Snowblind

Chapter 14: It’s All About Matt

West Covina, California

September 7, 1995

It was ten o’clock on a muggy and warm late summer morning and, for the third time in the last six weeks, Jim Ramos pulled into the parking lot of the West Covina warehouse where Matt Tisdale and his band rehearsed. His first visit had been when he responded to a 911 call that had turned out to be Tisdale himself having an episode of symptomatic SVT. The second had been two weeks later, when he and Carla, his partner, had been requested back so Tisdale could properly thank them for saving his life. Tisdale’s gratitude had led Jim to a ten-day motor yacht trip with the guitarist and his band and a collection of rock and roll groupies who would (and did) do anything asked of them. Jim was still reeling from that trip, still in semi-disgusted, semi-shameful awe at the things he had witnessed (and done) on that little trip to Mexico and back. And now he was here again, only this time he was dressed in a pair of jeans and a tee shirt instead of his paramedic uniform and he was driving his eight-year-old Nissan instead of a Ford ambulance. Carla was not with him for this visit. She was back at work after her own two-week vacation and Las Vegas trip. Jim, however, was now on an extended, open-ended leave of absence that had been arranged by Matt Tisdale and his money. Jim was now the official “tour paramedic” for the Matt Tisdale North American tour. And today was his first day in his new assignment.

The entire situation was more than a little surreal to him. Six weeks ago, he had been just another obscure private paramedic, barely scratching out a meager existence of living paycheck to paycheck, up to his ears in credit card debt and outrageous rent payments. And then Tisdale had come into his life, taking him with him on an outrageous drunken party full of debauchery, food, and even fishing. All because Tisdale had a bad heart and wanted a trained medic to hang out with him just in case. Nothing had happened involving Matt’s heart on the trip. Jim had never once had to employ the LifePak monitor/defibrillator or the Adenosine Matt had purchased. But he had experienced a threesome for the first time in his life, had watched two women have passionate lesbian sex, had participated in what could technically qualify as an orgy, and had personally reeled in a seventy-pound marlin off the southern tip of Baja California. And then, just before the boat had docked back in its berth at Marina Del Ray, Matt had offered him the “gig” (as he called it) he was now reporting for duty for.

“I want you to be my tour medic,” Matt told him on that fateful day. “You’ll be like that dude who follows the fuckin’ president around with that briefcase full of nuclear attack codes. They call it the football. You know what I’m talking about?”

“I do,” Jim told him. “But...”

“You’ll be my football carrier,” Matt went on. “You’ll never be more than thirty seconds away from me the whole fuckin’ time we’re on tour. Only, you won’t have to wear a fuckin’ uniform or shit like that. And, instead of nuclear attack codes so Slick Willie can rat-fuck Russia or Libya or some other shithole, your football is gonna have that LifePak and all of the medications and IVs and shit that you’ll need to get my heart out of that fuckin’ SVT shit if it goes into it again.”

“Uh ... well ... I appreciate the offer and all, Matt,” Jim said. “Really, I do, but I have to go back to my regular job.”

“I’ll arrange for an unlimited leave of absence for you,” Matt promised. “All I’ll have to do is fund another trip for that corporate asshole of yours. He’ll play ball.”

“Well ... maybe, but I’m not sure...”

“No more than thirty seconds away,” Matt interrupted again. “Do you know what that means?”

“Uh ... no. What does it mean?”

“It means you’ll be hanging out with me and the boys everywhere we go,” he explained. “You’ll ride the fuckin’ airplane with us from city to city instead of sitting on the bus with the roadies. You’ll have your own fuckin’ hotel room on the same floor as mine wherever we stay. You’ll be backstage with us at every fuckin’ show, an all-access VIP pass around your neck just like what me and the boys wear. You dig what I’m laying down here, dude?”

“Uh ... yeah,” he said slowly, pondering what he was being offered. He already had a taste of what hanging out with Matt and the band was like: One long, endless, drunken party full of debauchery and sin. It had been fun and eye-opening to say the least, but was it really something he wanted to do full-time?

“I’ll pay you seven-fifty a day for the gig,” Matt told him.

“Seven-fifty? Do you mean ... uh ... seven hundred and fifty dollars? Per day?” That was considerably more than what he was paid for working a shift at SMS.

“That’s right,” Matt said. “Plus, your lodging, food, booze, and anything else you want to indulge in is covered as well.”

“That is pretty generous,” Jim said. “But when you say seven-fifty a day, are we talking like four days of the week here?”

“No,” Matt said. “We’re talking seven days a week. Out on the road, we generally have a show every night for weeks at a time. Of course, we occasionally get an extended travel day when it’s a big haul between cities for the trucks and the buses, but I’ll still want your ass within thirty seconds of me when that happens. You’ll be out there with us to save my ass if it needs saving. You’ll be on the clock every fuckin’ minute of every fuckin’ day, so you’ll be paid seven-fifty for every fuckin’ day you’re out there with us.”

“I see,” Jim said, warming quite nicely to the idea now that he had this information. “And ... exactly how long will this uh ... gig last?”

“We’ve got three legs of the North American tour scheduled right now,” Matt said. “That’s going to run us into early March at the very least. The suits over at National Records have let me know that if the album sells well—and I have no reason to think it won’t—and we sell out the arenas here in the states and Canada—which we fuckin’ will—we might go hit up Europe and South America next summer.”

“That’s ... six months,” Jim said.

“At least,” Matt clarified.

Jim’s brain did some quick, dirty mental arithmetic. Six months times thirty days per month times seven hundred and fifty dollars per day ... was ... He shook his head. No, that can’t be right! A hundred and thirty-five thousand dollars? Well over triple what he normally made in a year, even with overtime shifts thrown in! And for only working six months? That could not possibly be right.

“It’s almost a hundred and forty grand,” Matt said, as if reading his mind. “I’ve already had my accountant do the math on this shit. You say yes, and he’ll take that coin and put it in a special account with your fuckin’ name on it. He’ll take out the taxes and shit just like your regular employer does, he’ll cover whatever it costs to keep up your health coverage and all that shit while you’re on the leave of absence, and he’ll make sure your rent and other bills get paid while you’re gone.”

“Wow,” Jim whispered, overwhelmed, that number—a hundred and forty fucking thousand!—still echoing in his head. Something suddenly occurred to him. “Were you planning to offer me this the whole time? Is that why you wanted me on this yacht trip?”

