by Benton, Ken
“Forget I asked that,” Sammy said. “Okay, a singing contest. Just tell me one thing please, Finn. Are you really on my side? I mean, do you have any motivation for helping me win?”
“Oh, yes,” Finn replied. “For one thing, I’d have to answer to Mort if I didn’t do my best—and he can tell, believe me. In that case, I might find myself as the next contestant. But if we win, I get my first choice of portion at…” He looked over at Enzo trying to sing.
So did Sammy. Enzo was thin with oddly cut short dark hair. One part of his hair would stick up, and another would hang down, like it was cut with a knife.
“All right,” Sammy said. “How does this song go again?”
Chapter Seventeen
“You better flash the lights again,” Joel said after getting an uneasy feeling.
When Mick complied, the brief illumination of the dark asphalt revealed debris directly ahead.
“Crap!” Mick jerked the wheel to change to the far right lane—well, technically the far left lane.
“I thought I saw something there.” Joel stretched his neck to peer over the westbound lanes on the opposite side.
“That must be your fantasy-ticket gas station there. Looks like a dim light is on inside—and outside at the pumps as well. They must have a nocturnal attendant. I mean, wouldn’t these places have to, in order to serve half the population? Like when Jessie and Archer come rolling up to one, which they might be doing right about now.”
“Let’s hope they roll into a more honest operation than we did,” Mick muttered.
“Or not,” Joel muttered right back.
Mick gave him a disagreeable glance before flashing the lights again. “I’m sure they will. They aren’t fantasy tickets, Joel. The gas stations are real. I’m sure the tickets are good, too—as long as you don’t show up in a vehicle they start drooling over.”
“How can you still say that?” Joel asked in disgust. “You guys got scammed. I tried to warn you, but—”
“So what are you saying? Every single person who buys those tickets is going to get robbed or carjacked when they try to redeem them at any of the sixteen locations they now have? It can’t be that simple, or they wouldn’t be expanding. Even your colonel friend acknowledged knowing about these unsanctioned networks. The fact the military doesn’t control them doesn’t automatically mean they aren’t a real business. You of all people should get that. Sammy and I needed a fill-up at one, just one of the stinking places, to complete our plans.”
“And you see how that worked out,” Joel said. “You were too eager, which is why you were vulnerable. All of a sudden it was urgent that you leave immediately. You could have waited a week, or even a few freaking days, and I would have helped you plan it. But no, you had to go chasing the first carrot dangled in front of your nose. People who do that, reacting emotionally instead of taking your time to work out the best strategy, are the ones keeping the crooks in business.”
Mick appeared to bite his tongue, which was good because this was the most critical point they were now passing.
Sure enough, not a mile past the gas station a bright light turned on from the other side of the interstate, shining from the westbound lanes into the eastbound, a couple hundred yards ahead.
“Joel!” Mick said hitting the brakes.
“I see it. Don’t slow down!”
“I need to hit the lights again to see.”
“Go ahead. They already know we are here. Try to go by them fast.”
Mick flashed the headlights and sped up. When he did, the light ahead could be seen moving its beam towards them. Joel had been keeping the two rifles within easy access on either side of his legs. He pushed the button to roll the window down with his right hand while maneuvering the AR-15 with his left, so he could hold it out the window with both arms as soon as the window was all the way down.
At that moment the spotlight beam hit them and the light became blinding. Fortunately, Joel was able to aim at it a second beforehand.
Joel fired a round. The sound of crashing glass accompanied the light going out.
“Use the headlights as you need to,” Joel said.
He then began firing random shots at about the same height the spotlight had been. When Mick flashed the headlights to see the road, Joel lowered the angle and fired several more rounds quickly, spread across the area. They were probably still too high to hit anyone, but hopefully low enough to convince whoever was on the other side to keep down. Joel turned around in the seat in order to keep up the cover fire up even after passing the spot.
When it was safely behind them, Mick began holding the headlights on a few seconds longer.
