by Riley Scott
At the tour bus, Chris wasn’t quite sure what to do. This was going to be her place of residence soon, but she wasn’t sure if she should just go straight to her hotel room for the night or stop in to congratulate Raven on a great show. Standing outside, she listened to the blaring music inside and heard a mix of excited voices. She looked around, wishing there was some sort of rule book for how to respond in these situations, or at least wishing she wasn’t so awkward right now.
“Got a light?” she heard a man’s voice in the darkness to the left.
She jumped, startled out of her own thoughts, glancing in the direction of the voice and relieved to find Paul the drummer standing beside the bus. His lanky frame leaned against one of the tires as he ran his hand through his shaggy, sandy-blond hair. He smiled, looking every bit like the goofy boy-next-door, which put her at ease. She laughed at her jumpiness and reached into her pocket, fishing out the lighter she had pulled from her purse on the off chance that it might make her more relatable to the crew. She had watched enough of their videos and behind-the-scenes footage to know they all smoked, so had come prepared.
“I’ve got a light, if you’ve got an extra cigarette.”
“Fair trade,” he said, flicking one out of the pack and handing it to her in one smooth motion.
“Thanks,” she said, offering him a light before lighting her own cigarette.
“What did you think of the show?” he asked, standing beside her. Even in the darkness, she noted how at ease he looked, as though posing for an album cover. Despite his tall and thin frame that would have looked awkward on most, he was poised and held a smile that spoke volumes about his self-confidence. She wondered whether this coolness was something that they were all born with, or something they adopted as they spent more time together living the rock star life.
“I’ve been to a lot of concerts,” she said, taking a deep drag and exhaling it. “But none have ever moved me quite like tonight’s. It was the most incredible show I’ve ever seen.”
“Glad to hear it,” he said. She admired the way his smile lit up like a little boy’s grin. “We’ve hit a really good meshing point lately and it’s made for better shows than we’ve ever put on before. I’m happy to hear that you really enjoyed it.”
“Well thanks for putting on a great show,” she said, nodding her head in approval.
“She’s pretty amazing, isn’t she?” he asked, as if sensing the direction of Chris’s thoughts.
“That she is,” Chris admitted, unsure of how much she should actually say, but deciding that she might as well befriend the band guys as well since she was going to be cohabitating with all of them soon enough. “She really knows how to give the crowd everything they wanted—and perhaps a whole lot more than they ever anticipated.”
“She knows how to give that to us too,” he said with a laugh. “Just wait until you’re on the bus every night. I’m sure you’ll catch a glimpse of it tonight at the after-show bus party, but you’ll be in for a treat when you get to experience her full force. She’s goofy, fun-loving and sweet and she will shock the pants off you that way. She’s so much more than she ever lets any of the others see, but I’m sure you’ll get to see it.”
“I hope so,” Chris said, a smile taking over her lips. “I want everyone to have the chance to see her at her truest self. I want for her to stop hiding behind a façade of bitterness.”
“Oh, she’s plenty bitter too,” Paul said. “But there’s a softness beyond that shell. Come on in and you’ll see.”
“I don’t know if I should,” Chris said, her earlier qualms recurring.
“Of course you should,” he said, shrugging. “It’s the after-party. You don’t want to miss it.”
“I don’t even know if I’m invited,” she said, her brows furrowing, as she felt every bit like the awkward kid in junior high who wasn’t invited to the dance.
“We don’t throw invitations out around here.” She heard a husky female voice behind her and turned to stare into Raven’s dark brown eyes. “You’re one of us for now. That means you’re invited. Now, come on in and party your ass off.”
Chris wanted to retort but bit her tongue. Instead, she opted for a smile, crushed her cigarette on the ground and followed Raven into the bus. She glanced back at Paul, who simply nodded and winked at her, as if to reassure her she was making the right decision.
