| Chapter 4
“Er … Hi! I’m um … here to … uh, introduce the band, Fearless. Yeah, they‘re pretty cool.” Jimmy gripped the microphone with knuckles white from tension, and his voice rose a quarter octave with each word. He dropped the mike and it screeched, making the crowd hold their hands over their ears and shout their disapproval. The boos would come soon if he didn’t pull himself together and Angie was regretting her decision to force him into this. If he’d known that both she and Lauren had had to furiously argue with the manager to allow this, he’d have killed them both. Oops. Too late now. She waved frantically, trying to get his attention while he stared at the audience with a deer-caught-in-headlights look. Standing near the stage, she could see sweat begin to pearl on his forehead and his hand started shaking. Shit. Finally, she caught his eye and he mouthed something nasty. A couple of teenagers behind her started snickering, and when she shook her head disapprovingly, they began to laugh obnoxiously loud. The murmuring crowd quieted, craning their necks, trying to see what was going on. Angie lost her patience. “Come on, Jimmy.” “Yeah, get on with it, Jimmy!” several people shouted from the back row. And suddenly, he started laughing. “Damned reporters, feisty things aren’t they?” he asked, his hands trembling less. Angie closed her eyes. Not again. “I’ll have you know,” he continued, “that this one up front here is particularly feisty. Has to be, if she can put up with her girlfriend, Lauren Lucelli, Fearless’ own fearless lead singer. Bit of a troublemaker if you ask me.” He paused for a second, the corners of his mouth twitching mischievously in a way that clearly was supposed to say “serves you right” to Angie. He opened his mouth to continue, but was cut off by a shouted, “Hold on, did you say the little blonde up front is dating this Lauren chick? We have lesbians in the house?” The teenagers behind Angie started laughing again and patted her back in what they must have thought was a guy-to-guy-like way. There were a few catcalls and Jimmy chuckled into the mike. “Indeed,” he simply said, trying to contain his laughter. “Is the singer hot?” a male voice shouted. “Angie?” Jimmy asked, taking a few quick strides to where she stood and shoved the mike in her face. She’d gone pale by now, not entirely sure that being outed in front of a tightly packed straight bar rooftop was a good idea. She shook her head and Jimmy persisted, encouraged by the jeering crowd. She mouthed “I’m going to kill you” before mumbling an agreement into the mike. “Hey, we can’t hear you!” “Dammit, I said she is fucking hot!” Angie huffed, much, much louder than she’d intended. Applause erupted through the muggy night air and she thought she heard muffled laughter from backstage. She may have imagined it. Regardless, her face turned scarlet and she had a damned strong urge to bolt. “Jimmy, get her on stage! Quit fooling around!” Great. She was crammed on a rooftop full of frat boys and horny straight guys who wanted to check out her girlfriend. Angie pulled a cigarette out and lighted it, exhaling angrily as an ugly green head she didn’t know existed reared itself. “Okay then! Give it up for Fearless!” Jimmy happily left the stage and made his way over to the reporter, where he was immediately cuffed in the shoulder. The band members trekked out bravely and snatched up their respective instruments to ruckus catcalling and stomping feet. The floor seemed to shake as the band skipped a few first words, going straight to the music with a heavy number Angie didn’t recognize. Lauren stood center-stage, feet shoulder-width, clad in those tight, black leather pants that Angie thought increased her lover’s sexiness factor considerably. The singer’s long hair down loose and wild, her eyes lined heavily with smoky-dark makeup. Her fist clutched the microphone, and when the drummer abruptly stopped, Lauren let out a howl that sent shivers down Angie’s spine. The audience, too, stopped jeering -- shocked. The raven-haired woman threw her head back for the full ten seconds of unleashed rage. When her breath ran out, her eyes snapped on the crowd, blazing fiercely, and she shouted: “Got your attention? Good. Because this is pretty fucking important!” If Angie and Lauren could have seen the street below, they would have caught sight of a crowd stopped dead in their tracks, staring up at the two-story building’s roof. The audience pushed in on the stage, forcing Angie against the barrier while Jimmy shoved at people behind them pointing out her cast with vicious words. The beat picked up where it had left off, though slower, more dramatic. The lead guitarist ripped a strangled series of power chords while Lauren closed her eyes and dropped her head as though steeling herself, her body swaying with the melody. “Two shadows meet in the night, darkness suffocating/ They share a secret, a lie, a cutting grief -- deathly-hot/ Dawn will tear them apart, rip their hearts/ Rip their hearts, blind their eyes, if they’re caught/ And it won’t matter how they met, how they loved/ That they dream, that they hurt, that they