Song: Shake It
Band: Metro Station
Enjoy!
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I was filled with trepidation while I waited for my dad to leave the house.
He left at exactly five minutes past six o’ clock in the night.
I pressed the dead bolt of my push-in lock into place on my bedroom door and got dressed in a pair of black ripped skinny jeans, an off the shoulder blouse that was a brilliant crimson colour with a decorative mesh of roses for sleeves and black knee-length boots that had a small heel at the back.
My hair was swept up in a high ponytail and my lips were a stunning ruby red. I wore a kohl shaded eyeshadow which made my eyes seem like they were the stars lighting up the pitch black sky. A shiny black, leather purse hung on my shoulder and I smiled at my reflection with satisfaction.
When my dad was about to leave, I had told him that I was going to bed early. I even faked a loud, exaggerated yawn for good measures.
I was determined not to get caught this time.
The pillows on my bed were set up perfectly to mimic my body shape—I hope—and I unbolted the lock on my room door when I was done getting ready to prevent suspicion.
I climbed down the tree and hopped onto the ground with my black purse still slung over my shoulder. Triumphantly, I made it to the cab that was waiting for me two houses down from my house.
The journey to the concert took about forty-five minutes to an hour and I informed Quincy that I was on my way via text.
I don't know why, but I was still hesitant about letting them know where I lived since I still wasn't so familiar with him and his friends.
As soon as the taxi stopped at the venue's gates, I was bombarded with a horde of people.
Teenagers and adults were present but I would say that about seventy percent of the throng of people was dominated purely by boisterous teenagers who seemed to be on an unstoppable high of unceasing sugar rush.
I took deep breaths, readying myself for the tiresome yet thrilling art of socialization. I shoved a wad of cash into the side of the cab driver's head. He grabbed it much too eagerly, counting the contents in his hands.
“Could you pick me up again later on,” I queried.
His head snapped to the side to glance at me and he nodded eagerly.
“Just call my number,” he instructed, still counting the dollar bills keenly.
I quickly cracked the door open, knowing I probably gave him a little over the amount he originally charged and stepped unto the gravelly surface of the road.
The laughter was louder now and a cool breeze slapped my curls into my face. The vicinity felt smaller with so many people and the hairs on my arms stayed in a high position, alert at the unending case of unfamiliarity.
The cab sped off and I glanced around to see if a certain group of familiar faces would pop up in my eyesight.
I was about to dial Quincy's phone number when a mass of gorgeously untamed frizzy curls greeted me. A wide smile stretched across his lips as he shouted, “Vannessa! There you are.”
Quincy enveloped my tiny body in a bone crushing hug and I giggled.
“You look gorgeous,” he mumbled into my ear with that flirty voice of his and although I was blushing like a madwoman, I mumbled a polite ‘thank you’ before quickly greeting his friends.
They gave me their own share of enthusiastic hugs and salutations.
“We are so happy you came,” Quincy exclaimed. “I was worried you wouldn't come because we're getting back late.”
I laughed.
Internally I fought the voices in my head which reminded me of the risk I was taking. Those voices were warning me one final time that there was still enough time for me to turn back and forget that any of this even happened with a good night's sleep.
But I stubbornly ignored it and persisted.
“I'm glad I came… I mean, I didn't know you guys would be so happy to see me.”
“Why wouldn't we be happy to see you?” Allison furrowed her eyebrows. “You're adorable and fun to tease.” She grinned and my chest warmed at her sweet words.
“Plus, we love hearing your stomach act like a ravenous animal that had been hibernating for months.”
My cheeks coloured pink and I hit Charles on the arm playfully.
“I thought you would stop with that tired joke by now.” I whined and he grinned cheekily at me.
“Hey!” Mary exclaimed, a playful glint lit up her bright blue eyes under the omniscient show of white coloured lights from the tall street lamps. “That's my boyfriend you're hitting. Only I get to abuse him.”
Allison shoved Charles lightly and I couldn't help the chuckle that escaped my throat.
“Oh please, Mary. I think you mean ‘our boyfriend’ since he's my part time lover when you're not around. So I also have the right to abuse him whenever I please.”
“Oh ladies, ladies,” Charles intervened, stepping in-between them. “No need to argue, there's enough Charles for everyone to get a taste of.”
Mary's eyes sharpened into thin slits and she grabbed his ear in-between her index finger and her thumb harshly.
Charles cried out in pain and the rest of us guffawed as Mary sent a string of not so kind words his way.
Quincy rolled his eyes at them after silently watching their playful banter from beside me.
He shook his head playfully. “I wonder how you guys are my friends. You never argue over me and my good looks.”
