Columbia

Footsteps and rustling shattered my already delicate sleep. I had forgotten where I was. Eye wide open, everything pitch black and unfamiliar. Momentary confusion consumed my mental resources while I palmed the surroundings. And, as the reality of being on the bus flooded back into me so did the realization of a compound hangover. I could only laugh, peeling the curtain open to let the morning light bombard my senses. I rolled out of the bunk, almost losing my balance before landing on my feet. I braced a hand on each wall, walking down the bus like I was inside a ship on rough waters. It was a small miracle when I discovered the fridge stocked full of sugar-free Red Bulls. I would find out later Jeff had managed to swing a deal with a Red Bull rep.

Tucker had been the source of the noise. He was setting up his laptop on his table. I tried to hide my agony as a stumbled by, grunting in place of morning pleasantries. Stepping off the bus, the southern air was thick but hollow as if god was rationing out oxygen. I finished the red bulls before finding the hotel room. A knock on the door revealed that Charlie was already awake.

“Sup dude, how was your night?” He said, going back to packing up his suitcase.

“Ugh, okay. Bar was too busy. Lots of beer, though.” I closed the bathroom door behind me. Unzipping my toiletry bag, I stared into the mirror. My reflection avoided making eye contact. It’s a good thing because I had some words for him about repeated bad decisions. If insanity is doing the same thing over again and expecting a different result, what do you call doing the same thing over again knowing you’ll get the same agonizing result?

Sociopathy?

After showering and dressing, I walked down to the van to see most of the crew had left their luggage against the rear door. I lifted the suitcases in between seats where they would fit. My body shook in poisoned defiance with every movement.  I stepped back on the bus to take another six red bulls. I hoped one for every hour of the drive would suffice.

Dave was sitting just inside the door. He handed me a day sheet, which outlined all the pertinent details leading up to the night’s show. “Have a good night’s rest?”

“Yeah,” I lied, “slept in my bunk.”

“Glad to hear it. You’ve got a long drive ahead of you. You should stop half way and grab a quick bite to eat, stretch your legs and all that.”

I feigned enthusiasm with a grin that hid gritted teeth, “Will do. I’ll see you in a few hours.”

I waited for five minutes until Jace climbed into the passenger seat. He laid out a bag full of drinks, energy bars and other assorted food. “I grabbed a bunch of stuff in case we need it.”

“My man,” I said pulling out onto the highway.

The sun shone with mid-day intensity but from a horizontal morning plane – one of those late August days when nature basks in the pinnacle of its maturity. Butterflies extended their wings, flashing their utmost brilliance before becoming plastered slime on the windshield with an anti-climatic thud.

“God, this drive is going to suck,” I sipped from my red bull.

Jace agreed twisting the radio dial to find something resembling music. “I wish I had an i-pod adapter. These stations only play crap.”

“You kids and your technology.”

“Shut up, dude. Everybody has an i-pod, even old people like you.”

“Watch it. You keep up with comments like that, and I’ll fall asleep at the wheel to kill us both.”

“Whatever, I could take over driving. I drive these fifteen passenger vans for tours all the time back home. I’m a runner. Music acts come to town and hire me for a day to run errands.”

“What?” I crushed the empty can and tossed it into the back. “You do this shit for living? Why the hell am I driving then? My skills would be much better served guarding the beer cooler.”

Jace put his feet up on the dash, “I’m not twenty-five. They wont let me drive the van for insurance reasons.”

“I’m sure they just think I’m the better driver. They know I’ll be responsible and trust me with such an important job.” I weaved the van into the left lane and around a car. “So, is that how you got the job on this tour then? Because you had experience?”

Jace’s trademark mischievous look grew across his face, “Sort of. Except I applied to be tour manager and bullshitted a little bit about my experience. They were interested at first until they went the professional route and hired Dave. Then they called me a week before we started and said they had a new spot open up as a gopher because someone got fired last minute.”

“They did can a guy who wasn’t pulling his weight. Man, we would have been proper-fucked if they hired you as tour manager.”

Jace laughed still fiddling with the radio to make it play something that wasn’t gospel. “Yeah, we would have been screwed. I just really want to work in the music touring business but there’s no way I could have done Dave’s job. Tucker would have killed me.” He turned the volume to zero, “fuck, is all the music about jesus down here?”