Even though she had heard all the commotion coming from the bus, she wasn’t prepared when the door swung open. Inside there were far too many bodies crammed into the small space. Feeling as if she was at a nightclub, she marveled at how much the simple bus had been transformed. There were people smoking a joint on the couch, and others grinding together to the fast-paced music streaming out of multiple speakers. Raven was greeted by adulation wherever she walked.
“Want a drink?” Raven called back at her as Chris stood in the doorway.
No longer caring whether or not it was professional, she knew she needed a drink. She ignored her inner turmoil and nodded.
“Come on then,” Raven said, waving her over to where she stood in a mix of people. Chris obeyed the order and made her way through the mess of writhing bodies until she stood next to Raven at the bar. “What would you like?” Raven asked. Before Chris could answer, she felt Raven’s arm go around her waist and pull her in close. Her breath caught in the back of her throat and her heart pounded. Feeling intoxicated, she looked around and saw that Raven had merely saved her from being crashed into by what could only be described as a drunk frat boy on the loose.
“Careful, Justin,” Raven called out. “How many times have we had to tell you not to accost the pretty girls?”
“Friend of yours?” Chris asked with a laugh.
“No,” Raven said, shaking her head and lowering her voice so no one else could hear. She leaned in closer and whispered in Chris’s ear. “He’s one of our roadies and he’s a little out of control.”
“Oh,” Chris said, nodding her head, even though she wanted to ask if any of them were really in control.
“Anyway, now that I saved you,” she said with a wink, “what can I mix up for you?”
“Tequila,” Chris said, not wanting to step too far outside her comfort zone.
“Tequila and what?” Raven asked, a smile spreading across her lips.
“Tequila and lime on the rocks,” Chris answered, noting the glimmer of amusement in Raven’s eyes.
“Sounds like a party girl drink to me,” Raven said, nodding in approval. “I like it.”
“I’ve always figured, why mix when you could drink something good enough to stand alone,” Chris said, having experienced the reaction to her favorite drink quite often. “If something is good enough, it doesn’t need a mixer.”
“I’ll trust your judgment on that and mix myself one too,” Raven said, grabbing the bottle. Chris’s eyes widened at the sight of the bottle of Don Julio Real.
“She’s a rock star. Of course she can afford a three-hundred-dollar tequila.” Chris silently reminded herself where she was and wiped her sweaty palms on her pants. She watched closely as Raven mixed the two drinks.
“Cheers,” Raven said, clinking her glass to Chris’s.
Chris reciprocated, smiled and took a drink. “God that’s good,” she said, bringing the glass back down from her lips.
“Yeah. It is,” Raven responded, her voice somewhat breathless. “Hot.”
“What?” Chris asked, certain she had misunderstood her words.
“Nothing,” Raven answered, her words tumbling out quickly. “You can hang out with me if you feel more comfortable, or you can make some friends. Your call, but either way, welcome to my party.”
“Thank you,” Chris said, glancing around the small space to view her options. “I’ll hang out with you for a while.”
“Good,” Raven said, seeming truly happy about the prospect. “Let’s introduce you around.”
Thinking she was going to shake a few hands and make small talk,
Chris followed her until she stopped at the front of the bus.
“Everyone, listen up,” Raven called, her raspy voice sending Chris’s heart into flutters, making her feel like a frightened child. “I want to introduce you all to Christina. She’s a new part of the crew and she’ll be with us for a while, so everyone make her feel welcome.”
There were a slew of “Hey Christina,” and “Hey girl,” greetings but she felt out of place. Although she had attended her share of big-name parties, this was a different breed of partiers. She stood and smiled, even though she felt like she had been thrown to the wolves. Perhaps this was some kind of test by Raven to see if she would make the cut. Straightening her shoulders, she nodded around the room, making eye contact with her new acquaintances. It was time to cue on her skills typically used for addressing crowds, talking with the press or meeting new people, regardless of how different these people might be from her normal environment. “Hey everyone,” she called confidently before taking her seat.
