CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Cassie
The music scene has been under a dark cloud since the incident at the Rustic Chords Music Festival last weekend.
Because the concert was in a farmer’s field, even though security was high, the set-up wasn’t as well designed as it should have been.
The makeshift stage and rails made out of scaffold weren’t properly engineered, and so, when Luke came out, the hysteria and the weight of people against the rail forced it to give way—which meant hundreds were thrust onto me, Luke and the stage.
Fourteen people were seriously injured, three of whom are still in critical condition.
One woman, the one with light brown hair, a pretty face and a red bandana tied in her hair, died the next night.
And every single time I close my eyes, I see her face as she was crushed into the dirt. Every goddamn time.
My hotel room drapes are thrown open and sunlight streams through the massive window, blinding me as Cherry, my guitarist, stands looking at me with her hands on her hips.
“Goddammit, Cassie, it’s three o’clock in the afternoon. Have you eaten anything?” she asks me, like she’s my mama.
I sit up and rub the heels of my palms into my eyes.
The gauze wrapped around my right arm where I assume my guitar cut me after it was broken catches my eye, along with the remnants of angry red scratches from people clawing at me.
They’re a haunting reminder of what happened every time I look down at my arms. When I woke up in the ambulance I didn’t know what had happened. The last thing I remembered was blood.
Turns out it was nothing a few stitches on my inner forearm couldn’t handle.
“I don’t need another mama, Cherry. I already have one of those, and she and my sister haven’t stopped calling me.”
“Well, someone needs to look after you. Dax is downstairs and he really wants us to play tonight. It’s our last show and we already missed the one in Albuquerque.”
Right, because I was in the fetal position on the hotel bathroom floor.
“You should talk to Dax. He risked bodily harm to help drag you off that stage and you’ve barely answered his calls.”
“Bodily harm?” I deadpan. “A woman died.”
I pick up a bottle of water off my bedside table and take a long pull, wishing it was bourbon. But since that night, I haven’t been able to touch a drop of alcohol. Probably because I threw up the entire night after Rustic Chords.
“I wanted to be alone,” I tell her.
Cherry comes and sits on the edge of my bed. Her fiery red hair goes with her name. So do her trademark bright red lips. She’s small and fit, with pretty features and a full inked sleeve of Disney princesses, baked goods and inspirational quotes. She swipes my hair off my forehead.
“Babe, I’m fucking worried about you. You haven’t gotten out of this bed in four days.”
“It’s easier here,” I tell her, moving back under the blankets. “I’m trying to forget the way her eyes looked.”
I feel the familiar sting at the bridge of my nose as I say the words out loud.
“You’re drowning yourself in ice cream and …” She picks up a bag from the floor. “What is this?”
“Caramel corn,” I tell her.
“Gross.” Cherry wrinkles her nose. “Maybe the best thing for you is to get out of this room. To get back on that stage, back to real life.”
I shake my head violently.
“I know,” she says, placing her hand over mine.
“But from what the grief counselor said, and you’d know this if you’d have come with us to see her, people heal in different ways.
One is to avoid anything that reminds them of the event that brought trauma.
The other is to get right back on the horse, so to speak.
Show yourself that the incident was a one-off.
Tonight is the last show for a while. It might not hurt to show the world you’re alive and surviving.
Then you can take a break and get your head straight. ”
I sigh as she pulls me up to a sitting position. I toss my knotted hair into a bun on the top of my head and fasten it with an elastic from my wrist.
“One show, Cassie. In a closed stadium with cemented rails, and you never have to sit on the edge of a stage again.”
“I don’t know. I know the stage is secure. It’s not that. It’s her eyes, and the screams. I can’t shake them.”
I look down at my phone. There are a ton of messages from well-wishers and multiple messages from my mom, Ivy and Dax. Ivy has called me three times today already. She keeps asking for her and my mama to come out to see me, or for me to go there. But I just can’t face them yet.
I look back up at Cherry and breathe out a deep sigh. “One show.”
Cherry nods. “One show, babe.”
“I’ll try it. But I’m not promising anything,” I say, standing, ready to head to the shower. Cherry stands too and pulls me in for a hug. “We’ve got this, Cassie.”
I make it into the Arion Stadium in Santa Fe, New Mexico, on unsteady legs with my band.
I only feel ready to face the stage for rehearsals after a hefty dose of anxiety meds from a road doctor.
It’s a bustle of activity as it always is during rehearsal, and the headliner’s band is just finishing up as we arrive.
I can do this, I tell myself as we set up. I look at every single person in the stadium. Who are they? What are they doing here? Should they be here? A million thoughts run through my mind as the anxiety creeps up my throat.
We prepare to run through our eight-song set twice, but my voice is shaky and my legs are weak.
Someone gets me a stool and I sit through most of the rehearsal, pushing that night, the flashes of people grabbing me, the fear in their faces, from my mind whenever I feel the intense pressure invade my chest and the sweat coat my palms.
I barely make it through the rehearsal before rushing backstage.
I’m supposed to eat, but it just isn’t in me.
I pick at a salad, then I’m ushered in to be readied by our contracted makeup artist. Another hour goes by in a blur and I try to think about the last time I felt real joy.
