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Otherside Bananas
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A man on a road, going absolutely nowhere.

This bloody traffic.... Spike stretched up in his convertible, trying to see an end to the standstill somewhere in the distance. No such luck. He fell back in his seat with a curse and checked his watch. 5:pm? "They're gonna kill me," he muttered. Try-outs had surely ended by now. Oh well. They won't make any final decisions 'til I get there.

Leaning back in his seat, Spike ran both hands through his stylishly shaggy white hair. Should he call them, see how it'd gone? Nah. Might get Anya on the line. Don't have the energy for that one.

He waited for a second. The cars in front of him waited, too. How long had he been sitting here? Long enough that twiddling his thumbs was starting to lose its luster. And he didn't have anything to read. With a resigned sigh, he turned on the radio. It was a testament to how long he'd been sitting here that his boredom had overridden his hatred of the radio and it's regular fare.

Apparently, his desperation was not going to be rewarded. He winced when the far too cheerful voice filled the car. Dammit. It is Drive-Home time, isn't it?

"...with her new single, "Fairy Tale!" "Fairy Tale" is the second single off Kennedy's new album, "All About Me," which reached #5 on the Billboard charts this week. This is me telling every last one of you to go out there and buy it right now! It's totally great!" There was a pause for breath. The first. "For those of you just tuning in, this is WXMR, SideStream Radio, and I'm Janice Lee. Now, how 'bout dat punk! This is the Angels & Devils' brand new song, the title track to the equally new album, "Made to Love You," which should be hitting all the cool record stores next month. Here it is, "Made to Love You!" Spike groaned. Can I not escape this shit?

With absolutely no pause for silence, the crashing guitars, drums, and vocals filled the car (which was open, so they kind of leaked).

"MAKE IT BETTER-- YOU COULD NEVER-- LOVE ME AS I AM. SO I'D BETTER MAKE ME BETTER, ALL SO THAT YOU CAN! IF I WAS MADE TO LOVE YOU YOU COULD LOVE ME, RIGHT?? IF I MADE MYSELF TO LOVE YOU, IT COULD TURN OUT RIGHT!"

"Great rhyme, you git!" Spike shouted over the din. "'Cause nothing in the English language sounds like 'RIGHT!'"

Several of his fellow grildlockees gave him funny looks through car windows, but the singer ignored him. "CHANGE MY FACE, I'D CHANGE MY HAIR, YOU CAN TELL ME WHAT TO WEAR AND WHAT TO DO ALL TO MAKE YOU LOVE ME! MADE TO LOVE YOU. I AM-- MADE TO LOVE YOU!"
The guitarist launched into an 'impressive' solo. Spike flipped the radio off in disgust. Noise. It was all just noise, nowadays. When he realized what he'd just thought, Spike sunk down in his seat with another groan. God, I sound like my father. But it was the truth. Everything was disguising something. If the guitars were poor, they loaded up the drums. If the lyrics didn't make any bloody sense, they just amped the volume so you couldn't tell what the hell they were saying.

"Posers," he muttered. He'd already gotten an advanced copy of Angels & Devils' album. He and the rest of XCOD had had a little listening/mocking party. Xander's favorite had been 'I Only Have Eyes for You,' quite possibly the sappiest song to hit the punk scene since the onset of the genre. The ponce of a vocalist even got choked up right in the middle. The brunette had laughed for at least half an hour before Devon had whapped him one.

Spike rubbed a hand over his face when he thought of the wayward frontman. Asshole. Half the group gone in one fell swoop. That's the kind of shit that'll fuck a band right over. At least I can count on Oz and Xander not to pull something like that.

@ @ @

"I don't believe this! I leave you two alone for one day, and you turn us into a girl band??"

Xander held his hands up disarmingly. "Dude, if you wanted a say, you should have been at tryouts."

Oz nodded. "You really should have been at tryouts."

Spike gestured emphatically. "It wasn't my fault. The entire interstate was backed up. Some bloody great banana was layed across the whole road." He collapsed into one of the chairs in the small office, rubbing his head.

Xander was momentarily distracted. "A what?"
"Giant. Fucking. Inflatable. Banana. Some wanker'd cut one of the cables. Traffic was backed up for miles."

The brunette tried to picture this. "Heheh. That's kinda cool."

Oz nudged him. "Focus."

Xander nodded seriously and conciously removed his grin.

"We're keeping the girls. They were the best we saw. By far. Plus, Willow sent them, if that says anything," Oz shot Spike a look that clearly said that since it was his fiancé being discussed, it better damn well mean something. Xander continued. "Dawn, the drummer, is better than Parker ever was. And the vocals~" He shook his head. "Man, for a blonde, that woman's got some serious issues. I think they fit our image."

"Lots of rage," Oz agreed.

"Our image is guys in black rocking our arses off." Spike pointed vaguely for emphasis, aware that he sounded slightly whiny. "Rollin' Stone said so."

"So now we can be guys, slash, hot women in black rocking our asses off," Xander replied.

