Ruin Porn (9 page)

Across the room from him, Evin was on the edge of Ritchie’s bed, elbows resting on his knees as he stared slack-jawed at Miah and the fatty Miah was rolling on the hotel bible.

Finn tried not to laugh. He really did. But when Miah glared at him and Ritchie’s shoulders shook, he knew he hadn’t succeeded.

“I thought none of you did drugs,” Evin finally got out.

Finn smiled. He was leaving this explanation up to Miah’s convoluted sense of logic.

“Cannabis,” Miah began, singeing the end of the joint, “is not a drug. It’s an herbal remedy. A medicine.”

“That’s semantics, dude,” Ritchie said. “A medicine is a type of drug, regardless of whether it’s quote-unquote natural or manufactured. One could even argue that most contemporary pot strains are just as manufactured as the pills hocked by big pharma.”

“Thanks, Nurse Myer,” Miah drawled.

Finn held his breath as he waited to see if Ritchie would be goaded by the dig at his mom, the nurse. But Ritchie was too chill from the show to be thrown by Miah’s normal taunts.

Ritchie settled against the headboard of Miah’s bed. “Whatever. You just enjoy smoking it.”

“What? Like you enjoy smoking pole?” Miah pushed.

Ritchie waved him off. “Only if it’s Finn’s pole, you know that. Irish dudes have tiny dicks.”

Finn snorted. “Glad I can accommodate your overactive gag reflex. We going to drink already?”

Miah inhaled deeply, then scooted back to the headboard next to Ritchie. He let out a long stream of thick smoke with an extended sigh and shook his head. “See, this is the thing….”

“Fuck me, here we go,” Finn muttered under his breath as Ritchie laughed.

Miah was undeterred. “I was at the cafe with Sid picking out my purple haze when I realized how futile it is to fight memory with alcohol. Why do we try to bury our conscious memory? That we can think about our thinking at all makes the thought an object, real matter to contend with and not an ethereal concept.”

“Yeah, sure. That makes perfect sense, Miah.” Ritchie patted Miah’s arm and smirked.

Miah got excited and shifted on the bed so he was cross-legged facing Ritchie. “I know, right?” He took another long toke.

Fucking purple haze.
Miah had chosen one of the strongest strains available.

“This is only the beginning for us,” Miah added. “What happened in the square today is a mere hint of what’s to come. I can feel it. I’m taking us there, boys. That’s not a wish or a dream or a thought, that’s real matter there. Real because I’m making it real.”

Finn looked over at Evin. He was scratching his head and staring at Miah with a confused expression. Finn had to stifle another laugh.

“I’m finding us a way to get to Peru,” Miah said. “Or maybe I’ll just go there on my own during break.”

“No way in hell,” Ritchie said at the exact same moment Finn said, “I don’t fucking think so.”

“Ayahuasca,” he rolled out of his mouth, as if it was heaven instead of a hallucinogenic drug in Peru that was way too trendy to be safe. “You just want me to stay a rock god instead of a God. I’m the leader of this band—” Miah started, took another inhale. He blew it out slowly, watching the smoke roll upward and then muttered, “You three would be nowhere without me.”

“Yeah, yeah, we all just sit in the corner with our thumbs up our asses while you do all the work,” Finn snarked.

“No really,” Miah continued. “Evin would be a dirty, holey Sock and you two…. Probably nothing more than shop rats, working from paycheck to paycheck.”

Ritchie tensed. “That’s enough, Miah.”

“I take that back. You would be a nurse, Ritchie, you’re good with that shit,” Miah commented with a nod that he probably thought looked sage. “Finn would be stuck hiding behind the flutes and the fucking cellos, playing along to maestros’ little baton. It’s because of me—where we’re at now.”

Finn started to bristle. He wasn’t in the mood for one of Miah’s diatribes. But Miah obviously wasn’t aware of Ritchie’s tense posture or Finn’s ire because he kept right on rambling.

“I pushed you two ’cause I knew you had it in you. I pushed you hard, ’cause I love you.” He stared at the smoke rising up from the joint for a few seconds, then took another hit and blew it out. “I’m like Ataguchu. Finn, he’s Catequil, god of thunder and lightning. Powerful, much like his music. And Ritchie, Ritchie is definitely Inti. A source of warmth and light and a protector of the people. And our Evin is Kon—the rain and wind that comes from the south.” Miah’s head lolled to the side, and he held out the joint to Ritchie. “Smoke with me. Please, Ritchie.”

