by Chuck Wendig
He’d overstepped. Landry’s face had gone ashen. It was clear to see but he just shrugged and thought, Fuck it. He slid off the bed and started to toe around for his jeans.
“You’re a nasty, cynical man,” Landry said, looking away.
“Don’t forget old.”
“You’re not that old.”
“I’m old enough.” Old enough to be a motherfucking rock god put out to pasture. Old enough for a reunion tour with a bunch of asshole has-beens I don’t even like or recognize anymore. “You know what, fine, you’re right. I gotta go. Band practice calls.”
“Don’t forget to call Lena and the kids, Pete.” Way Landry said it, Pete knew it was sincere—not a whiplash of snark, not some snooty stung-bum bullshit. He really wanted him to call his wife and his kids. Because it was the right thing to do and Landry was a good man and…
Fuck. What the hell was he doing?
Don’t think about it and you don’t have to figure it out.
Sounds good to me, brain. Good job.
“I’ll see you later, Lan.” He kissed the man’s temple, even though Landry flinched as he did. Then he headed in his favorite direction:
Out the fuckin’ door.
* * *
—
“YOU’RE LATE.”
That, from Evil Elvis Lafferty, the lead guitarist of Gumdropper—everyone always said What balls, to be named Elvis in a rock band, but his parents had named him Elvis, full-stop. (The Evil, he added himself.)
Evil Elvis, with the bleach-blond hair still down the middle of his back (“Cut your hair, mate,” Pete always told him, “it’s the next bloody millennium and you look like an aging hippie”), his sunburst Gibson Les Paul electric hanging from its strap, a guitar pick rolling between fingers and knuckles.
“Can’t be late,” Pete said, holding up both hands like a card player stepping away from the table. “I’m the lead singer. I’m not late, you’re just foolishly early is all.”
Behind Elvis stood Raina Weeks on bass—not an original in the band, but she’d been with them for twenty of their thirty years since their founding bassist, Dave Jameson, jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge one Christmas. That meant she was younger—in her forties instead of the rest of these crusty old assholes in their fifties. Still looked good, too, with the long dark razor-slash hair in her face, the black-cherry lipstick, the Misfits T-shirt. Rounding out the band was Max Quick on drums—Quick, presently rocking up out of the studio bathroom, wiping his hands off on his cargo shorts.
Quick marched up—he didn’t walk so much as he tumbled forward like a thrown whiskey barrel—and wrapped his arms around Corley. “Hey, brother, good to see you,” he growled.
Thank fuck for drummers, Pete thought. Always the best of the breed. The glue that kept a band together, both as members and with the beat.
Raina didn’t say anything, just did that thing of hers where she didn’t say shit but lifted her chin in sleepy greeting. Corley did his thing in return, which was offer a saucy wink over a sneering lip.
But now back to Elvis, who still looked pissed.
Elvis, who had gone soft. Gone corporate. Gone fat, too, given the tub of pudding around his middle.
“We were supposed to start two hours ago,” Elvis said.
Corley shrugged it off. “And you surely did start without me, as I see you with your sunburst, and looks like Max has already been working up a froth at the drums—”
The sweaty Neanderthal gave a hound’s grin.
“And Raina’s fingers look limber like they’ve been making that bass guitar do its thing.”
Another chin-lift from her in confirmation.
“So really,” he continued, “I’m not late, I’m coming in like that last bowl of porridge—just right, when all the muscles are loosey-goosey and all your instruments have been properly lubed with the blood, sweat, and tears of rock-and-motherfucking-roll.”
“Fine,” Elvis said. “Let’s go from the top. Set list is on the amp. We’ll roll right down the middle—”
“Hold up,” Corley said, finger up like he was testing the wind.
“Christ,” Elvis said, flipping back his hair. “What now?”
“Gonna go to the WC.” The water closet. “Maybe drain the proverbial dragon.” Wasn’t a proverb, but whatever. “Maybe use the acoustics in there to warm up the ol’ screamin’ cheetah—” He flicked his Adam’s apple, thwomp thwomp. Screaming cheetah was what he called his voice, in part a reference to the band he’d fronted back in Killarney—the Screaming Cheetahs, as that’s how his vocals coach in choir described his voice when it really got going. (Actually, the full description was, “Peter, when you sing that way, it sounds like two cheetahs are screaming as they eat each other.” Pete liked to believe that the teacher meant it in a sexual manner.)
“Make it fast,” Elvis said.
“Elvis, old chum, don’t get pushy. Okay? This is rock-and-roll, not a fucking sales meeting.” He puckered his lips and blew a kiss. “Be back.”
* * *
—
IN THE BATHROOM, the smile fell away.
He went to the sink and washed his hands, then his face. His face—that craggy long mug, like a calcified Halloween mask where the paint and the plastic have gone brittle and started to crack, started to peel.
I turned fifty-five this year and everything’s gone to shit.
