Seize the Day

7:00 am rolled around way too soon for my taste. As I snuck out of bed and rummaged through my clothes to find my electric lime-ass green staff t-shirt, Matt woke up too. “Sorry, babe,” I whispered. “Go back to sleep, I’ll call you later, ok?” He mumbled something and was snoring again in seconds. I sent Addie a text message, hoping she was already awake and I wouldn’t have to go pound on her door. On the way to the lobby, I grabbed the largest, strongest espresso drink they could muster from the coffee bar, and plopped into one of the big comfy chairs to wait. Just then I got a reply from Addie saying she was on her way. When I heard the elevator ding, I was expecting it to be her, stumbling off in a still-asleep stupor, but was a little shocked to see Zack walking toward me.

He shot me a groggy smile. “I don’t sleep well a lot of the time. I was awake, so I figured I’d come check things out with you, help out if you need it. If you don’t mind, of course.”

“Most certainly, Zee!” I greeted him with a hug. “You can totally hang with me today. See the inner workings and whatnot. I might need some big, strong muscles to help with tables and stuff, anyway.”

“Great. But first, I’m going to need one of those.” He pointed at the coffee cup in my hand.

“Right behind ya,” I said, pointing at the coffee bar over his shoulder.

Adriana finally made it down to the lobby, with about 2 minutes to spare before we were supposed to be at the convention hall. “Damn, woman!” I teased. “Good thing we’re like 50 feet from where we need to be!”

She popped me on the back of the head. “Shut up. I need coffee.”

Zack pointed over her shoulder to where I’d sent him just a few minutes before. “Morning, sunshine,” he added.

“Yeah, yeah,” she grumbled back.

Once we made it to the convention floor, I stationed Zack at the freight entrance, directing the vendors to the table where Addie and I were handing out packets, badges, and pointing out their booths. It was hilarious when people recognized him, and made a scene. At about 10 o’clock, when we had almost half the vendors checked in and setting up, Matt called me.

“Mornin’, puddin’,” I giggled.

“Hey, babe. How’s it going?”

“Good, got about half our dealers in and unloading right now. I’ve got Zack directing traffic and showing them to booths. Said he couldn’t sleep, so he wanted to help.”

He laughed a little. “You want me to come down?”

“You’re more than welcome to, of course, but it’s not necessary. You need your beauty rest.” I tried not to laugh, but couldn’t help it.

“Very funny,” he said. “I’ll get up and around and come see you in a little bit.”

“Well, I’m certainly not going to tell you no!”

“Good. See you in a bit, gorgeous.”

Since a big part of the vendors had been checked in already, I left Addie to take care of the late-comers, and went off to find the event manager Jeff, to see what else needed to be set up. “Hey!” I called, as I spotted him at the far end of the floor, chatting with Zack. “Didn’t you have an assignment, mister?” I ruffled Zack’s hair. “Hey, Jeff, how’s it going?”

“I’m going to tell your event manager that his staff isn’t very welcoming or accommodating, if you don’t cut that out,” Zack laughed.

“Yeah, right,” I said. “What’s he going to do? Fire me? I’m a volunteer!”

“Yeah, and my best one,” Jeff said. “You’re lucky I let you move to California!”

“Right, like you could have stopped me.” We all laughed for a moment. “Anyway, what else needs to be done, Chief?”

“Actually, right now, we’re good to go.” He turned to Zack. “Do you know if your stuff is here yet?”

Zee nodded. “It’s upstairs in the rooms.”

“We can get it down here and go ahead and get you guys started setting up,” I told Zack. I turned to head toward the hotel to get the packages brought down to the convention center, when I slammed into a brick wall. Well, not exactly, but Matt had come downstairs and was standing directly behind me. “Shit!” I grinned up at him. “How long have you been standing there?”

“Too long. I didn’t think you were ever going to turn around,” he said, hugging me.

“Seriously, you guys act like it’s been longer than 5 hours since you saw each other.” Zack stuck his tongue out at me.

“Aww, don’t be jealous, Zacky!” I poked the end of his nose. Jeff was standing by laughing at us the whole time. “Matt, this is Jeff. He’s the brains of this operation. Or the lack-thereof?”

