Wait until the music's over

9. Showtime (Pt. 2)

The show sucked. Actually I sucked, the guys were great. I've never sung so badly in my whole life, not even at the school play in 3rd grade, when they forced me to sing You are my sunshine in a sunflower costume. The costume was cute, but I couldn't stand that fucking song.

At least I had a loud voice that time, but tonight... I couldn't even hear myself at the beginning. All because of this flu or cold I got. Or what else? Ok, I was pretty shocked at first, when we started soundcheck there were more or less 15-20 people in front of me, I kept my eyes closed and when I opened them at the end the place was filled. But I'm not a newbie, I've been making music for ten years, let's say seriously for six years. For the last two years I've been in a band which was pretty popular in California, I've seen bigger crowds than this. Despite all this, I was scared. You don't shit your pants for a flu. Well, unless it's a stomach flu. I've experienced other 'first shows', but as far as I remember I've never been so terrified before. Like I was expecting some kinda retaliation from the crowd, I barely looked at them. But as I walked off the stage everybody was there, patting my back, congratulating and telling me how good I was.

Bullshit.

I sucked. And now I deserve staying here alone in detention, in the club's backyard, smoking a cigarette after another, just to heal my throat.

But no, I don't deserve this either, because I can hear the iron door open behind me. I turn around and the feeble light coming from inside the club illuminates two figures, one is Stone, the other one is shorter, presumably a girl. Maybe if I press myself against the wall they won't notice me. But the lit up cigarette betrays me.

Shit.

"Oh! Here you are, I've been looking for you anywhere" says Stone as soon as he spots me in the dark.

"Err... I was here... I was..."

"Relaxing, calming down after the adrenaline rush, I know, don't worry! I really wanted you to meet a certain someone though" Stone walks towards me getting out of the cone of light, and basically pushing the girl forward.

"Uhm ok"

"Hey Eddie! I'm Angie... ehm... nice to meet you" the girl puts her hand out to shake introducing herself and I take it trying to figure her out in the dark. So this is the famous Angie. I've heard about her all day, everybody seemed alarmed for her absence, especially Jeff. He already mentioned her to me a couple of times, I know they're close friends. I'm sure she's a nice person, but my talkativeness is below zero.

"Nice to meet you"

"You must have heard about her already, she's our underage groupie" adds Stone with an incredibly serious tone.

"STONE?! What... what the fuck?" Angie yells at him.

"Hey, just kidding! She's 18 now" I clearly hear the sound of a slap, but I can't see where she hit him.

"Stone! Just come here!" a voice, I think it's Jeff's, calls him from inside the club .

"Uhm excuse me, I'll be back in a while. Don't worry, I leave you both in good hands" Stone's smiling so widely that I can see it in the dark, he nods and vanishes in the club, closing the door behind his back.

"Ehm... of course he was joking about the groupie thing hahaha" Angie explains giggling hysterically.

"Yeah, l guessed that"

"Oh ok, so much the better... listen, why don't we sit down there?" she asks pointing at some kind of not very appealing rusty bench placed against the fence, under a street lamp "At least we can ehm see each other while speaking"