I could never do the groupie thing, she realised as she watched the screaming, waving throng. A little jumping, lots of cheering, some singing along, plenty of clapping, that was about the extent of it. Perhaps it just wasn’t in her to offer such devotion to a celebrity, rock star or not; she certainly could not imagine crying along to live performances the way she’d seen people do on those concert DVDs.
But oh it would be so awkward to have eye contact and not even pretend to be excited, she mused. The organisers had very kindly put the media box right up front, just slightly to the right of the stage. If she stayed where she was, at the nearest corner, she had an unbelievable view of the band. I wonder, she thought, if they would be insulted to see me merely bobbing along to the music – she didn’t even know the words.
Then Daughtry came on. When she caught the guitarist’s eye, she waved. It felt a little weird, but not as weird as she imagined it would be if he looked in her direction and saw her just standing there, unmoving. They sang one of their hit singles and she realised she knew at least some of the words. So she shouted along like everyone else. When she didn’t know every word, she guessed or made some of it up. It wasn’t like they could hear her anyway.
She cheered – at least that came naturally; she jumped when everyone jumped; and she waved whenever one of the band looked her way. She was tired from being on her feet for so long, she was definitely thirsty, but she wasn’t going to give up her vantage point. She could feel herself getting stickier as the minutes ticked by, though the slight drizzle helped a little bit. And she didn’t even mind when other equally sweaty people bumped into her.
What do you know, she thought, as she began waving along to one of the songs, I’m actually having a pretty good time. She wouldn’t say she was a huge fan; she liked some of their songs, sure, but really, she was there because she had a media pass and she wanted to check out their live gigs. Well, they were awesome. The view from where she was definitely helped. She wished all event organisers treated the media this well and she counted it a great night out, even when she had to walk all the way up the entrance ramp to the carpark on Level Three because it was past midnight and the entrances into the shopping centre were locked.
