Sin Delicious

by Willow Sears

  Be aware that anyone connected to our bandwagon gets sex on a plate, even the most tenuous of hangers-on. In fact, some of the lowly ones are responsible for the greatest excesses and depravities, wanting to cement their notoriety and entertainment value on the tour, aware that anyone could be picked to hump equipment on an off the back of a lorry. Of course, the extent of the excesses depends entirely on the appetites, demands and reputation of the major band on the tour. It just so happens that both Thunderhed and their prime support act, Coliseum All Stars, are caners of monumental proportions, who constantly defy medical science just by remaining alive.

  There are two games I find myself playing when my brain is zonked but won’t let me commit to sleep. First is the Who on This Bus Has Had More Sex on Tour than Me game, to which the answer is everyone, including our driver. This even takes into account the fact that different faces may come and go on a daily basis. I’m not talking about sex acts that they have claimed to have had, or ones I have presumed they have had. I’m talking sex acts I know them to have had. That means acts I have witnessed, many of them perpetrated in this very vehicle. The Sunday shuttle bus to church it ain’t.

  Game number two is the Who on This Bus Has Tried to Have Sex with Me one, of which the answer is often nearly equal to that of the first game. Any female within grabbing distance of this tour is considered a fair target, the general consensus being that it’s a question of when and not if. Often you get manly bits waggling or pointing at you without any preamble whatsoever, seeking attention as if it was owed to them. No female is safe. To put down any kind of solid marker upon a girl you have to marry them – and even then this might not deter others.

  It’s not just the band members either, although they usually make their moves first. Having patiently and smilingly batted away countless crude invitations, I eventually had to relive my taekwondo days and boot the All Star’s drum technician in the head after he made one prick-out advance too many. My actions could have got us thrown off the bus, since we are only sharing the big full-on Tour Special laid on for the Coliseum All Stars. They are big in their own right – more so in Europe than at home in the States. When the tour began it was just them and us for a few weeks and they had no trouble filling out some very decent-sized venues. Many fans over here consider this tour to be a double-header, so there are no inferiority complexes going on amongst our fellow passengers. It’s all mammoth egos here.

  Back at the start our band had its own little van but it was crap and had a faulty petrol gauge that saw us rendered unexpectedly fuel-less one night. Rather than find some gas to fill it up with, everyone decided it should undergo a Ritual Smashing Up Ceremony, so that’s what we did, using any weapons that came to hand. We thus had to move to the bigger bus. We were borrowing their roadies and our equipment was already on their lorries anyway, so it wasn’t much of a big deal. We will be paying for it somewhere along the line. Perhaps they thought it should be payment in kind, hence all the wanger-waggling.

  Fortunately, my demonstration of my unique self-defence capabilities didn’t get us chucked off, which might have seen a premature end to Death in Venus’ tour before Thunderhed had even joined up with us. It merely brought howls of laughter and applause from the onlookers, since casual violence is seen as part of the entertainment. Perhaps the bigger stars feared a similar kicking of image-wrecking proportions. More likely they haven’t yet given up the chase and are just biding their time, knowing that eventually everyone gives in. They now all call me The Fridge, as in frigid. It’s a shame about the drum tech because he’s quite a nice guy when not dosed up on speed. He’s pretty funny and I got on well with him – and still do, since every tour beef has to be immediately forgotten or no one would be talking to anyone else.

  He is called Skellz because he has black outline tattoos of his bones down his arms and on both hands – exact matches of his skeleton beneath. The artist did it brilliantly so that it looks like the skin has been peeled back and pinned, as if he is undergoing dissection. I took a close-up photo of his hands grasping the rather peachy bare backside of a model from the Thunderhed entourage. It’s an awesome shot, if I do say so myself – very rock ‘n’ roll. I reckon it would make an excellent cover for this sex photo-journal that is never, ever going to be published. But if it does, just remember that it’s his brilliant bone-tattooed hands on that luscious rear end that you see. That will be the eternal claim to fame of this otherwise potentially dispensable behind-the-scenes lackey who thinks he has every right to have sex with me, no strings attached, no effort made at romance.

