We were sitting on Jazheel’s bed, feeling defeated: Two $85 tickets to Metallica’s Summer Sanitarium 2003 tour — with Deftones, Linkin Park, Limp Bizkit and Mudyvane — and no way to get to Orlando.

Jazheel’s dad was supposed to lend us his car but he changed his mind. Deftones’ Minerva was playing in the background while we figured out what to do next.

“I get all… numb/When she sings it’s over,” wailed Chino Moreno in his plaintive voice.

“The Greyhound!” Jazheel said as she jumped off her bed. She grabbed the phone and called her father again.

It was close to midnight when her dad dropped us off at the Miami station. We had endured a tough interrogation on the way there and his questions still lingered in my mind: Did we know where we were staying? Sort of. Did my parents know I was taking a six-hour trip on the Greyhound? Yes (not really).

As we waited at the Greyhound station, I was beginning to doubt the decision. Would my 19-year-old body be found in a dark alley the next morning?

We found a seat at the back of the bus. I put on my headphones and pressed play on the CD player: “Such a strange numb/And it brings my knees to the earth…”

The song slowly erased my insecurities and I dozed off. I woke to a baby’s cry, and … what was that smell? In the darkness, I saw a door opening next to me. The bathroom.

We arrived in Orlando at 6 a.m. The taxi ride to the hotel was a blur; I barely remember sliding inside the stiff bedsheets and closing my eyes.

That afternoon, I saw Chino smash his microphone on the floor, drunk out of his mind, performing the worst concert of his career.