Louder Than Words ✨ Guns N' Roses

06.

"How are all you fuckers doin' tonight?"

I looked around the room, confused. Everyone responded positively, rasing their solo cups of alcoholic elixir up, cheering at the mere sound of W's voice. It was even raspier over the sound of a microphone...

"Alright, well that's good to hear. You all know the drill, me and my boys are gonna play a little music for ya, you sing along if you know the words, then we'll be done. Peachy."

A few scattered chuckles and murmurs followed. There was a cold nervousness growing in the pit of my stomach, a product of anticipation and Slash. I hadn't seen him yet and I was more than anxious to.

Duff, the tall blonde, and Izzy came out onto the stage, instruments ready. Meegan and Adriana were significantly taller than me (I was a pathetically average 5'4) and had a better view of what was going on. I was left straining to see the stage, that quickly went dark after W stopped talking.

I heard Slash before I saw him.

One moment it was silent, and the next there was the sound of a lone guitar, crooning away on it's own, complimented by a bass. Maybe that's not the right word to describe the sound, but I don't know how else to put Slash's mind-blowingly technical guitar skill into words.

Slash doesn't quite translate into words very well.

"This song's so good," Meegan shouted annoyingly over the song. "Starts so slow and sad..."

I blocked her out as the lights finally came on again. The rest of the band joined Slash and the sound got deafeningly intense. In past years I might've covered my ears, but I couldn't miss a single moment of Slash's only audbile mode of communication.

W was shouting something about porno and someone's mom being dead, Meegan and Adriana might've been singing along, but I was on another planet.

I was like that. For the entire night.

It was the first time I realized Slash could express himself, and it was the exact moment I began to understand rock n' roll. Before, it just sounded like a mess of loud noise and chaos, but after that... it sounded to me like Slash's beautiful voice finally pouring out of him, saying all those things that words couldn't.

Yeah, he definitely wasn't deaf.

He quickly started to sweat, so halfway through the second song he peeled off his wet t-shirt and tossed it to the ground. I was disappointed when it didn't land near me.

"Oh god," Meegan groaned under her breath.

And I realized with acute horror that the stars in her eyes weren't for W. I nearly vomitted when I saw her staring at Slash's toned chest like he was a perfectly cooked filet mignon.

Disappointment plagued me. Of course Slash would like Meegan more, she was literally Los Angeles in a nut shell. Who was I kidding? They were probably already together in the first place...

"He's amazing, isn't he?" she wheezed into my ear.

"Yeah," I whimpered to myself.

Uncertainty weighed on me for the rest of the show, though I watched with a hunger that was new and foreign to me. Only when the last song was over and done with I was finally able to peel my gaze away from Slash, who was lighting himself another cigarette and wiping the sweat from his chest with his t-shirt.

God, I wanted to be that t-shirt.

I could've sworn he was looking at me, but it was too hard to tell through all that hair.

He turned away from the crowd as W came back to the mic. I'm gonna be honest here and tell you I have no clue what he said.

Only because Slash had tossed his guitar pick over his shoulder, right into my outstretched hands. He paused for just a second and looked sideways, before he kept on walking.