The Gathering: Book One of The Uprising Series

by Bernadette Giacomazzo

  Suddenly, Tommy and I were surrounded by a phalanx of men on motorcycles that circled around us continuously. The perimeter was large enough that we couldn’t escape, even if we’d tried. They were motorcycles of all kinds and all brands – Harley-Davidsons and Kawasakis, Yamahas and Suzukis, even a Triumph and a Honda in there – and the men riding them were a uniformly-tattooed bunch, clad in leather and denim and white T-shirts and hard black helmets that looked like they belonged on battalion soldiers.

  “What the – Tommy!” I screamed.

  Tommy wrapped one arm, protectively, around my shoulders, and seemed to brace for impact when one motorcycle – a cherry red Ducati Scrambler Classic – emerged from the crowd and veered towards us. It screeched to a frightening halt mere inches from our feet and kicked up a bunch of dust and soot in our faces as its roar dulled to a sputter. We coughed, loudly and violently, desperate to get the dust and soot out from our lungs, as its rider jostled the kickstand to the floor and approached us.

  I took a quick stock of the rider: he was tall, but not overly so – he and Tommy were the same height. He was thin – thinner than Tommy – but not emaciated. His left arm was covered in a variety of colorful tattoos, and a quick scan revealed a devil riding a motorcycle, a halo-adorned angel with cartoonishly-large breasts exploding out of her tiny red bikini, a tribute to his mother, and a skeleton playing a flaming guitar. His acid-washed jeans were ripped and covered in dust, as was his once-white T-shirt, and his worn black leather boots were a direct compliment to his worn black leather vest. His mouth and nose were covered by a black neck gaiter that had white skull and crossbones, his eyes were covered by black mirrored goggles, and his black helmet completed the picture of pure intimidation.

  For a minute, he paced back and forth between Tommy and I and the rest of his motorcycle gang. Tommy kept his arm protectively wrapped around my shoulders, never taking his eyes off the pacing leader of this rather frightening motley crew.

  The leader then stopped and held his right hand up in a fist. It was then that I noticed that his picture of intimidation was made complete by his black leather fingerless gloves, which were well-worn like his boots and vest. At the sight of his fist, all the motorcycles gave one last engine thrust before emerging, one by one, out of the circle and forming a diagonal line next to Tommy and myself. As they got in line, they killed the engines, until all twenty of them were in line and there was nothing, but an eerie silence punctuated by the chittering of rats and roaches.

  Three more men appeared next to the leader – they, like him, all seemed to have the same uniform of a left arm adorned with tattoos, acid-washed jeans covered in dust and soot, white T-shirts that were now ecru from wear and tear, well-worn black leather boots and vests and fingerless gloves, and hard black helmets with various decorations. They, unlike him, looked to be rather well-fed, and they ranged from the relatively average sized to the brawny to the just plain fat. Together, they cut an imposing figure against the battered skyline.

  Finally, the leader – the tall, thin one – spoke. “Who are you?” His voice was gravelly, as if he’d been smoking five packs of cigarettes a day since he was 10 years old.

  I swallowed, audibly, and cleared my throat. “Um. Hi. I’m Evanora. Evanora Joy.” I held up my left hand, limply, in a fearful salute as Tommy tightened his grip around my shoulders.

  “And um, Evanora, Evanora Joy,” the leader repeated back to me, almost mockingly, “what do you want?”

  “I’m looking for a man named Steele,” I said, my voice wavering slightly, as I felt my knees give out from underneath me.

  I reached my right hand behind me and grabbed onto Tommy’s lower back. He leaned in closer to my ear and whispered, “it’s alright, Evanora, I’m here. Nothing’s going to happen to you as long as I’m here.”

  The brawny one, who looked like a bowling ball with hands and feet, spoke up. His voice wasn’t as gravelly as his leader’s, but it was just as forceful. “What business do you have with Steele?” he asked menacingly.

  “Well, none, really,” I said, my voice steadying as I began to find my confidence. The smell of lilacs was suddenly in the air. “At least, not yet. See, I’m here because I found his name in a book by Jimmy Webb, and it said he knows what happened to Willie Lynn and Tom Newman from Faust…”

  The leader removed his googles and tucked them into the front pocket of his vest. His eyes were the color of a glacier. He took another step forward and looked into my eyes. “What do you know about Faust?”

  I took a deep breath through my nose, and all I could smell was lilacs, cold air, and stale cigarettes. “Well, I reconnected with Jamie Ryan a few nights ago, and Jordan Barker is my father…my real father…”

  Suddenly, their formation softened. The leader took off his helmet and his neck gait and revealed himself – he was a funny-looking man, but not in a bad way; rather, he was just unique. His ears had huge holes where earrings used to be, he had a salt-and-pepper five o’clock shadow that was nearly all salt and no pepper, his nearly all salt and no pepper hair tapered just below his ears into a soft curl, and his teeth were small but all present and accounted for (at least, as far as I could tell as his thin lips formed into a smile). Because he was so thin, the rest of his features – his prominent ears, his aquiline nose, his round bulging eyes – looked strange on his face, yet it somehow seemed to work.

