Rock All Night(12)

Killian laughed.

“Soooo… what about Riley?”

“Well, Killian moved in with Derek – ”

I looked over at Killian in shock. “In that house? You’re kidding me.”

“It wasn’t that bad,” Derek snapped.

“It was terrible,” Ryan laughed.

“It was a place to stay,” Killian said diplomatically.

“You don’t… still live there, do you?” I asked.

“Fuck no,” Riley said. “They were crampin’ my style.”

Ryan smiled. “We bought separate houses – much nicer houses – a while back. Anyway, we started looking for drummers, but there weren’t really any great ones around Athens or Atlanta. Anybody really good was already in a bigger band.”

“I said we should go to New York and have a look around there,” Killian said.

“So we road-tripped up to New York City. We stayed in this horrible flea-bag hotel – ”

“It was fine,” Killian said mildly.

“You had a bed all to yourself. I had to sleep next to him,” Ryan complained as he pointed at Derek.

“Woooo! Didja tap that ass, Ryan?” Riley hooted.

“We don’t kiss and tell,” Derek said, in a voice that suggested he was keeping a secret.

“No I did not,” Ryan said emphatically.

“Didja tap Ryan’s ass, D?”

“Wellllll – ”

“NO,” Ryan said. “Shut up, both of you. Anyway, Killian had played a lot of shows with some American bands during Gobsmacked’s tour, and he couldn’t stop talking about this one crazy chick in a punk rock band.”

Killian leaned forward. “What was the name of that group again, luv?”

“* Killz,” Riley said matter-of-factly. “With a ‘z.’”

Figures.

“So we go to see… um, that band on Friday night, and she gets up on stage,” Ryan said, jerking his thumb at Riley. “And she just blew us away.”

“The rest of the band kind of sucked, but she was awesome,” Derek agreed. “We figured we’d play her some stuff we’d rerecorded with Killian – songs that were ten times better than what we’d used to get him onboard, and a hundred times better than anything her band could do. Then she’d say ‘okay’ and we’d get our drummer. Easy.”

“So we write her a note and send it backstage, and ask if we can buy her a drink afterwards,” Killian said, “and explain our proposition. It was a perfectly lovely note. And she writes back over the original text in big red letters, Fuck off. That’s her answer.”

I looked at Riley. She shrugged.

“I saw ‘em from up on stage. I thought they were f*ckin’ weirdos. Nobody at our shows ever looked like them.”

“Yeah, it was an unusually large crowd of bull dykes,” Derek said.

“And every one of ‘em had a bigger dick than you,” Riley jeered.

Derek just laughed at her.

Killian blew out a mouthful of smoke. “So Derek, being Derek, goes and asks the bartender what the drummer of * Killz likes to drink. Then he buys a fifth of whiskey off him and proceeds to bully his way backstage.”


“The whole band was in there, sitting around the table in this shitty dressing room, and I went in there and slammed the Jack down and said, ‘We want you in our band,’” Derek said.

“Just like with Killian,” I recalled.

“Yeah, except – ”

“I told ‘em to f*ck off again,” Riley grinned. “But I drank their booze.”

“We tried to talk to her, but she just kept telling us to f*ck off,” Derek laughed. “It was like, ‘Fuck off. Fuck off. Fuuuuck off. FUCK off. FUCK OFF. Fuck… off.’ Two dozen different ways to say ‘f*ck off.’”

“Literally?” I asked.

“Oh yeah,” Derek nodded. “I’d say, ‘We heard you play.’ She’d nod and say, ‘Fuck off.’ ‘We think you’re really good – ’ ‘Yeah? Fuck off.’ ‘We’ve got a really unusual sound – can we let you hear some of our songs?’ ‘Um – FUCK OFF.’ It was the first time in my life I ever wanted to punch a chick.”

“You woulda drawn back a bloody stump, *,” Riley smirked.

“Anyway, I left her a CD we’d burned, and we just walked out, figuring that was that,” Ryan said.

“And I stole the Jack Daniels bottle back and told her to go drink on somebody else’s dime,” Derek said.

“Yeah, I was pissed about that,” Riley laughed.

Derek pointed at her. “But that was what made you listen to the CD.”

She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. “Hardly.”

“Anyway, so we go to a bunch of other shows and talk to some other drummers, but none of them are interested in moving down to Athens,” Ryan continued. “We go back home five days later, all depressed – ”

“And who walks out of my house when we finally drive up but this bitch right here,” Derek said, pointing at Riley.

I stared at her. “You were in his house?”

She frowned defensively. “I needed someplace to stay.”