Just in case anyone thinks this to be an actual, factual tale, I think it best to point out this is a work of fiction, I have nothing to do with the music industry, have never met any of the members of Evanescence and at no time did the events that follow actually take place. Here ends the ‘please don’t sue me’ disclaimer, on with the show.
**************************
You know, there are times when I really enjoy my work, the sense of satisfaction at delivering on-time, on budget and to a level of quality that just blows people away is fine as far as it goes, but just occasionally something special gets thrown up.
I guess I should take a step back here and fill you in some of the background, or this ain’t gonna make a lot of sense. About two years ago I started a small company working out of a run down warehouse in the depths of Britain doing special effects work for movies, TV, stage plays, anyone really. What set us apart from everyone else was simple, at a time when the industry was speeding towards computer graphics and virtual effects, we went the other way and started to build a reputation as some of the best physical effects guys around. Well, okay, the best physical effects guys if you didn’t have the budget to call in the big boys like Stan Winston and his team or the ILM posse.
We did everything that came our way, from horror movies that made the Blair Witch look like Independence Day to coming up with new live effects for plays in the West End and everything in-between, there was nothing we wouldn’t get involved in. Along the way we acquired a rather odd, but extremely talented, group of people that could do everything from special effects to set and costume design and construction. Which, I guess, led to a phone call about a month and a half ago to see if we’d be interested in doing the design of a music video.
Hell it was something we hadn’t tried before, and we felt confident we could pull it off so, naturally, we said yes. Strangely enough it was just after we’d committed that the overall theme from the record company changed from doing one sea monster creature to doing full head and makeup prosthetics for almost a hundred people, and physical effects for almost five hundred others. See, it turns out that the original concept had been designed by some marketing geniuses, and I use the term loosely, at the record label and the band had flat out refused to do it. Now that I know them a bit better I’m not in the least bit surprised, mainly because the original idea really was a bit of a stinker.
Anyhow, regardless of the rather major changes to what we’d thought was a relatively easy job we ploughed on with our initial designs and storyboards based on the four line description given to us over the phone at about midnight four days before we were due to present all this stuff to the band themselves for consideration. As odd as it sounds we were never told who the band actually was before we met them, only that they were a rock group and they’d have a lot of input into their own look and actions when they arrived. The office pool seemed to favour Linkin’ Park, though I wasn’t convinced, it seemed a little too, well, fresh for a Park idea somehow. Friday morning arrived and we pilled into our meeting room and waited for the stars to show up.
I swear you could have knocked me over with a feather when Evanescence walked through the door. At first I thought the first figure through the door was a bouncer, he sure as hell had the right build and the trademark scowl to go with that particular career. Then I saw Amy Lee walk in and I finally put the name Ben Moody to the guy. I should at this point confess there’s something about Ms Lee that just makes my brain shut down, what exactly it is I don’t know but she’d certainly be right at the top of my ‘fantasy date’ list. This led to a rather awkward moment when I couldn’t quite remember my own name and sure as hell couldn’t pronounce it when introduced to her. Thankfully she saw the funny side and we all got down to business.
Out of all the people we’ve worked with, whether actors, musicians or creative I’d have to say that together these two were probably the best we’ve ever had the pleasure to talk to. They came in with a pretty good idea of what they wanted and thankfully it dovetailed nicely with what we’d designed. Our ‘clothing consultant’ took Amy aside for an hour or so to try out a few different looks from our existing wardrobe early in the proceedings and by the time we reached mid afternoon she’d got a set of four sketches for Amy to have a look at. I know for a fact that every male member of my team was wishing she’d go for the black leather outfit that looked like catwoman in bondage, but we weren’t too disappointed when she asked if we could combine that with an almost dress-like red outfit that left her arms, shoulders and neck bare and dropped low enough to guarantee a lot of freeze frames on the final video.
Meeting over we found ourselves with four weeks to get through more prosthetic work than we’d ever seen and the pace we set for those four weeks was incredible. One of our head designers is a big fan of the Evil Dead movies and hit on the idea of giving all our creatures the same white eye treatment, not only was it a real creepy look it was nice and easy to design and implement and we could farm production of the necessary contact lenses out to someone else. That proved vital as we were running flat out to get everything finished in time, and it still took a massive collaboration with Evanescence’s stage crew the night before the shoot to get everything ready.
