Rock Hard

“The returning hero,” Varg said.

“If not conquering,” Stig added.

“Both, I would wager,” Sven said, getting in on the action.

“How much?” Varg asked.

“Oh, at least twenty.”

I sat down behind my kit trying to ignore them, as hard as that could be once they really got going.

“Dollars or the girl?” Varg asked.

“The woman I saw him talking to was at least 25,” Stig observed.

“30 actually,” I said, for no reason.

“Ah, going for the cougars now are, ya?”

I snorted. “Please, 30 is hardly a cougar, she’s not even ten years older than us. And she looked younger, besides what does it matter?”

It wasn’t the hill I planned to die on, but they’d started going after Stephanie. They could break my balls all they wanted, I could take it, but she had nothing to do with it really.

“All right, guys, let’s do ‘In the Embrace’ from the top,” Seth said from the booth.

We all jumped to attention, and we started to play. I knew there would probably be more teasing to come, but I really didn’t care. My night with Stephanie was beautiful and, while it made no logical sense, I wanted a whole lot more.

It could have been love, or it could have been greed. All I knew was I wanted to see her again. Even if she was a bit posh. I accepted all sorts, or at least tried to. It was how the band had stayed together for so long, that was for damn sure. Stig was okay, but I sometimes though we were friends with Varg because no one else would be.

It had just gone on so long none of us really noticed anymore. Going through lawsuits together can do that. A church had burned down near a venue we’d played, and people had accused us of arson, likening it to some similar incidents back in the 90s where some black metal bands went on a rampage wrecking old churches.

The century had changed, but most minds hadn’t. Not when it came to subcultures. We weren’t even the same kind of band, and pyrotechnics definitely weren’t our thing, but that mattered little to the prosecutors, intent on getting the blood the public were baying for.

In the end, it was revealed that the church had burned down because of faulty wiring. We were still said to have gotten off on a technicality. I could understand the anger, honestly, and held no ill will against the locals hurting for the loss. My ire was reserved for the slanting media and pragmatist courts. We could have written a song about it.

Or a series of online articles, as Stig suggested, though that wouldn’t really have done anything. We decided the best way to punish those who would rather we didn’t exist, to the point of nearly locking us up, was to go on doing just that.

Our continued existence as the band became a monument to their failure. The fact we were about to have three albums on international release was just the icing on the cake. We planned to send an autographed copy, in both CD and vinyl, to every news editor, station manager and prosecutor who gave us shit during the trial.

Chapter Three - Stephanie

Traffic began to mangle as I pulled off into the parking garage. Happily, everyone at the company had their parking space, well away from the maddening crowd. One of the perks to being an overnight success, even if the term had lost some of its meaning after the turn of the millennium.

It was an interesting bit of meta that the company operated both online and in retail, combining online shops with the brick-and-mortar variety. It helped us hit both the youth market and the older set in one go. Could be why they grew from an indie operation on Etsy to a billion-dollar empire. Nice work if you can get it.

“Morning, Pat,” I said, signing in at security.

“And to you, lady Stephanie,” he said, with a dandy tip of his uniform cap.

Patrick O’Malley had worked in the building for over thirty years and had seen all manner of business come and go through the marble lobby. Old desk out and new desks in, as the economy ebbed and flowed, bulls becoming bears and back again. Not that Seattle was anywhere near Wall Street, shielded by the overlords in the East by the mountains and a strong sense of identity.

There was a reason there was never a style of music called “The New York Sound” or “The Boston Sound,” while I did have, at least vague memories, of a “Seattle Sound.”

“What’s on the agenda?” I asked Maddie, as I breezed by her desk.

“There’s the meeting with corporate this afternoon, and you have to decide on the final designs for the new line, and you have a lunch meeting with Fawn Birch.”

“Fawn who?”