“Hey, shut it,” Jeff said. “Nice to meet you, dude.” He held out his hand to Matt, who shook it. “So, you guys looking forward to this?”

“Of course,” Matt said. “We love shit like this, meeting fans and whatever. Plus we’re all pretty big horror movie fans, so there’s that too.”

“Well, usually, I’m in a little closer contact with our guests, but since you’ve got this one with you all the time, I figured she might be able to handle it.” He pointed at me and smirked.

“Yeah, thanks for the vote of confidence, guys,” I huffed. “Whatever, Jeff, you know you couldn’t pull this shit off without me!”

“Yeah, I could, I did it for two years before you came along!” he said.

“But you couldn’t do it without me after last year.” I grinned triumphantly.

“No, probably not. You did a fuck-ton of work last year. And this year, too, even from the other side of the world.” He raised his fist.

“You know it,” I said as I hit my fist against his. “Anyway, let’s go get your stuff.” I turned to Zack and Matt. “We can get mostly set up and still have time to chill for a bit before the fun begins.” Suddenly, a realization hit me. “Fuck!” The guys all turned to look at me. “Costume ball tonight! I totally forgot!”

“There’s a costume party?” Zack said. “Sweet!”

“Yeah, but I forgot all about it, so none of us brought costumes. We’re gonna have to make a trip to HEX.” I grinned, knowing that Halloween Express would be a fun trip with this crew.

“HEX?” Matt asked.

“Halloween Express. Costume store here in town, and one of the thirty-two jobs I held down while I was here.”

“Sounds like fun,” Matt said. “Zack, go round up everyone else and we’ll go find some kickass costumes.”

We spent almost three hours in the store, trying things on, and attempting to come up with good matching costumes. What used to be my whole staff was helping us try to decide what to wear, putting together accessories and all. Luckily it was during the day, so there weren’t too many other customers. We were trying to come up with fun couples costumes, but it didn’t necessarily work out that way. The hot new costume of the year was the Travelocity gnome, so of course, we forced Johnny into wearing that. Alex talked Brian into being a scarecrow, but he only agreed when she allowed a scary mask, and when Michelle agreed to be a bloodied and gory Dorothy. Alex went with the costume she’d worn the year before and was Blind Mag from Repo: The Genetic Opera, ice blue contacts and all. Zack and Gena couldn’t settle on a couple costume. Zack wanted nothing more than to be the Headless Horseman, and Gena decided on a sexy mummy. Mike went with your basic Michael Myers. Matt and I went with basic, but grossly disfigured zombies, with the addition of a small space heater for Matt to carry around, clearly labeled “For Her Thighs.” Sure, we were going to have to explain it to a lot of people, but I was totally ok with that. Besides, there were bound to be a couple of people who got it, and that would make it all worthwhile.

After we’d picked out our costumes, accessories, makeup, and Gena and Michelle had perused the shoes, we headed back to the convention center to get their booth set up and get things going, starting with the small “red carpet” press event, announcing all of the celebrities in attendance. The boys chit-chatted with the other actors and guest while they waited in the line to be announced, photographed, and quickly interviewed. The girls and I stood very close to the entrance waiting for everyone to get through the door.

Friday was the busiest first day we’d seen for the convention. The line for the boys’ table was even longer than we’d expected, and had to be routed out the door into a hallway to keep the floor clear. Zacky sold out of VU stuff by the time we closed the doors, and had to call Lacey to break into his storage unit and have more overnighted to us.

Everyone headed back upstairs to get ready for the costume party. Avenged Sevenfold were featured guests, as they’d graciously volunteered to judge the costume contest, and we sold more tickets at the door for the party than the last three years combined. As we came back into the atrium, all decked out, the DJ, who was the same DJ as from the night before, announced us as “The Queen of Karaoke and Avenged Sevenfold.” Great, bring a little more attention on me, can ya? I sighed mentally. Alex elbowed me in the side and grinned.

