Page 6 of I Would Die for You

“Now!”

Stoking impatient anticipation, the mob moves backward and forward, and Cassie is caught up in the ebb and flow of a wave that she can’t duck out of. Screams rise as young girls get caught up in the electrifying expectations of pubescent dreams, and car horns sound from the boy racers who have brought their Fiesta XR2s up to London’s busiest street to show off, only to be thwarted by a thousand scantily clad girls.

A single synthesizer note echoes from above and hysteria reverberates around the buildings, bouncing off the walls.

“Good afternoon, London!”

The microphone screeches and you can’t even see the person speaking, but the crowd knows exactly who it is. At least, those who saw the full-page advert in last night’sEvening Standarddo. The other bystanders, bemused office workers on their lunch breaks and frustrated cabbies, are there against their wishes, hemmed in by a mass of overactive hormones.

“Whose bright idea was this?” yells a commuter into the side of a policeman’s helmet.

The policeman grimaces. “We’re trying to shut it down, sir, but it’s going to take a while to disperse.”

Cassie isn’t going anywhere—not until she’s seen and heard all that her idols have come here to deliver.

“Thanks so much for coming out today,” says Ben Edwards, the static on the microphone gradually easing through the speakers. “I must say, you’re all looking particularly…hot.”

Cassie’s sure that from up there on the rooftop he can’t even see the hordes of girls hanging on to his every word; she certainly can’t see him from down here, but still the teasing words garner the desired effect, and girls scream as they no doubt fantasize that the lead singer of the country’s biggest band is referring to them alone.

The opening bars of their latest hit single start up and the crowd surges forward, toward the store, as if expecting to be let inside and up the four floors of stairs to where the band are performing. But a ten-strong armed barricade of policemen block the way, holding the baying mob back.

“Sod this!” says the chanting girl, who’s now next to Cassie. “We’re not going to see anything from here. You wanna try and get a closer look?”

Cassie nods, not knowing if this cool chick with her bleached-blond hair, cut asymmetrically across one eye, is talking to her or someone else.

“Come on then,” she says, grabbing Cassie’s hand then ducking down and slipping out of sight into the sea of bodies.

Getting out is even harder than being in the middle of the fracas—Cassie feels like she’s being churned around in someone’s gut, before being regurgitated and spat out onto the softening tarmac of the gridlocked road. But once she is, the relief is instant, her sweat immediately evaporating as much-needed air buffets her overheated body.

“Come on!” says the girl, pulling her by the hand through the double doors of the department store across the street.

“Where are we going?”

“Somewhere we can actually see their faces,” says the girl, taking the escalator steps two at a time.

By the time they emerge at the fifth-floor restaurant, panting and gasping for breath, Cassie has cottoned on to what the girl is planning and can only imagine that a hundred other fans have also worked it out. But there’s just a gathering of well-heeled individuals, most with perfectly coiffed shampoo and sets, wondering why their lunches have been disrupted by the bedlam on the street below.

“I don’t understand why they’re not at school,” she hears one lady say to her friend, who tuts in agreement. “They’re just running amok, like animals in a zoo. The parents have lost all control!”

Cassie doesn’t disagree, and if her dad knew she was here instead of sitting in her timetabled history class right now, he’d have a fit. Especially if he also found out that her mum had given her permission to play truant. Well, it was more of a wry smile as she wordlessly handed Cassie the national newspaper advert announcing the “secret” gig, but the intimation was there; it was in the special bond they shared, and ifthatwas “losing control,” then Cassie loved her all the more for it.

“Go and grab that corner table over by the window,” says the girl, with an assertive nod. “I’ll get us a can of pop.”

Cassie run-walks to the corner, praying that her new friend’sintuition has paid off. When she gets to the booth overlooking Oxford Street below, any expectations she may have had are blown out of the water.

“Oh my god!” she squeals, causing the purple-rinse brigade to pull their mouths tight in abject horror. But she doesn’t care, because just across the road, one floor down, her favorite band in the whole wide world are performing a concert, seemingly just for her. The sound isn’t exactly clear, muffled by the double glazing, but it doesn’t matter; she’d ratherseethem thanhearthem and she can’t get much closer than this. Not today, anyway.

“You’re a fucking genius,” she says, as a bottle of Panda Pop is slammed down on the table in front of her.

“I have my moments,” says the girl, taking out a JPS cigarette from a pack of tens and lighting one up. “I’m Amelia, by the way.”

“Cassie—pleased to meet you. How did you even think of this?”

Amelia shrugs her shoulders. “I can’t take all the credit,” she says, keeping a watchful eye on what’s happening on the rooftop below. “Ben gave me a heads-up.”

Cassie thinks she must have heard her wrong. “Sorry—Ben?” she questions, assuming it must be one other than of the “Edwards” variety.

“Ben!” says Amelia, smiling at the frontman, who, if Cassie didn’t know better, seems to be smiling back.

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