Page 49
Never failing me, never blue
The glint from her shimmering strings
The grace when she plays
Everything about her
Makes others disappear
(2nd guitar solo)
Chorus:
Her embrace, takes my breath away
My love for her will never fade
She’s my girl through and through
Never failing me, never blue
(slowly sings) Her embrace, takes my breath…away (away trails off)
You would’ve thought the crowd held the winning lottery tickets with as wild as they’d become. Security flanked the stage, arm in arm, ensuring no one came near it. Guess we hadn’t really thought that out given we were on one of the smaller stages when these guys were used to playing on the main stage six feet in the air. Oh well, security will earn their salaries tonight, holding that insane crowd back.
“Make sure and catch Social Sinners and Maiden Voyage on the main stage Saturday night. We are Imminent Danger, grab our QR code and stalk away. Happy Rocktoberfest, Black Rock!”
“That was fucking lit!” Tibby jumped around, so fucking amped up. “I could run a fucking marathon right now.”
“Right?” Claude howled like a wolf. “We are a bunch of lucky fuckers.”
Fuck man, every single Masterson band member was here high-fiving and hugging us. Seriously, this was a night we’ll never forget.
Chapter Eighteen
Wolf
The desert at night, after the last stage had fallen silent, had a different vibe to it than when it was full of activity. There were still small pockets of people awake here and there, like our group, but for the most part, people had partied hard and were crashed out everywhere, trying to recover before we all pulled out of here in the morning.
Jagger and Johnny had joined us, along with their manager, and Johnny’s other half, Draven, the former lead singer of Damaged Saints. Their pyro accident after Rocktoberfest a few years ago had left him unable to sing anymore. It sent a ripple through the industry when it was revealed that one of their roadies had been responsible for the incident.
Draven and Pressley had their heads pressed together for a while now, discussing the intricacies of what life on the road for a canine looked like, while Jagger and Johnny swapped stories with our guys, of the places they’d gone and the things they’d seen along the way.
“I didn’t think I could get on the bus with the dogs,” Jagger said. “I was that afraid of them. There I was, with an offer to join an amazing band and go on tour with my best friend, and I almost drove back to New Bedford without singing a single note for them because a dog had treed me when I was a kid. I can laugh about it now, it feels silly as fuck. I hid in their fucking linen closet one afternoon because I failed at sneaking into the house without the dogs hearing me and no one else was home.”
“Dude!” Tony said. “After hearing you tonight, that would have been the worst mistake ever.”
“Seriously. You couldn’t pay me enough to go back there,” Claude said. “I’d sleep with a chihuahua first.”
“I get you,” Jagger said. “The streets back there are paved with ghosts and broken dreams, but you can keep those little yappy dogs away from me. Talk about scary.”
He shuddered when he said it. I’d forgotten they were from the same town. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Pressley perk up the same as I did, as we listened for the opportunity to learn something new about our drummer.
“Exactly man,” Claude said. “Don’t forget all the tired, bitter people who do the same thing, generation after generation, and wonder why they only live a block from the apartment they grew up in.”
“Oh yeah. They offer to help you get a job on the dock or a factory, get your foot in the door, build work experience so you can put money aside for after graduation,” Jagger said. “Only no one talks about what it actually looks like after you graduate, when you’ve got that piece of paper in your hands and the last thing you want to do is work that job they got you for the rest of your life.”
“That’s when they call you ungrateful,” Claude said, “or make comments about you thinking you’re hot shit because you actually stuck it out and finished school.”