We grabbed some seats at a table close to the front, and all got some drinks. A couple songs into the night, after we were pretty sure everyone who was changing had already done so, Jeff and the DJ called up people who wanted to be in the costume contest. I led the boys up front to the DJ’s table and we waited. There were all sorts of costumes -- Michael Myerses, Freddy Krugers, zombies, bloody prom queens, dead brides, several variations of Satan/the devil, including one female pin-up mechanic devil. “I’m a satanic mechanic!” she said as Brian looked her over. The Rocky Horror reference was certainly not lost on this group, and we all laughed.

The boys took their time deliberating, but eventually decided that the enormous papier-mache velociraptor had to be the winner. There was a whole lot of time and effort that went into building that costume, and it certainly showed! Besides, who doesn’t love dinosaurs? After the costume contest, it was just a huge dance party. Drinks, music, dancing, and schmoozing with other guests made it a great night. I even let everyone talk me into singing karaoke again.

After a couple of hours partying well into the night, my internal clock told me that I'd gotten far too little sleep in the last two days. While Matt and I went upstairs to scrape the blood and gore off and get to bed, Johnny, Mike, Brian, and Michelle decided to stick around and drink longer. Zack, having slept just as little as I had, followed us to the hotel, Gena in tow.

Getting a decent amount of sleep made it a ton easier to get up Saturday morning. I had to make sure everyone else was up and ready too, since people could get in at 10am. The boys had to be at their table and ready to go by 11. Again, the line for their booth was unimaginable. I overheard people saying they'd waited for over three hours, just for an autograph and a handshake. I remember what it's like waiting in lines like that, I thought to myself, a sudden wave of realization slamming into me.

A lot of the time I'd spent since I met Matt and the guys, I managed to not think about who they are. But hearing people's stories about waiting three and four hours to meet my boyfriend and three of my best friends was just wholly surreal. They certainly do have the best fans in the world. I'd even been asked myself for photos and autographs with fans. Chelle and Gena had told me to expect this, but I honestly wasn't expecting to have been welcomed into the A7X "family" so quickly and so open-heartedly. I had expected more reactions like that kid at the mall, accusing me of being the "other woman" who'd split up Matt and Valary's fairy tale, or reactions like my ex-husband, calling me a gold-digging groupie who was just looking for fame and money. Luckily, from the fans I'd met so far, I'd gotten neither of those.

At about noon, the Berrys and their other roadies texted Matt to let them know that they’d showed up with all of their gear. They'd had to fly all of the band's equipment out for this show. We closed the boys' booth at 2pm, giving them a little time to mill about the convention and mingle before they had to go get ready for the show. Since they’d been all but tethered to their table, Johnny and Zack wanted to get up and go meet some of the other celebrities. It was adorable to see them gushing over Robert Englund and Kane Hodder, Freddy and Jason respectively. Even cuter was seeing their reaction when both stars recognized them, and only agreed to sign their stuff for autographs in return! Each of them was completely in awe that these horror legends knew who they were.

Finally around 4 o’clock, we all loaded up and headed to the venue to check on the Berrys and the road crew to make sure everything was set and ready to go for the show. There were a couple of local metal bands playing as opening acts for Avenged, so they wanted to get their equipment set up and sound-checked before people started showing up. Matt made me stand in all four corners of the room, at the barrier, at the soundboard, and even at the bar making sure that the sound was great no matter where the fans were. He even took the mic up to the front bar himself and did a vocals check. They played through a little bit of “Remenissions” to check the full sound, then covered up their equipment and we went to hang out backstage. The other bands showed up soon after to load in their equipment. I knew most of the guys in these bands pretty well from hanging out at local shows all the time. They all thanked me for the opportunity to get to play with Avenged Sevenfold, and for thinking of them when we set the bill for the show.

There people go again, acting like I’m a big deal, or something, I thought to myself. I didn’t do anything! Talking to these guys that I’d known for years made me realize just how much I really was going to miss some aspects of Kentucky. I went to the bar and chatted with Pam, my favorite bartender in the world. I ordered a bunch of drinks for me and the girls, and returned to the backstage area. Brian perked up when he saw me walking into the room with a full bottle of Jack Daniel’s and a bucket full of bottles of Miller Lite.

“Looky! She brought me presents!” he yelled, as he started to lunge toward me. I pulled a pretty quick spin-move and completely dodged him as he ran right into the door.