bleed/ And it won’t matter that they die every night/ With the crushing sun, the scorching heat/ Those words of fire that make them believe/.” Angie’s heart nearly stopped. Lauren’s voice had gone ragged, emotion-roughed, angry. She dropped her cigarette and didn’t notice. She stared into those dark eyes across the stage that fixed the audience with a look so intense they were completely silent. “The night is short, already gray sky breaks/ See their tears, hear their cries, feel them tremble/ One last touch, crushing lips, daylight takes/ Takes the night, the comfort, fuels the fight/ They stand by each other, two women melding/ And comes the blasting sun, the razor light/ Comes the day with fiery words, righteous delight/ And they fight! Can’t hold back, can’t run/ Can’t shield their eyes, or walk away, or die with the night/.” The music stopped. Angie’s whole body had gone ridged, her fists balled, shaking. She was quivering, seething. How dare they, she thought. How dare … “How dare you deny/ Another woman’s right to love/ How dare you deny/ A force of nature that’s not a choice/ How dare you believe/ It’s not sacred/ It’s not precious/ It’s not pure/ As pure as any woman’s love/ How dare you take away my life/ How dare you turn your eyes/ And pick the self-righteous sentence/ That of destruction, and fear, and hate.” “Open your fucking eyes/ Look into their eyes/ listen to their cries.” Complete and utter silence -- only the sounds of passing cars and the dampened techno beat next door. The electric guitar suddenly ripped through the silence -- the melancholy melody mind-numbing and eerily mournful at first, until the pace suddenly changed and the drums kicked back in -- depressing minor chords switching to hopeful majors. The solo was quick, though, and ended with Lauren’s voice -- a quieter anger seeping in. “How dare you whisper/ How dare you stand by/ Let us cry/ Let our love die/ Open your eyes/ Fight the lies/ Don’t just stand there/ Averting your eyes.” “We won’t go back into the shadows again/ Our quiet anger has boiled too long/ See through the blinding hate/ See through the lies/ Look into your souls/ And don’t deny.” For several seconds, it seemed as though the crowd didn’t realize the song was over. The music had stopped abruptly. Lauren’s legs began to tremble slightly and she raked a hand through her hair nervously. Then, two sets of hands started clapping, then three, then four. Within seconds, the roof was filled with wild applause. A dozen people shoved through the crowd toward the exit and were followed with angry shouts of outrage. Lauren’s scowl faded slowly, her eyes focusing, stunned. She took a rattling breath and whispered a few words to the lead guitarist before turning back to the audience. “I’m damned surprised you liked that,” she said, fixing the crowd again with her dark eyes. “Knowing how ya’ll vote around here.” The crowd booed and began verbally abusing the people who had left the rooftop. They shouted. Screamed. Vied for her attention with calls of, “We’ll see about that!” Slowly, the singer’s lips turned upwards by a fraction and she gazed at the reporter, her eyebrow raised. Angie’s lips twitched and she nodded her approval. “Right. So you like political songs. ‘Cause we can play some nice fluffy shit. Unless you want to hear more politics?” Cheering approval and stomping feet. Lauren turned to the guitarist and nodded, and a melody Angie recognized about women’s rights followed. Then another new song about the war in Iraq. And then a song about a woman named Cindy Sheehan, a mother who’d lost her son in the war and was staging a protest at the Western Whitehouse -- the president’s ranch near Crawford -- demanding to meet with him so he could explain why her son had died. Lauren had been busy. Angie was pretty sure her lover hadn’t written since they’d started dating, the recent fiasco having eaten much of the singer’s time. No wonder she’d been so exhausted the past week. And nervous -- the seeming lack of ease from the first time she’d seen the woman perform practically nonexistent. Of course, that last little concert had been in a small Arlington bar, and most of the patrons had apparently known her or the band. It was completely different to play in Deep Ellum. But the band had won the crowd over with that first risky heavy number. After a set of ten songs, Fearless announced they’d be taking a 20-minute break and Angie made her way to the back of the rooftop at the bar, where Jimmy had secured five barstools by threatening a group of frat boys that Fearless would leave if they didn’t get a drink. They vacated their spots, but not before ordering the bartender to add a pitcher to their tab that they left on the counter for the band. The lead guitarist slipped onto a stool next to Jimmy and said something that Angie couldn’t quite hear, jerking her thumb over her shoulder. Angie followed their gaze and caught a glimpse of raven hair, her lover surrounded by a group of people. Jimmy jumped up and headed toward the singer who’d been accosted, while the reporter frowned. “We’re not doing too bad, eh?” the guitarist asked. “Hey, Dawn,” Angie