Metal Angel (19 page)

Half animal

Half god

Your heart is a wild stallion

Your thoughts are clouds in the wind

And I am weak with love of you

I turn to you like a child

Get out your black bike

Let's take the long ride
.

Let me put my arms around you

Let me lay my head between your wings

For the long ride
.

It seemed not to trouble the audience that in singing this tender ballad Volos was declaring love to himself. Nor did it trouble Angela. To her he walked on water. Even in his self-absorption (of which she knew as much as anyone), to her he could do no wrong. The exaltation she felt when she touched his wings was like worship, a sharp striving joy untinged with the resentment she had always felt in the presence of her father's God.

Someone came and stood beside her. It took her a moment to gather herself out of the music enough to glance over and see a Hoss Cartwright hat shadowing anxious eyes: Texas. He bent to speak directly into her ear, though standing as they were near the PA stacks, way over their heads in sound, drowning in the stuff, he could probably have shouted without disturbing anyone.

“I think I finally got the security nailed down,” he told her. Not that security was any part of her job. It was his problem. But Texas was a sweet old guy, he worried about Volos, he worried about her and her kids, and now he was worried about crowd management and needed her to tell him she was sure everything would be all right. She smiled vaguely at him and turned back to watch Volos just as he reached a climax, arching his body, flinging his head back so that his dark hair coiled down between his shivering wings. Not aware that she did so, Angie sighed.

“Ange.” The voice sounded so much like Ennis's that she jumped, jolted by the same kind of sudden reflexive guilt that sometimes hit her when she thought she saw Ennis on the street or in a store. At first glance every sturdy, brown-haired young man was Ennis to her. Some days she seemed to run into him everywhere. But she was getting used to it now, and anyway the man beside her was just Texas again, peering at her.

“Angie, you know he probably don't have no idea of the way you feel about him.”

Volos, he meant. It did not surprise her that Texas had noticed. Sometimes it seemed to her that Texas didn't have much to do except hang around and watch a person. He was kind of useless. But never mind that, because he was a nice guy, maybe her best friend in L.A. He was sweet with her kids, and he took care of them for her whenever she couldn't find a sitter.

She shrugged her shoulders at him. Shoulders blessedly uncut by bra straps, blessedly comfortable in T-shirt and nothing more. Sometimes in public she had to restrain herself from lifting her hands to her delighted, wayward breasts. Sometimes she walked stiffly. Her new freedom was made half of euphoria, half of terror—of her own body, its new self-consciousness, its passions, its unexplored abilities, its power. Nothing in her upbringing helped her know how to make her body send signals to a man.

“No reason why he should,” she told Texas.

“You kidding? You don't give yourself enough credit. What you want to do is get yourself a little makeup, maybe a hair ribbon, a pretty dress—”

“It's all right with me if he doesn't notice me,” Angie said.

“For crying out loud, Angie, you mean you're just going to go on like you been?”

She said softly, “Sure. Isn't it enough?”

Coming offstage after the first set, Volos walked past her, all gleaming with sweat, and smiled. It was enough.

From a platform atop the gantries with the lighting man, Mercedes waited for the second set, still seething over the costuming of the first. Destroyed denim. Jesus Christ, how déclassé. Volos listened far too much to his little chippie of a seamstress.

The lighting man's intercom crackled, and he spoke softly into it, then pushed the big switch. The stage went dark, but spots lashed the crowd, and under their stimulation it screamed like a single huge primitive animal and lifted a hundred thousand cirri into the tides of the night. The arms held T-shirts, hand-lettered banners, homemade Styrofoam wings. It irked Mercedes that Volos would not let Brett franchise somebody to sell light-up wings. It irked him that the angel insisted on these Stone Age staging arrangements and was not interested in a laser show, computerization, a dance troupe, anything programmed or choreographed or state-of-the-art. Lots of things about Volos irked Mercedes these days.

He waited, not totally immune to the excitement. Somewhere backstage, roadies with faint red flashlights were leading the rock god back to the stage.… No telling for sure what color Volos's wings would be when the spot shone on him, but Mercedes, who was as good as anyone at reading the singer's moods, decided that anything in the blue to orange range would be safe.