“HA!” I yelled back. “Firstly, I’m a ninja. Don’t try that shit with me.” He just glared at me as he rubbed the shoulder he’d rammed into the door and I continued. “Secondly, this is for me and the girls. You didn’t say you wanted anything, so you don’t get anything.” I stuck my tongue out at him just for good measure. Michelle grinned and raised her arms at me, as if asking for the drinks. “Ladies, for you,” I curtsied as I passed on the alcohol. “I’m in good with the staff here, I used to party with the blonde bartender, so if you need anything else, lemme know, kay?” Gena nodded and quickly made use of the stack of plastic glasses on the table.

“I can’t have any?” Brian pouted. I shook my head “no.” He stuck his bottom lip out as far as he could.

I heard Zack snickering on the other side of the room. “Dude, have you seen her pouty face? You’ve got nothing on that shit.” Matt joined in the laughter as he entered the room from the stage.

“Seriously. She’s too fucking cute for her own good.” He winked at me.

I mocked up the best pout I could, and looked at Brian. “I don’t know what they’re talking about, BriBri. I think they’re making fun of me.” My bottom lip quivered as my eyes fluttered lightly.

“Oh god!” he yelled, turning his head. “Ok, fine! You win. I can’t pout at you. But can you promise you’ll never, ever do that again?” He poked my nose. “I’d have to go out and buy you the Eiffel Fucking Tower if you looked at me like that!” My pout quickly turned to a grin. He looked at Matt and added, “Good luck with that one, dude.”

“I guess I’ll take my chances.” He came over and gathered me up in another hug. “Anyway, sound is good, guess we’ll just hang out back here until things get going?”

“Or we could go play pool,” Gena piped up.

“I’m with Neener. I wanna shoot some pool!” I jumped up and started toward the door. I glanced over my shoulder questioningly.

“We’ve got time, let’s go,” Zack said, grabbing Gena’s hand and pulling her off the sofa they were sitting on. Brian and Michelle followed. Matt stood slowly. While everyone else went out into the bar, I backtracked to stand next to him.

“What’s up?” I knotted my arms around his waist. “If you don’t want to play pool, we don’t have to.”

“No, I do,” he said. “I was just thinking.”

“Oh. I probably don’t want to ask what about, do I?” I chuckled lightly and looked at the floor.

“Unless you want to hear that it was you, then no, you don’t.” He kissed the top of my head. “Let’s go hang out before Brian or Zack come back to find us.”

Wouldn’t you know that at that exact moment, the door opened. It slid open just a crack, and Michelle poked her head in. “Hey, are you guys co...” she started quietly.

I softly pushed her head down and yelled over her and across the bar, “Gates! Sending someone else to look for us also counts, asshole!”

Michelle was covering her ears to guard them against my screams, but she was laughing. “I told him you’d know he sent me anyway!”

“Come on, I’m going to kill your husband, ‘Chelle,” I laughed. She just shrugged and led us out the door.

We shot several games of pool, most of which were won by Matt and Brian, before we decided that us girls needed to get back to the hotel to change and get ready. Michelle, Gena, and I loaded up into the car, picked up Alex on the way, and headed back to our hotel rooms. Alex and I waited for about 45 minutes after we were finished getting ready before we split up and ran to pound of the girls’ respective doors. “Come on!” I heard Alex yell to Gena through the door a couple yards down from where I was continually banging on Michelle’s door. Finally, at the exact same moment, they both swung the doors open and let out exasperated sighs. Alex and I giggled. “And you guys said we are the creepy ones!” she trilled.

“Are you two beautiful enough yet? My god, I’m getting antsy,” I said, shifting my weight from one foot to the other. I can’t stand this waiting anymore! Then I had another realization. This is still new to me, I actually can’t wait to see the show. These girls have seen them a million and two times.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Michelle scoffed. “I know you’re excited, but you’re just gonna have to chill.” She patted my arm. “I promise you, nothing will start until we’re back there. Like Matt’s gonna let that happen,” she finished with a wink.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I just want to get back over there before it starts filling up!” I was trying with everything I had to stay calm. It’s still only the fifth time I’ve seen them play, it’s going to be exciting to me!

