Chapter 4 - Fangirl

There is a sound storm in the arena.

The bass drums are booming, burgeoning, blazing through the air, reverberating through my chest cavity. Technicolour blades of light cut through the fog, flashing across the crowd, blinding everyone looking at the stage. Multi-coloured confetti rains down and the roaring audience demands an encore. It’s quite unlike anything I have felt in a long time.

The singer, Aania Minaj, waves her hand in the air as she saunters along the stage's catwalk, flashing her signature smile. She bends and reaches out to fans yelling her name.

But I'm not here for her. Not entirely, that is.

I'm here to watch Zayan Zaffar on the guitar. Ze, as he is famously called for his wicked skills. We are screaming ourselves hoarse. I watch him intently, his every straddle and jerk, all his moves. If only I could watch him play in his sanctuary—untamed, untrained, a wild beast in his abode. Looking up at him, I wish I could see what goes on in that head when a rhythm comes to life, the stories of his life that back his songs.

Isn't he a spectacle, I gush appreciatively to Runa, who is my plus-one tonight. I wouldn't normally have chosen her to come with, but she is the one who had the tickets, and she reached out to me herself. How could I have said no? But this was a point Rafae didn’t understand and we had a cold spat about it, which we usually get into when my plans are concerned. Heaven forbid I mess with his schedule!

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Be a supportive husband, I cried mockingly over the phone. Tell them I’m sick or something…

He didn't respond and told me he would call me back. I fidgeted for a while, holding the door of my wardrobe, wondering if I should go for a dress or jeans. Rafae didn’t call in the next twenty minutes and I thought, If I leave now, I might just make it to the show. And on the spur of the moment, I called Runa and asked her to pick me up, then texted Rafae that I was going to the show. He still hadn’t called me back.

What I didn't know was that Runa would show up on a motorbike. Initially, I did feel the thrill of clutching on to Runa's back as we rode on a speeding bike to the show. Her dare-devil riding left me feeling tipsy.

Aania announces her next song—a ballad, saying she fell in love with it the first time she heard Ze play it in a quiet corner of his room.

That is not his usual spot, she says, putting her thin arm over Ze's shoulder, a wide smile on her face.

I know it was for someone, but he won't tell me who, she laughs and the audience laughs with her. You guys should ask him, she prods us.

There are scattered shouts from the crowd, demanding that Ze tell us whom the song is for.

He laughs good-humoredly and begins the song. For all you ladies, he announces, with a slight grin.

The crowd screams in glee as the music begins, and cheers again when the music moves to verse.

Now this guy knows how to bring a smile to your face, Runa says of my grinning face.

Except, he doesn't know I exist, I tell her. If only you could cease to be invisible.

I'm sensing you have some ideas.

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Of course, and I'll be happy to give you a demo, Runa quips. Unless he's dating that twenty-year-old on the stage with him. I'm not the insecure type, but she does seem like a serious competitor, she says.

I don't think so.

I hope you're right, she goes. But don’t get your hopes up, you know women are such hounds when it comes to men like this.

Right, I give her an ironic side-glance. I'm married. Just so you know.

Which is exactly why I propose you meet him. See the wonders of the world. Get a new perspective on love, she waves her fingers around my head, like she had magic trickling down my face, as she casts a spell. Then she giggles and says: Didn't you ever feel like you made a mistake, marrying a guy who resembles a walking spreadsheet?

No.

I laugh as I imagine Rafae as a walking spreadsheet.

On stage, Ze expands a riff. With a pained expression on his face, he runs a scale up the neck and slides back down; the guitar cries in symphony.

Strobe light effects are moving to the beat of the sound as the music changes rhythm, going faster as the ballad transcends to another melody.

Look, he's off the stage! Runa says to me. I look at the stage and Ze isn't there.

We could catch him backstage! Her pupils dilate with excitement.

Maybe he's gone to pee or something. Why would he pee in the middle of a set? I do a mouth shrug.

Come on, she drags me from the floor to the backstage entrance.

We'll lose our spot, I object.

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It would be worth it if we get to meet him backstage, wouldn’t it?

Are you planning to crash the loo by any chance? God, he's not in the loo.

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There are multiple hurdles on the way towards the back gate. Slotted barriers, and guards manning the entrances reserved for pass holders and staff. We don't have any passes, and we are definitely not staff. Runa has her work badge in her purse, which she slings around her neck. Its ribbon colour matches the ones the volunteers are wearing. She swishes her card before the face of a docile teenage volunteer and declares herself 'staff', walking speedily and dragging me by the wrist. It isn’t very bright, so no one can read the card. We move with ease.

Until we come to our last barrier gate—the guarded rail a few feet away from backstage. We can see him near the stairs of the stage, as a girl in a black cap and polo shirt hands him a water bottle and tissues.

The tissues turn to cotton balls as soon as they touch his face. He asks for more. A whole box is presented; he quickly rips as many as he can, wipes his face and drops them back into the girl’s hand.

