Interstate Rock Songs

It was Adriana's lunch break and Chelse sat outside of the fast food joint she worked at. Chelse was a pretty girl with light blonde hair that she never cared to brush. She always wore floral design dresses or skirts while Adriana wore more dark mellow colors. Adriana was a more uptight version of her best friend. They always felt like they didn't belong in the decade they lived in, especially Chelse, who was more of a free-spirited hippie deep down.

"C'mon, you said you wanted adventure. Now's your chance! This is the modern day Woodstock. There will be nothing more punk rock than this road trip!"

"Really? Nothing? What about that one time Carlos stuck a pin needle through the inside of his cheeks and spat out a gross mix of blood and saliva before that final set at Krista's party. More punk rock than that?"

Chelse paused for a moment and sneered. "Definitely more punk rock than that."

"Ugh. Let's do it then. I've saved up a few paychecks for this."

"Wait."

"What?"

"You sure your Mom isn't going to chase you down with the sandals again?"

"Shut the fuck up." Adriana blushed. "That was a one-time thing!"

"Really? Thought you'd give me more of a fight."

"No, let's do it."

"Alright, whatever you say. I'll let Anthony know you're going."

Adriana had been aching to see a live performance ever since she had turned 18. She felt she had missed big chunks of her youth being locked indoors during the global pandemic. It seemed those crucial stupid-teenage opportunities had been slowly slipping away from her fingertips and with her friends planning to move out for college, there was a limit on the time they had left.

The next day, Chelse called and gave Adriana the details for the concert.

"Sounds amazing not gonna lie."

"Best part is, it's only in Austin!"

"Jesus. Only in Austin, you say?" Adriana looked up the distance on her phone.

"That's 1500 miles away!" Yeah, that's not so far at all." Adriana rolled her eyes.

"Exactly! It's just around the corner."

"That's like...a three day drive, bitch! Are you kidding me?"

"So what?"

"My mom would never let me." 

"Really? Everybody's going and you're just going to be left behind again? I already knew you were gonna chicken out. I know you. You'll get depressed for a week, complain and wonder why they don't invite you to the next one."

"It's just so freaking far..."

"You said you'd handle your parents. You know I don't think we'll get another moment like this anytime soon, Adriana."

And there it was in front of her, the opportunity she had been yearning for, all she needed was to accept. "Damn!" Adriana stared at her phone, then tapped her fingers on a nearby dresser. "Fine. Shit."

"You sure?"

"Yeah I'll deal with my Mom."

*****

The next day, Adriana waited outside of her porch fully-packed early in the morning. She had left a note on the refrigerator for her parents to find after work. She'd deal with the consequences later, hoping they'd have sympathy for her after their shift.

Few minutes later, a loud honk of a car horn sounded.

Anthony had pulled up in his full-sized cargo van stuffed with their usual group of friends. The van had been iconic for the many crazy shared stories in their inner circle that began the same way, driving to a kickback across town. Adriana approached it with a genuine smile on her face, and remembered that time they all ran out of the van to switch seats in the middle of heavy traffic, or that time Anthony stole the stop sign from the military training camp. She slid open the door that had tinted black windows decorated with KROQ and other rock band stickers.

Chelse sat shotgun in the front with an arsenal of cheap but delectable liquor-store purchased snacks. "Get in, loser!"

Adriana greeted everyone then searched for an empty seat. "Uh..."

Kevin and Johnny had filled the backseats, they played Yu-Gi-Oh! cards while, Carlos sat in the middle with his protruding Mohawk hair and denim vest. He kept a large cooler under his legs, while Gwen had been on the other centered seat. She was a friend of Chelse, who had never particularly cared for Adriana's company.

"Just squeeze in the middle of Gwen, you're both tiny anyways." said Anthony.

Gwen turned to Adriana almost with a bothersome expression and pointed down to a pillow between the two seats on the floor. "Uh, Is this even safe?"

A collective groan went up and Adriana felt embarrassed.

She turned to Chelse for a reaction. Chelse looked as if she wanted to strangle her.

Adriana gulped down and ignored that second voice in her head.

"Just kidding! Ha." she hopped over Carlos and sat down on the pillow. 

Chelse turned around again. "So, everyone ready?"

Adriana looked at her, nodded and gave her a quick thumbs-up before clumsily stretching her legs out under Anthony's chair forcing a big smile. "All good."

When the car engine started, that exhilaration and excitement began again. All her worries went away when they left the concrete jungle. Chelse was voted as the default DJ as she had a great prolific recollection of great songs from a wide range of music genres and decades. 

"Look! Stars!" Adriana yelled, it was still dark at 5:45 a.m. when those stars pierced through the dark canvas above, Adriana relished in finally being able to watch them untainted by the light pollution of the city.

