Page 22 of Your Rhythm
“You didn’t show them the matching t-shirts, did you?”
“Hell no,” he mutters darkly. “That shit is staying buried where it belongs.”
I let the curse word slide. He’s almost fifteen, after all.
“I’m surprised there evenarephotos of us as kids where we’re not wearing those things,” I muse.
“I only found three.”
We both laugh at that.
“But girls aside,” Kyle continues, “I didn’t think I would like doing the project as much as I did. I got really into it.”
“What do you mean? You didn’t think you would like telling everyone how cool your brother is?” I demand, acting offended.
“No I mean like, I didn’t think I would enjoy all the work I had to do, but it was kind of fun— building a story like that, talking about what music means to me. I liked thinking up all the questions.”
My chest tightens. I love seeing him get excited about stuff like this. I used to worry I was pushing the music world on him too much, but he took to it almost as much as I did.
“You remind me of someone, talking like that,” I tell him. “One of my...friends is a journalist. I should introduce you to her.”
“Her?” Kyle asks slyly. “Is she a Montreal babe?”
“You said it yourself. All the girls in Montreal are babes.”
“How are you going to introduce me if you won’t let me come visit you?”
Right. That’s the other reason for my call.
“I’ve been thinking, Kyle. Mom and Dad are on my ass about getting them tickets to our Metropolis show in June. They keep going on and on about how it’s their last chance to see me before the Euro-Tour. So I decided maybe, under complete parental supervision and with clear limitations in mind, you could come with them and spend some time with me and the band.”
There’s silence on the other end of the line, and then he starts shouting so loud I have to pull the phone away from my ear.
“BREAK OUT THE G-STRINGS LADIES, BIG K IS COMING TO TOWN!”
“Big K?” I choke out, once he’s stopped making noises that I think are supposed to be gunshots and cash register sounds. “Take a piece of brotherly advice and never call yourself that again.”
He doesn’t pay any attention. “We’re going to rock the world together, BB. Montreal won’t know what hit it!”
“Did you hear anything about my parental supervision requirement?”
More gunshot noises. I take it the answer is no.
Ace walks out of the steamed-up bathroom in a pair of boxers, and I glance at the clock. It’s time we headed over the college concert hall we’re playing the show at. I get in a goodbye with Kyle, who’s still at the height of his gangstah antics, and we meet the other guys in the hall.
“Hey guys, where’s your flannel?” JP jokes on the way over. “We’re all supposed to match, remember?”
He’s usually in flannel to begin with. Ace and Cole wouldn’t be caught dead wearing anything other than black, and I guess I kind of fluctuate between the two as far as style goes.
The hall is already buzzing when we get in. Our opener, an Ottawa band we’ve played with before, is up on stage doing their sound check. Despite the fact that we just ate our weight in McDonald’s, we all load up on food when the first thing we spot inside the doors is a catering table.
“Hey, that’s for the crew!”
Nico, our production manager, walks over with a tablet and a headset. He’s been helping us on the road since the days we occasionally had to sleep in The Chick Magnet. Besides everything it’s done for us personally, seeing how our career taking off has helped everyone else who makes Sherbrooke Station what it is has been pretty mind blowing. We used to not even be able to pay Nico, and now we’re taking him to Europe with us.
He tells us we’ve got twenty minutes until our sound check and then rushes off. We’re supposed to meet with Kay after that for an interview, and then we’re on at nine.
The sound check turns out to be a total shit show. We haven’t played a gig in weeks, and the time we spent slacking off on practice is coming back to bite us in the ass now. Nico tries to blame it on technical problems to help us save a bit of face, but we’re off our game and everyone knows it.
