Sin Delicious

by Willow Sears

  The car outside is another black limo, the door this time being held open by Bag Man. He looks as smart as ever, the plain shirt tight over his massive muscular torso beneath a sharp-fitting black jacket. That neck – can I compare thee to a cross-section of tree trunk?

  “Fuck-a-doodle-doo, Bag Man!” says Sindee, for no reason other than she is elated, and in such moods she says randomly amusing things. She drags me into the back of the car and immediately opens the door to the small compartment used to house drinks, and sticks her head in. Her behind is up in the air, right in my face.

  “Where the effing fizzy stuff?” she calls out from inside the compartment.

  In typical rock hero fashion, we don’t ask where we are going. Bag Man is doing the driving and I’m not sure I’ve ever heard him speak anyway. He must say something to hotel staff and people on ends of telephones but he retains stern silence whenever around us, like he’s programmed not to speak to his masters. We drive past the museum I’d mentioned to Russell, dedicated not to buried shit but to all things erotic. If only he’d asked. We drive a few minutes and then Bag Man pulls over and from a gap between two buildings a shady figure appears.

  He is tall and wide and big-haired, and looks shiftily around him as he approaches us. He wears black shades to help keep him incognito. He has on a plain black T-shirt and leather trousers, although so do half the men in this city it seems. On his feet are motorcycle boots, steel toe-capped ones, just like Cas Casanove favours for his stage get-up. He is definitely a boot man. Some of his bandmates might be seen in skater shoes along with their skinny jeans, but their singer always wears a boot of some kind. It is clear he has snuck out of a much grander hotel than the one we have been lodged in, just to see Sindee without tongues wagging.

  “Bag Man will take you shopping,” he says. “Get some new outfits, whatever you want. I’ll meet you later for lunch.”

  Then he is off, and Bag Man presses the button to close our window, in case we think to shout something that gives the singer’s identity away. Very cloak and dagger, but this place is used to it. I know exactly where I want to go: Savage Store. I give our driver the name of this woman’s fetish-wear outlet and he searches on his phone for directions. He takes us over the river and into the old Soviet-controlled area of East Berlin and the rather austere Stalinist buildings along Karl-Marx-Allee. Off this there is a less imposing, more modern feel. The shop itself is no dingy backstreet abode. It is light and airy, with its pale tiled flooring and chrome racks. Exquisite masks sit in glass-fronted cabinets and footwear decks low beech-wood tables. All manner of fabulous clothing and accessories are to be found here, from uniforms through to the latex Savage Wear this is home to. I could spend hours studying the designs brochure displayed on the chrome lectern.

  Bag Man somehow lodges his wide behind into a pink tub chair in the front window and wordlessly sits there in full view of passers-by without shame. Sindee and I are in our element. I could buy the whole shop. There is stuff here to have anyone drooling at the wearer’s feet. This is power dressing at its most effective. It is difficult to keep a clear head and think objectively about outfits when every new thing seen demands to be bought. Cas said to buy whatever we liked but I don’t suppose he meant it. I help Sindee pick out a few things and then cheekily add a plain electric blue latex top to her pile for me. And a short skirt in black latex to pair it.

  Bag man checks his watch and comes to the low desk that serves as a counter. It is a sign for us to hurry up. We hand him the pile but then hurry back for a couple of last-minute items. I’m going to need some of those tights I saw in a similar electric blue colour to the top. They are in a rather sexy very fine mesh and sort of wet-look, and thus quite essential. Sindee is going to need those ankle boots with the sharp chrome studs. We add these to the pile on the counter. Bag Man doesn’t bat an eyelid at the number of items, so I decide it is probably wise to get another pair of those tights, just in case. Actually, I had better have another pair in lilac. Since I’ve got them I ask the assistant to fetch down the gorgeous corset also in lilac. It’s just my size! Bag Man is attempting to hand over the Amex Black Card he’s been dutifully holding for the last fifteen minutes. He patiently withdraws it again and raises his eyebrows as if to say, “Finished?”

  “That’s it,” I say, giving him a guilty smile. “Sorry.”