The plan was simple, and followed our usual template for this sort of work where timing is so vital. We had a copy of the song from the record label and, using two of our design team as temporary stand-ins, had videotaped the actions and set pieces as a reference. Over the last couple of weeks we’d spent a lot of time on long distance phone calls to the band, working out the details and generally getting to know them a bit better. That might sound like a silly thing to say but when you’re planning on wrapping a rather intimidating man into a full head cast, and dunking one of the hottest women on the planet into a tank of water for a few hours, it helps if they at least trust you and, for preference, like you. Makes for a much nicer atmosphere.
The idea was to film on three separate days. The first day we’d do the concert scenes, and the plan was to do four takes. The first and second would be with all our extras in full make-up to give us time to spot any problems when we ran the tapes back, the others with the same extras but without the prosthetics. We’d use a stupid number of cameras, I think we ended up with eight or so in the end, and hopefully get the whole thing done with the minimal amount of discomfort for everyone involved. Again, that might sound ridiculous, but if you’ve ever been to a small venue to watch a gig you’ll know how hot it can get. Add in all the lights, cameras and other equipment, not to mention the fact that a fifth of the audience is wearing rubber masks over their heads and virtually all of them are blind thanks to the contact lenses and you want to spend the minimum amount of time possible in that environment.
The second day we’d shoot all the backstage shots as those were pretty simple, and the third would be used for one crew to get all the close ups of the crowd and Ben, while a second crew (which by some odd coincidence I found myself running) would shoot the underwater stuff with Amy. Hey, sometimes it’s good to be the boss.
Everything was pretty much going to plan, right up until the point Amy had to put her costume on for the shoot. While she’d tried it on for size a couple of weeks ago, our designers had added the detail work to the outside since then, and one of those details was a line of red feathers around the top of the body to soften the line between cloth and skin. I’m sure you can see where this is going already, so to cut a long story short she simply couldn’t wear the thing. Every time she tried to move her arms or walk or even breathe the feathers would rub against her skin and she’d collapse in giggles. Not quite the effect we wanted for the video, though it would have been interesting to shoot.
After a couple of minutes thrashing out the problem, including one moment where I will admit to averting my eyes as what Amy had intended as a simple lean to pick up a glass of water turned into a full-on convulse that revealed rather more than was intended, we had a solution. In fact I think it’s officially the Great British Plan B, when something breaks or doesn’t work, reach for the duct tape. One long strip of duct tape round the top of the outfit held the feathers away from her skin and we were back in business.
Relieved that we’d managed to sort the problem out so quickly I was headed back out to the stage when Ben came running out of the dressing room where he’d been trying hard to live up to his surname and not break into laughter himself as he watched his partner struggle to maintain her dignity. He motioned me off to one side and whispered a request that left me smiling from ear to ear. A quick glance at the watch and I agreed to try my best to do what he’d asked and rushed off to get things ready as Ben headed back in to stall as best he could. As it happens a rather large gentleman dressed in black with a genuinely scary scowl can stall remarkably well and I got enough time to have popped down to the local boozer for a pint before they were ready.
Finally they took their place on the stage and I was deeply impressed as all four members of the band took the time to talk to the extras, most of who were drawn from the UK fan club, and shake hands with the front couple of rows. Then we were ready for our one, and hopefully only, dress rehearsal. Another deeply impressive moment for me was when the band actually started to play the song live, something I hadn’t expected. I certainly hadn’t expected them to be so on the ball when it came to the timing and was impressed as I watched the monitor next to me that was showing a karaoke style bouncing ball timing the lyrics.
The crowd were certainly pumped, and even though they were already hot, sweaty and near blind from the contact lenses they gave everything they had and genuinely seemed to be enjoying themselves. A stagehand popped up about twenty seconds before the one part of the set that really did worry me to signal the stronger members of the audience to shuffle forwards into position. The idea was for Amy to dive from the stage into the audience where, if you’ve seen the finished video, she gets sucked down into what looks like a suspiciously well-lit sea scene. This had me pacing for two reasons, the first was that she was literally diving, head first, arms out into the audience and I’d seen this trick go wrong at gigs before. The other, more practical reason, was that the guys I had pegged to be underneath her were all wearing those damn contact lenses and I hopped they’d see the signal okay. Just in case we arranged for the house lights to dim, both to hide the movement of the crowd and as a back-up, ‘if you’re not where you should be, move your arse’ signal to the catchers.
The moment arrived and Amy dived forward with no hesitation whatsoever. The guys caught her perfectly and held her for a second or two. If you watch the video you can see her sliding down and under the crowd like it was the surface of a lake, but for this take we simply held her on the ‘surface’ to get the timing right. In fact, this particular shot would be redone on day three with a lot less people in the room, as I had no intention of putting the star of the show on the ground with five hundred people grouping around effectively blinded.
