Work Text:
Sure, his boss was well meaning or whatever but Neil was starting to suspect that Abby had some ulterior motive for sending him backstage to attend to the headlining band for the night.
Neil didn’t mind, not really. He like being behind the bar; he was comfortable there. And although serving drinks backstage broke the monotony of serving drinks at the club’s bar, it was kind of unfair how it was almost always Neil hauling drinks backstage when there were waiters hired specifically to do that. Neil’s job was serving drinks behind the bar, had been for the past year, but Abby never seemed to remember that whenever she sent Neil off with whatever ungodly concoctions had been requested.
He looked down at the sheet of paper she had given him earlier, a small smile creeping unbidden to his face. It seemed his favourite customers were back in town. Neil set about mixing drinks, pouring vodka shots, collecting dust packets from Marissa and stashing them in the small apron he wore as the other bartenders bustled around him. The club music wasn’t at maximum volume as yet, it was only ten PM on a Thursday, but the atmosphere was electric in anticipation of the night’s show. Abby hadn’t told him who was performing tonight but Neil could guess by the drinks order alone.
Once all the drinks were mixed and the shots were poured, Neil grabbed a glean glass and a bottle of Johnnie Walker off the top shelf, placed it on his tray, and made his way backstage.
It would have been quicker to just skirt the edges of the dance floor to get to the door near the stage but Neil wasn’t in the mood to get groped tonight. Instead he exited through the breakroom behind the bar, took the stairs up a floor, navigated the corridors and to get to the stairs on the on the other side of the building then took the stairs down to the club’s basement level again. The backstage area turned green room was just down the passageway on his right.
Neil knocked on the door.
“Neil!” came Nicky’s ecstatic squeal when the door opened. Neil wasn’t sure whether the bassist was excited to see him or the tray of alcohol but Neil grinned anyway as he grabbed the bottle of whiskey and the glass before placing the tray in Nicky’s waiting hands.
“Come on in.” Nicky pointed Neil vaguely in the direction of where Andrew was as he took the tray towards his other bandmates. “He’s over there.”
Neil found Andrew sitting on the sound equipment cases stacked against a wall close to where the extractor fans where, cigarette in hand. It wasn’t unusual to find Andrew in odd places like that (and wonder how he had even climbed up there) and Neil had long ago given up being surprised. Abby would complain later about the smell of cigarettes that lingered in the room of course, but Neil made no comment. It wasn’t like Andrew would spontaneously start listening to her chiding, anyway.
“Why are you all the way up there?” he called out as he approached.
“He likes to feel tall,” Aaron snickered as he, Kevin and Nicky began inhaling their drinks. Andrew flipped him off.
“You got what I asked for, Rabbit?”
Neil rolled his eyes but dug into his apron to pull out the cracker dust packets. He held up the glass and the bottle of Johnnie Walker Black Label in the other hand.
“I didn’t ask for the Johnnie Walker.”
“Yeah but I brought it anyway. Should I take it back?” Neil smirked at the annoyed glare on Andrew’s usually impassive face, which only deepened the look. “Really though,” Neil said, softer than intended, “if you don’t want the Johnnie, I can get you something else”
Andrew eyed the alcohol and the dust, and then nodded. “Give the rest to them but leave me one. Put the booze down there.” Smug, Neil left the bottle and glass on the floor where he’d been standing and walked over to the rest of the band.
Nicky cheered (and Kevin sneered) when Neil dropped the packets on their already half empty tray. Aaron was the first to grab a packet but was closely followed by both Nicky and Kevin. Neil scoffed at that.
“So, how’s our favourite bartender?” asked Nicky brightly, trying to ruffle Neil’s overlong hair, which led to a short scuffle. Neil twisted out of his grasp with a laugh and tried to rearrange his hair but he probably failed, judging by the impassive stare Andrew trained on him all the way from where he lounged on the floor where he had left the alcohol. (In the back of his mind, Neil wondered how Andrew had climbed off the big equipment cases, but stashed that thought away with the rest of his Andrew related musings.) Oh, well. Neil’s hair was too short to tie in a way that didn’t look ridiculous but too long and wavy to stay put whenever he did deign to style or attempt to make it behave.