  But there’s this whole display of pasties and nipple tassels behind the counter and Sindee might want that red pair at least – and that white one...

  Bag Man doesn’t seem to even look at the total on the little screen. Without flinching he merely enters the PIN. I cannot believe we have got away with that one. Cas might have us bring it all back tomorrow. Still, how much of this shop could we buy for the same cost as a single hundred-mile helicopter ride? We get driven back near our start point and shown into a swanky modern restaurant. It’s not the type of place you would expect to see a burly, hard-bitten metal freak like Cas patiently sitting, but then it’s not the type of place to find many of his fans either, so perhaps it is just the perfect spot for a quiet lunch.

  He rises as he greets us – what a gent! The sunglasses come off, but you can see he is nervy about being identified. The fact that there are two of us girls might help assuage suspicion but I doubt it. Not with the way we are dressed. Bag Man doesn’t sit in the one empty seat with us, but at the next table, ever the bodyguard. The place is popular so I’m not sure how they managed to swing that with the management. The new outfits are in the car so Sindee avidly begins telling him about them and he smiles and says, “Sounds great, baby”. It’s as if they are already partners. He doesn’t ask the cost. The more she talks about them the more enthusiastic she gets, and the more he grins and looks proud. He has done this for her. Money can’t buy you love? Get real!

  The waiter comes with menus. Someone has ensured they are in English so that we can understand them.

  “I’ll have the sausage,” says saucy Sindee without even opening it. She’s being even more of a flirt than normal now he is treating her. The place is called a ‘grill’ but it is way more than that. I go for some tasty fish and Sindee opts for pasta. Cas goes for steak, as per usual, and orders the same for Bag Man. He might as well have the word tattooed to his bodyguard’s forehead so that he can just point to it any time a waiter comes near and save himself the trouble of opening his mouth. The sommelier comes to take our order and Cas looks a little perplexed by the choices. I think he is just going to ask for JD’s all round but instead he tells the sommelier what we are each having and asks him to bring a bottle – yes a whole bottle – of whatever goes best with each dish.

  “Excellent,” says our wine waiter with a curt bow. You bet your sommelier ass it is!

  It is interesting that a man whose ethos and reputation revolves around non-conformity still thinks that a good way to win over an equally rebellious, pink-haired ex-porn star is by treating her to some fine dining in a very respectable establishment. Interesting that he wants to show her he has some understanding of manners and class when so many adore him for spitting in the face of such things, and living as close to the edge as possible. I think it’s rather sweet. It could easily backfire: I’m sure potential relationships have faltered many times because of meals gone wrong. Who wants to bed someone who gets sauce all over their face or bits in their teeth, or chews with their mouth wide open? Cas clearly realises this. He doesn’t try to be flash or overbearing, or rude to the waiting staff. There is no attempt to play up to an image. He makes sure he gets menus he can read and orders food he can pronounce. He’s found out which cutlery to use, as we discovered at the banquet at the chateau. If he is naive in certain areas, such as wine choice, he lets money do the talking. He strikes me as being in control. He looks like he might get found out in a place like this but he has got it all down. I am impressed. No doubt my friend is too.

  I’m no fan of conformity myself but I’m relieved there are no belching contests on the cards. Think how muc
h different this meal would have been with the likes of Sheen here or, God forbid, Russell. Cas might have long hair and look like a street fighter but it feels just as decadent to play a sophisticate as it does to act the hard-rocking rebel. Another thing: Cas is not being all flirty and gooey although Sindee is trying her best. He is remaining polite and keeping conversation above waist height. He is being respectful, as if sex isn’t all he is after here, even though when he first fell for her it was on seeing her in a sex film. I like that he isn’t being vulgar.

  There is something thrilling about him, that’s for sure, yet all this man does is sing. He is not the most handsome male to come out of California. He is not the most technically gifted vocalist in the world, possibly not even at this table. He is not the best songwriter ever known. If it was down to pure musicality, he might not even make the top ten of people on this three-band tour that you might think the most essential. Yet he is the tour. Whenever he is on stage he is no less than a giant. It is him the eyes can’t help but follow. He is the one who suspends reality for the listeners, drives that feeling into them that they have walked into some ongoing heroic Viking saga. He is the one that whips them into a frenzy and creates the worship. Other members get it by default but if he wasn’t fronting them those worshippers would never have looked the band’s way in the first place.