He exhales and takes a phone call, which takes only seconds to answer.

A guy with a blond mohawk, purple t-shirt and metallic nails lifts the guitar and fixes the strap after Ze puts it on.

It is almost as if Runa is possessed. She calls out random stuff to him in a continuum: We are huge fans, we are musicians, we love your stuff, like that, but her voice doesn't reach him.

Also, she isn't a musician. She just wanted to learn to play a guitar, at a point when she was having a midlife crisis and her boyfriend married someone else. So after a few classes at the workshop, and expanding her already huge entourage of

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friendships, she felt 'better already' and complained that she could never take out time to pursue music full-time. But she thought highly of our teacher—Adam—and dropped him a message asking him if he was single and interested in taking their student-teacher relationship to the next level.

Adam never replied to her.

To my relief, Runa calmed down after some time and apologized for the message.

What I haven't told Runa, is that Adam’s lips flicker into a smile whenever he hears her name.

I think she's a bit too all-over-the-place for Adam, who has a very subdued nature and frail physique for a man in his forties. They are polar opposites.

We love your stuff? I hiss at her, breaking into a laugh.

Who says that?

She cups her mouth and shouts again, We love you!

I love you too, he chants back, flashing a wide grin at us before hopping quickly up the steps leading to the stage. Every second counts.

Our mouths hang open.

Surreal.

You heard it! He said I love you too! Runa chirps excitedly at me. I nod shakily, both of us running back to our spot in the arena.

That's consent right there, I could do him in my dreams tonight, she goes on.

I did not have to know that, I say, shaking my head.

Oh sure, yeah, you must want to do the same! But I'm okay with us doing the same guy. As long as it isn't real, she suddenly gets sharp in her excitement, like I had designs on her boyfriend, whom she doesn't even have anymore. I mean they keep coming and going—I lose track.

She uses the look I give her to start a new conversation: My parents are trying to fix me up with a guy they know.

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Oh, how appalling.

No, I actually like this guy. But the problem is...

There's a problem? I mock, referring to all her previous problematic relationships. The real problem was that she was incapable of being normal.

I lied to my parents. I stood him up, thinking oh, he's probably just another jerk awaiting a huge dowry. But then...there was no complaint from his side... isn't that weird?

So my mum asks me the next day: How'd the date go?...and I say, It went okay, knowing she'll get to the bottom of the story and bust me in my room later that night—but no busting follows.

The next day she says: I called the guy's mother last night—and I go, Shit! And she says, The guy liked you but he couldn't quite make up his mind. So both parents decided we should meet again.

What? I ask, losing the plot.

Exactly! That dog! He stood me up too! He lied to his mother too.

Then you’re a match made in heaven, I mock, shaking my head.

So, Runa begins after a pause, Now he interests me. I looked him up, he's cute, and he’s a foreign graduate, a doctor—like me. He likes music—like me. He owns three guitars and a small studio and he's part-timing with a band these days.

Sounds alluring. Why did he become a doctor, again? Shut up, why do you always negetivitate things?

Is that even a word?

Okay, so you're now in love with a guy because he stood you up and you didn’t actually got stood up, you found out that you did?

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No, I'm not in love. But I'd like to give him a chance. Because he seems cool. Although he’s playing hard to get but—

So when are you meeting him?

Geez, I’ll have to check my calendar, she says. She winks and then laughs, flinging her hair back with a comic air.

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The show concludes around midnight. We rush to get back, but it will still take us an hour to reach home. Now that the excitement has subsided, I can feel that the night is colder than usual; the darkness that surrounds us chills our spines.

Runa lobs her helmet my way and tries to humor me in the hope that it will bring some colour to my face which is now white as a ghost. As thrilling and adventurous as the bike ride seemed while coming to the show, it feels the complete opposite going back. The roadway at this time is an unlit pitch-black ominous path. Every rock and shrub on the rough roadside remind me of night city goons. Images of us, throats slit, molested and murdered, lying savagely mutilated by the sidewalk, keep flashing through my mind in gory detail, making me shudder.

As luck would have it, after a mile or two, Runa's second- hand Honda starts having some trouble. I realize something is wrong, not because the ride isn't smooth but because Runa starts cussing at it.

What's wrong, I ask.

She replies with more cuss words. Then the headlights go off.

All my nightmares come alive.

That thing about manifesting your imaginings…I begin.

Runa tells me to shut up and breathe. When I do, the cold air feels as though it's freezing my lungs.

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This is bad news, she shouts over her shoulder and I ask why.

Just pray. For what?

Some of her words get lost in the cutting winds, but I catch a few: … keep safe.

The cars won't see us, duh, she yells. Good news. There aren't any cars.

So all these people who came to see the show, what route did they take exactly? She asks.

Just then, a car whooshes by.

I swear this was the first one I saw.

You're going to see more, now that we're going at snail’s pace.

I look up the nearest fuel station and we decide to get the lights checked.

Something must have come loose, Runa suggests. Our brains, maybe.

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