Chapter 15

Markus returned in eight minutes as he'd promised, said hi, gave Maggie a quick kiss, and started scanning the crowd with binoculars.

"Okay honey," he said. "I'm gonna take Cindy and Amanda down to watch the show. If you want, you can watch it from the sound booth with me."

"I want." Maggie giggled.

"Hey Markus, you seem a little tense. Something up?" Amanda asked.

"You'll understand when you get down there." he said, then turned to her and Cindy. "I want you both to promise you'll stay exactly where I put you, all right?"

"We promise." Amanda said solemnly, realizing his seriousness.

"Good. I've never seen the boss mad, but if I let anything happen to you..." he paused and turned to Maggie, leaving the sentence unfinished. "After they're in place, we'll go back around backstage, then we'll have to go through the crowd to reach the sound booth in the middle of the floor. I want you to hang onto the back of my belt and don't let go. I'm telling you this now because we won't be able to hear a damn thing down there, me especially because I'll be listening to the security channel on my earphone. Any questions?"

There weren't, and he turned to the huge young security man at the back of the room.

"Connors, these two young ladies are two thirds of Corey's new band, and they are your only duty tonight. Keep your attention on their surroundings at all times. You don't want to even think about what will happen to you if anything happens to them. If something does, I want you on the radio half a second later. You'll bring up the rear on the way down there. I'll come and get the three of you about half an hour before the end of Mr. Michaels' set. All right ladies, if you'll follow me..."

He led them back the way they'd come, over the cat-walk and down the stairs to the backstage area, then around the side to the floor between the security barrier and the edge of the stage, and right up to center stage. The stage was five feet high, and Corey had a two foot high flight case placed on the floor against the front of the stage for them to stand on. Markus gave them a hand up and a wave goodbye.

They watched the rest of the opening act, fascinated by their proximity, and inspecting with new-found interest the performers' clothes, instruments, and equipment. The crowd seemed restless, and cheered loudest when the lights came up at the end of the act.

A curtain fell to hide the crew as they cleared away Claria's stage gear and set up Corey's band's equipment. Cindy and Amanda turned to each other, and were going to discuss what they'd seen, when Cindy noticed the crowd.

"God, look at them. They're all women and girls. And they look..." She found herself unable to find the words.

Amanda turned and looked past Connors, their security guy, who stood with his back to them, scanning the crowd. Beyond him a row of the arena's security staff, Corey's security staff, and a few Vancouver city police stood almost shoulder to shoulder with their backs to them, also scanning the crowd, and beyond them the crowd itself was pressed tight to the security rail.

"I read it's about eighty five percent female, on average." Amanda commented. "Only Julio Iglesias has ever had more gender bias in his audiences. And they look like junkies waiting for a fix."

"No wonder they didn't respond to Claria much. They're only here to see Corey, and that's it." Cindy said. "Now I understand what Markus meant. Suddenly I don't feel that safe here, even with that wall of beefcake between them and us."

"If it wasn't safe here, Corey and Markus wouldn't have put us here." Amanda re-assured her. "If you'd have come to his record signing at the mall with me, you'd have expected this. When Corey comes out, they're gonna freak out like it was 1963 and he was the Beatles. They're all going to go completely and absolutely insane, I shit you not."

"Holy shit." Cindy gulped.

"Hey, take it easy, lover!" Amanda laughed. "I can't believe you're so freaked out by this, after all the tough guys you've thrown out of the bar!"

Cindy got herself together with a conscious shake. "Yah, you're right, no use letting it get to me." She turned back to the stage and lifted the bottom of the curtain a couple of inches so she could watch the crew work. "It's just that I know what a mob can do. A lot of girls got hurt at Beatles concerts back in '63. Boys too."

A couple of girls leaning over the barricade started pointing at them, and yelling at the wall of security men: "How come they get to be inside? Huh? We should be able to lean on the stage too, dammit! What makes them so special?"

"We won the draw!" Amanda yelled at the girls.

"What draw? We never heard of no draw!" the girls yelled back.

"The draw for a free concert and dream date with Corey Michaels, in Boston a month ago!" Amanda yelled back.

