Tinker and Blue

by Frank Macdonald

  “We’re all set to go here,” he said into the microphone, his voice attracting the attention of the guests, including the official photographer who found his way to the stage through the viewfinder, his shutter winking. “You all know what the other fellow says about wedding pictures, don’t you, that if the wedding was any good then the pictures will be the only proof it ever happened, even for the people who were there. Especially for the people who were there, I guess, and judging from the size of the liquor bar over there, I’d say we’re in for one hell of a wedding.

  “Now the only way to start off any reception, of course, is with ‘The Wedding Waltz,’ and my friend Gerry here is going to play just that for the bride and groom to get things started. Take her away, Gerry!”

  The introduction stunned Gerry who was preparing for Blue Cacophony’s intro number. “What are you doing, Blue? I’m not ready for that. I’m not even in tune.”

  “What the hell’s the difference,” Blue barked back. “Nine out of ten people out there won’t even know the difference.”

  “And one out of three on the stage,” Gerry snapped.

  “We’re having a little technical problem here, ladies and gentlemen,” Blue said into the mic, “but Gerry will be with you in just one moment.”

  Holding the violin between his knees, Gerry tuned it to the challenge Blue had forced on him, then began to play, his one-armed style attracting as much attention as his music, but its romantic tone brought the bride and groom onto the dance platform in front of the stage, and the guests turned to watch.

  “What are you doing?” Peter? asked as he, Tinker and Kathy, who had just arrived in the Plymouth, walked toward the band.

  “What?”

  “What’s with these clothes, this music?” he asked, nodding toward the tuxedoed Gerry. “You look like some silly act on The Ed Sullivan Show.”

  “What’s wrong with Ed Sullivan?” Blue asked, thrusting his chin forward, ready to physically defend the variety show host.

  Tinker and Kathy, official guests of Mike, the bride’s father, eased themselves away from the tension that surrounded the stage, especially Blue, and made their way to the food tent. On the dance platform, guests began joining the wedding couple as Gerry’s violin grew more and more comfortable in his hand, like an amnesia victim suddenly remembering a previous life.

  “Look, Peter?, I know what I’m doing here. You don’t have to worry about people finding out that Blue Cacophony was playing ‘The Wedding Waltz,’ because The Subterranean doesn’t review weddings. Your reputation and your revolution’s safe,” Blue said as Gerry’s music softly ended to solid applause.

  “Let’s hear it for Gerry,” Blue said, jumping onto the stage and grabbing the mic again. “Now you’re probably wondering what’s a bagpiper doing at a wedding. It’s an instrument usually reserved for funerals, as the other fellow says, but there’s those people who say what’s the difference between them? Well, Nathan here adds something really different to Blue Cacophony’s music, and I’m going to ask him to play something lively to get this place hopping. A waltz’s okay for those in love, but what about the rest of us, huh, those of us who aren’t getting married today or maybe ever. We need something lively, right, and let me tell you, nobody’s ever heard anything as lively as ‘The Mexican Hat Dance’ played on the bagpipes. Take her away, Nathan.”

  Like Gerry, Nathan was caught in the spotlight of the wedding guests’ attention, barely able to comprehend the situation in which Blue had cast him, but in the few moments it took to prepare his pipes, Gerry ran through the hat dance quietly to trigger Nathan’s memory. By the time Nathan had found his way into the popular party tune, the guests had begun to bounce in place, then began dancing the giddy steps that changed the tempo of the reception. People began clowning on the dance platform, forgetting the strangulation of their neck-ties, the ankle-wrenching fact of their high heels.

  For the next couple of hours, Blue managed the stage in a way that kept the rhythm of the party going, with Gerry and Nathan finding themselves willing accomplices to the war-time tunes and nasal country of Blue’s version of some Nashville ballads, making their own contributions by retrieving from hundreds of hours of practice, the standard music that both had long ago left behind, but would never forget. The wedding guests danced themselves dizzy.