“I’m fine,” he replied to Nicky.
Kevin snorted. “Sure.”
Neil decided to ignore that comment. It was too early to rip Kevin a new one, he told himself. He’d wait until after the band’s set, or until idiot was too drunk to do more than gape at him.
“So, are you guys back now or what?” Neil asked when most of the drinks were done and he was putting empty glasses back on his tray.
Columbia House had been on tour with another one of Palmetto Record’s big-name bands, All Or Nothing, as far as Neil knew but Matt (AON’s lead guitarist) had already been to the club over a week ago already. Neil wouldn’t say he had missed the band members of Columbia House but the club hadn’t been the same without them demanding drinks from him every other night. Or, rather, one band member in particular. Neil shoved that thought away as well.
Kevin tried to lecture him into re-joining the music scene and Nicky interrupted him by rambling on about all the places that they’d played in during their tour and a particularly hot German that he’d met in Amsterdam. Neil only half listened as he watched them drink and take their cracker dust. Nicky offered him some of their drinks and he declined and when all the alcohol was gone except for the drinks they would take with them to the stage, Neil took his tray of empty glasses back and waved them goodbye.
“Neil.”
Neil paused at the door and looked to where Andrew was still sitting on the floor with his back against the wall. He held his glass up. The bottle of whiskey next to him looked like he had barely taken a few sips from it. Neil frowned at that as he made his way back to Andrew. He knew for a fact that Andrew could match the taller Kevin Day, drink for drink, and come out on top so it was strange to see the bottle almost untouched. The cracker packet had disappeared altogether; it was not lying empty and discarded next to him.
“Do my eyes deceive me or do I spy a sober Minyard?”
“That’s not how that game works, idiot. And you’ll spy a knife in your eye if you don’t quit it.”
“I’d like to see you try, you tiny asshole,” Neil grinned.
“You think you could take me?”
“As tiny as you are? I know I could.” Neil knew for a fact that he couldn’t, had watched Andrew take out a guy twice his size in an all-out brawl. But Neil had always been an instigator at heart, and that did in no way stop him from running his mouth.
“So eager to die, this one,” Andrew muttered, as if to himself.
“I’m not the one looking for an excuse to fight. I get off at one, if you’re really itching for it”
Andrew stared at him so long, Neil wondered what he’d said to stump the unflappable Andrew Minyard.
Eventually, and with a greatly put-upon sigh, “Go away, Rabbit.”
“I’ll see you later then, asshole.”
Neil left the makeshift green room with a smile on his face and took the long way back to the bar.
***
He expected the set to be loud, chaotic and fast-paced as it always was but Neil couldn’t help but stare at how good Columbia House sounded when they got on stage. Nicky was bubbly and energetic as always as he danced and spoke to the crowd and Kevin and Aaron absolutely killed it on the guitar and drums respectively. But Neil was blown away by Andrew’s performance.
Andrew hated performing, Neil knew. He’d once said it was like cutting yourself open and letting people look inside of you. And for a person as private and irritable as Andrew, it must have been a nightmare. For as long as Neil had been serving the acts that headlined in The Foxhole, Neil knew that Andrew was never sober when he performed. There was always something in his system to numb the feeling of people walking around his mind and listening to the things they found there.
But tonight, Neil couldn’t help but stop and stare as Andrew sang. They were playing some of Neil’s favourites (and a few he hadn’t heard live before) and while Neil always felt uncomfortable listening to Andrew sing, he couldn’t make himself drown out the sound of Columbia House’s music. They were raw, unapologetic and so, so talented . Their music, their lyrics always managed to make something in his chest ache when Andrew sang them. To Neil, it was like he had been flayed open and put on display along with Andrew on that stage. Neil would never admit to anyone just how much he wished he were on that stage with them.
