Yvonne pressed her face towards me. “I’m moving to the back. I’ll meet you guys after.” With that, I watched her turn and disappear into the crowd.
With Edgar doing his best to shield me, I was able to catch glimpses of the stage through the bouncing, rioting crowd. The band looked great. They all threw their heads around in unison, and the singer bellowed and growled through a veil of hair. It was deafeningly loud. I turned to look at Fern. She had one arm braced against the guy in front of her to keep his sweaty back away, pushing him aggressively. Her other hand reached up in the air, fist clenched. Her mouth was wide open in a snarl. She looked amazing. Craig stood behind her in the same way Edgar was behind me, whipping his hair around. Sometimes it would hit Fern, but she didn’t seem to mind it. I was grateful Edgar wasn’t moving his head. He had long dreadlocks and I imagined that it would suck getting one in the eye.
By the second song, a mosh pit formed in the crowd ahead of us. I watched people move through it, smashing into each other. “Hey,” I shouted, grabbing Fern’s arm. “Want to go up there?”
She nodded, her eyes shining. We linked arms and pushed through the crowd. Edgar and Craig followed. It was strange, because to get through the crowd, we had to shove people hard and elbow them aggressively, and no one seemed to mind. It was a very powerful feeling.
“Fuck, Rachel, be careful,” Edgar yelled into my ear, making me pull back at the volume of his voice.
“I’m fine,” I said and threw myself into the mosh pit.
Mistake. I slammed into some huge guy immediately and almost fell over. Then as I rebounded off him, someone smashed into the back of my head and my vision went pure white, my eyes pricking with shock. I threw my arms up around my head and kept myself from stumbling. This had been a bad idea.
When I opened my eyes I saw a giant, long-haired monster careening towards me, his eyes frenzied. He didn’t even know what he was doing, I realized. Everyone in this mosh pit was insane. As he stumbled into me, I shoved him as hard as I could. He reeled off in another direction. Okay, maybe I could figure this out. Glancing around, I saw a few other girls in the mosh pit as well, holding their own. Okay. I braced myself to absorb the impact of another guy, and then was sent crashing into Fern, who laughed hard. I realized if I just relaxed and went with the motion of getting smashed into, it wasn’t as painful. And I had to push back. It started to feel surreal, with the constant motion and the deafening music in my ears. I didn’t notice any pain. It was fun. A short girl slammed into me, and I shoved her hard. She stumbled backwards and I laughed, turning to the left to absorb the impact of another guy with my back.
I noticed Fern, who had been knocked away from me, her mouth hanging open in a shriek that I couldn’t hear. Some tall guy’s hand was on her chest. I looked up at his face. The guy was grinning. Nobody around them seemed to notice what was happening. Rage streamed through my veins, and I froze for a second, staring at Fern’s terrified face and the pale, spidery hand crawling across the front of her dress.
I felt a hard push from behind me, but I was so furious that I remained planted where I was, sending whichever moron had slammed into me reeling back the way they’d come. The music pulsed in my head. I saw Craig and Edgar coming in from the other side towards Fern, but they were too far away.
I opened my mouth in a scream of rage and threw myself towards Fern. My boot slammed down hard on someone’s foot, and they cried out painfully into my ear. I felt the high-heel snap off, giving me a lopsided gait as I shoved my way towards my friend. Some oblivious girl stumbled in front of me, and I grabbed her firmly by the shoulders and shoved her aside, barely breaking stride.