  “I have a special treat for you now,” Blue told the crowd. “I’m going to have a friend of mine come up here and sing a few songs for you. He’s a wedding guest so we don’t even have to pay him, but wait until you hear this guy, and if you like what you hear, then you can hear him any day you want because he sings for his supper, as the other fellow says. Ladies and gentlemen, let’s have a big hand for my friend Tinker, the best street singer in San Francisco.”

  Reluctant and uncertain, Tinker joined the band on the stage. Blue passed him his guitar and while Tinker started with “Dock of the Bay,” Blue jumped down and made his way to the liquor tent as the lights of the estate lawn suddenly lit up against the falling darkness. He ordered a beer and leaned against the bar, watching the party. Gerry and Nathan were improvising on stage. Kathy pulled the sullen Peter? onto the dance floor. Mike, the bride’s father, wandered off the dance floor toward the bar.

  “You guys are great!” he said, spotting Blue. “I never figured a famous band like yours would be playing songs people could dance to without drugs. And listen to this guy! He’s got a great voice, but I’ve always known that.”

  “You did?” Blue asked.

  “You should have heard him in the tunnel. Some of us would be working on the face and all of a sudden you could hear this voice travelling through the tunnel while he was tearing apart some machine. Shit, I miss him down there. You guys go way back, I take it.”

  “Yeah, buddy, we go way back,” Blue said, pulling a deep drink from his beer, “and any day now we’re going way back where we come from. Back where we belong.”

  Blue ordered another beer and taking it with him walked away from the bar toward the parking lot where he sat on the hood of the Plymouth, parked among the newer models. Alone, he lit a cigarette, listening to the faint but clear sound of Tinker’s voice carrying on the still air, and wished Karma was with him.

  —

  Two weeks earlier, Blue had walked into their bedroom to discover Karma making inspired progress on the last panel of her nine lives. Sitting on the bed, he watched her, paint-smudged, working feverishly at her painting. Studying the picture, recognition came to him.

  “Hey, I know that place. That’s the waterfalls at the commune in Colorado, the place where we went swimming that first time. And those people are— us. Wait a minute. What’s going on here, Karm? That’s me, you and Barney. I thought you were doing your past lives, not the one you’re living now?”

  Karma’s brush had stopped but she kept her back to him.

  “Karm? Karma?”

  Slowly, Karma turned, her eyes meeting Blue’s. He didn’t like what he saw in them.

  “I’m sorry, Blue, but— listen to me, please. I have to go away.”

  “No problem, we’ll go together.” Blue’s offer was tinged with desperation.

  “I have to go alone, Blue.”

  “Aw, Christ, what did I do? Whatever it is, I’m sorry, but I’ll make it up to you. For Christ’s sake, don’t leave. We were going away together, remember, going to Cape Breton, the two of us, all of us....”

  “You didn’t do anything, Blue, but I can’t go with you. I’ve known that since the accident. Something happened, Blue, something wonderful. I haven’t been able to talk about it really, because the words just aren’t there. Maybe if it happened to you— what I mean is that you have a way of turning things into stories.

  “Blue, I don’t know if I died in the accident or not, or whether your prayers helped bring me back like you believe, or if it was the doctors who helped me, or if I just wo
ke up from a dream. It doesn’t matter. What does matter is the knowledge I woke up with. I don’t mean answers, because I don’t know what the experience itself means. What I do know now is that everything I believe is absolutely true. We are beautiful creatures, Blue. If you could have seen how we look in the light, you would understand, and that’s the only way I can describe what I saw. Light, the most beautiful kind of light, filled with beings. Not strange beings, Blue. Us! I don’t know if you’re friend Danny Danny Dan was among them, but if he knew what was ahead of him, he would give up that eternal funeral of his and go across into the light.” Karma stopped, hoping for a smile from Blue.

  “I know you haven’t been the same since the accident,” Blue replied, “but I can’t tell you what the difference is. I noticed it, though, ask anybody. But that doesn’t mean we can’t stay together, does it? If you want to go away, well, there’s Cape Breton or any place you want to go. I’ll go, I mean that, Karma, I’ll go.”