Even Alex was trying to calm me down. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but dude,” she said. “Just breathe.” She hugged me, as we waited for Gena and Michelle to grab their jackets and purses. “They’re my favorite band, too, you know.”

“Thanks, kid,” I said. I just brushed off her glare as I said that. “It’s partially the show, partially worry that Ben will be back to cause another scene, and partially just regular stress of trying to make sure the con goes smoothly.” I took a couple deep breaths, over-exaggerating each one. “See? I’m fine.” I am fine, I told myself. Just amped! “Besides, I know all of the opening bands, and I want to make sure I see them play too!”

We finally got everyone dressed and into the car, and drove the two blocks back to the club. We got there just about fifteen minutes before the first band went on. These guys had been friends of mine for quite a few years, and I’d seen them play countless times around the scene in Lexington. They’d even split up for awhile, but ultimately decided that they were much better together than not playing at all, and so they had recently regrouped. I’d had the hugest crush on their guitar player once upon a time, but I’d never let him know that. I stood right down in front of the stage, rocking out and singing along with all of their older songs. After the first two or three songs, Matt strutted out and stood behind me, arms around my waist. I had a feeling that it had something to do with the way each of the band members acknowledged me from the stage, from the singer calling me out by name for knowing all the words, to the guitarist pointing his solo “O-faces” right at me, from the drummer pitching me a busted drumstick before the first song was over to the bassist winking at me.

I turned and looked up at him and grinned. He leaned down and pecked my lips lightly. Then I just continued bobbing my head, screaming out the lyrics to the songs I knew and listening intently to the new material they’d written.

The second band were also old friends of mine, so it was a similar situation. Matt was pissed, but he had to go backstage and get his voiced warmed up. He made sure that everyone saw him kiss me before exiting the floor, though. “I’ll be right here when you come out on stage, ok?” I said in his ear. “Front and center, I promise.” He nodded and went backstage. The other guys followed him back to get dressed and warmed up as well.

Michelle, Gena, Alex and I stayed straight down front to rock out to the second band, waiting for our boys to take the stage. As soon as the openers left the stage, the crowd, which was quite a bit larger than it had been during the first band, started chanting “Sevenfold, Sevenfold!” I could see the Berry brothers bopping around on stage making sure everything was in place, tuned, and ready to go. Jason turned and shot us girls a huge grin and a goofy wave.

Suddenly, the lights went out, and the chimes that were the beginning of “Nightmare” sounded over the more powerful than usual PA system. The crowd went absolutely nuts. We saw Mike sneak in behind the drum kit and get ready. Brian and Zack strolled onstage and took their places. Johnny sauntered out as well, wandering around what was a much smaller stage than they were used to. When the recorded intro finished, Zack, Brian, and Mike launched into the song, harder than I’d ever seen them play. Matt came running out, leapt up onto the ego riser directly in front of me and screamed “Nightmare!” I hadn’t thought it possible, but everyone in the place got even louder, screaming right along with him.

Moving along the set list, they played through “Critical Acclaim”, “Welcome to the Family,” “Buried Alive”, and “Scream”. Of course, Matt knew that “Scream” was one of my favorite songs, so he sang it directly at me, much to the dismay of a group of sluttily-dressed young girls who’d been trying to get and hold his attention the whole set. They managed to get a wave and a smile from Zack, but that’s about all they’d gotten. They played “Seize the Day”, of course, as well. Matt’s performance echoed the label showcase in pointing me out in the crowd and crooning those lyrics to me and me alone. For some reason, even as many times as I’ve heard that song, it gave me goosebumps, knowing that it meant something just a little bit different than it had to me in the past.

I was watching Matt intently as he introduced the next song. “You all having a good time so far?” The crowd roared in agreement. “We want to thank the crew here at Buster’s, and mostly the kids at Scarefest. Bunch of fuckin’ rad people over there,” he said as he pointed to the center of the pit, where a group of Scarefest volunteers were standing, and they all cheered. “Jeff, you’ve got yourself a badass convention here, and a great staff, and we’re happy to be part of it.” Jeff raised his beer bottle in response. “And what would a gig at a horror convention be, without a little horror-punk tribute, huh?” He scanned across the throng of people, who were all anxiously awaiting the song. Then he locked his eyes back on mine, winked and blew me a kiss.