responded, tearing her eyes away from the scene where Jimmy had grabbed Lauren’s arm and was shoving people aside with a forced smile. “I had no idea you girls had been so busy. Lot of new songs. Great stuff, by the way. I think it’s going really well.” “You know, when your girl heard what Jimmy did, she was a mess. She showed up all crazy-like and went into this long freak-out about how we needed new material and shit.” Dawn laughed and lighted a cigarette. “So we went to the nearest gas station and bought a couple of newspapers, then went to the bar and decided which topics to tackle.” Another woman slid in beside Dawn and snatched the pitcher of beer, immediately filling a mug for herself. “You telling her about Monday?” she said. “Yeah,” Dawn said and snorted. “Anyway, we spent the rest of the night writing lyrics. That first song was a Lucelli original. I wrote the Sheehan number. Tristan here got stuck with the Iraq deal.” “I wouldn’t say stuck with it -- wasn’t that hard,” Tristan said. Angie sighed with relief when the singer finally plopped down next to her, a bemused smile on her face. She accepted a mug of beer that Tristan handed her and took a long sip, sighing contentedly. The reporter gazed into her lover’s dark eyes for a long moment, her hand resting on a leather-clad knee. “You did good,” she said simply. She wanted to say more, and Lauren looked like she’d have liked to respond, but a gangling thirty-something guy with mousy brown hair squeezed through the crowd and stuck out his hand with a brusque, “Ryan Orr, Dallas Alternative, music reporter.” An arrogant smile cut across his face as he introduced himself to the rest of the band. Lauren gave him an inquisitive stare -- shared by Angie and the others. “So,” he began with a nonchalant air, his hands confidently in his pockets. “I see you won the crowd over. Good job. Tough group, usually -- known to boo a lot at newbies. When I got your press release, I almost tossed it in the trash. I don’t usually do pieces on complete unknowns. But I was bored and thought I’d come to see what you’re all about. Got a bit more than I expected. I’ll admit that. You’ve got some Melissa Etheridge in you, don’t you think? Maybe a little Fiona tossed in -- some Curtis, some Aerosmith-esque guitar work. Heavy lyrics. I get so sick of all the whiney, pretentious, existential crisis shit you can expect for the most part these days. Nah, you’re old school. Good with the bitterness. Which is coming back, so that’s definitely not a bad thing.” He took a deep breath after rattling all that off and opened his mouth to say more, but Lauren cut him off. “Excuse me, but what press release?” “This one, got it right here,” he said, his arrogant look fading a touch, replaced by a bemused smirk. He pulled a crumbled piece of paper from his pocket and handed it over. “But, we didn’t …” the singer began and trailed off, reaching behind her and snagging a Jimmy arm, forcing him to face her. “You didn’t.” “Um, I kind of did,” his eyes widening at her threatening scowl. “No matter,” Ryan cut through the tension. “I’m here, I’m writing about this. No way around it now. Could I have a business card? I knew that thing was written by an amateur when I scanned the page for contact info and didn’t find any. Quite a mess if you ask me.” Lauren’s eyes snapped on the music reporter and pinned him quite effectively. His smile faded, but only a touch. She might be annoyed with her friend, but no way she was going to let this stranger criticize his work. “I don’t have a business card,” she growled. “Um,” Jimmy nearly squeaked. “You do now. And you have a Web site. And some CDs, and I had the management put cards on every surface in this place, and …” He stopped at her blank stare. Sighing, he fished through the black leather “man bag” that Angie and Lauren had teased him for carrying earlier in the night. He pulled out a CD and card, handing them over to the waiting reporter. “Happy birthday, Lauren,” he said quietly. For a couple of seconds, she looked outraged. But Angie could see the wheels churning rapidly behind those dark eyes and the scowl slowly absolved. And then the singer began to laugh, her shoulders shaking. “Yeah, okay,” she finally managed. “So you have our card and our CD that I’m assuming was recorded during our practice sessions.” Jimmy nodded at her raised eyebrow. “So, am I to take it you think we’re quite lucky for your presence, Mister -- what did you say your name was?” Angie had to force back a laugh at the man’s startled expression. Yeah, he surely did think Fearless was lucky for his interest. And she sincerely doubted he was used to being treated this way by local bands. But he was in for a big surprise. Though Lauren may have all the talent in the world, she’d expressed time and again that she didn’t want the rock star life. And the laugh that Angie bit back was echoed with abandon from Fearless’ guitarist and drummer. Lauren smirked and took a sip of beer while the man recovered. “I guess you don’t give a shit about publicity. Is that it?” he said, the smile gone. “Nope. This isn’t a career for any of us -- more of a hobby and sometimes