"Now whose ready for some real fun?" said Carlos as he had already been mixing Champaign and orange juice on a row of carefully placed plastic red cups. "One for you." He handed generously the first two cups to Kevin and Johnny in the back.

"Thank you."

"And one for you." he handed them out until everyone had a cup.

"Give me pure Champaign with a tiny dab of OJ." said Anthony.

He gulped it down and reached for a bag of chips Chelse held.

Then wiped the dust on her skirt.

"Pig." Chelse teased.

Anthony smiled back.

"Pshh. Hey, Chelse, beer-me some cookies?"

Chelse tossed back a bag of cookies while Adriana ripped them open. She needed something to wash over the strong Mimosa Carlos made that she had been babysitting. The first gulp had made the inside of her stomach burn up. 

Then the 50 mile sign passed to cross the state lines.

Chelse played the last few songs in accordance with the area they had been in. Red Hot Chili Peppers and Sublime dominated the speakers before they crossed the borders followed by The Doors, Santana, Jefferson Airplane and Green Day.

"Shots at the borders?" Carlos shouted eagerly.

Adriana tried to look at Chelse like "Really? Aren't there usually cops around?"

Nobody seemed to care.

"Naw, Chelse has something special prepared instead." smirked Anthony.

She kept a tray of edible brownies in a Tupperware in the front.

Adriana had been disinterested in the drugs and alcohol, but had admittedly enjoyed all of their company, and watching the scenery so far made the trip better.

"Yo, rest stops in 5 miles, Anthony. I gotta take a piss." yelled Kevin.

"Yeah me too." said Gwen.

"Alright, we'll get out, my legs are killing me. Then the party starts."

Adriana got out and stared at the mountains in the horizon.

She worried about her parents still, her mom would be coming home late from her shift soon and would likely blow up her phone from there on.

At 5:30 p.m. right on cue, Adriana received the phone call she had been avoiding.

Her mother was expectedly pissed. She let it ring for a few times then reluctantly answered.

"You're in big trouble."

"It's only for three days. Why are you so upset?"

"You know why, you've had that job for a month and you're already taking four days off? Do you know how irresponsible you're being?!"

"Oh, come on Mom. This is a once in a life time opportunity."

"Your dads going to be pissed off when he hears about this."

"Ugh. Its just for a few days."

"I don't give a shit! If you're living under my roof, you'll follow my rules. Do you understand? And I hope to God you're not hanging around those drug addicts you call friends."

"I'm not and fine, I'll find a way to turn around."

"Trying is not good enough! I want you here by tomorrow morning."

"Ok. Ok." Adriana hung up.

Chelse could feel the tension on her face after the call, she got out of the car and put her hands on Adriana's shoulders. "It's fine, she'll get over it just relax."

"Thanks..."

They all got back on the road again.

Anthony pointed out a Welcome to Arizona sign approaching.

When Adriana noticed it, it flipped her mood back around a bit.

"I've never been to Arizona."

She opened the window and took a big whiff of the countryside as they passed by a ranch. She never thought she'd enjoy the smell of cow dung and manure so much.

"Ohgawd, it fucking stinks!" yelled Gwen.

"Shut the window, Adriana!"

"Oops. My bad."

Carlos laughed. "So, where's the DJ! You know the drill. New State. New genre."

Gwen volunteered connecting her Bluetooth and quickly played a few Pop songs before Chelse high jacked her music with Stevie Nicks and Meat Puppets as they passed through a desert full of cactuses.

Adriana swapped seats with Carlos and stuck her arm out the window, waving it up and down riding the breeze. She felt weightless for a second. Then she noticed a bad wreckage of a tour van on the opposite side of the long highway. "That looks bad."

"That's fuckin' wild." said Carlos. "Wonder if they were headed to the festival."

After it got dark, they all shared a hotel room for the night.

*****

Next morning, Carlos snuck in some Spanish tunes entering New Mexico, Los Tigres Del Norte played as they were waking up. "New State, new genre, you know the drill." He followed it with another round of cocktails and Chelse handed out brownies to the back.

She smacked Anthony's hand trying to reach for one. "Not for you."

They were all so close to the music festival now. Adriana's phone seemed to buzz every other hour now. She ignored them while Texas approached and it brought out the country mood in all of them. Chelse played her favorite songs from Townes Van Zandt, followed by some Willie Nelson and George Strait classics. 

Then the longest stretch of road came, it almost looked like a mirage, Anthony kept driving and aggressively chewing bubblegum. Adriana noticed Kevin and Johnny had stopped bickering and were snoring in the back of the car. Soon they all were too, Anthony chatted with Chelse who provided him the assortment of the snacks he requested and water. Soon enough, Chelse had also drifted and fell asleep too, shortly after Adriana followed suit.

