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The Band

by Brent W, Beaverton, Oregon, USA, Age 15


I walked down Burnside. It was late Friday night and most of the early weekend traffic had cleared. The street was quiet and its streetlights flicked on and off like a kid playing with a light switch. The front page of a day old newspaper blew across the street like tumbleweed in the day light of a desert. I pass an abandon shopping cart with a day worth collection of empty pop cans. Its owner must have been picked up off the streets not long ago. Burnside never seems to change, always hearing the bass outside some of the dance rooms and concert halls.

I was on the night shift at Every Day Music, walking home to get ready for the weekend. My job isn’t an exciting one, sell some records, listen to some old punk bands, and make a few bucks to pay my rent. I live in a small apartment with my good buddy and band mate, who plays drums, John. I have been in this band for about a year and I play guitar. We have been playing shows lately and have gotten pretty popular within the Portland punk scene.
I stepped into our two bedroom apartment, to see John on the couch watching Jeopardy. He was trying to guess the answers but obviously had no idea what he was thinking.

John is a chubby short black haired guy with bad hygiene. He doesn’t talk much and keeps to himself; I guess that is just his personality.
“John did you get your pay check?” I said from my bedroom.
“Yeah I did dude. It’s on the counter,” John hollered.
“Thanks I’ll take some to put in for the bills,” I said.
“Whatever,” John said.

That’s typical John behavior. He usually doesn’t care and trusts everyone.
He works as a garbage man over in the suburbs; he brings home a pretty good pay check so that helps out a lot with rent. His job fits him because it isn’t much of a social one to begin with which is good for him.
I sometimes find myself playing the role of the wife in this apartment. I get dinner and breakfast, do all the bills, and find myself picking up after both me and John. It doesn’t bother me much because at least I am out of my parent’s house.
“We have a show tomorrow, remember” I reminded John.
“Yeah I know you told me yesterday morning, last night, this morning”.
“Okay Okay” I interrupted him.

John and I crossed Burnside Bridge around six. We pulled up in front of the Solid State and plowed through the anxious kids trying to get a chance to talk to their favorite bands. These local shows never seems to change, always the teens waiting for you to finish your set so they can watch to the next untalented band.
We met George, who sings, and Taylor, who plays bass, who are the other two guys in the band. George is a tall good looking, well built, front man who has lots of energy. He was the last one to join the band about four months ago; he put a voice to our music. The thing with George and I is that we don’t have the best of a friendship; we disagree on a lot of things and don’t have a lot in common.
We unloaded our equipment and got it all set up for sound check. We talked to the manager to see how long our set was and when we would play.
“Hey Gipedo,” George called me.
By the way my name is Guy but my nickname is Gipedo I picked it up awhile back.
“Yeah,” I responded.
“You better not screw up tonight and just stop playing in the middle of a song like last show,” George said in pissed off voice.
“I had to last show I was off timing with everyone else and…..”
“No excuses just don’t mess up,” George interrupted.

We started off the show pretty smoothly until I let out my anger and tripped George to get back at him for getting mad at me. He just got up like nothing happened and on my part I didn’t get much done except piss him off more.

I feel like I personally, am singled out of this group like a back-up singer for Britney Spears. Everyone’s eyes are always on George because he is a front man and more popular around Portland. I sometimes think about going solo and getting out of this one man band of George.

A week later we got together in George’s parents basement where we have band practice. The only catch was that George wasn’t there at his own house. We called his cell phone but the irresponsible person George is, we heard it ringing in his bedroom. We had no other way of reaching him. But I knew exactly where he was.
“He is probably with Stacy and blew us off for her” I said
Stacy is Georges girlfriend who owns him and controls him every step he makes. She is just another person who I don’t get along with very well for just the reasons such as this event.

George arrived later on with the one and only Stacy, who I had guessed all along. She was holding shopping bags and giving commands like a dictator.
“Hey dudes what are you guys doing here” George said
“We are here for a little thing called band practice” I said irritated
“Oh I am sorry I forgot” George said.
I said in my head, “I just forgot”, if I can’t give an excuse why can he. I guess for mister popular it doesn’t matter if you blow off your friends to go buy some girl clothes. My anger just built up more and more and another disappointment from George I would be through with him.

We had a show three weeks after the day that George didn’t show up for band practice. It was a big show because the crowd was twice more than ever before at other shows. It was at the same place and same time but I could just feel a better tone in the air that night. We started playing our set as usual and everyone seemed interested. Again George was the main highlight of the night but I just ignored it like usual. The only thing is that for once I had my chance to make a scene and maybe get attention for once.

It was in the middle of our third song that I unplugged my guitar and started to run away from everything and everyone. I just dropped my nervousness and said good bye to someone I didn’t want to be. I didn’t look back that nigh, I just walked with my guitar back to my apartment. For once in a few months I had the courage to stop thinking of perfection and trying to make everyone the way I wanted them to. I had made my goal of getting away from George and I felt good about it.

THE END