“What’s the matter, is your jew-guilt getting to you?” Jace threw an empty chip bag at me. I threw it back at him, “Don’t you fucking start with me, you little shit.”

Jace reclined his seat back, “I hope I can learn a lot from Dave. I’m going to be, like, his assistant on this tour. Then I can get on another tour when were done, a music tour. If I don’t, I’ll be pissed off.”

“Sounds like you have a little crush on Dave. But, seriously, you’ll make it happen if you want it enough. Dave knows his shit. I can’t imagine a better manager to learn from. That’s both the best and worst part about following a dream, you’re invested in it. When things go right, you actually get a genuine chemical high from it, like you might experience in a relationship and unlike the cheap, fleeting high drugs can buy you. But when things go wrong, you actually get depressed. It makes a good argument for taking the safe route and chaining yourself to a cubicle. At least then you don’t give a shit one way or another what happens. There are no emotions aside from empty ones such as irritation with coworkers, boredom arising from monotony and stress to meet deadlines.  It’s just something you do between eating, fucking and drinking your face off, or raising kids or whatever is important to you. But, I wager that in the long run you’re better off dealing with the momentary setbacks and heartaches in favor of a more fulfilling existence.  Do what you love, love what you do and all that stuff.”

“You love dudes, and love doing them too.”

“Goddamnit Jace, I’m teaching you a life lesson here.”

Jace folded his arms and shifted lower in his seat until the back of his knees curled up onto the dashboard. “I need some sleep. I’m still tired from drinking last night.”

“Those few sips of beers were killer, huh? You had, what, six gulps and I think you chugged three of them.”

“Shut up,” Jace muttered turning his head away and closing his eyes.

He slept for the next three hours. I drove along in silence, too bothered to dick around with the radio. The caffeine did an adequate job at keeping me awake, but sent my thoughts spinning into high gear. Rubber and pavement hummed beneath my feet as I found myself in disbelief – was this really happening? Am I really driving a van through godknowswhere USA to a destination I couldn’t point out on a map? This is what I live for. No time to really stop and think. No stagnation. Everything was in motion and not even exhaustion could catch up to me.

There is a difference between exhaustion and fatigue. It’s like putting money on your credit card. Fatigue is the interest. You can skirt by from day to day as long as you make small deposits in the form of fitful naps. Exhaustion is the outstanding principle balance that accumulates as you withdraw more and more. Eventually there will come a day when you have to pay it down, and when you’re stretching the limit like I was not even a quarter of a way through the tour, the process of reimbursing your body is an ugly hybrid of hibernation and detox.

My body’s sleep mechanisms kicked about halfway through the trip. Forgoing the whole nodding off and startling awake from the rumble strips dance, I pulled over at a rest stop. Jace sat up sensing the van had come to a stop.

He cleared his throat, “Are we close?”

“Half-way. I’m stopping to take a leak.” I stepped out of the van. The large shrubs near the side of road offered a superior alternative to the undoubtedly disgusting truck stop urinal. The sun had risen directly above us blasting away any shadows. I jogged down a gravel pathway a couple hundred yards and back, drinking a warm redbull. When the blood was sufficiently moving, we headed out on the road. Jace’s nap served him well. He was awake now and we felt like we were on the final stretch, even if that stretch was over two hundred miles.

I propped the wheel with my knee while opening an energy bar. “Remind me to stop at a hardware store. Jeff said we need some tape to designate the press and reserved seats for the showings.”

“What kind of tape?” Jace took the final sip from a vitamin water.

“He said something like yellow caution tape, but without caution written on it.”

“Dude, just get red velvet ribbon from a craft store. That’s what they use in the music business. VIP shit.”

“Good idea,” I said, watching Jace climb in between the front seats to the back row. “What are you doing?”

“I gotta piss. I’ll use this bottle,” He held up the empty vitamin water bottle.

“We just fucking stopped a few minutes ago. Why didn’t you piss then? Don’t use a bottle. I’ll stop again soon.” Before I finished the distinct hollow sound of urine flowing into a bottle filled the van. “For fucksakes.”

