Roars of approval.
“Welcome to a night of queer musical cabaret. I’m your host, Avoca Reaction – because that’s what great drag should do. Now, mic check. My name is WHAT?”
“Avoca Reaction!” the crowd calls back.
“Because WHY?”
“That’s what great drag should do!”
“That’s right! I’m your friendly neighbourhood bisexual non-binary intergender drag entity. Now, is there anyone here who has never been to a cabaret before…?”
Small Private Ceremony aren’t on until third, and despite my hideous nerves at seeing him, me and Fiona still have a brilliant time. We scream for the kings and queens and almost cry laughing at the comedy, and we don’t talk very much at all except to grasp each other and whisper, “Would you look?” and “I am dying…”
And then he comes onstage.
Standing in black Doc Martens and a floor-length, deep-red velvet gown with a split up the leg is Roe O’Callaghan. His hair is curlier than ever and pushed forward, so his eyes are barely visible under the thick mop. And with lips so painted they look swollen, he starts to sing, slowly at first. Softly. I only notice that he’s holding a guitar when, three lines into his song, he takes a single, jerked stab at it.
The lights come up, and the rest of the band are now visible. A blond bass player with a page-boy haircut that I assume is Miel, wearing a white vest and black waistcoat. The drummer is a ginger boy with glitter in his beard, and the lead guitarist is a big girl with bubblegum-pink hair and a buttoned-up Victorian nightgown on. None of their outfits go together, but weirdly that’s what makes them look like they belong to one another.
They play mostly covers at first, Roe going from Karen O to the Corrs in the same song. I can tell, even objectively, that he is an absurdly talented performer. He can make songs that should be embarrassing and mawkish into these slick punk numbers, and slick punk numbers into sentimental ballads. Then, they start singing their own material. It’s easy to tell when Roe has written a song: it’s full of his dry wit and sincerity, full of colour and story and metaphor. He sings a song about a Russian spy that, it’s clear, is pretty well-loved among the twenty or thirty people here who know the band well.
“You’re a tripwire trap
In a house that’s tapped
With a telephone trigger that’s rigged to blow;
When the ringing sounds,
I won’t wait around.
I will pick it up and say ‘hello’.”
And people are singing along, yelling “tripwire trap” and then “hello” every time the chorus comes around. By the final chorus, he’s screaming it. Clusters of people are screaming it back.
Roe has fans! I think in amazement. My boyfriend has fans!
“All right everyone,” Roe says, finally addressing the crowd. He starts retuning his guitar, and I can see a tremor. His hand is shaking. He is sick with nerves under all that velvet, trying so hard to keep it together. “How are we doing?”
Fiona and I shout loudest. His head jerks in my direction, his eyes meeting mine and then journeying down to my enormous T-shirt. His mouth twitches slightly, an almost-smile playing on his red lips.
God, he’s so sexy. How is he so sexy?
“This is a new song,” he says simply. “I hope you don’t mind that it’s a bit slow.”
And he starts.
“How long have we been here?
And do I say too much?
These days I’m mostly vacillating
In and out of touch…”
His eyes focus and settle on me, and every hair on my body is awake and standing on end. He is singing this song at me, to me. It feels startlingly intimate in such a full, sweating room. The only music is an occasional strum of a chord and the thud of a kick drum.
“In and out of focus
Always trying to construct
These aimless conversations
as a substitute for trust…”
Roe’s eyes are boring into me, to the point where a few people in front of me are turning around to see what he’s looking at. The snare drum kicks in. The chorus explodes as the girl on lead guitar starts playing a high, tinkling riff that vibrates my blood.
“And then there’s you, in livid blue
Come seeping through the silence;
If you’re not dangerous, then how come I hear sirens
And is everything just violence?
“And then there’s you, in livid blue
Come wading through the weather;
But if we’ve got to live in hiding,
least we’re stuck in here together…”
I’m completely breathless. What does this mean? Does Roe love me? Is he scared of me? Is it both?
But I don’t have time to figure it out, because at that moment, a glass bottle sails across the room and hits Roe in the mouth.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
AT FIRST, I’M SURE IT’S AN ACCIDENT, OR A JOKE.
It is neither of these things.
The lights suddenly go out, and the room is plunged in darkness. There’s some kind of fight happening near the door, and I hear Avoca Reaction’s voice, loud and defensive.
“You need to get out of here. No, you’re not welcome. No. No. Get out. Get out, before I call the…”
I can’t hear what happens next. The room, which moments previously was alight with the happy, joyous shouts of singing teenagers, is now full of horrified screams. I grab Fiona next to me.
“Where’s Roe?” I yell. “What’s happening?”
A crowd of people heave backwards, crushing me and Fiona against the wall. I hear her screaming as a boy falls backwards on top of her. I crouch to pick her up and am almost trampled in the process. I haul her to the side of the stage and manage to stand up on top of it, trying to see what’s happening.
A group of people have wrestled their way into the gig. Most of them are about our age or a few years older. The biggest ones, the biggest men, are shoving people backwards and screaming in their faces. A few others are carrying things. I
