Dark Star: Confessions of a Rock Idol (2 page)

If you want a little taste of heaven,

Come with me after the show,

I’ll take you to kingdoms above and beyond,

Anything you have ever known…

Dibbs, Crazee, Scoogs, and I were gods. Fans worshiped us. We were on a pedestal so high, none of us knew how we got there or how to get back down to reality, even if we wanted to. Any drug, any girl, any meal, any instrument, any car—
anything
—was ours for the asking. Our manager, Gray Harris, saw to that as he took DeathStroke to breathtaking new heights.

By the time I was twenty-three, I was so strung out on booze, pot, uppers, and coke that I often got confused about what city we were playing. More than once I would grab the mike in, say, Baltimore, and yell to the crowd, “How ya doin’, Pittsburgh? Are you ready to
rock?”

I was ugly, all right, spitting into the crowd one night, stomping offstage another. I was drugged out and utterly insensitive. And I made no attempt to hide the fact that I was making time with as many women as possible while we rode the crest of this fame-driven wave.

Dibbs, our drummer and my best friend since childhood, was the first to approach me about my unbridled antics—and my growing dependency on drugs, which was beginning to vex even the regular users in the band.

“Dude!” Dibbs cornered me one night in Vegas between sets. “Clean it up, man. You’re a zombie! You’re ticking these people off. They’re not gonna take this kind of abuse forever.”

“Dibbs, chill, man! These groupies would follow us straight to
hell
if that’s where we were playing.
Now get out of my face!”

“Do you hear ’em?” he screamed above the roar. “I’m hearin’ boos out there! They made us who we are, Lester. You need to clean up your act. I mean it!”

Clueless was I to the fact that Gray and the boys in the band had been putting out feelers to see if there were any other lead singers who might be able to take my place—a thought I would have both cursed and laughed at, had I known.

It was during this period that I started getting the letters from Karen. Don’t get me wrong, we got thousands of letters each day from fans, not to mention hundreds of flowers, gifts, clothing, hotel room keys, and other strange paraphernalia. We also received death threats from angry parents, suicide notes from strung-out teens, and hate-filled letters from so-called Christian community leaders.

Amidst it all, Karen’s notes stood out. Part of me passed them off as the fanatic obligation of some wigged-out cultist. But another part of me—a very tiny, unreachable part buried beneath layers of steel and stone—wanted to cling to the words like a suffocating person clings to oxygen, as if they were life itself.

Dear Mr. Lester,

Unlike most of the mail you receive, this is not a fan letter. I am not a fan of yours, but I would like to be your friend. My name is Karen Bayliss. I am sixteen years old and live in Topeka, Kansas. Most important, I am praying for your salvation. I will not stop praying for you. It is my desire for you to surrender your life to Jesus Christ and for you to lead your following of fans to Him.

You will hear from me often. Until next time, may the Holy Spirit begin to draw you to Himself.

Sincerely,

Karen Bayliss

No return address, no phone number, nothing. Just a crooked gray postal stamp on the envelope confirming that it came from Topeka.

Prosecutor Frank Dooley was a piece of work. Thick, dark brown hair, not one out of place. Dark blue suit with a white hankie sticking up out of the breast pocket. Long face. Always tugging at his sleeves out in front of him, making sure about three inches of white cuff could be seen, as well as two big gold cuff links. His Southern drawl was as thick as Coca-Cola syrup; every word had at least two syllables.

“Your Honor,” he said in response to an objection from my attorney. “It is my intention to make it crystal clear to you what kind of individual we are dealing with here. Everett Lester has been a troubled soul since the day he was born, and I am simply asking the witness, who has been a lifelong friend, to answer some specific questions about Mr. Lester’s youth.”

Judge Sprockett pinched at his protruding Adam’s apple and overruled the objection.

“So then, Mr. Dibbs, is it true that the defendant, Everett Lester, was excessively violent as a boy?”

“I don’t know if you would call it
excessive.
Boys are—”

“Mr. Dibbs,” Dooley interrupted, “is it true that Everett Lester had three large pet piranhas when he was a teenager?”

“Objection Your Honor,” said my attorney, Brian Boone, almost laughing. “What could having a few pet fish possibly have to do with—”

“Overruled. I’m going to humor you, Mr. Dooley, but let’s make this quick.”

“Mr. Dibbs,” Dooley zeroed in on the witness, “is it true that Everett Lester had three large pet piranhas when he was a teenager, and that friends would pile into his basement bedroom to watch these flesh-eating creatures devour live fish and mice, and even rats?”

“Yes...”

“And is it true that Everett smashed mailboxes, shot guns at street signs and picture windows, set roads on fire, and tipped over cars with the help of friends?”

“Pellet guns. He used pellet guns, not real ones.”

“That is not the question, Mr. Dibbs. The question is, did Everett Lester destroy mailboxes, shoot at homes, set fires, and roll automobiles?”

“Well…yes.”

“And is it true that when you and Everett Lester were boys, he was known to sell drugs?”

“At times, yes, but his family—”

“Steal cars?”

“Yes, but you need to—”

“Sleep around?”

“Yes.”

“And beat the living tar out of other boys for even looking at him wrong?”

Shaking his head and looking down, as if he were being disciplined, my old best friend managed one more yes, and Dooley was done with him.

2

AS IT TURNED OUT
,
the band members in DeathStroke did not kick me out of the group. It wasn’t that I quit the drugs or alcohol, but over the years I built up such a tolerance that I was able to perform while flat-out stoned.

Besides, my compatriots were not about to get rid of their cash cow. They realized my popularity was the major factor in the success of DeathStroke. I was not only the group’s charisma, but also the musician who had written the lion’s share of our top hits. For their own good, my “buddies” chose to dance with who brung ’em, even though they were watching me disintegrate in the process.