"I'm not buyin' it."

"Hey, c'mon, man. There have been lots of badass bands with female leads."

Spike raised an eyebrow. "Go on, then."

Xander scratched his head. "Uh... Garbage!"

Oz nodded agreement. "Garbage."

Spike shrugged noncommital aquiscance and waved Xander on. The brunette cast around.

"And, and um, Eurythmics!"

"Eurythmics," Oz approved.

"Pretenders."

"...Pretenders..." Oz said reluctantly.

"Aerosmith."

"Aero--" Oz stopped and glared at Xander.

Spike narrowed his eyes. "Steve Tyler is not a woman."

... "Oh, right. Well, forget that one, then. But we can totally be badass!"

"Yeah, well first, can they even play with the band? How'd they play with you?"

Oz and Xander shared a look. "Huh?"

Spike looked back and forth between them, a sinking feeling starting in his stomach. "Exactly how did you try them out?"

"Two minutes each, improv or prepared," Oz said.

Oh. For the love of... Spike closed his eyes, fighting the urge to strangle someone. "That is not how you audition someone to be in a band," he said quietly. "Any joker can pull off a straight solo. You have to play with them, people! See if they mesh with the rest of the group." Spike opened his eyes, for the express purpose of glaring at his two slightly sheepish bandmates. "Get some recommendations with former employers, jam a bit, you know. You do not," he shook a finger in Xander's face, "determine a musician's compatibility with a group based on a two minute performance!"

There was a brief period of silence.

"He does have a point," Oz said.

Xander's brow lowered. "Well, gee, Spike. That's a really good idea. Maybe you could have suggested something like that earlier, instead of now, when it doesn't matter anymore."

"Well if I'd known you were going to pull some stupid--"

Xander cut him off with a vague hand-wave that nearly clipped Oz. "Look man, it's a done thing. You didn't come to tryouts, you didn't call to see what was up. You don't get to rag on us now. I think they'll do a great job. If you're going to be a pain in the ass about this, well screw you."

Spike glared at him, then the impassive Oz. He felt the fight go out of him in the face of the determined young men. As long as they don't binge on tour, it can't be that bad, right? "*Sigh* ...Really hot?"

Xander rolled his head back. Behind Spike, the door opened. "Abso- Anya!" He shot up in his chair. "Get merch taken care of?"

The slender blonde woman closed the door behind her and treated him to a suspicious look. "Yes. I put all the t-shirts with pictures of Devon and Parker off to the side. Do you want to try to sell those? They're kind of outdated, considering..."

Xander suddenly felt a panic go through him. "Oh- I didn't even think~" He turned to his bandmates. "Man, we need to get some shots of us with the girls onto some t-shirts, stat."

Spike groaned. "Nooo. I hate those bloody photo shoots. We just had one a month ago!" Oz nodded solomn aggrement.

Anya stepped into the circle of men. "Well, they'll never be ready in time for the first concert. Our suppliers need at least seven business days to run the first test prints. I guess if you were willing to trust them, and risked crappy t-shirts, they could just go ahead and print the full order first go, and you could have them next week," she said, indicating through tone of voice her reluctance to rush the fine art of merch.

"So we'll just introduce them on the second date," Oz reasoned, ignoring Anya's discomfort.

"Third," Xander said. "San Diego and Sacramento are both this week."

"Whatever," Oz shrugged. "And someone's gonna need to get earpieces fitted for Buffy. Can we do that before the rehearsal on Thursday?"

Xander snapped his fingers. "Oh, and we're gonna have to go through the set list and pull the songs about women." He suddenly perked up. "Dude, we're gonna have to write some new stuff for the girls to play."

"You guys really didn't have a plan when you did this, did you?" Anya asked. She shook her head. "I'll get Rich on it. Do you want to book another bus for the two of them? There is room on the band bus, but..."

Spike looked back and forth among the three conspirators. "Uh, guys... Can I at least meet these people before we tattoo their names on our foreheads?"

"Oh, yeah, sure. But they are in, man," Xander cautioned. "Me and Oz already gave them the okay."

"Yeah, yeah, you said. Are they still here?"

"Yes," Anya cut in. "They've been filling out insurance forms and what have you for the last hour."

Xander paled a bit. "Not your forms."

"Of course. I told you there would have to be improvements in your documentation, and--"

"I thought we agreed to only use that documentation on people we didn't like!" He turned to Spike. "Dude, we've gotta save them before they sign away their souls!"

"Hey!" Anya said indignantly. "I took that clause out!"

The brunette grabbed Spike by a leather sleeve and yanked him out of the room.

!! !! !!

Giles is not Spike's dad.

Ballpoint pens work really well on banana skin.

...You notice that I write authors' notes even when I don't have anything to say?

I'd ask you to review, but it's not like it will affect your decision anyway. There are two kinds of people in this world: Those who review, and those who don't.

There are two possibilities after this world: up or--no, I don't mean that.

I was kidding, okay?

I'm sorry.

~Star Mouse

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