FicWad

Megadeth played only two dates in February, just to test the waters and see people's reactions. To Dave's delight, the audience was massive and responsive; it helped that the guitarist had one name for himself already, but now he was proving his own worth without the Metallica moniker.
The great response from those two concerts fuelled Dave's determination. It was great, being on stage again, playing live and feeling people's energy; he felt wild and powerful, ready to take over the world and destroy his enemies.

Dave's plan now was to convince Kerry to join Megadeth for good; the man had everything he was looking for and Dave didn't want to let him slip. He wasn't sure what Kerry's real intentions were; he had his own band, but seemed to like performing with Megadeth.
Dave tried to approach the issue once back in L.A.; Kerry had told him that he was willing to play with Megadeth again, and Dave tried to appeal him to join his band without pushing the issue too much.
“Are you free for the rest of the month?”
“Yeah, Slayer won't be touring until March.” Kerry answered.
“So, you would like to come, some day or other, and rehearse with us, right?”
“Sure, it would be great. You're putting together a kickass band, man.”
“But we still have a vacant spot.” Dave hinted.
“You'll find someone, it just takes some time.”
Dave pulled a face; Kerry wasn't being very responsive. Maybe he didn't catch the hint, maybe he was playing dumb. Did he want to keep a foot in both camps? Dave couldn't tell. Sure he had to make a decision and pick one of the two bands at a point.
“Well, thanks for helping, anyway.”
“No problem, I'll be here whenever I have the time.”

~*~

“Just give it up, you're not going to find anything in there.”
“There has to be at least one single decent album.”
“They are all good, you are the ones who can't appreciate their worth.”
David, Kerry and Lee had come to Maria's house to pick up Dave and ended pretty much self-inviting themselves to lunch. Lee was going through Maria's album collection, looking for something to listen to, but with no luck.
“No, I tried before and I had to give up. Some of your so called music is pretentious bullshit, some is plain incompetence and, worse of all, some is both.” said Dave
Maria rolled her eyes. “Just because you don't understand it, it doesn't mean it's bad.”
“Hey, what's this?” asked Lee, picking up a box hidden in the back. “Can I open it?”
Maria stared at the box without answering; there was quite a piece of her past hidden in there. She had packed it up and hadn't looked back at it until that moment. When she had first left it behind, it hurt too much, like a pulsating open wound. She had wanted to forget about it, but didn't have the guts -nor the heart- to throw everything away and erase that memory. Then some times passed, numbing her pain, leaving her with some mixed feelings about the whole experience; she recognized it as the best time of her life, and also as a bitter disappointment.
Now Maria could watch at that time with more detachment.

She sighed, and finally nodded, “Sure, go ahead. I haven't opened it in a long time.”
Lee opened the box and took out the stuff there was inside of it: two t-shirts, a bag of pins, some flyers, some scattered pictures, a worn out notebook and three vinyl.
“What's with this stuff? It looks wacky.” said Lee, looking at the front covers of the records.
“I was in a band for about three years. That's what is left of it.” Maria confessed plainly.
“You were in a band? I bet it was some weirdass shit.”
“That was the New York no wave scene for you; we rejected anything commercial and wanted to explore new sounds, do something different. We never cared about making catchy songs, or harmony and melody. The music we liked is difficult to listen to, visceral and maybe even confrontational.”
“Isn't that the definition of punk? ” asked Dave.
“Well, in our case it wasn't about strumming on the same three power chords over and over again; we were, as a movement, more experimental. But we embraced the 'do it yourself' punk ideology; my bandmates and I managed everything by ourselves.”
“That's what every band does in the beginning.” Dave replied.
“I mean, we even released our music independently, without a label; we recorded two EPs and one LP. Our lives revolved around the band and no one else was involved in it.”
Dave turned up his nose. “Fuck that, I'd rather have someone taking care of the business part than handling every single thing by myself. Get a manager, find a good record label and focus on the music.”
“Signing a contract for a label doesn't mean jackshit.” replied Kerry, “My bandmates and I literally had to self-finance our debut album because we weren't given a recording budget. And we haven't found a manager yet.”
Dave shot a glance at Kerry. If it wasn't a bed of roses for Slayer, maybe he had a chance to convince the guitarist to join his band. Not that Megadeth was doing any better, but he could take advantage of Kerry's frustration.

“Well, now I'm curious. Let's listen to this one.” Lee said, putting on one of the records. Before the ending of the first song, the guys were already complaining and commenting sarcastically.
“Holy shit, this is bad. Really bad.”
“It's like the music equivalent of a train wreck. Every fibre of your being is repulsed, and yet you cannot stop looking. Or listening.”
“As I said before, it's not supposed to sound pretty or easy to listen.” replied Maria.
“You know, with Slayer, we pride ourselves on scaring the hell out of everyone, but you took it a step further.” said Kerry.
“Oh, you metalheads, thinking you are so tough and intimidating. Here, let me introduce you to this nice woman called Diamanda Galas.” said Maria with a grin, changing the record.