Matt shook his head. “No fuckin’ way,” he said. “I mean, I wanted you on the yacht trip because you’re a medic—I already told you that shit—but I was sincere about the underlying reason. I wanted to thank you for saving my ass. It didn’t occur to me that you should go with us on tour until we were at my pad in Cabo. Do you remember our first night there?”

“Uh ... sort of,” Jim said. He had been pretty hammered that night (as he had been most nights on the trip). He had a fuzzy memory of getting a blowjob on Matt’s couch from an extremely attractive nineteen-year-old Mexican girl while Matt and the band played quarters with shots of tequila at the dining room table. Other than that, he did not remember much.

“That was when I got the idea,” Matt said. “Me and Austin were out on the deck taking a few bonghits with the bitches and I realized I wasn’t fuckin’ scared about my heart doing that funky shit because you were there. I knew if it started fuckin’ jittering again, all I had to do was get you and you’d make it stop doing that shit. It was fuckin’ comforting, dude. You know what I’m saying?”

“Uh ... yeah, I guess,” Jim replied.

“And then I started thinking that I want that feeling of comfort to be with me while we’re out on tour and shit. While we’re flying in airplanes, while we’re performing on the stage, while we’re banging local gash in the hotel rooms after the shows. That’s when I got the idea to hire you to be the tour medic. The very next day I called up that weasel motherfucker that counts the beans for me and told him the plan and he did the math and started putting things together. Everything is pretty much arranged, dude. All you have to do is say yes.”

And so, he said yes. And now, here he was, about to start his first day on his new gig.

The large rollup door for the rehearsal warehouse was now standing open. Jim, per instructions he had been given several days ago, drove his car through it, to the inside of the building. All of the band’s gear, all of the lighting and scaffolding, the miles of cables and wires, even the stage itself, were all gone, presumably in Tacoma being set up in the Tacoma Dome for tonight’s opening show. Parked inside already was a black Mercedes sedan, a Corvette, a 5-series BMW, and a Lexus. Sitting in folding chairs around a card table near where the sound board had once sat, were Matt’s band members—Austin Jefferson, the bass player; Steve Calhoun, the drummer; and Corban Slate, the young, baby-faced rhythm guitarist. Matt himself was nowhere to be seen. Sitting in another chair, well away from the band members, was a mid-forties man wearing a suit and tie and keeping a leather briefcase close by him. Jim had never met this man before, but he had been told that their road manager would be traveling with them. His name, Matt had told him in a previous conversation, was Greg Cahn, or Grand or something like that.

“He’s a back-stabbing, ass-sucking, Book of Mormon thumping hypocrite who would probably kill his own grandmother for a little sniff of my blow,” Matt had advised. “Never trust him about anything, and always keep your ass firmly covered when he’s around.”

Not exactly a glowing character recommendation, Jim thought, eyeballing the man nervously.

He parked next to the Corvette and got out of his Nissan. He walked around to the back and opened the trunk. Inside was the single suitcase he had been instructed to bring. Inside of it were all of the jeans and most of the t-shirts he owned, eight pairs of underwear, ten pairs of socks, a couple of sweaters, a winter coat, his shaving and toiletries equipment, and about a dozen of his favorite books. He set the suitcase down on the floor and then closed the trunk again. He was trying to figure out what to do with his keys when the man in the suit walked over to him, a large grin on his face.

“You must be the paramedic that Matt hired,” he said.

“That’s right,” Jim said, keeping his voice monotone.

“I’m Greg Gahn, the road manager,” he said, holding out his right hand.

Jim shook with him. “Jim Ramos,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

“Of course, of course,” Greg said, his grin getting wider. “Welcome to the crew. I’m very excited to be working with you. It will be nice to have a paramedic on standby to help supplement the medical treatment that I sometimes have to carry out.”

“You do medical treatment?” Jim asked carefully. “You’re not a doctor, are you?”

“No no,” Greg said, chuckling. “I’m not a doctor. My education is in entertainment production and religious studies. I do, however, have a fairly extensive informal training in advanced first aid and various pharmacological treatments.”

“I see,” Jim said, wondering exactly what he meant by ‘informal’.

“Anyway, if you’ll just put your car keys on the front seat of the vehicle and leave the door unlocked, I’ll take you over to your ‘football’, as Matt calls it, and we can go over what is in it.”

“Uh ... wait a minute,” Jim said. “Just leave my keys in the car?”

“It will be perfectly safe,” Greg said. “National pays for a service that will come in after we depart. They will hook all the vehicles up to trickle chargers to keep the batteries healthy and they will secure the keys at that time. They will also come in weekly to dust off the vehicles and check on their status.”

“No kidding?” Jim said. “There are people who get paid to do things like that?”

“Yes, of course,” Greg said.

“Interesting,” Jim said, and then shrugged. He opened the car door and tossed his keys inside. “I guess any thieves wouldn’t bother much with my car with all of yours sitting here anyway.”

“I would think not,” he said. “Now, shall we go see your football?”

“I guess we should.”

His football was a medium sized suitcase that looked pretty much like any other piece of luggage. It had an extendable handle and wheels on the bottom so it could be rolled from place to place instead of carried. It latched shut with a simple locking mechanism that required a four-digit code be input. Currently, that code was set at 0000. Greg dialed it in and then opened the case.

“This is everything that you requested for this assignment,” Greg told him, waving at the inside of the case.

The largest piece of equipment inside was the LifePak 10 monitor/defibrillator; the exact model that SMS equipped their ambulances with. There were two batteries installed in the monitor and four spares, along with a plug-in battery charger. Jim turned the machine on and watched as it went through a brief series of self-checks before gracing him with a flat line rhythm since it was not currently connected to a human body with a heartbeat. He picked up the paddles that would be used to defib Matt if such a thing became necessary, set the output to one hundred joules of energy, and then pressed the charge button. A high-pitched whine sounded as the machine powered up. Once fully charged, Jim pointed the paddles away from each other and pressed the two thumb buttons, releasing the charge harmlessly into the air. He then opened the zipper pockets on the LifePak’s case, finding multiple packages of electrodes and a large bottle of conducting gel. He zipped everything back up and then turned the machine off, satisfied.