  He might have ended up a mechanic, or a bouncer at a strip club bar, or a convict for life. However, because he can sing a bit and isn’t scared to show this, because he is loaded with that mysterious quality of charisma, he has become all-powerful. No one in this room can touch him. It isn’t just his physical strength, which is enough to see off anyone even if they could somehow get through his bodyguard. It isn’t just his money. This place is possibly the swankiest in the city so it follows that the wealthy eat here. That tall chap sitting on the table diagonally might be a baron for all I know. He might own a whole squadron of helicopters. That still isn’t going to cut it here.

  It isn’t even Mr Casanove’s couldn’t-give-a-shit attitude, which means he has no qualms about walking into a place like this, or indeed anywhere, in a T-shirt and with long hair. He doesn’t care what people here think of him or what the usual behaviour might be – and not giving a dime about what others think, or about any consequences, gives you incredible strength. He does what he wants because he knows. Others might be richer, or have a vastly superior lineage, or instinctively know which wine goes best with turbot, but Cas, well, he can fill a stadium with just his name. He can bring one hundred thousand people to an arena, have them jump when he tells them to and sing whichever line he wants them to. A large proportion of that crowd would do whatever he told them. A similarly large proportion would grant him sexual favours in private, many even in public, many who might usually tear you limb from limb if you gave even the slightest suggestion that they had homosexual leanings. That is his power: he can raise a dedicated army any time he fancies, willing to do his every whim, just by singing a few songs.

  So, yeah, you might own a fabulous stronghold up there in the mountains, Mr Count von Crapp, or whatever your name is, but the man sitting opposite me with just one word, one song, could send a screaming horde of long-haired, black T-shirt wearing warriors to tear it all down. They would lay down their lives for him – and I mean that quite literally. There are men who would give their wives or girlfriends to him – even give themselves to him. There are women who would give up everything for him. He would take it all with impunity, with no care for morals or hurt feelings, and still they would give it to him.

  Remember – I will say it again because it is worth repeating: he is not the best looking in here, almost certainly not the most talented, neither the most suave nor genteel, possibly not even the richest. However, he alone, with just one hint given that he was here issued on Twitter by the publicity team, could see this place swamped before most of our fellow diners were even onto their pudding; a rampage from scores just hoping for one glimpse of him, one touch. Your money or your fine manners or your intelligence won’t count for jack shit if you find yourself in the way of that. He is a rock star and as such is all but untouchable. Assuming that sexual exploits and general extravagance are the mark of a man’s success, I can’t think of anyone that Cas Casanove would be jealous of right now – except perhaps any man who hadn’t rashly got hitched a little before meeting the girl of his dreams.

  So, while I dwell more on thoughts of his omnipotence, it is also worth considering how powerful the young female sitting next to me has suddenly become, because she is the one who has stolen this rock star’s heart. She is the only one who could bring him to his knees, so that when she announces that we really ought to be getting back now, he just has to suck it up, despite his clear disappointment. No afternoon delight for him as he was hoping for. The girl who has presented herself on a plate to random others is now going to make him chase her. He will do so too, that is obvious from his expression, because in his perfect world he would be fucking her right now on this here table – and him with a wife and baby on the way! This girl has the power to make a nonsense of his wedding vows, and nothing about my friend tells me that she isn’t going to go right ahead and do just that.

  Chapter Twelve

  Beautiful Day.

  The original plan was to sit around yawning and trying not to die of boredom for a couple of days whilst Thunderhed whisked off to play a festival alone. The worst part for me would have been the jealousy from knowing that they were doing it in England. We have shows coming up there but I’m a little bit homesick now, not that there is much there for me. This one isn’t a metal festival either. Thunderhed are big enough and with just about enough mainstream appeal to do this. Much as I like the metal scene it would be nice to get away from all those black T-shirts for a while. Anyway, the original plan was to seethe with envy for every single moment of their absence.