~*~

“Ok, I think we're ready. Let's do this.” said Dave, then signalled Joe, the guy who owned their rehearsal space, to start recording.
Megadeth was finally ready to make their first demo on tape; they had selected three songs, one of which was 'Mechanix', to distribute and circulate.
It was an obvious step to take. Tape trading had given Metallica a strong following, making them the most famous of the underground metal bands of the Bay Area and ultimately opened them the doors for a recording contract. Dave hoped to achieve the same success.
Kerry didn't participate in the session, as he was still a member of Slayer, and his bandmates wouldn't have liked him recording with another band.

They got it right the first take; the recording was fast, raw and vicious, it captured perfectly the energy of their live shows.
Dave smirked, visibly pleased. “Good, now let's make more copies and pass them around.”
“Are we going to send them to some labels too?” asked David.
“Everything in its own time.” replied Dave.
“Can we go now? I'm hungry and tired.” said Lee yawning. “We've been playing all day long.”
“Just one last thing; I was thinking of asking Maria to do some managing for us.”
“What, why?” wondered David.
“I'd rather have someone taking care of the business stuff so we can concentrate on the music. She used to do it for her own band, so she knows how to handle these things.”
“What makes you think she will accept? She doesn't exactly care about our group.”
“It's not like she leads an exciting, busy life. Hell, without us, her social activity would be reduced to serving customers. I'm giving her something to occupy herself with.”
“She's got a steady job that pays her bills and rent, which is more than what we have.”
“That comes in handy too. It will be useful to have a forwarding address and a phone number where we can be reached.”
Dave stood speechless for a few seconds. “Jesus Christ, how calculating.”
“Do I have to remember you that Tony is getting tired of hosting us? We may need a new place to stay very soon.”
“Whatever. Ask her, ask a monkey with brain grafts, ask a team of soviet space dogs, I don't care.” Said Lee walking away. “I need food!”
“Well, it's set. I'll ask her.” confirmed Dave.

~*~

Maria pushed the door and entered the café. It was quiet and not too crowded. She looked around and spotted her father Vinny sitting at a table in the corner. It was his birthday, and the day before he had called her asking if they could meet for a brunch. “Don't worry about the present.” he had said, “I'm just glad to see you, baby girl.” It was quite a weird think to say, since they lived in the same city, but in fact they only saw each other on special occasions for a couple of hours at best.
That was, actually, the reason he had decided to meet her. Maria was his daughter, and Vinny didn't want them to be estranged. But the actual truth was that they were it.

Her parents divorced when she was eleven and Vinny left New York for Los Angeles; he never came back and Maria never went to visit him. He had given her his new address and phone number, and for the first year she called him weekly and wrote lots of letters, but time and distance took their toll and their contacts became every year scarcer and scarcer.
Lidia, Maria's mother, met another man a couple of years after the divorce, but refused to marry or live with him until Maria left for college, as she didn't want her daughter to feel like her own father was being replaced. Maria considered her mother's decision to be uselessly convoluted, but Lidia was resolute.
When she came back to her mother's house in Staten Island, Maria knew it would be only a temporary thing. She had no idea what to do, she just felt she had to go away from N.Y., anywhere else, it didn't matter. She started working to gather enough money to leave, and when her father called for the Christmas greetings, Maria had the sudden idea to ask him if she could visit him to celebrate the New Year's Eve. Vinny didn't answer for a long moment, but just when she was starting to lose hope, he agreed. Lidia let her go without asking any questions, but made her promise to call every week, no matter what.

Vinny had a new family. Maria knew his father had remarried, but he never had spoken about his new wife and kids. They were all very kind and polite with her, when they greeted her for the first time. They had even bought her a present, a black dress. “I asked your mother for your size.” Vinny said.
But all their warmth couldn't stop Maria from feeling like an intruder. She had no place in that family.
When she told her father that she wanted to find a job and a house there in L.A., he called a friend who owned a little shop with his wife and asked him if he needed any help. With her first pay and 500 $ Vinny gave her as a present, Maria moved out. She never saw or talked to her stepfamily anymore.

Vinny greeted his daughter with a big hug. “How are you, darling? Sit down and order anything you want. It's on me.”
They talked about trivial things, trying not to fall into an embarrassed silence. Maria wondered if she had inherited her bashful nature from her father. She didn't remember much of him from her childhood, what he used to be, whether he had changed or not. She guessed he felt guilty about her, because she was his daughter but felt more like a stranger; because he didn't really care all that much about her, but as a father, he knew he should. Maria wasn't hurt by it, mainly because she didn't care all that much either.

“Take care of yourself, sweetie.” Vinny said when it was time to leave.
“You too, dad.” Maria reciprocated. She wondered if Dave and David had cleaned the apartment as they had promised.