“The basement won’t be permanent,” Ryan said, as we rode the bus downtown to The Garrison Valley Ballroom. “You remember Minako, my roommate? At the end of the summer she’s moving back to Japan. So I’ll be without a roommate, and you can move in with me.”
“Right,” I said with a grim face. “So I’m only sleeping on a concrete floor for what? Twelve weeks? Great plan. You could have mentioned this shit before I came back to town.”
Ryan shrugged. He was cradling his guitar case between his knees. I had mine as well.
Nick was playing roadie. He had both of our small amps at his feet.
“To be honest, Eric,” Nick said, “we figured you wouldn’t be too bothered by it. After all, you spent half of last year sleeping in a closet. We figured having the basement to yourself would be a piece of cake.”
“I’m not a goddamn troll,” I said. “I was planning on having a proper bed, like a human being.”
“Anyway,” Ryan said after an awkward pause, “I didn’t mention the cool part. Jed is in Calgary, right? But he’ll need a place this fall too. If he’s up for it, the three of us could get a house together. A cheap one, like Nick’s place. We could live together and jam all the time.”
“That could be cool,” I said. “But we might end up driving each other crazy.”
“Man, you need to have a more positive outlook,” Nick said. “You can be pretty negative sometimes.”
“Easy for you to say,” I replied. “You’ve got a bed to sleep in tonight. Well, if we do get a house together, I’m calling the big bedroom. Ryan and Jed can take the walk-in closet and basement floor.”
“We’ll get a place with three bedrooms,” Ryan said. “I mean, duh.” He looked out the window, then reached up to pull the stop cord. The bus cruised over to the curb and came to rest. We picked up our gear and climbed down to the sidewalk, a short walk from the venue.
The Garrison Valley Ballroom was a converted warehouse next to a set of railroad tracks. We walked through the gravel parking lot, up steel steps and in through heavy fire doors. There was a short hallway where the ticket-takers table was set up. Past the table we could see inside the main hall: there was music playing on the sound system, but the Ballroom was still mostly devoid of customers.
“Hey,” Nick said to the girl and guy sitting at the table. They had the ubiquitous steel box in front of them to hold the cash, with a stamp and ink pad to mark paying customer’s hands. “We’re Riot Band. We’re here to play. So we don’t need to pay.”
The guy had black emo hair sweeping across his forehead and two lip rings. I’d seen him around the GVU campus. He flipped open a little notebook, and after briefly consulting the pages within, he shook his head. “You guys aren’t on the list,” he said.
“Yes, we are,” Nick said. “We’re a late addition.”
“Well, this list is brand new,” the guy said.
I stepped up to the table. “Could you go get Dustin? He’s organizing this thing, right? Go grab him. He’ll sort it out.”
The guy exchanged a quick glance with the girl and rolled his eyes, but he got up and disappeared into the venue’s dark interior. The girl didn’t look at us. A few other people came in and paid the girl, then entered. They didn’t look at us either.
A few minutes later the skinny emo guy came back, and right behind him was Dustin, my rat-bag former roommate. He smiled and stepped forward, shaking hands with Nick. “My man,” he said, in his deep, monotone voice. “What’s shaking?”
“Not much,” Nick said. “Except we’re not on the list.”
“Oh, no problem,” he said. Dustin grabbed the ink pad and stamp from the table. He stamped Nick and Ryan, and then smiled at me. “Hey Eric,” he said. “How was the whiskey?”
“Good, what was left of it,” I said, holding out my hand to get stamped. It was typical of Dustin: the first thing he mentions is a gift he gave me, even though it was an opened bottle. “How’s everyone?” I asked out of uncomfortable formality.
“Fine. The apartment seems empty without you.”
I laughed. “Yeah, I bet. Maybe you can find a family of refugees to move in and take over the closet.”
“You shouldn’t joke about refugees, man,” he said. “Refugees need our help.”
“What time are we on?” Nick asked.
“Um, how’s eight thirty?” Dustin said. “The first real band is going on at nine.”
“Real band,” I said. “Right. We’ll make sure we give them plenty of time to set up. Come on guys.” We stepped into the darkened hall.
“Do you believe that bag of shit?” I asked as soon as we were inside. “’Refugees need our help,’” I said, mocking Dustin’s voice. “That guy is the biggest people-user I’ve ever met. He doesn’t give a shit about refugees. And just because this gig is supposed to be for the food bank, don’t think he gives a shit about that either. The guy would steal a hobo’s shopping cart.”
“Forget it,” Ryan said. “He got us in, right? We don’t have to talk to him again. Let’s just chill out until it’s time to go on.”
I looked around. The name “Ballroom” must have been ironic. Although the room was big enough to hold a ball, its interior was black and cold-looking. Only vampire-inspired goth debutants would hold a ball there. That didn’t matter to us, though. The stage was huge, and the bar was open.
We took the gear up to the stage. The other bands had already left their equipment up there. There was a drum kit and the amps for the first “real” band set up, and the rest of the bands’ stuff was stacked off in the wings. We left our guitars and amps at the center of the stage, so that when eight thirty arrived we could just hop up, plug in and play. Then we climbed back down off stage and wandered toward the bar.
“I see some friends,” Nick said. “I’ll catch up with you guys later.” He wandered off to some of the occupied tables in the still thinly peopled room.
“There he goes,” Ryan said. “Our designated schmoozer. I guess he’s off to make connections on our behalf.”
“Maybe,” I said. “Did you notice he’s started identifying himself as a member of the band? He says, ‘We’re Riot Band.’ And, ‘What time are we on.’”