This quieted the girls for a moment, but then one of the local police came over to see what was going on. As Connors and the policeman spoke into each other's ears the two girls in the crowd started chanting: "Throw the bitches out! Throw the bitches out!" and were joined by a few more in the crowd around them. Connors pointed out their 'Access All Areas' passes to the policeman, who nodded and turned to the two trouble makers in the crowd. He said something to them that Amanda couldn't hear, and they shut up so fast that the rest of the chanters fell silent as well.

Cindy and Amanda turned their backs to them in relief.

A few minutes later the lights suddenly went out, and the crowd exploded into screaming. The wall of noise continued as the curtain rose in the near-total darkness. It got even louder as a single blue spotlight came on, softly illuminating the keyboard player as he began the piano notes to the first song, one of the minor hits from Corey's second album.

Suddenly he was there. A white spotlight shone down on center stage, and Corey was standing there in the suit Cindy had given him, with no way for anyone to know how he'd gotten there without their noticing. He stood in a relaxed stance, his weight on his left foot and that hand in his pants pocket, his right hand holding a microphone and resting against his right thigh. His head was bowed about halfway, his eyes were closed, and a confident little smile played around the corners of his mouth. All the huge video screens lit with his image, a live feed from a telephoto video camera in the sound booth.

The crowd went insane, their noise suddenly twice as loud as before, almost frightening in intensity. Corey stood motionless as the rest of his band came in and more stage lights faded in, letting the waves of incredible crowd noise wash over him. He let it continue unabated past where he would normally have come in with the vocals, patiently waiting all the way through where the first verse would go.

Cindy and Amanda noticed something happening out of the corner of their eyes, and looked behind them. The front row of the crowd were all female, and crying, every one of them. Almost all were screaming hysterically at the top of their lungs. Many waved to Corey and tried vainly to get his attention, some waved their hands in front of them like children having a tantrum, some held their hands over their mouths and sobbed into them. The motion that had caught their attention was that of medical personnel pulling girls who had fainted out of the crowd. As they watched, another girl fainted and fell forward at the waist, banging her head on the middle rail of the barrier in her unconsciousness. She hung there, unable to fall the rest of the way over the barrier because her legs were pressed against it on the crowds' side by the pressure of the people behind her. A pair of paramedics were there in seconds to lift her over the rail and wheel her away on a stretcher.

With an amazed glance at each other, Cindy and Amanda turned back to Corey.

The noise had started to subside just a bit at the end of the first chorus, and Corey stood motionless until the beginning of the second verse. Then he lifted his microphone, and sang, moving nothing but that hand and his lips.

"If I could be with you, there's nothing I couldn't do..." He softly crooned.

Almost immediately the screaming suddenly stopped, leaving only the music and the sound of many females' crying, which almost seemed like silence after the noise of a moment before. They all listened intently to his singing, and watched him even more intently, and occasionally a girl was heard to cry out his name.

By now he seemed to be concentrating totally on the song, his expression coming gradually alive, and he seemed lost in the memory of a girl whose love he had lost, his lyrics begging her to return.

He slowly opened his eyes. Cindy and Amanda both felt he was looking right at them, both felt he was singing for her and her alone. It seemed like he sang most of his songs to them, though it was probably less than half. They were to later learn that every girl who ever attended a Corey Michaels concert felt that there had been at least one moment when Corey Michaels had looked right at her and sang for her alone, no matter how far back in the stands she was sitting.

The concert reviewer in the Vancouver Sun wrote the next day:

"Sometimes you see a concert that's magic. I've never seen a crowd of twenty thousand as completely under the spell of an artist as the one that attended the Corey Michaels concert at the Coliseum last night. He appeared more completely confident in his music, his band, and himself than this writer has ever seen him, and for Corey Michaels that's saying something. As a woman, I must admit that he held us all spellbound, our hearts in the palm of his hand, for over two hours. We all fell in love with him, and with his intimate, emotional music. He did three encores, and it's the only time I've seen a crowd persistent enough to bring the artist back on stage after the arena lights had come on. Corey had them turned off again, and came out and gave us one more. Then he went away and left us broken-hearted.