  It was actually Skellz who did the formal introductions when Thunderhed joined us on tour. We were at a party in some big house somewhere to celebrate this union. I was in the vast kitchen along with many others, including the oft wang-waggling drum tech, who was giving us an impromptu solo on the hanging pots and pans, using two wooden spoons for sticks. He’s actually a pretty good drummer. Better than Russell LeMuscle, that’s for sure. It amuses me that this lowly crew member, who is essentially the drummer’s bitch – responsible for looking after the kit, loading it, setting it up, tuning it, miking it, and preparing the electronics rig and the audio software – yet even he gets to be called a technician and thus sounds more gifted and important than the drummer himself.

  So, plink-plonk-plankety-plankety-crash went Skellz, finishing with a rapid rolling crescendo to much cheering and whistling, and then a slow American drawl from behind me was saying, “Well, now, and who do we have the pleasure of meeting here?”

  I turned and there he was: Jimi ‘Cas’ Casanove. I had seen pictures, obviously, but that never really quite prepares you for the aura. Charisma is difficult to define because it concerns forces we do not fully understand. It is an invisible field that rare people exude, and they don’t necessarily have to be doing anything to exert it. It is a pull. You can almost feel yourself being dragged across the floor towards them. It’s not just looks or physical attraction. It’s more complex than that.

  They are the givers, the entertainers and performers of the human race. We are inexorably drawn to gawp. They use wit or song or skill to dazzle us and they are desperate for our approval. They want to give all of themselves so that they can be adored. They can’t help themselves. Some fly too close to the sun, losing the delicate balance that prevents admiration turning to jealousy and disdain. They can be loved and then hated in the same brief conversation, between one verse and the next. They tread the thinnest of lines between altruistic charm and loathsome self-aggrandizement. Whichever side of the line they are on it is very difficult to turn away, to not watch or listen. They are always compelling, and you may not even be able to work out why this is so. It is their magic.

  He is big; the size was the first thing to hit me. Not just tall but solidly muscular too. Being a rock star he was in one of the few professions that allowed you to go about wearing only a brown leather waistcoat with nothing underneath. You can’t really see that kind of thing taking off in the banking sector. Being partially dressed allowed us a view of the powerful arms and shoulders and the broad chest, all tanned and smooth. He is blond. I’m sure blond males are no more deserving of typecasting than their female counterparts but there is an instant impression that mischief and raciness is at their core, especially when the hair is long and wavy – going for the Robert Plant look rather than the Axl Rose.

  He is handsome but that is such a broad definition it is all but meaningless. The blue eyes got you staring, but there have been bluer. The nose is large but thin, and since his forehead is wide it doesn’t dominate. The teeth are straight, and I don’t doubt that an orthodontist has been at work here. There are lines on the skin. He looks at least five years older than his real age, perhaps more, but then you are bound to harden off quickly when you cram a lifetime of high living into a few short years. There is something else about him that always takes over my senses, and that is his smell. You have to be close to properly notice it. He smells of smoke. N
ot the ciggies or joints that he constantly has on the go but an exotic woody or peaty smoke, and it is faint, drawing you ever closer to better detect it.

  There is sweetness to it, like caramel or toffee, maybe spice too. It smells like complex bourbon or malt whisky, minus the alcohol twang – although there is surely never more than ten percent blood in his alcohol system. I guess it’s his aftershave but it actually seems like it’s his body naturally producing it, letting all the fine and gorgeous aromas of the spirits he’s consumed seep back out through his pores, with all the unpleasant ethanol left behind. He doesn’t smell like a pub despite his mammoth consumption. It is soothing, warming. For all the danger he seems to embody, if you could lie in his arms, eyes closed and quiet against that broad chest, even on the wildest of nights, just breathing him in, you would surely never know a greater feeling of safe comfort as long as you lived.

