the wild one.

twenty seven

Harley was late for work. That was starting to become a common issue nowadays, and Mark wasn't having it. He had put Harley on her second strike, even if she argued that the first wasn't her fault. Jeanie had noticed Harley's snippy comments towards Mark and her usual upbeat attitude had disappeared, and she wondered what was going on with her friend.

"Hey Harls," Jeanie walks up to the counter, leaning against it as she looks worriedly at Harley. Harley gives her a delayed "hm?". "Are you doing okay? You look like you could be sick."

Harley blinks and frowns, trying to think of if she was or not. Then she recalled going to Vince's before work and snorting a few with him. "I'm fine. Just tired. Staying up late on tours is catching up to me."

"Speaking of, I'd like to speak to your manager about that. This is becoming an issue with our shortage of staff." Mark interrupts and Jeanie rolls her eyes.

Harley gives him a blank look. "Doc's not gonna do shit about that, he doesn't care."

"Well, I'll give him a reason to."

Harley scoffs. "Good luck."

The shift went on okay, Harley not too overwhelmed. Jeanie had taken most of the heavy loads, still thinking that Harley was sick. Harley was just tired and wanted a nap.

She did take one when she got home - she crashed on the couch as soon as the door closed and fell asleep right when her head hit the cushion. Harley remembered when she was half asleep that she had an Elektra meeting to go to later that day, and she hoped she'd wake up in time.

Harley woke up 30 minutes before the meeting. Thankfully she was able to get there on time, only being about a minute or two late. The rest of the band were already there, along with Doc, Tom, and the other Elektra officials. She could care less that she was the last one there. She plops down into a chair next to Vince.

"Right. Well, now since Harley's here, we can start the meeting." Tom announces to the group.

"We've gotten reports from Tom and Doc that you guys have most of your second album written, is that right?" They ask, and they glance towards Nikki, as everyone knew he was the songwriter.

"Yeah, I guess." Nikki shrugs.

"Great. What do you have?"

"Like you said, maybe half an album. We've played most of the songs at shows already." Nikki told them.

The boss nods thoughtfully before turning to the group. "While you'll be on track to release your album, hopefully by October, at this rate. Erm, what's the album called?"

"Shout With The Devil."

Vince snorts, already knowing how this'll go.

"You realize that'll leave a bad image on the band, that you guys support satanism and such?"

"Nikki's already summoned a demon, what's the big deal with the name?" Harley questions.

"He what?" Doc asks, looking at Nikki now.

"It's gone, and we don't even know that's actually what it was." Nikki protests, glaring at Harley.

"It was pretty close to one." She points out.

"Okay, everyone, quiet down. Demon or not, the album idea is bad. You know what the Christians will think of it."

"Well fuck the Christians."

"Change that to the title." Tommy snickers.

"Right. Nikki, could you maybe change a word or two?"

"Ugh, fine. Maybe I can." Nikki sighs like it's the end of the world.

"Great. On other news - tours."

The rest of the band sighs at the news.

"Listen, I know you guys just got off a tour with Kiss. But we have something big for you now, and we think you guys will really like this."

"What is it?" Vince asks, glancing up at them.

"So we've managed to score you guys a spot with Ozzy Osbourne on his tour for the Bark At The Moon album." They say, and Harley's eyes widen at the mention of the band.

Of course, she knew who Ozzy was, she didn't spend most of her childhood listening to Black Sabbath without knowing who the band was. Even though the rest of Sabbath wasn't going to be there, she still couldn't believe she was about to be in the presence of someone like Ozzy. Maybe he would be more chill than Kiss had been.

"When do we go?" Tommy asks.

"January, in 1984. So you guys best get that album done soon, so you guys can have new material to play with."

They had to sit around for some more boring business things like financial stuff and transportation for the upcoming tour, but as soon as they were released, they were buzzing with excitement at the new information.

"Dude, I can't believe we're touring with Ozzy now," Tommy says, waving his hands around excitedly.

"I know! It's crazy." Harley grins, bouncing along with them as they walk.

"We have to get this album recorded soon, though," Mick adds.

"We will, it'll be fine." Nikki waves him off.

"Is it fine if Honey comes with us?" Tommy questions, glancing among the group for reactions, everyone pretty much shrugs in response.

"As long as she doesn't cause a scene we should be fine," Vince says.

"Cool." Tommy grins.

-

Harley knew they could've spent a lot more time recording in the studio, but no one in the band really cared. Harley spent the longest in the studio, wanting to make her section as good as she could try. Everyone else practically bullshitted their way through, Mick had recorded his guitar lines in 2 weeks top and was done.

No one even said anything to it, which bothered Harley. She was pretty much the only one sober during studio days, everyone else was high or drunk. If she weren't required to be recording her parts for the album, she allowed maybe one or two drinks. Otherwise, she had to be sober to be in prime focus mode.

Now that the album release was just a week away, she was more stressed and nervous than ever. While she was excited for the world to see "Shout at the Devil", she was also nervous about the reviews of it.

Some part of her mind told her they'd get the worst reviews because no one was sober during recording; fresh addicts typically fumbled with the ropes of it, so she had expected them to note the sound quality being absolute shit.

But as she sat in the studio listening to the album, it did not sound like shit. The album sounded good despite the effort put into it, and Harley would say she was proud of it. She wasn't sure what Elektra was going to pick for the singles, but Harley could most likely guess it'd be Looks That Kill and Shout at the Devil.

Which, they had somehow been able to convince Nikki to change the title.

And technically, they had a tour. It wasn't a Motley-centered tour, which was okay. They got to tour with the Ozzy Osbourne, which Harley still couldn't believe. She had yet to tell Lela or work, which was surprising with her excitement over the tour. Harley supposed it had to do with the fact that she was nervous with both of their reactions.

With work she could expect pretty much anything - she mainly expected to be fired. She was pretty much on Mark's last straw, which was fine with her since she hated the bastard anyway.

And for Lela, Harley wasn't sure why she was nervous. Maybe because they haven't seen each other in a week, with both of their jobs. And Harley had a strange feeling that something was up with them, but she just wanted to continue acting like everything was okay.

In her mind, everything seemed okay to her at the moment. No matter how much she tried to keep it down, Harley had a feeling things would start to become uprooted very soon.