Special guests Claria were also excellent, and are well deserving of their new-found fame.

Attendance: Sold out.

Five stars out of five."

Neither Amanda nor Cindy even noticed when Markus first shook them by the elbows and shouted: "Come on!".

He shook them again, and shouted "Hey, we've gotta go!" They looked down at him for a moment, looked wistfully back up at Corey, who winked at them, and left to go upstairs with Markus. Their reluctance was palpable around them.

Amanda met the gaze of the girl who had yelled at them earlier, and to her surprise found no animosity there, only sadness, and a deep envy. It took her a moment to lip-read what the girl was saying to her:

"You're so lucky. You're so lucky..."

'And she thinks I've only won a date with him.' she thought to herself in wonder.

Back up at the control room they found that Maggie had already returned there. They said a quick 'Hi' to her before sitting down to watch the rest of the concert. Maggie was torn for a moment, half of her not wanting to miss a second of Corey's song, half of her wanting to give Markus a quick hug and kiss before he had to go again. Suddenly she jumped up and threw her arms around Markus' neck, kissing him frantically.

He kissed her for a few moments, then pushed her back a bit and grinned at her."

"Hey." he said to her softly. "I bet you were entertaining romantic thoughts about the boss, and now you're feeling guilty and unfaithful about it, right?"

She blushed crimson and nodded sheepishly.

"Hey, it's okay, I understand. The boss is pretty powerful when he's having a good night. Even I felt it a bit, the first show I worked for him, and I'm the most homophobic bastard in the universe."

This brought a smile to her face, which she raised to him, looking hopeful.

"It's okay, alright?" he asked her, and she hugged him close.

"I love you Markus." she whispered intensely in his ear.

"I know you do, Babe, I know you do. I love you too."

They hugged a few moments more, until he whispered: "I've gotta go. I'll be back after the set."

They shared one more quick kiss, and he turned to leave.

"Enjoy the show, okay?" he said at the doorway.

"I will." she smiled, and gave him a little wave as he passed from sight.

The sisters never noticed any of this, as they were entranced watching Corey, a state Maggie quickly re-joined.

When Corey said: "Goodnight Vancouver! Thank you!" and left the stage the first time, a chant began of "We want Corey! We want Corey!". People began lighting their lighters and holding them up in the darkness as the stage lights went out, first in ones and twos, then in hundreds, till the arena was a sea of ten thousand tiny flames.

The crowd went insane again when the stage lights came on and the band started playing 'Take My Romance', his first major hit from his first album. The screaming continued and peaked when Corey came out and sat on the edge of the drum riser, his shirt open and his jacket over his shoulder, striking the pose from the cover of 'Be My Lover' and the poster Amanda had fallen for. The crowd quieted as he started singing, and cheered madly when the band finished the song, and segued right into 'Be My Lover.'

Then he said goodnight again, and after he'd left the "We Want Corey' chant began again. It only seemed to get louder when the house lights came on, and people began stomping in time to the chant. Soon it seemed that everyone in the building was stomping as hard as they could in time with the chanting. The whole arena shook with it, and the girls couldn't help but wonder if the whole place was going to collapse.

A couple of minutes later the crowd began to rush the barrier in front of the stage. The security line held, but someone could be faintly heard screaming in pain all the way up at the control room.

Gradually, the house lights dimmed and went out again, and a thunderous cheer went up from the crowd. The stage lights lit, and Corey and the band came back out. The crowd cheered themselves ragged. Then they quieted as Corey sang a slow and haunting song about a man who loved a woman with his entire soul, but his lover had died.

There was a lot of crying as he finished the lyrics, and as the band played the ending he spoke quietly over his microphone.

"I love you all, but I have to go. I'll be out of the building when this song ends."

He waved to the crowd, blew a kiss up at the control room where he knew the girls were sitting, and was gone.

A subdued cheering went up, and continued while the band finished the song and walked offstage, waving. It quickly died when the house lights came up again, and the crowd began streaming towards the exits. In five minutes they were all gone.

None of the three women had spoken a word or moved a muscle when Markus returned for them, they continued to stare at the empty stage, reliving what they'd experienced.

