VIP Monsters
Eric and I stood out from the rest of the press crowd like crooked dull-yellow bottom teeth in an otherwise twinkling white perfect smile. We showed up as Hunter S. Thompson and Dr. Gonzo. I had a soft platinum moustache, waxed into little curls swirling up—tiny pinpricks of crashing waves, mascara dyed tips. My torso was covered by a middle school girl’s hooded sweatshirt I had cut the sleeves off of, cut down the middle, a single button sewn to barely clamp the contraption together. A flimsy bright pink shirt, a depiction of idyllic sand peppered with palm trees and garnished with a glittered butterfly and the words, “Paradise Beach.” I tore it ruthlessly so that my upper chest and stomach were exposed, pale skin glowing in hourglass shapes. I carried my spiral-bound notebook folded, crammed into my back pocket, stuck pens in like a bandolier in severed kangaroo pockets. Eric wore a ratty, off white t-shirt, holes eating away the neck-line, scrawled in permanent marker, “BACK WITH ANOTHER ONE OF THOSE BLOCK ROCKING BEATS.” A navy blue cardigan protection from the mild force of the elements complimented his shirt. He wore short shorts. He had broken his leg, drunk-falling down an embankment at another music festival a few weeks prior, and now lurched along on crutches, day-glow purple cast swinging like a stilted orangutang as he navigated the desert terrain.
Of course, we were already drunk when we checked into the press tent. We had bottles of hard alcohol and amanita mushrooms shoved into hidden folds of my backpack. I had, and still have, an amazing backpack. We were prepared for journalism. I showed them my ID and they gave us the corresponding sticker badges for the magazine I was on assignment for. Eric was along for the ride. His girlfriend Jessica was with us too. He got a free ticket, and I got two good friends and a ride across Washington. I had a list noting the bands I was supposed to cover, a planned navigation between stages and show times.
This was the Sasquatch Music Festival in the glorious year of our Good Lord and Savior, 2008. Over 20,000 people exodus to the cragged plains of eastern Washington State to create a tent refugee camp and lay another annual layer of filth on the sprawling, dying acres of earth that suffered us, its visitors.
Amanita mushrooms. You have to choke them down. A taste of feet that have lived in boots stomping swamps for years without socks. Wet feet. This wouldn’t be so bad if you didn’t have to chew them so relentlessly. To simulate this element of toughness, try a piece of uncooked steak, see how long it takes to swallow it. Just like eating raw steak, likely amanitas will make you puke.
We wandered. My notes were spastic and practically illegible. We drank. Heavily. Friday was lost in a terrible blur. The only clear moment I retain from the festival that day was not being able to stand, gravity intensified. I was on a star. Planted on my back. Beautiful noise was drifting all around. I struggled to turn my head. Gravity had the upper hand. I saw Jess sitting with a concerned look on her face. Concern mixed with mild amusement, whilst staring at her monster boyfriend, pinned, like me, under the gravity of the star. Eric groaned, turned his head facing me and a gelatinous grey slug oozed from the side of his mouth. It continued oozing, Eric was expelling all evil from his body. I was confused as to how it was so thick, but tried not to dwell on it. His eyes were closed. Jess managed to resurrect us.
Back at camp, we were more or less recovered when a scraggly looking dude wandered through, asking if we wanted acid. What a stupid question. Of course I wanted acid. Skeptical though. Unlike mushrooms, where you can physically see what you are getting, identify the species—whatever—acid is based on trust.
However, placing your trust in some random dude walking around selling invisible drugs is a debatable topic. Trust is an interesting little factor in the world of drugs. Acid, too, does not grow out of the ground, it is made by fucking weirdos in bathtubs with questionable ingredients. After that it’s put into little vials and discreetly distributed to other characters of questionable integrity. These people drop little dribbles onto consumable bits of whatever. Sugar cubes, paper, crackers, candy, anything that can absorb a drop of liquid. Once you’ve been ripped off, you learn to be careful.
I inform Mr. Scraggly of my skepticism. I propose a deal. He gives me two hits, and if it does the trick I will pay him double. He can come by the camp the next day. He agrees. He never comes by the camp.
So, wait a second. Flash forward. Two years later, I walk into a room saturated with ashes, stink scent of vice. I am buying a couple hundred dollars worth of Ecstasy. As I sit down on the repulsive couch—various sticky spots, questionable origin, spattered—this guy holding a bong in his hands points at me.
“Dude. You owe me twenty bucks.”
I’ve never seen him before.
“What? Who are you?”
“I sold you acid two years ago at Sasquatch.”
