I offered him a “favor” if he took us all the way but he wasn’t interested. I guess he was saving it all for his wife or maybe it had to do with the fact I hadn’t had a shower in a week.
He was a fidgety, mild mannered man who seemed worried that I might leave a long blonde hair behind so as he practically pushed us out at the next stop, I saw him wiping the seats down with a lint brush.
We were dropped off at a local truck stop that was next to a fireworks stand. I wasn’t even allowed inside to look at the cherry bombs and sparklers since I wasn’t old enough.
So we made our way into the truck stop, used the bathroom, sat down and ordered a Coke.
Peggy was getting restless and I could tell somewhere between Maryland and here, she was not acting like the same Peggy that I knew and loved.
“What’s going on with you?” I asked and was met with stony silence.
“I don’t know man,” she finally answered. “I’m not sure I’m really feeling this trip, you know.”
No, I didn’t know. What was she talking about? We had planned this trip together and we were on an adventure to find rock stars. She couldn’t give up on that dream now.
She gave me a line of crap about being broke and tired of running, she had called her father in Tewksbury, and he was on his way to get her.
When did she have time to call anyone? Let alone a father that I thought was dead and what the hell was a Tewksbury? Then I remembered when I went to the bathroom, there was a pay phone next to the men’s room.
“What are you doing?” I asked her. “You can’t go back now.”
“He said you can come with us and he’ll make sure you get back to Maryland,” her eyes focusing on the straw paper that she was twirling around in her fingers.
I just sat there and shook my head.
“Don’t be mad at me Poppy, okay?”
She began to go into Poppy this and Poppy that but Poppy didn’t want to hear it.
I looked around at the half-empty truck stop, looked in my purse and found $50.00 that I had swiped from the money basket in the kitchen. I knew for a fact that my father was not going to buy an RV and travel around the country with my mother when he retired so I figured she wouldn’t need the money anyway.
Peggy just sat there looking at her balled up piece of paper.
I got up, she looked up at me and I said, “Fuck you! I don’t need you.”
“Poppy wait…” she said following me as I walked out the door.
I loved her but I felt like she was letting me down. I didn’t want to go back home where there was a constant fight between my parents. Kill each other or divorce but quit dragging my brother and me through the mud.
I hated school and all the mean girls who picked on me and made me feel small. Always making fun of the way I dressed. Long scarves, bell-bottoms, funky hats, thick black eyeliner…I always stood out but instead of looking cool to them, I looked like a freak.
When I was at concerts, I felt alive, I felt like one of them. I certainly dressed like them and was cool like them. The people in my area just didn’t get it, they weren’t cool like me.
Peggy helped to make me cool and now she was deserting me.
“You planned this all along,” I finally shot back at her.
“Planned what?”
“The fact that we ended up in Massachusetts and your father just happens to live here. You planned it didn’t you?”
“No, I swear, I had no idea where we were going.”
I didn’t believe her. She was always alone with one of the drivers at some point and who knows what she did or said to them to get them to drive up North.
I walked back out to the highway and threw up my thumb.
“Don’t!” Peggy pleaded but it was no use. I was a stubborn little bitch and I was going to have it my way or no way. Now it was the highway and I was getting ready to be back on it.
Cars and trucks whizzed by without a notice to me so I started walking. Peggy stayed back in the parking lot. I had no idea how long of a wait she had but at that point, I didn’t care.
I could hear her calling after me but I never looked back. I never saw her again.
I found out last year that she had died. After 20 years as a junkie, she was finally five years clean but mixed her methadone with an over the counter cold medicine and the combo was lethal and she was found dead in her apartment. She was 47.
A small, weird little black van pulled up alongside me and a cute black haired guy asked me if I needed a ride.
Yeah, I thought, dumb ass, the thumb in the air is usually a good indication of that so I hopped in the back.
I was met with four other guys and a brown haired chick who looked drunk. There were guitars, amps and a drum set crowding the back of the van.
The front passenger seat was filled with papers, trash and coats.
The whole scene smelled like pot, sex and vomit but it was a ride and they were rock star wannabes which was cool with me.
They were a local club band on their way to a gig in Boston. We had a couple of hours ride to go so we got to know each other.
Tim, the driver was the lead singer but went by the name of Flash. Stupid, I thought, but it was the 80’s and they were a hair band, known for their big hair and over the top girl makeup.
Bing was the drummer, Cindy, the drunk brunette was his ol lady, Marco, and Rich rounded out the lead guitar and bassist.
I quickly zeroed in on Tim who was the cutest of the bunch.
They passed a joint around, we all took a hit, and even though it was shit weed, I still caught a buzz.
Beer cans and whiskey bottles littered the van and clunked every time the van hit a bump.
They were cool and invited me to their show that night and I said hell yeah.
They were playing for tips at a local dive but had big dreams of moving to Los Angeles and making it big. They had one more month in New England and then they were headed out West.
When they found me, they had just come up from a gig somewhere in Massachusetts but I can‘t remember where.
Tim was the oldest and the rest of the gang was around my age.