In order to get our timing right to push her back up to the ‘surface’ we needed to run through the song as normal to give Ben time to do not only the riff but also his own bit of crowd surfing, so Amy would be taken on a big loop around the crowd to be delivered, hopefully, feet first to the stage at the right time. At least that was the plan. After seeing her reaction to the first version of her outfit, Ben had asked me if I could organise a little more of the same, a payback he said for a practical joke involving a hotel room, card key, ice bucket and a snatch towel. Not wanting to know the details I’d agreed and corralled some of the crowd into helping. As Amy started her tour the plan went into full effect.
Suddenly, as the hands underneath her supported her weight, all the people surrounding her that had been raising their hands in typical rock crowd enthusiasm turned towards her. Hundreds of fingers descended on her and started teasing and prodding her body, the sheer black trousers offering little protection from the touch, the red top faring little better and of course her shoulders, neck and worse of all, underarms were fully exposed.
As she’d dropped her mike just before the crowd dive for fear of knocking someone cold, there was no way for most of the audience to hear her shrieks of laughter over the heavy beat pounding out from the stage. In fact the only way to hear her was when she was right overhead as the crowd moved her around, ensuring everyone could have a turn at this most unexpected of party games.
Amy was bucking and writhing, but those people supporting her were doing a damn good job, holding her securely but never holding tight enough to hurt her. What made it all the more unbearable for her was there was no rhyme or reason to her torment, the fingers arriving seemingly at random, everyone doing their own preferred movements and with no way to predict what was coming next. One moment she’d have a pair of strong, masculine hands goosing her ribs through the top, the next they’d be replaced by long fingernails racing up her sides and down into her vulnerable pits.
Something in the back of my mind was jumping up and down while waving a large sign trying to get my attention and I glanced down at the timing readout on the video display next to me. For a moment I couldn’t figure it out why the display was showing four minutes plus as the song was only meant to go for a little over three and a half. Then I realised Ben was playing a riff I hadn’t heard before and I glanced up to see him thundering on his guitar, trying out anything he could think of to draw out the rehearsal. He saw me glance his way and flashed me a grin before dropping back into his ‘game face’, a grin I returned as I threw him a ‘draw I out’ symbol and ducked down from the camera platform and dived into the crowd, moving as quickly as I could to a position about a foot in front of the stage just as Amy finished her torturous circuit of the room and started the final straight back to the stage.
Her face was a picture, eyes squeezed close as her head jerked seemingly randomly from side to side as fingers tickled her ears and cheeks as she past, her mouth open wide as the laughter poured from her. God she was beautiful, hand on heart I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything quite as breathtaking as Amy Lee in the clutches of ticklish nirvana. I ducked down and moved slightly forward, bringing my hands up in so my palms were just above my head. As I felt her calves slide over my hands I started wiggling, determined not to miss this opportunity. I felt her body jerk and twist to escape me, but as she passed overhead all that happened was my fingers moved ever higher, up her legs and round her knees, dancing over the backs of her thighs. Once again my conscience got in the way and I dropped my hands as I reached the top of her legs, moving them outwards to tickle her hips rather than her ass.
I don’t know if it was the thought of the ordeal finally ending or if it was just her body redoubling its efforts but as her feet neared the stage, and my hands touched bare skin for the first time, Amy went nuts above me. She was howling with laughter, head thrashing from side to side as her long black hair whipped the people below her into submission. I felt something tug briefly at my headset but gave it no mind as my wandering fingers finally found her soft armpits. For that one brief moment, I was in tickling heaven, as one of the most gorgeous women I’d ever met thrashed against my hands, her laughter seemingly intended just for me as that heavenly voice echoed in my head. Then she was gone, pushed up and away from my reach as the crowd gave her a boost back onto the stage.
I suddenly realised I had to get back to my position at the camera station if I didn’t want to give the game away and slipped through the crowd as quickly as I could, arriving back with seconds to spare as Amy, by some miracle, managed to finish the song despite the ride she’d just gone through. The music finished and I saw Amy look around, and even from this distance I could see a distinctly playful look in her eye as she scanned the crowd. She glanced up at me, then her gaze hardened and she shot me a look that seemed to ignite my blood while sending chills through my body. One of the camera operators lent over and pulled a red feather from the plastic headband of my headset and I knew I’d been rumbled. It must have caught on her outfit as she passed over me and that look was all I needed to know I wasn’t going to get away clean from this.
