Page 134 of Call Me Baby 2: Side B

Jasmine throws a hand.

“I am so hungry, I fight rat…

“then eat rat.”

The laughter rips out of them all over again. But I’m sitting here, watching Andrew behind the bar, missing him, realizing there was never going to be a win tonight.

If he folded, I’d hate him.

If he stood tall, I’d hate myself.

Tonight was only gonna prove one of two things: either he’s still the myth he was before me, or I’m not enough for the man he is now.

TRACK NO. 12: DESPERADO

EAGLES

// ANDREW - OCT 07, ’23 - HOUSE OF VICE - LOWER EAST SIDE, NYC //

// FLIP THE VINYL TO SIDE B //

Everyone had their Vice story, their moment.

Andrew’s never really ended.

The first time his sneakers hit concrete, the place felt alive. Music pulsing, walls sweatin’, lights strobing, skin slidin’ against skin. The kind of place that made you forget time, forget bills, forget your fuckin’ name if you let it. And Andrew—twenty years old that first time, Jersey bones crossin’ the Lincoln line like it’s a toll he’ll never stop payin’ just to play someplace bigger than parties, livin’ rooms, garages, and backyards—stood there a beat too long, takin’ it all in.

Vice held shit in its soul. The stage had warped from the anthems stomped into it. You could feel the ghosts it left behind—the stories, the hookups, the fights, the highs. Like the night Joan Jett cracked her white ‘65 Gibson Melody Maker over some asshole’s back mid-set and kept playin’ with blood drippin' off the strings like nothin’ happened, the stain still in the grout.

By twenty-four, givin’ pleasure was like any other setlist—hands, moans, orgasms, then lights out. He played it in order, hit every cue, got the applause, walked off stage before they realized it never meant anything.

They wanted Andrew Harding.

And once they got him?

He always delivered.

He’d try to dip out and avoid it if he could—duck, dodge, always have an exit strategy. But once they cornered him, he caved. He never had it in him to tell ‘em no. The word always felt violent. So when the inevitable came, he nailed the role so hard people thought it was real.

Hell, even he forgot who he was half the time.

Vice nights always kicked off in that alley, where it reeked of wet cigarettes and city rain, steam risin’ off the grates, cab horns bleedin’ in from the street, walls drippin’ black brick. At the end was Kenny—big bastard, coulda been a cop in Union City with the way he swung that Maglite. Always bustin’ Andrew’s balls before he hit the first step. Then a staircase lured you under, like a concrete, come-hither finger.

The second he hit the bottom platform and that black door swung open?

He disappeared into the music...

The bass always hit first, vulgar in his chest before Vice devours him…

Purple haze spills off the bar and paints his arms.

The floor hums under his soles, wet tile grabbin’ at his sneakers.

Tonight, Vice is crammed, body to body.

By the third song, he's already drippin' sweat, his shirt clingin' to his spine like it can't inhale. He stopped hearin' himself somewhere in the chorus, the guitar screamin' into his eardrums.

All night he’s been breathin’ in secondhand lust. He don’t even know if the air in his lungs is his or Miss Mini Skirt’s at his feet. She’s too fuckin’ close, and he can’t focus. His eyes are everywhere and nowhere.