"Hey ladies, snap out of it, time to go!" he called, snapping his fingers and grinning. The girls looked at each other with sheepish grins.

Markus turned to the young guard who had watched over them through the evening.

"You can go, Connors. Mr. Michaels said to say thanks. Good job."

"Thanks, Mr. Roberts. Tell Mr. Michaels it was my pleasure." he replied, and for the first time he allowed himself to smile as he looked at the beautiful young women he had guarded all night. "It's been a pleasure working with you." he told them, and left, taking the regular route down rather than the cat-walk.

"Hey Connors, the crew partying tonight?" Markus called after him through the door.

"Yah, in the visiting team dressing room. Mr. Michaels rented it for us for the night."

"Maybe we'll see you there later."

"Cool." they heard Connors' fading voice say.

"Well ladies, are you..." Markus said, turning back to the room, before Maggie melted into his arms and kissed him. Over her shoulder he could see Cindy and Amanda hugging and kissing. The sight caused him a few guilty, unfaithful thoughts himself, before he closed his eyes and concentrated on kissing Maggie. They kept an arm around each other as they turned to go, Amanda and Cindy right behind, holding hands.

There were two guards in the hallway outside Corey's dressing room, the same two that had guarded his dressing room in Spokane. The taller one's eyes lit in recognition upon seeing Cindy.

"Hey, I remember you!" he said suddenly. "I had to throw you out of the arena after the show in Spokane!"

"Don't worry about it, Mike." Markus told him with a smile and a shake of his head. "Just don't worry about it."

The three women giggled uncontrollably as he opened the door for them. They fell immediately silent as they got inside and saw Corey, who was lounging in an armchair and drinking a Budweiser.

"What's so funny?" he asked with an easy smile.

The three women simply stared at him for a moment, then Maggie shook her head and ran over to where Markus was rummaging in the small fridge, and plastered herself against him.

"Don't mind them, Boss." Markus laughed, straightening with a Coke in his hand. "They're still in the fog zone from the concert. You really got to 'em tonight, even Maggie here, which kinda surprised me. She's a country fanatic. Good show tonight, Boss, the best I've ever seen you do."

"Put some steel guitar in it, and you'd sell a million on the country charts too." Maggie said in Corey's general direction, her eyes closed as her hands roamed over Markus body unashamedly.

"Thanks. I was inspired tonight, that's for sure." Corey said with an easy smile, still watching Cindy and Amanda, who were still standing by the door staring at him.

"C'mon, my loves. Come here." he said gently, waving them over, still wearing the relaxed smile. They walked hesitantly over to him, and Amanda reached out gingerly to touch him like she was afraid he wasn't real.

"C'mon girls! I'm still the same guy I was three hours ago!" he laughed, taking one of their hands in each of his.

"After what I saw tonight, I can't believe this is real." Cindy breathed. "It seems so impossible that you would ever choose to be with me."

"Exactly." Amanda quietly agreed. "You were so beautiful tonight, Corey. You have more power of personality, more magnetism, than everyone else I know put together. I... I don't know what else to say." She was having trouble meeting his eyes.

A sad look passed over Corey's face. "This is why I never date my fans. When they come near me, they all turn into zombies. What you should say, is that you still love me. Love me, not worship me. Love I need, worship I can get anywhere."

This seemed to break the spell, and they piled into his lap, breaking into tears and telling him they loved him over and over.

"And I love you." he said, hugging them warmly.

"Oh, Corey... I'm so lucky I never saw your concert before I met you." Amanda murmured." "I'd have never had the courage to go through with it if I had."

"Lucky for me you didn't then." Corey told her, softly and seriously.

Suddenly Cindy sat up, her eyes blazing a bit.

"I can't believe you haven't released a live album, or a concert video!" she said, sounding a little angry. "Is everyone in your organization stupid, or what? They'd have to be if they think it wouldn't sell! You're like Peter Frampton, for Christ's sake! You're twice as good live as you are in the studio!

"Look, you record a concert video, get the best video crew there is for the production and the audio recording, you let me and Amanda design the promotion campaign, and I guarantee, I absolutely guarantee, that in six months you'll have sold more of them than the rest of your albums and videos put together! I'd bet my life on it, no shit!"

