Page 137 of Rock Giant
“You feel sick?”
Realisation made her splutter.“I’m not sick because I’m pregnant, Paul.I’m sick because all this is stressful and fucked up, and I don’t know how to make it right, or if I’ve managed to make a single sensible choice since the first day of Equinox.I do know that us being seen together will make things infinitely worse.I had everything mapped out.I finally had my life together, and then you...then this...God!You need to just leave me the fuck alone before you completely fuck up my life.”
“Jodi.”
She shook her head.
A group of people came outside, vapes and cigarettes already in their hands.
“Seriously.Thanks for being concerned, but you needn’t be.Now stay the fuck away from me.”
CHAPTER 40
Paul “Rock Giant” Reed
They’d spoken.Paul had been given the confirmation he’d sought that he didn’t need to worry.Too bad it didn’t make him feel any better.Worse even, it felt like he’d added another loss to the ones he was already mourning.How was he supposed to stay away from her, when she so obviously needed rescuing?
He wasn’t in the proper headspace to go on stage, but that was the life of a performer.Sometimes you had to plaster on a smile and deal, even when you felt like poo and the only thing that appealed was the idea of taking a very long walk in the wilderness, living on berries and mushrooms for a few weeks, and actively avoiding hearing anything but your own voice.
Spook patted him on the back.Ronnie offered him a meek smile.Paul was pleased to note that the latter didn’t look any different to usual.Well, perhaps a little less elastic grin, but same amount of sugary insolence.
“Sorry,” he huffed, simultaneously with the same word leaving Ronnie’s mouth.“I’m sorrier.”
He got offered a sticky jelly strawberry.
Chewing it filled an uncomfortable gap and gave his jaw a workout.
Ash joined them with his guitar already slung by its strap around his shoulders.“We ready to melt some faces off?”He produced a pick and readied it between thumb and finger.Ash normally announced them with a few opening riffs.
“Ready,” Paul agreed.The energy would come.It always did.He bounced onto the balls of his feet a couple of time to loosen up.
The show was running over ten minutes late, so Samson had shaved time off the interval between the bands, endeavouring to get them back on track.Venues liked that.Meant the locals didn’t voice excessive noise complaints.On the downside, it meant Black Halo were already in the wings as the Ghost Boys were saying their farewells.The last notes of their final track were still reverberating, and roadies were already rushing on, barking information back and forth between themselves through their headsets.
Lee and Balin came off first, sweat soaked and bubbly.Nash lingered, dragging the mic stand as he bantered with the crowd.Jez got out from behind his drum-kit and the roadies swept on to move his set off and bring Luthor’s forward.Paul braced, ready for the inevitable dirty look he’d get when he and Nash passed.Happened practically every show.This one was no doubt going to be extra vicious given the boy had had a week to stew, and things were obviously dicey between him and Jodi.
Luthor and Ronnie went on.Paul turned his head to ask Spook to repeat what he’d just said, something about a locally brewed beer.He got a millisecond warning that something was coming courtesy of the horrified contorting of Spook’s face.Wasn’t long enough to do anything about it, before the stand smashed into his left shoulder, bounced upwards, and struck his Adam’s apple, stealing his ability to breathe.For several bewildering moments his head rang, and his vision danced in and out of focus.All he could hear was the rush of his own blood.Then an explosion of voices battered his eardrums.
He got hit again, across his thighs, narrowly missing his kneecaps.The third time, he was still reeling, but ready for it.He blocked the stand’s arc with his forearm, then stepped to the side of it, which got him in close enough to launch a retaliatory swing at its wielder.
Nash seemed genuinely gobsmacked at the fact he’d been punched.He flew backwards, bowled off his feet by Paul’s right hook, crashed into Jez, and the pair of them toppled onto their arses in full view of the paying audience.
Laughter flooded the arena.
“No!”
Someone grabbed Paul from behind but failed to arrest his forward momentum.He pulled them along with him.Nash was on his knees when he reached him.Paul led with his foot, and put him down again, even as the bastard was gearing up to make another jab with that mic stand.
He got in another few kicks.
Audience laughter turned to alarm.Cameras picked up the scuffle and broadcast it.On the big screens shifting shapes mimicked his actions.He wrestled the pole from Nash’s hand and chucked it away.He didn’t need weaponry.He had two perfectly good fists.
All around him, people were screaming.
Multiple hands clawed at his back and arms.Another series of explosions went off inside his ears.His knuckles were bleeding.
“PAUL...FUCKING HELL!Don’t kill him.What is with you lately?”
Hair both black and blond swished across his field of vision.He swung his fists and his left shoulder screamed as if something inside had ripped.Someone dragged his arms into his back, then sat on him.He rolled, attempting to throw them off.Succeeded, and crashed into one of the guitar pedals.Something heavy fell across his legs.He tried to push himself up, but his left arm refused to support his weight.No matter.He pulled his right beneath him instead and used that as a lever.Around him lay a tangle of bodies and wires.A patch of yellow striped hazard tape was stuck to his sleeve.
