Page 28 of The Comedown

But wait…

“Up there? What does that mean?”

Without another word, Collette shoves past me, and I’m held hostage by her ass swaying forcefully from all that attitude she’s working to contain. Remind me to piss her off more often ’cause fuck.

“Can you do this?” Bruce asks, and I scoff, not taking my eyes off Collette.

Slade appears, tossing a cup of cold water at my face, making me finally look away. No questions, no underestimating. He knows what’s up. I can turn it on when needed.

“Let’s go, boys,” I tell them both, pushing past and on to the stage. Axel’s already getting situated at the drums when he stops to throw me a glare.

I flip him off, grinning from ear to ear. “What? I’m here, motherfucker.”

How did I get here?

The crowd erupts in absolute mayhem, and without even needing to see her performance for myself, I can tell Collette fucking killed it. The energy in the stadium helps clear my head, and I shake the last drops of water from my face, grabbing my mic stand to drag it downstage.

Spread out around the place are lit-up ten-foot tall plastic jewels. Some are around the pit and some are hanging over the stands. They all cycle through different shades of jewel tones though, blinking in harmony with each other. It all looks so much better than they made it sound when the concept was explained to me.

I should’ve came earlier to enjoy it when no one was here. Damn it.

“What the fuck is up, San Diego?” I yell, smiling when everybody rocks the building on its foundation. “Give it up one more time for the one and only Collette!”

The roar surges so high, I wince, remembering my earpieces too late. I need to be able to hear, but not this damn much.

I gesture to someone offstage, and not a moment later, they’re brought out to me.

“I don’t know if you’ve heard, but Collette and I actually made a song together.”

Together? Ha! She wrote her lyrics and had her people send it to mine, then I filled in the rest with my pieces and sent it back, except I sent it to Collette directly. She never responded though. Instead, she had her own producer record her parts without any heads up beforehand. I ended up having to record mine afterward, but with a different producer—the one my label wanted me to use. The whole experience was…disappointing. I wanted to be in the studio myself to watch her as she sang in the booth. I wanted her to watch me spit my bars. I’ve made plenty of other tracks the same way, but with Collette, I wanted it to be…I don’t know…more personal.

Now I’m finally getting my wish, and I can only feel one of my legs and half of my fingers.

Fuck. I never should’ve taken that pill Slade gave me. I don’t even know what the pill was, just that it made me feel like a fucking zombie. A super horny zombie. And judging by Collette’s reaction to the grope sesh I didn’t bother getting permission for—fucking oops—I took it too far.

The crowd finally calms, so I take my cue, telling them, “Since this is our first time performing it together, I thought yinz could help start us off.” This always buys me time. Whenever I can’t remember lyrics, I just have the fans sing them to me. They pay me, but then they sing to me. Unfortunately, I still gotta stand up here and act like I give a shit. Like I love hearing twelve thousand people butchering the fuck out of lyrics I originally butchered the fuck out of in hopes my label would actually approve them. What a fucking world.

The crowd breaks into the intro at all different times, so I make a joke of it, having them start over again. By the third time, we’re all laughing and I’ve got both legs and most of my fingers in working order again. I swear my eyelids aren’t even attached to my face because my eyes are so dry it’s like blinking through a wasteland.

We finally get the intro right, but with no sign of Collette, I start to think she’s blowing me off out of spite for missing rehearsal.

The first verse approaches, then her voice comes through loud and clear. I scan the stage, searching for her, but don’t spot her anywhere.

Where is she?

A commotion in the crowd pulls my attention away to see the blue hair she’s wearing again in the middle of a group of people. A group…of fans. Fuuuck. She’s not supposed to be down there, especially without a bodyguard within reach, and no, those Rent-A-Cops the stadium hires for the night don’t fucking count. They’re about as helpful as one-ply toilet paper.

Every nerve ending in my body fires to life, burning off any last bit of haziness, and I jump straight off the stage, landing on both feet. Multiple shouts go off behind me, but I’m already walking for her. I don’t give a fuck. Follow me or don’t, but I’m going to Collette.

I fight to keep my steps slow and calculated even though all I want to do is run. Fans are like flies at the first whiff of shit, they can smell slip-ups a mile away. If I had attended rehearsal, this shit wouldn’t be happening right now, I can guarantee that. Not unless I had Bare here to personally escort Collette off and back on the stage to me.

I stage-dive all the time, sometimes without Bare nearby, but that’s me and I don’t care if I get hurt. I don’t even consider it a good show if I’m not bleeding afterward, but Collette getting hurt…

I’ll have someone’s head if she so much as gets a scratch on her.

Just as we’re about to jump into our first shared chorus, I take off, jogging up to her to take her hand in mine. With a yank, she’s against me, between my arms, and I can breathe again. She can punish me all she wants for touching her without asking later, but for now, she couldn’t pry my hands off her if she tried. Nobody could.

We lose ourselves to the lyrics, the crowd around us simultaneously singing along and screaming at our proximity—both to each other and them.