“No. Fucking. Way.”
I then go on to explain to him that if he hadn’t sold me that acid I wouldn’t be sitting on the disgusting couch buying a large quantity of a horrible drug in Olympia, WA, the worst place ever. I was very excited to tell him the story.
So let me explain. The giggly onset began to kick in, accompanied by the nervousness of mixed pleasure and fear for what was to come. I squashed this nervousness with vodka and beer. Our tent neighbors were feeding us alcohol like candy to kids on Halloween, pellets to goats at a petting zoo. They were entertained by our antics—our weird. Eric and Jessica partook heavily. Words slurred, “real-life” blurred, we felt the need to explore.
Night fell over the sprawling tent metropolis, and paths were mixed haphazardly with no grid or apparent destination or direction. There are no landmarks here. Every scene is the same. Walk long enough and it repeats indefinitely. Eric and Jess call out to me, when I veered off the path suddenly. Looped images. I ignore them completely. My mind is lost. Smatterings of conversations merge and collide with each other, as I stumble drunk tripping through campsites.
“Did you see…?”
“That girl was so fucking…”
“I don’t think I will be able to fall asleep…”
Somehow, someone calls my name out.
It’s a dude I know from school. He does music stuff too. Bird themed.
He invites me to his camp party for drinks. I felt like I kept it cool. Faces were blurring and distorted and sounds were coming from every direction, but I smiled and laughed at things they said—because they are funny or because everything was. I am enjoying myself, but I have no idea where I am. I recognize some faces though. I talk at these faces and listen to them. I smile the whole time.
I was wearing my suit jacket. I love them and will always. So many pockets, pockets of possibility. These pockets are mostly stuffed with beer. I am bulging random elephantitus. I hallucinate quietly, socializing, drinking, proposing ideas, promises, whatever can make my mouth move. I forgot to pee for a second though, felt a smart spurt of urine launch. I touched my pants, damp, noticed a little ring of darker colored jeans. Without saying anything to the lovely nice people I was barely holding reality to socialize with, I departed the scene, embarrassed, walked with no direction.
I became lost in the sprawling tent wasteland. I watched patches of landscape lurch and bubble up into the sky, stars shot from the ground into the atmosphere with flowing comet tails until they locked into their predetermined place, faces passed blurred and contorted, I recognized them as people that I knew, but I knew it wasn’t them. LSD is full of controllable trickery, depending on the dose. The wet spot on my jeans faded. I was reasonably comfortable again, still reeling with visual impossibilities, walking without directions or destinations. Completely and utterly lost. I was smiling though, breathing heavily, astounded by the way the world moved around me.
I knew, but was too fucked up to care, my twisted perception, flighty mind, and general cluelessness of geographical positioning, that it was very unlikely that I would find my campsite. So I just pushed on, thrilled by the cacophony of sounds merging and flexing and whirling around me. I was in a vacuum. Sounds sucked and whirred, from what direction I was unable to tell.
So I kept walking, beginning to tire, gulping slurps of beer from my clasped hand whenever I had moments that I realized it was still there. Warm, my sweat slick pulsating liquid blanket, the temperature of the cheap beer felt near boiling. I didn’t care. I was thirsty and didn’t have any water anyways. My jacket was becoming lighter.
Step, step, stop, stare. Repeat. Remember to breathe. Keep walking.
There it was though. A little glow. An aura that whispered of comfort. One of those loud whispers that anyone could have heard. A little glowing patch, emanating a subtle sphere of sanctuary. My legs were tired. I saw a beautiful young lady, sitting cross legged on a towel right off to the side of the path. She glowed a white-gold light, vibrating inches into the air around her. I thought it might be a sign.
“Excuse me, I know this will probably sound weird, but could I sit next to you for a minute? My name is Evan.”
Her name was Emma. She glowed, radiant, her teeth shaped and sized with such perfection that it was clear even gods did not possess the skill to create such wonder. We traded words, stories, I told her how high I was on LSD and how everything I could see was moving in impossible ways.
“Well, you are acting pretty normal.”
“I never do that, perhaps it’s because I am fucked up.”
She excused herself to go get a toothbrush, I watched the world move, she returned, our mouths pointed words and sentences at each other. I knew that it might be the acid but I told her anyways, “Emma, I really think we are meant to be friends, I would like to get to know you.”
She told me she lived in Reno, Nevada and would be moving to Olympia, WA to begin going to the Evergreen State College. We made scattered plans to meet up the next day. Emma let me know she was going to sleep. Our mouths pointed smiles at each other, I got up, left, walked.