  “I believe you would, Blue, but you can’t. I need to go by myself because what I need to do isn’t about us, it’s about me. I need to go for me.”

  “Go where for how long?” Blue asked.

  “India. An ashram in India, and I don’t know for how long, Blue, because time has nothing to do with it.”

  “India! Good God, girl, that’s on the other side of the world. How are you going to get there? Where will you stay? Do you know anybody from home to look after you there? And what about us, Karma, what about us? You’re throwing me away like I’m some old gelding ready for the mink farm. What about me?”

  “This isn’t easy, Blue—”

  “You’re friggin’ right, it’s not!” Blue shouted.

  “Don’t yell, Blue, or we won’t be able to talk at all.”

  “To hell with talking!” Blue said, storming out of the room, happy that it now had a door he could slam behind him.

  Blue left the commune and ran himself to exhaustion through city streets, stopping finally beside a park he had never seen before. He sat on one of the benches, only then noticing that Barney, panting, had followed him from the house. Blue tried to send his thoughts everywhere but where he had just been. It was fruitless. There was no escaping the fact that a hole as large as the San Andreas Fault had opened up in his life with nothing but blackness gaping before him. Nothing distracted him, not music, not food, not thoughts of home. Karma was breaking up with him and running all the way to India to hide. He tried to nurse his anger to rage, imagined returning to the commune, smashing up the place, pounding Capricorn and all his stupid pagan teachings to pulp, then telling Karma to go fuck herself, packing his suitcase and heading out with Tinker in the Plymouth for home. Screw San Francisco. Screw the commune. Screw Blue Cacophony. And screw Karma the Dharma!

  “Screw her, Barney, screw her! I suppose she’s going to leave you with the commune while she goes off to India to get all her holy answers! Well, the fact is that I just don’t care what she does. Her plane can crash for all I care. I wouldn’t even go to her funeral!”

  Standing beside the bench, Barney placed his head on Blue’s thigh, his brown eyes confused by his friend’s anger. Blue stroked the dog’s head while two slow tears leaked their way down his own cheeks. Blue bent over and buried his face in the dog’s neck to hide the shame of his crying eyes from passers-by. He lost all sense of how long he sat there clutching the dog, but dusk was coming when his awareness returned, a coming darkness to match the empty black place inside him.

  “We may be made of light, as the other fellow says, Barney, but the bulb in here just burnt out, old buddy, and it will never be bright again in my life. What are we going to do without her? Write some real Nashville songs, I suppose, or maybe not write any more songs, at all. I really don’t care.

  “She knew this, Barney. She knew when she woke up from the accident that this was going to happen. That’s why she’s been mostly far away even when we’re close together. She was getting ready to write me a Dear John letter. Well, the writing’s on the wall now, isn’t it, or rather the painting’s on the wall.

  “I didn’t even think of it, Barney. It never occurred to me that Karma would be leaving me. Know what I was worrying about? Leaving her. I kept thinking what if summer comes and it’s time to go home and Karma won’t come? How is she going to handle me leaving her behind? I don’t know if I could of left her behind, though. Maybe I would of decided to stay here with her, but that was a thought to be chased away like a mortal sin, so I never really let myself think about it. It was just too scary. But what was I worrying about, huh? She had it all planned right from the start. Right from the start of her new life anyway, and all of a sudden I’m just another one of her past lives, something to move away from. Christ, I should of left her first, then I wouldn’t have to explain to everybody— to hell with everybody! I wouldn’t of left her anyway, would I, Barney? Would I?

  “I didn’t even ask her when she was leaving. I hope she didn’t mean she was going tonight. She can’t be gone already. It’s getting dark as death out here, and Karma might be gone before I get to say ... what? Christ, Barney, what am I going to say to her? Help me think of something on the way back, buddy, because I’m not thinking so good on my own right now. Come on, boy, and remember that what you saw me doing before, you know what I mean, the tears, well, that’s our secret, okay? Nobody has to know that. Nobody!”

