Fern got a little quiet for a few moments, which she always tended to do when we talked about Marie-Lise. I figured this was because she was always trying to play it cool so that no one would suspect how much she truly admired and idolized her. “Yeah, but I mean, how?”
“If we showed up early I bet we could find her somewhere. I mean you remember how we just hung out for hours before our show. We could have fun with it — try to find her, and if we can’t, maybe we could do some shopping or something.”
“That’d be cool,” Fern agreed.
A huge blow came when Socks made some calls, just to see if Gurgol needed an opening act, and found out that Heathenistic Bile had somehow landed the gig. “I don’t understand that at all,” he grouched at rehearsal that weekend. “I don’t see how they got that gig. They have no fan base, and they’re terrible.”
“Maybe we’re wrong?” Edgar fretted. “Maybe they really are wicked awesome and somehow, we just don’t get it?”
“Nope,” I shook my head. “And you know what’s going to make this amazing is that we’re going to get to watch a huge crowd laugh at that shitty band. It’s going to be awesome.”
Socks and Edgar didn’t want to come up to St. Charles early with us, so Fern and I took a bus. The guys would meet us there later, and we’d all drive back home in the van. The bus made stops in the small towns along the way to St. Charles, picking up more people and dropping off others, which was aggravating. After a while both of us just fell asleep. We’d gotten up early to catch one of the first buses so we could have the whole afternoon to search for Marie-Lise.
When we got off the bus in downtown St. Charles, we got into a taxi and asked the driver to drop us off at the club where Gurgol was playing that night. In the cab, Fern fretted, looking into the mirror in her powder compact. “Do I look okay?”
“You look great.” We had discussed what to wear so that we would look cool if we met her, but not ridiculously done-up. Fern had opted to wear a black dress and tights, and I’d gone for a black sweater and dark navy jeans. I remembered the girls who’d flocked around Paul after our show, and I didn’t want to look like some sort of desperate groupie. We wanted to talk to Marie-Lise to get her insights into being in a band, into what it was like as things moved forward, and about being female in the industry. Not to kiss her ass or be just another face in the crowd.
The cab dropped us off outside a large club. The front doors were bolted and the street was deserted. “So what now?” I was starting to lose my nerve a bit. I totally felt like a stalking, hovering groupie, sniffing around.
“Let’s check out behind the club. You know they’ll load in through the back doors,” Fern suggested.
I felt like a fool as we carefully walked around the building. Even if we did see Marie-Lise, what if she didn’t want to talk to us? What if we annoyed her? What if she was a huge bitch? And who did we think we were anyway, trying to force her to talk to us?
It then occurred to me that walking out back might result in an encounter with Heathenistic Bile. What if they were back here too, buddying it up with Gurgol? I didn’t want them to see us slithering around like desperate losers. I was starting to think this had been a really stupid idea. But I followed closely behind Fern, who must have started feeling stupid too, because when we reached the corner of the building before the back parking lot, she paused.
“Rachel,” she whispered, “what if Paul and those guys are back here?”
“Yeah. Maybe we should turn back,” I murmured.
Fern peeked around the corner. “There’s a tour bus.”
Now afraid that members of either band would come up behind us and catch us doing this pathetic spy routine, I glanced behind me. “Let’s just get out of here,” I said. “I feel like an idiot.”
“Me too. But check out the bus.”
I peeked around the corner and saw the big tour bus parked by the back doors. There was no sign of any people around and there were no other vehicles.
“What time is it?” I said.
“It’s just after noon.”