Access Unlimited

by Alice Severin

  “Comme toujours, chef.” Like always, boss.

  “Good to see you remember your French. Wouldn’t want the tour bus lifestyle to lower your standards.” Dave was teasing, but there was a serious note to his voice. It was a simple sentence. On the surface.

  “Absolutely not. Of course it is early days yet. I’m sure I can still manage to fall out of a limo half-dressed.”

  Dave cleared his throat. “Yes.”

  I had no idea why I’d said that. I chalked it up to the edgy feeling I had standing by a bus next to a highway. “I’ll check in with you later or tomorrow on the blog. I’m going to tell the band.”

  Dave’s voice, was low, almost kind. “Tell Tristan first. Before the others. Trust me on this.”

  “T’a raison. Comme d’habitude.” You’re right. As usual.

  “Bien sûr. Ok. Chow.” And the phone went dead. Of course.

  It was funny to think of him looking out for me, sitting at the head of his empire, while I went to talk to a half-naked rock star, ruling his world from a mobile bed.

  * * *

  It was a little crazier tonight, which I put down to the announcement about the nomination. Outside the venue, there were people hoping to be able to pick up tickets, along with some enterprising people selling bootleg Devised and Tristan Hunter t-shirts. I didn’t see James doing anything about it. Peter Grant, he was not.

  And Tristan was brilliant on stage. He swooped down towards the crowd, luring them in, taunting them with distance, before coming close enough to touch, falling to his knees, clinging on to the microphone like a lifeline. Every word wrenched from his throat, twisting through the vowels, the veins in his neck standing out from the effort. AC matched him, knowing just when to lower the volume and retreat slightly, leaving a space that Tristan filled, effortlessly, the notes punching through the darkness. The drummer, Pete, was really very good. He watched them, stuck with the rhythm, following Tristan’s cues, happy to be the solid base for what they did. The dynamic range was good. Some drummers bash away at the kit, no matter what’s going on around them. Not Pete. The bassist wasn’t as strong, but he didn’t distract either. It was a nice set up and it sounded damn good. And when Tristan and AC stood back to back, leaning on each other, Tristan’s dark hair flowing over AC’s shoulder, the piercing shrieks and collective groan of the crowd summed it all up. Whatever the two of them had, and however it worked, together they touched a different nerve, and the response was immediate and blood-at-the-surface desperate. Looking out at the crowd, they all had a similar expression—a kind of wonder, an openness that was intimate and deeply personal—and repeated on almost every face.

  Gauging the power and intensity of tonight’s audience, I had a feeling the craziness was going to ramp up. What if he won? There would be no stopping him.

  It was a slightly unnerving thought.

  chapter seven

  Toronto to Detroit

  I woke up, disorientated from my dream, with a song from Heaven 17 running through my head. I looked over at Tristan. His chest was rising and falling gently, his dark hair a mess on the pillow. The duvet covered part of his hip, but had slid off slightly, leaving the hollow of his stomach and what lay beneath in darkness. I sat there, in the dim light, watching him. His beauty, so casual and careless in sleep, was extraordinary. I wanted to trace the lines of his face, kiss his full mouth, soothe away the dark circles under his eyes that were the only sign now of the stress he was under. But most of all, I wanted him to sleep. I knew he’d start to be aware of me sitting there soon enough. I crept out of bed slowly, and tried to cover him without waking him up. He shifted slightly, and sleepily pulled up the duvet. When his breathing returned to a steady rise and fall, I threw on my jeans and tiptoed out to go sit at the front of the bus.

  The driver gave me his usual dismissive glance when I quietly said good morning to him. I stuck in my headphones, and started playing the song that had been running through my head when I woke up, “Crushed by the Wheels of Industry,” keeping it low enough that I could still hear the steady thrum and rhythm of the tires of the bus going over the metal seams in the highway. It was just before 5. It was still dark, and there was a slow yellow pink glow in the distance which wasn’t the sunrise, but today’s destination. We were driving straight to Detroit from Toronto—Cleveland came next. Everything was strange—already. And it was only the beginning. We all had piled in the bus and the band had finally gone to sleep. Tristan and I had retired to the back bedroom, his face pale with exhaustion. We went to sleep, but something had woken me up and I found I couldn’t sleep. And after trying for an hour, I’d given up. Now I was up here looking at the lights on the road.