  The new plan is this: get on the helicopter and go with them to the festival! It feels like my birthday when I find out. It is decided by Cas in a potential moment of rashness, since he has been doing his best not to make his attraction to Sindee obvious, but certain wives and girlfriends are not present and that leaves a couple of seats free on the chopper. His cover story is nonetheless thin.

  “It won’t help our image arriving without a compliment of chicks in tow,” he says. There are nods from the band, who generally have to agree with whatever wisdom he comes out with. Anyway, it was true: the tour manager’s lady friend was taking the lead guitarist’s deeply tanned girlfriend Ovaltine to a salon in Paris for the day, presumably so that she could take her skin shade beyond medium oak in time for her big festival appearance tomorrow. The rhythm guitarist’s so-called girlfriend is currently Missing in Action – perhaps returned to the ‘somewhere in Scanda-Land’ where he found her, although he doesn’t actually remember where or when he last saw her, nor does he seem overly concerned. Gio and Sheen are currently sans babes and fancy free, so that left none. And there, conveniently, were Sindee and I, both of us just happening to go by the Latin name foxus incrediblis: the answer to every chick-less band’s prayers.

  “What about these bitches?” says Sheen, falling into the trap. I restrain from dishing out kicks for use of the B-word aimed in my direction. Sheen calls everyone that, female or male. You just get used to it, like you get used to the fact that being near him equals being in a cloud of exhaled smoke. Or that he might at any moment do something off the wall and random, just to stir things up. The other morning at breakfast, for instance, he came down nude but for sunglasses and neck chains, and created a massive fight, alleging that someone had stolen his “fucking drumstick, man.” Seriously, it almost came to blows. He has, like, one billion drumsticks, so no one could see why he was so worried about this one in particular. He was raging, like he was on some weird post-drug paranoia trip. They were all calling each other names and hurling accusations. Then, just like that he turned and left, grinning back over his shoulder as we all witnesse
d the offending drumstick protruding from his backside. He’s a strange one, for sure.

  So, ‘these bitches’, to shrugs of agreement from all present, are elected to join the party. We were currently in Germany and we are going to fly via the chateau to “get some shit”, and then on to the festival. Do helicopters wear out? I hope not. As ever, things are to be done on the hoof. You just have to learn to live this way. You have little bags stuffed with lady essentials that you keep close, to get you through all eventualities. Other things you pick up where you can, wherever you end up. There is no thought as to where we might sleep tonight. The band are spontaneously going a day before their headline slot, just to get a feel of the place, so no arrangements exist for this unplanned arrival. Something always turned up, usually dealt with by an overburdened tour manager.

  Even in the rock world turning up to festivals in a helicopter is rare. The bigger names tend to get put up at nearby hotels, driven to and from the venue. Some bands love to do the whole camping thing, from huge hired Winnebagos or posh yurts, right down to cheap tents and damp sleeping bags. Some bus in, party all night, then sleep on the bus and wake up hundreds of miles away, on the next leg of their tour. We buzz over this fleet of parked tour coaches as we make our way to the specially designated helipad. All eyes point up our way. Everyone below knows someone huge is up here. Pulses will be racing at the thought of who it might be. It’s hard to be so famous that the thought of meeting other famous people doesn’t excite you.

  “Get these girls some band passes,” is Mr Casanove’s first instruction on arrival, and thus Sindee and I have free rein to go wherever we please. The backstage area at festivals is not as dissimilar to the main part as you might think. There is less of a throng, obviously. There is more comfort too, in the form of tables and folding chairs, plus snazzier drinks tents and recreation tents too, with pool tables and video screens and such like. There is a portacabin village for the logistics side of things, and for staying dry, plus a whole media area for interviews, although this is set away and screened off from the band areas so unwanted press guys can’t be on your back all day or sneaking photos of what goes on in those drinks tents. However, it is still essentially all grass and portaloos. And where there are such things, should any rain fall at all, there is mud.