It looked like last call at a karaoke bar at a convention center—people were getting sloppy. Everyone but Shawn, who was still pogoing up and down on the light-up dance floor. If he struggled to find the boundaries of his person and his persona, Keith had never seen it. He could be mean in real life, he snapped at people, which he would never do in front of the Talkers, but the energy was always the same. Full throttle. Shawn’s security guard, a former college football player, was parked by the entrance, ready as always. There were a few clumps of Talkers dancing, and Keith watched as their eyes kept darting over to Shawn. As long as he was up, so were they. The women didn’t even look tired—they had clicked into some deeper source of energy, one that Keith thought he actually understood. They gave it to each other, back and forth, like a game of hot potato. Steffani called it “feeding the beast,” when Keith needed it, the ego boost, but here on the ship, the beast was feasting at all hours. Most of the time, Keith was embarrassed about the beast, but on the cruise, there was no need. It made everyone happy—a bonus, not a deficit. He pushed himself up to standand jogged over to the women, his hands pumping along to the beat of the song. They screamed and opened up their circle wide enough for him to enter, and then he was surrounded by them, their rapturous faces, and for a little while, he wasn’t even tired anymore either. Shawn smiled as wide as the ocean, and Keith pretended it didn’t make him happy to see it.
12
Friday, 2:46 a.m.
Deck 4
Sarah rubbed her eyes. The JackRabbit crew had taken over the upper level of the Sacagawea restaurant for their after-hours bar and mess, not to be confused with the actualAmerican Fantasycrew bar several floors belowdecks. Most of the JackRabbit staff was dressed exactly like her, in Carhartt pants and big heavy boots. To their credit, the men (the staff was almost all men) were moving heavy shit around all day, and no one needed to lose a toenail. There was an ice bucket of Budweisers for the drinkers and an ice bucket of sparkling waters for the recovering alcoholics, and the room clicked with the metallic chorus of a dozen cans being opened at once.
“Listen,” Sarah said. She was standing on a stool at one end of the room, shouting. There was no mic, which was classic for people who did nothing but put on music shows. “I know it’s late, but I just wanted to say great job today. Everyone is super pumped.” The assembled offered up a weakwoo. “Ha ha,” Sarah said. “Just remember, for most of these guests, this is the biggest trip they’ve planned all year, and they’ve been looking forward to and planning it for months, and you are the ones who get to give it to them.”
“Cheeseball!” Tyler called out.
“Nice,” Sarah said, and gave him a look, not that he cared. “Anyway, see Team One on the third floor at nine a.m. to set up for the photo line. Get some sleep!”
Groans went up around the room, but laughter, too. The world was divided between people who actually gave a shit about their work and people who tried to work as little as possible. If she had even three of the hard workers, everything would be fine. Most of them were like Tyler, though—lazy, like everything was beneath him, and he was just barely willing to do the job he’d been hired to do. Sarah gave a wave and headed back to her room. The narrow hallway swayed slightly. The red, white, and blue waves of the carpet were busy enough to distract the eye when the ship was keening or pitching, but Sarah felt it all the same.
When Sarah told some of her friends about how much she liked Boy Talk, how hardworking she found them, her friends would roll their eyes. “Oh yes,” they would say. “How hard to be middle-aged rich white guys. Boo-hoo.” Boy Talk did make millions, sure, or at least they had thirty years ago, but they probably didn’t anymore. Who knew what their royalty checks looked like? That wasn’t any of Sarah’s business. They hadn’t written the songs on the albums that had actually sold well, but she was sure they still got nice checks every time their hit songs were used in an orange juice commercial or played at a baseball stadium. For the cruise, they would pocket between one and two million dollars, which they would then have to split five ways. It was a lot, more than most people made, but it wasn’t astronomical. Not billionaire money like some of the pop girlies were making nowadays. Yes, they were rich dudes who had been famous since they were teenagers. Regardless, they all still had hopes and dreams and lives with their own peaks and valleys, and if you paid enough money, youcould get on a boat and watch them perform for you, like a Russian cat circus.