**************************
You know, there are times when I really enjoy my work, the sense of satisfaction at delivering on-time, on budget and to a level of quality that just blows people away is fine as far as it goes, but just occasionally something special gets thrown up.
I guess I should take a step back here and fill you in some of the background, or this ain’t gonna make a lot of sense. About two years ago I started a small company working out of a run down warehouse in the depths of Britain doing special effects work for movies, TV, stage plays, anyone really. What set us apart from everyone else was simple, at a time when the industry was speeding towards computer graphics and virtual effects, we went the other way and started to build a reputation as some of the best physical effects guys around. Well, okay, the best physical effects guys if you didn’t have the budget to call in the big boys like Stan Winston and his team or the ILM posse.
We did everything that came our way, from horror movies that made the Blair Witch look like Independence Day to coming up with new live effects for plays in the West End and everything in-between, there was nothing we wouldn’t get involved in. Along the way we acquired a rather odd, but extremely talented, group of people that could do everything from special effects to set and costume design and construction. Which, I guess, led to a phone call about a month and a half ago to see if we’d be interested in doing the design of a music video.
Hell it was something we hadn’t tried before, and we felt confident we could pull it off so, naturally, we said yes. Strangely enough it was just after we’d committed that the overall theme from the record company changed from doing one sea monster creature to doing full head and makeup prosthetics for almost a hundred people, and physical effects for almost five hundred others. See, it turns out that the original concept had been designed by some marketing geniuses, and I use the term loosely, at the record label and the band had flat out refused to do it. Now that I know them a bit better I’m not in the least bit surprised, mainly because the original idea really was a bit of a stinker.
Anyhow, regardless of the rather major changes to what we’d thought was a relatively easy job we ploughed on with our initial designs and storyboards based on the four line description given to us over the phone at about midnight four days before we were due to present all this stuff to the band themselves for consideration. As odd as it sounds we were never told who the band actually was before we met them, only that they were a rock group and they’d have a lot of input into their own look and actions when they arrived. The office pool seemed to favour Linkin’ Park, though I wasn’t convinced, it seemed a little too, well, fresh for a Park idea somehow. Friday morning arrived and we pilled into our meeting room and waited for the stars to show up.
I swear you could have knocked me over with a feather when Evanescence walked through the door. At first I thought the first figure through the door was a bouncer, he sure as hell had the right build and the trademark scowl to go with that particular career. Then I saw Amy Lee walk in and I finally put the name Ben Moody to the guy. I should at this point confess there’s something about Ms Lee that just makes my brain shut down, what exactly it is I don’t know but she’d certainly be right at the top of my ‘fantasy date’ list. This led to a rather awkward moment when I couldn’t quite remember my own name and sure as hell couldn’t pronounce it when introduced to her. Thankfully she saw the funny side and we all got down to business.
Out of all the people we’ve worked with, whether actors, musicians or creative I’d have to say that together these two were probably the best we’ve ever had the pleasure to talk to. They came in with a pretty good idea of what they wanted and thankfully it dovetailed nicely with what we’d designed. Our ‘clothing consultant’ took Amy aside for an hour or so to try out a few different looks from our existing wardrobe early in the proceedings and by the time we reached mid afternoon she’d got a set of four sketches for Amy to have a look at. I know for a fact that every male member of my team was wishing she’d go for the black leather outfit that looked like catwoman in bondage, but we weren’t too disappointed when she asked if we could combine that with an almost dress-like red outfit that left her arms, shoulders and neck bare and dropped low enough to guarantee a lot of freeze frames on the final video.
Meeting over we found ourselves with four weeks to get through more prosthetic work than we’d ever seen and the pace we set for those four weeks was incredible. One of our head designers is a big fan of the Evil Dead movies and hit on the idea of giving all our creatures the same white eye treatment, not only was it a real creepy look it was nice and easy to design and implement and we could farm production of the necessary contact lenses out to someone else. That proved vital as we were running flat out to get everything finished in time, and it still took a massive collaboration with Evanescence’s stage crew the night before the shoot to get everything ready.
The plan was simple, and followed our usual template for this sort of work where timing is so vital. We had a copy of the song from the record label and, using two of our design team as temporary stand-ins, had videotaped the actions and set pieces as a reference. Over the last couple of weeks we’d spent a lot of time on long distance phone calls to the band, working out the details and generally getting to know them a bit better. That might sound like a silly thing to say but when you’re planning on wrapping a rather intimidating man into a full head cast, and dunking one of the hottest women on the planet into a tank of water for a few hours, it helps if they at least trust you and, for preference, like you. Makes for a much nicer atmosphere.