Allison scoffed loudly at him.
“Go get a life Quincy, you're just jealous because Charles is more good-looking than you'll ever be.”
Quincy's loud laughter rung out over the pounding music and even though Allison's remark had been playful, I didn't miss the tiny dip her eyes made over Quincy's well put together outfit and his handsome face.
Her eyes caught mine and she glanced away… sheepishly?
Hm? I'll have to ask her about that later on when the boys are busy chatting it up and acting a fool of themselves.
“So shall we go in?” Mary said, slightly bouncing on her feet. Charles rubbed the ear that she had gripped painfully. I'm surprised she didn't rip off his entire ear judging from the death grip she had used on him
“Yeah, I have the tickets set and ready.” Quincy motioned his head to the small, crispy looking tickets with curvy ends which he held up for us to see.
We stood in a queue and got through within a minute or two, surprisingly. While we were waiting to be verified entrance through the scarily large gate, I half expected the guards to whip out heavy, metal battens and demand we show them our ID’s. But they didn't.
One of the bulky guards had gingerly taken the tickets from Quincy. Quickly, his eyes skimmed over the contents before they wrapped blue and white bands around each of our wrists. Then they dismissed us with the cracking of the gate just wide enough for us to enter.
We waded through the crowd until we stopped at the very front of the turnt up crowd. While we were shoving our way to the front of the horde of busy body people, something flashed across my eyes.
That's… weird.
My eyebrows knit together in bewilderment.
A boy with cropped blonde hair had breezed past my eyes so swiftly that I could almost believe that it was a figment of my imagination.
I only caught a glimpse of his side profile, so most of his face was giving my brain a hard time uncovering his identity. To make matters worse, a girl with hair raised so high in the air like it was still the eighties era of big hair didn't ease my problems as she chose that exact moment to block my view with her startlingly outdated hairstyle.
I craned my neck to see past her. She shifted a little to the side and I almost breathed a sigh of relief as I could make out just a little view of where the person was standing only seconds ago. But the person vanished. And all I could see were disappointingly unfamiliar faces.
My heart sank. It somehow felt like it was a trick of the light and I scolded myself for thinking about him.
Again.
Why am I thinking about that inconceivable prick?
“Are you ok?”
Mary's voice brought me out of my reverie and I turned to her with a light startle.
With wide eyes, I pulled a few strands of hair behind my left ear. My lips twitched up into a polite smile as I tried to calm my anxiety which seemed to be growing exponentially.
“Y-yeah.”
She clapped her hands together excitedly. She was basically standing on the tips of her toes as she eagerly stared ahead at the busy stage a few feet from us.
“Ok good. Just wanted to know if you were as excited as me to see the artistes that are performing tonight.”
“Yeah. I am definitely excited.” I said, still smiling.
But I didn't seem to exude any of the excitement that was bubbling throughout her petite body. Neither did she seem to still care for my reply as she gasped and laughed giddily.
Her eyes studied the stage just as three people trailed behind each other onto the large, entrancing platform. I followed her gaze. The lights were blindingly bright and the three people headed straight to the three microphone stands situated in a distant section of the stage.
They adjusted their microphones and seemed to be readying themselves as they put the mic into place to match their respective heights and did breathing exercises. I then realized that they were background singers.
The once loud, booming music had now been switched to a soft symphonic melody which the musicians on stage had begun to sync as they teased the audience before the main show. I could hear indecipherable chatter among the throng of people as they anticipated the very first performance of the night.
It amazed me that no one was demanding that they start the show that they had paid a generous amount for.
My mind was still running wild with thoughts I wished I wasn't thinking.
Why do I feel like I just saw that insufferable retard?
I glanced around at my companions as if that could steer my thoughts in a different direction.
Charles was standing beside Mary who stood to my left—still eagerly watching the staff as they prepared for the performances of the night. Allison was hooting, hollering and dancing wildly to my right as the music slowly transformed into something with a stronger rhythmic bass and—
“Where's Quincy?”
The words fell from my lips before I could stop them and Allison looked at me, baffled. She then frowned and my words impelled her to cast a quick glance at her surroundings.
“Can't you see him? He's right…”
Her head whipped left then right with sudden urgency. Her confusion was evident as her eyebrows creased together.
She turned back to me and shrugged. She seemed to want to investigate further but decided against it at the last second. She pursed her lips, smoothing out her very bright pink lipstick.
“He was just right here a while ago. I don't know where he went but he'll come back eventually.”
Just then, a man dressed in a series of tightly fitted clothes graced the stage. As he entered, there were hoots, whistles and applause as the crowd seemed to know him. But among the hoots and hollering, I couldn't for the life of me, understand the clothes that were adorning his thick body.