Next, he inspected the other supplies in the football. Matt had told him to write out a shopping list of everything he would conceivably need, focusing primarily on the guitarist’s heart issue and not so much on basic first aid. He saw that everything he had asked for was there. Three one-liter bags of normal saline for intravenous fluid. Six sets of IV tubing. Ten each of 18, 20, and 22-gauge IV catheters. Ten commercial IV start kits. A bag valve mask. A laryngoscope and three 7.0, 7.5, and 8.0 endotracheal tubes. Three commercial ET tube fasteners. A dozen each of 10-milliliter, 5-milliliter, and 3-milliliter syringes. A dozen needles of varying gauge to put on the syringes. And then there were the drugs. Five prefilled syringes of epinephrine, three of atropine, two of sodium bicarbonate, six of lidocaine, two of calcium gluconate, two of magnesium sulfate, and two of Narcan. In addition to the prefilled syringes, there was a premixed bag of dopamine, twelve vials of Adenosine, and six vials of Versed.

It was the Versed that brought a little bit of Jim’s nervousness about the legality of this gig back to the forefront of his mind. Versed, a potent benzodiazepine, was a Schedule IV controlled substance with high potential for abuse. On the ambulance, the Versed and the morphine were both carefully tracked from medic to medic, shift to shift, with both oncoming and offgoing medic required to sign for possession of it and keep it inside a lockbox that was, in turn, kept under a separate lock and key inside the ambulance. When the drugs were used, a complex form needed to be filled out to replace it and a copy of that form was then forwarded to the DEA. Just having six vials of the shit sitting in this football with no one really accountable for it did not seem right.

“We’re sure that I won’t get into trouble if I have to utilize any of this stuff?” Jim asked, not for the first time.

“You were the one who insisted on the oversight and procedures we’ve put in place for this assignment,” Greg said.

Yes, he had. Paramedics could only work in the United States if they operated under the authority and license of a physician. And so, Matt and his people had found him one. They had paid some gynecologist in Spokane, Washington to agree to be Jim’s medical authority and to sign his name on a set of protocols that, theoretically, would allow Jim to operate with all the rights and privileges of an on-duty paramedic. They had even picked Washington because that was currently the only state that included Adenosine in the paramedic scope of practice. The problem was that Jim was not licensed to work in any state except California. And he had never been officially trained on the use of Adenosine. And he was pretty sure it was not kosher to have a Washington licensed physician providing oversight to a California paramedic even if that paramedic was operating in California, which he would not be for the vast majority of the tour.

“I understand,” Jim said, “that we’ve met the technical requirements for me to operate advanced life support equipment and to use advanced life support drugs while on the tour, but ... well ... I know that what we’re doing is not strictly legal. We could all get in a lot of trouble if something goes wrong. Particularly me. I could be charged with practicing medicine without a license. That’s a federal felony.”

Greg looked at him thoughtfully for a moment and then nodded, his grin still firmly on his face. “Let me ask you something, Jim. Do you believe in Heavenly Father?”

“No,” Jim said plainly and honestly. “Not even a little bit.”

Greg’s grin faded. “I see,” he said. “Well ... how about this. Do you believe in the power of money?”

“The power of money?” Jim asked. “What do you mean?”

“I mean that money talks very loudly, and you are now working for people—Matt Tisdale primarily, but also, in a sense, National Records—who have an awful lot of money. That means they can talk very loudly and be heard. Do you know how Matt was able to purchase a LifePak monitor, controlled pharmaceuticals, and advanced medical equipment that is only supposed to be sold to those operating under a physician’s license?”

“Because he has a lot of money,” Jim said. “He explained that to me. And I get it. But we’re talking about unlicensed medical practice here.”

“We are not talking about unlicensed medical practice,” Gahn corrected. “We have done what you asked. We have a licensed physician providing oversight to you and he has approved standing orders for you to follow in the form of those standard protocols in that binder inside the football.”

“But I’m not licensed in Washington or any other state but California,” Jim said. “And the physician is only licensed in Washington. That’s not exactly legal. If I were ever scrutinized...”

“That is unlikely to happen,” Greg said. “But if it did, do you know what we would do?”

“What would you do?”

“We would use the monetary resources of both Matt and National Records to hire the very best medical lawyers we could find to defend you before whatever agency is questioning your integrity in pretty much the same manner that the so-called dream team is defending OJ Simpson. They would employ an army of junior partners and paralegals to comb through law books and legal rulings dating back to the Stone Age until they found something that could be used to justify the actions that you took or were capable of taking. They would have you walking out of any hearing looking like an oppressed hero who was only trying to do his job while Big Medicine, Big Pharma and the nurse’s union tried their best to hold you down.”

Jim’s eyes widened. “You think that would work?”

“Of course it would work,” Gahn scoffed. “I’ve seen such tactics employed multiple times during my association with Matt Tisdale and the other members of Intemperance. Justice for money. It’s the American way.”

“But ... but ... even if these lawyers of yours could convolute the issue and keep me from being punished ... I’m still doing something illegal. I’m still operating outside the scope of my practice. I’m still technically practicing medicine without a license.”

Gahn looked at him with a complete lack of understanding in his gaze. “What is your point?” he asked.

Okay ... maybe this is all right after all, Jim thought as he saw, for the first time, the inside of the aircraft they would be traveling on from city to city during the tour. He had been a little nervous about it when he first saw it from the back seat of the limousine as they parked on the tarmac at Van Nuys Airport. It was not a huge aircraft at all. It was, in fact, the smallest plane Jim had ever boarded in his life. And it did not have jet engines like every other plane he had flown on, but two propellers that hung down from the overhead wings. A Dash-8, the pilot-in-command had called it during his pre-board lecture. But as Jim climbed up the stairs on the side and into the interior, his nervousness faded to amazement. It looked like, if it had been fitted with rows of standard aircraft seats, it could hold maybe thirty passengers. But it did not have rows of standard aircraft seats. Instead, there were six large recliner type chairs with tables next to them in the front of the cabin. There were two couches aligned in the mid portion of the cabin, each capable of holding two or three people. Just behind the couches was a small wet bar, complete with barstools, and stocked with a large variety of liquor held in place by rubber straps. Beyond the bar were four bunk beds attached to the fuselage, the beds neatly made up with linen and pillows. Beyond that was a door that led to a bathroom/shower combo.

The pilots, after giving their lists of do’s and don’ts about traveling on their aircraft (no smoking, no drugs in the cabin—though they would not check what was in the stowed baggage until they started going international—no destructive behavior, no groupies), had already sealed themselves behind a closed door in the cockpit. Jim’s impression was that they wanted to see as little of their passengers as possible. There was a single cabin crewmember who greeted them as they boarded. She introduced herself as Lori. She had a face like a Mack truck, a body that rippled and jiggled with fat rolls, and was at least fifty years old. She had a quirky sense of humor and seemed nice, but she made it very clear to all that, while she would serve them drinks, clean up their messes, and even prepare food for them, she was in charge once they boarded the plane and they would follow her orders and show no disrespect for her.

