AllFreeNovel
Share Us
My nod gives the bright-eyed Nicole the cue to start. Her shout is over-the-top loud and elicits a huge laugh from Dax. "One… two… One, two, three, four!"
I strum the singular chord, which elicits a raucous shout from the loud, sold-out crowd. It's the greatest sound in the world, and I'm totally addicted. I take another scan and take it all it. Two thousand people packed tight. Limbs hanging off the balcony, stuffed in doorways, and packed along the stairway. It's as if everyone knows how special tonight might be.
A goofy grin pulls on my face, and I let the moment carry me. Devil May Care was never supposed to work, according to everyone not in the band. A seven-piece band, six guys and me, the tiniest, thinnest but loudest of the group. Each of us specializes in a different musical genre. But we mesh. We always have.
We take the song to the bridge, and Bryon on the trumpet works his way next to me. He gives me a shoulder bump and juts his chin toward the crowd. All night, they've been singing along to every lyric, so it's no wonder they have their phones held high for the finale, lights on, swaying and producing a scene worthy of a music video. I hold my microphone out toward the crowd and let them become part of the act.
Bryon gives me a side hug. Manuel, one of best lead guitarists in the business, steps to the other side of me. I've known the two of them half my life and don't need to say a word. Everything I need to know is written on their faces.
Even after all these years and the relative success of our band, we're humbled, grateful, and astonished by the love we receive from our fans. They come to every show, know the words to every song, and shout us out on social media as if they're on retainer.
Manuel pulls me into a hug and shouts into my ear, "I'm going to miss all of this!"
His words release the dam of tears I had been attempting to hold back. After the performance tonight, he and his cousin Santiago, the bass guitarist in the band, will head to Texas. Manuel is moving permanently to the Lone Star State. He's expecting his first child and wants to be closer to the rest of his family. Santiago is helping him with the drive, and I fear he, too, may not return to our little slice of paradise in Ohio.
Manuel spins away with the beat, and I lift the microphone and return to the melody. Music helps me escape from reality. It allows me to soar and exist in a world that's beautiful, safe, and warm. A world I never want to leave.
Nicole spins and pounds the tambourine against her hip as if she's been on tour with us for a decade. I wish I could stay in this bubble forever, but I can't.
Bryon approaches me from one side, Santiago, and Manuel on the other, and I realize this is it. The end. I raise a fist to the sky, and the seven of us join as one to sing the final words together. "It's Never Too Late!"
Dax tosses his drumsticks out to the crowd, wraps an arm around Nicole's shoulders, and the two of them join the rest of us at the front of the stage. There are hugs, laughs, hoots, and tears. The cheers are deafening, and we don't rush off the stage. Instead, we absorb it, bowing and blowing kisses to the audience. We milk it for as long as we can.
I'm long limbs, hugs, and kisses to anyone with a heartbeat that dares to enter two feet of me. I'm an emotional, dripping mess, slowly unraveling in front of the world, and I don't care.
The stage manager waves his arms frantically off stage. I ignore him, but can't ignore the tug from Dax on my elbow. "We don't have to go home, but we have to get out of here." He punches both fists into the sky. "That was freaking insane."
A small mop of dark hair pushes past the security guards and pops up in the middle of our small group—Nicole. "That was awesomesauce. Thank you a million times."
She extends the tambourine toward Dax. He waves it away. "Keep it, but if I see it on eBay later, I'll come looking for you."
The mention of the word eBay is like a kick to the stomach, but I don't react. They don't know. Nobody knows.
"What type of fan would do that? Never." Nicole's defiant words fade into the air as the guards appear and whisk her away, but not before she steals another hug from Dax.
Santiago leads us from the chaos of the backstage area back to the green room. My head is in a haze as I zombie walk behind him. I barely feel the pats on my back, the cheers of the dozens of people lining the halls, or the screams of joy from my bandmates. If this was our last performance as a band, I wouldn't change a thing.
The staff pushes bottles of champagne into our hands the minute we enter the green room. I swap the ice-cold celebratory treat for a room temperature bottle of water. My routine to protect my voice kicking in even amid the chaos. Norris, our keyboardist, pulls me by my elbow to the corner of the room. "Ariel, you kicked ass out there tonight."
Norris is flying high. We all are. The post-concert euphoria is the best kind of high. It's not the flawless execution; it's not reaching the last note after weeks of rehearsal and months of touring. It's about spreading the joy of what we love and being accepted for who we are. It's a magical combination that had eluded me for half my life.
But it's all ending after tonight. Manuel is moving permanently to Texas. He and Dax are the glue in this ragtag group. I fear we'll fall apart without him.
Variations of this same story have been whispered to me in the back of the tour bus. We've been on the road for most of the past five years. The guys are no longer in their twenties. We're in our early thirties, and they've transitioned from stage door groupies to wives and serious girlfriends. They're looking forward to the next phases of their lives—homes, kids, and stability.
I'm the opposite. I can't picture a future not doing what I'm doing right now with the people I'm doing it with. I don't want anything to change.
When we started this baffling experiment of a band, we promised each other that we'd ride it as long as we were together. Together to the end.
Is this our end?
Not if I can help it.
They're my best friends, my family, my everything.
And I'll do anything for my family, which is why I've kept one whopper of a secret from them. I brush away the guilt by convincing myself that what I'm doing is for their own good, all the while knowing the true reason.
For a group of stupid teenagers, we were right about so many things. But not everything. I give Norris a tight hug. "Keep everyone here. I'll be right back. I have to check on something."