Cindy was a mess. She had a smile like David Letterman with a big gap between her two front teeth but she looked like Steven Tyler from Aerosmith.
She had long stringy brown hair and big dark eyes that reminded me of a snake. She wore no makeup and thought everything was a joke. She laughed at everything. I found out later that she was just high all the time.
On one hand, she was very intelligent but on the other, she was on her way to becoming a serious drug addict and a piece of shit. We became fast friends.
I don’t know if I was trying to replace Peggy, (like I could), but I found a kinship in Cindy like we were long lost sisters.
We stopped at a gas station to refuel, take a piss and grab a bite to eat. None of us had much money so we agreed to share a large of chips and a six-pack of coke.
The bathroom was filthy and littered with used sanitary napkins and filth. I don’t think the place had ever been cleaned.
I was afraid to sit on the toilet so I peed hovering over the nasty porcelain hole.
At the sink, Cindy was rubbing her nose and held out her thumb to me. On the side of her thumb was a small bit of white powder.
“Do you want a bump?” She asked.
I knew what cocaine was but had never tried it and quite honestly never thought too much about it. I said no and she shrugged. “More for me,” she laughed.
I asked her where she got it and she said she swiped it from Bing’s bag. She said he knew that she stole shit from him but he didn’t care because he liked the way she sucked his dick.
He was from a wealthy family who gave in to his whims of being a drummer. He was basically the founder and the money man of the band who could afford all of the equipment.
He and Tim met while working at a record store and decided to form a band mainly to get chicks.
Back in the van
, the darkness was a stark contrast to the bright sunny day I had just walked out of and I felt like we were a band of vampires.
I later learned that Cindy was only a year older than I was.
I passed a pay phone and thought about calling my aunt who lived in Framingham. Then I thought nah why should I? She was my mom’s sister and although she pretended to love my mother, my mom made no qualms about the fact that she hated her younger sister.
We had taken a family trip to come up here to see her a few years ago and it was a trip from hell. She lived in a teeny tiny studio apartment that was drowning in boxes of books and trash.
She had two large dogs that shit and pissed all over the cream colored rugs and the place smelled like a kennel.
I don’t know why she had invited us there since she had no place for us to sleep. We had to take shifts on the couch and the rest of us who were unlucky enough to get the floor, were awakened every morning by the dogs slobbering on us as we tried to sleep. It was disgusting and I couldn’t wait to get the hell out of there.
I knew she wouldn’t rat me out to my parents if I called, she was a terrible mother to her own daughter so she probably didn’t care about me either.
We made it into Boston as night fell and pulled into the back parking lot of a dive called Players. I later out found it was a sports bar but a lot of bikers hung out there too. It was a weird combination. Jocks at one end watching football and bikers on the other shooting pool.
I helped them unload their stuff which didn’t take long since there wasn’t much of it. They were “headlining” a two band session and the other band was doing a sound check as we walked in.
Their show started at 10:00 which gave them time to get ready and do their hair and makeup. We were all led to a small dressing room off to the left that looked like something out of a theatre. Nothing fancy but there were a lot of mirrors and some lights that weren’t burnt out.
Cindy just kind of hung back as the guys got ready. In about an hour, they had transformed from a bunch of guys in torn jeans to guys who wore more makeup then I did. The place stunk like hair spray and testosterone. Another weird combination.
At their set, Cindy and I went up to the bar. No one bothered to check our ID’s, good thing too since I didn’t have one and I doubted she did either. We were with the band and it was all good.
They were actually really good and it turned me on to see Tim/Flash sing and play guitar at the same time. Like at my first concert, I watched his fingers caress the strings of his guitar and tickle them at just the right moment. His full pouty lips almost kissing the microphone as he sang.
Oh yeah, I thought, that’ll work.
When they took a break, they came over to the bar and were surrounded by women. I was almost jealous! How stupid, I thought, I didn’t even know this man and I had already put claims on him.
He put his arm around me as he drank a beer and in some dumb way, that made me feel good. He was letting these bimbos know that he was taken. Yeah, taken by a runaway hitchhiker he had only known for two hours.
After the show, they didn’t have time to remove their war paint so we packed up and headed back out to the darkness of the Chevy van. For the first time I noticed a bumper sticker on the back that read, “Don’t Laugh, Your Daughter May Be In Here!”
I also realized for the first time, I had nowhere to go. The rest of the band and Cindy lived locally but I didn’t so I just kind of stood there.
We all got back in the van, Tim drove around the neighborhood and dropped off everyone, and Cindy got out with Bing since they were shacked up together in his parent’s basement apartment.
Marco and Rich shared an apartment and Tim/Flash, lived alone.
After everyone was gone, we were alone in the van. He moved the paper and junk to the back and invited me to sit up front with him.
I smiled as I got in beside him. His hair was teased into an 80’s mess and the girl makeup and eyeliner was kind of a turn on.
He drove up to a modest little house that had an APARTMENT FOR RENT sign on the front lawn. There was a chain link fence around the house with a cracked and broken walkway leading up to the front.