“You got it, hon,” Matt told her with a smile. “We get what you’re saying. This ain’t the tour bus. We’ll mind our manners in here.”

“Then we’ll get along just fine,” Lori assured him. “Now, if all of you will just take the primary seats and get buckled in, I’ll get you all some preflight cocktails.”

“Now we’re talking,” Matt said, his smile getting bigger.

Everyone found a seat to plant their butt in. Jim’s was in front, across the narrow aisle from Greg Gahn. Matt and the band settled in behind them. Lori made sure they were properly buckled in and then sealed up the door of the plane. She made a quick call to the cockpit on the intercom to let the pilots know that this had been done and then made her way down the aisle taking drink orders, starting with Matt and Austin in the very back. Matt ordered a Jack and Coke, heavy on the Jack. Austin ordered a double rye, neat. Corban ordered a cosmopolitan, but only on the stipulation that the lime juice be freshly squeezed and the drink be properly shaken and strained.

“Cosmo, fresh lime, shaken and strained,” Lori repeated mechanically.

“Seriously, Corban?” Matt asked, shaking his head sadly. “A fuckin’ cosmo? Could you be more faggy than that?”

“I’m not faggy, I’m metrosexual,” Corban said. “And you should try the cosmo, dude. It’s absolutely fabulous.”

“Stop fuckin’ calling me dude,” Matt barked.

“Sorry, Matt.”

“What’s metrosexual?” asked Lori, raising her eyebrows.

“It means I embrace the sense of fashion and fastidiousness of the male homosexual lifestyle without embracing the sexual practices of the demographic,” Corban explained.

“How’s that?” Lori asked.

“It means,” Matt paraphrased, “that he likes to mince around and wear designer underwear and go to a fuckin’ two-hundred-dollar hair stylist and drink cosmos like he’s a faggot, but he doesn’t suck schlong or let some dude stick a schlong up his ass.”

Lori pondered that for a moment, trying to wrap her brain around it. Finally, she nodded. “I see,” she said. She moved on, looking at Jim. “And you?”

Jim looked at his watch. It was only a few minutes past eleven. And he was on duty. But ... well, he was on a rock and roll tour, right? And, when in Rome... “I’ll have a vodka and tonic.”

“We only have Stolichnaya,” she said. “Is that all right?”

“Uh ... yeah, sure,” Jim said. “I think I can live with that.”

“Glad to hear it,” Lori said. She turned to Gahn. “And you?”

“Perrier, in a glass over six ice cubes,” he told her. “With a rinsed lemon slice.”

This earned another shake of the head from Matt. “Fuckin’ Perrier over six ice cubes,” he spat. “Tell me something, Greg. Does your old lady ever let you get on top?”

“The details of my sexual life are not your concern, Matt,” Greg said huffily.

“I really wouldn’t want them to be,” Matt said. He then brightened. “But you know what? I bet there are some people out there who would like to check it out. I mean, I’ve seen your old lady. She’s not bad for an older broad. Nice big titties. Decent ass. You should let Kim and one of her camera crews film the two of you getting it on.”

“What?” Greg asked, appalled. “We would never do anything like that!”

“Don’t reject this right away,” Matt said. “We could be onto something here. A couple of Mormons having typical Mormon sex! I mean, I’m sure it’s boring as fuck, but people would still pay good money to see that shit! I bet she could sell a couple hundred thousand copies, easy. And she’d give you at least a couple bucks per copy in royalties! That’s a couple hundred grand in your pocket! That’d be enough to let you get back on the blow full time!”

“You are disgusting, Matt!” Greg said angrily. “I will discuss this topic no further!”

“All right,” Matt said sadly. “But at least think it over.”

Greg said no further, as promised. Lori, her expression still neutral, said, “Okay then. I’ll go get these drinks going.”

She got the drinks going, mixing them up precisely as ordered and then bringing them forward and serving them one by one, giving each person a little white cocktail napkin with the name of the aircraft company printed on it. About the time everyone had drink in hand, the plane shuddered as first the left and then the right engine was started. Soon, they were taxiing.

“All right, guys,” Lori said, standing near the cockpit door and facing them. “Let me go over the standard safety spiel this one time and then we won’t do that on subsequent flights as long as everyone plays nice and does what they’re supposed to. Fair enough?”

“Bring it, baby!” Matt directed.

She brought it, telling them about the emergency exits, the seatbelts, the smoking policy, the life vests, and when they could take out their little entertainment devices. They all listened respectfully to her lecture. She asked if there were any questions. There were none. She then walked back to her little seat adjacent to the cockpit, talked to the pilots on the intercom again, and strapped herself inside.

Three minutes later, the engines wound up to full power and they were accelerating down the runway. Jim gripped his drink tightly during the takeoff roll. He had not flown all that many times in his life and was not entirely fond of the experience. The plane accelerated a lot faster, lifted from the ground a lot sooner, and climbed considerably steeper than any aircraft he had ever been in before. It also bumped and bounced more. But, in only fifteen minutes or so, they were at cruising altitude and in straight and level flight. Lori told them they were free to move about the cabin if they wished and let them know that she would be happy to refresh their drinks at the bar. Everyone except Greg unbuckled and headed for a refill.

After getting his second Stoli and tonic, Jim started to head back to the seat he had been in for takeoff, then decided to find somewhere else for the time being. They had another two hours or so until they started their descent, and he did not really want to have to talk to Ghan if he did not have to. He had already decided he did not care much for the guy. Instead, he went over to one of the couches and sat down, setting his glass in the holder on the armrest. The couch was very comfortable as he settled into it.

Corban took his Cosmo and returned to his seat, where he put on headphones attached to a CD player. Austin and Steve grabbed the other couch and began having an animated discussion that involved (strangely enough) lumber dimensions—they kept talking about two by fours and four by fours and one by threes. Jim wondered if they had backgrounds in the construction industry. Matt spent a few minutes—long enough to swallow down another Jack and Coke—talking to Lori at the bar. He then had her make him a third drink. After taking it from her he walked over and sat on the couch next to Jim.

“How’s it going, dude?” Matt asked him. “Having fun so far?”

“This is a very interesting experience,” Jim told him. He was still a bit nervous about this whole deal. Flying on small aircraft, practicing medicine without a license, being responsible for the cardiac resuscitation of a world-famous rock musician. Even just talking to Matt was weird and intimidating, although he had gotten some decent practice at it during the trip to Mexico.

