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He wasn't answered verbally. He was answered by having Matt's hands grab him by the front of his shirt and lift him bodily off the ground. Before he even had a chance to let out a startled squeak, he was flying through the air with the greatest of ease and crashing into the tub of ice and Gatorade in the corner of the room. Matt walked over and picked him up again, slamming him into the nearest wall and driving the breath from his lungs. Matt's hand reared back to strike again and the only thing that prevented Greg from having his nasal bones smashed into his brain was Jake grabbing Matt's hand before it could strike. Even so, it was a close thing. Jake was lifted six inches off the ground before his sheer weight ended the forward motion.

"Let go of me, Jake," Matt said, trying to squirm free. "It's time I sent this coke-sniffing freak to see his Heavenly fucking Father!"

"Chill, Matt," Jake said soothingly, refusing to let go. "Chill. This isn't the answer."

"Who cares what the answer is?" Matt responded. "I just want to see his teeth sticking out of my knuckles!"

Jake, with the help of Coop, finally managed to wrestle Matt free and propel him back into his chair. Greg, still trying to get his breath back, glared at the guitar player, fire and brimstone in his eyes.

"Don't ever touch me again, Matt," he finally gasped when he was able to talk. "You may be able to get away with a lot out here on the road, but I'm a National Records executive and you will keep your filthy hands off of me!"

"Did you tell that asshole he could smoke weed before we went on?" Matt demanded. "Did you fuckin' tell him that?"

"Yes, he fuckin' told me that!" Darren said, still holding his joint in one hand, his lighter in the other. "Tell 'em, Greg. Tell 'em who's the fucking boss of this show."

"I am the boss of this show," Greg said. "And I don't see any problem with..."

"I'm the boss of this fucking band!" Matt yelled, standing up again. Jake and Coop were both forced to shove him back down.

"No," Greg said. "I'm sorry, but you're not. You are all National Records employees of equal stature. Steve Crow is your immediate superior and, while out on the road, I am your supervising agent, instilled with decision making authority and ultimate say-so on daily activities. Check your contract, Matt. I'm afraid that's the way it is."

"And so," Matt said, "using your decision making authority, you thought it would be a good idea to tell Darren to go ahead and smoke out before stepping onstage for a live video and audio recording? You told him this in spite of a long-standing band rule that specifically forbids this? What the fuck are you trying to do?"

"I'm not trying to do anything," Greg said. "I'm only here to make things flow smoothly. Darren told me that he performs better if he smokes a little marijuana first. I don't see any harm in doing that."

Matt actually became incoherent he was so mad. "You don't..." he stammered. "He doesn't... you won't..." He turned and cocked his fist back to hit the dressing room wall. Once again Jake jumped forward and grabbed it, preventing a broken hand this time instead of a broken bass player or a dead tour manager.

"Let me go!" Matt yelled. "I need to hit something!"

"I'm hitting something right now," Darren said defiantly. "Fuck all this shit." He put the joint in his mouth.

"Don't hit that fuckin' thing, Darren!" Matt yelled at him.

"Darren," Jake said. "Please. Don't start doing what these record company fucks want. It ain't good for us."

"Yeah, man," said Coop. "We need to stick together."

"You're moving in a starkly counterproductive direction, Darren," said Bill.

Darren looked at them all for a minute. For a second or two, it looked like he might put it down. And then Greg spoke up.

"Do what you want, Darren," he said. "If you need something to mellow you out before we go on, that's your business."

"I do what the fuck I want," Darren said. With that he sparked up his disposable lighter and took a tremendous hit.

They hit the stage a few minutes later, barely managing their pre-show display of camaraderie, all of them sullen and uncommunicative. But as they began to play, as they heard the impressive roar of the Detroit crowd screaming at them, they went to work and performed their best.

Darren played perfectly, as did everyone else.

Chapter 13a: Lines of Persuasion

Austin, Texas

June 7, 1984

They moved about the stage, their motions pulsing, frantic, as they closed out Almost Too Easy. As the last beats were hit in a carefully timed crescendo, Jake, Matt, and Darren moved backwards, entering the safety perimeter that would keep them untouched by the coming explosion. By now they were well practiced in this maneuver and there had been no mishaps. The last beat was hit, the last strings strummed, and the two canisters detonated, sending a boom and a flash of light out. The audience of 11,224 cheered wildly.

"Thank you, Austin!" Jake shouted after stepping back to the microphone. Before him, the pyrotechnic canisters were still smoking. "Thank you and goodnight!"

He put his guitar down and stepped backwards, letting the applause wash over him, relishing it, basking in it. Darren and Matt appeared on either side of him, their arms on his shoulders. Bill and Coop formed up on the outside. They bowed one time to the crowd and walked off the stage, exiting through the stage left door.

This wasn't really the end of the show and the crowd knew it. There was still the encore. They screamed for it, stomped their feet for it, sending noise and vibration through the arena.

The roadies had placed cold quart bottles of Gatorade on a table just inside the stage door. All five band members picked one up and drank deeply, throats working frantically, green liquid running down their chins onto their chests. They took deep breaths after the first long drink and then drank some more. Jake forced himself to stop after consuming half the bottle. He didn't want his stomach to cramp when he went back out there for the last two songs.

The thundering of the crowd was too loud for conversation to take place, especially since the band's ears were still ringing from seventy-eight minutes in front of the amps and from the concussion of the explosion. But Bobby Lorenzo, Darren's personal assistant, had no problem understanding sign language. Darren mimed the act of lighting a lighter and Bobby brought him one, along with a marble pipe stuffed with greenbud. Darren put the pipe in his mouth and fired up, inhaling deeply and expertly. He then passed the pipe and lighter across to Coop, who took them and did the same.

In had been a month since Greg, using the authority vested in him by the Intemperance contract with National Records, had repealed the long-standing prohibition against getting high before performing. In that month, things had led exactly where Matt and Jake had always feared they would if this rule were relaxed. At first it was just Darren taking a few hits before the start of the night's show and then he began slipping out during his breaks in the performance — Matt's extended guitar solo, Coop's drum solo, and Jake and Bill's duet — and reinforcing his high with a few more hits. Then came the further hits during the encore break. Then, starting about six shows ago, Coop, unable to take it anymore, began to join him in the indulgence.

"Look, guys," Coop said when Matt and Jake called Coop on this after the first time. "I can handle it just like Darren does. It's just weed. It ain't like we're getting drunk before we go on."

But of course, once the precedent was set, neither Darren or Coop saw the need to stop drinking alcohol four hours prior to a show, or to keep from snorting a few lines of coke when the effects of drinking alcohol all day long had them a little weary. As a result of all this, tensions among the band members were high and there had been some screw-ups onstage. In San Antonio the week before, Darren tried to do a fancy twist maneuver and knocked over his own microphone stand. In the last show, in El Paso, Coop actually started playing the wrong song at one point in the set, forcing the rest of the band to quickly change gears and play out of the sequence they'd rehearsed. When confronted after the show following these mistakes by an angry Matt and Jake, both had simply claimed that it was road fatigue and over-repetition that had caused the mishaps, not the drugs and alcohol.