Jace finished up and climbed back into the passenger seat. “What? Stop being a baby. It’s just piss. You want a sip?” He extended the bottle toward me. “It’s warm.”

“I swear to god, if that bottle so much as touches me, I will beat the living shit out of you.”

The next ten minutes involved Jace motioning the bottle toward me, and me swinging my fist wildly in his direction. The car behind us probably wondered why the driver in the large white van was swerving irately at the threat of apple juice. It wasn’t apple juice, you shitty Prius driving hippie! It was piss. Warm piss. Warm jew piss.

The long drive gave us plenty of time to put distance between ourselves and the bus. At the hotel, I put everyone’s luggage in their rooms and took a shower before the bus pulled up. I would have done the UPS run but we had a meeting about the next day’s show in Raleigh, NC. A large scale protest was being planned because, apparently, I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell and Tucker Max promote rape culture.

We met in an empty hotel conference room after everybody had a few minutes to settle in. It was nice to be on time for a meeting. The gist was pretty simple: don’t engage the protesters and if approached be professional and say “we’re only there to do a job.” In other words, don’t give the protesters more reason to bitch. There were some other details to go over, but I needed to hit the UPS store.

I took off alone since everyone was still in the meeting. At the UPS there were thirty or so boxes, more than usual. An order of Beer Pong kits had come in too, and I needed to use every square inch of space, cramming boxes right up to the ceiling to make them fit. On the way back, I pulled into a crafts store and picked up some kickass velvet ribbon, smooth as Aphrodite’s breasts, red as the lust that courses through her heart . Crafts stores are creepy. There’s so much pent up sexual frustration that a single mention of “boner” would send the whole place, and their Garfield knitting patterns, into a mass orgy. Gray hair, repressed desires, old ladies making out, hard. Thick hardened tongues containing just enough saliva to make them sticky as they tenderly explored each crevice on wrinkled faces. Whoa, holy shit.

I made it back to the hotel at 3:20pm giving me ten minutes to change before our 3:30pm roll out. I couldn’t remember the room number, so I had to dick around at the front desk for a couple of minutes, which delayed me. At 3:33pm I received the following text from Dave as I put my shoes on:

“Wake up sunshine are you coming down bro?”

Wake up? As in, from sleeping. I almost cried. Most people used the time between arrival and the show for a nap. Not Chris. I swallowed the distress down into my stomach with a mental note to kill it with beer in a couple of hours.

The setup at the theater went smoothly.  Jeff walked in as we were draping the last swag bags over the seats. I remembered the red ribbon and handed one of the spools to him.

Jeff spun the spool around in his hand with a raised eyebrow, “This is about the worst thing you could have bought.”

“Really?” Fucking Jace and his stupid velvet ribbon idea.

“Yeah, I want something cheap that we can throw away after each show.” He put the ribbon into his backpack. “Not a huge deal. I’ll keep it in case we have some use for it.”

I did a beer run a took a bucket full of ice from the movie theater to top off the cooler. Tucker and Nils were discussing ways to fuck with the protestors the next day. I offered them each a beer. Tucker nodded in approval. “You’re getting better, finally starting to think ahead. Things like getting our luggage into the rooms. That’s the difference between an amateur and a professional. Look at Dave, for example. He knows his shit inside and out and is thinking twenty steps ahead at all times. He’s already hired off-duty police officers for the show tomorrow to guard the bus so nobody vandalizes it. We’re also going to remove all the pint glasses from the swag in case somebody tries to throw one at us on stage. The chances of any of that happening are basically zero, but considering them can be the difference between success and failure. You might only be driving a van, but you’re in the trenches and that’s where it all begins for the rest of us. Keeping things stocked, getting the swag on time, setting up for the show, it all contributes to the larger goal.”

Nils laughed, “I even saw him out in the Florida heat, shirtless and emptying boxes the other day.”

I thought about making a ripped like a Greek God joke but instead thanked them for noticing and went to the back while I was ahead. I saw the second spool of red ribbon in my bunk. I put it on the bus’s kitchen counter up front in case Jeff wanted to keep that one in his backpack too.