The last time I felt alive. These last five months have sucked the life out of me physically and creatively.
I look at my reflection in the mirror as my hair is styled.
I don’t recognise the woman in front of me. She’s me, but empty. Hollow. Done.
When was the last time I felt anything? I know the answer immediately and close my eyes to remember. I let my mind trace his face, begging the memory of his truck and Silver Pines to paint the dark areas of my mind with color and life as my eyeshadow is applied.
I will myself to relive the last moments I felt like myself.
Haden when he smiled, when he kissed me.
Haden in his simple, safe life on his quiet ranch in Kentucky.
Far away from any stage. At Silver Pines, where everything is peaceful.
Even the trees and the birds are friends, creating the most beautiful music together.
A soundtrack for hardworking ranchers who seem like they’re just genuinely good people.
“You can open your eyes, hun,” the makeup artist says, snapping me back to the present.
The rest of my prep passes and, by showtime, I’m feeling dizzy and short of breath while I smooth down my hair and make sure everything looks perfect.
I tighten my belt once, then again. My makeup is so thick, my lipstick so dark, my cheeks so highlighted I almost look plastic.
My leather pants so shiny and slick. I think of my first show ever.
The Rambling Jamboree in Berkshire, Oklahoma.
I wore jeans and flip-flops. I strummed Ivy’s old acoustic guitar, my hair in a ponytail and not a stitch of makeup on. It was just me and the music.
“I barely recognize you,” I whisper to my reflection, trying to muster up that confidence I used to carry around with me everywhere I went.
I screw up my eyes as I remember the comment I read just this morning about how leather isn’t the best choice for my thighs, as a heavy pounding on my door tells me it’s showtime.
I jump at the sound, but straighten up and do my best to appear prepared and relaxed. Though I can’t stop my heart thundering in my ears.
“Ready, sugar?” Dax asks as I shuffle out.
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I murmur. I hear the crowd and my stomach drops.
Fuck.
The sound of tens of thousands of people gets louder the closer we get to the stage, and my breathing increases. I try to calm myself down, singing one of the songs in my head that I used to play for my dad by his favorite, Janis Joplin.
“Shit, I’ll be right back. I want to talk to Luke’s people quickly,” Dax mutters, giving me a side squeeze and heading off to find the headliner’s entourage. “Be my pro, Cassie.”
There’s no one here but us, there’s no one here but us.
I hear Haden’s words from his truck over and over again, and it somehow soothes me.
My band surrounds me and we make it through our preshow routine.
But even that makes my skin crawl. The last time we did this …
The woman’s eyes flash in my mind and I screw my own eyes shut as Shawn mutters our usual “One, two, three, Cassie Spencer and The Spin!” The band chant the line around me but I feel like I’m having an out-of-body experience as I move toward the stairs leading up to the stage.
The crowd goes crazy as my band makes their way out to take their places.
I press my hand to my chest, and it is clammy.
I can’t catch my breath, my shirt is too tight and my ears are ringing.
I focus on Cherry fiddling with her guitar strap as someone screams the headliner’s name.
I nearly jump out of my skin at the noise.
I picture Haden’s eyes and the moment he looked into mine and whispered, “There’s no one here but us.”
There’s no one here but us. I white-knuckle the wall as everyone but me crosses the stage. But I can’t follow. My feet are cemented to the floor.
I’m alone. I close my eyes, willing this feeling to go away.
I’m alone like I was when my mom drank too much and fell asleep before me.
I’m alone. Like I was when I was eight and I broke my ankle falling off my bike in front of our house, where I stayed until my dad came down the driveway to help me.
“Dad?” I whisper, picturing his face when he helped me up and remembering the way his arms felt around me. I can almost smell him. Tears mixed with thick mascara sting my eyes and then spill over onto my cheeks. But this time, my dad doesn’t come and I’m still alone.
Alone like I was on the stage when I watched the woman’s fight drain from her, when I wondered if she had a mother who loved her, or children, or a sister like me.
When I wondered who she was leaving behind, wishing I could bring them to her, wishing I could hold her hand.
Just for a minute. Just so she wasn’t alone.
“You okay, girl?” I think someone says now.
“Don’t make me go …” I say, clutching my shaking body.
“Cassie,” the voice says.
“I want my dad …” I whisper.
“Oh shit, you need help, honey. Can you hear me?”
I open my eyes and am met with Evan Woods’s manager. I can’t remember her name. What is it? Francesca? Flora? I shake my head frantically. My teeth chatter and my body shudders violently. My legs give out and I fall to my knees. She crouches down beside me.
“Just hang on, I’ll call someone,” she says, pulling out her phone.
“Don’t make me go,” I tell her. “Don’t make me go.”
“Cass!” Cherry’s voice calls from somewhere, but I don’t see her.
“Don’t make me go … please.”
I think I empty my stomach between sobs.
Evan’s manager grips my elbow as she speaks on her phone but I can’t hear what she’s saying.
All I see is that woman with the pleading eyes pushed into the earth, bloody and lifeless.
Static lines my vision and I press my face to the cool metal of the backstage stairs, searching for any kind of relief.
Don’t make me go.