Part 45
That Night, During the Concert
Solomon fell from public sight when he was arrested for raping a girl in Metro City. He always maintained his innocence, but admitted they’d both been shooting heroin nonstop for a week, and he didn’t have the best grasp on the events. She’d been writing a book about him, and bared the scars of their encounter. The book was never published, and her name remains unreleased to the world of fans screaming for her blood. Locked up, Solomon kept to himself and endured sobriety. He avoided fights, but held his own when another inmate looked for an opportunity to beat up the guy from TV.
I’m hiding behind the bass cabinet. Even over the music I can hear the audience screaming.
Solomon sang, “The Folk that not know me yet!” He throws off his robe, revealing he wears nothing beneath but a black thong. His body has been dusted in white powder. “These are the dead, these fellows they feel not.” Solomon sees me and advances, licking his blood off the microphone. “We are not for the poor and sad.” Solomon punches himself twice in the mouth. “The lords of the earth are our family!” He almost gets a hand on me when he’s struck in the side of the head by a brown beer bottle. A chunk has broken off the bottom, but it’s largely intact. Solomon snatches it waves it above his head. “Our chosen shall rejoice, with sorrow are not of us. Hear me, ye people of sighing!”
“Woah hoa!”
“The sorrows of pain and regret are left to the dead and dying!” Solomon sets the bottle on an amplifier.
The crowd cheered, “Woah hoah!”
Solomon punches the bottle once and it explodes into his knuckles. He spins, displaying his bloody hand, spiny with shards. “Our chosen shall rejoice, with sorrow are not of us. Hear me, ye people of sighing!”
“Woah hoa!”
“The sorrows of pain and regret are left to the dead and dying!” With a jagged shard, Solomon carves the Eye of Horus in his chest, so deep that his wounds spurt and gurgle. The band slows to a breakdown jam. Solomon talks over it. “Ladies and Gentlemen, woman and children, you came here for a show!” He weakly throws his arm in the air. The audience screams. “Tonight, live on this stage, you will see a God!”
A great roar goes up from the audience. I can hear the fading sound of Solomon’s voice and the people before him whipped into bloodlust. The song returns to normal pace, and Solomon sings. “Hear me, ye people of sighing!”
“Woah hoa!”
“The sorrows of pain and regret are left to the dead and dying!”
In prison, Solomon read. Most critics thought he’d dry up and blow away upon release. As a child star, his life-inspired TV show character was a high school dropout that never read a book that wasn’t on TV. When he started writing his own music, he wanted to shock, and he wanted make noise. Solomon’s rebellion was ambiguous and without form. He raged against anyone that would strap him down. Prison finally provided an opportunity for education.
Spotlights erupt illuminating the replica of Rosyln Chapel the band emerged from. I’m grabbed by roadies from behind and shoved aside to a darkened corner. I expect execution, but only one stays long enough to wag a fat finger in my face and yell, “Stay out of sight!” I end up against a PA stack that rumbles with the drums. I’m elevated enough to see aged dowagers on shoulders flashing their tits. Old men and women in fine tux and evening gown are bumping around in the mosh pit. When will he reveal the artifact we’ve come to steal?
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