"Want me to take over?" asked Carlos.

"Naw I'm good. Just beer-me some brownies."

Adriana woke up after a few hours with a crick in her neck. She was woken up by the sun blaring through the windows, everything looked like the reddish tint filter some film directors put on Mexican films. Adriana noticed some of her friends were now gone, Anthony who was with Chelse had been gone too. Chelse had taken over the wheel. Kevin was gone too, but Johnny and Gwen were still there.

"Where's everyone at?"

"Oh they couldn't hang." Chelse said agitatedly.

"They left?"

"Yeah, they took a stupid detour had me drop them off, bunch of idiots." she cursed. "But, they won't ruin this trip though, right?"

"Right..."

"Good! They were losers anyways."

It was unlike Anthony and Chelse to fight, they were something of an ideal couple who usually discussed their disagreements amicably. She couldn't believe half of them were so close to the festival and opted to just leave like that.

The "100 miles left to Austin" sign had passed by in a blur, while Chelse drove speedily at 75 mph, meeting the high speed limit, they were only about an hour and a half away. Chelse kept trying to lighten the mood. Adriana's mom stopped calling as much too, she'd leave only open-ended text messages instead, with weird overly emotional undertones. Adriana had enough with responding to them. 

"Honey, I'm so sorry I was so hard on you. I just want you back. I want to see you smile again."

Adriana had left the messages unread.

"Your flower's are withering, sweetheart. I took the liberty of watering them. We miss you so much."

"How's everything with your parents?" asked Chelse.

Adriana now sat in the front with her.

"Just another of Dad's stupid melodramatic messages. Mom put him up to it." 

They all finally made it, Chelse quickly pulled up to a field to park, there were thousands of people already there rushing excitedly to the front, most had on their favorite band shirts and shade hats for the sun.

"Oh my god, Chelse!" 

"I know. It feels unreal."

She couldn't believe the energy in the place. There were lots of black cats outside of the arena purring. Chelse's tried to pet one, but they avoided her. They finally made their way to the security checkpoint and presented their tickets while Gwen and Johnny followed behind. Adriana grabbed a lineup event planner and analyzed it.

"Look, look, look!"

There had been a new lineup, some changes and new stages. There was a small biography for the new bands added. Two talented Norwegian kids based in Liverpool would open up, they played Indie Rock really fuckin' good too. The band was called, Her's. Groovy. No way! Carlos would have loved the surprise appearance of that Vicente Fernandez singer. Even Adriana knew of his name despite not speaking the language, she remembered it from the recent headlines. He would play on the Spanish Rock Stage.

"Are these all cover bands?" Chelse asked.

"Not sure, why?"

"Meatloaf is going to be one of the headliners of the North Stage?"

"Weird. Didn't we lose him recently?"

"He had a voice like an Angel."

Gwen and Johnny pointed excitedly at the mystery singer.

"After his 5th solo album, from the 27th club comes the Legendary..."

"What's on the back?"

"Doesn't say anything else?"

Everyone seemed so excited about it.

"Who do you think it is? Keith Richards or something?"

"Maybe it's Morrissey?"

"No idea."

Chelse held Adriana's hand as they pushed their way through security, and onto the front of the stage, through the thousands of guests, Johnny and Gwen tried to keep up and rushed to the front. They all watched as the musicians had played amazingly well live, and finally the mystery singer came out in his dark black robe. Shadows still divulged his face whoever it was. His guitar riffed with a rough punk aesthetics, and quickly changed into a pop melody. He played his guitar with his left hand using an inverted right-handed guitar. It was a Sonic-blue Mustang Fender.

Crowd seemed to pause and broke out into a deafening cheer when he removed his black hood. The guy had long rugged blonde hair with white streaks on the sides. 

Adriana's pockets buzzed again.

Chelse smiled and turned to Adriana with a flushed face. 

"Are you freaking seeing this?!"

Adriana looked down on her mother's text message again.

"Please forgive me, Adriana."

She could almost hear her mom's voice saying it this time. Adriana sighed and finally texted her back.

"I do."  

"Will you finally come home?"

"Yes."

Adriana turned to Chelse who looked so peaceful watching the performance. She finally focused on who it was on stage, it was Chelse and her own favorite singer, only older, a 55-year-old, Kurt Cobain.

Adriana turned to Chelse who had tears streaming down her cheeks.

She held her hand tighter. Then let go as the world around began fading into a white light.

"Chelse, are you coming?"

"Look, Adriana, it's Pixie-Meat all grown up." Chelse smiled and waved her Goodbye before turning back to the main stage.