Encore
Locked in the trunk of the car, pitch black, Curtis was thinking, fuck, a number two hit in ’78, would have been number one if it wasn’t for disco and the fucking Bee Gees, and I’m going out the answer to a trivia question – what rock star was shot in the head?
Well, after Lennon, of course, but it’s not like The High had crazed fans. Didn’t some speed metal guitarist get shot right on stage by a crazed fan.
Curtis thinking that would be cool. Better than because he tried to rob the fucking shylock working the parking lot of the Greektown Casino in Detroit. Shit.
Sam Cooke, too, shot in the head by a jealous husband, but Curtis also heard it was because he refused to sing “When a Man Loves a Woman” and the chick shot him.
Not even a plane crash like Lynyrd Skynyrd and Ozzie’s man Randy Rhoades, Richie Valens, Buddy Holly, Jim Croce, John Denver – shit, Curtis remembered playing that big festival in Colorado in ’79, John Denver smiling and waving, so happy to be a country boy, nobody seeing what he was like backstage, asshole -- or Otis Redding, Otis crashing before “Dock of the Bay” was even released. Marc Bolan would have been remembered for a lot more than “Bang a Gong” if his girlfriend hadn’t wrapped her Mini around the old oak tree with him in it. Half the Allman Brothers Band in motorcycle accidents.
But no, fuck, he was after a lousy ten grand, trying to pass a bogus cheque, and a small-time shylock was going to finish him. Not a proper rock star death, not a sex and drugs and rock’n’roll send-off like Jimi or Morrison or Keith Moon or Bonham or on and on, not even choking on vomit or Freddie Mercury fucking himself to death or blowing off his own head like Cobain.
Marvin Gaye, he was shot, too, but it was by his father, that was just weird.
Well, fuck it, Curtis wasn’t going to beg for his life. The shylock had no idea who he was, screw him. Curtis tried to tell him, tried to get him to understand he was clearing ten grand for singing “Honey Trap” to drunken, methed-out zombies handing their hard earned money over to blackjack dealers and slot machines, but no, the asshole said he’d had enough.
Yeah well, Curtis had enough, too. Dragging his ass out on the road again after all these years, sure it was a blast, sure the little blue pills meant he could get with the groupies again – even if they were mostly old chicks, tattoos sagging so he couldn’t tell what they were – sure knocking off a shylock at every casino made it almost profitable, he still wasn’t going to wet his pants and cry. He played fucking Live Aid in ‘85, toured with the Stones across Canada, was sharing the bill with the fucking Doobie Brothers, Grand Funk and Ted Nugent, cat scratch fever in every casino on the tour.
He was pretty sure some guy from Earth, Wind and Fire was murdered, too, and one of Booker T and the MG’s, probably one of the black guys but he didn’t know that for sure. And all those fucking rappers, shooting each other all the time.
Fuck it. It wasn’t right. Not a rock star death, not drinking himself to death like Janis or Bon Scott. It was better than a Beach Boy drowning, the fucking irony. Brian Jones drowned too, but Curtis was pretty sure he was high or drunk or both.
The trunk opened and Curtis closed his eyes. They were wet. So were his pants.
Barry, been playing bass in the same bands as Curtis since they were kids watching the Midnight Special on TV in their parents’ basements, said, “Come on, let’s go, we’re on in five.”
Curtis climbed out of the trunk, saw the shylock face down on the pavement, a guitar strap around his neck, said, “Shit, you never seen any CSI shows, you better get that,” and Barry said, don’t worry about it.
“It’s Nugent’s.”