  His wife was with him that first night as always, stuck fast to his side, very pretty and with gorgeous hair, but perhaps a bit falsely top-heavy for her frame. Despite having her in tow he was still fine to approach a group containing a fox like me because Skellz was also there and the two of them went way back, the latter being part of the Thunderhed road crew when they first toured. Everyone knows everyone. That’s how this thing works. It’s all one big family, with each member loved like a sibling, regardless of rank. They might annoy the living shit out of you for the vast proportion of any day but they will still get your unconditional support even if you can’t work out why you are giving it.

  I, for instance, was introduced by Skellz – a man to whom I had denied sexual favours to the point of kicking him in the head – as a “top photographer/journo-babe” sent by the record company, with Access All Areas. Perhaps he just assumed this to be true, or perhaps he didn’t want to describe me as the freeloader I essentially was, and risk getting me ejected from the tour. I had once assaulted this man in the face but he still had my back.

  “Dude, this is The Fridge,” said Skellz to Cas, jerking his thumb in my direction. “She’s, like, a ninja lesbo.”

  “Wow,” the singer replied, without demanding further details. “I’ve always wanted to meet one of them.”

  He actually offered his hand to shake, which threw me a little. Not a high-five or one of them raised hand, thumb clutches that rappers give each other, but an old-fashioned palm extended shake, and not too firm either. It seemed surprisingly gentlemanly for a fellow not wearing a shirt. His missus offered me the same too – presumably happy to communicate with me now she had ascertained that my lesbo ways were no threat to her territory. Her grip was firmer than his, just a gentle warning since her smile seemed so genuinely warm, and as she let go she bent one finger in, allowing the nail to gently tickle my palm, sending a little pleasant shiver through me. It was intentional – like a secret Masonic handshake but for players, to let one know that if any sexual favours were required, then please make free to give her a call. It was rather thrilling, as it goes.

  “Actually, my name is Willow,” I informed them all. I didn’t refute anything else that Skellz had said, about why I was here and who had sent me. It was good to feel like an important member of the team. I didn’t even put them straight on the lesbian thing, even though I’m pretty sure I’m not one. Not entirely, anyway.

  “So who are you riding with, Willow?” came the slow drawl again. It was a loose phrase, a roundabout way of finding out if I had any particular affiliations or bed mates.

  “Mainly with Sindee,” I replied and – pow! – I saw it. I say ‘pow’ but actually his reaction was little more than a blink and a slight twitch of the lips. It was like the name had given him the tiniest slap across the face. I had it down as the flickering reaction of a man who had fantasised about the girl in question and had a flash of guilt, before realising that his wife was no mind-reader and couldn’t tell. It was only retrospectively that the full significance dawned on me.

  Fast forward to tonight and find us at another post-gig stimulant-fuelled gathering, trying to channel the surge of adrenaline that these shows bring, trying to fit a party into the precious time before the roadies packed up and saw us all back on the bus again. The flirty looks between them had been noted but there was still was no suggestion that closer contact was anything other than fleeting. For the most part Thunderhed were on their bus or in their hotel, and we were in ours. The paths crossed but it was groups that formed. Seldom was he allowed to fly solo in places where females could strike. Mrs Casanove was always by his side. There she was tonight, a huge white smile on, chatting to someone else but leaning back into him, keeping in close contact almost as if to prevent any sneaky bitch from whipping him away whilst her back was turned.

  I had been playing with my camera, pretending to be at the ready in case anything rude occurred. Sindee was a few feet from my side, trying to encourage an anonymous record company lackey to drink two martinis at once through his nostrils. Lord knows what she had planned for the olives. I idly took the shot of the wife because she was there in front of me, looking flirty and sexy, and I wanted to record the ‘hands off my man’ body language. Studying the shot afterwards I saw it. I zoomed in and it became plainer. It was just a fraction of a second in time caught: Mr Casanove the married rock star captured with his eyes fixed ahead on Miss Sindee Liscious.

