Like We Care (37 page)

Because right now, he meant it. He hated these kids, for not being more. He hated all those who stayed away. He hated the critics and his manager and the record company and his accountants and his lawyers and those fuckers from R
²
Rev who got him into this in the first place. He really, truly
hated
them all.

He was back in touch with something pure that had been defanged and franchised for the sake of his career. It felt good to feel it again.

“
On your feet, motherfuckers!!!!!!
”

This was how all his shows began. He’d prowl the stage from wing to wing for a minute or two, stomping around with his white boy pimp swagger, letting the kids bask in his nastiness while the recorded track pummeled them into readiness.

“
On your feet, motherfuckers!!!!!!
”

He’d give this shout three or four times, until it threatened to become boring, then he’d saunter down to the front of the stage, where the palms of the fleeced would invariably be outstretched to him worshipfully. He’d make a pass or two before them, slapping his skin against theirs, just to give them a thrill. And to see if there wasn’t just one more nickel he could grab from their hands.

“
On your feet, motherfuckers!!!!!!
”

But tonight, as he made with the high-fives, they meant something. He couldn’t hit these kids. He couldn’t lay them out and drive the toe of his boot into their kidneys, like he did with the mother of his little girl. But he could make the high-fives sting.

He wound up and swung at the palms laid open before him, packing naked spite into each blow. His soul soared as he watched kid after kid withdraw their hand in pain. Maybe he’d just do this for a half-hour, until he drew blood.

“
On your feet, mother—
”

The meaty hand of Wad Wendell reached from the pack and grabbed the singer by the forearm. Bobby Slopes got the other. Together, they pulled.

ScroatM flew from the stage and sank into the crowd. And, as planned, the Dickinson High School football team and assorted others proceeded to beat the shit out of him.

His wireless mike remained hot. Together with the muffled thumps and knocks of the scuffle—which synced up remarkably well with the percussive throb of the track—could be heard the singer’s frightened yelps.

“Hey!”

Joel was in the thick of it, not sure until it happened if he’d actually sink this low, but then surrendering enthusiastically and with surprising glee as he got in his licks. As the singer was rocked and slugged from teen to teen—some who were inflamed by the industry exploitation which ScroatM represented, some who just liked to beat people up—Joel spotted Scroat’s boxers hanging out of his pants.

Wedgies were so grade school, Joel deliberated at the heart of the riot. Then again, you’re only a kid once. . .

“Ow! Hey
—hey!
” ScroatM screamed, his voice echoing through the musty old theatre (Peggy Lee played here in 1965), accompanied—perhaps faintly, if you really listened—by the sound of ripping underpants.

Because Tok$ic Records had sent along only two bodyguards, one of whom was idling the car outside; because Artie Pistone was backstage making vague threats of mob retaliation against the theatre manager, who was protesting the damage being done to his frail sound system; because the theatre had cut loose most of its security staff when the expected crowd failed to show up; because Hutch Posner was at the back of the auditorium with the cameraman and was a pussy, there was nobody to put a stop to the thrashing.

The track kept playing, well into the portion where ScroatM should’ve been rapping. Some of the kids who weren’t beating up the singer—maybe ten or twelve of them, all white and well-scrubbed—jumped up onto the stage and pretended to perform. Their voices couldn’t be heard, but they made hateful faces and flipped gang signs and pulled at their crotches and struck the ingrained poses, and damned if it wasn’t good enough.

When the mike was thrown free of the melee and tossed up on the stage, the takeover was complete. One kid after another barked lyrics and stray vulgarities to the back of the house, until a fight broke out over the microphone, and a second skirmish erupted. Kids started jumping up on stage to get in a few licks, then turned to swan dive back into the crowd. But no one bothered to catch them. The floor began to be littered with broken teenagers who, when they got out of the hospital, could add
gravity
to the list of cruel disappointments that had left them bitter and mad at the world.

Back toward the lobby, a tightly constricting circle of gangstas had found a trembling Hutch Posner and the several thousand dollars of video equipment that he was obligated to protect. He knew from countless music videos that this was not going to turn out well for him.

These were his children. This was all pretend.

They would try not to kill him.

Todd, Annie, and Frank stood at the rear of the theatre, mostly queasy but slightly—regrettably—amused by the carnage unfolding before them. They had assumed that Joel and the boys would just get in a few shots—if that—before ScroatM was fished from the scrum and the show played on.

But this was turning nasty. They should have done something to prevent it. They really should have.

The cops finally moved in to break things up. The music was still blaring.

“Do you know how to arrange bail?” Todd yelled to Annie.

“What?” She was truly deafened by the noise. Todd knew it.

“So you wanna go out sometime?” he shouted, a little softer.

“
What???
”

Todd grinned at her stupidly, pleased at his own cleverness.

Frank leaned in to holler in her ear.

“He
said—
”

Todd went white with embarrassment and cut Frank off with a shot to the arm. Frank smiled at the boy playfully.

He was just having fun.