“Did that make up for not putting any rounds in the gas station?” Mick asked.
“A little.” Joel came all the way back inside and set the weapon down. “I aimed a couple towards it just for spite.”
Mick cracked a faint smile. “Where did they get a spotlight, and how did they power it?”
“A gasoline generator, obviously.”
That’s when the walkie-talkie squawked. It was very staticky, but someone’s voice spoke. All Joel could make out was a name that sounded like “Lanny.”
Joel picked it up and messed with the dial before looking at the screen, turning it off, and setting it down.
“See?” Mick said.
“See what?”
“You don’t want to be tempted, either. Or don’t want them messing with our minds.” He paused and then added, “Or are we just out of range?”
“Out of juice,” Joel answered.
* * *
Sammy’s eyes needed a few moments to take in the scene after they all came out on stage. Finn and Enzo had to push the piano, which wasn’t easy with a broken wheel on one corner. Daniel, pistol in hand, stayed close enough to make any private communication between the two contestants impossible—but far enough away to make jumping him and wrestling for the gun a suicidal endeavor, even by a coordinated effort. Enzo barely glanced at Sammy anyway, and was plainly uninterested in becoming friendly with his opponent in a dual to the death. This must be how Roman gladiators felt entering the arena.
Enzo was first up. Sammy and Finn were to stand to the side of the stage during their performance. As Sammy studied the arrangement of the audience, he realized the futility of an escape attempt.
Mort and Arturo, the two gang leaders, sat at a table in front of all the seats. Arturo was a large man like Daniel, and donned his own hat, which was more like something an actual cowboy would wear than Finn’s. Ominously laying on the table in front of him was a rifle resembling Joel’s .308 that had been confiscated, except it had a longer magazine so was probably a semi-automatic.
More ominous still was Mort’s weapon, also set before him. Silver and short-barreled, it jogged a memory of a TV program Sammy once watched about Los Angeles drug gangs, where a member held up a similar-looking gun and said straight into the camera, “See this? This is a .223, baby. Kill anything that moves.” Mort’s weapon might be an AR-15 pistol modified for fully-automatic.
It made sense that the gang leaders would possess the most formidable weapons. As Sammy got used to the sporadic lighting in the theater, he could discern that seat location for the show was also an indication of rank. No one occupied the first two rows behind the judges. Starting in the third row, the second-tier guys congregated, spaced out one or two seats apart from each other. These included Jimbo and Chili, who had primo center seats. Those two both waved at Sammy when he made eye contact. Sammy nodded and tried to form something resembling a smile in return. They all visibly held weapons as well, displaying them as jewelry.
The lower-tier ranks congregated beyond them in various places. Noticeable spacing separated the different groups. The farther up the rows, the shoddier the spectators became. Sammy was glad he couldn’t clearly see those in the back rows.
The low hum of audience chatter ended when Mort stood and turned behind him, bringing a moving hush over the
crowd.
“All right,” Mort said. “Let’s get going. Who’s doing the introduction?”
A blonde man ran down an aisle. When Mort saw him, he sat back down. The jogger went around the far side of the stage and came up by a set of stairs there. Sammy then recognized him as Bat, the other of his captors.
“Welcome to the show,” Bat said in a loud, scratchy voice. “For our entertainment tonight we have two very special singers competing—the cheater,” he held a hand towards Enzo, “and the rabbit.” He pointed sideways at Sammy.
It seemed that Sammy and Enzo had already recruited their own fan bases, as a few claps and cheers came from different spots for each of them.
“So without further ado, let’s get it started in here. The cheater is up first.”
Bat jogged off stage. Finn and Sammy backed all the way to the side. Daniel spoke something to Enzo before sitting down at the piano.
Mort stood again. “Cheater,” he said, “tell us something about yourself.”
Enzo looked back at him nervously. “I’m local. Hope Gardens. My name is Enzo.”
“The Miami brothers!” Arturo boomed from his seat.