“Magenta,” he directed the lighting man.

“Right, boss.”

The intercom crackled again, a bank of fresnel lenses blazed, and there was Volos, his back turned, his wings slowly spreading—and great balls of fire, they could really spread on this stage, they made his presence immense, huge, even the people in the cheap seats knew they were seeing something—poised on the edge of the drum riser he flamed the color of a wild rose, and then came the hammering downbeat, the turn and leap and the dancing advance to the mikes, flanked by his two ax men in their outlaw hats. And Mercedes had to admit Volos was right, he looked good in chaps. They outlined that incredible crotch, visible when he lifted his guitar. Their long fringes and rawhide thongs flowed with him. But Mercedes was not entirely happy, because the Navaho headband and silver-spurred roach stompers were courtesy of Texas, and Mercedes did not care for Texas' influence on Volos any more than he did for Angie's.

The show was reaching its height. Burning Earth had upped tempo and pulsed into “Before I Die,” with Volos soloing on guitar—on many frontmen the guitar was nothing more than a giant phallic prop, not even plugged into the speakers, but Volos could really play. The critics made much of that, comparing him to Jimi Hendrix. Hooray for the critics. Funny thing they had never noticed how their new darling could have played his guitar more effectively if he had slung it a few inches higher instead of right at his crotch. But he wore it where it looked best. On that one matter at least, he had taken Mercedes's advice.

Or maybe he would have worn it there anyway. Volos liked being a big dick.

Bink and Red were singing backup vocals, and Red had come over to share a mike with Volos, heads close, lips nearly touching in a stance that reminded Mercedes of a homosexual kiss. He felt a sudden hot stab of jealousy. That rapt, lovemaking look on Volos's fine-edged face—it should not be shared with so many people, only with him. Damn Volos, he always did that, he gave everything he had, threw it all away to the crowd. He courted the mike, that cock of God, with soft lips and fluttering eyelids. He offered to that hellbeast of arms and faces beyond the lights his heart on a platter, his music the colors of wine. And it made people wild. Soon his worshipers would want to eat him. Someday they would tear him apart and swallow the bits, brown bread of the devil's communion.

“Boss?” It was the lighting man.

“White,” Mercedes directed. “Just for a moment, until we see what we have.”

Volos sang on with wings the color of the sun.

Jealousy left Mercedes and was replaced by something far colder. He smiled, his teeth hard behind tight lips. “Red,” he ordered.

All right, he would share his lover. All right, he was the pimp and Volos the whore who would make him rich. All right, Volos could be the sun if he wanted, and Mercedes nothing more than a spot on its face. Mercedes could wait. He knew what always happened to superstars.

Finale. From dry ice, smoke poured up, throwing everything into shadow. Gunshot sounds ricocheted from the synthesizer. The lights swung wildly, thrashing, flailing, red whips of a raging god. Amid it all, Volos buckled to his knees, guitar laid down like a defeated sword, head bowed, wings flowing down a king's sunset cloak onto the stage.

God, the bastard knew how to pose. Mercedes smiled again, watching the first of the girls up front struggle onto the stage and run sobbing toward him.

It was only a matter of time.

In the bowl of the amphitheater the fans stood on their seats, necks stretched and mouths agape, far too many baby birds in a nest far too large. From where he stood, just offstage, Texas could see only out-reached, imploring hands and heaving breasts. Lots of breast and cleavage. Looked to him like these girls hadn't dressed at home.

“Volos,” they cried out like wood thrushes. “Volos!” Their reedy voices grew stronger, were joined by the darker shouts of men. Cries became a chant.

“Vo-LOS! Vo-LOS! Vo-LOS!”

“I hope he doesn't get 'em too psyched,” Texas muttered to himself. Mobs scared him. Instead of his customary western string tie he wore a clip-on so that he could not be strangled.

“Vo-LOS! Vo-LOS! Vo-LOS!”

Standing as he was in the wind of the speakers, Texas could see their invocation more than hear it. The panting chests. The half-lidded eyes, the mouths wide open as if bread of communion hung for the taking in the vibrating air. And the kid was not holding anything back as the show drew to a close, singing his heart out, dancing like fire, shining all over with sweat and glory. Between numbers he drenched his head with water, shaking it so that his dark hair flew and flung off droplets, sprinkling the front rows. Those who felt that baptism wept and screamed.

