by Maddy Wells
“Come on! Outside! The rules.”
“Everyone’s going to be smoking their heads off in here tonight.”
But she dutifully went out to the driveway to have her cigarette, and the music in the basement stopped. I went to the dining room window and saw Tim and Captain Kirby chatting with her. She was laughing and swishing the air with her free hand to keep the smoke out of their faces, which they didn’t seem to mind, and when she came back in she said, “I like your friends. They’re funny.”
“They’re not my friends,” I said, “They’re my colleagues. They’re my band.”
“And Janet can cook, can’t she?” Jane opened the fridge, hoping for a different outcome. She closed it again.
“Captain Kirby,” I said, correcting her.
“What do you mean, ‘Captain Kirby’?”
“Don’t call her Janet. Call her Captain Kirby. That’s what she wants to be called.”
“I thought we had some bread around here.” Jane opened the breadbox and pulled out some rolls left over from dinner. She held them up, “Ta da!” before slicing one and sticking it on top of the toaster because it was too thick to fit down the slots. “I’m in a good mood,” she said, leaning against the counter with her arms crossed over her chest. “You?”
“Splendid.”
“Your friends are jumping out of their skins, they’re so excited to meet The Griffin. I guess none of your friends—your band, I mean—are going to the prom.”
“No, none of us.” I guess we could have gone as a group, which would’ve been an awesome gimmick. As the band’s leader it was my responsibility to schedule stuff, but I never seem to think of stuff outside the Trap in time.
“Well, you’re lucky. I hate that this is all on the same night. I’d rather hang out with you guys and the Griffin.”
“No kidding.”
“But it doesn’t last all night, thank God. I’ll be back before two probably.” She buttered her roll, took a bite, wrapped it in a napkin and went back upstairs.
“Are you coming back from pre-prom to help get stuff ready?” I asked her.
“Absolutely. I won’t be long, sweetie. I won’t stick you with everything. You know that.”
I knew nothing like that, but it sounded normal to hear her say it—yes, The Griffin, the male progenitor of our family unit was coming back from foreign wars bearing mortgage money and expensive baubles for Mummy and perhaps some affection for me, and we, mostly Mummy of course because she was the Mom, would order a cornucopia of takeout in honor of his triumphant return—and I smiled in spite of myself.
Chapter 7
Tim hadn’t tried to change his Saturday schedule at the Seven-Eleven like I’d asked him to. His plan was to go in, and after an hour claim severe stomach cramps from eating one of the charred hot dogs that roll around for days on the Seven-Eleven rotisserie and are part of the Seven-Eleven mystique, then pedal home to change into his cool clothes, then race back to the Trap to await the arrival of The Griffin. I was left with Captain Kirby to get the Trap ready for the onslaught.
“You can come back later,” I told her. “There’s no reason both of us should be tied up doing maid duty.”
“Clean-up and prep are just as important as the main event,” she said. “It’s like the first thing you learn in cooking school.”
“There isn’t going to be any actual cooking going on here,” I said. “Just to be clear.”
“Oh, I know,” she said. “It’s like a rock and roll road show. Beer and pizza. I’m totally cool with that.” She had brought rolls of black, cobalt blue, and orange crepe paper and was festooning the Trap with them.
“That looks really good,” I said. “It’s The Griffin’s colors exactly.”
Captain Kirby smiled. “I Googled your dad. I mean I knew the words to the song we sang the other day without knowing I knew them, but I didn’t know who he was. You know how it is.”
“That’s okay.’
“But he’s like famous.”
“I’m just surprised you’re so anxious to meet him when you don’t even know his band.”
“Hand me the staple gun,” Captain Kirby said. She was on a ladder making an elaborate creation that looked, I swear to god, like a crepe paper eagle—she pulled out a roll of white for the head and chest—which she hung off the ceiling of the garage.
“He’s going to love it,” I said. “That’s awesome.”
