deadly nightshade | fever in, fever out

chapter 37: sticks and stones

Marla had run back home for a few moments so she could change into her witch's robe but for the time being Sam, Aurora, and Belinda gathered on the far side of the room with Cliff, Frank, and a couple of Bloody Maries. Belinda adjusted the threads on her white dress with those blue scissors while in their art class, but she still managed to look like a doll as she had originally imagined. Sam glanced about the room in search of Marla and Charlie somewhere on the floor.
The interior of L'Amour had been decorated with shiny black and orange garlands. Clusters of little orange and white gourds hung all along the bar behind them. Orange and dark yellow lights shone down upon their heads, but every so often, they switched over to a soft purple. The whole room smelled of pepper courtesy of the Bloody Maries and cinnamon courtesy of a series of scented candles behind the bar to keep the place from reeking of alcohol and God knew what else. Every whiff of the cinnamon made Sam think of the cup of hot chocolate she made for Cliff and she knew she would have to make more of those for him following that night.
"It's gonna be a bit before they're coming back, though," Frank told her at one point: his lush dark hair brushed over his shoulders like the ears of a dog. He awaited Charlie and the black and white Kiss face paint, given he already had a low cut white shirt on and extra tight black leather jeans as well as high heeled black boots which made him appear taller than he had originally appeared before.
But then the Cherry Suicides took to the stage in their black pointed witch hats: Zelda ducked behind her drum kit with her hat off kilter on her head. Sam noticed that was the only thing she had on to even remotely resemble to a witch's costume.
"Consider yourselves lucky, New York City," Morgan announced into the microphone; Sam noticed she had on bright pearly orange lip gloss on her dark lips painted on in stripes so it looked like she had caterpillars on her mouth, "we've got a series of new songs in honor of this show here tonight. We haven't even debuted these back home in Rhode Island! The first one was helped on by a woman—you may've heard of her, she's more batshit insane than we are. Her name is Wendy O Williams."
Frank yelped out at the sound of her name.
"It's called 'Scream for Me'!"
Zelda tapped on the cymbal closest to her so it made a noise akin to a bell. And they were all met with an intense wall of sound courtesy of Rosita and Minerva; Zelda's hat stayed in place atop her head as she pounded away as if she was a blacksmith swinging her hammer. Morgan brought the head of the microphone close to her striped lips: the first notes out of her mouth were low and harsh, but strong and tight.
"Morgan really upped her scream game, didn't she?" Cliff said to Frank.
"Yeah, she did!" Frank brought his glass of Bloody Mary close to his mouth but he never took a sip.
Belinda gaped at what she saw before her. Her eyes were wide with amazement, and she held onto her skirt as if she was stepping over a puddle. Sam and Aurora glanced at one another. A Halloween show needed a girl who could scream on a song of revenge like it meant business. Not a girl who was under the knife, but rather she was giving the knife to someone who asked for it.
Sam glanced over to the left side of the room, to Louie, who stood next to the side doors wrapped in a heavy black coat with a big hood upon his head. She spotted something shiny and pointed behind him—a bit triangular point upon a long dark pole. And she realized he was Death, and he could prance around with that thing and take under one of the souls before them at any given moment. He flexed his fingers and she noticed some white markings on the back of his hand: even from a distance, she could tell those were bones. Skeleton gloves for a good costume!
"There's Marla!" Aurora pointed out, and Sam and Belinda turned their attention to the right side of the room.
Indeed, they recognized Marla's violet hair on the far side of the room. Right before her was Charlie and his head of thick dark curls, and it took Sam a second to realize they were slow dancing to the music. Such a morbid song about killing someone for fun and then eating them and yet they danced as if it was a simple waltz instead. Charlie twirled her as Zelda unleashed a drum solo which followed Morgan's last powerful screech. A drum solo followed by a short picking guitar solo courtesy of Minerva and her big floppy witch's hat.
A guy in front of them punched another person in the face and Belinda lunged back at the sight of it, but Cliff and Frank laughed out loud at that.
The Cherry Suicides played another new song, called "Broomsticks", followed by another one called "Bitches' Brew" and another one called "Dia de Los Muertos", the latter of which Morgan let Rosita sing and in Spanish to boot. The whole entire time, Zelda never lost her pointed witch hat even as she played at a quick pace.
