"A little hometown celebration," Matt said. "Just do it."
Jake did it. He took the plastic wrappers from Coop's bathroom drinking glasses. He dumped some cocaine into one and some pot in the other. He then pocketed them and made his way to the front door. While Jack Ferguson and two of his underlings were watching Bill, Coop, and Darren get the orgy started, Matt and Jake slipped out the door and into the hallway. They went down the elevator to the lobby and out to the front of the hotel. A quick walk around the building brought them to the parking lot. After a few moments searching they came to a Mercedes convertible.
"Isn't this one of your dad's cars?" Jake asked.
"Bet your ass," Matt said. "We're going out for a night on the town."
"Where we going?"
Matt grinned. "Today is Wednesday," he said. "I actually confirmed that with a copy of the Heritage Register. I also confirmed that D Street West still has live entertainment on Wednesdays. Guess who is playing there tonight?"
"Who?" Jake asked, grinning, starting to like this idea.
"Airburst," he said. "Of course, the show is already over by now - its almost 11:30 -but we can still close out the bar, can't we?"
"I suppose we can," Jake agreed. "Do you have the keys?"
Matt opened the door of the driver's side. It wasn't locked. He leaned over and opened Jake's door. Jake sat down in the luxurious seat.
"Open the glove box," Matt told him.
Jake did so. Inside were the keys and a white envelope. Matt took both. The keys he put in the ignition. The envelope, he opened. Inside was a stack of bills.
"A thousand bucks," Matt said, smiling. "God I love my old man. He does just what I tell him to do." He peeled off roughly half of the cash and handed it across to Jake. "Come on. Let's go have ourselves a good time."
Jake pocketed the money. Ten minutes later they were pulling up in front of D Street West.
The hero worship Jake had experienced at D Street West in the past, when they were simply Heritage's most popular club band, was nothing compared to what they experienced that night. The bouncer guarding the door - a man both Jake and Matt knew well and had partied with many times - was hardly able to form an articulate sentence when he saw them. He absolutely refused to take the cover charge from them.
Within seconds of their walking through the door, everyone in the building knew they were there. A huge crowd formed around them, with people pushing and pulling and shoving and shouting, everyone trying to be the ones next to them, to be close enough to see them and converse with them.
Nor were they allowed to buy drinks. The bartenders - again, most of them people Jake and Matt knew on a first-name basis - fell all over themselves to give them free drinks. And not just them either, but anyone who happened to be officially in conversation with them at the moment.
While Matt reveled in the attention and privilege, Jake found it a bit disconcerting, especially when it was someone he knew who was acting so strangely. A good example of this was Chuck O'Donnell, the owner, the man who had booked them for that first gig and so many after it. He was almost slobbering with excitement at having Matt and Jake in his establishment. He hugged them repeatedly and offered them anything from the bar that they wanted.
"Thanks, Chuck," Jake told him. "But we're just regular customers. You don't have to treat us special."
Chuck scoffed at this suggestion as if it were sacrilege.
And then there was Airburst, a band that had opened for them dozens of times, that had partied with them even more than that, a band whose female lead singer Matt had once enjoyed a threesome with. They were just as awe-struck as everyone else, unable to converse on the same level they once had, able to do little more than blather out the same simple phrases like "we really love your music" and "you guys rock".
This bothered Jake for a while, especially since he'd once considered Dave Merlin, Airburst's lead guitarist, one of his closest friends outside his own band. But, like with everything else, a few drinks and a few lines of coke made it all seem better.
Jake ended up running into a girl that he knew from high school. Her name was Sara Borne and she had been one of the elite back then, a girl who wouldn't have given him the time of day had he been the last boy on Earth. Now, she was just doing anything she could think of to get into his good graces.
At closing time, she abandoned the group she had come to the club with in favor of leaving with Jake and Matt. Matt, of course, had picked up a girl of his own - a naïve and innocent looking nineteen year old named Julie. The four of them - Matt and Julie in the front, Jake and Sara in the back - went cruising through the city, passing a joint around from time to time, snorting a little coke from time to time. By the time they reached the rural area north of the city, they were feeling very loose.
"Do you want me?" Sara asked Jake when they finally parked off the road in a grove of walnut trees on someone's farm. Her eyes were shining and excited, as if she couldn't believe that she was actually doing this. Matt and Julie had already disappeared, having "gone for a walk" the moment they'd parked. They had been carrying a blanket with them.
"I used to fantasize about you," Jake told her, his hand reaching out to stroke her face. "You were one of the best looking girls in school."
She giggled. "I always thought you were pretty cute too," she said.
Jake frowned a little. "No lies," he said. "Let's keep things honest here. You used to call me 'Bonerack' along with everyone else. You and your friends used to make fun of me because I had long hair and wore nothing but rock band T-shirts and I hung out with the losers."
She opened her mouth to deny this but then thought better of it. "I'm sorry," she said shamefully. "I've grown up since then."
He looked her up and down. "Yes," he said. "You certainly have. And you're just as hot as you ever were."
Another giggle. "So, you want me then?"
"Do you want me?" he asked.
"Yes," she said. "Very much."
"Why?" he asked. "What's different about me now? I've put on a few pounds, that's true, but I'm still the same person. I'm still have long hair. I still hang out with stoners. I'm still dressed in jeans and a rock band T-shirt. What's different?"
"I'm able to see you for who you really are now," she said. "I've listened to your music. You're deep, Jake. Incredibly deep. Deeper than any of us ever would have thought possible."
Jake digested this for a moment and then smiled. "Good answer," he said. "Damn good answer."
She laughed. "Shall we take a walk?" she asked him.
He reached out and stroked her face again. "Do you know what I really want to do with you?" he asked.
"What's that?" she asked, perhaps with a bit of nervousness. After all, she had to have heard about some of the things he had done with other women.
"I want to kiss you," he said. "I want to kiss you a lot."
"Kiss me?"
"Yeah," he said. "I haven't kissed a girl in months, since before we went out on the road."
"What?" she asked. "But those stories about you and the..."
"Oh I've fucked dozens of girls," he said. "In every way, shape, and form. But I haven't kissed one. Not even a single time."
"How come?" she asked.
"It's a long story," he said. "But I want to kiss you. I want to kiss you very badly. Are you a good kisser?"
She licked her lips slowly. "I've never had any complaints," she said.
"I bet you haven't," he said.
They leaned into each other and kissed very softly. She had puffy lips, the kind of lips men dreamed of kissing. In fact, when he had fantasized about her back in his high school days, when she was a cheerleader and student council vice president, her puffy lips had been the body feature he used to dream about the most. Was that perhaps the reason he had focused on her tonight? He thought it probably was.