Catastrophic Happenings

“So, I have a gig for us in a couple of weeks,” Azalea said to the four in her basement before practice started.

All four men turned their eyes to her in surprise.

She was taken aback. “Was that…not okay?” she asked slowly.

The three band members gave each other looks of both confusion and excitement. In their minds, almost any chance to play would be great. However, Rick’s thoughts were more complex. He was in awe that Azalea had been so forward to even find a gig to play, no matter the caliber. On the other hand, he was hesitant if he should allow the band to perform at all. They didn’t have any finished songs and the band had only been together for less than three weeks. In that time Azalea and Cade spent more time bickering with each other than they did playing music. Rick didn’t believe the band was ready for any kind of public scene.

“Where?!” Sammy asked eagerly.

“How? Who?” Rick asked the more complex questions.

“Well,” Azalea said, “It’s my friend Melanie’s sweet sixteen. But before you say no,” she was able to cut off the exasperated gasp she had expected from Cade, “It’s a hundred bucks, we’d only have to play some covers off the Billboard Tops and sing her happy birthday, and this could be the beginning of a lot of easy cash from other sweet sixteen’s”

She smirked when no one had any immediate words to offer. Azalea looked at each of them, “I will let you all ponder that, and I’ll be back after I get my phone charger.”

“I’m in,” Sammy shrugged before Azalea had even made it a quarter-way up the stairs.

Cade shot him a glance and groaned, “It’s a sweet sixteen.”

“I have to agree with Cade on this one,” Austin said. “It’s just…I don’t know. What do you think, Rick?”

“I think the general idea is kind of brilliant. It’s an easy crowd, Azalea has the connections, it’s fast cash,” Rick was impressed, but there was still the hesitation.

“How come you sound so unsure then?”Austin pried.

He directed the question to all three of them, “Do you think we’re ready? Honestly? We’ve hardly taken baby steps.”

“Does it really not bother anyone that we wouldn’t even be playing our own music?” Cade asked with disgust. “We’d be playing shit on the radio while congratulating a teen bopper on finally hitting puberty.”

“We don’t even have our own music,” Sammy reminded him.

Cade raised his hand and pointed in Sammy’s direction. “Exactly. Exactly. We should be focused on that.” As if to emphasize his point further he picked up his guitar and started to tune it.

Austin had been rubbing his chin with thought. “We can’t ignore the money aspect though. A few parties at a hundred dollars a pop could add up.”

“Yeah, so Azalea says that there are so many parties she has the ‘in’ to.”

“I do have the ‘in’ to a fair amount of parties,” Azalea added when she strolled back into the room. She had gotten used to leaving the band and being welcomed with words about her being spoken. It didn’t faze either party any more.

“About seventy-five percent of my class is turning sixteen this year,” Azalea said while she was plugging her charger into the nearest outlet. “Most of them are probably throwing parties, and you know a lot of the kids at Grace Hill are going to have blow outs. I know that a lot of them would think it was awesome to have live music that comes cheap. And just think, all of these are local so we can play parties while working on new stuff, make cash—even more than a hundred per for some, especially if we gain a good reputation. It’s easy money and free publicity, you can’t beat that.”

“That sounds like something Rick would say,” Sammy mused.

Rick had to agree with the points that Azalea was making. He weighed the pros and cons in his head as Azalea and Sammy continued trying to convince Cade and Austin that playing sweet sixteen’s would not be so bad. Rick glanced at the two boys, he thought that they were winning Austin over. But Cade, no matter how much sense the argument made, would never be swayed into thinking that he was wrong—especially about an idea that was Azalea’s.

“I think it’s a good idea,” Rick announced as soon as he had made up his mind. “But the decision will be unanimous, as always.”

“Wait!” Azalea yelled as she scrambled to the center of the circle they had naturally formed. “Before we vote, I would just like to make one last point. Most of these parties will shamelessly be filled with easy girls and free liquor,” she said slowly with her hands up for emphasis, as she rotated to meet each person in the eye.