“Welcome to the lifestyle,” Matt said with a grin, hefting his drink in salute. “Once you get used to this shit, it’s hard to go back to the middle-class.”

“I guess it will be,” Jim said.

“Maybe you won’t have to,” Matt said. “You seem like an alright motherfucker so far—maybe a little square, maybe with a little bit of a stick up your ass, but nothing too offensive. I mean ... I don’t feel a need to kick your ass whenever I’m in your presence. That’s a good thing, right?”

“Uh ... right,” Jim said, unsure if he’d just been insulted or complimented.

“What I like about you is that you’re always cool and collected. Nothing seems to faze you. I’m thinking that’s a good quality in a tour medic. If you work out on this road trip and they ask us to go to Europe and Asia, I’ll keep you around if you’re up for it. That’ll be at least another six months out. And then, after that, who knows? Maybe South America? Maybe another run through the states. All at the same pay rate of course. You could pull in some serious coin just for hanging out with us and making sure I don’t fuckin’ die.”

Jim was a little taken aback by this suggestion. “Stay with you for ... another year or so?” he asked. “Beyond what I’ve already signed on for?”

“It could be that long,” Matt said.

“That’s a long time to be away from home,” Jim said.

Matt simply shrugged. “You told me on the boat you ain’t got no permanent bitch or nothing, right?”

“Right,” Jim said. “Just an ex-wife who wouldn’t piss on me to put me out if I were on fire.”

Matt pointed a finger at him and nodded approvingly. “I like that one,” he said. “Kind of describes my feelings about the bible-thumper over there sipping his fucking bubbly water—and most of the suits that work for National. Anyway, you ain’t got no kids either, right?”

“Not as far as I know,” Jim said.

“What about other family?”

“My parents, my sister, my brother, a couple of nieces and nephews,” he said. “Some friends I hang out with at work.”

“You can keep in touch with them with that new email shit they got going, can’t you? Won’t even cost you a stamp.”

“True,” Jim said slowly. “But still ... a year and a half away from home.”

“And about four hundred grand in your bank account for doing it,” Matt pointed out. “Is that such a bad deal?”

The man had a point. “No,” Jim said. “It really isn’t.”

“And it’s not like we’ll be gone from LA the whole time. We’ll be back every four or five months; on the tour breaks between legs, for international rehearsal before we head out overseas. That shit’s necessary for your sanity.”

“That is good to know.”

“Think about it, dude,” Matt said. “I’m offering you a gig where you get paid to party. You get to drink and you get to smoke out if you’re into that. There ain’t no random drug testing when you work for Matt Tisdale. And the gash! You’ll get laid with a different bitch or bitches pretty much every night. You saw how it was hanging with us on the boat and down in Cabo. They’ll be throwing the pussy at you just because you hang out with me. That’s a perk that fuckin’ corporate America don’t offer, right?”

Jim nodded, remembering some of the “gash” he had scored on the Mexico trip. Beautiful, nasty women willing to do anything asked of them—and more—with little or no preliminaries. Women so far out of his league that they could not even see his league from where they were, but they had dropped their clothes for him happily just because he was one of Matt’s people. Yes, that was quite a perk to his current employment position.

“So, just think it over for now,” Matt said. “I’m not asking you to sign any papers or any shit like that just yet. Let’s just see how this first leg goes and we’ll take things from there.”

“All right,” Jim said. “We’ll do that.”

“My man,” Matt said with a smile. He took a large gulp from his drink, savoring it. He then nodded over in the direction of Lori, who was constructing new drinks for Austin and Steve. “How about that stewardess bitch? Ain’t she about the ugliest fucking chick you’ve ever seen?”

“Uh ... no, not even close,” Jim said truthfully.

“Really?” Matt asked in disbelief.

Jim chuckled. “I’m a paramedic, Matt. I’ve been working the streets for fifteen years. I’ve seen women out there that would make Lori look like Cindy Crawford. Skank that would haunt your dreams.”

“No shit?” Matt said, visibly impressed by this claim.

“No shit,” Jim assured him.

“You’ll have to tell me some of these stories,” Matt said. “Only ... not right now. Wait until I can get a few lines in me first. Anyway, she may be ugly as a fuckin’ prolapsed rectum, but she seems like a pretty cool bitch. She don’t take no shit off of us. I respect that shit; you know what I’m sayin’?”

“I think I do,” Jim said. “There’s something I don’t understand though.”

“What’s that?”

“Why did they assign someone who looks like that to your plane? I mean, you’re Matt Tisdale. All of this was set up to keep you happy, right?”

“For the most part,” he agreed.

“So, why an old, ugly chick to work on the plane? I would’ve thought they’d get us a hot one—you know, some girl with big tits in a short skirt willing to give her all.”

Matt was shaking his head. “They would’ve scraped up something like that if I’d wanted them too, but that’s a bad idea in a situation like this.”

“It is?”

“It is,” he said. “You don’t want no hot gash workin’ as a servant for you on a day in and day out basis. You want either a dude, or some bitch you wouldn’t dream of fucking. You don’t shit where you live, my man. That’s one of life’s great truths. It’s best to have no fuckin’ sexual tension with the people you work and live with day after day. Trust me on this shit.”

Jim nodded, impressed; feeling there was indeed some wisdom with this counterintuitive thought. “I guess that makes sense,” he said.

“There’s enough gash for the taking in this world that you don’t have to be bringing it into your business. Make that your policy and you’ll go far without any needless distractions and bullshit in your life.”

“I will keep that in mind,” Jim said, intending to do just that.

The conversation petered out at that point. Matt continued to sip frequently out of his drink and occasionally look out the window at the landscape passing below. Jim started to feel a little awkward after a minute or two and so, just to break the silence, and because he genuinely thought Matt would be interested in the topic, he asked, “Have you heard that new song that Jake Kingsley and Bigg G just put out?”

Matt’s head whipped around so fast it was like it was on a spring-loaded swivel. His expression, which had been somewhat pensive, suddenly turned serious. “What?” he asked... demanded.

Jim immediately got the impression he had said something wrong. He knew that Intemperance had broken up under bad terms, that Matt blamed Jake Kingsley for the death of Darren Appleman, but he had kind of assumed that after so many years that those things were water under the bridge now. “Uh...” He couldn’t think of anything else to say.

“Are you saying that you heard a song by Kingsley and Bigg G?” Matt asked, slowly annunciating each word. “Is that what you’re telling me?”

