The Aftermath

                                                               Several hours had passed in the blink of an eye. The gig had been awesome, off the charts mega. Twelve encores were performed for the screaming adoring fans whose collective pulses soared higher than many doctors would have thought safe let alone humanly possible without loss of life. Inevitably there were some casualties but nothing life threatening, it just proved too much for some and they fainted due to over excitement. The capacity crowd of ten thousand; except the handful of fainting casualties, left the venue to seek out a lively pub or two before heading home totally satisfied with their evening.

There, amongst the discarded plastic cups, confetti and all kinds of trash that people throw away at gigs the world over, he sat having a cigarette and looking out at the empty space where earlier thronged with noisy people, now silent, earlier he held that noisy crowd in the palm of his hand, now he held just a cigarette. He looked remarkably normal for a rock star. I sat down beside him. He offered me a cigarette, I politely declined. He sighed, a long almost never ending sigh, his eyes transfixed on the emptiness and desolation in front of him.  

'Did you catch the gig?' He asked me directly but sounding disinterested to be honest.

'Parts of it. I was working on the door but once everyone was in I had a look.' I answered directly. He shrugged his shoulders almost dismissively of my limp answer and appeared deep in thought. It was then I noticed a grave look of intense pain etched across his features. But why so pained? The gig was truly awesome even spectacular, the gathered media had already declared it the gig of the year, yet here I am sitting with the star of the show and he seems on the brink of a breakdown or meltdown in front of me.

'What did you think of it?' He asked frankly; 'The bits you caught that is.' He looked at me with an intense gaze probing anxiously for my no doubt by the book answer.

'It was brilliant. Every number I caught was performed flawlessly, You should be very proud of that performance.' I answered trying to boost his flagging ego but feeling the inadequacy of a rather glib reply. He hardly reacted to my feeble answer, just lit another cigarette and took a long drag. The stage behind was being dismantled and the noise of the drills seemed to irritate him greatly.

'Let's walk, too noisy to think.' He said, so I walked with him.

A couple of minutes later was all it took for him to give vent to his thoughts.

'Great gig they all say, best of the year.....hey best gig of the decade some others said to me right after I left the stage. Twelve fuckin' encores we did and sent the crowd home happy. Twelve encores, it must be some kinda fuckin' record, what do ya think?' But before I could reply he continued, 'Yeah gig of the year, of the decade even. Crowd happy, record company happy, rest of the band ecstatic and probably off their faces on whatever shit they decided to snort tonight. I don't know, why I am I so miserable? Why do I feel so fuckin' low? The crowd think I'm God, they worship me, I can do no wrong in their eyes and all I had to do was sing a few songs. When I'm on stage and in full flow I, em, get a surge of, well power and it lasts right until I leave the stage: it goes to shit after that. It just doesn't make any fuckin' sense anymore. When the gig ended and I came back down to earth, I just have never felt so alone, never felt so hopeless, so worthless, so disposable. It's like em, say you're one of those mountain climbers and you climb this really high fuckin' mountain and you know, you struggle but you climb that fuckin' mountain but when you get to the top then there's nothing, no beautiful view, no sense of achievement, no surge of adrenaline, there's just nothing. That's what I feel like. The whole gig thing is like when you see a beautiful girl but as you get near the end of the gig, the beautiful girl starts to get uglier and uglier, so ugly that you just can't look in her direction anymore. It's just so hard to take. Everyone thinks that because I have thousands and thousands of fan that I've got it made, that I've no problems, everything smells of roses but they're so wrong, mostly everything smells of shit. I used to think that once we made it then everything would fall into place but everything changes and I hate the position I'm in today.' He told me coldly without emotion. It was eye opening; unbelievable. I thought I'd try to draw him out just a little bit more.

'What's changed?' I asked gently, not wishing to startle him.

'Everything. Before when I'd finish a gig, sure there was a come down, sure I'd feel pretty low but now it's like I'm falling and I'm never going to stop. That is, my mood is spiralling out of fuckin' control and there's not a fuckin' thing I can do to stop this, em, what's the fuckin' word? Em.'

'Vortex.' I offered hoping to help.

'Yeah vortex, that'll do. I've fallen so far that I've gone through the earth and out the other fuckin' side. Next stop hell or am I there already?' His eyes remained on the gathered piles of trash in front of him. This time I was the one who had the long sigh as I desperately tried to formulate an answer that would at least ease anyone of his many troubles. In quick fire motions I thought of and rejected ideas one after the other and became frantic for solutions that would ease his burdens. Then suddenly in a flash I had an idea.

'Just stop performing, take a break, a hiatus, a sabbatical or just announce that it's the end of the group. Of course you can always reform. Let your fans start to panic when they realise you've left the stage for good, no one has to know that's it's not permanent. You go off and get your drive back, climb that mountain, dive into that ocean, race that car, life with sheep herders in Tibet, whatever gets you in a position to return rejuvenated.'

I wondered if I had said the wrong thing, maybe I'd be in hot water if anyone found out that it was me who retired the group. I began to feel ill at the thought of an angry mob camped outside my house, Jesus how could I have so stupid; how could I have been so dumb. I'd make my excuses and leave but not before trashing my solution, but he beat me to it.

'A hiatus, interesting idea, has it's good side but also comes with a ton of shit. I'll think about it for a while.' He began thinking. I made a gesture indicating I was going to say something but he held up his no smoking hand to stop me so I remained silent. We sat there for what seemed like an age and then he coughed to clear his throat, 'Thanks for listening to me whine on all night. Thanks for your advice, you've been a great help. I'll leave you now as it's been a long night.'

'When are you playing next?' I asked him frantically.

He smiled, 'I don't think they've that much electricity in the sheep herding areas in Tibet.' He laughed out loud as he walked away.