Corey stared at her in surprise for a moment, while Amanda slowly sat up from hugging him.

"She's right. I would also, quite literally, bet my life on it. 'Cuz it's a sure thing." she told him from a distance of four inches. Then she gave him a kiss, and relaxed against his chest again.

Corey glanced over at Markus in wonder.

"They're right, Boss. Never thought about it before, not my department, but they're right. In the studio you're very, very good, but when you're live," he shrugged and took a swig from his coke, "When you're live, you're magic."

"Hmm..." Corey mused, then reached into his pocket for his phone, speed-dialed a number. "Carl? Yah, it's Corey. Corey! Yah, go ahead." He held the phone away from his head for a moment, saying: "The crew's already partying. Can't hear a damn thing till he gets out in the hall. Okay Carl, do we record any of the video feeds? No? Do we have the gear to do it? Okay, rent us what we need for the next show, for all the feeds, and a couple of good hand held cams too. Oh, and tell Joe to rent us a sixty four track digital recorder for Tuesday as well. Yup, we're recording the whole show, audio as well, and if we don't get what we want we'll record the next show too, and so on till we've got what we want. Tell everyone involved there's big bonuses for them if this works out the way I think it will. Yes, I said big bonuses. Yes I'm sure! I know I've never said 'big' before, I know what I'm doing! Okay, later. Yah, we've gotta schmooze tonight, but we might pop in for a minute after. Okay, bye."

He tucked his phone back in his pocket.

"Your wish, my ladies, is my command."

"I can't believe you just did that, on our say so, just like that!" Amanda exclaimed in amazement. "Oh God, if I wasn't afraid of ruining my dress, I'd come right now!"

They all got a chuckle out of that.

"It is very exciting when you're completely decisive like that." Cindy told him. "But what's the thing with the 'big bonuses'?"

Markus answered for him. "The boss pays our crew better than any artist out there, so he doesn't give bonuses very often. Twice so far, as a matter of fact. Once when the staff of the arena we were at was on strike, he gave the whole crew a thousand dollar bonus each to cross the picket line and do the arena staff's jobs as well as their own. The other time there was a bridge washed out and we had to make a three hour detour. He told 'em he'd give 'em a bonus if they got him onstage by nine forty. We made it with four minutes to spare, and he gave us each a thousand bucks." He paused to finish the rest of his coke. "He's never said 'Big bonuses'. As a matter of fact, I bet right about now..."

He walked over to the door and opened it.

The guard he'd called Mike asked: "Yes Mr. Roberts?"

"Shhh..." Markus said, smiling and holding a finger to his lips.

Faintly they could hear the sounds of partying drifting down the hall. A few seconds later a huge cheer went up, and continued for most of a minute. Markus closed the door.

"They're about eighty feet down the hall and behind two fire doors. I think they'll be motivated enough to do a little extra recording work." he told them with a grin.

"It's worth it." Corey stated. "I'd rather not have a video crew I'm not familiar with running around telling us how to do our show so they can record it. My crew are very capable, and for a big bonus you can bet that they'll learn everything there is to know about shooting a concert video. More importantly, they already know my show, inside and out to the millisecond, and by using my own crew I can tape as many nights as we need, until we're absolutely satisfied with the results. We'll deal with post-production after we're satisfied with the footage. The sound track will be no problem, I'll edit it and re-mix it myself. The only thing up in the air is who'll run the hand held cameras, since they won't be able to do that and one of the existing jobs at the same time."

"We could do it." Cindy stated. "Me and Amanda. That way we could get some good backstage footage and stuff as well, without having a stranger in your dressing room. We've got two days to familiarize ourselves with the cameras, and I think we know as well as anyone how to capture the essence of your... your magic I guess. If we don't like the footage, we can always get someone else to do it for the next show."

"It's your baby." Corey chuckled. "I'm sure you'll do a great job."

"You know," Amanda told him with a sly little smile, "It sure sounds like they're having a lot of fun down the hall there. Why don't we go down there for a while?"

"Before the schmooze? Sure, why not?" Corey agreed. "It'll save some driving. I'll take Markus' report, and we'll head down there."

