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Prologue

There comes a time in every man’s life where he must face his demons

It sounds cliché, I know

But I break the mold

Because I’ve faced my demons

In the flesh

And I’ve won

But it’s the ones inside your head that don’t die

They keep living

My personal deotten worse since the incident

They’ve gro

They own me

When I was fifteen years old, I made a deal with the Devil—or at least one of his spokeswomen—on the muddy red banks of Lake Shasta, California I wanted talent, faain They gaveI ever wanted I joined a band called Hybrid, uitarist, and propelled the band into stardoalore (no, not Honor Black

Including the final thing My final wish That Hybrid go down in history

We did There was a azine to cover the whole event Our last tour (unbeknownst to anyone but , beautiful, and our biggest fan

Da it all She recorded it all

And, somehow, she saved me

First it giveth, then it taketh away The band broke up The unthinkable happened People died

I should have died

This was all supposed to end before I turned twenty-eight

Yet I lived Dawn lived

And I was given another chance at life To live free of the Devil’s shadow To live my life the way it should be lived

I really should be the luckiest SOB on the planet The fates that took away Morrison and Joplin and Hendrix—that wasn’t my fate after all

Somehoon

But victory is as bitter as the Quaaludes on ue How can I really live with myself when my whole life has been loaned? I lost the people closest to me They died, they suffered, for my selfishness

How dare I be allowed to go on, to run free, when I brought this upon them and myself

And so I haven’t

I’m not free

My na members of the metal band, Hybrid I’m about to embark on my first solo tour, to be the rock star I was always meant to be

But so out of this alive

And neither is she

Chapter One

Sage

April, 1975

The pink lips at the end of my dick were some of the nicest I’d ever seen

But the chick’s tits were even better

I put ainst her forehead and pushed her head back until my dick bobbed out of her wet mouth

“Lie down,” I told her “On your back Grab your tits and get ready for me”

I was being co and a bit of an ass

It wasn’t like me

But nothing was like me lately

And I didn’t really care

She did as I asked She was a pretty young thing, a few years above jailbait, with long brown hair she probably ironed every day I didn’t re I just called her ‘Babe’

I called the other one ‘Sugar’ Sugar had Farrah Fawcett hair, blond and teased and frosted like a cake Sugar was in the same Detroit hotel roohiirl style All she needed was a hat in her hand Tricky was even htly cocktail of vodka, beer, and cocaine Soh, anted to

Two chicks at once: every ar and Babe were good friends, or so it see in the free love that was still trickling in fro naked, and they didn’t hold back when theywhen Tricky told Sugar to get her fingers up in Babe’s bush Naturally, they were fans of Hybrid, before I had basically killed the band Killed Mickey Brown, Bob our bus driver, and Graha that didn’t count Everything else made me bleed

The singer, Robbie, my best friend, wouldn’t speak to me Noelle, our bassist, was still mentally ill from what happened

I didn’t need to be rear or Babe would open their mouths and wax on about howheart It never stopped hurting So the next best thing was to fuck the shit out of theet et

I was getting there I was getting there

Babe pushed her ether, and I squeezedback inabout What I wanted Just vibes buzzing along, nerves on fire, space travel inside your head