Ritchie caught eyes with Finn, asking permission without asking. One of them tried to keep up with Miah most nights while the other stayed more sober than not just in case. Ritchie would only need to take a token hit to appease Miah, but that one tiny inhale would put him out for the night pretty damn fast considering he rarely smoked. Finn would make sure neither of them did anything stupid, so he nodded in agreement.

Their hotel was more old row house than modern structure. The fourth and top floor was cut into two suites, one that faced a canal and the other that faced a string of shops and apartments in the street behind. Miah and Ritchie’s room was on the canal side, and Finn went to the window, pulling back the curtains and watching over them as they smoked and Evin stared at Finn, quiet.

Yeah, Miah could be a total dick sometimes, but never without purpose. He worked his ass off, put more pressure on himself, and worried even more than Momma Ritchie. He just showed it in dickishness rather than mush. But his motivation was always for the greater good, always based on the ultimate goal they’d all vowed to achieve: the success of Rez.

Before long Miah tucked his head onto Ritchie’s shoulder and both of them were mewing in a soft sleep. Finn beckoned for Evin to follow him outside. When Evin clicked the door shut behind him, Finn explained what had just happened the best he could.

“Miah gets like this when he smokes. He doesn’t smoke often, which is why we put up with it at all. And he wouldn’t do it tonight if we didn’t have the day off tomorrow. Listen, Miah’s old man was a fucking piece of work, but Miah won’t be the one to tell you about it. That’s the only reason
I’m
telling you. That Miah isn’t a jackass more often is really a miracle unto itself.”

Evin leaned on the balcony rail. “So you put up with the bullshit.”

Finn shrugged, pulled a lollipop out of his pocket, and began to unwrap it. “He’s attempting to make sense of his life. Like all of us are. He just goes about it with a little bit more bravado.”

“Bravado that masks insecurity?”

Finn chuckled. “Not Miah. For a lot of people that would be true, but not him, not anymore. He’s a confident ass because he really is confident. He believes his own hype. It would be annoying as fuck if I didn’t know he came by that self-assuredness the hard way. I’ll let him tell you more about all of that.”

Evin was quiet for a long time. Then, “You know, I’ve been thinking about why Miah thought I would be a better bass player than guitarist. I can’t come up with any answer other than I was never suited for guitar in the first place. I think I did it to get the attention of my parents. How pathetic is that? I really think the bass does suit me better. What about you? Why did you first pick up a guitar?”

Finn didn’t have to think about this answer. “My parents forced an axe into my hands before I can remember having a choice. But I kept up with it because I fell in love with that mournful slide of notes in ‘Since I’ve Been Loving You’ that just dead-on bleeds into Page’s counterpoint to Plant’s vocals. Because of Lindsey Buckingham’s pick and the badassness of ‘Big Love’….”

Evin was staring at him, rapt, and Finn almost forgot what he was saying, where he was, and why it was a really bad idea falling for his bandmate when he looked into those eyes. He swallowed down the urge to move closer and used his humor to keep Evin close to him instead.

“I kept at it despite how fucking egocentric Jeremiah Thade can be some days, because if Slash could kill it with a guitar and not kill Axl, then so can I.”

CHAPTER FIVE

Paris

A
S
A
member of Sock in the Sun, Evin had begged for the opportunity to do promotion. His band was unknown in an oversaturated market and it was those that caught the attention of either fans or the media who had the best likelihood of making it big. Despite their challenges, they’d been picked up on a cursory contract by KMA Music and handed the job as Rez’s opening band, but he hadn’t had the opportunity to do any real promo because they’d been booted so fast.

In the heat of the Made in Americana tour—with a band that had already made it and was on its way up—he was beginning to understand why bands hated doing promo. Not just hated it—loathed it with a fiery passion of a thousand supernova galaxies.

“Why did you push for this when you hate it so fucking much?” Evin asked Miah as the two of them set up a laptop and tested out the Internet connection in Miah and Ritchie’s hotel room.

“’Cause it works” was Miah’s only answer, and then he was focused on the screen, squinting, trying to read the box where fan questions would pop up when they went live.

“You need your glasses, Miah?” Finn asked.

“Shut up, Finn,” Miah growled.

Evin faced Finn—on the bed behind him, lounging and reading
The Economist
with a
People
magazine surreptitiously tucked inside—and mimed a pair of glasses over his eyes, dropping his jaw in shock.
Jeremiah Thade, lead singer extraordinaire, wore reading glasses?
Finn snickered, nodded, and put his pointer finger to his lips to shush Evin.

