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“Get going, Vince,” Priya mumbles, snapping me out of my reverie.
She’s wearing yoga pants and a loose linen blouse the color of marigolds that accentuates her dark skin. She sneers at me with her massive dark eyes as she ties her long, jet-black hair into a ponytail. Priya lived in India with her parents until they moved to Manchester when she was eleven. When she’s irritated with me, her accent peeks out.
“I am,” I mumble, feeling petulant. Priya and I haven’t dated in over twenty-five years, but she still makes me feel like a useless boyfriend sometimes.
“Look alive! It’s Boston! Isn’t that where the American Revolution happened?” Apollo asks, unbuttoning the collar of his Hawaiian shirt.
“Dunno, probably,” Henry adds.
“You realize the lot of us barely finished college,” I quip.
We started the band when we were twenty. Priya was eighteen, still finishing up her GCSEs. By the time Priya turned twenty-two, we were on the cover of every music magazine and playing shows on every continent, except Antarctica-where we had to turn down a gig.
“Doesn’t mean we can’t be life-long learners,” Henry adds.
“For the last time, if you want to get your writing degree online, apply!” Priya calls over her shoulder.
Despite his current lack of a permanent address, Henry has been investigating online writing programs and droning on about how it’s never too late to learn new things. He has always been the most studious among us. It makes sense; as the drummer, he’s the logical and literal beating heart of the band. He keeps us in time and in line.
Priya’s on vocals and keys while Apollo plays rhythm guitar, and I play bass. My sound is most prominent in our first two albums since that’s when we were exploring funk fusion.
Since it’s our reunion tour for our first record,Glass Eyes, I need to bring my A-game. For this tour, I’m the beating heart of the band. I’m the one responsible for moving us through sound and genres. It’s a lot of pressure, and I’m already starting to feel the stress.
Lyndsey pops her head back into the bus. “Y’all ready?” she asks, glasses slipping down onto the bridge of her nose.
I watch her as she shoves them back up, then zips up the black hoodie she always travels in. I like how nonchalant Lyndsey is. It’s refreshing. Most twenty-seven-year-olds would throw themselves at my feet the moment we met, but Lyndsey just shook my hand and asked me to confirm if my rider was a case of Kombucha and red hots.
As tour manager, it’s her job to ensure each venue reads over our contracts and provides us with the supplies we need to put on a show, which includes our favorite candy. It’s weird how fame makes normalcy feel like a luxury.
When normal transforms into luxury hotels and complimentary bottles of champagne, someone not actively fawning over me feels like a treat. Lyndsey is the first person to make me feel normal in three decades.
The venue is cavernous. Our footsteps echo into the rafters as we make our way onto the stage for soundcheck. Lyndsey assured us that the last of our gear was loaded in and ready for us. I grab my guitar, a seafoam green Fender Squire, and find comfort as the worn strap settles on my shoulder.
No one ever expects tour to be monotonous. While the thrill of the crowd is exhilarating, I find comfort in the quiet consistencies that lead up to a show. I strum a couple of scalesand feel the metal strings vibrate beneath my fingers; the same feeling since I was fourteen.
Playing bass always feels like Christmas morning. Maybe I’ve spent my whole life trying to recreate the awe of unwrapping my first Stratocaster on an overcast Christmas morning fraught with emotions in Manchester.
We each put in our in-ear monitors, and Jeni, our sound girl, waves from her seat at the sound booth.
“How is it so far?” she asks into the microphone.
“I’m gonna need more vocals from Priya!” I say.
Jeni nods and fiddles with the levels. Henry plays a lazy beat while Apollo tunes his guitar. We play covers of the songs we loved as teenagers: seventies punk songs, John Denver, Bowie. We play for each other, and it almost feels like we’re back in Priya’s brother’s basement, trying to mold a cohesive sound in a room dominated by a waterlogged washing machine and bright orange shag carpet.
When we finish soundcheck, we hustle back into the green room: a cinderblock cave with cool tile floors and a velvet couch. Lyndsey crouches in the corner, eating complimentary root chips and answering emails.
“I’m going to grab a coffee; come with me?” Priya asks Lyndsey. Lyndsey looks up and blinks in a daze.
“You’re sure you want to risk it?” she asks.
Priya shrugs. “I want real caffeine more than I don’t want people to bother me.” She grins conspiratorially at Lyndsey, who passes Priya her hoodie to reveal her surprisingly toned arms.
She’s wearing a black short-sleeved T-shirt. She sports a pigeon tattoo in the American traditional style on her bicep. On closer inspection, I see it’s carrying a realistic heart in its beak. I catch myself staring as Priya shrugs the hoodie onto her shoulders and zips it up to her chin before stuffing her hair into a baseball cap.
Lyndsey hands her a pair of oversized sunglasses. “Now, it’s a real disguise.”
Priya grins. She’s loved having another woman on tour. She says that she’s officially no longer outnumbered thanks to Lyndsey and Jeni.
