Read Destroy for Free Online Page B

her, handing her another envelope, this one marked with a black X on the front of it.
    â€œNo way! No fucking way!” she screams, sliding out the two backstage passes to the same concert. “I’m gonna meet Bowie! Holy shit!” Jumping right at me, she throws her arms around my neck and squeezes me so hard that my cigarette pops out of my fingers. “Thank you so much, sweetheart! Thank you!”
    I grab her shoulders and kiss her on the cheek and move her off me, tears running from her eyes, and I say, “Happy birthday, Nina,” then rub the cigarette out with my foot.
    Nina wipes her eyes and goes, “How did you get these?”
    â€œCome on,” I tell her, dumping the rest of my beer down my throat. “I know a lot of fucking people, darling. A lot of well-connected people.”
    Nina wipes her eyes again and says, “You are amazing sometimes, James. Absolutely brilliant.”
    â€œAnd feel free to take whoever you want.”
    â€œReally?”
    â€œYeah. I’m out of town that night, so go ahead and take anyone, just not Brian.”
    She sticks out her tongue, and I dig out my coke and look for a surface to cut out a line. I end up grabbing a picture off a computer desk of some dude white-water rafting.
    â€œYou want some of this?” I ask her.
    â€œYou know I don’t do that shit, darling.” She puts the tickets and passes into her purse and goes, “That’s another reason why me and you would never work out. I hate watching you kill yourself with that shit.”
    â€œHey, ya know, I was actually thinking the other day about how much of this I do and came to the conclusion that it’s really not that I love doing coke all that much anymore, it’s more like I don’t dislike it enough to quit.” Pause. “It’s kinda like being a Rolling Stones fan still.”
    â€œRight,” she laughs.
    I take a seat on the edge of this messy bed and dump some coke on the picture and start grinding the chunks down when the bedroom door bursts open and in walks the same dude from the picture I’m using as a surface, wearing a PBR trucker hat and a NOFX T-shirt.
    â€œWhat the fuck is going on in here?” he wants to know.
    â€œWe’re having a private party,” I snort back. “Wanna join?”
    â€œFuck you, tweaker. I don’t know you two.”
    â€œSo what, man? We don’t know you, either.”
    â€œSo what made you think you could come into my room without permission and do drugs off my shit?”
    I get to my feet and go, “Relax, man. We’re not gonna take anything.” I look around the room. “It wouldn’t even be worth our time.” Pause. “We didn’t know the room was off-limits.”
    â€œBullshit. There was a huge sign on the door.”
    â€œYeah, but really, man,” I say with a grin. “What’s in a sign, ya know?”
    â€œOh, shit. A smart-ass.” The dude swipes at the picture, knocking it and all the coke on it out of my hands. “I want you two out,” he says.
    â€œDon’t be a dick.”
    â€œDon’t tell me what to do in my own room,” he snorts, jabbing a finger into my chest.
    â€œDude.” I shove him back. “Don’t ever touch me again.”
    Nina jumps in between us. She shouts, “Stop it!” Then she turns to me. “James, let’s just leave the room. It’s not a big deal.”
    â€œHey, totally fine with me.”
    â€œSo go,” the dude rips.
    Nina yanks me past him, me grinning at him the whole time. She pulls me out of the room and back up the stairs and into the living room, where I run right into Tim and Jessica, this rad married couple I met when my homies Sebastian, Lena, Chloe, and I took a road trip up to Seattle to see the Murder City Devils get back together for two last shows.
    â€œOh, shit,” I say. “What the hell are two well-put-together,