"All right." Markus began, clearing his thoughts. "We had twelve audience injuries and three staff injuries tonight. Only one serious, a girl got her leg broken pretty badly when they rushed the rail. She'll be in the hospital for a few days.

"There were a few hundred counterfeit tickets caught at the gates, but judging by the overcapacity, only about a dozen got in. And it looks like we've pretty much dealt with the scalping problem.

"There was a run on the merchandise after the show, and we're sold out, and I mean sold out on everything. We're..."

"Good God!" Cindy exclaimed. "You didn't play Seattle, so that means you must've sold... over forty thousand T-shirts tonight! Over thirty thousand CDs! There was only twenty thousand people here tonight!"

"Pretty impressive, huh?" Corey said, rubbing his chin. "But we should let Markus finish his report."

"I'm impressed." Markus told her. "You know all the numbers on this whole operation?"

"Yup." Cindy affirmed. "But sorry I interrupted. Go ahead."

"Anyway, we've got a double order of everything coming in for Tuesday, and it should be here in plenty of time.

"The storm's blown out to sea, and it looks like it'll be smooth sailing heading down to Portland.

"That's it."

"Hmm." Corey thought to himself for a moment. "I'll visit the girl with the broken leg tomorrow, and do some promo. Book me an interview at the radio station that plays me here, and I'll try to say something that'll help keep the crowd under control next time.

"Find something to pad the barriers with, something slippery, that should cover most of the injury potential.

"Get Cindy up to speed on the counterfeit ticket thing. I'm sure between the two of you, you can get to the bottom of it.

"Give all the front line security guys a five hundred bonus and a bottle of their favorite, they earned it tonight. Thank God we got the girls out of there. Cards and thank yous to the local cops and medics that were down there too, and a donation to the police and paramedics funds, whatever they call them here, ten grand each.

"That should do it." Corey finished.

"Check." Markus acknowledged. "I'll head down to the party and pave the way for you, or they'll mob you like the fans, the mood they're in. See you down there in a few minutes."

"Okay." Corey agreed as Markus and Maggie left.

They just sat and cuddled for a few moments, before Amanda sat up and spoke, somewhat hesitantly.

"About what we talked about earlier. About how we're going to present our relationship." She paused, and seemed to gather her courage to continue. "I love you both. I don't want to have to hide that. I want to be able to hug you and kiss you whenever I want, and I don't care who knows it."

Corey turned to Cindy. "It's your strategy. What do you think?"

"Look, Amanda," Cindy told her, "When we're in public, and that means everyone but Markus and Maggie, you can't give me any obviously sexual tongue kisses. Don't give any to Corey at the same time I am either, but other than that it's fine. You can't rub my pussy or my tits, and if you touch my ass it has to look very casual. You can touch Corey anyway you would with any other boyfriend. You can hug me or give me a quick kiss, rub my back or touch my legs. It's okay if everyone knows we're healthily uninhibited, very comfortable with ourselves and each other, and share a very close relationship among the three of us as friends and band mates. It's okay if it looks like we both have the hots for Corey, and are very close as sisters. Just don't do anything sleazy, okay? We'll have lots of private time to have fun later."

"Okay Cindy. That makes sense, I guess." Amanda admitted. "It's just that when a girl's in love, she wants to be able to proudly show it off a bit, you know?"

"I know, babe. I feel it too." Cindy said as she leaned forward to hug Amanda. "But we have to deal with the necessities of reality."

"I know." Amanda said, then brightened. "Well, let's go party!"

They left the crew party at twelve thirty, and were feeling pretty tipsy by the time they left the record company's party at two thirty in the morning. They dropped Markus and Maggie off at the airport hotel, and it was three-thirty before the limo left them at the plane. They'd been laughing and giggling at one silly thing or another since they got in the car. Corey dug out his keys and handed them to Cindy, then picked both her and Amanda up in his arms and carried them over to the plane. She entered the security code in the keypad beside the door without asking what it was, then unlocked the door, and heaved on the handle to unlatch. Corey had to take a little side step when she pulled on the handle, then stepped out of the way of the door as it settled down on it's struts, becoming stairs.