  It is not a look of greedy wanting. You have to look close to spot anything at all. It is an instant of panicked, almost painful yearning, when his body realised that no contact, no closeness with this girl would ever be enough. There was more captured in that single frame than just him seeing her and an appreciation of aesthetics. There were other invisible forces at work between them as well, still effective at a distance of twenty paces, changing the chemicals in his body, aligning him to her, triggering nature’s urge to drive him her way. That impulse would only grow, never patient and metered but always pressing, hitting you all at once like a missile. It is biology’s way of ensuring that you don’t stop at fondness and cuddling but are driven hungrily onwards, wanting to possess them, devour them. Nature doesn’t just want you near to them; it wants you inside them, or to have them inside you. In short, this photo I can’t stop studying has captured the moment Cas Casanove truly fell in love with Sindee.

  The pressure of his wife at his side should have been enough to force these feelings away but nature has other tricks up her sleeve too, meaning that once bitten you can’t easily escape. From that moment on your perceptions are bent so that everything the new apple of your eye does becomes mesmerising, every flaw heart-achingly perfect. I know this because by the end of the first day shared with Elowen I was already sure that no moment without her would mean anything but agony. I see in that frame the same fleeting expression I know was on my face that day. It is all the bliss and closeness you wanted to share with that person from now until forever going off inside you in a single burst. It is the panic from knowing you will never be able to fuse into that person the way the chemicals in your body demand.

  It seems odd that a boozing, brawling, hard-bitten son of a gun like Cas Casanove could go all swoony over a lady. However, strip away all the excess and nonsense and it seems he is no different to anybody else: sent all soppy and flustered and over a barrel by those urges to procreate and nest that we call love. The biggest irony is that half his songs seem to concern heartbreaks caused by devil bitches, and if ever there was a rollicking minx who could splice your blood-pumper in two with a single blow it was Sindee. I feel his pain on that score. I feel his pain in general. These urges can strike at any moment, without caring to discuss with Fate first whether or not it is fair upon you. That’s what made me study the photo so long and hard and keeps me coming back to it: leaning against him is his gorgeous, sexy Playboy model wife, but that expression of helpless love on his face is aimed at someone else.

  The tour bus trundles on in the darkness, the low tyre rumble accompanied by the tinny sound of music played through headphones. Sindee next to me nest
les further into my shoulder. She is wearing Loverdose. Elowen used to wear it when it first came out and I thought she always smelled divine. I could’ve happily breathed her in all day. I could have bought her the Tattoo version if we were still together today, and how apt that would have been. Sindee, I remember, also commented on how nice it was that first day the three of us met up. When she called on me to design some costumes for her she had taken to wearing it. It was different on her but still close enough to spark sense memories that fortunately gave only comfort, rather than aching nostalgia. I doubt this is why Sindee wore it – I imagine she just liked the fragrance – but if this was her intention then she is an even sweeter girl than I already believe her to be.

  She smiles and whispers something in her sleep, and finds my hand and clasps it. She likes to hold my hand. She likes to kiss me too. Sometimes we end up alone together and we kiss. It is all we do, despite what everyone thinks. I know she wants do to more than kiss but she never does. She knows I want to do more but she also knows I’m still too fragile for that, so all she does is kiss me and hold me and bring me back some tenderness and sanity. I’m falling for her. I keep trying to stop myself because she has Elowen Mk II stamped all over her and I know I couldn’t handle that heartbreak again. The trouble is she is just too infectious.

  I think it is because I get to see her in the quiet times. When she is partying and fooling around she is hilarious. When she is being naughty she is the most irresistible thing on two legs. I love her strength. I love the sexiness that has everyone swooning to the point where she can say or do whatever she wants. I love the fact that she can look at life without fear, and that anything she does, however daring or rude, can only bring her more strength. I used to think I was every bit as fearless but one single instance saw right through me and left me without a shield. Her sensual extroversion both delights and frightens me. I want her to cavort shamelessly because it reminds me of what I might have been, but at the same time I worry it must surely go too far. With all her mystery gone, the desire for her will disappear too. I would hate anyone to think of her as anything other than wonderful.