I heard Zack start a guitar riff that I recognized vaguely, but not as an Avenged Sevenfold tune. It wasn’t until Syn started playing the solo that had been a saxophone part in the original and first cover versions of the song that I realized what it was. They had decided to cover The Misfits cover of “Diana.” I looked around the room to see if anyone else recognized the song. It seemed that a few might have. The smile on my face couldn’t possibly have been any larger than it was at that moment.

Matt grinned hugely down from his spot on the stage at me, while Gena and Michelle just giggled. Brian and Zack took their dueling guitar stations, back-to-back dead center stage. Both looked down at me and grinned. “You knew about this?” I asked the girls, who were still giggling uncontrollably.

“Of course we did, Zack and Brian have the biggest mouths ever,” Gena yelled over the music. I just rolled my eyes, and turned my attention back to the stage. The boys actually killed the song, considering they couldn’t have had more than three whole days to work on it. For the last chorus, Matt jumped off the stage and stood on the other side of the barrier right in front of me. He grabbed my hand and fully serenaded me with the end of the song, all the while those skanky girls scoffing and pouting. Like they’ve even got a chance, I chuckled to myself. I ignored them the best I could and concentrated on not turning into a puddle of mush when Matt smiled at me as he sang. When the song was over, I gave him a quick kiss to he could return to the stage. Zack looked at me with his palms up questioningly, as if asking how they’d done with the song. I threw him and Brian a two-thumbs-up, which they answered with huge shit-eating grins.

They shot into “God Hates Us” and “Unholy Confessions” as their closers. The crowd definitely got into both songs. There was a huge circle pit that formed out of nowhere for the breakdown of “Unholy Confessions.” We were against the barrier, so except for a little smooshing we managed to stay out of it. The kids were loving it though, and the boys were definitely feeding off of their energy and bounding across the stage even more than earlier in the night. It looks like they’re having even more fun than usual, I thought to myself with a smirk. Just as they were about to wrap up that last heavy run of the song, Matt called attention to the rest of the band, and told them to keep going.

“I don’t think these fuckers are finished moshing just yet, are you, Lexington?” he yelled into his mic. The crowd yet again went crazy. I loved watching him up there. I could easily see that there was little to nothing in this entire world that made him happier than being M. Shadows, standing up there, rocking out in front of hundreds or thousands of kids as often as he could. Again, drawing moxie from the crowd in front of him, Matt instructed Brian, Zack, Johnny, and Mike to keep playing. He then took of his trucker cap, aviator sunglasses, and in-ear monitors. Just before he laid his microphone down on Mike’s drum riser, he said, “You ready for this? I’m coming down there with you crazy motherfuckers!”

With that, he sailed off the stage, nearly over my head, into the ready and eager arms of hundreds of fans. He surfed the crowd for a bit, until he got to the huge gap where the circle pit was once swirling. Zacky and Syn were just fiddling around on their guitars, keeping the rhythm, but not quite all-out playing the hard-rocking melody of the end of the song just yet. Once Matt got to the pit area, he signaled to Syn to start up again. Brian counted off to Mike, and they cannon-balled into the final headbanging run again. I was just tall enough to see over a decent chunk of the audience, and one of the security guards motioned for Michelle, Gena and I to sit on the barricade railing to get a better look.

Matt looked like he was in seventh heaven, down there, right in the middle of the biggest circle pit I’d ever seen. This was quite a feat in and of itself, as this was the smallest venue, other than a couple of bars, that I’d ever seen a “real” show take place. However, because it was so small, and because of the intimacy and closeness, the audience was really getting to connect with the band, and it showed in their energy and enthusiasm. They were just as excited about getting to slamdance and mosh with Matt as he was with them. After playing through the sequence twice, they finally ended the song, and Matt stayed within the crowd, high-fiving and fist-bumping everyone who was near him. Jason waded through the people as quickly as he could, bearing Matt’s mic.

“Thank you, Buster’s! You are were fuckin’ awesome tonight! We’ll be hanging out at the bar for a while afterward, come say hello!” he yelled. Jason helped guide him through the throngs of people to the backstage green room. Me and the girls followed suit and joined the band.