The idea was to film on three separate days. The first day we’d do the concert scenes, and the plan was to do four takes. The first and second would be with all our extras in full make-up to give us time to spot any problems when we ran the tapes back, the others with the same extras but without the prosthetics. We’d use a stupid number of cameras, I think we ended up with eight or so in the end, and hopefully get the whole thing done with the minimal amount of discomfort for everyone involved. Again, that might sound ridiculous, but if you’ve ever been to a small venue to watch a gig you’ll know how hot it can get. Add in all the lights, cameras and other equipment, not to mention the fact that a fifth of the audience is wearing rubber masks over their heads and virtually all of them are blind thanks to the contact lenses and you want to spend the minimum amount of time possible in that environment.
The second day we’d shoot all the backstage shots as those were pretty simple, and the third would be used for one crew to get all the close ups of the crowd and Ben, while a second crew (which by some odd coincidence I found myself running) would shoot the underwater stuff with Amy. Hey, sometimes it’s good to be the boss.
Everything was pretty much going to plan, right up until the point Amy had to put her costume on for the shoot. While she’d tried it on for size a couple of weeks ago, our designers had added the detail work to the outside since then, and one of those details was a line of red feathers around the top of the body to soften the line between cloth and skin. I’m sure you can see where this is going already, so to cut a long story short she simply couldn’t wear the thing. Every time she tried to move her arms or walk or even breathe the feathers would rub against her skin and she’d collapse in giggles. Not quite the effect we wanted for the video, though it would have been interesting to shoot.
After a couple of minutes thrashing out the problem, including one moment where I will admit to averting my eyes as what Amy had intended as a simple lean to pick up a glass of water turned into a full-on convulse that revealed rather more than was intended, we had a solution. In fact I think it’s officially the Great British Plan B, when something breaks or doesn’t work, reach for the duct tape. One long strip of duct tape round the top of the outfit held the feathers away from her skin and we were back in business.
Relieved that we’d managed to sort the problem out so quickly I was headed back out to the stage when Ben came running out of the dressing room where he’d been trying hard to live up to his surname and not break into laughter himself as he watched his partner struggle to maintain her dignity. He motioned me off to one side and whispered a request that left me smiling from ear to ear. A quick glance at the watch and I agreed to try my best to do what he’d asked and rushed off to get things ready as Ben headed back in to stall as best he could. As it happens a rather large gentleman dressed in black with a genuinely scary scowl can stall remarkably well and I got enough time to have popped down to the local boozer for a pint before they were ready.
Finally they took their place on the stage and I was deeply impressed as all four members of the band took the time to talk to the extras, most of who were drawn from the UK fan club, and shake hands with the front couple of rows. Then we were ready for our one, and hopefully only, dress rehearsal. Another deeply impressive moment for me was when the band actually started to play the song live, something I hadn’t expected. I certainly hadn’t expected them to be so on the ball when it came to the timing and was impressed as I watched the monitor next to me that was showing a karaoke style bouncing ball timing the lyrics.
The crowd were certainly pumped, and even though they were already hot, sweaty and near blind from the contact lenses they gave everything they had and genuinely seemed to be enjoying themselves. A stagehand popped up about twenty seconds before the one part of the set that really did worry me to signal the stronger members of the audience to shuffle forwards into position. The idea was for Amy to dive from the stage into the audience where, if you’ve seen the finished video, she gets sucked down into what looks like a suspiciously well-lit sea scene. This had me pacing for two reasons, the first was that she was literally diving, head first, arms out into the audience and I’d seen this trick go wrong at gigs before. The other, more practical reason, was that the guys I had pegged to be underneath her were all wearing those damn contact lenses and I hopped they’d see the signal okay. Just in case we arranged for the house lights to dim, both to hide the movement of the crowd and as a back-up, ‘if you’re not where you should be, move your arse’ signal to the catchers.
The moment arrived and Amy dived forward with no hesitation whatsoever. The guys caught her perfectly and held her for a second or two. If you watch the video you can see her sliding down and under the crowd like it was the surface of a lake, but for this take we simply held her on the ‘surface’ to get the timing right. In fact, this particular shot would be redone on day three with a lot less people in the room, as I had no intention of putting the star of the show on the ground with five hundred people grouping around effectively blinded.
