Page 100 of Trusting You
East takes the stage, all ropey and casual in a leather jacket, tight ripped black jeans you wouldn’t catch me dead in, and long hair pulled back in a man-bun you also would never kill me in and style my corpse with.
His layers of silver necklaces clank through the speakers as he takes a seat on the stool Green Mile dragged over in front of the mic, and East’s fingers, covered in various skull and bone rings, lift up his acoustic guitar, shining black like an oil slick under the spotlight.
If Ash is the tattoo lord, East here is the demon lord.
“Hey all,” he says, and I feel Carter start against my chest. She’s inched closer to me due to the crowd pushing us forward, and I want to lay my palms on her shoulders and stroke down.
She’s affected by East’s voice, all smooth and slow. I try not to lose my eyeballs in the back of my head on their roll over. Part of me hoped Carter would be different, but of course, the allure of East is hard to avoid, unless you’re a heterosexual dude.
That’s all he says before strumming a few notes on his guitar. Typical. After five-ish years of friendship, I’m lucky if I squeeze a few sentences out of him, but I’m aware he suffers from anxiety. It’s an irony he hasn’t missed, considering he and his bandmates recently sold out their first venue in LA. Poor guy is about to be more famous than a boy band, and fuck knows how he’s going to cope with it.
I guess that’s why he’s got us.
Soon, he’s quieted the room. It’s an impossible gift, one that floors me each time. Just my former dorm neighbor, East, playing his guitar and singing a tune, yet he can lay silence across a crowd as quickly as an incoming storm. His lyrics are addicting, and half the time I don’t know it, but I’m bobbing my head along, Ash knocking out the beat with his fist on the bar top, and Ben strumming the tune with his fingers on his thigh.
Carter sways, her ass scraping across the front of my pants and I grit my teeth. That perfect peach of hers is molding to my dick, ripe for squeezing, and I search for the cool quench of a beer before I remember I can’t have that, so signal for another tonic instead.
I’m knocked in the back as I raise my arm, and I hook my other around Carter’s waist to stay balanced.
“Hey, man,” I say over my shoulder. “Watch it.”
He looks at me with wide eyes, and I turn so I can see him better. “Wasn’t me. It’s coming all the way from the back.”
I crane my neck. “What’s coming?”
Bouncers are against the wall, telling people to “move back, move back!” Yet the clusters of girls aren’t listening and screeching to get closer.
When I raised my arm for a drink, I didn’t notice how far away from the bar we’d come, how we’re being shifted closer to the stage. Crammed, more like.
“Locke?” I hear Carter say, and I bend my ear to her. “I don’t like this.”
“Me neither,” I mumble and keep her tight against me.
I scan the crowd for Ben, who’s been moved a few people away from us. He meets my stare and nods. “Fandamonium. We need to get out of here.”
“Come on,” I say to Carter, and try to spin her with me, but we’re getting crushed, hands palming my back, pushing.
“Back off,” I growl at nobody in particular.
Carter spins so she’s flush against my chest, holding on. I’m looking for Ash, and since we’re taller than most, I can spot him, still near the bar. Somehow, the fucker remained where he was, probably through intimidation alone. He crooks a finger for us to come to him.
“Yeah, how?” I mouth, but I’m navigating the crowd sideways, pulling Carter along with me, gaining closer traction to Ben.
East is still singing, but he flubs words. He never flubs words. I risk a glance at the stage and see him rising from the stool, pacing back, away from reaching hands and screams that get closer and closer.
Bouncers have arrived, but despite their girth, they’re doing nothing to quell the tide.
Green Mile fights onto the stage and roars into the mic, “Get the fuck back, people, or he’s leaving the stage! Hear me? The night’s over if you don’t behave your damn selves.”
No one’s listening. East has already hooked the guitar under one arm and is escaping the stage, three or four security types ushering him down.
As he’s stepping behind the stage, East looks up, finds me. Come this way, he mouths, and I shake my head over the masses of hair and bodies. There’s no way Carter and I can get to him, and he’s got to go, get out of sight. Maybe that’ll calm everyone down.
I shoo him away, giving him permission to leave. Ben and I have it covered. I think.
He’s at my side, using an arm to help shield Carter, and we’re on the move at a turtle’s pace. People are getting angry, demanding East return to the stage. Ash storms toward us, his expression the eye of a hurricane, and takes my other side.
“We got you,” I murmur to Carter when I hear her whimper. “Nothing’s gonna happen. We’re getting out.”
Her nails dig into my pecs, but she’s moving in time with us, though her face is buried in my shirt. She doesn’t want to look, see the anger cross everyone’s faces, the hysteria building.
Fuck. Green Mile got it wrong. He underestimated East’s fame in this tiny-ass bar in the middle of Nowhere, Brooklyn. We underestimated it.
Glass breaks. Screams and shouts build. Then, the worst thing happens.
A shot rings out.
“Fuck!” I roar, before every realm of hell breaks loose and lands in this bar.