Matt and the boys were already halfway undressed, toweling off and changing into dry, clean clothes. He didn’t see me come into the room, so I was able to very nearly sneak up on him. “Nice choice of cover songs,” I whispered in his ear.

He jumped slightly, but then chuckled. “Thought you might like that.” He kissed me lightly.

“Let me finish changing, I’m gross.” I could sense the adrenaline still pumping through his system from a great show. He was going to still be “Shadows” for awhile after that one.

“Dude, what the hell caused you to decide to crowd surf and mosh out there?” Johnny called from the back corner of the dressing room.

“Seriously,” Brian added. “Awesome as that was, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen you do something like that.”

“I don’t know. Just seemed like a good idea. I miss playing in clubs this small, it was like the crowd was totally different that what we’re used to, you know?” Matt slipped on a fresh Guns N Roses t-shirt.

“Yeah, I know,” Zack said, contributing to the conversation. “I miss being able to actually see and touch the people we’re playing for. I mean, I love that thousands of kids come out to see us every night, but it’s different when you can actually look at them.” He finished changing as well. “Anyway, what’d ya think of the Misfits cover, V?” he asked with an enormously mischievous grin.

“It was awesome, Zeeves, it really was.” I went back to Matt. “Thank you,” I said softly. He winked at me, then disappeared into the restroom. “How did you learn that so fast? It couldn’t have been maybe three days since I played it for Matt!”

“Baby, we’re Avenged Fucking Sevenfold,” Johnny chimed in. “Besides, Zacky’s been making us listen to The Misfits for years. We’d all heard the song, I don’t know how Matt hadn’t!”

“And Matt’s kind of a slave-driver once he gets an idea in his head,” Brian said.

“Fuck you, dude,” Matt said from behind us, holding a mostly empty water bottle in one hand and a still unopened one in the other. Everyone else laughed. “I wanted to play it, they knew of it, it wasn’t that bad.”

“But I still don’t understand. Why that song?” Gena asked, a confused look on her face.

“‘Diana’ is my middle name. When I was in high school, I was trying to be cool and shit, and decided to go by that instead of ‘Vivienne,’” I explained. “That song, and “Dirty Diana” by Michael Jackson, were like my theme songs for years.” I slugged Matt on the arm. “I’m just glad you went with that one, instead of “Dirty Diana.” I’d have died!” I got another laugh from the group. “Thank you again,” I said. “It was perfect.”

“So, Shads,” Michelle said. “Crowd surfing, huh?” She shot him a smile. “That’s new.”

“Yeah, I know,” he said again. “Just felt like it. It was awesome. I’d never actually done that!”

“Well, our adoring public awaits,” Zack said. “Let’s go get our drink on, huh?”

“Fuck yeah!” Johnny and Brian said simultaneously.

After everyone was fully dried, redressed, and hydrated, we headed back out to the bar floor. We hung around by the small merch table that was set up and the guys signed autographs, took photos, and chatted with fans. Me and the girls just hung around watching them interact. They really were some of the nicest celebrities I’d ever had the chance to meet. Each of them were genuinely thankful that people enjoyed their music and their live shows as much as they did.

Finally, after two hours of signing, talking, and drinking, Brian and Johnny got the bright idea to keep partying, but take it to a strip club. “Oh, come on!” Johnny begged. “It’s been ages since we went to one out of town!”

“Christ, I swear to everything, if you get us kicked out of another club, we will never, ever step foot inside one again,” Matt vowed.

“I promise!” Johnny chirped. “Best behavior!”

“Oh, let’s go,” I said. “It’s been awhile since I went to a titty bar, too!”

Michelle and Gena shrugged. “Sure, let’s go,” ‘Chelle said. “I’m in.”

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Costume Party!

Contest Winner: Velociraptor

Zack: Headless Horseman

Gena: Sexy Mummy

Alex: Blind Mag

Johnny: Travelocity Gnome

Mike: Michael Myers

Brian: Scarecrow

Michelle: Bloody Dorothy

Matt & V: Zombies!

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Vivienne’s show outfit