Black out.
I awoke in the backseat of an unfamiliar vehicle. I didn’t remember how I had got there. Perhaps a kind Samaritan placed me there, perhaps I broke in. I was uncomfortable. I pushed myself up, again feeling the gravity possessed by stars. The discomfort was because I was sleeping on three tall boys of PBR , holding each other in solidarity. They were employing the wildebeast technique, binding closely together in order to dissuade predators from picking them off individually. I had seen nature shows however, I was not tricked. I snapped one off and pocketed it, exited from what appeared to be a suburban. I fled the scene.
In the daytime I was able to locate our campsite. Eric and Jess were already up, lounging, making coffee. I drank the beer that I stole. They inquired about my night, I told them it was fucked up, met a pretty girl and probably broke into someone’s car. Our neighbors, again pleased by our antics, coerced us over to their little umbrella oasis. They fed us beers and we inhaled them. We are petting zoo goats. Pretty, pretty fucked up goats. We played Apples To Apples, I wrote AIDS BLOOD on one of the blank cards. I kept checking the time, noting the bands I was missing. Downing beers. I didn’t care. Eventually, I summoned the motivation via obligation to my editor to make the walk to the music.
On the way, Eric and I remained fairly fucked up, either from the night before or because of our morning consumption. Again, backpacks laden with booze. We discussed important topics.
“I don’t know how I feel about having to wash my hands after I take a piss,” Eric said, “If I don’t piss on my hands, why should I have to bother?”
“Well, I think really that is a fundamental question about how dirty your cock is. If your dick is dirty, you should probably wash that first. After that, I don’t think it is important if you wash your hands after you piss.”
The festival goers behind us sort of chuckled, snickered, like they always wash their hands after they pissed. Yeah right.
Eric spun around on his cast, his pointed finger a crossbow leveled at the haters, “Don’t you act like you don’t know exactly what we are talking about and that you don’t do it yourself.” He spun back around. They remained mostly silent, all conversation was in hushed tones. You don’t fuck with people who look like this.
When we approached the press tent, I had my ID in hand, ready to assert my journalistic credentials. The man had an envelope in hand—mine.
“How did you know this one was for me?”
His eyes narrowed, parental disappointment, and spokes dryly, “Let’s just say you two made quite an impression yesterday. Let’s try to behave ourselves today, okay ladies?”
We walked away in shame. What did we do yesterday? Enough to get remembered by a man handing out dozens of VIP passes, apparently. I steeled myself, try to harden my mind that remained as viscous as watered down syrup. Today I would get the material I needed for my article. I did. Successfully.
I wrote words about sounds. I tried to translate noise to words. I felt really good about it. When I swung by the press trailers, I stumbled into a room where an interview was happening. I ignored it, cracked a free soda and began pouring vodka into a lemony beverage. A professional looking woman approached me, “ Excuse me sir. You can’t spike your beverage in the press trailers.”
The dude getting interviewed laughed, briefly, asthmatic hyena sound. I looked at him, still drunk, recognized him, he played the eccentric dorky dude on “The Office”. Dwight, right. I stared for a second before the kind lady escorted me out. The guy from the press tent was sitting at a picnic table bench thing. I sat near him to have a smoke. He rolled his eyes at me, “It’s you.”
“Yep, it’s me.”
He passed me a loaded bowl under the table. It smelled like some potent weed. I partook, exhaled blue smoke, a familiar fogginess came over me. I figured we were on okay terms. Everyone else here was so professional looking, I only brought one pair of clothes. Rollingstone, Spin, all those dudes dressed like factory manikins and I looked like a piece of street trash. I reveled in this difference and told myself my article would be better than theirs.
Emma was not at the noodle stand, I was terribly disappointed. I decided I would call her later. The day evaporated. I briefly saw Lisa, an old flame, with her new guy. Conversation was brief, I just told her I was fucked up. She rolled her eyes at Eric and I before departing. I seemed to be getting a lot of eye rolls at that point. I shrugged it off.
My favorite band of the last decade was about to play, Modest Mouse. I couldn’t bring myself to see them. It’s hard to explain. I walked out of the bottleneck entryway as sweaty youths pushed through frantically. On the path back I noticed a barely post-adolescent boy crying.
“What’s wrong?” I said, speaking, but not actually knowing if I cared.
“My, my my my my favorite band, mod mod mod mod modest, mouse is about to play, but I cant get in!” Youngster made choking crying noise, I felt bad for him. He loves the band that I love.
“Kid.”