  Here we were, the tour bus, running through what was left of the night, us and the trucks, and the highway, straight here, Highway 401—the Macdonald–Cartier Freeway—which, if the guidebook I’d bought was to be believed, was the busiest highway in North America, with over half a million vehicles a day. And I’d never heard of it before. This road, which for some people was their livelihood, their daily routine, was a giant 10-lane slice separating the interior from the lakes, the last vestiges of the industrial dream. It was so flat and wide here. And the only lights seemed to be the high yellow lights adorning the cabs of some of the trucks, the regular service stations, filled with neat geometric lines of tractor trailers, parked at an angle, towering over the cars that were parked in front, the bright lights of the service forecourt serving as a neon invitation to leave the endless ribbon of highway, a plastic and bright civilization beckoning, a refuge from the sense that you could keep driving, forever. An endless giant road, glimpses of factories and houses, turning on their lights for another morning.

  I was shocked out of these thoughts by the growly voice of the driver. He really was something out of central casting, his cowboy hat carefully placed in his locker behind the seat, a big silver bracelet on one wrist, an even bigger watch on the other, his huge scarred hands settled on the wheel comfortably. It was hard to imagine him even driving a car—his hands took over half the wheel. But he seemed to own what he was doing. He’d made it very clear this was his bus. His life. We were being tolerated. Barely. So to hear him asking a question seemed as unreal as the distant lights on the plain we were bumpily gliding through, at 70 miles per hour, maybe a little faster.

  “Why can’t you sleep?”

  I didn’t think he would want the long answer to that one. Truthfully, I wasn’t sure, and I wasn’t sure what he was asking for. “Always an early riser, I guess. Once I wake up, I can’t really get back to sleep.”

  “That’ll work when you’ve got a house of kids to make pancakes for. Kids never sleep either.” He said it calmly, as he switched lanes to go around a line of trucks and cars that were slowing for the exit.

  I thought about it for a minute. It was what he knew. That’s what people did. Sometimes things just were what they were. “No kids planned just yet. Not sure they’d like the touring life.” I wondered if he’d answer a question. “Did your mom make pancakes?”

  He honked at a truck that was drifting into our lane. “No, my dad did. She was always working. Her pancakes were better though.”

  Without thinking, I said, “What were wrong with his?”

  “Too thin. He was always in a rush. Said they cooked faster that way. Made more. I think he just had a heavy hand with the milk.”

  I laughed. “It’s funny how breakfast means more than just food. Always linked to something.”

  He was quiet for a moment, focused on the road. “So, what did you eat for breakfast? When you were a kid, I mean. Not this crap you inhale in between drinks.”

  I looked out the window. One of the lanes seemed to be a steady stream of trucks, one grey rectangle after another, like toys. “I don’t know. A lot of different things I guess. It depended on how things were going.” I was quiet again. But he
seemed to be waiting for more of an answer. “I guess I always think of it in phases. There was the cinnamon toast phase. There was a poached egg phase, but my mother hated doing it, so that didn’t last long. Weekends were bacon. Slightly burnt.” I laughed. “They used to take away my food if they didn’t think it was cooked enough when we went out to breakfast, but that was on holiday. I used to try and hide the bacon or sausage under the pancakes. It’s still a guilty pleasure. Diner food. I can never decide if I’m risking death, or being a rebel.”

  He sat there, silently, for a few minutes, but he didn’t seem thrown by what I’d said. “Bacon’s good. You really need a griddle with a flattener—a press. I used to do short order cooking when I got out of the army.”

  “Where were you stationed?”