Enzo nodded at him. “That’s right. They’re gone now. I was a lieutenant, if that means anything.”
“Only if you stayed in your own hood,” Arturo replied.
Laughter in places.
“What are you going to sing for us?” Mort asked.
“Um…” he glanced at Daniel. “La Bamba.”
Arturo nodded enthusiastically.
“All right, cheater.” Mort sat back down. “Good luck.”
Daniel began pounding on the piano keys like they were bongos. Enzo reacted as if confused, and hesitated after opening his mouth, causing Daniel to frown and start over. Someone in the audience booed.
This time Enzo sang, quietly at first and then with more forced enthusiasm as he scanned the audience. But he kept stopping and starting again, looking back at the piano as if he were lost or couldn’t remember certain words. The song ended much shorter than Sammy remembered it being.
Daniel stood up and nudged Enzo to the edge of the stage. Mort was scowling and Arturo smiling.
Mort spoke first.
“That was bloody awful!” He shook his head in dismay and picked up his fearsome weapon to wave in motions as he spoke, causing Enzo to flinch. “You didn’t know half the lyrics, and completely failed to keep any rhythm with the music. Absolutely horrid.” Sammy thought he detected a sudden British accent invading Mort’s voice.
Arturo then spoke. “Yeah, it wasn’t a good song choice for you, man. And you acted nervous. You need to calm down, dude. And find your balance, you know? This is a serious competition! All of us came to hear you tonight. You’ve got to do better, man.”
“Just terrible,” Mort said shaking his head. He waved them away with his fingers.
Daniel steered Enzo away from the judges and led him to the side of the stage where Sammy and Finn were. Finn pushed Sammy forward, causing him to drop his tree branch crutch and stumble on his hurt leg, resulting in some laughs in the crowd. But his leg didn’t hurt as bad now, and Sammy discovered he could limp on it without the crutch almost as easily as with it, so left it where it lay. He noticed Enzo finally look him in the eye as they passed, with a fierce expression.
“Tell us something about yourself rabbit,” Mort said to Sammy after arriving at center stage.
Sammy thought for a second. “I’m only visiting. I’m from Idaho.”
His response earned some belly laughs from the crowd.
“Are you a farm boy?” Arturo asked.
Sammy shrugged. “I guess so.”
“You guess so? Shouldn’t you know that? What are you going to sing for us?”
Sammy glanced at Finn struggling with the guitar.
“Blinded … Blinded by the light.”
Mort rolled his eyes but Arturo once again responded appreciatively, and told them to proceed.
Finn began strumming. Sammy started singing the ridiculous lyrics Finn taught him, which weren’t many. It was a lot of repeating what was undoubtedly the chorus over and over, with that stupid fig newton part—Sammy even accidentally sang fig newton once—and a few other scattered rhymes that included Mozart had a go-cart, teenage diplomat wearing an Indian hat and something about curly wurly that Sammy decided to just rhyme within feeling squirrely early. It ended abruptly with Sammy trying to put more emphasis on the last line, I asked him if he needed a ride.
When the song was over Sammy looked down at Mort, who now held his head in his hands. Finn steered Sammy forward to the edge of the stage. A lone clapper somewhere was drowned out with growing boos that seemed to expand as the spectators noticed Mort’s reaction.
Mort took his hands off his face. “What the bloody hell is going on here? You can’t be serious.”
“Yeah that was bad,” Arturo said. “Really bad. What would make you choose that song, man? It’s like you never heard it before, don’t know the lyrics or the tune, and don’t respect it at all.”
Sammy frowned at Finn, who remained still and expressionless.
Mort turned to Arturo. “Isn’t it obvious? They were both coached to pick songs they think you like.”
“Well that’s cool,” Arturo replied. “I’m okay with that strategy.”
Mort looked back at Sammy. “That performance was so bad I have half a mind to end this right now.” He took up his gun again, but instead of waving it for a visual aid as he did with Enzo he simply pointed it directly at Sammy. Sammy saw Finn step away from him in his side vision, but Sammy stood still himself and did his best not to react. If they shot him, they shot him.