He had on pants—which seemed to be half eaten by a pack of rabid wolves on his way here—a sweatshirt which seemed to be too small for his well overgrown body and a pair of ruffled white socks along with ankle-length shiny leather shoes which reminded me of cute outfits that I wore to church when I was like five.
To sum it all up, his outfit was atrocious. And it made my eyes burn looking at it as I wondered if he was too broke and had to shop in the toddler section of the clothing store.
“Ayo!” He drawled out into the microphone. The crowd burst into louder cheer. “You know it's your boy Biggy D and if you want to have a damn good time tonight, let me see you raise your hands up in the air and just say yeah-ah.”
He had a very deep baritone which exuded confidence and his energy was definitely contagious as he hyped up the eagerly anticipating crowd.
The crowd had reiterated his words screaming ‘yeah-ah’ and he hummed in satisfaction before using one hand to pull up his pants—if that was even possible. He could barely lift his arms and when he moved, his belly button and beer belly was on display like he had been dared to dress three sizes too small for the event.
“Now without further ado, give it up for the very sexy. Very talented lady of pop music. You know her as one of the greatest artistes of the 2000's era.”
The crowd erupted into a fit of wild cheers, seeming to know who the man was referring to. I on the other hand didn't know who was coming tonight since I chose to come last minute. So I was unaware of everything.
The man, Biggy D, grinned and stood still. He held the mic gingerly as if to prevent too much movement so as to not rip his clothes to shreds.
“Ladies and gentle people,” he stalled even more. “Please welcome the greatest. The one and only… Your pop diva,” he shouted aggressively.
“Lady Gaga!”
I almost didn't register his words as I watched him struggle to clumsily pull up his pants that were slipping off him. I kind of felt bad for dissing his outfit that made him seem like he was constipated.
But when he spun around and ran back to the back of the stage, I couldn't help shaking my head as I espied a small piece of his butt crack.
I turned to Allison that instant. To my surprise, she was already looking at me with pursed lips and without even saying a word, we bursted out laughing
I couldn't shake the feeling in the pit of my stomach that still told me that something was terribly wrong. But as bright golden stage lights danced in my vision and along my body teasingly, I looked up and pushed the thought at the very back of my mind.
The crowd went wild, whooping and cheering when an image of Lady Gaga appeared above us. It was almost unreal. It was… euphoric. Seeing her in person.
I have always been a sucker for upbeat pop music despite my lack of pop dance skills.
The lights drastically enhanced her slim yet amazingly curvy figure that was tightly fitted in a glistening gold floor-length dress. A classy slit ran from the bottom of the dress and rested at the very tip of her leg.
I wouldn't be surprised if someone had definitely made a trip up into the night sky and had stolen all the stars from the constantly reappearing tapestry of pitch black to make the most stunning golden dress that has ever graced my lucky eyes.
Her fatally high heel shoes were also a shocking gold. Even her light blonde hair seemed to glow gold surreally amongst the blindingly bright lights which seemed to abide by her every heed and command.
“What's up my beautiful people?!” She shouted, bright eyed and grinning widely, riling up the ecstatic crowd.
She received a potentially deafening cacophony of screams, shouts and whistles in reply. A much louder applause compared to the man that had introduced her. I shoved my palms against my ears as if that could somehow shut out the sound completely.
I looked around frantically to see that Mary, Allison and Charles were also culprits of trying to destroy my eardrums before ripe old age could cause damage.
The literal star of the night was dramatically lowered to the stage from a well structured star shaped platform which had hovered about thirty feet above us in the air just moments ago.
“You go girl!”
My head snapped to my right swiftly. And beside Allison was the unmistakably handsome Quincy Fouse.
He grinned when we locked gazes and I forced a smile. But it didn't reach my eyes. My eyes scanned his appearance. His face seemed pale and his usually contagious grin which always seemed to brighten my dull mood no matter what felt like a performance for the first time.
He quickly broke eye contact and returned to his previous stance which involved facing the stage and thrusting his hands in the air as he hollered and hurled words of admiration at the figure on the huge stage.
My gut was telling me that something was definitely off.
Maybe it was the hot, clustered environment I was in. Maybe it was the deafening screams surrounding me.
I couldn't focus completely on the artist that was putting on a great show.
Which was a strange occurrence since I'm usually one to get nervous yet excited for something so huge.
It was Lady Gaga for goodness's sake.
But even that amazing fact couldn't deflect my thoughts as I pondered the dreaded question that my mind was screaming at me…
Where was Quincy?