“Yeah, I noticed,” Ryan said. “I don’t think it’s a big deal. He’s like, our fourth member or something. Like that producer of The Beatles. Who was it, George Marshall?”
“That doesn’t sound right, but I don’t really know. I just hope it doesn’t cause problems down the road. How did he set this up, anyway?”
“That’s how,” Ryan said, pointing to Nick. Our manager was standing at a table, shaking people’s hands, laughing and talking. I watched for a moment. Nick was everything I wasn’t, I knew that for sure. He was stylish and social. He had no problem approaching strangers, and enjoyed making friends. I wasn’t afraid to talk to people, but most of the time I just didn’t want to. But Nick did. He wanted to get out there and interact.
“Well, I guess he does add something, doesn’t he?” I said. “Maybe not on stage, but he does do something for us.”
Ryan nodded. “Yeah. Come on, let’s have a beer. I’m starting to feel the nerves.”
We slid up to the bar. “Why would you feel nervous?” I said. “The place is practically empty. I don’t think it will fill up in the next twenty minutes. And we’re only playing a fifteen minute set anyway.”
“Yeah, I know,” he said. The bartender came over and we each ordered plastic cups of draft beer. “Even so,” he added after we had been served, “I haven’t practiced much in the last few weeks. I feel rusty. Not like you. You’re not rusty at all. Hell, you look like you’ve gotten better.”
“Really?” I said, trying to hold in a rush of pride. I hadn’t told Ryan and Nick about my extra practice sessions with Knelson. “How can you tell?”
“You don’t watch your hands the whole time when you’re playing like you used to. And your sound is cleaner. Less farty.”
I laughed. “Well, that’s good. No one likes a flatulent bass.”
“You know what I mean,” he said. “You know how it sounds when you don’t hit a note cleanly.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I know.”
We drank the beers and Ryan said he wanted to head outside for a cigarette before we went up to play. Nick was still occupied with his social activities, so we left him in there and headed out.
Standing in the parking lot, Nick lit his cigarette. He gave me one, which I managed to smoke without feeling too sick. I still hadn’t picked up the habit, but I was only just able to have one without wanting to puke. “How do you feel now?” I asked him.
“Not bad,” he said. “I’ll feel better once we’re playing.”
A big guy came out of the door and stood at the top of the steel steps, just a few feet away from us. I hadn’t noticed him inside, although he was hard to miss. He was around six-four, and looked as hard as nails. Besides that, he had buzzed hair and wide, wild-looking eyes.
“Greetings, world!” he screamed out loud.
Ryan and I looked at each other.
“Yaaaarrrr! There she is!” he screamed, and then bounded down the steps and across the parking lot toward a group of young people who were approaching the building.
“Good grief, who’s that guy?” I asked Ryan.
“I don’t know. He looks nuts,” Ryan said.
The big guy came back with the group. He had his arm draped over a small blonde girl’s shoulders. It was starting to get dark, and I couldn’t see until they were very close that the girl was Jasmine, my most recent ex-girlfriend.
I felt a stabbing pain in my stomach as she walked past. She gave me a cold glare, and I returned the look, trying to appear impassive.
As they stepped inside, Ryan nudged me. “Shit, was that--”
“Yes it was,” I said.
“Um, how do you feel?”
“Fine,” I said. “I’m done with that girl. She’s nuts. If he’s crazy too, that means they’re probably meant for each other. Fuck ’em both. Let’s go inside and play a show.”
We both flicked away our cigarette butts and walked back in. Jasmine and her group of friends, which included her friend Cara and some other guys and girls I didn’t know, were waiting their turns at the ticket table. Ryan and I walked past them, nodding to the emo guy behind the table.
Inside the hall we found Nick talking to a couple of girls. They were both hotties, and they both looked interested in our manager. He brushed them off when he saw us.
“Okay dudes? Are we ready to roll?”
“We?” I asked. “What are you going to do?”
He smiled and shrugged. “I don’t know. What do you want me to do? Want me to introduce you?”
Ryan shook his head. “Nah, that’s cool man. You got us the gig, so you’ve really done your part already. Thanks, though. We’ll take it from here.”
Ryan and I looked at each other. The word crossed both our lips at the same moment: “Beer.”
“I’ll grab them,” Nick said. “You guys should get on stage. It’s eight thirty.”
The stage was dark and waiting for us. We walked over and climbed up. There were some microphone stands. We positioned them, set up our amps, and got our guitars out.
A paunchy guy in his forties came up to the stage. “You guys on first?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “We’re on before the real bands.”
“Okay. Need any sound? Or do you just need the mikes on?”
“Just the mikes,” Ryan said. “We’re just going to use our own amps.”
“No problem.” He gave my little practice amp a two-second look and I thought he was going to make a comment, but he turned away. He walked to a little booth at the back of the room, and a few seconds later the stage lights went up.
“Well, everybody’s watching now,” I said to Ryan. We had our guitars plugged in. We set the volume low while we tuned up, and then cranked them up. Ryan tapped his mike, heard nothing, and looked closely at it. He found the switch, flicked it on, and tapped again. A ‘thwup, thwup’ sound went out across the room from the tower speakers at the back of the stage.
With the lights shining on us it was difficult to see the crowd. I knew Nick was there. Dustin might be watching. More likely he was waiting for the ‘real’ bands. Jasmine was out there. I knew she was watching, probably with eyes full of hate. Her psycho-looking friend was probably watching too. I tried to put it out of my mind.
Ryan looked at me. I nodded. Time to do it.
2009, © Nolan Whyte
/ my profile 