Mort and Sammy’s eyes met and held a gaze at each other for a moment before Mort moved the gun barrel over to Finn.
“This is as much your fault as his, Huckleberry. Don’t think you are getting off scot-free.”
“I’m sorry,” Sammy blurted. “I can do better.”
Mort said, “You damn well better,” at the same time Arturo said, “For your sake I hope so.”
Mort set the gun back down. “Maybe there is some hope for you.”
“The last line was good,” Arturo chimed. “You hit the last line of that song okay.”
Mort ignored him. “Rabbit, you start the next round, so you have only ten minutes to prepare. Kowtowing to Arturo isn’t going to get the job done, trust me. Please come up with something we can all enjoy. Anything.”
“Dig deep,” Arturo added as Finn turned Sammy’s shoulder to start leading him backstage.
Once there, Sammy noticed that Daniel now held the guitar and talked with Enzo on the other side of the room with a new air of confidence, as if they were clearly winning.
“Any ideas?” Finn asked Sammy.
“Are you going to play the guitar again?” Sammy asked.
“No, it’s our turn for the piano.”
“But that’s still out on stage.”
“Right. No more piano practice. Just tell me the song and I’ll tell you if I know it. Or if you can hum it for me, I might be able to reproduce it.”
“You play the piano, then?”
Finn frowned. “Obviously. The guitar, piano, even some saxophone. Don’t believe me? There’s a saxophone around here someplace.” He walked back to the dark recesses of the stage and vanished.
“Finn, wait,” Sammy called after him.
But he didn’t.
Now this was a better moment for an escape attempt. Daniel’s gun was somewhere other than in his hands, as he now sat on a stool completely occupied by a useless effort to tune the guitar.
As if reading Sammy’s thoughts, Daniel stopped playing, frowned, yelled for Finn, and produced his pistol that had apparently been in his lap. It was a sizeable semi-automatic handgun appropriate for Daniel’s big hands—probably a .45.
“Yeah, yeah,” Finn’s voice said as he reappeared with a large cardboard box in his hands. He set it down at Sammy’s
feet and pulled a saxophone out of it.
Sammy leaned down to poke around the box while Finn tried to play the sax. He almost got one or two notes from it. The box mostly contained children’s percussion instruments such as symbols, a triangle, tambourine, and a small xylophone. But one item caught Sammy’s attention: a harmonica.
“You play that?” Finn asked as Sammy dusted if off.
“I used to. Been a while.” Sammy tried to play it and found it worked—at least for the lower cross-harp blues notes of 2 draw through 6 blow, the only ones he could ever play back in the day.
“Finn, can you play some bluesy-sounding riffs on the piano?”
“I can try. But they want a song, rabbit. Not just a musical recital, you know? Something they recognize. It’s a singing contest.”
“Hmm.” Sammy blew a few notes. “How about Blues in the Night? That one’s a classic, so most people should at least know the tune.”
Finn stared back blankly. “Hum it for me.”
Chapter Eighteen
“When you left him,” Joel asked, “were you thinking about how to get back?”
“Well I certainly should have been, no doubt about that.” Mick’s tone included more than a trace of defiance. “I had a lot on my mind, like staying out of sight so I could survive long enough to get to the interstate and start another gunfight with a hardened criminal. And it was light out, so things looked different. I think this is where I crossed the tracks.”
“Railroad tracks aren’t the best thing to be driving over in the dark,” Joel said. “Maybe I should get out and find a safe crossing place.”
Mick flashed the brights. “You can see that they’re pretty flat here. I don’t remember them presenting any tire hazards, either. And this vehicle has Michelins.”
“All right. Go for it.”
Joel tried to stay aware of as much of their dark surroundings as possible while Mick crossed the tracks, turned the headlights back off, and then attempted to retrace his earlier foot route. What he lacked in confidence he made up for in determination. Joel allowed himself a moment of optimism.