The Friendship Song by Nancy Springer Page B

Behind the big red platform was a wall with a huge circle design that kept turning, turning, white and black and black and white. The music was like the circle, it just went around and around, and kept coming.
    We said, Hey, Daddy, we’re not about to die
    â€™Cause living is the truth and death is a lie .
    So rock it, rock it, just rock it on by ,
    Big wheel turns and the stars keep burning .
    It was like they were playing just for themselves, or us. We could have any seat we wanted, front row if we wanted, because there was nobody in the audience. Everybody was onstage.
    We didn’t sit down, though, but just stood staring.
    â€œThis is so intense,” Rawnie whispered. “They are so hot .”
    â€œHot as Neon Shadow.”
    â€œHotter!”
    Some of them were on the riser with the drummer and his congas and cymbals and things, they were up there playing wild fills and fast runs like guitar gods on a mountaintop, and some of them were all around the red—I knew it was the red car—on keyboard and sax and tambourines, and they were all young, they were all rocking, they were all beautiful one way or another. But it wasn’t so much their faces or the way they moved or the way they were dressed that made me want to scream and faint and turn inside out. Or even the way they sang, though they were singing like fire. It was just that they were so alive.
    I blurted at Rawnie or whatever would listen, “These are dead dudes? These can’t be dead people.”
    They weren’t ghosts or anything like that. They looked as solid as I was. Yet they weren’t quite real, I knew that. They were too perfect. The lead singer, the one at the center mike, he had a face like a bad angel. He was like a baby-faced desperado, an outlaw throwing his body at the world, but there was something about him that made me think of an orphan at the same time, like I wanted to take him and cuddle him and calm him down and make him smile.
    â€œThey’re dead, all right,” Rawnie said softly. “Because there’s Elvis, and he’s young again.”
    â€œOh, my God.” Now I understood why people had cried when he died. “That’s Elvis?”
    â€œYepper.”
    â€œOh, my God. Who are these other guys, then? Who’s the one in glasses?”
    â€œI don’t know.”
    â€œBuddy Holly,” said a quiet voice behind us. “Hornrims and a Stratocaster. There’s never been anybody quite like him.”
    The band roared, “Rock it! Rock it! Rock it on by.…”
    Already—even before I turned around—I knew. And there he stood, right next to me. Nico Torres.
    â€œBecause living is the truth and death is a lie.”
    But it wasn’t all of Nico, really. He was half made of air. I could see through him. The rest of him was still unconscious in a hospital bed.
    â€œNico!” Rawnie and I both screeched.
    â€œYou know me?” His face was a lot like Rawnie’s, dark and beautiful and real quiet whenever he was not singing. It hardly moved even when we screamed at him. I could tell he was surprised, though. “Who are you guys? So far nobody knows me here.”
    â€œWe’re not from here!” Rawnie had to do the explaining, because I was having trouble getting my mouth coordinated enough to talk. “We came to find you and take you back with us.”
    â€œWhy?” He hardly even seemed interested. His eyes were on the band, and he said, “My God, look at Hendrix bend those strings.”
    â€œBecause we love you,” Rawnie said. “We think you’re the greatest.”
    He didn’t even smile, just said, “I’m not. These guys are the greatest. Hendrix taught the whole world how to turn on the juice. So did Elvis, he took rock music out of its little black box and turned it loose. And Morrison, look at him grooving with his shirt off, he was half-crazy, he died young and stupid, but he