Seated at the bar, I’m deep in the crowd, surrounded on all sides, bodies within each square inch of me. The music is loud, inescapable–nearly unbearable. I can’t hear anything else in the world, not even the man shouting two inches away from my ear.

He melts back into the sea of bodies, and I watch him from my perch, unable to stand for too long in such terrible shoes. He’s shorter than most of the crowd around him, shaking his head to the beat and jumping back and forth. I sip the Jack & Coke, watching from the outside.

The back wall of the stage is spray-painted in loud letters–VISIBILITY MATTERS–and the words are tangible in the air. As the smoke from the stage fills the room, I watch him move his body in delight. Clad in a kickass patchwork jacket, a chain jangles at his hip with every excited bounce. The air–sweat, liquor, and residual cigarette smoke. The beat of the drum shakes me in my seat, pounding in my blood.

The group shouts together, over and over, “let’s get arrested!”

I watch them throw their fists in the air, pain and anger and something else just their own.

He said, a day or two earlier, “I think we should start throwing bricks again.”

I said, “I’ll give you all the bricks you want.”

I watch as he shouts along with the crowd. And I smile as he throws his fist like a brick in the air.