His own father died at fifty-nine, so Pete assumed he’d kick off then or before. His father was a hardworking man but didn’t drink, didn’t smoke. Pete, hah, hadn’t been quite so kind to his own body. He’d put that shit through a sausage grinder of coke and benzos and booze and cigarettes—gone were the cigarettes, the coke, the pills, but he still drank and lately he’d taken up smoking weed because, ahh, weed was something else, wasn’t it? Dulled all the sharp edges, ground down the fangs, covered life’s pointy bits in puffy, fluffy marshmallows. Everyone told him to go to edibles because they were better for you and your lungs, but smoking weed—even in the vaporizer—still made him feel a little bit like he was proper smoking, which in turn made him feel young.
Which he wasn’t.
The revelation of which hit him at least once an hour.
Not young. Gonna die. Fuckity-shit Jesus piss cunt.
Life, he told himself again and again, is pretty fucking sweet. He had a big-ass house in the Hudson Valley, he had two kids who were smart and mostly not shitheads, he had a wife who—well, he didn’t know if she liked him much, but she loved him for all his bumps and dings and fuckups. He had all the money he’d ever need. He’d lived a good life.
Listen to me, he thought. Talking to himself like it’s all over, pack it in. Give it up, into the bin it goes. That was what this reunion tour was about—and Evil Elvis was talking about an album of new material, said he’d written a few songs that could be the “start of something,” even said they could ironically call the album that, The Start of Something.
Yeah, yeah, great, sounds good, mate, Corley said, not telling the truth that the idea made him want to puke blood. And therein was the goddamn shit-hell paralysis of it all: He didn’t want to just curl up and die, but he didn’t want to go on tour and cut a new album, either. He was in some in-between place between the past glories of a long-done rock band and the quiet doom of the grave.
He thought of this space as the pasture. As in, where you go when you’re done being useful but aren’t yet dead.
His hand curled into a fist and he reared back—
Kssh, the mirror fractured as the knuckles popped the reflective glass, then blood, then—
None of that happened. The fist remained poised. The glass was kept unbroken. I don’t even have the fire in me anymore. Can’t be arsed to proper punch a mirror. Once upon a time he would’ve broken the mirror, kicked the sink, done rails of coke off the porcelain—
<
br /> God, coke would be nice right now.
Then, a knock at the door.
“If you’re not bringing me coke, I don’t wanna talk to you,” he yelled.
“It’s Elvis,” came the voice. The unhappy voice.
“Sorry, Elv, dropping a deuce in here.”
“Come out. I know you’re just in there staring at the fucking mirror.”
Well, aren’t you psychic. Pete would worry that Elvis had a camera in here or something, the ol’ perv, but truth was, Elvis knew him better than anyone. They started this band in 19coughcough82, best of friends then, and best of friends for all the years between then and now—but also, best of enemies, because they always seemed at each other’s throats.
He opened the door and stepped out.
Elvis waited there in the half dark of the hall outside the bathroom. Behind him sat stacks of risers and mic stands.
“You’re going to bail on us,” Elvis said—rather accusatorily, Pete felt. “That’s what this is.”
“The hell you say.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time. Five years ago, remember? Wasn’t even a reunion tour, it was Nike asking about doing one show—”
“Nike, are you kidding me? They sell fucking kicks, and not even cool sneakers, just like…shitty middle-class shoes.”
“You didn’t mind when they used our song for that commercial—”
“I told you, I don’t mind selling songs for commercials because it’s just a commercial—some of those directors are artists, guys who make music videos and TV shows and, you know, real-deal artists. Hey, they want to play ‘Apes Gone Wild’ for their stupid shoe commercial, more fucking power to them.” There, the Irish crept in again—facking instead of fucking. “Not like the blasted shoes played the song every time you stepped down on them. Christ, could you imagine.”
“So why bail on that show then?”
“Bah, this is all blood under the bridge—”
“This blood is washing up on my beach, Pete. This tour means everything to me. Goddamnit, Pete, it’s six cities—big stadium shit. The wild crowds, the pyro pots, that monster-sized screen showing off the stage—”
Pete cut him off. “You know, thinking about it now, we should be doing smaller gigs. More intimate. Clubs and bars and little fucking…persnickety theaters.”
“You asshole, you are bailing.”
“I’m not.”
He was.
He just hadn’t decided that until now.
And he wasn’t going to tell them that, either.
Which was fucked up, he knew. He was just going to do it. He wasn’t going to say shit about it, he was just going to casually disconnect from it all, like Homer Simpson easing backward into that fucking hedge.
Elvis leaned in. His breath smelled like—God, it smelled like a salad. Like vinaigrette. Vinaigrette is not rock-and-roll, you asshole.
“Listen. This is happening. We’re doing this tour. Six cities. Big crowds. I’d replace you if I could, but there’s no replacing you, just like there’s no replacing Tyler in Aerosmith or Axl in GnR. You’ll come along and then we’ll work on a new album together. It’ll come out, it’ll chart, and we’ll all top off our fucking retirement accounts.”
Pete licked his lips. “I don’t like how you’re speaking to me. I bet the others wouldn’t like it, either. I’m gonna go take a walk.”
“I’ll tell.”
“Tell who what? They already know you’re an asshole—”
“I’ll tell the world about you and your boy-toy. Landry.”
