“Where are those idiots?” Joey ranted. He looked over the washer and dryer and out the window in the utility room.
“Damn,” I muttered under my breath. “They must have run straight down the street. They’re screwed.”
We ran to the front of the dark house. “A perfect escape route and those spazzes run wild in the streets,” Joey spat in a thick, low whisper.
We found positions at the front window and peeked out the shades.
“There’s Hoops,” I said softly, thinking the police directly in front of the house could hear us. “He’s across the street under that hedge. Shit! The cop’s flashlight just hit him.”
“Where in the hell did Winn go?” Joey asked, searching the darkness.
“He must have run down the street,” I said, stretching my neck, studying the scene.
“Look,” Joey said, “that cop is going for Winn.”
“Yeah, and the other cop’s walking over there.”
The big cop brought Hoops back in front of Joey’s house.
We could almost hear what was happening. I saw the air conditioner in the wall and went over and put my ear to it. Unbelievably, I could hear what was going on outside.
“Okay, son, which way did your two friends go?”
“I don’t know,” Hoops answered, wide-eyed.
Inside the house, Joey gasped, “He’s questioning Hoops!”
Hoops was pleading now with the cop not to arrest him.
“Quiet, here comes the other cop with Winn. Damn!”
“Perfect. We’ll be playing ‘Walk, Don’t Run’ at Sing-Sing Prison,” I said.
We could hear Mike pleading now with the cop. After about a minute, we watched as Hoops and Winn walked away and down the street. The first cop stayed in front while the second cop went back over the fence to retrieve their squad car.
I sat on the floor holding my head in my hands. All at once it hit me, like that moment when you realize you left the iron flat down on your coolest shirt when you went to answer the phone.
“My car! What the hell are we gonna do about my car? That other cop’s probably writing the license number down now.” Slamming my fist down on the floor, I moaned desperately.
“All right, all right, don’t panic,” Joey said. “Maybe they forgot about it in all the commotion. Better still, they’ve only been gone twenty seconds…and they have to go all the way around. That’s five or six blocks. Maybe we have time to beat ‘em. Let’s go.”
“Are you nuts? They’re all still out there.”
“Let’s go check.”
We ran back to the window and saw Mike and Winn in the back seat as the cop car drove off.
“’Kay, let’s go.”
We shot out the back door to the wall. As we jumped it and to our utter surprise the car was still there running with the Kingston Trio singing “The Tijuana Jail” over the radio.
“I don’t believe our luck,” I said.
“Either they’re coming down Beverly Boulevard right now,” Joey said, “or we’re the luckiest ho-dads on earth.”
“Jump in, ass-bite!” I ordered as he hit the ground close to the car and jumped in.
I jammed the automatic transmission into reverse and backed it up for the get-away.
Joey said, “Let’s park it on the other side of the Bowling Alley. It’s an ocean of metal over there.”
“Wait a minute!” I yelled. “Sure! It’s perfect. The Ogner Ford Dealership right across the street.”
“Crank it across the street, Big Bopper!” Joey roared.
With as much power as I could get out of the old Chevy, it revved, clanked, and clattered across four lanes of the Boulevard towards what we thought—and hoped—would be safe ground.
Pulling into the main part of the dealership, I hung a right turn to park behind the newer cars that faced the street.
I quickly jammed it in between a used ‘57 white Ford Fairlaine and a wasted VW Bug.
“Perfect. They’ll never find it,” Joey said.
“Unless they check,” I countered.
“That don’t mean diddly-squat. You’re jerking off. Now let’s get back to my house and cover our tracks.”
“I think we just did that,” I said.
“It ain’t over ’til the fat lady sings,” Joey shot back. “We’re not out of the woods yet. They could have written your license number down.”
We ran like gazelles across the street and doubled back towards the Bowling Alley. We hoisted ourselves up on top of the wall one more time.
“Oh, shit!” Joey said.