“You know, cooking school isn’t like just making a roast. You have to know how to make a presentation. Like ice sculptures for the shrimp bar and chocolate fountains and stuff.”
“I never thought about that,” which was true because I had never seen a shrimp bar or chocolate fountain. I wondered what her family must be like if she knew about stuff like that.
“Even how the table’s set. There’s so much more to it than people think. That’s why I love it. It brings out a part of me I like, the creative part. Like writing music must do for you.”
So, Tim hadn’t told her that my songs were, at best, grids for him to fill in. If he hadn’t come along five months ago, we wouldn’t have anything worth playing for The Griffin tonight. It made me feel kindly towards him, as if maybe he liked making music for me not for my parent.
“You don’t have to hang around. The action won’t start until later,” I told her.
She climbed down the ladder and we went outside and sat down together on the front steps.
“I’ll just wait for some of your friends to come so you’re not alone.”
Which startled me for the simple reason that I don’t have any friends. This was a big event, so of course my friends should be crowding around me but I don’t remember who my last friend was. I didn’t want the scrutiny that a friend would subject my life to. Like: Why’s your daddy never around? Why’s your mommy dressed like that anyway? When the questions start, I pick up the Fender and turn on the amps. Captain Kirby was acting like a friend is supposed to, though, and she didn’t pry.
“You might be waiting for a long time,” I told her. “Really, you don’t have to stay.”
“Do you mind if I stay?”
“No. No, I don’t. I just thought you might have other things to do. Your mom might want you to do something.”
“No.”
Three Goth girls came down the street looking at all the houses when one of them spotted our number on the mailbox and nodded to the other two. They kept walking, more quickly now, mighty interested in their shoes, pretending not to see Captain Kirby and me on the stoop.
“And so it begins,” I said.
“Groupies?”
“Probably.”
“You psyched?” Captain Kirby asked.
“As a daughter or as a musician?”
“Either one. Both.”
The Griffin came by on Christmas Eve last time. He didn’t give us any advance warning and I thought my heart would jump out of my body I was so happy to see him. He put on his full regalia—eagle head, lion’s tail—before he opened the bus door and I thought Jane was going to expire on the spot she was so excited. “Come in, Griffin,” she begged. “I won’t talk about anything you don’t want to. I promise.” But the thing about The Griffin, he never came in anymore. He stayed in his bus and we came to him and he doled out his presents as if he were some sort of black magic Santa, the low watt lighting in the bus softening our edges, making us agreeable and happy to accept his presents in lieu of him. A Fender for me “’cause I know you got the blood, I smell it!” and a Kia for Jane because her old heap of a Honda Civic was running on will power, even though I don’t think she ever complained about her car, but that was The Griffin. He just knew what you needed.
“I listened to his stuff last night on-line,” Captain Kirby said. “He’s good.”
“Think you want to jam with him?”
“Isn’t that what you want to do?”
I shrugged. I wanted to blow him away with my songs. I wanted to play something so freakin’ awesome
he would tilt back in his orange Barca Lounger that was anchored to the bus floor and tip his eagle head to me. I wanted to see that involuntary nod of appreciation that wasn’t fake dad stuff cooked up to make you feel good about yourself. Anyway, what does anyone want from their father, especially one that came with a mythology? To vanquish him? He had never said anything to me that indicated he really thought I had talent. But then why did he give me the Fender and the Pink Fade drum set? And wasn’t I part of him? Something of him had to have rubbed off on me somewhere.
It was only four o’clock but couples and three and foursomes strolled—trying to seem casual—back and forth in front of our house then went and stood across the street or on the corner waiting for the cry to go up on Twitter that The Griffin’s chariot had pulled into town.
“I find it very hard to imagine that The Griffin is even my father,” I told Captain Kirby, which is more than I had ever told anybody about The Griffin and probably more than I should have told her, because I didn’t know if I could trust her yet. People will always take what you tell them and use it against you when you least expect it. “I don’t mean it like that,” I said. “I mean because he wears a costume and everything.”