In order to get our timing right to push her back up to the ‘surface’ we needed to run through the song as normal to give Ben time to do not only the riff but also his own bit of crowd surfing, so Amy would be taken on a big loop around the crowd to be delivered, hopefully, feet first to the stage at the right time. At least that was the plan. After seeing her reaction to the first version of her outfit, Ben had asked me if I could organise a little more of the same, a payback he said for a practical joke involving a hotel room, card key, ice bucket and a snatch towel. Not wanting to know the details I’d agreed and corralled some of the crowd into helping. As Amy started her tour the plan went into full effect.
Suddenly, as the hands underneath her supported her weight, all the people surrounding her that had been raising their hands in typical rock crowd enthusiasm turned towards her. Hundreds of fingers descended on her and started teasing and prodding her body, the sheer black trousers offering little protection from the touch, the red top faring little better and of course her shoulders, neck and worse of all, underarms were fully exposed.
As she’d dropped her mike just before the crowd dive for fear of knocking someone cold, there was no way for most of the audience to hear her shrieks of laughter over the heavy beat pounding out from the stage. In fact the only way to hear her was when she was right overhead as the crowd moved her around, ensuring everyone could have a turn at this most unexpected of party games.
Amy was bucking and writhing, but those people supporting her were doing a damn good job, holding her securely but never holding tight enough to hurt her. What made it all the more unbearable for her was there was no rhyme or reason to her torment, the fingers arriving seemingly at random, everyone doing their own preferred movements and with no way to predict what was coming next. One moment she’d have a pair of strong, masculine hands goosing her ribs through the top, the next they’d be replaced by long fingernails racing up her sides and down into her vulnerable pits.
Something in the back of my mind was jumping up and down while waving a large sign trying to get my attention and I glanced down at the timing readout on the video display next to me. For a moment I couldn’t figure it out why the display was showing four minutes plus as the song was only meant to go for a little over three and a half. Then I realised Ben was playing a riff I hadn’t heard before and I glanced up to see him thundering on his guitar, trying out anything he could think of to draw out the rehearsal. He saw me glance his way and flashed me a grin before dropping back into his ‘game face’, a grin I returned as I threw him a ‘draw I out’ symbol and ducked down from the camera platform and dived into the crowd, moving as quickly as I could to a position about a foot in front of the stage just as Amy finished her torturous circuit of the room and started the final straight back to the stage.
Her face was a picture, eyes squeezed close as her head jerked seemingly randomly from side to side as fingers tickled her ears and cheeks as she past, her mouth open wide as the laughter poured from her. God she was beautiful, hand on heart I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything quite as breathtaking as Amy Lee in the clutches of ticklish nirvana. I ducked down and moved slightly forward, bringing my hands up in so my palms were just above my head. As I felt her calves slide over my hands I started wiggling, determined not to miss this opportunity. I felt her body jerk and twist to escape me, but as she passed overhead all that happened was my fingers moved ever higher, up her legs and round her knees, dancing over the backs of her thighs. Once again my conscience got in the way and I dropped my hands as I reached the top of her legs, moving them outwards to tickle her hips rather than her ass.
I don’t know if it was the thought of the ordeal finally ending or if it was just her body redoubling its efforts but as her feet neared the stage, and my hands touched bare skin for the first time, Amy went nuts above me. She was howling with laughter, head thrashing from side to side as her long black hair whipped the people below her into submission. I felt something tug briefly at my headset but gave it no mind as my wandering fingers finally found her soft armpits. For that one brief moment, I was in tickling heaven, as one of the most gorgeous women I’d ever met thrashed against my hands, her laughter seemingly intended just for me as that heavenly voice echoed in my head. Then she was gone, pushed up and away from my reach as the crowd gave her a boost back onto the stage.
I suddenly realised I had to get back to my position at the camera station if I didn’t want to give the game away and slipped through the crowd as quickly as I could, arriving back with seconds to spare as Amy, by some miracle, managed to finish the song despite the ride she’d just gone through. The music finished and I saw Amy look around, and even from this distance I could see a distinctly playful look in her eye as she scanned the crowd. She glanced up at me, then her gaze hardened and she shot me a look that seemed to ignite my blood while sending chills through my body. One of the camera operators lent over and pulled a red feather from the plastic headband of my headset and I knew I’d been rumbled. It must have caught on her outfit as she passed over me and that look was all I needed to know I wasn’t going to get away clean from this.