My eyes darted to the house. We stopped dead in our tracks knowing it was either the cops or Joey’s mom inside the house.
Trying to calm our racing inner motors, we put on casual faces as if just returning from a game of pool next door.
We could hear Jenny’s voice in the kitchen as she rounded the corner into the dining room. Joey’s face tightened and I became a church mouse. Our cover was blown.
“What the hell have you two been up to tonight?” she demanded. “The back door’s wide open, the curtains are messed up, my neighbor just called saying the police were out in front—”
Joey cowered as I took backwards steps.
“Nothing, mom. It was just some jerks from the Bowling Alley,” he lied.
“Then why are there dirt and scuffmarks all over the kitchen floor, and why do I smell liquor on your breath? You stink like gin pots,” she growled.
“We just snuck some beers at the Bowling Alley, mom. Honest.”
She shot a wild look at me. “Rusty, are you going to stand there and lie to me. What happened here?” The veins in her neck reminded me of a Mighty Joe Young flick I saw on Channel Five.
“A couple of guys got in a fight in the alley parking lot and when they knew the cops were called, they jumped your wall outside and got nailed.” I was amazed at how easily I lied.
Jenny raged, “How did you buy liquor at the Bowl?”
I kept it up, “A drunk guy who we gave money to did it.”
She took a breath. Her eyes penetrated deep into my young soul. “You’re a bad lair, Rusty Johnson. Your eyes give you away.”
She directed her icy fury back at her son. “You’re going to catch hell for this, Joey, when I tell your father. Rusty, you better leave. There’s going to be some changes around this house.” She stormed off into her bedroom.
“What a wonderful soiree,” Joey spewed sarcastically. “God! I hate living at home. They’ll probably assassinate me at dawn. When I’m dead, just tell them to cremate me and scatter my ashes over the musician’s union. Dig?”
“Dug,” I said.
As I left the house, I glanced down at the piano. I felt sick to my stomach. Feeling confused and misunderstood, another feeling surfaced: Guilt. The thought crossed my mind about how unhappy the adults were around me who used alcohol on a regular basis. My father was at the top of the list.
Shoes clicked, echoing in the hallway, as I hung out before class on Monday. I could spot dark circles under Joey’s eyes as he approached me. The sound of students laughing seemed to fall into a vacuum. Joey pulled books from his locker like a prisoner loading up trays of food for other inmates in a penitentiary.
“I hate people that open with lines like this, but you look like doggie droppings,” I said.
Joey cracked a tired smile.
“I feel like doggie droppings,” he admitted.
My eyes rose to a cheesecake picture of Tuesday Weld in a tight sweater.
Joey noticed the look. He laughed. “Just like Dobie will never score with Tuesday, I guess I’ll never…” He stopped short. “Never mind. Meet me at your car for lunch.”
He walked away like a bloodless mummy.
At twelve thirty, we met and drove into Jensen’s Drive-in for lunch. We decided to eat in the car because we didn’t want to be around any of our fellow students. The car hop came over, took our order, and returned in a few minutes, attaching trays to eac
h of the windows.
Joey stared out the window—despondent, detached, simmering with rage. He finally drew a long breath and exhaled. “My parents have decided to move the whole family back to New Jersey.”
My eyes shot wide. I turned my head as if I was just slapped. “EX-FRICKIN’-CUSE ME?” I choked on my cherry Coke, spilling it across my unzipped Tanker jacket.
Joey took the paper covering off his straw and sailed it out the window with one quick thrush of air. He watched it as it sailed high and then coasted back and forth in a see-sawing motion to the ground, hitting bottom and exemplifying his feelings exactly. He jammed the straw into the plastic lid with a squeak.
“They’ve been talking about it for a year. We’ve been here for twelve years and my mother misses all of her relatives back there. Now that I’ve screwed up, it’s their excuse to ruin my life.”
“They’re serious?” I questioned. “They’re just trying to scare us. My dad says kids are libel to do anything at our age. We’re mostly nuts, he says.”
