Member-only story
THAT COULD HAVE BEEN US
The true story of a tragic club fire that never happened
“Stumpy’s gonna breathe fire.”
“Do what?”
“Yeah, Stumpy’s gonna breathe fire. On stage.”
A long pause. We stare at the road.
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Well, we don’t exactly know how he’s gonna do it yet, but there’s that middle part in ‘Godzilla’ where it’s just drums and shouting in Japanese and I think that’s when he’s gonna do it.”
“Aw man, cool! But wait, how’s he gonna do it?”
“Not sure. If you watch someone do that shit, Gene Simmons or one of those guys, they’re just spitting something on a flame and it makes the flame get huge. They don’t really breathe fire y’know.”
“Wait, hold up, so he’s gotta play drums, handle an open flame, put something flammable in his mouth, and then…well, let’s stop there. How?”
Another long pause. A swig of biting, sterile, bottom-shelf bourbon. I swerve to avoid a skunk.
“I dunno. This wasn’t my idea.”
“Jesus god. He’ll kill us all. You know that, right? Jesus. He’s gonna kill us. He’s fucking insane.”
I spent the rest of the hour-and-a half-drive from Louisville to Lexington trying to calm the nerves of Billy the Road Guy, whose last name no one knew, but who could carry an entire half-stack cabinet under his right arm. The logistics of fire-breathing were a minor problem, but Stumpy was a solid drummer and had the limb independence to do what was needed with one hand as long as someone handed him an open flame. We figured out you could light regular drum mallets, the Energizer bunny kind, and keep those going for a while. He was unlikely to kill us with just those.
Then there was the question of the flammable substance; the one that Stumpy (not his real name or even his real nickname) would actually blow onto the open flame. Evolution had worked well enough to keep any of us from suggesting gasoline. But kerosene was seriously discussed, because, as I recall it, we had solicited opinions from area musicians who did it in the ’60s, and that’s what they said they used. He could kill us, or at least himself…