“There you go,” Raven said, reaching down and patting her on the shoulder. The touch put Chris at ease as Raven’s intentions became clearer. Not malicious but welcoming. “You’re one of us. If you want to make that last, blend in. Make friends and be one of us.”
Chris nodded and she couldn’t quite tell what switch had flipped, changing Raven from cold to warm so suddenly over the course of the show, but she genuinely felt welcomed into this strange new world. She finished up her tequila, much to Raven’s delight.
“Want one more and then we’ll go dance?” Raven asked, before downing her own drink and heading for the bar. She gave no time to hesitate or resist the offer, so Chris took the drink once it was poured. “Good girl,” Raven said. “Now, let’s dance.”
As Raven pulled her to the tiny area where everyone was dancing, she heard the clamor around her. “It’s time,” a man’s voice yelled. “Put on the song.”
“What song?” Chris asked, leaning closer to Raven, noting the electricity that pulsed through her veins at the sheer touch of her hand.
“My favorite song,” Raven said.
“Cherry Pie” by Warrant flooded through the speakers. Chris watched, delighted as Raven transformed before her eyes, downing her glass of tequila and throwing her head side to side with the beat, her long, dark-brown hair flowing through the air. Every straight teenage boy’s fantasy, Raven dropped to the ground and slid across the floor to the music, before popping back up and moving her hips seductively in Chris’s direction. She raised an eyebrow and motioned to Chris to “come over.” Chris couldn’t have resisted if she had wanted to.
Never certain of her own dance moves, Chris downed her drink and danced over. Their bodies moving together, she could feel her arousal building as each move Raven made looked like raw sexual energy.
“That’s it,” Raven whispered in her ear, “move with me.”
Their hips circled to the rocking beat and Chris was no longer certain if it was the blur of the alcohol flooding her senses, or the proximity to Raven that was making her feel alive and ten feet tall.
Others danced, talked, sang and smoked around the two of them. But Chris didn’t care and to her surprise, Raven seemed as entranced as she was. Time stood still as they moved in sync.
When the song came to a close, Chris felt like it had ended too soon. Forcing her breathing to return to normal, she glanced awkwardly around the bus, feeling as if she was unclothed in front of everyone. No one seemed to notice anything out of the ordinary, so she tried to relax. She had just been dancing—nothing more. Yet if these people could have read her thoughts…
A man reached up and passed a joint to Raven, who took a deep drag.
“Thanks man,” she said, offering him a devilish smile. “Want some?” she asked, offering it to Chris.
Chris considered it. She hadn’t smoked pot since college. “Never mind,” Raven said, before she answered. “You can have some later if you want it. I’m not going to pressure you into anything you don’t want to do.”
“Thanks,” Chris said with a nod. She couldn’t figure Raven out. She had pegged her for the peer pressure kind of person, but Raven was proving to be decent through and through. “By the way, where’s the harder stuff? I thought this was supposed to be a crazed, drug-laden type of shindig.”
“Sorry to disappoint,” Raven said, winking again. The wink seemed to come so naturally and Chris envied it. She figured if she could wink like that, there would be little work she’d ever have to do on anything. “We’re a cleaner bunch these days.”
Chris raised an eyebrow and smiled. She didn’t believe that for a second, but she was having a good enough time that she wasn’t going to challenge the claim. “Fair enough,” she said.
“I’ll be back in a few,” Raven said. “Have fun until then. Make yourself at home. Pour yourself some tequila, dance, party like a rock star.”
Feeling a little more at ease, Chris poured another drink and took a spot next to a couple of middle-aged women on the couch.
“So you’re the new girl?” one of them asked, reaching out a hand. “I’m Monica and that’s my husband Todd over there,” she said, pointing off to the corner of the room where a man was controlling the music. “He’s one of their regular sound guys.”
“Nice to meet you, Monica,” Chris said, offering a smile.
“I’m Joanna,” the other woman said. “Just an Austin lady out enjoying the good show and after-party.”