Texas thought,
I
hope the kid knows what he's getting into
. At first the bared breasts had deceived him. He had assumed he was seeing one of humankind's simpler, more manageable emotions: lust. But now he knew. This was dangerous. This was worship.

Volos was right out at the front of the lowest part of the stage, touching people's hands. He gave too much, he trusted too much. Texas hoped—

It was too late for hoping. The last chords were rocketing with the fireworks, then falling, falling, Volos had gone down on his knees to the horned god of dark music, and dozens of people, young men and women, were up over the lip of the stage.

Texas ran forward. But—wait, the kid seemed almost to be expecting them. And all they wanted was …

Volos kneeled like a novice knight, his back straight, head lifted. Music hushed as the band stood watching, uncertain (like Texas) what they needed to do. The lights shone down morning calm and pure. And the people around Volos, some of them fat, some of them ugly as sin, they were all pilgrims to the holy land, worshipers laying their hands on a piece of the cross; they stood in near-silence and touched him as gently as shepherds greeting the baby Jesus. A hundred hands gentled him on his arms, his chest, his neck, his head. Lips, many lips, brushed his hair and face. Like a flower turning to the light Volos turned up his face and closed his eyes. Somebody kissed the lids.

Feeling way out of place, a heathen among the holy, Texas pushed his way to the kid's side—

Volos screamed.

In the same instant Texas saw: an anonymous hand coming away from the kid's back, carrying a long, pale feather. Texas could not have felt worse if he had seen in the crowd a hand coming up pointing a gun.

And before he could move another step, within an eyeblink it all turned ugly, it was all fighting, all hands that reached to grip and claw and tear. Volos was on his feet, with Texas pulling people off him and slinging them away, trying to position himself at Volos's back, between the kid's wings to defend them. Panicked, the kid didn't help him any. But there were others getting into it, the band members, some roadies from backstage. By the time the uniformed security officers arrived, Texas and the irregulars almost had things under control.

“Fuck it, Texas!” Volos screamed at him when they faced each other offstage. “You let them get behind me!”

The kid was shaking, and his dun-colored skin had gone ashy gray. “Easy does it,” Texas told him, trying to calm him with a hand on one shoulder. Volos pulled away.

“Why did you let them get onstage? Where were the guards?”

There had been a few polite men in sport coats stationed along the edge of the stage during the performance. Like him, Texas guessed, they had been thrown by the peaceful way it had all started. Or maybe by the numbers of people involved. It looked like there should have been more in the way of security.

He said, “I'm sorry, Volos. I screwed up.”

“And you said you'd never hurt me.” Volos turned calm but terribly, fiercely bitter.

“Hey, man, lighten up.” A soft voice—it was Red. “Texas didn't maul you.”

Staring narrow-eyed at Texas, Volos seemed not to hear. “Judas,” he accused. “I trusted you.”

Red tried again to intervene. “You trusted the fans, was the problem.” Crowd noise battered them, loud, screaming, as physical in its presence as a demanding child, making him raise his voice. “Texas just followed your lead. We all did.”

After his years as a cop, Texas knew all the things people said when they were in trouble, and he scorned most of them. He knew he should speak up for himself, but did not. Partly, he was quietly angry—the kid should know better than to call him names. And partly, it all felt hopeless. What could he say when Volos felt so betrayed?

The new guy, Bink, the sourpuss bass guitarist, came up and said, “It's all part of the job, for Chrissake. Can we get to the encore before they tear the place apart?”

Texas swallowed hard and bent to smooth a jutting feather. Volos jerked the wing away. “Don't touch them!”

“May I fix them, Volos?” It was Angie. Without waiting for his permission she started, and Volos sighed, extended his wings and submitted to her care. Texas watched, feeling his anger dull into worry. There were only a few drops of blood, only a few broken pinions and a tattered covert or two, but every mark made Texas feel sick. If the kid got feverish and infected again, Texas would hold himself to blame.