Cherry Bomb [h.s]

9

Spencer

Staples Center is much larger than I thought it would be. And it seems even bigger when devoid of tons of screaming fans.

It felt odd to walk through the doors and see the crew setting up for the concert. Like everything was just now coming into realization for me.

My band, which had barely even gained notoriety in our hometown, was suddenly playing at the fucking Staples Center. How it was all real, I had no idea.

All the lights are on, and the sun is still blazing outside. The air smells of sawdust and metal, and the stage stands before me, small compared to the countless rows of seats all around it.

"Woah, this place is huge," Willow's mouth hangs open slightly in awe.

"Of course it is, it seats 20,000 people," Amber replies, wide-eyed as well.

"And it completely sold out..." I add, "In just a few hours every seat here is going to be filled, 20,000 people are going to see us perform."

Amber and Willow wander off to admire the stage a bit closer, while I linger more towards the loading dock. There are still a few things being brought in by the crew. There must be at least 50 LED lights being set up around the stage, and I begin to wonder if there are pyrotechnics involved as well. 

"Enjoying the view?" Louis' voice calls from the right. He strolls over to me, an unlit cigarette hanging from his lips, hands in his front pockets.

"How are you not absolutely freaking out right now?" I ask him. We're just the opening act, I can't imagine how all of Ardere must be feeling right now.

"That's easy," Louis shrugs and pulls out a flourescent green lighter from his pocket, "I always knew this day would come. To me, it kind of feels like coming home for the first time."

He flicks the lighter as he brings it up and cups it to light his cigarette, but a booming voice causes him to pause before the end can glow orange.

"That better not be a goddamn cigarette, Louis!"

"Oh shit," Louis hisses and quickly puts the cigarette and lighter behind his back.

I look to the back loading dock where the shout came from, and watch as a very tall and extremely muscular brown-skinned man approach at a quick pace. His bald head is so shiny that it seems to reflect the light of each artificial bulb on the ceiling. A pair of blue jeans sit perfectly on his hips, and his white tank barely covers the many tattoos littering his chest, as well as the rest of his body.

When the man reaches Louis, he grabs his hands and wrangles the cigarette and lighter from him. He throws both of them on the ground and stomps on them with his steel-toed boot, leaving shattered bits of bright green plastic on the concrete.

"Angel, you asshole! That was my lucky lighter!" Louis whines.

Angel...?

"Yeah well you should have thought about that before you decided to smoke in here. I told you, take it outside."

"Wait..." I interrupt, not sure if I just heard Louis correctly, "Did you say Angel?"

"Oh shit, right, sorry," Louis' eyes widen a bit in realization. "Spencer, this is Angel," he gestures towards the muscular man, "Angel, Spencer."

"You're Angel?" I ask, even more confused than I was before.

"The one and only," Angel flashes a perfect, bright white smile, "Officially, I'm Head of Security and in charge of making sure the venue is properly set up and then strikes after a show. Unofficially though, I'm the babysitter for these chuckleheads."