  67

  Karma wasn’t gone. She was in their bedroom, meditating. The painting was finished. In it, Karma was in the water, Blue and Barney standing beside the waterfall pool, preparing to join her. Blue sat in the chair and watched Karma’s trance-like presence. He didn’t notice when she had opened her eyes but was suddenly aware that she was watching him. He shrugged uncomfortably.

  “I thought maybe you were already gone,” Blue said.

  “Would it be better if I was?” Karma asked. “I can move—”

  “I mean, I was afraid you were already gone,” Blue corrected. “When are you going?”

  “I have a ticket for next Friday night. The arrangements in India have already been made. There’s a Master there who is taking me as a student. How are you, Blue?”

  “You know me. I’ll be okay. Barney, too, once he gets back to Colorado where he can chase squirrels in the mountains instead of cars in the city. We’ll do just fine.”

  The next few days were filled with preparations for Karma’s departure. Blue was soon conveying the impression that Karma’s trip to India was his idea. Alone in their room, he touched her greedily, as if assuring to himself that she hadn’t already gone.

  On Friday evening, Blue borrowed the Plymouth and drove Karma to the airport. In the departure lounge they said their goodbyes.

  Blue was afraid to speak, feeling a lump in his throat that threatened to produce more tears.

  “You really have to do this, don’t you?” he said finally.

  “Yes, Blue, I really do. I know it hurts, but I believe we’ll find each other again, sometime.”

  “In another life, you mean. That’s the difference between us, you have all these lives to throw away trying to be perfect while I just have this one, and I’m going to be spending the rest of it wondering what ever happened to you once you got on that plane. India’s a big place, the dark continent, as the other fellow says.”

  “That’s Africa, Blue, not India.”

  “Whatever. Anyway, you’ll just disappear into those millions and millions of people and I’ll never know where you are or what became of you.”

  “I guess I’m luckier than you.”

  “How?” Blue asked.

  “Because I’ll always know where you are. When I think about you, there’s the ocean you love so much and the horses and the people and the stories. My mind will always know where to find you, and if I ever have to find you in the flesh, all I need to do is walk into that diner you’re always talking about –
the one that you told Mr. Lo always puts two King Cole tea bags in a one-cup teapot – or walk into that tavern or Legion of yours, and ask someone where I can find Blue.”

  “But you won’t.”

  Karma shook her head. “Probably not, but it’s comforting for me to know that I can find my best friend if I ever need him.”

  “Best friend? When did that happen?”

  “You’ve been that since shortly after we met, Blue. We’ve been that to each other, more than that, I know, but always that. That won’t change ever. I love you.”

  Then Karma was gone into a tunnel that took her onto a plane that took her to a place halfway around the world, leaving Blue standing there like someone by a graveside. He forced himself to leave, getting in the Plymouth and spending hours driving around the city, country radio blaring, his mind forming decisions, his eyes still too misty to go back to the commune.

  —

  Blue let himself slide off the hood of the Plymouth, stood and chugged the last of the beer, and walked back to the stage. Tinker was still crooning, backed by Gerry and Nathan, but the crowd was beginning to show its age. Most of the older guests were weaving their way toward seats or cars, guided by wives who thought it was time to go home, leaving behind them the young friends of the bride and groom, and Blue knew that now was the time for Blue Cacophony to show its stuff.

  Taking his place on the stage, he changed the band’s persona by playing “Failure To Love,” letting the wedding guests who still remained know that Blue Cacophony was here at last. The apron of plywood that formed a dance floor in front of the stage filled up. They were open to anything that would keep the party going, and those were conditions in which Blue Cacophony thrived. The band played its material and the dancers made the most of it. After an hour, Blue introduced a new number.

  “We got this guy back home, eh, Farmer. He’s this horse trader who told me one time that every once in a while he’d be loading a horse he just bought or sold, and all of a sudden he would just know that this was a horse, not some burnt-out minker or broken-down Clyde, but a real horse, the kind they make movies about. Well, that’s how I feel about this next song. I finished it the other day. Took me two years but what I got me here is a real horse, as the other fellow would say.”