Friendship always benefits; love sometimes injures.
Seneca
An autistic woman walks into a bar with her reusable water bottle clutched to her chest like a stainless-steel security blanket. She is immediately assaulted by noise so loud she can feel it in the soles of her feet, crawling up into her stomach, her chest, her head. This gay bar is dimly lit, too much so, for the autistic woman does not feel safe in the crowded darkness. The assault of sound, booming and vicious, is too much of a shock, and she begins to panic. The autistic woman is me, and my first time at a bar is filled with anxiety and fear and a non-attentive, manipulative girlfriend.
My girlfriend, M, introduces me to her friends, some of whom are drag kings in tonight’s show. I smile politely and make dreaded small talk. One of M’s friends, Dean, notices me shaking and gives me a questioning look, concerned. I smile and nod like everything is okay when it clearly isn’t. They are satisfied with my fake-ass assurance and continue talking and laughing with friends. I feel a hand that is not M’s touch my lower back as someone walks by me. By the time I turn around, my eyes meet a sea of strangers; the hand that touched me could belong to any one of them. A shiver makes its way up my spine, giving me goosebumps. I am now on the defense, prepared to smack the next hand that reaches out to me. I don’t like strangers touching me. I shift my water bottle in my grasp, and it is all I can do not to cause a scene and embarrass M. I am shaking with fear, but under the dim lighting, no one else notices—not even my girlfriend. I have not the heart to tell her.
A woman, the mother of one of the drag performers, comes up to M and I. She hugs M and turns to me. When M does not introduce us, instead turning her attention back to the show, this stranger-woman touches my shoulder, rubs it in what she must think is a reassuring way, and says something to me. I shake my head, not hearing her. She has to yell into my ear this time to make herself heard above the loud music. She still caresses my shoulder.
“Don’t you know, honey?” she starts, almost condescendingly. “You can’t bring outside drinks into a bar. You’ll get kicked out if they see you with that.” She points to my water bottle.
“But this is just water!” I shout back in response.
“Sure, it is, honey.” I wish she would stop calling me honey and take her fucking hand off my shoulder.
At her warning, though, I am afraid. I don’t want to get kicked out because that would ruin my girlfriend’s night. I look around, trying to discern bar employees from customers from performers. I don’t know who an employee is and who isn’t. I turn to M, but she is across the bar talking to people I don’t know. I walk over and ask if she can put my water bottle in her car. She pulls me aside and asks, “Right now?” and I nod my head. She sighs and takes my water bottle out to the car. When she leaves, I am alone, arms crossed over my chest, knowing no one and unwilling to speak to anyone out of anxiety and fear. The music is loud and harsh in my ears, like Taiko drums beating in tandem with my every breath.
While I stand to the side, watching other people as much out of curiosity as out of fear, I think about M’s friends and wonder why she is even dating someone like me. She told them this is my first time at a bar, and instantly her friends’ eyes lit up, excitedly offering to buy me drinks. I declined, again and again, until they finally gave up asking. They actually called me a party pooper, which I thought was an elementary school insult. M comes back inside and walks right past me towards the bar. She joins me by a table sipping something in a plastic cup. Everything smells like sweat and alcohol and sickly-sweet perfume.
The drag show begins, and it features one person dancing to music while others watch and cheer them on. Audience members throw money at the performer. The drag king walks off stage and dances seductively on random audience members, sometimes touching them—not inappropriately, but playfully—sometimes not. I shrink back into the dim lighting, my back against the wall. I am terrified of having the spotlight shine on me and being touched by a stranger. The drag king makes their way towards M and me. She offers several dollar bills, but I stay glued against the wall, unmoving.
I think about leaving. I really do. My apartment is just a few blocks down the street; I’ve walked longer distances than that. I could be safe in my bed within 10 minutes. I could be asleep in 20. I choose to stay, though, because I am afraid of walking home alone in the dark, defenseless. Besides, M has my water bottle in her car. I don’t want to leave anything of mine with her. I suffer the night out, losing track of how long the drag show lasts. In the meantime, I am bombarded with sound. My head is wrapped inside music notes, beating, drumming, struggling to stay breathing underneath the crush of noise. I lean my back against the wall and slump my shoulders. In the dark of the bar, I close my eyes and try to calm myself down by counting my breaths.
After an indeterminate amount of time, the drag show ends, and my girlfriend drives me home. As soon as we are parked in front of my apartment gates, I burst into tears. The buildup of anxiety and fear and worry has finally spilled over the top of my head: I am ugly crying, sucking in breaths between cries, the only sounds amid the quietness of a late summer evening. In the car, my girlfriend smells like sweat and alcohol, and I feel like puking.
When I can finally explain what’s wrong, she swears, telling me how bad of a partner she is, how shitty and inconsiderate she’s been, how she doesn’t deserve someone like me and that I deserve better. Only part of what she says is true: I do deserve better, but at that moment I refuse to believe it. In that moment, I live in bad faith, in a love covered in emotional abuse that only time will mend. With all her words, she fails to truly apologize to me. Instead, I am the one apologizing—for what, I do not know. I leave her car without kissing her goodnight and unlock my apartment gate in silence. Once out of sight from M, I vomit that day’s lunch in the grass.