“That’s okay,” Captain Kirby said.
“I think you should go home and change into something cool,” I told her.
“Isn’t this cool?” She stood up and vogued her baggy black chinos and tee. “How about you?”
I was dressed basically the same, although I had definite plans to debut my Michael Jackson military look that night. If Tim and Captain Kirby didn’t want to go along with me, I would go without them.
Captain Kirby did a pirouette and we laughed. We were startled by a guy laughing louder, walking up the driveway, which I thought was kind of weird, because who did he think he was.
“You waiting for The Griffin?” he asked.
I didn’t answer which should have told him go away.
“Me too,” he said and plopped down on the lawn and lay back with his hands over his head. “This is like the biggest thing to happen to Milltown.”
“It’s happened before,” I told him. “He has a wife and daughter who just happen to live where you’re sitting.”
“I just moved here,” he said. He sat up and looked at me closely. “So I didn’t know that.”
He typed something into his phone.
“What are you doing?” Captain Kirby asked.
“Tweeting that I’m waitin’ for The Griffin.”
“Do you go to school around here?” Captain Kirby asked.
“No,” he said, and by the way he said it I figured he was lying. People who are lying always look you in the eye to see if you’re buying. And boy was he making big eye contact. “I graduated two years ago from St. Albans,” which was the private boarding school in the next township that lawyers and doctors sent their kids to. I didn’t know anybody who went there. “I’m a musician. Lead guitar.”
“No kidding,” Captain Kirby said. “St. Albans? They have a great field hockey team. We beat them in overtime in the finals. ”
“Yeah. They’re awesome.” He stood up and walked over to us. “I’m Rob.” He extended his hand and we shook and had a chance to see how good looking he was, which was VERY. “I guess I shouldn’t impose, though, on who lives here until The Griffin actually shows up.”
“That would be a good idea,” Captain Kirby said. “You should at least ask permission.”
“Are you,” Rob said, pointing at Captain Kirby and looking a little astonished, “The Griffin’s daughter?”
“I am,” I said.
“What’s your name?”
“Mercy.”
“No kidding. What a great name.” He started typing on his phone again.
There were kids who Tweeted their every bite of a sandwich and there were those who didn’t. I was about to ask him to move when Jane drove up in her Kia apologizing like mad as she ran across the lawn for being late and making me do all the work to get ready.
She walked into the Trap which was lousy with crepe. “That eagle is magnificent! Who did that?” Her gaze swept past me and Captain Kirby and landed on Rob. “You?”
He smiled. He didn’t deny it. Pants on fire.
“Why don’t you come to the gym and work some of your magic there?”
She was flirting with him, like so openly, and I felt embarrassed for her, but he seemed to not mind. She swept into the house.
Rob looked after her. “And that is….?”
“The Griffin’s wife, Jane. Also my mother,” I said. “You going to Tweet that?”
“Absolutely,” he said.
Chapter 8
“Your mom left the door open,” Rob said.
He stepped between me and Captain Kirby. I thought to close the door, but instead he went into the house and closed the door behind him. I was going to get up and follow him, because like wtf, when it was like a dam opened. Kids stampeded across the lawn led by the three Goth girls who’d been the first to arrive. They planted their Doc Martens an inch from my toes and were giving me and Captain Kirby a death stare that said move over bitches until Captain Kirby stood up with her game face on and made them think again. Other kids were jockeying for position by the curb and clusters of three and four parked themselves in the middle of the lawn and a couple wearing orange and blue leggings so tight fitting that they seemed to be painted on were rehearsing a song in the driveway they were going to burst into to let The Griffin know they were ready for prime time. The afternoon was dry and still and the air was suddenly full of little geodesic floaters of white dandelion seeds that had gone airborne from the trampling and were drifting over the fence to Mr. Henning’s next door who was drinking a beer on his porch scratching his belly and watching, and across the street to the Tudesco’s, neat freaks who owned four runny-nosed Pomeranians and whose lawn looked like Astroturf, and for a minute I forgot about Jane.
