Raveolution

No Filter

"What do you mean this has happened before?"

The Megawatt Phoenix rave, I had been told on the drive to it, was a first time for an event of that magnitude.  Multiple crews aligned, working together as one. 

"Last time it was with Minor Intention," Zoe revealed. 

Hmmm, perhaps, or perhaps not.  

Zoe must have understood my particular thinking expression. "That was their name," she explained.

The abduction at Megawatt Phoenix was reminiscent of an historic night in our underground rave scene from many years ago. It was the night we call The Last Storm Rave. 

This scene has cultural lore?  I didn't even know it existed until a few weeks ago. 

"The night was normally called Storm Rave.  It was a monthly warehouse event that became the last one."   Hence, I finished her thought, "The last Storm Rave." 

"Exactly. It was the night when the two, now legendary, electronic music makers, called Minor Intention, who we sometimes also refer to as the magicians, were taken as they were unveiling their secret set."

Does she ever run out of breath?   As I wasn't there for either of these two incidents, they seemed incomprehensible as events not directly related to you often do.  Overload or on the verge.  There was more to this story, such as more people she mentioned.  And as the scene is full of people, sometimes with one, two or three names, I wondered, is her desire for me to keep track of all these details?   I might need to create a character key.  We don't have time for a novel length conversation today.  Lunch breaks are short and without a plan for how I would keep track, I stopped the story at a place I knew I could remember or digest the information for later. I also had an ulterior motive.  I wanted to address something she had brought up earlier, the fact that she had never been promoted.  So I redirected the conversation so we could lift the veil on that subject now.  I readjusted my French twist.  A chunk of light blonde hair fell out by my face. Not as neat as I usually keep my work hair, but I didn't fix it.  Then, hypocritically, I would tell her what I thought was wrong. 

"It's your hair, Zoe." 

"Wait, what? What?"  Her eyes got big and her signature sweetness shifted to sad surprise. 

"You can't look the way you do and expect to be taken seriously. Look, I'm not trying to be insensitive, but you have blue hair, bright blue bangs." 

It was the first thing you would notice, besides her natural beauty, when you looked at her face. How in the name of the Consumerican Dao had I been so oblivious to not see someone who worked at Koch - for years! - with a lightning streak of neon blue in her hair? 

"But this is who I am." 

"That's not how it works.  You're so cute, but I can tell your hair is an excuse for people not to take you seriously."  I had always thought I had a knack for understanding other people's unspoken negative thoughts and judgments. (Of course, now I know part of that was projection.) 

"I don't want to be conformist," she inhaled, puffing up her chest, chin down, looking up at me doe-eyed and doleful.  She shifted in her seat and bit on her thumbnail. 

How did you even get this job? 

"Although I suppose I did dye my hair all black and borrowed something boring and modest to get the job." 

"Then you do know how to play the game because it is a game.  The Koch crowd is quite traditional.  I would advise you to dress in line with company norms if you want a promotion. Otherwise, you send the message that you are rebelling and you make your co-workers secretly uncomfortable and possibly resentful.  It is a professional environment. It's best that you dress more subdued."

Some aspect of myself had believed it enough a few seconds prior to saying it, but at this moment?  Ugh, vile, self-castigating cottonmouth. The words had creamed into putrid peanut butter.  

Well, with her head down, she murmured, "I guess I had wanted to be accepted so I could make it a more accepting environment."  Zoe's hands crossed over her chest as if to hold her heart from falling out.  As her eyes welled, she thanked me for my honesty.  

My heart fell in unison with the first tear that fell upon her daisy-patterned porcelain bread plate. 

"J, I have to run to the restroom. I'll be right back," she assured me with a quivering voice she'd tried desperately to mask with her normal, enthusiastic, upward inflection. 

I looked around the cafe, the Troubadour, a place illuminated softly by natural light and glowing salt crystals decorated with spinning prisms, signs of gratitude, self-help books, and strange gods. Oh no, what have I done?

Immersed in the regulation of my breath as an attempt to halt hurt-based vertigo, I took only subconscious notice of a delivery to our table by the passing of a shadow, the ninja-thespian eater from the corner now gone. The envelope was thick, cream white, and made with slightly lumpy paper.  From it, I pulled a smaller piece of the same imperfect paper, which was folded over once.  Certainly not a commercial print job.  A homemade card?  Who does that?  On the front of the card, there were circles, partial circles, crescents.  I was staring at it so intently and obviously perplexed that I didn't see Zoe return to the table.

"Whaddya  get there?"  Her evaporated tears turned into a gaseous and intoxicating deck-the-halls-like cheer.  Feeling the uneven texture between my fingertips, I opened the fold and unsuccessfully analyzed the numbers inside before I answered. 

An invitation?