“I don’t really get how this all works,” Evin admitted. “Sock never did any of this shit.”

“You do know how the Internet works, right?” Ritchie teased as he walked by ringing a bell, then threw it on the desk next to the laptop.

What the hell was that for?

“Don’t be a dick, Myer,” Miah chastised.

Behind Miah’s back, Ritchie made the motion of sucking a dick, pushing his tongue into the side of his mouth.

“He’s pretending to suck a dick, isn’t he?” Miah asked Evin, refusing to turn around.

Evin snickered.

Miah huffed and pointed to the screen. “When we go live, Rezors will be able to see us and hear us. They can write in questions to us. It will be a continuous stream in this right-hand box. So we’ll just have to read and answer as we can. Sid arranged for some music reporter to sit in with us and play gatekeeper. No way we’ll be able to get everything in, but she’ll help.”

“How many people do you expect to sign on for this?”

Miah seemed to be considering that. “Twenty thousandish.”

Evin sputtered. “Are you kidding me?”

“It’s not a lot, but we’re—”

“Not a lot!” Evin objected and ran his hand over his scruffy chin. “Holy fuck. I’m in so far over my head.”

Miah leaned in. “No, Ev, you’re not.” Then he sat back and shouted to Sid, “Where the hell is that reporter?” There was a knock on the door and Miah pumped his fist in celebration. “I’m like fucking Jesus, manifesting my wishes out of thin air and positivity.”

“That’s a genie you’re thinking of, dickhead,” Finn interjected.

“Buzzzzz kill,” Miah drew out in response to Finn. “Sid, you got the door?”

Sid didn’t bother to answer Miah out loud, opening the suite door and letting a bohemian chic woman with a shaved head in the door.

“Shonda Mercier from
NME
and NRJ,” Sid introduced, pointing at them one by one, “Finn, Ritchie, Evin, and Miah. I’d tell you boys to be nice, but Shonda’s an old friend of mine and I know she can hold her own.”

Miah prowled across the room to her, kissed both her cheeks. “Welcome to the lion’s den.”

“Nice to meet you all,” she commented with a nod and an air of confidence. Unlike most of the women whom Evin had watched fall under Miah’s spell, if they weren’t there already, Shonda wasn’t flustered by his presence, or in any way moved. She took off her jacket, laying it on the bed next to Finn, and set a chair down next to the laptop. She fingered the bell, raising an eyebrow in question.

“Miah can pontificate,” Ritchie said and tapped it, a jingle emanating from the movement.

“Effective,” she approved and rapped her knuckles softly on the table twice. “Let’s do this.”

The five of them arranged themselves in front of the laptop, using the image on the screen as a guide to make sure all of them were in the shot. Evin tried to move to the end of the bed with Finn, but Miah wrapped a hand around the back of his neck and steered him into a chair next to him with a whispered,
Time for your reckoning
.

“You’re very biblical today,” Evin noticed.

“He talked to his old man this morning,” Ritchie explained since Miah had ignored him in favor of flirting with Shonda. “Goes with the territory,” Ritchie added.

Evin furrowed his eyebrows. “Miah flirts because of his dad?”

“What?” Ritchie looked just as confused as Evin was. He glanced at Miah when he saw where Evin’s attention was. “No, not the flirting, the Bible shit.”

There wasn’t time to ask Ritchie anything else about that. As much as Evin would’ve loved to have something other to focus on than going live with twenty fucking thousand people right then, it didn’t matter what he wanted because the green light was on at the top of the screen. Miah was running his fingers through his blond hair. He pulled it back into a ponytail, waved at the camera and spoke to the Rezors already logged in.

“Hey, you beautiful souls, we’ll get started in a bit.”

Miah and Ritchie chatted with each other, with Shonda, and made offhand mentions about some of the comments that were popping up (
Rezor from india, come here to play! Follow me miah!
). It was all familiar to Evin in a really surreal way. These live web events weren’t anything new for Rez. The Detroit 3 had built their career on the Internet—YouTube, Livestream, Bandcamp, SoundCloud, chat rooms…. Evin had always wanted to sit in on one of the live talks they did, but they were often pop-ups, unplanned and unscheduled. Miah would send out a tweet, and minutes later they’d be online, answering questions and talking with fans for three minutes exactly—3D3 they’d called them then, three minutes with the Detroit 3.