“After what we pulled this weekend, I’d say your dad was right,” Joey moaned while unwrapping his double cheeseburger. “Oh, and by the way, my folks found out we were lying. Winn’s parents got a hold of my parents and told them the whole scene. We’re dead. Doggie droppings. I had to take the blame for you to try and keep your ass out of it.”
“Me? What’d you do that for? It was my car!”
“Exactly!” Joey thundered. “I got you into that mess, so the least I could do was get you out of it.”
But none of that mattered now. Joey might be moving away. “So, Zag, what are we going to do if your family splits? You going to run away to my house? Sure is poor timing.”
“Right.” Joey’s tone was laced with sarcasm. He scratched his scalp angrily.
“We’re so close to a record deal, I know we are…and now this shit comes down.”
I took a deep breath. “I thought our lives were supposed to be like Father Knows Best—not The Naked City.”
I started the old Bel-Air. As I backed the car up, the radio came on and Bob Eubanks on KRLA played “I’m Busted” by Ray Charles. Ray sang about poverty and having no one to turn to. His bills were all due and his brother was broker than he was when Ray asked him for a loan. I turned, straightened the car out, and pointed it towards Whittier Boulevard.
“I hear ya, brother Ray,” I said, downcast.
“No jive,” Joey echoed in a hopeless funk.
3
Poor Little Fool
I paced frantically in my small bedroom. I ran my hand along the edge of my large ride cymbal and thought about how fast things could change in someone’s life. The sparkling set of drums that held my dreams looked motionless and morose. I knew I had to make some kind of stand concerning our careers as musicians.
In the two weeks following The Upset’s night of unintended consequences, it became obvious that Jenny’s decision to move the family back to New Jersey was serious. The effect on Joey was catastrophic. There were daily fights between the strong wills of Joey and his mother. After days of contemplation and countless counseling sessions with Joey on the phone, I decided to ask him if I could speak to Jenny.
“Anything! Please, man,” Joey cried. He was exhausted both emotionally and physically. “Ask your parents to adopt me. I’ll be legal in two years. Anything’s better than this. It’s all out war here!”
Joey’s parents had pushed him towards music his entire life. That’s why this all seemed so insane. They gave him piano lessons at a young age, before he switched to guitar.
They drove him to radio stations when he was ten years old to perform live. From his vantage point, he was only doing what his parents wanted him to do and now here they were pulling the rug from under him—because of one screw up. It didn’t jive and everyone knew it.
Joey spat back through the phone receiver to me, “I know what’s really going on here. They’re just sick of California and want to live their retiring years in the old New Jersey neighborhood where they started out. They’re using me as a friggin’ scapegoat and won’t come clean. Rusty, my parents are your grandparents’ age and I’m stuck in the middle of this shit. I swear to God, man, they’re gonna pay for it if they don’t let me stay!”
At four thirty the next day, Joey and I pulled up in front of Joey’s house. We had just returned from Cronon’s Music Store where we had picked up two songs to add to our repertoire: “Fingertips-Part 2” and “Surf City.” I hadn’t been in Joey’s house since the night of the party that now seemed to be our undoing.
“Well, Rusty,” Jenny said in a tolerating tone.
Joey sat quietly across the room.
I froze for a moment. I took a deep breath and began. “Jenny, I’m here to plead our case today. Joey and I have been working hard to try and pull off this record deal and if there’s any way you can put off this move, I would be truly grateful. If—”
She started to speak.
“Let me finish before I lose my nerve,” I said urgently.
“Oh, I don’t think there’s much chance of you doing that, young man,” she said with a slight edge. “Anyone who’s as close to my son as you are has to have a lot of nerve.”
“I would just like to apologize for that mistake we made and promise you that nothing like that will ever happen again.”
“That’s very noble, Rusty, and I accept your apology. It’s just that I can feel things unraveling for Joey here and I want to put a stop to it now. I’m so angry with you two. It’s going to be a long time before I can trust either one of you again. He’s much too important to us to let this kind of teenage trouble mess up his life.”