Rick tried to hold back his chuckle “Thank you, Azalea, for that last point. Alright, time to vote. So ‘yes’ or ‘no,’ and I’d also like to know the reason behind your decision.” He turned to Azalea first.

She smiled before declaring, “I vote ‘yes’ because the benefits far outweigh the cons and I think it would be a hell of a lot of fun.”

“Sammy?”

“Yes. And…what she said,” he childishly grinned while he looked over at Azalea. She gave the same expression back.

Although Cade was next in the circle, Rick decided to skip over him and ask Austin first. Partly because he thought that his comments might affect Austin’s vote, and partly because he didn’t feel like listening to him speak just yet.

“What do you think, Austin?” he asked with his chin raised.

“I think we should do it,” he responded slightly reluctantly.

“What?” Cade asked sharply.

Austin looked directly at Cade. “Look, I know it isn’t the most glamorous or promising of gigs. But it’s popularity and money to win and nothing to lose. It’s too good to pass up.”

Cade glowered as he looked at the faces of his fellow band members. He knew that Rick was going to call his name next. Azalea looked smug, Sammy had the usually grin on his face, and Austin’s eyebrows were raised as if daring him to be the one that ruined this chance for them.

“Cade?” the question came.

He sighed as he put down his guitar. “Fine,” Cade said as he threw up his arms in surrender. “Because if I said ‘no’ I wouldn’t hear the end of it.”


The day of Melanie’s sweet sixteen came quickly. In the time they had the band put their song-making to the side in order to learn over a dozen cover songs, and of course, they found a way to spice up the Birthday Song.

The four band members and Rick crammed into their white van with all of their equipment, and were soon on their way to the party.

“There is so much more room back here,” Sammy sighed happily as he leaned back into the long van seat.

“That’s probably because Azalea has no curves,” Cade snickered without turning around in the front seat. He had won the game of Rock-Paper-Scissors for the privilege of shot gun.

“I’m not apologizing for being a healthy weight for my size,” Azalea said in an almost bored manner as she focused on sending a text.

A mile or two passed with only Azalea and Sammy talking until Rick asked, “You okay back there, Austin?” He took his eyes off the road to glance at the still-faced boy in his rearview mirror.

Azalea looked over to Austin and noticed that his leg was shaking. She realized he hadn’t said a word the entire drive. It worried her since it deviated so much from his normally cool, “don’t give a fuck” demeanor.

Sammy tapped Azalea on the thigh, “Austin has stage fright,” he explained.

“I do not!” Austin burst out. “I just get bad nerves before a show.”

Azalea didn’t voice aloud her immediate thought that the two explanations were the same—she could see that he was in pretty bad shape.

Cade turned his head to look at Sammy, “Remember when he puked before we played that bar in West Virginia and the whole place totally thought that he was about to perform drunk?”

Sammy, Cade, and Rick burst into a fit of laughter. Azalea was still looking at Austin with concern. She looked at his face while his eyes were fixed out the window. There were drops of sweat at his hairline.
“C’mon guys,” Azalea spoke to the three. “That isn’t nice. He’s clearly not okay right now.”

“He gets nervous before every show,” Rick shrugged it off. “He’s always okay once he gets on stage.”

Though Azalea knew that the three had the experience to know that Austin’s stage fright was nothing to worry about, she still tried to offer advice to calm him down.

“You should sing a Disney song in your head,” Azalea told him quietly, not wanting to distract the other three from the conversation they were having.

Austin glanced over to her. “How would that help?”

“Because it just makes you happy inside. Like, I like to sing that song, Let’s Get Down to Business from Mulan. And while I’m singing it to myself in my head I start to picture all the scenes that happen in the movie when the song is playing. And then I get so lost in the cuteness of the cricket or the things that Mushu says that for a while I forget that I had something to be anxious about in the first place.”

Austin gave her a look of doubt, but her attention was already back on her phone since she had said her piece. And although he thought that her theory was completely ridiculous, he found himself emerged in memories of The Lion King when they arrived at Melanie’s house.