He’d always known that they could perform like this but it was insanely gratifying to actually hear and watch them do it. He couldn’t deny that a month and a half of touring and practices had done them a whole lot of good. Not to mention the fact that Andrew was probably sober and putting more effort into this performance than Neil had ever seen him do.
Neil only managed to catch his breath in the lull between songs.
“Give it up for Andrew, everyone!” Nicky cheered into him mic when they were three quarters of the way through their set. Andrew and Kevin were talking about something while they sipped at the plastic cups of alcohol Neil had left for them on the stage just before the band had started their set. Kevin nodded, with a slightly concerned frown, at the end of their short conversation. Aaron was repositioning one of his cymbals before Andrew went over to him too. Their conversation was much shorter and Andrew left Aaron with an incredulous scowl. When Nicky was done chatting with the audience, Andrew went over to him too, covering Nicky’s mic as he spoke to Nicky. Nicky was ecstatic when Andrew moved back to his place at the centre of the stage.
“Well ladies and all you sexy gentlemen, have I got a surprise for you,” Nicky began as he adjusted the strap of his bass guitar. Aaron was rolling his eyes at Nicky and Kevin was fiddling with his mixer. “So, we’ve been working on some new stuff for our upcoming EP and an album we’ll record soon and Andrew just told me we get to perform one of our newest songs for you. And you guys get to hear it first! Andrew wrote it while we were on tour and I think you guys are gonna love it. This one is from the EP and it’s called, ‘ You Know Me Too Well ’.”
The crowd cheered.
The was no preamble to the song, with Kevin and Aaron starting and Andrew immediately following with his voice tumbling over the backing of the drums and electric guitar.
Summer was long
And it's suffocating when you're alone
I gave you a call
Baby, I could come by, help forget it all
The song was laid-back as it began, no overly complicated riffs or beats, Neil noted. It highlighted Andrew voice, concentrated the focus on his words instead unlike some of their other songs. Andrew had his hands clenched around the microphone and his eyes focused on something, or nothing at all, in the middle distance. Neil felt apprehension bubbling in his chest. It wasn’t often Andrew left himself so vulnerable to the people watching him.
'Cause in this sticky weather, oh, it's really hard to sleep
As you know all too well
And when we get together, oh, you make me feel so cheap
But I can't help myself
The audience slowly bopped to the beat with drinks in hand but Neil was unable to do anything more than stare up at the stage, watching Andrew subtly sway to the music.
Filthy impetuous soul
I wanna give it to you
Oh, just to see what you’d do
'Cause I'm so drunk on you
Baby, you're all that I want
I want you all to myself
Oh, but you know me too well
Neil almost stopped breathing altogether when the chorus came in.
Andrew is sober , his thoughts repeated to him. Andrew was sober and singing those words. Andrew was letting himself want, letting himself feel and Neil was not sure how to react to that. On one hand, he had been waiting for months for this, waited for Andrew to finally acknowledge that music was more than just a way to pass the time, to keep his family close to him. That it actually meant something. On the other hand, Neil wanted to rush to the stage, cover him up with his own body if he had to and make sure no one else got even a piece of Andrew that Andrew wasn’t willing to give.
I left in the night
'Cause you don't like to see me in the daylight
And maybe you're right
We don't get on so well, when we [ride] the high
And lovers on the subway, they put on a show for me
But I just fell in lust
'Cause every lover's story always ends in tragedy
If you wait long enough
Neil was frowning when the second verse began. Who was Andrew singing about? Neil knew that Andrew’s lyrics were often more honest than he would like people to believe and that every song was rooted in some part of his life experiences. Even the songs he wrote with Kevin had multiple layers of meaning no matter how superficial the words seemed on paper. So, Neil had to wonder, what part of Andrew’s life were these lyrics coming from?
