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Fighting Luke
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1
Luke
I looked around the band room—if you could call the windowless glorified storage closet covered in worn and tattered gig posters from floor to ceiling a band room—taking in the scene unfolding around me. It was a pretty typical pre-gig situation—one that having been touring the country for the previous four months, was becoming a very familiar sight to me.
Arlo was pacing the small space, making it seem even smaller. As ever, he was a ball of pent-up testosterone, waiting to explode. Like we did every night, the rest of the band just had to wait and hope that he could contain that explosive energy long enough to unleash it on the unsuspecting audience, rather than losing his shit backstage with us, as had happened on occasion, when there had been unexpected delays.
I honestly didn’t understand my identical twin brother’s motivations a lot of the time. We were so alike physically, even now we weren’t kids anymore, but that was where the similarities ended. We were as different as night and day in all other respects, but not in a yin-and-yang kind of way. In fact, it was more like oil and water. Most of the time we couldn’t relate to each other at all. If we didn’t look so alike—sharing the same vivid green eyes, square jaw, and thick dark hair as our dad and other siblings—I’d swear we weren’t even brothers.
“Arlo, for the love of Jesus, Mary, Joseph, and the donkey in the fucking stable, would you sit the fuck down. Please. It’s cramped and claustrophobic enough in here as it is, without you taking up every available square inch of floor and every microgram of air pacing the room like a deranged circus animal. Not to mention the fact that you’re making me fucking dizzy.”
Arlo flipped me off, which was pretty much a term of endearment for him, so I was surprised when he actually did as I asked, throwing himself into a threadbare easy chair that was spewing disintegrated foam from its guts. I was pretty sure that stuff was going to leave a horrible mess on his skin-tight black pants, but decided to keep that gem to myself in case he started pacing again. We’d deal with the pants situation later.
Though he was now sitting, Arlo was hardly relaxed. In fact, it was fair to say that he was wound tighter than a nun’s hoo-ha. He cracked his neck then popped each of his knuckles. I winced at the sound of each click of his strong but slender fingers, so much like my own. When he’d done each joint, and then started back again at the beginning, I couldn’t stomach any more.
“Hey, Stevie! You got anything to help take the edge off before he blows a fucking fuse?” I motioned toward my antsy twin.
Stevie was the band’s drummer, and as I spoke, he was air-drumming, sticks in hand, tapping out slow and steady rhythms in front of himself, with no kit in sight. He was rarely seen without sticks in hand. Running drum combos and getting drunk and/or high was his way of passing the time, and if there was one thing we had on the road, it was bucketloads of time. I’d underestimated before we got into this gig life just how fucking boring a lot of it really was. Stuck in cramped quarters like this band room or the tour bus waiting for something. Waiting to get to the venue. Waiting to get on stage. Waiting to get paid. Waiting to get to our shitty motel. Waiting to see, speak to, or otherwise hear from Marnie.
I pushed that thought from my mind and focused back on Stevie, settling my gaze on his dark-gray eyes as they stared through me, not at me. His pupils were mere pinpricks. Again. Oh shit.
“Yeah,” he said absently, digging into his pocket and pulling out a blister pack of pills. “I got Oxy.”
Of course he did. My guess was he’d already indulged, following up with a vodka or ten. That was Stevie these days—always fucked up in one way or another. Sometimes more than one.
Arlo shot us a both a look that suggested he’d like for us to rot in hell.
“Eat shit and die. No way I’m taking that and then going on stage. I want to create a vibe out there, not kill it. If anything, I could use some nose candy, or cookies.”
Oh hell no.
The last thing we needed was Arlo more amped up than he already was. I glared at him, hoping he’d get the message without me having to verbalize it, and therefore avoid an unnecessary fight. After four months on the road together, tempers were frayed and we were all more than a little frazzled. The cracks were starting to show, for sure. Jake and Ryan were low-key watching the conversation unfold, like they so often did, ready to extinguish the flames of mine and Arlo’s tempers if they flared to flash point.
If it wasn’t for the level-headedness and reliability of our bass and keys players, respectively, I didn’t know where the band would be by now. Possibly no longer in existence. In their own different ways, the two of them drove the bus from the back seat. I did a lot in that regard too, but the truth was, no matter what I did, Arlo would always be less inclined to listen to me than just about anyone else on the planet. So having the two of them as impartial referees running interference between us helped keep the both of us in check. Not that I needed it, except when it came to Arlo. He was without a doubt, my Achilles’ heel. Arlo and Stevie were a different matter. Unlike the rest of us, they each needed to be managed and ‘handled’ pretty much 24/7, though in totally different ways.
I recoiled into myself, slumping lower in my seat. I had no intention of kicking off with Arlo. We were back in New York after so many endless weeks on the road, and I wanted our homecoming gig to be a sweet one. I was also both hoping and dreading that Marnie might make an appearance. I was pretty sure she was due back from shooting in Paris either yesterday or today, and had said she swing past if jet lag wasn’t smashing her six ways from Sunday. I’d put her name on the guest list just in case.
Seeing her was always bittersweet in Arlo’s presence. I liked hanging out with her, as long as he wasn’t there—which was almost never. She seemed like a different person around him—way more air-headed and superficial-acting than she was when we were alone together, and it was torturous witnessing his poor treatment of her, and watching her take it with a smile. She deserved better, way better, and knowing that she didn’t believe that to be the case made me feel like someone had gouged out my heart with a poisoned spear.
Ellis
