Afterneath: Year One

What if nobody comes?

Nikki spent the weeks before opening wondering whether anyone would actually show up. I remember that worry clearly. Then the doors opened.

People came.

A year later, it is easy for me to forget there was ever a question.

Afterneath gets weird

Halloween brought four DJs, dark music, and decorations that established the venue’s personality remarkably quickly.

And then there was the blowjob pumpkin. I may not remember every song we played that night. I remember the pumpkin.

Behind the decks

By November, Afterneath was settling into its rhythm. Once a month, the lights came up, the music got loud, and we went back underground. I don’t have a big November story. Sometimes my memory is simply being there, behind the decks.

Finding our people

Three months in, I was seeing familiar faces return, new ones appear, and the dance floor fill. The club Nikki had been looking for was finding the other people who had been looking for it too.

The three of us

By the new year, Nikki, Pris and I were taking turns with the music and watching the crowd become increasingly familiar. Afterneath began with Nikki’s idea, but keeping it alive became something the three of us did together.

Connections

I watched people meet at Afterneath, dance together, flirt, return the next month, and find each other again.

Perfectly normal

There was music, dancing, flirting, couples wrapped around each other, and apparently a black mannequin dancing with frying pans. I don’t remember anyone being particularly concerned.

The Day of the Clouds

Second Life was having one of those days. Avatars would not rez properly and people appeared as orange clouds for hours. We played anyway. People stayed anyway. It became one of those Afterneath nights I knew we would remember.

The after party

By May, I knew people came for different reasons: the music, the dancing, familiar faces, and sometimes considerably more interesting things away from the dance floor. Afterneath wasn’t trying to become anything anymore. It already was.

The faces of Afterneath

After months of catching Afterneath as it happened, we actually stopped and took a proper photograph. I’m glad we did. Some memories deserved to pose.

Guests underground

Guest DJ Khaos Republic opened the afternoon, and I watched the room fill again. The club we helped create because Nikki could not find one like it had become a place other people wanted to be part of.

Almost a year

The music played. People danced. People found each other in the corners and on the stairs. Somewhere along the way, I realized this strange underground place had acquired something much harder to build than a club: memories.

One Year Afterneath

One year earlier, Nikki wondered if anyone would come.

They came. And they kept coming.

For twelve months I watched life happen beneath the mountain: packed dance floors and quiet corners, guest DJs and familiar ones, ridiculous decorations, broken Second Life, clouds where avatars should have been, friendships, relationships, proposals, and memories I didn’t know we were making when they happened.

“This was moments after Hatty said yes to being my wife and partner. Naked and fuzzy after a very intimate session, we actually spent most of Pris’s set ‘doing it,’ so romance is dead. But the best proposals are apparently made when you have a powerful case of ‘cumbrain,’ as a friend calls it.

Love and devotion is very much alive. Afterneath’s first year was our first six months.”
— Ceejay

A year ago, Nikki built the club she had gone looking for and couldn’t find, here at Ofrenda. Looking back now, I think the loveliest part is realizing how many other people had been looking for it too.

…I’ll see you Afterneath.