During the pre-show I handed out beer pong kits to the fans who told the best stories. It beat sitting alone on the bus, drinking to stay awake. Or did it? Jace had our food ready when the movie started rolling. As we ate, Jeff went to the fridge. He saw the red ribbon spool sitting on the counter.

“What the hell?” He picked it up. “Is this ribbon stalking me? I thought I threw it out.”

Tucker glanced up from his meal, “Why the fuck do you have red ribbon?”

“I asked our Canadian to pick up some tape to block off press seats. This is what he brought back?”

“Are you fucking serious?” Tucker shouted, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Red ribbon. What the fuck are you going to give them a present too?”

The bus filled with laughter as Jeff grabbed the end of the ribbon and sent the spool rolling down the aisle. It unraveled for twelve feet before coming to a stop. Jeff looked at it both amused and astonished. “Griffin, not only did you buy some faggy red ribbon, but there’s only twelve feet of it. What do you expect me to do with this?”

“Oh my god,” Tucker pounded a fist on the table.

I fought back a smile knowing I had to deadpan the next line with a hint of enthusiasm for maximum effectiveness. I put my burger down, and turned to Jeff, “That’s why I bought two of them.”

Tucker threw up his arms, Jeff shook his head, and I did my best Canadian moose caught in headlights impression. Jeff took the ribbon and looped it under Corman’s chin, tying a big bow on top of his shaved head. Corman smiled proudly before removing the ribbon and handing it to me as I walked by. I threw the tangled red mess into the trash, the perfect metaphor for my heart. Stupid jerks.

To my disappointment, I was given bus duty (or as I came to think of it “beer drinking duty”) for the post-show. When Jeff came back to the bus with the press who were waiting for interviews, I went into the theater to tear everything down and take it back to the bus. Tucker and Nils were still signing stuff for the fans. Ben was taking fan pictures while Charlie and I lugged sound equipment. We couldn’t help but notice Jace sitting in a front row theater seat bullshitting with Dave and Nils.

“Lazy fucker,” I grumbled to Charlie who returned an agreeable nod.

After picking up Jerry and taking him to the theater, I met the bus back at the hotel. A few random sluts had found their way on. It was becoming a common sight – usually a group of girls who were waiting for their one friend to finish fucking Tucker. Sometimes there were groupies looking to experience the “rock star” lifestyle, not quite aware there were no rockstars of any sort on board (unless you count air-guitar). Rarely there was a nice, normal girl who had somehow been swept up but that wasn’t the case this night.

I sat down beside a wide-faced brunette with a pronounced chin and thick eyebrows. She wasn’t unattractive, sort of cute in that Eugene Levy way. I struck up a conversation and within seconds it was apparent she was looking to fuck. Not specifically me, but really anyone within arm’s length. I made pleasant conversation but I couldn’t get over the overbearing smell of peanuts, or was it more like peanut butter? I didn’t even realize peanuts had a distinct smell, but there it was. I looked around for a source. Nothing there, only her. Had she been eating gross quantities of peanuts? Was it some strange manifestation of body odor? She put her hand on my thigh in response to a joke I made. It stayed there. I looked down at it imagining free airline snacks or feeding an elephant at the circus.

“I’ve got a big drive tomorrow,” I exaggerated a sigh, standing up. “I better pack it in.” I walked to the cooler and took out a beer for the hotel room. The bus door opened and Jeff stepped on. He was well into the booze. “Have you met Jeff Waldman?” I said back at the peanuts girl.

She smiled. Jeff took a fresh beer before falling down beside her and proceeding to insult her in his own charming, drunk way. At one point on tour, Nils had said the key to getting any girl you want is not to give a fuck whether you get her or not. In Jeff’s case, this worked time and again. Girls would weather a barrage of insults, only to emerge more intent than ever on sleeping with him. In every case, one factor was consistent: Jeff clearly did not give a fuck.

I went to the hotel room and watched adult swim until the beer was done. I brushed my teeth, turned off the tv, turned out the lights and set my phone for 7:30am. Dave wanted to leave extra early to give us plenty of time to prepare for the protesters. It was only a four hour drive to Raleigh. The possibility for five and a half hours sleep brought a smile to my face as I closed my eyes, drifting off to sleep wondering why peanuts?