  “Missouri. They trained me in communications. Then Vietnam. Signed up right out of high school. They got me at the end. I was just a kid. Jesus. I was there at the Fall of Saigon.”

  I started to speak.

  “No, don’t ask. You’ve seen the pictures. It was worse. No room for compassion, they said.” He paused to switch lanes again. “I like driving. It’s like short order cooking. No time for thinking.”

  He turned off the signal. “I’ve got a few pins in my leg. They hurt when it rains. That’s nothing, when you’ve seen people holding their arm, pleading with you for help. The look on someone’s face when that’s happened…” He trailed off.

  “Could you get anyone out?” It was all I could think of to ask. It sounded wrong the minute I said it.

  “No.” He coughed. “No. Hard to forget.” He fell silent again.

  I wanted to ask more questions, but everything I thought of seemed invasive or superficial. “Impossible.” He didn’t reply.

  So I looked out the window, both of us watching the road. Finally I pulled out my notebook, and started to work. I making notes, and keeping Heaven 17 on repeat. It just seemed to fit. “(We Don’t Need This) Fascist Groove Thang” came up, the song that got them banned from Radio One and insured enough publicity came their way to keep going. It had a cold feeling, the sweet vocals with hints of the New Romantics, over what was at the time, state of the art electronica. In some ways, I thought, with fewer bells and whistles at their fingertips, it actually had more of the hollow spaciousness that made electronic music. That emptiness. I was writing all this down, and thinking about the lead-on band for tonight’s show, and if they’d be any good, when the driver called out.

  “There she is. Detroit.”

  I looked up. It was light enough now to see the distant skyline. There were skyscrapers, an up and down line, like the heartbeat on an oscilloscope, the lines an etch-a-sketch of vertical and horizontal. I was surprised—I’d always thought that Detroit would be like Baltimore—endless streets of half-boarded houses and warehouses. It looked almost thriving. I made a note to myself to never believe anything I read, and sat watching it approach, almost as if we were descending off some highway in the sky, the exits coming closer together now, houses becoming buildings and strip malls and streets. We were still in Canada. I laughed as we went through Tilbury—industrial names imported from England along with the people. We were heading for an exit that led to the Detroit–Windsor Tunnel. It all looked very normal. I don’t know why I was expecting a post-apocalyptic wasteland.

  The voice of the driver cut through my observations of the approach road. “Here, I’m glad you’re up. The manager—what’s his name? James? Handed me their passport details and the manifest. Can you make sure they haven’t left anything too obvious around? And stay up here when it gets handed over? Thanks. Otherwise we have to stop first. And we’ve got to wake them all up.”

  “I’ll do it.” I nodded to him. Now I was the tour manager. Shit. I looked at my phone, and checked what number speed dial Dave was on. Then I went to the back. How to do this. Loudly, I supposed. I tapped on the door to the bedroom, and went in. Tristan was twisted in the sheets, a fallen god. I kissed his shoulder. “Darling. We’ve got to get up. Border. They’ll want us all up.”

  He was alert in a second. “Where’s James?”

  “Left the papers with the driver. I said I’d help.”

  “Fuck.” He stood up, shockingly tall and naked. He put his arms over his head, and stretched, then reached out for his jeans. “Better wake them all up. Tell them to take what they have.” He choked out a hollow laugh. “Not kidding. Tell the driver we need to stop first.”

  “We’re already here.”

  “Oh fuck. Ok then. Showtime. Go. Go.”

  I went up to each bunk and shook the curtain. “Wake up, get up. Border. If you have anything with you, you’d better swallow it all or flush it.” There was a collective groan. “Look motherfuckers, just do it! Get the fuck up. Thank you. Help me out with this.” I had an idea. “Bottle of vodka for the first one dressed. Cases of beer for 2nd and 3rd place. Bottle of champagne if you tell me what you had to get rid of. Let’s do this! They have guns!”

  AC stuck his head out. “This prize is so mine.” He winked at me. “But I sleep naked. Want to watch me get dressed?”

