by Luana Ferraz
***
We bow in front of a rambunctious audience and, for a few seconds, I pretend they’re here to see us. Only us. It feels good.
We’re greeted off stage by Neil—who kindly has a cup of steaming hot tea for me. I like him already. Which is rare.
“That was fantastic!” he says, as he hands us towels.
“Thank you,” Pete grins.
Neil says something else, but it’s hard to hear since The Hacks are finally hopping onstage. Tyler mumbles something into the mic that I can’t understand as he points to where we’re standing and the crowd cheers louder. Then, they start to play and the arena comes alive.
“Can we hang out at the merch table?” Pete asks, getting my attention again.
“Oh,” Neil widens his eyes in surprise. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, we usually do this at our concerts. Since we have fans in here, I think they’d be expecting it,” Pete explains.
“Okay, well, go on ahead, then!” Neil agrees, not hiding his worry.
We head out anyway, dissecting our performance as we walk. This is one of my favorite parts—when we get to look objectively at what we did and point out what we can improve.
“About She’s Not Mine…” Pete trails off, testing the waters.
“I think we can add it to the set,” I say, faking indifference.
“You sure?” he asks suspiciously.
“No,” I admit. I can’t lie to him. “But we can try.”
“It’s just a song,” he tells me, still watching me closely. I sip from my tea, deciding to go on vocal rest again, since my throat is burning.
We reach the merch table and, as Pete predicted, there are a handful of our fans already there waiting to catch up with us. We chat, sign stuff, take pictures. Some of the other fans that are watching The Hacks concert notice our presence and whisper to each other. I notice most of their audience is female, which is not surprising—women are usually not afraid to admit they like shitty bands and songs.
After our fans walk out, Pete engage in conversation with Seth—who in addition to the light and sound stuff, is also in charge of the merch. I sit on the only stool behind the table, dividing my attention between his tour stories and the band on stage.
I watch closely the way they interact. The way bands communicate with no words during a concert always fascinates me. Something as simple as how they look at each other can tell you how long people have been playing together, if they enjoy what they do, if they get along. In The Hacks’ case, after just a couple of songs, I can tell it’s Tristan that commands the band, even though they make it look like it’s Tyler. He looks back at his younger brother on the drums every few minutes, making it look like he’s giving instructions, when in reality he’s taking them. It’s weird yet satisfying to see him do that.
My eyes fall on him for a moment. I slowly start to put his attitude into place. No wonder he feels like a rock star—his fans treat him like one. He’s clearly the most popular of them, not unusually, though, lead singers often are. And he enjoys it. He takes advantage of it. Although he’s not a very sexy figure on stage—more like a clumsy rag doll—he has the crowd on the palm of his hands.
He owns the stage, he owns his instruments, he has that nice out-of-tune-yet-still-pleasant voice, he demands attention. He makes sense in this context. And he definitely knows what he’s doing—every wink, every hair whip, every thrust is so clearly calculated. And the effect they have on the crowd is ridiculous.
When they’re halfway through the set and my eyes are still glued on Tyler, I have to admit it—he has it. Whatever ‘it’ is.
He walks from his piano to the crowd and puts one leg up on the speaker, slightly pushing his hips forward. I laugh.
“What’s funny?” Pete asks, startling me. I’m embarrassed to notice I’d spent so long watching their set, especially when they didn’t watch ours.
“Your teenage crush,” I say, pointing my head to the stage. Pete made the mistake of telling me he used to have a poster of Tyler on his wall once. I'm never gonna let him forget it. “He’s ridiculous.”
Yet, I’m still watching him.
“Still hot, though,” Pete shouts over the music and the crowd. I roll my eyes, knowing it’s a trap.
I take my phone out of my pocket and start to scroll through social media. I’ve had enough of The Hacks already.
DAY TWO
I have trouble sleeping. Firstly because the flat reeks of vomit—apparently Pete got sick in the morning and decided it was a good idea to leave it untouched until we came back. Even after lightning all my scented candles and leaving the windows wide open, I still can smell it from my bed. Sometimes I hate him so much.
Secondly, because I’m already anxious about our interview in the morning. Although we’re no strangers to interviews, we’ve never done anything this professional. We’ve mostly spoken to blogs and indie podcasts, and the casual music critique—the worst kind of interviewer. But never ‘the press’. Never in a room prepared for it. Never unrequested.
I can’t help but feel this is a test. Neil will be observing how we deal with the situation, how prepared we are, how reliable we can be. And, sadly, this only makes me more nervous.
I sit up on the bed, sipping from my magic sore throat potion, and decide to check my social media. I usually avoid doing it right after concerts since fans can be vicious, but I might as well just get the complete nervous breakdown experience. So, I open Twitter.
To my surprise, we’ve already gained a few dozen followers. First, I go through my mentions, liking concert pictures and nice fan messages. I have a handful of them who I like to stalk because they have the best snarky comments. Tonight, they don’t disappoint—I laugh out loud as I scroll through their feeds and read comments about The Hacks. It looks like we have similar opinions.
Speaking of them, I decide to have a look at their Twitter account. I find only the promo picture for the show tonight and no related likes. It seems they don’t use much of the platform.
