets like
that. He did, however, fuck me with a champagne bottle.”

I nearly burst out laughing. “Okay, I just
met you, Emeritta. I don’t need to know all your details.”

She shrugged, clearly unfazed. “It’s a pity
you took your oath. Wouldn’t Sage be fun for a night?”

I couldn’t help but glare a little. “I
wouldn’t know.”

“Oh, me neither,” she quickly said, showing
her palms in peace. “Sage isn’t the groupie type. I’ve heard the
occasional hook-up story, and I think he was with Miss Pamela for a
while, just fuck friends, but he’s the unattainable lone wolf of
the rock circuit. Just in case you were thinking about it.”

“Well I wasn’t.” I was really starting to
hate Miss Pamela and her ways. If I was being honest with myself, I
was jealous.

“You ladies want a beer?” a voice called
out.

We looked over to see Randy Bachman walking
toward us with two Coronas in his hands. He had an affable way
about him, one of those non-threatening musicians, which I guess
they all are when they’re from Canada.

He stopped by our table and handed us both a
beer, which we accepted graciously. We made small talk for a few
minutes while I tried really hard to be professional and not gush
about The Guess Who, knowing he probably didn’t want to talk about
his ex-band.

After he left to go join Fred Turner, I shot
Emeritta a look.

“You thinking about him?” I joked.

She shrugged again. “Not at the festival,
but he’s kind of cute. Why not?”

There I was back to not understanding her
mentality. We finished our beers and began the hot walk back to the
trailer, the grass tickling my bare legs. I realized she’d never
answered my original question.

“So, back to this, what do you think about
the other groupies…rock lovers…out there?”

She seemed to chew on that for a bit.
Literally chewing on a piece of her blonde hair.

“It’s a dog-eat-dog world, that’s what,” she
admitted with downcast eyes. “At the beginning, girls were a lot
nicer to each other. It was all about the music and we were all in
it together. Then the groupie scene kind of exploded thanks to that
stupid Groupie movie. Now you’ll find girls who pretend to be your
friend. You know the ones who say things like, “How are you,
darling, I heard you had a flood in your neck of the woods, I was
thinking about you and hoped you were okay,” or something else said
out of fake concern. But they only say that shit when you’re in
public and there’s lots of people around to see it, and then they
go and talk behind your back. They only want people—musicians and
famous people especially—to think they are oh so nice while they go
and spread rumors about you when you’re not looking. That’s what I
think about other groupies. No one helps or loves anyone anymore.
It’s every
fan
for themselves.”

I was surprised to hear her rant like that,
but there was a sense of relief to her face, like she hadn’t been
able to confide in anyone for years. I was slowly but surely
finding out that all the fun parts of the music scene weren’t
exactly as they seemed.

***

Given that realization, when we got back to
the trailer I wasn’t too surprised to find Robbie doing a line of
coke with Jacob and Noelle, the white stuff sorted out on the
faux-wood dinette table. None of them looked ashamed and just
continued to snort the stuff up using a twenty-dollar bill that
Jacob had provided. Jacob, who was wearing a yellow and brown suit
despite the heat, gave me one of his “I am what I am” looks and
carried on.

I tried to ignore the disgust I felt (they
had a festival to play, shouldn’t that have been enough
excitement?), and I walked into the rear of the trailer and flopped
down on the cheap green couch beside Chip who was lying down and
drinking a can of Pepsi. Sage, Graham, and Mickey were nowhere to
be found. I heard Robbie offer Emeritta a hit but she refused,
saying she never did hard drugs. I liked her even more after
that.