Charlie let go of Marla at one point and she disappeared behind the bar for something. She returned to their side with a series of what resembled to little white pearls on either of her hands, and she handed one of each to Belinda, then Sam and Aurora: Sam held up the pearls to the violet light for a better look at the little dots on the sides. Little skulls of different colors.
"Of course, Day of the Dead!" Aurora proclaimed as she threw the necklace over her head. Belinda and Sam followed suit.
"They're candy!" Frank added as Marla took the black and white make up out of her purse.
"I dunno if you'd wanna eat them, though," she pointed out. "At least, that was what Charlie told me. But they're for Day of the Dead, though!"
The violet lights gave way to the golden and amber ones but Marla was only able to paint a black and white star on the side of Frank's face. Indeed, the next new song the Cherry Suicides debuted was called "White Star" and the four of them sang in unison. Even with her being seated behind the drum kit, Sam wished she could hear more of Zelda's singing voice. She yelled during the chorus but her voice carried enough to where she wondered if she could sing something to exemplify her voice.
By nine o'clock, they had finished up their Halloween set and Zelda chucked a handful of candy to the audience. Marla waved at her and she pointed in her direction. The four girls disappeared behind the curtain on the side there and the amber lights returned to their rich deep violet.
"It's okay, Charlie didn't get the make up on either," Marla assured Frank, whose face fell when he realized he missed the full make up. "There's always a Day of the Dead celebration for later, though. We can do that tonight if you wish. Halloween into the Day of the Dead. Have it all as part of Samhain."
"True. But it's still Halloween, though, Marla."
Sam turned her attention to Cliff, who sipped on the remainder of his Bloody Mary. She thought about their little potential trip back out West to visit each other's parents, and she hoped they could do it on what money they had.
She then felt a tap on her shoulder and she turned around: Zelda stood behind her with her witch hat still off kilter upon her head and with a handful of salt water taffies held out before her.
"Ooh, yes please!" said Sam as she took the bright pink one for herself. Cliff meanwhile took the dark brown one.
"Root beer," he noted while he unwrapped the piece of taffy. "You ever been to Virginia City?"
"Me?" Sam asked him.
"Yeah."
"Not since I was little, no."
"Maybe when you and I go visit our parents in a couple of months, we can go there for a day or something."
"Ooh, yes! Sounds like a plan."
"Just looking at these taffies made me think of Virginia City and the candy shop there." Cliff slipped the taffy into his mouth and he squinted his eyes from the contrast of taste, between the root beer and the tomato juice. Sam giggled at him as did Belinda and Aurora, but he took it in stride. A Legacy show plus a meeting with her parents as well as his, and then a trip to Virginia City. It was all something to bear in mind even as Cliff returned home to California in time for Day of the Dead itself, and the whole prospect of the trip remained firmly on Sam's mind for a whole two weeks until she crossed paths with Joey on the way home from school one afternoon.
The sun hung low over the school buildings with the heart of autumn and Sam was sure she had failed her midterm for art history. She had no idea what had happened in that last week: her memory had fallen short with the exact art movements and Bill seemed to scrutinize her every move. It didn't help matters that he was still her counselor for that whole year, either.
She walked out through the front door only to be met with little snow flurries and that head of jet black curls near the curb.
"Hey, Joey," she greeted him, complete with a nervous smile. "What're you doing here?"
"I had to ask around a little bit 'cause I couldn't fully recall your schedule," he started as she descended the stairs, "but I just haven't seen ya in a while."
"Not since the album was released," she told him as she adjusted the lapels of her jacket.
"Yeah, and we go on tour soon, too," he added.
"Already?" she asked him as she remembered Thanksgiving was only a week away.
"Yeah. You put out an album and it's necessary to promote it, too. So I wanted to see ya before those big things happen soon."
Joey huddled closer to her as they walked side by side to the corner: the faded soles of his black leather boots crunched on the fresh fallen snow all around them.
"Would you like a cup of coffee?" he offered her.
