Arrowhead Stadium, Kansas – Saturday Evening, March 11, 1989
They had seats on the floor in the third row, compliments of Yannie’s brother. The stage was set in grand style for the visual and lighting special effects—a huge circular white screen encircled with spotlights stretched across the entire stage and towered to the ceiling. The stadium went pitch black. Lighters were flicked and danced as fireflies in the midnight sky. Neon blue, purple, and pink swords of light crisscrossed the open air. A clapper bell pierced with a deafening clang. The tubular xylophone beat as flashes of the band appeared. The circular screen transformed to pinkish-red—white orb in its luminous center burst diffused rays of gaseous colored light—a still image of an exploding nebula. With raised arms, the crowd cheered—souls on fire.
One slip and down the hole we fall . . .
Cymbals clanged, drums beat, synthesizer wailed, vocals echoed in the cavernous stadium—
Was it love, or was it the idea of being in love?
Or was it the hand of fate that seemed to fit just like a glove?
The moment slipped by and soon the seeds were sown
The year grew late and neither wanted to be alone
The crowd cheered as the synthesized symphony reached its crescendo. As abruptly as the clanging bell that set the music in motion, the end came with a boom of the drum.
“Come on, let’s go,” Yannie said rising from his seat. He flashed three official looking cards attached to lanyards and gave one to Jerry and Freddie.
“Backstage passes?” Jerry said with amazement.
“Get to hang with the groupies,” Yannie said over his shoulder as he weaved his way through the crowd. After passing through the security check, they were in a hallway that led down the side of the stadium. Reaching the end, they turned left. Several football-player-sized men with taut, neon-yellow T-shirts stenciled with bold SECURITY milled outside a closed door. Ronnie flashed his backstage pass and nodded towards the door.
“This the backstage party?” Yannie asked.
The beefy fullback checked their passes and nodded down the hall. “Two doors down,” he said with a baritone voice.
Two security guards blocked the door. One of them smiled at Yannie. “Hey, good to see ya, Yannie. How long’s it been?”
“Fleetwood Mac— ’87. You don’t remember?” Yannie said.
“Do that, for sure. You want in? This is the groupie party.”
Jerry was wide-eyed with anticipation, basking in Yannie’s “celebrity” recognition. The guard opened the door and a light fog of pungent smoke wafted into the hall. The room was decorated with Pink Floyd memorabilia—posters from past concerts, a blow-up pink pig hung from the ceiling, a life-size banner of a person screaming from “The Wall.” As they entered, the groupies parted and looked at the three college students as if they were from another planet. Actually, the groupies looked like they were from another planet—possibly the dark side of the moon. Like walking into the bar in Star Wars, Jerry didn’t fit into this alien party. All were dressed or adorned with skin art that displayed some reference to the iconic group—a long-legged girl wearing cutoff shorts displayed half her buns, one back thigh tattooed “Pink” the other with “Floyd” and two girls with bikini panties only, a triangle refracting a rainbow covered their crouch. Single-sized metal-framed beds lined the sides of the room—replicas from the band’s latest album cover—where several groupies lounged, eyes glazed over.
What am I doing here? The moment seemed surreal. As he slowly scanned the room, time seemed to creep in slow motion. A couple in the corner, he dragging a joint, she opening her mouth, he sealing his lips around hers, exhaled as she sucked in the amorphous cloud. Long tables at the back of the room displayed an assortment of catered food, a banner stretched the back wall—a series of hundreds of beds streamed into the horizon, a pondering young man sitting on one, a woman standing at another in the distance appeared to wait for him to come. He traced his gaze to the other corner, a bar with tiers of bottled spirits tended by a topless six-foot blonde, a paint-on black triangle tattoo enclosed her eye with a rainbow striped across her temple. He continued his gaze so not to stare, over his shoulder he saw Yannie talking to a girl, midriff T-shirt stretch taut with “Young Lust” drawn across a balloon chest. They seemed to know each other, engaged in close conversation. Freddie sat on one of the iron-framed beds, chopping white crystals on a mirror. What am I doing here?
He returned his gaze to the food, the only thing in the room that resembled reality. Stepping towards it, he brushed against the girl with cutoffs. She turned, her eyes tracing from his feet to his face.
“Oh, by the way, which one’s Pink?” she said with a British accent. He looked at her with numbed expression.
“Your left thigh,” he replied. Her eyes held his. He swallowed hard.
“Who are you?” she asked with eyebrows raised with interest.
“Floyd,” he said.
And he walked away.
He headed towards the food with several quick glances to the girls he brushed up against, conscious not to connect with their eyes, as though he wasn’t interested. In the center of the table was a bowl of fruit—bananas, pears, peaches . . .
And one apple.
One red apple.
One slip and down the hole we fall.
He felt something soft and supple brush against the back of his arm. She reached in front of him to pluck the red apple from the bowl of fruit. He felt the warmth of her bare skin against him. With one eye on the apple, he traced his vision up her arm, her breasts hovering by his side. Continuing up her neckline, he looked within the outline of the triangle and stared into her eye. Creepy. From the corner of her eye, the striped colors of the rainbow were painted into her hairline. His gaze transfixed, she drew the apple from the bowl. Her face so close to his, he felt her damp and warm breath against his dry lips. Her mouth opened and revealed the smooth pink of her tongue and her perfect pearly teeth. The red and gleaming skin of the apple came into view. Her eye within the triangle continued to look into his as her pearly teeth pierced the red skin with a succulent crunch. The spray of juice wet his cheek as she took the first bite. He felt a quiver run through him.
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Copyright 2017 © Jeff Cambridge
Excerpt from PURSUIT, a novel by Jeff Cambridge, a writer of transformational fiction with characters that tell life-changing stories.
This is a pre-published scene.
To read the scenes sequentially, begin with
“PURSUIT: A Novel – Prologue”
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This novel is a work of fiction. Any references to real events, businesses, organizations, and locales are intended only to give the fiction a sense of reality and authenticity. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
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