It has been over a year since I’ve gone out to do things other than grocery shopping or picking up medications at the pharmacy. I have avoided doing anything “for fun” not only because many places have been closed (and are only now beginning to re-open), but because I was afraid of getting COVID-19. If I’m being honest, I’m still afraid of contracting the virus, although I am vaccinated against it. Nevertheless, I do have more confidence in going out into the world now than I did a year ago. So, when my friend invites me to a live music show featuring our high school classmates, I agree to go and support them. It is only after I agree to go that I find out the music venue is a bar.
My friend Jon and I arrive at The Rebel Lounge at 6:30PM. The parking lot is small, and all the spaces are filled, so we park on the curb. By the time the show starts, cars will have parked back-to-back all along the sidewalk, snaking south into the adjacent neighborhood. Jon and I walk up to the front door where there is a laminated sign saying, “Masks are STRONGLY RECOMMENDED.” The door itself is locked and won’t open until 7:00PM. We sit and smoke in the car while we wait. Thirty minutes later, we join the line outside the door, and it doesn’t take long for it to start moving. Jon takes out his phone to show the employee at the door our tickets. We get green wristbands since we’re over twenty-one and make our way into the building. The lighting is dim, backlit by red-colored spotlights shining on an empty stage. Several people are inside already, nursing cups of beer.
Jon goes to the bar and orders a cup of Blue Moon. He has me try a sip since I’ve never had beer before. It’s fruity and orangey but has an underlying taste that I don’t quite like. I pop a piece of mint gum into my mouth to counter the bad aftertaste. After sitting for about fifteen minutes, we realize that the show doesn’t start at 7:00PM. The doors open at that time, but the show will begin later. We sit at a table in the back for a while longer, and I use the time to take in my surroundings. It’s not as loud as I expected, although music is only playing over the speakers. People mingle with each other, drinking and laughing. I feel foreign here: I’m the only person not drinking and laughing. Instead, I am observing. This is my second time at a bar, and I actually feel okay about it. I am grateful for this. I don’t know if it’s because my senses aren’t completely overwhelmed, or if it’s because I’m with a friend who actually seems to care how I’m feeling.
When Jon finishes his beer, we move to the front of the venue to get a good standing spot before the show starts. We see our high school classmates arrive, the ones who make up three quarters of the Noiseboys, and walk over to greet them. We catch up with each other, talk about what each of us has been doing since high school. Another classmate of ours, Camille, joins us. I do not remember how to make conversation after a year spent mostly at home, and no one tries very hard to include me in it, for which I am glad. I don’t mind standing and listening, at least for a while, because I hate small talk. It feels inauthentic. Already I can feel my social battery starting to drain, and the show hasn’t even begun yet. I pour myself a cup of water and take some Klonopin to help ease my nerves.
In my peripheral vision, I see the first band setting up their equipment onstage. Before the show starts, I use the restroom. Once I fix my shirt in the mirror, tucking in the front like the plaid-wearing bisexual I am, I take two draws from my vape, knowing the THC will help me relax quicker. Someone opens the restroom door and the blaring boom of someone speaking into a microphone spills into the air. I cannot make out what is said, but I feel every word. The music starts, and from the bottom of my feet I can feel the bass thumping. I feel a deep rumble throughout my entire body and it not uncomfortable. The sound crawls, climbing up from my feet, my knees and my thighs, until it settles in the middle of my chest like a purring cat. I put in silicone earplug-like things that filter out most of the noise, making it less overwhelming, less stressful. I take a deep breath and walk out onto the floor to join my friends.
During one of the bands’ performances, I mostly watch the audience—not because I don’t enjoy the show, but because I am so very fascinated by them. Never having been to a concert or a live show before, I take in my surroundings voraciously, committing everything to memory lest it be forgotten by tomorrow morning. The music makes people come alive, swaying and jumping and headbanging, moving together as one live entity. I look at the people around me and admire their collective movement. It is commanding, something live and beating, and it rocks, back and forth, up and down, pushing and pulling like waves. I even begin to move myself, if tapping a foot to the beat of the drums counts.
I look to my left at Jon and Camille and see that they, too, are coming alive, moving their bodies against the backdrop of sound. I am content to watch everyone move to the music, though I don’t do the same. I have a different experience, an internal one. The others, the body-swayers and the movers, show externally how live music affects them. It must be such a raw and lively experience that their whole bodies have no choice but to move in response to this drumming, beating musical stimuli. For me, though, it is different. The only way I can describe it is that it’s like fireworks are going off inside my brain, electric sparks that flicker and flash in every color imaginable. I am completely covered in sound and song, inside and out. I feel the music deep within me, a low buzz, a euphoric hum that vibrates against me, through me. I close my eyes and focus on the feeling of music, a welcome feeling. I stand still compared to the crowd around me, but inside, my body is abuzz with stimulation. I feel as though my entire body is vibrating, humming. I am unabashedly alight with static and rapture in a way only live music can make me.
By the end of the night, I am overstimulated in the best possible way. I do not feel like puking in the grass, and I definitely don’t feel like bursting into tears. Despite being very anxious about tonight, I enjoyed myself. I haven’t been to a public event in so long that going out feels different and new, like drinking in a restaurant or driving a car for the first time. A year and a few months are far too long to go without such social interaction, even for an introvert like me. I nearly fall asleep in Jon’s car while he drives me home. When I am finally nestled in bed, I fall asleep quickly. For the next two days I am exhausted and completely spent, but it was so, so worth it.
Wayward Musings 