“Nice to meet you as well,” Chris said.
“What do you do?” Monica asked her, looking her up and down.
“PR,” Chris said, not sure how else to put it, or if she should even try. “I just started today.”
“Well, in that case, welcome to the party…and good luck,” she said, raising her glass in a toasting motion. “Hopefully we will see you again down the road. We travel with the band and although we don’t party like we used to, on special occasions we’ll come—like tonight. For the most part, we travel in a caravan behind the bus with the rest of the crew and keep to ourselves at hotel after-parties but Austin is always such a fun show, so we thought we’d celebrate…Anyway good luck.”
Chris understood the doubt that filled the silence between Monica’s words, but she brushed it off knowing she was the underdog who could prove them wrong.
She made small talk with Monica and Joanna for what felt like an eternity, every once in a while glancing back toward Raven’s bedroom. Her mind went wild with what could be happening behind that closed door but she forced herself to focus on something else.
When she saw Paul stand to go outside, she stood as well. Desperate for escape, she followed him outside.
“Same trade as last time?” she asked him, hoping he wouldn’t see her as a mooch.
“Sounds like a deal,” he said, offering her a cigarette. “Needed to get out of there?”
“Does that make me pathetic?” she asked, raising an eyebrow at him.
“Not at all,” he said. “I think it makes you human. Not all of us were made to withstand that much at once. In fact, I think that’s why I like smoking so much. It gives me the chance to come out here and forget about all those people—at least for a minute. Don’t get me wrong, I like them and all that. I like the lifestyle, but sometimes you just need a breather, a moment to yourself to get right with the world again.”
“I like that philosophy,” she said. “I’m not ruining your alone time, am I?”
“No,” he said, quickly dismissing the idea with a shake of his head. “You’re one of us. You heard the girl in there. We’d all like you to stick around. We could use some consistency in a few areas and I think you could be the pin that holds it all together. So take your moments to yourself—or with me if you need to smoke it all away—and then go back in there confident. Don’t hide, don’t shirk away from it all. Just be yourself and take as many alone moments as you need to deal with it all.”
“It’s just a lot at once,” she said. “It’s k
ind of a different world from what I’m used to.”
“What are you used to?”
“Suits, ties, skirts, heels, professional behavior, fluorescent lighting, meeting rooms, presentations, folders, being on top of your game always, never letting on that you have bad habits or vices, and everyone acting like they’re a polished replica of themselves,” she said with a shrug. “Sure, we recognize that we’re just real people. We’re not always these overinflated versions of ourselves and while there are egos to deal with, it’s not like this, where one person seems to be the sun to everyone else’s planet. It’s more we hide behind the cape of our professional titles and our accomplishments. We don’t talk about personal things, we never broach each other’s personal space and it’s kind of a cold, corporate life. It’s nothing like this.”
“And how would you define this?” he asked, pointing back to the bus.
“Wild,” she said, shaking her head. “It’s tantalizing and intoxicating—even without the booze and pot. It’s like college, but with adults and it’s magnetic, like it could suck you in and make you never want to leave—never want to go back to the mundane. It’s a different world entirely. Even though I’ve only been here for a day, it feels like those suits and heels are a thing of the distant past. Here, they don’t matter. And here, nothing can touch me. It’s like being seventeen again, but with the freedoms and rewards that come with being an adult. It’s amazing. It’s also dangerous, but beautifully so, like a fire dancing on the wind.”
“That was pretty damn poetic,” he said, eyeing her carefully.
“I’m a wordsmith,” she said, shrugging off the compliment. “It’s what I get paid to do in part. I write statements and press releases that support building a positive image. It could be described as creative writing, but I also have the help of tequila tonight.”
They shared a laugh and he shook his head. “You’re pretty funny. You know that?”
She laughed and looked off into the distance. “I can be. You know, when I’m not out trying to play good cop, bad cop with some untouchable rock star, treading the waters between friend and ally or enemy and authority.”