“Uh ... well ... yeah,” Jim said. “I ... uh ... I heard it on the radio this morning while I was getting my things together for the trip. On KRON.”

“A new song?” Matt asked. “Not that Step Inside bullshit from last year?”

“Yes,” Jim said, now very sorry he had brought this up, but all he could do at this point was answer his boss’s questions. “It’s a new song, from Bigg G’s new CD. The DJ said it’s not even for sale yet, not until closer to the end of the month or something. Jake Kingsley sings on this one.”

“Kingsley is rapping?” Matt asked incredulously.

“No, he’s singing normal like. Bigg G raps in the song though. It’s like ... what do you call it again when two singers sing in the same song?”

“A duet,” Matt said through gritted teeth.

“Right!” Jim said nervously, wishing to get out of this conversation as quickly as possible before he got fired on his first day. “A duet! Bigg G raps out his part and Jake sings like a rock singer in his part. He plays the guitar too.”

“The guitar? You mean the acoustic guitar, like in Step Inside?”

“Uh ... no,” Jim said. “An electric guitar, like in a rock song. They keep switching back and forth from the rap part of the song to the rock part. It’s actually pretty ... uh ... oh ... uh, never mind.”

“Pretty what?” Matt demanded.

“Well...” a deep breath. “It was ... uh ... pretty cool. Uh ... that’s just my opinion, of course. I’m not a musician though.”

“No,” Matt said, shaking his head a little, “but you’re a music consumer, aren’t you?”

“Well ... yeah,” he admitted.

“How do you know it was Kingsley playing the guitar?” Matt asked next.

“The DJ said so,” Jim told him. “He made a big deal when he introduced the song about how it was Jake and Bigg G singing a duet and Jake was playing the electric guitar. Oh ... and get this ... Bigg G plays the piano on the song.”

“The piano?!” Matt almost yelled. “There’s a fucking piano in this song?”

What fucking can of worms did I just open up? Jim’s mind asked helplessly. And how do I close it again? “Yeah ... there’s a piano, mostly in the beginning and in the end parts.”

“Motherfucker,” Matt whispered slowly. He picked up his drink and downed the remainder of it. And then something else seemed to occur to him. “Was there a guitar solo in the song?”

“A guitar solo?”

“Yeah,” Matt said. “You do know what a guitar solo is, right?”

“I do,” Jim said. “And ... uh ... yeah, there was one.”

“And ... what did you think about it?” Matt wanted to know.

“The solo?”

“The solo.”

“Uh ... it kind of shredded, to tell you the truth,” Jim said softly.

“That motherfucker,” Matt said, shaking his head again.

“It wasn’t as good as one of your solos though,” Jim added quickly.

“I’m sure it wasn’t,” Matt said. He stood. “Excuse me. I think I need another drink.”

The guitarist stood and walked to the bar, slamming his empty glass down. Jim was relieved and hoped he wouldn’t come back.

What in the fuck was all that about?

The chartered Dash-8 aircraft carrying Matt Tisdale, his band members, his road manager, and his tour paramedic landed without incident at Boeing Field at 2:15 PM. The passengers deplaned and collected their meager luggage, with Jim the paramedic the only one carrying more than one bag. A limousine was waiting for them on the tarmac and they all climbed inside for the trip to the hotel. Since Matt and the boys were scheduled to hit the stage at 8:30 PM for their ninety-minute set, that meant the moratorium on intoxicating subjects officially went into effect at 4:30. Usually Matt adhered to an additional three hours atop that—at least—but on this day he needed a little something. He shot down one more Jack and Coke and two lines of cocaine in the limousine.

Greg Gahn got them checked into their individual suites at the Westin Hotel in downtown Seattle shortly after 3:00. They only had time to drop off their bags before they had to climb back into the limo for the trip to the KZOK radio station—the primary local hard rock—for the day’s interview. Everyone except Matt stayed in the limo.

The DJ doing the interview was a greasy looking biker type who went by the moniker “Doctor Biz”. During the pre-interview meeting with Biz and the station manager, Matt suddenly asked them: “Have you been playing that new song by Kingsley and Bigg G?”

The two men looked at each other for a moment, seemingly passing some message back and forth. Finally, they both shrugged.

“I Signed That Line?” Biz said. “Yeah, of course we’re playing it. We just got it in a few days ago and they released it for airplay this morning.”

“We’ve scheduled it for eighteen plays over the course of the day,” the manager added helpfully.

“So ... let me get this straight,” Matt said. “You’re playing a song by Bigg G, the rapper, from his latest rap CD, on your hard rock station?”

“Well ... it’s not strictly a rap song,” the manager explained. “It’s a fusion of rap and hard rock. And it has Jake Kingsley in it—playing the guitar even.”

“We still play Step Inside at least once a day,” Biz added. “For the same reason.”

Matt felt the little burst of anger flaring inside of him again, but he suppressed it. He looked at Biz, who he figured would be a little savvier when it came to judging rock music. “What do you think of it?”

Biz looked at him carefully. It was obvious he knew of the bad blood between Matt and Kingsley. “Honestly?” he asked.

“Yeah,” Matt said simply.

“I think it’s an amazing tune,” Biz said.

“Elaborate,” Matt requested.

“Well ... first off, it’s very innovative. Nothing like this has really been done before—with the exception of Step Inside—and they pulled it off quite well. It’s like Step Inside taken to the next level, made more intense.”

“I did that shit with Grandeur back on the Lines on the Map album with Intemperance,” Matt said. “Hard rock guitar with rap beat and rap vocalization. I wrote and composed that tune. Kingsley and G did not invent the genre.”

“Well ... you have kind of a point there, Matt,” Biz allowed, “but I wouldn’t put Step Inside and especially not I Signed That Line in the same genre as Grandeur. Don’t get me wrong now. Grandeur is a badass tune, one of my all-time faves from the stuff you did with Intemp, and it was innovative, but Step Inside and I Signed That Line are a different kind of fusion of the genres. Especially I Signed That Line. The tune shifts back and forth from full-on hip hop to full-on hard rock and has some mellow piano riffs thrown in at the beginning and the end. And in the bridge and the changeover, you get the true fusion where you have the DJ on the turntables, the piano playing, and the guitar chords all at once. It’s quite complex and compelling.”

“Really?” Matt asked, trying to picture in his mind how what Biz was describing could possibly be pulled off.

“Have you heard the tune yet?” asked the manager.

