Getting Real

Okay, so she needed her armour. He understood that a little better now; it wasn’t just about her performance—it was about her life. Okay, so he’d caught her out in a lie, but she hadn’t been flaunting it. In fact she’d tried not to engage with him in the gym, especially the second time, when she knew who he was.

Off stage he had no right to question how she dressed, talked or behaved and he was ashamed to realise how harshly he’d judged her. But there was no going back either, their ‘thing’ whatever it was—a hot infatuation, a fantasy trip—was clearly over, too much real world had intervened.

Looking at her now laughing with Harry, her body an open invitation with raised lettering to sleepless nights of wondering what he might’ve done differently, Jake didn’t know if he could be her friend. He thought the cost of friendship with Rielle Mainline might be his sanity.

29. Bolt from the Blue

Even though Ice Queen’s performance was a free Music TV Bolt from the Blue gig and had only been promoted as a mystery act, the fans were about fifty rows deep around the portable stage.

From where Rand stood in the doorway of a tent off the side of the stage, he could see there were already too many people in the small space. They’d agreed to do this gig primarily for the TV audience; the live audience was supposed to be limited. He wasn’t looking at limited. Word must’ve got out. He was also looking at the sound desk at the back of the area where Jake stood with the TV network people. They looked happy. Jake didn’t. He kept shaking his head and pointing back towards the stage.

“This is a blast,” said Rie. She ducked under his arm to get a look at the building crowd.

“This is a problem, but I don’t know what we’re going to do about it.”

“We’ve done this kind of thing before.”

He pulled a lock of her green hair. “Yeah, but back then the crowd were for some other band and we were the warm up no one bothered listening to.”

She laughed. “It was simpler back then.”

“I miss those days.”

“You do not. You like your home studio, your private jets and your big Ducati.” She stuck a knuckle in his ribs. He squirmed away and considered returning the favour.

“Yeah, but I’m not sure I want to get torn up to keep them.”

“Wuss.”

Oh that’s it. He made a grab for her, but she was a little ninja and scooted under his arm and back inside the entrance tent. He called after her. “Stay close to me.”

She gave him an irritated look and he wished for once she was less fearless about performing. He looked for Harry; her crew was out there somewhere too, capturing this for the doco.

Stu took Rie’s place. “This is a lot of people for an impromptu gig.”

Rand estimated about five hundred people were crammed into the yard of the old church now. They’d expected two hundred at most. They spilled out onto the street, stood on the low stone fence and sat in the branches of a huge fig tree. “Keep the girls close.”

It would probably be fine; it’s not like there was going to be any real trouble. Ice Queen fans were cool. Indoors there might have been; there were fire hazards, loading and access issues, but here in the open, on a bright, blue sky day, it should work out okay. And they were only on stage for a half hour max. So why did he feel so uneasy, like insects were crawling around the collar of his t-shirt?

They were late, that was part of his concern. Twenty minutes and stretching. No sign of a producer to give them a ready signal and all the time more and more people arriving and the group already assembled getting louder and louder. Some parts of the crowd were waiting patiently, talking amongst themselves; others were singing the chorus to Darker Deep, amusingly ragged and off key. Then from the front of the stage among the people who’d been there longest, a chant started up, “Ice Queen, Ice Queen, Ice Queen.”

Jake argued against the delay, argued against the idea that more people in the audience was better. Better for the network, but not for the band. The more people that arrived the less adequate their security and exit plans were. He wanted out. This wasn’t the deal and it was putting people at risk. He couldn’t get Ron on the phone either and this was something outside his experience to deal with.

“Mate, it’ll be fine. We do these things all the time.” The network’s producer had shifty eyes and Jake couldn’t get them to shift and fix on him.

“This wasn’t the deal.”

“Look, mate. Sure you can pull your people, but if you do that you void your contract and well, we can’t take responsibility for what might happen.”

The subtext was clear. Pull the band out, the network would stand back from the issue and still get footage for the evening news, and who knew what the fans would do when they heard Ice Queen wigged out and reneged on performing.

Jake needed to get to Rand. He couldn’t make this decision alone. Had there been the original hundred or so people in the crowd it wouldn’t have been a problem, but with probably ten times that number here now, he could see no way to get to the stage. They tried shouting down the phone and then they reverted to text messages.

Jake typed, 2 dangerous. Want out.

Rand replied with, Agree. How?

Jake had no immediate response. He knew the network officials were enjoying every minute of this delay. He’d already had a shouted conversation with the security chief who was equally worried, and said the band’s main exit route was now blocked by people who’d pushed through a barricade. They could clear them, but it would be a drama.