“Jenny, it’s the biggest mistake I’ve—we’ve—ever made. But if you will give us one more chance, I swear on my life to you, it will never happen again.”
“Hey! What am I, twelve?” Joey chimed in. “You two are talking about me like I’m not even here!”
“Joseph, hold your tongue!” she snapped.
I continued, “Jenny, we’ve been waiting for months to get this deal. You take him now and if the deal is offered, it’s all down the river.”
“There are no guarantees in your business. You boys have your whole lives in front of you. You can replace him and he can start another band back east. I’m sorry, Rusty. I heard you out, but his father and I have made up our minds.”
With that she stood and walked into the kitchen.
We walked outside. Joey paced up and down in front of the red Bel-Air. I lit a smoke, holding it down low in case Jenny was watching.
“I swear to God, Rusty, if they make me do this, I’ll do something crazy!”
The following night, I walked solemnly from my car to the stage door. On stage fifteen minutes later, we were in the middle of “Surfing Drums” by Dick Dale, as if trying to commit suicide on our instruments. The Plush Bunny nightclub rocked for what was supposed to be our last gig together. Joey was sullen and low key. Then he suddenly turned and yelled so I could hear over the music.
“There’s no way I’m going, man! I gave her every chance. She’s about as sympathetic as the Gestapo.”
He turned, walked across the stage, and played “Night Train.” Then he walked back to where I was drumming, leaned over, and yelled again, “They can force me, but I’ll just split!”
The drum sticks felt like bowling balls in my hands.
“No friggin’ way!” Joey yelled again over and over like a man obsessed.
“I’ve decided,” he said when the song was over and we prepared for another. “I’m leaving my family. I’m running away. Dig?”
“Dug! Where to?” I asked. “You stay at my house and they’ll have the cops checking all the time, and my mom won’t allow it without your old lady’s permission.”
“I got a plan,” he said.
I watched Joey play the lead on “Walk, Don’t Run.” It had become our most requested song. Joey seemed to lift off the ground, his emotions seemed in some st
range way tied to this one song. I could see the extreme focus and determination Joey showed during the lead solo.
When the song ended and the audience went nuts, Joey turned toward his twin-reverb amp. As he turned his head up, I could see that he had been crying.
Just then I saw Eddie Olmos at the front of the stage. To keep the momentum going and cover for Joey, I yelled to the band, “Hey! Let’s have Eddie up!” I turned and spoke into the microphone, “Hey cats and chicks, you’re in for a real treat now. Please welcome a guy with a band almost as good as the Upsets…Mr. Eddie ‘James’ Olmos.”
As the audience clapped and Eddie walked up on stage, Joey composed himself and turned to Eddie.
“Hey, man! What do you want to sing?”
“‘I Feel Good’ in C,” Eddie said, taking the microphone off the stand.
“‘I Feel Good’ in C, you guys,” Joey yelled to the others.
I counted off the song and Eddie screamed, “Yes, babies! I…”
The stress Joey and I were under seemed to lift as Eddie whirled the audience into a frenzy. Eddie’s ability to use his body to express himself the way other musicians used their instruments put him in a category all his own. As he sang, he’d run to the other musicians and put his left arm on us, holding the microphone with his right, bending at the waist as if he were a tour guide to euphoria and laughing like he had energy from another dimension. I took a quick view of the whole room and could see that no one could take their eyes off this human dynamo.
When “I Feel Good” ended and the audience exploded into applause and shouts, I looked to Joey and pointed at Eddie.
“‘Mustang Sally’ in C!”
He counted it off and we were all off again into the music womb. It was safe there during the four-minute song. The world couldn’t get at you. We held Eddie for six more songs and I thought how Eddie had been sent that night to ease our broken hearts.
After the gig, Joey was alone in his bedroom. His mind wouldn’t stop racing and he talked to himself like an old homeless man in the park.
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