a fundraiser. So you can drop the tone that so clearly says you think we should kiss your feet and beg for some press, okay? Play nice and we might -- stress on the might -- grant you an interview.” Ryan opened his mouth and closed it, clearly at a loss for words. Well, Angie thought, he had gone about the whole thing the wrong way. And good for Lauren for shutting him down. Angie could read the internal debate as various expressions flitted across his face. Finally, he settled on a much more politely interested smile and shook his head. “You have a point and I’ll think about it,” he said, his tone much less aggressive. “Just don’t run off after the show, okay? Can I find you here afterwards?” “Probably,” Lauren said and smiled, satisfied. He nodded and left the bar area. The singer turned on Jimmy, who was grinning sheepishly. “You really did it this time,” she started but couldn’t keep a strong dose of amusement out of her voice. “And you know what? You didn’t do half bad. Got us the gig, built a Web site, we have business cards, maybe a little press … even CDs. Thank you. It’s been a wonderful birthday. But I swear, if you pull another stunt like this without fair warning, I’ll have to kill you. This week has been freaking insane.” He crushed her in a relieved hug and ruffled her hair, releasing her reluctantly and with piercing loud laughs only after she complained of having breathing difficulties and began to tickle him in self-defense. Angie watched the two, shaking her head. And when Jimmy got back on stage to announce Fearless coming back, he wasn’t nearly as nervous, a giddiness marking his sarcastic comments and bouncing steps. The band followed up the first act with a second set of fast songs that kept the crowd lively. The numbers weren’t nearly as heavy -- save one on a woman’s right to choose -- and they ended with a sexy cover of ACDC’s “You Shook Me All Night Long,” a song that left Angie’s mouth dry and eyes heavy-lidded, visions of what she’d do to the singer once they stepped foot in her apartment flooding her mind. The rooftop had grown so tightly packed that the management wasn’t letting any more patrons up the stairs. And when the band finished, ready to leave near midnight, the crowd called after them for several minutes, demanding an encore. It was one o’clock by the time the band had packed away their instruments and secluded themselves with their friends and the reporter at the all-night grungy coffee bar, Insomnia, up the street. The music writer had been much less arrogant when he’d approached them the second time around, and Lauren had permitted an interview after the band took a vote and agreed it might do them some good. The friends bought a round Rocket Shakes -- banana-chocolate espresso milkshakes -- and sat for an hour, taking the music writer’s rapid-fire questions in turn. Before they’d left the Art Bar, the establishment’s owner had shown up, much to the management’s discomfort, which obviously seemed unsure whether his unannounced appearance was a good thing or not. It seemed he’d been called by a few regulars who wanted to let him know how freaking packed the bar was. He stopped by and kept saying, “Good turnout, good turnout,” and practically ordered the band to book a repeat performance the following month, a greedy smile plastered on his face as he took in the crowd and busy bartenders. He’d also handed a check to Jimmy for a thousand dollars -- rather cheap by Deep Ellum standards, but much more than the band usually got. Lauren had snatched it away and stuffed it in her pocket, vowing to wire the money to her fellow Peace Corps buddies who were still in Micronesia, where she herself had been stationed for a year prior to meeting Angie. That’s what the band usually raised money for -- though it sometimes went to fellows in Africa or South America, depending on where the band felt the greatest need was. Jimmy had been crushed with hugs by the band members after this last surprise that he’d kept so successfully secret. He promised to negotiate a higher rate for their next Art Bar performance. Fearless took a vote and made him their official manager, promising him a hell of a lot of work for no pay at all. The man had blushed, surprised, and had worn a pleased smile the rest of the night, spouting off ideas all the way back to Fort Worth. It was nearly three o’clock when Jimmy finally dropped the pair off at Angie’s apartment. The reporter hobbled inside, her good leg and armpits throbbing from the effort of standing on her crutches for hours, but a nervous smile crossed her lips as she fumbled with the keys, eager to get inside and give Lauren her birthday present. But she never made it past the living room, where she was scooped up into her lover’s arms and placed carefully on the couch -- Lauren’s rough and eager kisses demolishing the image of a red envelope well hidden in the reporter’s file cabinet. By the time the dark-haired woman’s hands dove under the blonde’s skirt, she forgot about the present entirely. And even the reporter’s ringing cell phone couldn’t destroy their passionate celebration. *** Angie awoke with a start. Her