T
odd returned to the theatre a couple hours later, still looking for Joel. When the police vans had spilled open at the police station, he was not among the arrested. In the frenzy, he had probably just slipped away and gone home. But Todd wanted to check here first to make sure he hadn’t been laid out in the fight and left for dead. Todd felt responsible for all this.

He knew one of the kids on the cleanup crew, so they let him into the dark, empty theatre. The auditorium was now deathly silent compared to the roar of a few hours earlier. He stood and let the emptiness press in on him.

There wasn’t much light, but he heard a groan coming from the front of the hall. Down where the dance floor met the stage—where the attack had taken place—a grate had been kicked out revealing a crawl space. Todd heard another pained whimper and saw movement. Someone was hiding down there.

“Joel?” Todd whispered, starting to get scared.

He inched forward as this figure spilled out of the hole in considerable agony. Todd recognized the costume, if not the beaten down demeanor. He had seen Artie Pistone and the body guards being hustled into the police station along with the kids that were picked up. No one had been left behind to see to him.

Todd watched as ScroatM clutched his broken ribs and wiped the blood away from a gash above his eye. With great difficulty, he pulled himself up into a sitting position and leaned back against the stage. He was breathing hard and trembling.

Todd stepped up and stood over him. The hip-hop star looked up stiffly and seemed to attempt to reactivate the pose. He’d be damned if some kid was going to catch him crawling around on the floor like this.

He sneered up at Todd and tried to stand, but his right leg wouldn’t support him—if it wasn’t broken, it was most certainly wrecked. He fell back down to the ground and let out a little squeak of a cry. Every part of him hurt.

He was beaten. That was all. He’d mend and come back, nastier and angrier than ever. He’d come back and personally take it out of the asses of every little fuck who did this to him. But right now, he needed help.

He looked up again to Todd, this time with almost a look of solidarity. He’d allow this kid to help him, to come away with the story of how one day he did a solid for the millionaire rap star who had made the mistake of coming to his shitty little town.

He fixed a slightly vulnerable glare on Todd and weakly offered up his hand for assistance. Even in his suffering, he clung to the act.

“Yo. . .”

Todd stepped closer. He kept his hands in his pockets.

“You
do
realize you’re not black, don’t you?”

A
mong other things,
Like We Care
is a book about music and kids, about how everything that was once sublime about rock and roll—the rebellion, the posing, the parental bafflement and rage—has been reduced to such a hateful, cynical, soulless
industry
. Rock and its offshoots have been distilled into nothing but simple-minded swagger and bile, infecting a generation that I fear will never know what genuine music—even at its rudest and most corrosive—can do for the soul.

I was fortunate enough to be born into the years of high cotton, so in order of my exposure to them and without apologies, thanks beyond words to the following musicians:

The Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Kiss, Rush, Cheap Trick, Warren Zevon, the Band, Elvis Costello and the Attractions, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, R.E.M., Muddy Waters, Sonny Boy Williamson, Howlin’ Wolf, John Hiatt, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Lucinda Williams, Wilco. And NRBQ. Always NRBQ.

Thanks to Richard Chapman, who read my half-finished manuscript at precisely the point where I needed encouragement, and who championed it to completion. Thanks to my publisher, Bruce Bortz, who patiently endured a prolonged dance with a particularly skittish author, but with whom I embark on this adventure with nothing but high hopes. And thanks to Elly Zupko at Bancroft Press, who pulled my manuscript from the slush pile and started me on my way.

Thanks especially to my manager Zach Tann, who got behind this book when no one else would and worked it like a mofo.

Much love to Lori, Kathi, and Nick, whose humor and support have sustained me more than they will ever know. And to my mother, always my biggest supporter and source of strength during the lean times. Only good years from here on out, Mom.

And most of all to Kevin and Paul, whose extremities may be gnawed upon by corporate America, but whose hearts and minds have had a loyal and determined protector (me, whether they liked it or not); and, finally, to Pam, who may not always know why I write, but understands that I must. If the words come, baby, it’s because you let me go out and chase them down. I’m proud to be your sweet patootie.

T
om Matthews wrote the original screenplay
Mad City
, which hit theatres in 1997. Starring Dustin Hoffman, John Travolta, and Alan Alda, it was directed by Costa-Gavras. He has also written scripts for Universal Pictures, Warner New Line Cinema, Century Fox, and Walt Pictures, working with producers as Steven (
Traffic, Erin Brockovich
Tisch (
Forrest Gump
), Hunt (
The Last of the Mohicans
Lynda Obst (
Sleepless In Seattle

Prior to the launch screenwriting and novel career, Matthews spent years working in the picture industry as a journalist, critic, and publicist for Century Fox. He’s freelance work for national and regional publications that include
L.A. Weekly, Marquee Magazine, The Milwaukee Journal,
and
Creative Screenwriting
. Matthews was also a managing editor for
Boxoffice Magazine
for six years.

A Wisconsin native, he lives in Wauwatosa, WI with his wife and two sons. He is currently developing a documentary series about Las Vegas with George Knapp, the resort city’s leading investigative reporter.

Like We Care
is his first published novel.