“I live around back,” he said as he pulled the van into the driveway disappearing into a garage. “Up there,” he said pointing upward to an apartment that sat neatly over the garage.
He explained the house belonged to an older couple who were basically pretty cool and when he told them he was leaving for LA next month, they began to advertise for a new tenant.
We got out of the van and made our way up the stairway. Opening the door, the scent of incense filled my nostrils.
“Whew, I have to air this place out. Been gone for about a week,” he said as he cracked the window over a couch.
“Well, here it is. It’s not much but it’s home for now and hopefully it’s on to bigger and better things.”
It was a nice place, better than I had imagined considering the condition of the van.
He opened the fridge and offered me a beer which I declined. He then sat on the couch and lit up a bowl.
He patted the cushion next to him and offered me a seat which I did not decline.
There he was in full hair band costume…ripped leather, five-inch boots and more makeup than your aunt Sally would wear to a church picnic.
“So, what did you think of the show tonight?” He asked as he took a drag from the joint before handing it to me.
I took a toke and coughed, “Good, good, I thought you guys were really great.”
“We’re getting there,” he coughed. “Marco is talking some shit about joining the Marines and we are trying to talk him out of it. His parents are so far up his ass about it though. But a bassist is a bassist and they are a dime a dozen if he leaves.”
We finished the joint and he leaned in to kiss me. His pink lips gently touched mine and then his tongue emerged ever so softly and found its way to mine. Soft, passionate and seductive, it was the best kiss I had ever had.
I had never tasted lipstick before.
We kissed for a few minutes then he slowly opened his jeans and pulled out his hard cock. It was also nicer than I had imagined and as I leaned in to get a better look, I caught a musky whiff that smelled like sweat and leather.
I bent in to kiss it and he shuddered slightly. I took my right hand and gently placed it at the end of his shaft near his body and with my tongue licked one side of his cock then the other. I continued to do this for a few minutes and I could feel his shaft getting harder and harder. My tongue found its way to the tip of his penis and with little tiny strokes, licked the back of the head.
By now, he was almost fully reclined on the couch and moaning in ecstasy. I then took the cock fully into my mouth and begun to suck it slowly making sure my teeth were firmly covered by my full, waiting lips.
As I sucked, my tongue teased his cock until he could take no more and he exploded into my mouth. It tasted like pineapple.
He laid there for a few moments and I watched him as his breath came in heavy strokes. “My God!” he finally said. “Oh…my…God!”
He sat up to look at me. “I have never, ever in my life, had a blow job like that. Unreal!”
“Are you sure your name isn’t Poppy Blow?” he laughed. “Man! That wiped me out!”
“Hey that’s a cool name for you?”
“What?” I asked sarcastically.
“Poppy Blow?” He was still high and a bit drunk.
“That is so stupid!” I laughed.
“Well how about Poppy Blew cause you sure blew my mind!”
Hmm…my real name was Poppy Bishop but this new name had a ring to it but I didn’t like the way Blew was spelled. So I changed it to Bleu and that was it. I was now going to be known as Poppy Bleu.
He got up, went into the bathroom, and wiped himself off. I just sat there hoping he would not wash off the costume, not yet. I wanted to get off too but I didn’t know his method of operation after a blowjob, h
aving just met the guy a few hours ago. I didn’t know if he was going to kick me out, go to bed or want to fuck.
I soon found out.
He walked out of the bathroom and down a small hallway into another room. I could see from the couch, a pale pink light come on. I also heard rock music.
“Come here,” he called out to me.
I got up and made my way back to his bedroom. It was decorated in a Middle Eastern style with a lot of scarves and incense. He lit a stick of Jasmine and I watched as the thin smoke curled its way into the Moroccan style curtains. The bed was big and lush and I wondered how it had been carried up the tiny steps out front.
Big, comfy pillows filled up the bed and he plopped himself right down in the middle.
He patted the bed as he did the couch and invited me to lay down with him.
I wanted to but wanted to freshen up a bit so I excused myself to use the bathroom. He instinctively told me where the washcloths were and after taking a whore bath in the sink, I felt clean enough to have sex.
I walked back into the room and he was lying naked on the bed. Thank God he kept his hair teased and the makeup on.
His cock was hard again and that impressed me but then again, he was only 21.
Neil Young was playing on the record player and I believe the song was “Harvest Moon.”
I took off my top and jeans and revealed to him that I do not wear underwear. I had a bag with me that contained extra jeans and tops, makeup, and that sort of thing. I called it my “never know” bag because ya just never know.
He smiled when he saw me in the nude and at 112 pounds, I felt sexy. I never had much in the boob department but as one guy told me, more than a mouthful is a waste and I was going to make sure Tim/Flash got at least that much.
I lay down on the bed next to him and we began to kiss. His hands slowly rolled their way over my naked body and I softly moaned. He reached down between my legs and I knew before he had ventured down so far that I was already wet.
Lick and a Promise-Diary of a Rock Star Groupie (Rock Star Series Book 1) Page 2