Here’s the truth: Our lawn was a dandelion patch. In the early spring you could kid yourself that the yellow flowers were pretty and you could make dandelion salads and dandelion wine if you didn’t have a life. I mean a lawn tells you a lot about the people in the house behind it, right? A normal lawn equals a normal family leading a normal existence which we prided ourselves on not leading, and I was thinking that on Monday the Tudescos would call the code enforcers on us and I’d have to mow, but Jane wouldn’t be ashamed of that. She would see it as evidence that we were a special and talented family who had better things to do than mow a lawn and douse it with herbicide. It was definitely unlike Marjewel’s and Isak’s lawn which looked like it was painted on. They probably had a fleet of illegals working on it. Very ordinary.
Captain Kirby elbowed me in the ribs and jerked her head toward the house. “Do you want me to throw that asshole out?” she said.
“Rob?”
“He’s a bullshiter.”
“So?”
“He’s hitting on your mom.”
“He’s probably asking her to introduce him to The Griffin. Jane can take care of herself.” Like yeah right, look at our lawn.
Captain Kirby looked mournfully at the front door. “He said he graduated from St. Albans.”
“So?”
“When I said we beat their field hockey team in the finals, he said yeah.”
“And?”
“They don’t even have a field hockey team. St. Albans was an all-boys school till a couple of years ago and they don’t have eleven girls in the whole school.”
Captain Kirby had a crush on Jane. Well, get in line, I thought. Jane wore a helpless halo like Marilyn Monroe that brought out the Sir Galahad in certain types, and Captain Kirby was one of them. When I asked The Griffin once if that was what attracted him to her, he laughed and said, “You think she’s helpless? Jesus, no. Hell no. You’re one hundred and eighty degrees wrong. Your mom’s a wild child.” Which I put away in a box I call “Figure Out Later.”
Tim peddled up on his bike. H
e had left his guitar in the Trap and he jumped off the bike while it was still moving and trotted it into the Trap to make sure his guitar was secure and then he came out and ran over to me. “You okay?”
“Sure I’m okay. Why not?”
“There’s no crowd control here.”
I was in a really bad mood because I’d been sitting on the steps watching dandelion floaters instead of taking charge. “It’s not a crowd,” I said.
“Fifty people? I would call that a crowd.”
“I’ve seen more.”
Tim jerked me up from the steps and led me into the garage. He handed me my guitar then he uncased his and turned up the amps and ran up and the down the scales. He pointed for me to join him and Captain Kirby got behind the Pink Fade and started hitting her sticks. We sounded good and the kids packed into the driveway and were digging us and we nodded to one another because we were nailing it and Tim broke into the riff that opened the song we were going to do for The Griffin when a horn started honking out a deafening version of Jump Naked, The Griffin’s song that Judas Priest covered and took into the top fifty. The Griffin’s black windowless bus made a laborious turn onto Walnut Street like our playing had summoned it and drove slowly towards us like a scary mythological beast. The Griffin himself was painted on the side, his giant wings spreading up and over the top of the bus, Raymond lurking under one wing wearing a beret looking very French in an iridescent orange tee and sneering a Cheshire Cat grin, his teeth like shiny piano keys higher than the bus tires, and the drummer, Bang, was depicted as a sinister leering man-in-the-moon, his round pocked face filling the front grill. There was a ghostly outline of another figure on the back. I didn’t know who that was supposed to be. A new member? Anyway, the bus looked like a creature from the underworld come to swallow up the good people of Milltown and Have Mercy was forgotten as the metal head mob made a run for the bus screaming and singing along because the horn had stopped honking and speakers mounted in the grill were blaring out Hotter Than Hell, The Griffin’s new release.