The chorus came back with both Kevin and Nicky singing back up. The instrumental that followed was Kevin’s guitar solo and Nicky fingering through the bass and Aaron keeping everyone in line with the tempo he set. Andrew was still at the mic but his eyes were on the crowd. No, not the crowd, Neil realised. The bar. Him.
Forgive me 'cause [I – I can’t] forget
[You] got [your] own two hands clenched around [your] neck
Oh , Neil thought.
He remembered a rooftop, Andrew, cigarettes stubs scattered in front of him and Neil with his hands held tight to himself, Andrew’s breath ghosting over his face. The words ‘ I won’t let you let me be ’ floating like cigarette smoke above them.
Oh , Neil thought. And then: Oh…
Andrew closed his eyes.
Filthy impetuous soul
I wanna give it to you
Just to see what you’d do
'Cause I'm so drunk on you
Baby, you're all that I want
I want you all to myself
Oh, but you know me too well
And suddenly, the world was unsteady beneath his feet and the lyrics were all too clear to him and Neil was wondering what the hell was happening. He wanted to hear the song again, wanted to analyse every lyric, pick up the pieces that he’d missed. Find some kind of answer that made sense.
The words dug themselves into his skin, tugged at his attention but Neil could only focus Andrew’s white-knuckled grip on the microphone. Because this was too much to hope for, too much to want. Too much. He wasn’t prepared for this. Neil felt light-headed as Andrew sang the outro.
Oh, but you know me too well
Oh, but you know me too well
Oh, but you know me too well, well, well
And then the song ended and the band moved on and without Neil knowing how it happened, the show was over and a DJ was in the sound booth, heavy electronic music shaking the walls. The bar was flooded with people demanding drinks and only then did Neil shake himself out of his stupor.
Andrew…
Andrew didn’t come to bother him at the bar and he didn’t come to find Neil at the end of his shift. Neil caught glimpses of Nicky on the dance floor during the night and Aaron sometimes appeared at the bar to get more drinks but neither Kevin nor Andrew were anywhere to be found. Kevin was most likely somewhere upstairs going over the sound recordings that Abby usually made for them. And Neil thought he had an idea of where Andrew might have gone but he was afraid that Andrew wouldn’t welcome his intrusion. Andrew hadn’t come to see Neil, even to annoy him. He probably didn’t want to see him after he had watched a sober Andrew unfurl his soul in front of an audience.
Neil tried to ignore his disappointment. Well. If Andrew wasn’t going to come to him, he was going to have to go to Andrew.
He was on the rooftop, smoking on the ledge with one leg dangling over the edge and an arm resting on the knee of the other. Neil sat near him, far enough away for Andrew’s comfort but near enough for Neil’s presence to be unmistakable.
For Andrew not to even call out his staring, was telling.
“Can I have one?” Neil eventually asked when it was clear Andrew wasn’t going to offer
“Get your own.”
“But I want one of yours.”
Andrew glared at him. “Why?”
It was such a loaded question. Neil could only imagine what Andrew meant by it. Why do you tolerate me? Why you? Why are you here when you could be anywhere else?
Neil didn’t know the answers to those but he suspected that if he thought about it long enough, the answer would be glaring him in the face. So, he answered. “Yours taste better.”
Andrew didn’t say anything to that. Instead, he dug his pack out of his pocket and placed it between them along with his lighter.
“So, you wrote a song for me,” Neil ventured once he had the cigarette lit and burning steadily in his cupped hands.
“I have been for the past six months,” came Andrew’s sarcastic reply. “Took you long enough…” he mumbled, not quite under his breath as he looked out over the city skyline.
Neil’s world was tilting on its axis. “Six months...” That must mean – “when you got out of Easthaven–”
Andrew rolled his eyes even as the fingers that held his cigarette shook. “Idiot.”
“I have been told that I can be a little oblivious,” was all Neil could think to say.