"I'd love that," she said as they glanced in either direction of the snowy street. The flurries had started a mere few minutes ago and yet the New York streets were already a rich shade of off white. Over them stood a blanket of darkness held up by the skyscrapers and the scraggly dark trees, made dark with the incoming winter. He lingered closer to her as he led her across the pavement to one of the coffee shops on the other side.
Once they were safe and sound in that dry warmth, Joey turned to her with his brown eyes large and soft like a couple of chocolate drops.
"It's like that one night all over again," he recalled, "the night we saw Legacy together down at L'Amour."
"I know, right? Except this time, it's actually almost winter." He turned his head to the counter behind him.
"Coffee and cake," he said.
"Coffee and cake?"
"Coffee and cake." He gestured back to the cake pops near the cash register.
"Oh, cake!" And Joey chuckled in response to that. They took a seat by the window as it began to frost over with the increasing snow.
"Can I tell you something?" he asked her in a low voice.
"Of course."
"There's a part of me that wants to start playing hockey again," he said as he ran his gloved fingers through his thick black curls.
"And?" She shook her head.
"Well, I think it'd interfere with touring and doing stuff with Anthrax."
"And why are you telling me this?" she asked him.
"'Cause I showed you my hockey stuff. I've been trying to do that with the guys but they seem more interested in what goes on down here in the City than what I might have in store."
Sam knitted her eyebrows together at that.
"Have you asked them about it?" she coaxed him.
"Yeah, I've told Frankie about it 'cause he's the other athlete here with his baseball and everything. But I haven't really heard much, though."
"Maybe we can do another round of hockey again," she offered him. "Like just you and me again."
"Oh, yeah, do that for real!" he said and his face lit up. "We can do that before we go on tour with Metallica this March."
She gasped at that. Cliff never mentioned them when he told her about it!
"You guys are all going on tour together?" she sputtered.
"Yeah!" He stopped in his tracks. "Wait. You didn't know that?"
"No!"
"Oh, damn." Despite his dark sun kissed skin, a soft warm blush bloomed across his face. "Well—I don't think I was supposed to tell you that, but—you are a friend to us. We told you about Spreading the Disease while it was still in early production after all."
"And now I do know!" she exclaimed.
"Yeah, and you should definitely come along if you can, too—you and the girls." He stood to his feet to fetch their cups of coffee. She kept her eyes fixed on Joey's slender body, made even more slender and elegant by his fitted black overcoat and his black jeans. Cliff never said anything about their touring with another band, let alone them, but she nodded her head at that. He did ask her to come along, too: there was no way she could hold onto that. And there was no way she could hold onto that when she had other things to worry about, like her art history midterm.
A few more things to worry about as well as her trip out to the West Coast. She knew that if Cliff would leave out details, she could leave out details herself: it only made sense to her. Joey soon returned to the table with the cups of coffee in either hand and a pair of cake pops in between her fingers. No sooner had he taken his seat again, his expression turned serious.
"By the way—referring back to the question I brought up to you back on birthday."
"Oh, that!"
"Yeah. So—again, take all the time in the world if you still haven't thought of anything. But—have you, though?"
"Yes," she replied with haste, such that it took him aback.
"Really?"
"Yes. I'll share it. I'll share that full body drawing. I promise."
Joey hesitated for a second, but then he picked up the little red cup and raised it up in between their faces. Sam picked up her cup as well and they tapped the edges together. They took sips from their espressos at the same time.
"So late March?" she asked him as she held her cup with both hands around the base.
"Yeah. So we can do the thing with the hockey any time between now and then."
"What're you doing for Thanksgiving? I only have that Thursday and Friday off but it's still days off, though."
"Goin' to visit my aunt and uncle in Rochester. What're you doing for Christmas?"
"Going to visit my parents back out West."
"Oh, shit. So—how 'bout some time after New Year's?"
"Sounds like a plan." She raised her cup again and they gave each other another toast of the red coffee cups, and they took a drink in unison once again.
"Mind if I walk ya home?" he asked her as he pocketed two of the four cake pops into his coat pockets.
"Not at all. I have homework, anyways."
"Alright, let's get a move on..."
Without another word, Joey and Sam took the subway back up to the Bronx. She offered to let him sleep in her apartment again but he assured her it was alright for him to head on back upstate that evening.