Tearin' Down The Walls

AUTHOR'S NOTES!!

I am pretty excited to post this for you guys...but let me start off by letting it be known that this story wouldn't exist if I hadn't had such a crazy experience at my job last week.

Long story short, this was inspired by a bad windstorm wreaking some havoc on my store -- I work at a dry cleaners -- and without giving too much away, let's just say that I immediately thought "Man...wouldn't it be something if I decided to put CC and the rest of Poison in this situation???" -- and you know what?! It WORKED, so I did.

Fun fact....During the first year or two that the Poison dudes moved to Los Angeles, they were living in the back of a dry cleaning warehouse....so....yes, writing this story was ABSOLUTELY inevitable! --- and writing Poison in their early days as youngsters was a lot of fun to do, for a change! Just picture four guys in their early twenties trying to navigate life in LA....with no money...no food...and no record deal...while living off of women to feed them and get them their essentials...Epitome of glam, am I right?! (Hey, they have a song called "Cry Tough" for a reason, ya know!)

Anywyay...I hope you enjoy...and hopefully get a laugh or two outta this one! (I sure did as I wrote it....especially because, like I said, I ain't makin' this shit up! I have a feeling you might know what the real-life incident was when you get to it...If you do, tell me in the comments! I'm curious to know if you picked up on it!)

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1985

West Hollywood, California

CC's POV

"Holy cannoli!" I screech as a blaring howl rings through my ears, along with the sounds of trees violently blowing in the wind, "I haven't been in weather like this since my days in Brooklyn!"

"Who knew California even got wind like this," Rikki mutters in agreement as he quickly wraps his arms around his torso as the abrupt breeze continues smacking the two of us, "Last time I was in it was when I was still in Pennsylvania."

As the two of us brave the arduous journey back to our dump of a home in the back of an abandoned dry cleaning warehouse, the only thought running through my head is how nervy it was of Bret and Bobby to ask us to go out to scavenge for food...in this fuckin' weather.

We don't have money for shit 'cause whatever cash we got is bein' used to pay rent and print flyers to promote ourselves. That's why we're stuck livin' in a friggin' warehouse in the first place and most of the time we really only get food from the chicks who stay with us after our gigs, but it is what it is, man. This is what ya gotta sacrifice to make it big out here, and if the four of us are on the same page about one thing it's that.

We're gonna fuckin' make it whether people are ready for us or not.

If pushin' through conditions like these means anything in the end, we'll be thankin' ourselves for continuing on even when we wanted to just give up...At least, I friggin' hope we're right about all of this. We didn't come out here for nothin'! We got dreams to pursue and if anyone's gonna make sure of that, it's us!

We also got rent to pay, flyers to create, and gigs to perform just to keep on survivin' out here. And we also need food, but we ain't bringin' any home tonight, that's for sure. I couldda' sworn that we had some kinda leftovers from the other night still at the place, but I guess not. And if we did, whatever it was probably rotted. I'd have no issue eating it, though! Isn't that insane? Ya know you're desperate when you're willing to eat moldy crap off the corner of a decrepit dusty floor, but ya gotta do what ya gotta do, right?!