Six months. Neil tried to think of all the songs Andrew had played for him in all the time they’d spent in studios, record shops and rooftops, here at the Foxhole and at Palmetto Records down the road. There were too many that came to mind and he wasn’t even sure when half of them were written. They couldn’t all be about him. Andrew would never–
“A little?”
“Hey, it’s not my fault I don't know anything about… this stuff.”
“You know nothing, Jon Snow.”
“I don’t even know who that is.”
“Figures I'd be stuck with a dumbass,” Andrew grumbled with a shake of his head. Neil wasn't sure he was supposed to hear that. Andrew took another drag from his cigarette. "Forget it. It's nothing"
Neil looked out over the rooftop, watching the lights of the city around them flicker and dance. It was a hot late-summer night and the air felt thick in his lungs but, he thought, it was by far better than the thick goop the air became down in the club. This air felt fresh, as clean as it could be in the city. Neil smiled even as he felt Andrew’s eyes boring into the side of his head.
“Staring,” Neil said, using Andrew’s words against him.
“Don’t think I would hesitate throwing you off this roof.”
Neil peered over the side of the building. “You say that like I wouldn't drag you down with me.”
Andrew looked like he was praying for patience from a god he didn’t even believe in. “I hate you so much.” He didn’t let Neil reply. Instead he pushed the leather jacket on the floor behind him aside, pulled out something flat and square and gave it to Neil. “Here. So you don’t bitch about it to me when it comes out next week.”
In his hands was a vinyl copy of the band’s EP to add to his growing collection. It was titled ‘What Did You Think When You Made Me This Way ’. Neil recognised the cousins’ house in Columbia on the cover. All the members of the band looked like they were over-dressed in all black and ready to take the stage instead of just milling around the front of the house like they were. The old couch in the lounge had been pulled out and dumped on the lawn, with Nicky mid-air above the cushions, jumping on it. His bass lay forgotten on the grass. Aaron was looking at him with a judgemental glare where he was setting up his drum kit in front of the garage. Kevin sat on the porch steps with his favourite electric guitar in hand as he shouted at Nicky. Above it all, Andrew sat on edge of the porch roof, legs dangling over the edge, with a wired microphone hanging from one hand and a cigarette in the other, staring blank faced into the camera. Neil smiled at that.
The titles of the EP’s songs were on the back of the cover and the lyrics were printed on a flap on the inside.
Neil skimmed the lyrics of the other songs, he’d have more time to go through them later. He read the lyrics of the song that had stopped him in his has tracks earlier. He read the them over and over.
…
'Cause every lover's story always ends in tragedy
If you wait long enough
{Bridge}
Forgive me 'cause [I – I can’t] forget
[You] got [your] own two hands clenched around [your] neck
{Chorus}
Filthy impetuous soul
I wanna give it to you
Just to see what you’d do
'Cause I'm so drunk on you
Baby, you're all that I want
I want you all to myself
Oh, but you know me too well
…
“I thought you hated me,” Neil finally breathed when he thought his voice wouldn’t betray him. He gently put his copy of the EP down a safe distance from the edge of the roof.
“I do. Every inch of you,” Andrew corrected.
“So you won’t even let yourself like me even a little bit?” Andrew said nothing. Neil bit the bullet. “I’m taking a turn. Why?”
Andrew didn’t meet his eyes for a long time. “You’re too stupid to tell me no,” he growled out, the words pulled out of him like pulling teeth with nothing but vice-grip pliers.
Neil waited, but Andrew would not be more forthcoming than that. So he had to ask. “And you don’t want me to tell you yes?”
Andrew looked angry at that, and flicking his cigarette over the roof edge as if it had personally offended him. He plucked Neil’s one from his fingers and threw it over as well for good measure. Neil struggled to suppress his shit-eating grin at that. That seemed to do nothing for Andrew’s frustration.
“Well,” Neil said, grabbing Andrew’s cigarette pack that lay between them and lighting another one, for courage. “When that changes, let me know.”
Neil left the cigarette on the edge of the rooftop for Andrew, picked up his vinyl then went back inside.