Our third album,
Deceiver,
sold more than the previous two albums combined, going platinum in one year. At that stage of my life, I had everything anyone in the world could want. Between the income from concerts, records, gift sales, and endorsements, all four DeathStroke band members were millionaires. Imagine it—I was only twenty-four.

I was bewildered to find that, although powerful, those seven figures did not bring contentment. I always needed more; I
yearned
for more. More drugs, more booze, more women, and especially more power and recognition.

Coincidentally, it was during the
Deceiver
era that I started interacting with a popular West Coast psychic named Madam Endora Crystal, whose profound insights were said to have helped Hollywood celebrities, politicians, pro athletes, and Fortune 500 executives. Oddly enough, Endora resembled the mother-in-law witch by the same name from the old TV show
Bewitched
—red hair and all.

Endora lived in LA. I met her at a party thrown in Burbank by friend and actor Robert DeBron. During the bash, Endora performed ten- to twenty-minute psychic readings with any partygoer who chose to do so in a private study. I didn’t participate simply because I didn’t think it would have looked cool; I never wanted to appear like I needed anything from anyone.

It was well known in celebrity circles that Endora stunned people with her remarkable insights and accuracy. She was said to have uncanny psychic, medium, and channeling powers to explore the past, communicate with the dead and higher powers, and accurately predict the future.

At the party, Endora told me she was intrigued by me and would love the opportunity to do a reading. As the days went by following the party, I couldn’t get her off my mind. So when we played LA several months later, I arranged for a limousine to pick her up and bring her to the Ritz-Carlton, where we were staying.

Our first private meeting blew me away. The woman knew details from the past that I never would have recalled, and she exhibited knowledge about personal matters that would have gotten anyone’s attention.

She spoke of an older brother who loved me very much, yet while cloaking himself with a mask of happiness and success, was dreadfully troubled and dejected.

Obviously, she referred to Eddie, who had a high-pressure job in New York City, a tempestuous marriage, and three teenagers who regularly cursed him to his face. My heart felt dark and heavy, my stomach almost sick, when she told me Eddie would be wishing for his current problems in the years to come when he’d face what she termed a “long run of bad luck.”

The oldest brother, Endora said, was the loyal one in the family, the model child. That would be Howard, still residing in northeast Ohio with a wonderful wife and three delightful children—and still taking care of my mother, Doris, who now lived with Howard’s family.

Next, Endora spoke insightfully about my only sister. “This one has chosen to travel a different path,” she said. “I’m feeling you are bothered by this new direction she has taken.” After a moment of silence, she smiled. “But do not worry. It’s going to be okay. Good things lie ahead for her.”

Mary was four years older than me. After raising two boys and steering through an ugly divorce, she had become, in her words, a “born-again Christian.” And yes, I was concerned. Every time I talked to her, she quoted the Bible to me. She wrote letters loaded with Bible verses. We argued about religion. She insisted Jesus Christ was the
only
way to heaven. I thought she had joined a cult.

“I’ve traveled the world, Mary!” I would yell into the phone. “I’ve seen more religions than you’ve seen movies. You can’t tell me that the people I’ve seen worshiping their gods are going to hell! It’s too small, Mary. If there is a God, He’s got to be bigger than the one you’re describing.”

“Let’s not argue, Everett,” she would say. “We have such little time to talk.” I was always traveling, and she had a new life in a small city in southwest Ohio. It was good to hear Endora tell me things would work out well for Mary. She was a kind person, and I hoped the best for her.

When we neared the end of that first session, Endora’s countenance became disturbed as she tapped her long, black fingernails on the table between us.

“There is a dark cloud that, unfortunately, still hovers over you, Everett,” she said with her eyes closed. “I sense something…missing in your life. I feel a heart, beating fast—very fast. Hoping. Wishing. Trying… There is warm water; it is dark and perilous. You are fighting to get through, to find what’s missing…”

A tear actually slipped out the far corner of Endora’s purple-shaded eye. And with that,
BAM
, it was over. She raised her head quickly and opened her eyes, as if to draw a line to stop what was happening. To separate herself from the emotion of it.

“That’s enough,” she said coldly, shaking slightly, and beginning to rise up as she spoke. “We’ll cover more next time.”

From that moment on, the forty-eight-year-old redhead named Endora Crystal became my personal psychic. I started her out on a retainer of twenty thousand dollars a month, plus expenses, to be at my beck and call. She traveled with us as often as possible, and when she wasn’t touring with our entourage, she was within reach by phone.

The combination of my secret insecurity, constant drug abuse, and Endora’s profound knowledge about me, my background, and my behavior led me to lean on her daily for encouragement. I trusted Endora, and soon she became kind of a spirit figure to whom I could run with all my problems.

If I was uptight after a show, drunk, empty inside, mad at the world, or bitter about the past, I would call her, no matter what time of day or night. Often, I would wake up in the morning with an aching feeling in the core of my stomach, and I’d phone her before my feet even hit the floor.

Endora had a way of drilling into my head that I was more than a rock star. She believed I had been sent “from the gods” to lead millions of people to the truth about life itself.

“The fact is, dear Everett,” she said to me on many occasions, “there are
many
gods. I believe you have been chosen to reveal to society that
all
gods are good.
It’s obvious you yourself are a god. And people must be free to choose whatever god they want to serve: Apollo, Zeus, Buddha, Athena, Everett Lester—or even themselves!

“This truth will allow people to live freely. Do you see, Everett? No more guilt. No more condemnation. No more fear of judgment or damnation! And Everett, they must know that when they die, they will immediately live again on the Other Side—and possibly even be born into the world as a new baby or even an animal, a new personality. It’s an unending cycle. Do you see? And it can be glorious, if you can just convince people. And you have the power, Everett Lester. You have the following…”