Page 5 of Fake Rocks
“Nice to meet you,” Colin said. “And I’m Col for short.” He held out his hand and I shook it politely. I didn’t want to piss Jonas off that much.
For a split second, I wanted to stay and carry on chatting, particularly to Tris. But duty called and Darren and Barney were waiting.
“Gotta go, catch you later.” I treated Tris to a megawatt grin and left the house.
Darren waited outside Monet’s, his hair covered by a scruffy beanie, as he dragged on a cigarette. He huddled inside his parka, almost hiding from view. If you’d walked past him, you’d probably have offered him some loose change, not knowing he could probably have bought the entire coffee house, not only the drinks on the menu.
“Why are you always late, Saff? We’ve been waiting fucking ages.” He ran a hand over his unshaven chin, the stubble making him look rough and ready, as usual.
I grabbed the cigarette from him and inhaled. “Jonas has got contractors round and he needed me to meet them.” Any mention of Jonas was usually enough to shut Darren up.
“And stop nicking my fags,” he grumbled as I dropped the butt to the ground and stomped my heel to put it out.
We went inside and found Barney. He was on his phone at the table in the corner we usually claimed as ours when we went there. Monet’s was an independent coffee shop, off the main Hammersmith Road. Fairly popular during the week with employees from the various office buildings around, it served all types of tea and coffee along with various snacks and cakes. Rosie and I often came there as a post-hangover treat too.
“And to what do we owe this honour?” asked Barney as we approached the table.
I fixed him with a glare. “I’ll go and get the drinks in, then we can talk.”
Darren, Barney and I had known each other since university, where I’d also met Rosie. Somehow, I managed to still scrape a 2:2 in English, despite being on the verge of being kicked out each year. We’d formed a friendship group based on skiving lessons and hiding out in the library pretending to read, when in reality we were writing lyrics and melodies, and being seen at all the best parties. When we’d finally managed to put together some music, we were in even more demand at those parties. It didn’t hurt Jonas was already in the music business and had the right contacts. At that point, he’d pretty much have done anything to ensure I didn’t end up getting into more trouble. Him signing us to Numb Records shortly after we’d all left uni was the best thing that could have happened. TheSB had some moderate success and played low down the bill at a couple of festivals, as well as several gigs in various clubs and bars across the country. We always struggled to keep a drummer though, and the last one had left over a year ago. Which was also when we stopped creating new music, resting on the laurels of a reasonably successful first album.
According to Jonas, that had to change.
Impatiently, I stood in the queue and placed our order. Barney always had some skinny, lactose free latte thing - he had a milk intolerance apparently - Darren’s usual was a cappuccino and mine was Americano. Strong, no milk. I liked the bitterness of the coffee. In fact, I liked bitterness in a number of areas of my life.
The barista stamped my new loyalty card and smiled. “Not long until the next free one!” She grinned and held the machine out for me to tap my debit card.
If only she knew in the bottom of my handbag were more unfinished loyalty cards for Monet’s than she’d had hot lattes. I never remembered to bring them to the counter and they usually ended up either unstamped or used as roaches for joints.
Holding the tray as a barrier, I weaved my way back to our table and dished out the drinks.
“Jonas thinks we need to get a permanent drummer,” I announced. “And we need to get some new music out.”
The guys exchanged a glance, which I couldn’t fail to miss. It was one that smacked of surprise, disbelief and suspicion.
“You serious?”
“Why now?”
They both spoke at the same time.
I debated whether to tell them the truth about Jonas’ timing, but then decided against it. It was bad enough I knew they felt they got billed as ‘Saff Barnes’ backing group’, but admitting I was only doing it because Jonas was tired of me getting bad press wouldn’t help my cause.
Deciding to play the casual card, I shrugged. “Why not now? It would be great to get things back on track, get out and do some gigs again, even if we don’t have any new stuff. Yet.”
There was the look again.
“Come on, guys, what do you think?” I didn’t want to beg, but it might have to go that way.
“I might know a drummer who’s looking for a band.” Barney fiddled with the handle of his coffee mug. “Bumped into him in the pub a couple of weeks ago. Think I can probably find him on Facebook and see if he’s still around?”
Darren coughed and I wondered if the two of them had been scheming together to form a band without me and had started putting out feelers. Whatever.
“Sounds great, Barney. If you can find him, maybe we can get together later in the week for a jam session? I’d suggest coming over to mine, but it’s a bit of a building site at the moment.” Tris’ face appeared unbidden in my mind.Where had that come from?
There was mumbled acceptance from the pair of them. Satisfied, I drained the remains of my coffee. Jonas would be pleased, and it called for a celebration. I checked the time, shortly after midday. I wondered if Rosie would be up for a drink.
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