chapter four

Riiiinnnnggg! Riiiinnngggg! My phone is calling me. Screaming at me to get off my lazy ass and answer it. With a heavy sigh that’s just what I do.
“Hello?” I ask rubbing my eye.
“Hey! Were the hell are you?!” Jeordio, with a crazy loud song playing in the background.
“What do you mean? I’m at home, asleep. Or at least I was till you…”
“We have a show to do RIGHT NOW, you know!! Get your skinny ass down here!!... Hey!.. Put that back! Get him out of here!!!!... Just hurry up!!”
Looking around, I find a suitable pair of pants and a shirt with no stains on the front of it. After a quick look in the mirror to see how bad I look, I freeze. The face in the mirror isn’t the one I had when I went to bed last night. It’s still my face; in fact, it’s how I looked when I was about seventeen or so. I stare long and hard into the mirror wondering if I’m just more drunk than I thought I was. Man, that’s really drunk. I step back from the mirror and look at the clothes I’m wearing a little more closely, too. I have on a pare of dark blue, almost black jeans and a tee with a band name on it that I haven’t listened to in years. I also don’t remember the carpet being wine red colored.
I spin around the room taking it all in at once. Then it hits me. I really am too drunk for my own good. Because this room looks like the one I use to have like ten years ago. It was just a cheap little apartment to call home. I lived in it when we were just starting to make it big. God, that’s a little sad that this is what I make my house be when I’m extremely drunk. Trying to relive the glory days? Or some shit like that.
I stumble out on to the sidewalk and into my car. Well, it looks like the car I used to have anyway. As it careens into the traffic, I wonder what show Jeordio could possibly be bitchin’ about. I don’t have even the foggiest idea of were I’m going but the car seems to know the way by heart. Almost like it’s driving me, not me driving the car.
This goes on for about a few miles. I finally come to a halt in front of a giant concert hall. There are teens honking horns and smoking and making out and drinking. The teens must be here to see Dimond Death, my alter ego. Most of their tees have my face splashed across the chest. A couple of them are dressed like me and Jeordio. Some like they just crawled out of their coffins. I think I’ll stay away from those kids. Who knows if they really do bite and if they have all their shots.
I slip very, very carefully on to the pavement. It’s mostly black out here so even if I walk near them they most likely won’t see me at all. I’ll just become a faceless shadow passing by them on my way into the building.
The minute I get inside it becomes very obvious just were I am now. I’m standing in the same exact concert hall that I performed at when I saw her! This is weird. This is really freakin weird! And I’m about to piss myself because this can’t be right at all! No way in hell!

Backstage, I’m still freaking out about this whole thing. It’s like I got a second chance! Wait! I’m not dead?! Am I?!!
Everyone around me seems to be in some kind of daze. Not a one sees me having this little episode. And I have to say that this scares me quit a bit. Do they really not care about me? Gwad!
Once we’ve all dressed and done our make-up, we stand behind the curtain. Nerves getting to me and I think the rest of them to. Cheers and praise came from the other side. Slowly, the curtain rose up into the black, night sky. I swallowed the lump that had stopped me from telling the others that I think I might be to drunk or whatever I am right now to go on stag and do anything but stand there like an idiot. That might not be a bad idea. And that’s when I realize I’m face to face with these insanely huge flood lights. No. Those aren’t flood lights or strange lights. What I’m staring into is just normal, old neo stage lights. You know, almost like the ones you find in the public bathrooms. With that though, I start to hope and pray that I’m not passed out on some random bathroom floor.
I blink like forty million times. Now I can see where I really am. I passed out in bed with the lights on. Sighing, I turn in bed to check the time and date. Three fifty, the next day. I can feel all my muscles finally relaxing. That’s about when I see it. I wasn’t looking for a letter, so I didn’t notice it at first. But there it is. A plain white envelope with my name printed in the middle and an unrecognizable name scribbled in the top. Something about the name and writing keeps me in the same position on the bed.
Pick it up already! The voice in the back of my head is shouting at me to read the letter instead of just staring at it. So, that’s just what I do. My hands are shacking. I can’t swallow, let alone breathe.
Trembling, now, I grab the letter and tear it open. Inside is a folded piece of lined notebook paper and five little cards. I pull out the first card and turn it over in my hands. It’s my face on the front and my name, birthday, and static. What a weird feeling it is to hold a fan made card of yourself.
The card is really good. I’ve never seen someone draw like this before. That’s probably what I like most about them. I dump the others out and flip throw them. It’s the rest of my band; Jeordio, Geff, Chris, and Ax. This is insanely cool. Once I’ve given them all a good look-see, I turn all my attention on the letter. Carefully, I unfold it and begin to read:
Dear Mr. Dimond Death,
Please let me start by saying just how much I lov big a fan I am of all your work. Your music inspires many of my own songs. They have also inspired many of my own paintings.
I’m writing to you because I would like to ask you to come to my art school and talk to my classmates and I about your music and art and how you feel it affects others. I also think that you would like this school. It’s a program for high school students in L*****n. I hope that you can and will come. Please write back soon.
Sincerely,
Belladonna Thorn


I held the letter in my hands for a few more minutes. Then I looked back at the cards. This kid really wanted me to come. Wow. This is pretty cool. Didn’t know I still had any fans like this. I’d figured that most of them had grown up by now and stopped listening to my music. I survived the room and spotted my phone laying on the TV across the room from me.
I slowly pulled myself off the bed and over to the phone to call Jeordio to get his opinion on this matter. After all, he is still my closest friend.
As I reached for the phone, I slipped my foot under a cord in front of me. Trying to move over to the TV again, only made me fall. I landed on the remote and the TV clicked on.
“In today’s news, we have with us a young girl who just topped the charts in both goth music, pop, and metal alike. So, please give a warm welcome to miss Belladonna Thorn!”
I sat blot up right. Belladonna Thorn. Just like on the letter. It had to be the same girl. Or maybe I just didn’t hear that name right.