skin was coated with a thin sheen of cold sweat, hair plastered to her forehead. The details of her nightmare slipped away before her eyes could focus, but it didn’t matter. She knew what she’d been dreaming about -- that hate-filled voice in her face, breath stinking of cigar smoke and Cognac, a 9-mm revolver pointed between her eyes. The reporter forced her gasping breath to slow and desperately focused on the pleasant smell of her lover nearby. The realization that she was laying in bed slowly forced its way through the haze of confusion and fear. Her mouth was dry and sticky. Her hands clammy. She sat up with effort, her whole body stiff. Carefully, she crawled out of bed, extracting herself from her lover’s arm that was clamped around her waist. Lauren made a whimpering sound of protest in her sleep but didn’t wake. Angie grabbed her crutches and made her way into the kitchen, desperate for a glass of water. The liquid slid down her parched throat in cool relief as she drained the glass in long gulps. The reporter leaned against the counter for several minutes, thinking. The after-effects of the nightmare faded, leaving an empty feeling behind. She hugged herself, shivering slightly in her nakedness as the air conditioner blasted coolly along her sticky skin, raising unpleasant goosebumps and forcing her nipples to contract painfully. The blonde shuddered, running a hand through her disheveled hair. She felt wide awake, despite the fact that the clock on the wall read 5 a.m. She’d been asleep for barely an hour. She tried to force a feeling of exhaustion to take hold, but couldn’t do it. Her cell phone lay on the coffee table where she’d dumped her purse unceremoniously, its contents spilled across the surface haphazardly. A red light was flashing in the dark and she stared at it curiously. Who the hell had called so late? She limped over to the table and picked up the phone, flipping it open and hitting the speed dial for her voicemail. “One new message, received at 3:04 a.m., from an unknown number.” Pause. “Angie, this is Jay. Thought I’d help you out since your article gave us some leads. We’ve just been called to the scene of another signal 12. Method of operation sounds the same. I guess that unlike some people, you actually get to sleep at night. So just give me a call when you get this. Address is 7900 Arlington Court, apartment one-oh-seven. Village Grove complex. See you.” She cursed under her breath and shot a look at the wall clock. Less than two hours -- there was a chance investigators would still be at the scene. Dammit, dammit, dammit. She struggled with her purse, sending objects flying as she dove for her notepad and a pen. She replayed the message and jotted down the address. Then she abruptly stopped. “It’s freaking 5 o’clock in the morning,” she muttered, setting the phone and notepad down. She should go back to bed. She should forget about the whole thing until her alarm blared at eight, ordering her out of bed for her morning shift. She should snuggle up to her beautiful lover, inhale that sexy lavender scent, and fall back to sleep. She sighed. It wasn’t like the crime scene was going anywhere. It wasn’t like she couldn’t just call the detective back in a few hours, get the story later, right? Right. But that adrenaline burst that came with big news had already shot straight through her system. And if she thought she’d been wide awake before, she was even more awake after hearing that damned message. Her shoulders began to shake with silent laughter as she resigned herself to the fact that she wasn’t going to let it go, that she would instead get dressed as quietly as possible and leave her lover a note, after which she’d hobble out to her car and drive to 7900 Arlington Street, apartment one-oh-seven. Daylight broke as she pulled into the complex and found the cop cruisers, the familiar homicide unit van, and spotted a man dressed in black slacks and a black polo shirt -- his flaming red hair sticking up in the back -- speaking with a group of uniformed officers within the confines of crime scene tape sectioning off a staircase. Yellow streaks of light cut across the horizon and cast a somber atmosphere. The reporter stashed her purse under the driver’s seat and grabbed her notepad, stuffing her car keys in her pocket, a pen tucked behind her ear. Angie’s hair was still a mess, having refused to flatten in her brief attempt to tame it with water and a comb. Eyeliner was smudged most unattractively. She probably looked like she’d fallen out of bed and grabbed the first wrinkled pieces of clothes she could find -- the green skirt she’d picked not quite going with the pink blouse she’d chosen from her closet in the dark. But what the hell did it matter? She’d successfully made it to a crime scene before 6 a.m. -- definitely a first for her, and by the looks on the cops faces as she limped over on her crutches, a first for the cops to see a reporter at such an hour. Detective Key caught sight of her, shook his head with a smirk, and waved her on over. Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 5 Feedback? E-mail me at kimberlylafontaine@yahoo.com. |