I search for their tag and click on some of their fan accounts, but find nothing interesting or current. So weird. What band doesn’t rely on social media nowadays?
I change platforms, then—Instagram. First, I post a picture Pete took of us with the fans at the merch table on our band’s account. Our handle is @wecurrentlydonthaveaname. Self-explanatory. We’ve had a few different ones for every different formation we tried. But since we decided to remain as a duo, we’ve been struggling to find the perfect name. Mainly because Pete doesn’t want to agree with my current idea—Unnamed Duo. Cool, right? Could you tell him, please?
The Hacks’ Instagram page is a mess. Black and white pictures mixed with colorful ones of concerts, travels, selfies and even walls? I swear to God… They clearly don’t have a theme, which, for someone who likes so much to curate her own page like myself, is distressing. They have considerably more followers here, though. It kind of makes sense—I too would rather look at their handsome faces than read their words.
There’s a photo from the show tonight, already. It was posted less than thirty minutes ago. One of them is also still up at three in the morning. I wonder who it is. The caption is just an England flag. Lame.
I go over the comments and some of them startle me. I had no idea these were the type of fans they had. Or, actually, Tyler has. Every single inappropriate comment is about him. Interesting.
I search their tag and now I find a lot of content. There are a million pictures and videos of the concert, including of mine. I open some of them to see what The Hacks fans have to comment about Pete and I and I’m pleasantly surprised. Many of those who bothered to post about us enjoyed our duo, some are absolutely confused as to why they chose a punk band to open their concerts, and a few are complaining we were too loud. That makes me laugh. But if the worst they have to say is that we’re loud, I’ll take it!
I go back to their official page, scrolling down to read the photo captions. I have a t
heory that you can tell whether different people are taking care of an ‘official account’ by the way they write their captions. It doesn’t take long to find a pattern—there are at least two different people who post often. One always uses emojis and almost never hashtags. There’s a pattern to the pictures, too—one person is in charge of the business-related stuff, the other person posts everything else, which doesn’t make much sense. Some of the pictures are clearly selfies, taken by different members, but none of them share the same dry captions. There’s always a little information or joke under those. And I have to say, they photograph very well. Although, if it wasn’t a widely known fact, I’d never tell they’re brothers.
I come across one of the very few pictures where Tyler isn’t wearing sunglasses and you can actually see his eyes are blue. All three of them are in the pic, all three of them look gorgeous. Like, illegally gorgeous. I send the pic to Pete along with the text ‘who would you rather?’
He’s online but he doesn’t answer me. He must be angry that I didn’t let him sleep in my room tonight. I can’t afford to have both of us sick, though.
***
You know when, sometimes, the autopilot takes over in your brain and you suddenly ‘wake up’ with no memory of how you got to the place you are?
Pete hands me a water bottle and it’s only then I notice we’re already inside one of the meeting rooms at the hotel waiting for our round of interviews. I know I have taken a shower, I know I am properly dressed and my makeup is in place, and I know we had a quick breakfast before this. I just don’t remember any of it.
I sit nervously on the red cushioned armchair. My throat is recovered but I still dread the prospect of talking to people. I’m not very good with words—that’s Pete’s department. I pray to Gods old and new that these people will let him take over and not ask me anything. He takes the twin chair beside me, observing me closely. He takes my hand and squeezes it. He always knows.
“Are you guys comfortable?” Neil asks. He adjusts the black leather chairs in front of us, where the journalists are supposed to sit. “There’ll be only a handful of the local press, each will be given fifteen minutes. Do you have any restrictions?” He pauses, looking at us.
Pete and I exchange a confused look.
“Any subject we should ask them not to touch?” he explains and I stiffen a laugh. He clearly forgets who he’s talking to.
“I don’t think so,” Pete answers, looking at me and raising his eyebrows. It will be a surprise if these people even know our names, let alone our dirty secrets. Right?
“Brilliant,” Neil nods and then leaves.
“We’ll be here for over an hour,” I quickly do the math.
“Relax.” Pete squeezes my hand once again.
“I wish I could.”
Neil re-enters the room with the first couple of people—two guys in baggy, ripped clothes and long beards. I recognize one of them immediately since we’ve tried to book an interview with him several times. Pete even followed him on the street once. We exchange wide-eyed glances.
“Pete, Becky, this is Graham and Otto,” Neil introduces us. We shake hands and they sit down.
“We’re from Peroxide, it’s an online magazine,” Graham, Pete’s stalking subject, says.
“Oh, we know,” Pete chuckles, unable to repress his fan-boy nature. “It’s our favorite nowadays.”
“Ace!” Graham nods, genuinely surprised.
Peroxide is one of the last and coolest outlets still exclusively dedicated to punk culture. Pete says Graham is the sole reason this isn’t a dead genre, which is obviously an overstatement. However, having a piece written by him is the dream of any up-and-coming band in the scene. I make a mental note to thank Neil for this later.
The interview runs smoothly. He asks pretty basic questions—where we’re from, how we’ve started, why we don’t have a name, how we feel by opening the tour for a major band like The Hacks. Pete and I resort to our usual strategy: I begin the answer and he takes over after a couple of sentences. He’s funny, he’s charismatic, he’s eloquent—everything I’m not.