But also—this was important to her—Boy Talk were the hardest-working people on the boat. They stood on that tiny stage all night long. They sang the songs, they told the jokes, they did the dances people remembered. Except for Terrence, who was famously Libertarian, they never said a word about politics in public, rather than risk losing half their audience because of their stance on vaccines or genocide or whatever. They’d already gotten clean from whatever ailed them, more or less. Scotty and Shawn had gotten new noses; they all seemed to have miraculously grown more hair. Scotty and Terrence and Shawn still couldn’t sing, but they fucking showed up and did it anyway. Keith and Corey sang their fucking hearts out to make up for the other ones. They were famous, and that was all some people needed in order to feel like they were successful, but Sarah knew better. Fame and money operated separately, as did fame and respect. Serial killers were famous—it didn’t mean you wanted to be one. Sarah respected the hell out of their effort and dedication, and the Talkers did too. It wasn’t the key to achieving success, but it would have been impossible to hold on to their success without it. Keith and Shawn Fiore could have been coal miners, and they would have given it their all. That was what Sarah admired—people who worked as hard as she did. She knocked her key card against her door, and it whirred open. She pitched forward onto her small bed and fell asleep with her clotheson.
Day Two
Friday
Sunrise / Sunset:
7:11 a.M. / 6:37 p.M.
High / Low:
84°f / 70°f
Today’s Hi-Lites:
Photo Opportunity,
10 a.m.—Marilyn Monroe Lounge, 5 Aft
Boy Talk Concert,
7 p.m.—Broadway Theater, 3, 4, 5 Fwd
Deck Party:
MTV Night, 10:30 p.m.—Lido 9Aft
13
Friday, 9:48 a.m.
Deck 5
No one liked Photo Day. Maybe the crew did, because they just had to sit around in shifts making sure the Talkers were orderly and the guys were safe, but the guys all dreaded it, that was for sure. Photo Day was death warmed over. It wasWeekend at Bernie’s. It was what they had to do, and so they did it, but no one enjoyed it, not for a second. Keith had learned a few things over the years: to wear comfortable shoes, to have his sunglasses on hand for when his eyes got too tired to hide it, to have sanitizer nearby, and to take breaks, even if it meant the day lasted longer. Every year it was a miracle that Corey agreed to do it, to do something he hated purely for other people’s pleasure. Even when he was fifteen, Corey had complained about being touched by so many people.
During Photo Day, every single person on the cruise could come and get their photo taken with the entire group. Boy Talk stood in a line, spaced out like a gap-toothed fence, and groups of ten fans would file in, flank each guy, pose for the camera, and then move on. It sounded so easy, a moving sidewalk of women, click, walk, click, walk. In reality, though, each person who came through the line hugged each member ofBoy Talk or shook their hands and said hello or asked a question that they’d been rehearsing for the hours that they’d been waiting, or for the last thirty years, and so by the time it was all done, the guys had been standing for six hours and had physically touched every guest on the ship and taken in several hours’ worth of word vomit. The last two years, Keith and Scotty had worn masks, which offended some of the Talkers, but come on. They were there, weren’t they? Keith had almost not gotten on the plane, thinking about the waves of perfume and anxiety coming off the Talkers—and all the hands, hands, hands, hands, hands—but then he thought about Shawn telling him that he was letting everyone down, and that was worse.
The lounge was empty for now, except for a few production guys with rolls of electrical tape on their belts who were setting up the backdrop and some blocking markers on the carpet. The room was supposed to look like a Hollywood speakeasy, whatever that meant. It reminded Keith of the basements he’d hung out in before the band got together, the fancy rec rooms that some of his friends’ fathers had poured their money into. Sometimes Keith thought about those houses, the places he would have spent his teenage years if they hadn’t been on the road all the time. The easy trouble he would have made, the local fun he could have had. Boy Talk had given him everything, and it had taken everything, too. Shawn had already turned eighteen and was ready to be done with New Jersey. Like most things in his life, it hadn’t been up to Keith.