“What?” He barely said this. I could have mistaken those words as a tire being punctured by a nail. His eyelids were bee stings plunged into barrels for apple bobbing.
I tore off my VIP sticker. I pressed it into his chest.
“ Go see your favorite band.”
As if he felt it might be a trick, an illusion, he gave no thanks but instead dodged past me towards the entry gates. I felt really good about myself. I listen to Modest Mouse bouncing off the hillsides sitting on the top of Eric’s car, sipping on beer. I was lonely and content with it.
When night fell, my notebook was bulging with notes. I clutched them to my body, swaddled them in my backpack. I will write a good article, I told myself. I returned to camp, extremely happy with my pregnant spiral-bound. Eric, Jess, and I drank with the neighbors. I called Emma. She responded. We made plans to meet up. I swerved over to our meeting place, almost passed the fat man selling “DOLLAR BEERS”, and filled my pockets. Suit jacket, I love your pocket possibilities.
Emma appeared, still glowing, even without the residual ambience of LSD coursing through my body. I felt nervous, still drunk, so with that balance reasonably comfortable. We walked around, talking about the big nothings, family, school, ambitions, whatever. We talked about Washington, how she was moving to Olympia. We started holding hands. I drank, she told me that she doesn’t. There was a brief and awkward pause before she told me, “I think you should know that I was born in 1991.”
Quick calculation, baffled by booze, answer came around eventually. This means she was 16 years old. I was 23 years old. Christ. I shrugged anyways, “That doesn’t bother me, I don’t think I can get in trouble for holding hands, Emma”.
I thought of the year 1991 again when we were in the back of Eric’s car, steaming up windows. Kissing with ferocity. Pulling her shirt over her head, delicately kissing, mouthing nipples, grasping breasts.
1991.
I decided, or made no decision at all, I didn’t care. I was lonely. When have I cared what was or wasn’t illegal? We kissed and touched enthusiastically for quite some time before noticing movement outside of the car. Emma returned to her shirt and bra instantly. We cracked out of the opposing non-tent side and fumbled for our props, found beer of course.
There were brief introductions. Eric and Jess seemed bored by her presence. Jess eyed me with a look that SCREAMED, “She Is TOOOO YOUNG!”
I ignored those glances. Emma said that she needed to walk back to her camp. I walked her back, leaving a mental bread-crumb trail. We kissed when we part ways, she said that her boyfriend would not be happy about this, but she plans on ending it with him soon. We exchanged contact information. We said we would stay on touch. I was unaware at this time that our lives would end up revolving around each other.
In the tent, or maybe in the car, I slept happily. Content. I kissed a pretty girl. As I snuggled my face into fabrics, I wondered why such an ugly fucker like myself got to kiss pretty girls. Maybe it was kisses of pity, or maybe I was just as clever as I wanted to think I was, and they liked what I said, saying clever things. I think signs point to clever, or that I play my looks down too much and might be a pretty man, like Eric.
Emma was gone. I drank heavily on Sunday, a functioning alcoholic possessed with a zealous mission of journalism. I saw and wrote about every band that I was supposed to cover. My notebook was wet with ink ejaculate. I love seeing the creases from the previous page pressed into the next one. Makes me feel progress. Something was getting done.
We drank, abused privileges, talked our way onto stages to watch bands we liked. Sasquatch 2008 ended with a grand finale. The Flaming Lips performed with their theatrics, I believe in order to compensate for their lack of talent. Eric, Jess , and I decided that it is time to leave. All of the camping nomads were crowded here to watch Wayne Coyne—lead singer—bounce around the crowd in a gigantic plastic hamster ball, a human condom.
Eric, Jess, and myself—danger trio—stormed back to our camp to collapse it into shapes that could be packed into cars. Jess shined her flashlight into her eyes; they spoke of evil, campfire horror story, before she spoke of misbehaving.
“Everyone is at the Flaming Lips show, right?” Each word dripped a tantalizing venom of risk and fun.
“So, what?” I was drunk, unable to see the foreshadowing in her tonality.
“Let’s just take what we want before we leave.” She smiled like one does at their parents, receiving a birthday present they will return or trade for drugs, cash.
We became an operation. Hearts pounding fear, embracing brutal efficiency. Jess ricocheted from campsite to campsite. She was the scout. Three sharp downward moments of flashlight shard and a sharp S noise meant it was good. This meant that we ran to that location and stole everything we could grab. This went on for a good 30 minutes until people started returning to their camps, and we returned to the car. We bathed in booze, bottled water, soda, and food stuffs as we cruised back to the green side of our state. I slept, smiling, knowing that we were beautiful monsters.