His brow went hot even as his middle went cold. “I…” He couldn’t find the words. “You don’t—that’s not—”
“I’m not going to be a fucking dummy this time,” Elvis seethed. “And I’m not letting you fuck this up.” He softened his tone when he said, “I hired a private detective to dig up some shit on you. I already knew you were into other men—I’m sorry to pull this shit, but you need a leash to—”
Elvis’s head snapped back with the hit.
He juggled his feet backward a few steps, cradling his nose as blood came running out of his nostrils like his face was a broken spigot.
Pete shook his hand as pain went through it.
“You fugging hit bee,” Elvis said.
“Yeah, I fucking hit you. And you threaten me or my family again, I’ll do a whole lot worse, mate.”
Pete shoved him aside and stormed out through the studio space. Quick twirled a stick as he called after: “Hey, man, where you going?”
“Out the fuckin’ door,” he yelled as he looked over his shoulder.
Raina gave him a quick nod.
He gave one back.
Then he was gone.
So, how do we know? That’s the big question, isn’t it? How do we know if these are the End Times? We know from the Gospel of Matthew that we won’t ever really know—but we also know that there are signs, signs that something is coming. Signs in the stars—like from Luke 21:25: “And there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth distress of nations in perplexity because of the roaring of the sea and the waves, people fainting with fear and with foreboding of what is coming on the world.” Sakamoto’s Comet? Global warming? Could be signs, sure. We also know about plagues and moral decay and false prophets. But the point isn’t that the End Times are here, or even coming. It’s that they could be, they always could be, and so we must be vigilant and take up the light of God to protect us.
—God’s Light podcast with Pastor Matthew Bird
JULY 3
God’s Light Church, Burnsville, Indiana
HIS PHONE JUST KEPT DINGING.
Ding, ding, ding. Like a happy little bell.
Emails, texts, new podcast subscribers. He’d started his podcast—God’s Light, with Pastor Matthew Bird—just seven days ago, and already he was up to…how many subscribers, now?
Matthew checked the phone to see.
His heart leapt like a dolphin jumping in the wake of a fast boat.
Twenty-five thousand subscribers! In just under a week.
Astonishing. It was like he found himself connected to a larger, digital congregation, one he knew existed but never felt he could be a part of. He was wrong. He spoke to them and they listened. God’s light was shining far and wide, and he was helping to carry that torch into unforeseen places.
He leaned back against the kitchen counter as he nursed a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with one hand and checked his phone with the other. The emails were nigh-constant now—they ranged from emails of support (“We love that you’re speaking truth to power about the great evil of the New World Order”) to emails of protest (“Religion is a drug and you’re its dealer!”) to invitations for speaking gigs to invitations to appear on TV shows, radio shows, other podcasts. Just this morning, he’d even had an invitation to sit down with a speaker’s agent—someone who could help him get speaking gigs and make sure he got paid well for them. Not that being paid was the point, of course, no, no, no, but traveling took time, it took money, and the church certainly needed repairs…
“Honey,” he yelled. “Autumn, check this out.” He took one more bite of sandwich, then grabbed a swig of cold milk from a frosted glass before wandering through the house, looking for his wife. He had to show her his new numbers. His reach, as the term went. “Honey, you have to see this.”
He checked upstairs. Nothing.
He checked downstairs. No one.
Maybe she’d gone shopping. The pantry was looking a little spare. What was today? Saturday? Gosh, since all this started the days had slipped through his grip. That was a good thing, he told himself. As the saying went, the Devil loved idle hands.
His hands were no longer idle.
“Autumn,” he yelled one more time. He thought to yell for
Bo, but he knew Bo was probably at Ozark’s again.
He heard a car door outside open and close.
Ah, there she was. She probably had gone to the store, he wagered, but when he went outside onto the front porch, he saw it wasn’t her.
It was a pickup truck. Forest green, rusted out. Cap on the back. Two men were getting out—one went around back and popped the gate down, the other slid a toolbox off the front passenger seat.
“Uh, hey, hi,” Matthew said, chuckling nervously as he wandered over. “Can I help you?”
The man by the front of the truck had messy, sandy hair and a few days’ worth of beard growth. He looked young and strong. White T-shirt, jeans, a hammer hanging from a belt loop. The other man came from around the back with a sawhorse under one arm and a circular saw dangling from the other, a power cord trailing behind. The second man was long like a flagpole, with a bent nose and hair cut down to the scalp.
“Hey, Preacher,” the sandy-haired one said.
And it was then Matthew recognized both men.
They’d come to last week’s service. Last week’s service was bigger than he’d ever anticipated—the room was bursting at the seams like an overstuffed doll. It had filled up with people who came not just from the towns around Burnsville but from as far away as Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Louisville. He was suddenly bummed that he hadn’t scheduled a service for tomorrow—this year, the Fourth of July fell on a Sunday, and he wanted people to be with their families. But now he thought he could make a heckuva speech about the freedom God had granted to man. And suddenly he felt anxious that he’d wasted an opportunity. Would he lose momentum and, as a result, lose people? That was no good.
“Preacher?” the sandy-haired man said.
Matthew laughed in a self-effacing way. “Sorry, I was lost in my own head for a moment. You were here last week? You’re with Ozark?”