Their fifteen minutes are over in the blink of an eye, and Graham seems genuinely pleased with what he’s got.
“This has been fun,” Pete says as we get up to shake their hands again.
“Indeed! Let me know when your next solo gig will be, I can’t wait to watch your full set. For what I remember, you can bring down a room,” Graham says. Pete and I freeze. What does he mean? Has he seen us perform before?
“Wait, wait… what?” Pete asks.
“Oh, I’ve seen you before, at The Ditch,” he continues, mentioning a show we played in another life. I instantly start feeling dizzy. If he saw us then, he saw him. “What was it, five years ago? Six? You were a three-piece back then, right?” he asks, confirming my theory.
“Yeah, yes, that’s right,” Pete nods, stuttering a little bit.
“It was a great gig. But you fell out of my radar after that,” he says.
“Yeah, we…” Pete pauses, looking at me. I’m staring at the floor, trying not to faint. “We took a break.”
“Right, right,” Graham says. I can sense his eyes are on me, too. “Well, I’m sorry for your loss. And I’m glad you’ve kept going.”
“Thank you,” Pete answers politely.
When I see their shoes passing through the door, I collapse on the armchair again. My heart stampedes in my chest. My eyes burn. I’m angry. It’s been such a long time. Why do I still have this type of reaction? Why does he still have such power over me? I hate him. And I hate myself.
“You played at The Ditch?” Neil asks as soon as we’re alone again.
“A thousand years ago,” Pete says, causing a new wave of memories to wash over me.
Or, rather, flashes of memories. To this day I still haven’t decided if my lack of clear recollections from that time is a blessing or a curse. I just know I hate knowing such a time existed.
“Are you okay?” Pete squeezes the back of my neck.
“What did you lose?” Neil asks.
Pete remains quiet. He’s not going to say anything if I don’t want to. And I never want to. Maybe that’s the problem.
“Not what, who,” I say quietly.
“The third guy?” Neil pushes one of the chairs closer and sits down in front of us. I only nod. “What happened?”
“He od’d,” I blurt out and watch as his eyes widen, his mouth gapes open, his eyes dart to Pete. Everyone reacts like that.
He stays quiet for a long time, probably waiting for me to steady my breathing. Which I manage to do. The silence in the room is warm and melts away the lump in my chest. I’m still angry, but the threatening tears are contained behind my eyes now.
“So…” Neil says when I finally look up. “You do have something you don’t want to talk about.”
“What are the odds he would know about that?” I snap.
“You shouldn’t underestimate the scope of knowledge of a member of the press,” he says calmly. I snort. “Is there anything else?”
At the same time I shake my head, Pete says, “Her parents.” I shoot him a hurt look. He doesn’t see it and goes on, “And relationships. You know, personal stuff.”
“Got it,” Neil says, getting up.
“Won’t that only make people more curious, though?” I ask as he rearranges the chairs.
“Yes,” he says. When he stops, he looks at me, “Would you rather take the chance of dealing with one of those questions during the interview?”
I shake my head. I can’t deal with those things inside my own head as it is. I’d rather not have to hear any questions about anything.
“I’ll give you a few minutes, okay?” he says as he heads to the door.
“Are you curious?” I ask before he leaves.
“Oh, yes. Yes, I am,” he smiles. And goes away.
I let out a heavy breath. I’m still thinking about him. I’m always thinking about him—another thing
that I hate. But I can’t help it, I was the one stupid enough to let him shape and define a big part of my life. Our lives. Unfortunately, Pete had to go through it with me, and I think that’s what hurts the most. Sometimes I wish I was the dead one.
“I can’t believe Graham was there,” Pete says after a while.
“We were close, weren’t we?” I look at him. “We were so close.”
“We’re still close. I mean…” he says, motioning around the room.
He’s right. I let that sink in for a moment.
“So… who would you rather?” he speaks again. I frown, not knowing what he means, so he continues, “You know I know who you would choose, right?”
I smile. It’s about last night’s text.
“I know who you would choose,” I answer, happy to lighten the air.
“I don’t think you do,” he challenges me.
“Oh, please,” I snort, “Blond hair? Blue eyes? That sounds familiar to me,” I joke since those are exactly his girlfriend’s characteristics.
“Good point,” he frowns in a fake-thoughtful expression. “But he’s also got that leather jacket and bad-boy attitude. That’s more of your type.”
I roll my eyes and laugh. Because it’s true.
“I guess we’ll have to share,” I joke again. He doesn’t take it as a joke, though, as he turns to me with a suspicious expression. So, I add, “I’m joking.”
“Right,” he says, narrowing his eyes.
I don’t have time to argue since Neil re-enters the room with the next interviewer. But I know Pete will want to continue this productive discussion later.
***
The hour and a half we spend talking to four of the coolest specialized local press end up not being as excruciating as I thought it would be. Even though we had to answer the same questions to all of them, each approached something different about our craft—our influences, our ambitions, our skills on instruments. And none mentioned past dead band members or made personal questions. Another mental ‘thank you’ to Neil.