  “Love to, but I seem to be in charge of not getting us arrested.” I smiled. “Besides, I forgot my glasses. Need them for the small print.”

  He smirked. “Bitch. Go on. Save us.”

  I went back up to the front of the bus. I noticed that the road leading up to the Border Control and the tunnel was named “Freedom Way.” As I flipped through the packet of materials to be handed over, it all seemed a bit Orwellian. The information we had to hand over looked complete, at least as far as I could tell. And it gave useful details like where we were staying, times for the soundcheck, contact details. It occurred to me that I should always have a copy of all this. Perhaps the boys were happy being carted around, half-conscious, propped up on the stage and coming awake and alive when they needed to, but I wanted to know where the hell we were going. I wondered if Tristan had all this information. I had a feeling that nothing had been chosen without his tacit approval, if nothing else. I’d already seen him flare up at James in Toronto, asking him what he was actually doing for the money he was extracting from the tour, and it was not a pretty sight. It probably explained why James wasn’t here. I thought back to what Dave had once said—“He’s a hard-ass, your musical hero.” Yes, he was. And fairly unafraid of storming into the midst of trouble. The thought made me worry for him. I just hoped we could get through all this quickly and get some rest, and that James had not fucked up the paperwork in any way. Or tonight’s gig and hotel.

  The bus stopped, and the driver opened the door. The border police for America, in their uniforms with the Homeland Security logo emblazoned prominently, and the double hand guns stationed at each hip made it feel more like we were entering a military camp. I swallowed. Police made me feel guilty, and big men with big guns made me feel anxious. I took the packet, and went over to the man waiting. I tried to be friendly. “Good morning.”

  “Papers, manifest, passports please. Can you have all the passengers on the bus disembark for identification please?”

  “Sure. I’ll get them.” I handed him the packet. “This should be everything.” I tried to smile. He turned away, and went into the portacabin that was the office. Another policeman, soldier, guard came over and stood by the bus. What the hell were they anyhow? Maybe he thought we’d do a runner like in some Grand Theft Auto game. My stomach lurched. I didn’t even like passport control at airports, and they weren’t armed. I hopped back into the bus. “Guys. Please. Come. Act normal.” The drummer was in his underwear. “Fucking get dressed please. Thank you.” And I stood there, feeling a bit like the headmistress at some school for delinquents. Tristan emerged from the bedroom, looking better than he had a right to.

  “You heard the lady. Let’s do this.” And he came up to me, and put his arm around me. “Come on, Lily. I’ve done this
before. Don’t worry.”

  “They look incredibly pissed off.”

  “We probably should have come through Port Huron. Never mind, too late now.” He turned around. “If any of you have anything illegal you better swallow it now, I don’t care how much of it there is. Or put it down the drain of the shower. Don’t flush anything, they’ll be in here searching in a heartbeat. And don’t tuck it under your pillow, for fuck’s sake.”

  We went down the stairs, the bus driver behind us, then AC. The bassist and the drummer followed after another minute. “I’m going to kill them,” Tristan murmured. “Slowly.” We all finally stood there, in a line. I felt like I was waiting for detention.

  The border control officer finally came out, carrying the packet of materials. I could tell even at this distance that everything had been put back in a completely different order. He held the passports in his hand. He walked up to us, and followed the line. I felt like he was inspecting the new recruits and found us lacking, very lacking. He stopped in front of the bus driver, and studied his features for a moment, then looked through the passports. “Hank. . . ”

  “Yes sir.”

  He glanced at the rest of us. “Well it’s a job, isn’t it. Do you have your operator’s license?”

  He pulled out his wallet, and handed his license over. The border officer compared it to the passport, then handed them back. “Thank you. You’re free to go.”

  He looked at the next passport in his hand. “Pete Harley?” The drummer raised his hand. So I wasn’t the only one who felt like we were in school. He went over to him. “American citizen. How long were you in Canada for?”

  “Three days.” He didn’t add sir.

  He grunted, and flipped through the passport. “Travel a lot, do you?”