Photo by Raphael Schaller on Unsplash
A man flashed a light on my ID and studied it. It’s a good picture - I have a sarcastic smile and, every so often, a stranger and I laugh about it together. He clipped a wristband on my hand and waved me into the concert without comment. I took off my coat and toyed with the lime-green bracelet while I waited for my friend, Emily, to get through the line. The crowd was dressed in all-black regalia: the women wore chokers, Metallica and Nirvana logos were splashed across guys’ shirts. Only the most faithful fans were willing, despite the snow, to see an Alice in Chains cover band on a Wednesday night. I wore a plain black t-shirt.
It’d been at least five years since I’d been to any concerts. Back in high school I’d had bunches of concert tickets, bracelets, and merch plastered on my bedroom walls and I wondered what happened to all that memorabilia. I’d probably thrown it away at some point, which I regretted but, at the same time, didn’t. You can move around only so many times before even the precious things get thrown away.
“This is something.” Emily said.
“Oh for sure,” I said, relieved by her sudden presence.
Emily was a beautiful, long-legged blond with an impassive face. She surveyed the scene with a cautious eye while people milled about in front of us. ‘What about a drink?’ I asked. I pulled out my wallet and, leaning on the bar, stared blankly at the craft beers on tap. I thought about choosing one at random to try but, when the bartender came, I ordered two PBRs and gave one to Emily. ‘Can’t go wrong with a PBR,’ she laughed, folding her cash back in her purse.
We’d met in Junior year of Highschool, when we worked at the city pool that summer. That was one of the happiest summers of my life and, every so often, she tells a story about The Pool that I’d entirely forgotten about. Between the two of us we could remember what it was like being sixteen. Part of it, at least.
“It looks just like it used to,” I said.
Emily tilted her head in a polite way, as if she were curious. A pair of dimples punctured her cheeks and her blue eyes flashed. She sipped on her beer.
“I don’t really know what I’d expected,” she mused, finally. Then, “When’d you go to concerts?”
“My dad used to take me to them in high school. Marilyn Manson, Rob Zombie. Stuff like that.”
“I didn’t know that,” she said, half-accusingly, as if I’d been lying to her for years.
“You didn’t?”
A man stepped on-stage with a backwards hat and a pair of sunglasses. He waved to the crowd, which offered faint applause. The singer introduced his band-mates, the drummer, the bassist, the guitarist, each of whom walked onto the stage to almost no response whatsoever. They dove into their borrowed lives; they began with a classic Alice in Chains song and I was hopeful that, maybe, the séance could be true.
I only really knew four Alice in Chains songs: “Down in a Hole,” “No Excuses,” “Heaven Beside You,” and, “Would?” I remembered my Dad staying up late in the living room to listen of those four songs over and over. He was always drunk by the time night came around but you’d only know that if you really loved him. I asked him, once, what it was he liked about the band and he struggled with that, blustered vaguely for a time until, finally, ‘you can really hear the pain in the singer’s voice. He ended up killing himself, y’know, and you can hear that,’ he said.
The band played “No Excuses” and they did it right, just like the recording, as if they’d robbed a dead man’s grave.
You think it’s funny?
Well you’re drowning in it too
I remembered about Emily and looked to see how she was doing. A look of utter bewilderment had settled on her face.
“D’you wanna get outta here?” I asked.
“One hundred percent.”
The venue was in the middle of the block and knots of people flowed up and down the street, choosing the right bar. Muffled drum beats thumped in my ears. A few concert-goers defiantly smoked their cigarettes while their hands trembled from the cold. I wondered, if my Dad hadn’t finally died of alcoholism, if we would have gone to this. Would the music have sounded right then?
“So that was a waste of money,” I said.
“Sure,” she said, happily, “but what else was I going to do tonight?” She gestured widely, as if she didn’t have anything to lose.
“D’you wanna go to Jake’s?” I asked.
We went around the corner, to Jake’s. It was half-full and the bartender floated back and forth, pouring beers. Biggie Smalls played on the radio. I dropped my coat in my favorite booth, the one in the corner, where I can see the whole scene from a single point of view. I’ve had a lot of good nights in that booth. Bad nights, too, but those become good stories after a while.
Emily got the next round and we stayed out late talking about the concert, then about Joan Didion. With each drink our sentences got longer and more confused.
“D’you know what I mean?”
“For sure,” she said.
We laughed louder than the music and, after a while, I forgot about Dad, as if he’d been laid to rest.
Zack Austin lives in Omaha, Nebraska with his husband. He believes in pop culture. This is his first publication.