I Was Born for This(51)

‘Are you drunk?’ Rowan hisses at him. The slurring in Lister’s voice is unmistakable.

Lister narrows his eyes and frowns.

‘Probably,’ he says.

‘What the fuck?’ Rowan shakes his head.

Rowan pulls me away from the group and puts his hands on my shoulders.

‘I know a lot of shit’s happened this week,’ says Rowan in that very parental voice he puts on when I’m freaking out about something unnecessary, ‘and I know that makes your anxiety worse, but you’ve got to calm down. Nothing bad has happened to you, Jimjam. Nothing bad is happening to you.’

‘Everything’s bad.’

‘Nothing bad is going to happen to you.’

But it feels like it is.

‘I am not afraid,’ says Rowan softly. ‘Remember?’

‘I am not afraid,’ I whisper, but the second half of that quote, I was born for this, swirls around my mind and makes me want to run.

I can hear the rain outside. Wait – no. That’s not rain.

That’s the girls.

The screams mean that they are very happy that we are here.

I focus on the air a few metres ahead of me so that the hoard of fans goes blurry. We are standing at one end of the room and the fans are gathered in a roped queue that winds all the way around the room. I smile at the blur and salute at them, the things I always do. I faintly register Rowan waving on my right and Lister waving on my left. Lister calls out, asking them how they’re doing, but they just scream back at him. Lister says we’re looking forward to meeting them and we’ll be just behind this curtain and he hopes they’ve been having a good day so far and he hopes they’re looking forward to the concert tonight. And then we are turning away and walking behind the curtain and my smile can drop and once we’re totally out of sight Rowan is squeezing my hand but I’m gone, I’m already gone, I’m up above the three of us and gazing down at the three bodies and wondering who on Earth decided that these three pathetically flawed human beings deserved so much worship.

Then the first girl appears from the other side of the curtain and she is so happy. And we are so happy to meet you. Have you had a good day so far? Would you like to take a selfie?





They are so happy.

They look so much happier than they do in photos.

Jimmy’s smile is so wide – a youthful, dreamlike grin – as he gazes over the crowd, almost surprised even, surprised and happy that so many people would want to come here to see him. He’s wearing a hoodie with Donnie Darko on it. God. I love him. I love him.

Rowan’s smile is close-lipped but there is light in his eyes and he looks proud, so proud to be here, so proud of all the things that he and his two best friends have achieved throughout their lives together.

Lister is the one doing the talking this time. I’d hoped it’d be Jimmy, but I don’t mind really, not when Lister looks like Paradise itself, glowing, warm and alive.

They are so beautiful.

How could three people so beautiful exist in a world like this?

Once I have looked at them all separately, I look at the trio together. There is something inexplicable tying them together. Rowan and Lister stand symmetrically waving, Rowan always on Jimmy’s left and Lister always on Jimmy’s right. Both that little bit taller than Jimmy, who is the heart and the centre of The Ark. Rowan and Lister revolve around him like the three make up a solar system. I feel an inexplicable fear of them separating. Imagining them on their own is impossible.

Then they disappear behind the curtain. And all is right in the world.





I quickly lose count of how many people we’ve met and greeted and watched disappear again behind the curtain. We quickly find a routine where the three of us say exactly the same thing each time. The fan walks towards us, Lister says hey, how are you, they reply, Rowan answers them if they say anything that needs a response (for example, if they tell us how much they love us, or how we’ve changed their life, etc.), and then I say how glad we are that they came to see us. Then Rowan suggests he take the selfie, because he has the longest arms.

And then they’re gone.

And everything is fine. Everything is okay.

Rowan was right. Of course. Nothing is going to happen.

Almost everyone wishes me happy birthday. And a lot of the fans ask me what I did to my hand. I tell them I accidentally smashed a mug.

‘I heard about that online,’ says someone, which hits me so off guard that I fail to say anything in response, and Rowan has to quickly interrupt with another, ‘Do you want me to take a selfie? I have the longest arms!’

I have no idea how long we’ve been going when we’re offered a five-minute break. Sometimes we don’t take breaks when they offer them, but Rowan takes one look at me and says, ‘Yeah, just five minutes, if that’s all right,’ and someone gives me a bottle of water, which I drink half of in about ten seconds.

Lister sits down on the floor.

‘How you doing?’ Rowan murmurs to me.

‘Fine,’ I say.

I want to tell him about Lister and that I’m terrified of the fans and what’s the point of being in a band when all it’s doing is causing us misery?

‘Really?’ he says.

‘Yeah. It’s fine.’

He seems to believe me.