“No,” Matt said. “I didn’t even know it existed until one of my crew told me about it on the flight up here.”

“You didn’t know it existed?” Biz asked incredulously. “We’ve been hearing rumors about a new Kingsley and G duet for a couple of months.”

“Is that so?” Matt asked slowly.

“Yeah,” the manager said. “Our promotors have been telling us about this since at least July, since even before they started telling us about your new CD. We were really happy to start playing it this morning.”

Matt frowned as he heard this. How was it that these radio assholes in the Pacific Northwest had known about this new tune by Kingsley and G, but he, who was eyeballs deep in the music industry in the very city that produced ninety percent of American music, had not heard a word? Something smelled like a skanky crotch here. “Any chance I could score a copy of that CD?” he asked his hosts.

They looked at each other for a moment and then back at him. “Well...” said the manager, “unfortunately, we only have two copies of Bigg G’s new release currently. I’m afraid I can’t give one of them away.”

Matt felt that burst of anger again. He suppressed it again. They probably were not lying about that. “I understand,” he said softly.

“I could run you off a cassette tape of it though,” suggested Biz.

“A cassette?”

“That’s right,” Biz said. “We have a high-speed cassette recorder in the studio. Employees use it all the time to make personal tapes from our collection. I can get you one made while we’re doing the interview.”

“All right,” Matt said, nodding. “That’d be cool.”

The interview went well. When it was over, Biz handed Matt a cased cassette tape with the title of Bigg G’s latest CD written in black sharpie on the front.

“Thanks,” Matt told him, pocketing the tape.

“I Signed That Line is the first cut,” Biz told him. “There’s probably nothing else on there that you’ll want to listen to.”

“Probably not,” Matt agreed.

He went back to the street and climbed into the limousine again. They started heading for their next destination: a music store in Tukwila, near the airport they had landed at earlier.

“Hey, Greg,” Matt said as they worked their way through the afternoon traffic. “I need you to get something for me.”

“What’s that?” Gahn asked, his signature grin on his face.

“A portable cassette player with some headphones.”

The grin faded a little, becoming a look of confusion. “A cassette player. What for?”

“I don’t need to explain myself to you,” Matt told him. “Just get one for me as quick as you can. Maybe they have one at this store we’re going to.”

“Dude,” Corban spoke up. “There’s like a cassette player right here, in the limo.” He pointed to the sound system installed against the partition between the passenger compartment and the driver’s compartment. There was indeed a cassette player there, as well as a CD player and a VHS player. But Matt had no intention of listening to the cassette in front of other people.

“Mind your own fuckin’ business,” Matt barked at him. “And stop calling me dude.”

Corban gave him a look of appeasement and a shrug. “Your world, boss,” he said.

“All right,” Greg said, exasperated. “I’ll see what I can dig up.”

“Cool,” Matt said. “And make sure it’s a stereo player, not a mono. And high-quality headphones.”

“Of course,” Greg said with a sigh.

Greg was indeed able to dig up the required items at the record store. He presented them to Matt after they climbed back into the limo following the autograph session. Matt took them from the manager without even a word of thanks. Greg seemed unoffended—or he was at least used to it.

They arrived at the Tacoma Dome just after 5:00, the limo parking among the tractor-trailers and the buses in the rear of the facility. They were shown first to their dressing area and then reported immediately to the stage to begin their soundcheck. This took about fifteen minutes to accomplish. The roadies and techies then marked all the switches and dials and began getting ready to soundcheck the opening band—a group of hackers from Reno called Malignant that National had recently signed to their label—before the doors opened at 6:00.

Matt and the band, with Jim the paramedic and his ‘football’ trailing along behind, were then led back to the dressing rooms. Matt, unlike the rest of the band, had an entire room to himself. He went inside and shut the door behind him, cutting off Greg who was trying to give him some instructions about his stage clothes. He locked the door and then went over to the dressing table, where the torn jeans and black button-up shirt he would wear tonight were neatly folded.

Instead of picking up the clothes and getting ready—they would be meeting the locals and signing autographs backstage in just thirty minutes—he pulled the cassette case out of his pocket and set it down. He then opened up the packaging that contained his new cassette player and headphones. It took him a few minutes to figure out how the batteries went into the device—his close vision was not what it used to be and there was no way in hell he was going to wear reading glasses—because he couldn’t tell which way the plus and minus signs were supposed to be aligned.

Finally, he got it right, mostly through trial and error. He pulled the tape out of the case and inserted it into the player. He plugged in the headphones and put them on his ears. He took a deep breath and then pushed the play button on the device.

He really wanted to hate the song, and at first, he did. It opened with a slow piano melody and picked up into a rap beat complete with turntables and thumping bass guitars—sounds he generally detested—followed by G’s baritone rapping about some fucking thing or things he didn’t like. The rap built up a bit in intensity and then suddenly, the chorus came up and the tune switched from rap to a grinding hard rock guitar belting out a three-chord riff of impressive complexity. And then Kingsley’s voice cut in, singing out how he signed that line and sold his soul.

Son of a bitch! Matt thought in amazement. Is he singing about what I think he’s singing about?

The chorus ended and the tune switched back to the rap rhythm. Matt paid a little more attention to the lyrics this time around, hearing about how G was treated like a slave, paid like one too, about how his talent was exploited and he didn’t get shit for his effort.

They are talking about that! Matt realized. They’re talking about fucking National Records! About how those assholes fucked us over on our contract!

The next chorus started and Matt further realized they were actually modulating keys from E major to G major as they shifted from the rap to the rock portions. And they were doing it almost seamlessly, so that no one but a professional musician or sound engineer would notice. He could not help but be impressed by this—even though he really did not want to be. Kingsley belted out his words again, his voice a little more intense, a little angrier on this go-around, leaving no doubt remaining that he was singing about the music industry in general and National Records in particular.

The key remained in G major as the bridge portion began. Jake sang an agonized diatribe about how he’d just wanted to have his voice heard and wanted to make a simple living, about how they’d taken that dream and smashed it to pieces and flushed them away, about how he was put in a trap from which there was no escape. The words were mournful, angry, hard hitting. He trailed off the last syllable of the bridge and then launched into the guitar solo. And Jim was right. It was not as good as what Matt himself could have done, but it shredded pretty impressively.

The solo gave way back to the rap beat in E major and Bigg G singing out a final verse. From there, Kingsley belted out one more repetition of the chorus, his tone even angrier this time, and then they faded to a slow outro that was a mixture of the piano, some light turntables, and G and Kingsley singing out alternating vocalizations. The song ended on a fade out of the last piano note.

Matt pushed the stop button on the machine and then the rewind. When the tape stopped moving, he pushed play and listened to the entire tune one more time. Once this was complete, he pushed stop once more and removed the headphones from his head. He then threw the tape machine, the tape, and the headphones into the garbage can next to the dressing table. This did not stop the song from continuing to play in his mind, however.

“Motherfucker,” he muttered, shaking his head back and forth a few times.

I Signed That Line was going to chart like mad, maybe even faster and higher and longer than that song by those Brainwash nerds had—what was it called? Together? Jake Kingsley had been involved in that shit too. But at least Together only covered one basic genre. This I Signed That Line shit was going to explode both through the hard rock demographic and the hip hop demographic. Talk about fucking crossover!

He’s a musical genius, Matt’s brain whispered to him. Fucking admit it!

“So, what if he is?” he said aloud. “He’s still a fucking sellout. He still led the push to vote Darren out of Intemperance, which is what led to Darren killing himself with heroin.”

But even as he spoke the words, he had to admit that they did not have quite the same power behind them that they once had. When you came right down to it, Darren had been a fuckup—a fuckup who managed to fuck up majorly time and time again despite multiple chances to redeem himself. Was Kingsley really all that wrong for taking the stand he had taken? Was it all just a power struggle against me, or was he really only trying to act in the best interest of Intemperance, as he claimed at the time?

Matt did not like these thoughts in his head. Did not like to doubt himself, especially not on a subject as painful and far-reaching as Darren and the breakup of Intemperance.

We really had something going with Intemperance though, another part of him insisted on saying. We were on top of the fucking world, and it was because Jake and Nerdly and I were a great fucking musical team. We could put together tunes that rocked, that still rock, that they’ll still be playing on the radio fifty fucking years from now!

“Fuck this shit,” he spat, trying to drive the doubts from his brain. They did not want to go. His usual method of drowning them—cocaine, alcohol, marijuana—were unavailable to him at the moment because he had a show to do in a few hours.

So, instead, he turned to another subject. Why in the fuck didn’t I know until this morning that Kingsley and G were putting out this tune?

Maybe that was a question he could get a few answers to.

He stood up from the chair and walked to the door of the dressing room. He unlocked it and opened it up. He then stepped across the small hallway to the larger, communal dressing and shower room where the food and the drinks and the groupies would be after the show. He ripped the door open and put his head inside. Austin, Steve, and Corban were all sitting in their stage clothes. Jim was sitting on a couch, drinking from a bottle of water and watching everything, his ‘football’ next to him. They were not who he had come to see, however.

“Matt,” said Greg, who was standing next to Jack Ferguson. “You’re not dressed yet. We only have a few minutes until we need to head backstage.”

“I need to talk to you,” Matt told him.

“Right now?”

“Right fucking now,” Matt insisted. “Come with me.”

Greg came with him. They walked back across the hall and went into Matt’s private room. Matt closed and locked the door again.

“What’s the problem?” Greg asked.

“Did you know that Jake Kingsley and Bigg G were putting out a tune together? A tune that was to be released today; on the very fucking day I’m starting my tour?”

Greg hesitated to speak, an act which was all the answer Matt needed.

“Fuck me,” Matt spat. “You knew about this shit and didn’t tell me about it?”

“Well ... yes,” Greg admitted. “Steve Crow told me that I should try to keep this information from you as long as possible.”

“What the fuck for?” he demanded.

“It was thought that the information might be ... oh ... upsetting to you,” Greg said. “And that if you were upset it might cause a distraction that would detract from your tour duties.”

“Did he think I wasn’t going to find out about this?” Matt nearly yelled.

Greg managed to look apologetic. “Uh ... actually, it was thought that we might go quite some time before you did hear about it,” he said. “The tour has started. Your days are now quite full. It has been noted on past tours that you don’t typically listen to the radio much and I have been instructed to tell all of the DJs who will be interviewing you as we travel not to bring up the subject. Your band members all know not to bring up anything involving Jake or Intemperance with you. So ... yes, we thought we could at least get you well into the routine of touring before you found out.”

“You assholes,” Matt said, shaking his head. “So, Crow and the rest of those fuckheads at National have known about this shit for months?”

Greg shrugged. “That is a fair assessment of the situation,” he allowed. “Who did tell you? That unsavory DJ? That station manager? If it was them, I can guarantee they will never be granted another...”

“It wasn’t them,” Matt said. “Don’t fuckin’ worry about who it was. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that I know, and I’m fucking pissed off that no one told me.”

“That was because we feared the reaction you are now having,” Greg said. “Are you going to be okay for the show tonight?”

“Of course I’m going to be okay!” Matt spat. “I played an entire fucking set once with my heart going more than two hundred fucking beats a minute and my chest throbbing like a rotten tooth and feeling like I couldn’t fucking breathe. You think I’m going to have trouble because of this shit?”

“Well ... when you put it like that,” Greg said.

“Answer me this, though,” Matt said. “The timing on this thing. Is it deliberate?”

“The timing?”

“The fucking timing!” Matt barked. “This Bigg G and Kingsley tune coming out on the very same day I start the tour. Two weeks after I release my own CD. So my tunes are going to be playing on radios across the fucking world in the same sets with this I Signed That Line tune. Coincidence?”

“Well ... the basic timing that you and Bigg G’s CDs are coming out in a similar time period is a coincidence,” he said. “But ... well ... the exact timing ... well ... that was actually by design.”

“By design?” he asked through gritted teeth.

“I’m sure you’re aware that sometimes competing recording industry entities will cooperate when it benefits their mutual interests.”

“Imagine that,” Matt said.

“This was one of those times,” Greg said. “Bigg G is contracting with Aristocrat Records for MD&P for this CD. The promotions department of Aristocrat and Steve Crow got together and agreed that it would be mutually beneficial for there to be a new Intemperance related tune from Jake Kingsley in circulation at the same time as your CD went on sale and your tour started.”

Matt was pretty much out of anger at this point. He only sighed. “Of course they fuckin’ thought that,” he said.

“It should help sales of both projects,” Greg added helpfully.

“Get out,” Matt said simply.

“Okay,” Greg said. And then... “Are you going to get dressed now?”

“Yeah,” Matt said. “I’ll be out in five minutes.”

“Very good,” Greg said.

“The show must go on, right?”

“Indeed it must,” Greg agreed.

He left the dressing room and Matt locked the door behind him. He then began to get ready for the show.