  One by one, too, the other three men divested of their gaits, goggles, and helmets, following the example set by their leader.

  “No way. The first Faust baby? You?” The leader laughed. “No shit!” He stared intently at my face, as though he were looking for a particularly annoying pimple or other deformity. “Yep. Yep. Yep. You got that fucker Barker’s nose, that’s for sure. And that name can’t be anyone else’s but his and that crazy Puerto Rican lady he was with at the time.”

  “Hey!” I suddenly got defensive. Even though there was a lot about her I couldn’t quite understand, that was still my mother. I could fight with her, if I wanted – that was my divine birth right, as her only daughter – but this guy couldn’t. “That’s my Mama, you know!”

  “No shit,” the leader said, nodding his head and laughing. “Jordan lost his virginity to her, you know. Just lost himself in all that Boricua butter, screaming ai mami, and next thing you know, they were saying it literally because here you are.”

  I groaned as Tommy muttered “too much information, sir” and the leader laughed rabidly.

  “How do you know so much?” I asked, almost impatiently.

  The leader outstretched his arms. “Evanora, baby, c’mere and give your Uncle Steele a big ol’hug.”

  I squinted my eyes and relaxed. Tommy, too, finally loosened his grip on my shoulders. “My uncle?” I asked incredulously. “Are you my mother’s brother or my father’s?” I hugged him slightly.

  Steele laughed maniacally after he returned the hug. “Brother? Brother?” he laughed. “Nah, not kin to either one. I used to be a DJ on a rock station in the old New York – that’s how I met your daddy, that fucker. Yup. Became real good friends, me and him. Used to come by the station once a week and we’d split a pizza while I played my records. Swear to God, I think that might have been the only thing he’d eaten all week. Soon as that pie came in, he’d tear into it like it was his last meal on Earth.” He sighed and shook his head. “I cried for a week when he died. Couldn’t believe he did that shit. I always told him, Jordan, kid, you gotta take it easy with that heroin shit, you’re never gonna get your dick hard…”

  I groaned again. “Uncle Steele, I get the point.”

  “Right, right. You didn’t know your daddy, huh?” – and to this, I shook my head – “shame. Goddamn shame. Good man, that daddy of yours.” He looked over at Tommy. “This your boyfriend?”

  Tommy laughed. “In a manner of speaking,” he replied. “Hi, Uncle Steele. I’m Tommy Sherman. I’m Evanora’s friend.”

  Steele cocked his head to the side, looking like a
rather confused dog who didn’t understand his human’s commands. “You British, boy? Why you got that funny accent?”

  I shook my head. “Another story for another day, Uncle Steele,” I replied, pointing to his compatriots. “Who is everyone here?”

  Steele looked over his shoulder and pointed to each of his compatriots. “Well, over here” – he pointed to the normal-ish looking one – “is Rush. This right here” – he pointed to the brawny one – “is Rock. And that one” – he pointed to the roly-poly one – “that one is Chainsaw. Now don’t mind Chainsaw, if you don’t hear him say anything – that’s normal. He doesn’t say much at all.” He looked over at Chainsaw. “Right, Chainsaw?”

  Chainsaw replied with a low grunt.

  “There ya go, Chainsaw. There ya go. Great conversation, pal.” Steele looked back at Tommy and I and laughed maniacally, again. “Chainsaw, kids. Best friend you’ll ever have.” He stood on either side of Tommy and I and wrapped his arms around our shoulders. “C’mon kids. Walk with me, talk with me. What can your Uncle Steele do for you today?”

  We walked up New York Avenue, taking care to avoid the scurrying rats and roaches, marveling at the bombed-out shells where once-luxurious buildings stood. Tommy, Steele, and I walked in front of the legion of riders whose flanks were held in position by Rush, Rock, and Chainsaw. “Well, uh,” I began, “I’m here for a few reasons, actually. You were mentioned in this book by a Jimmy Webb…”

  “Yep, that’s right, fuckin’ Jimmy,” Steele said. “He used to own this nice little shop called Trash & Vaudeville. A real beautiful shithole – stunk like body odor and yesterday’s Chinese food, but what a fuckin’ clothing collection. Jimmy was a total fuckin’ burnout, but man, what excellent taste in fashion. Anyone who was anyone got styled by him and went there to get all their clothes. We couldn’t keep Ivan Sapphire out of that store, me and Jordan. Every time Faust had a show, Little Lord Fuck-Your-Girl, Ivan Sapphire, needed a new outfit. And I used to say to him, ‘Ivan, listen, it’s going to end up on the floor of some groupie’s illegal basement apartment in Dyker Heights, what the fuck do you care what you look like? You could show up in your boxer shorts and they’ll eat it up. Don’t worry about it! Save your money!’ But nooooo, Ivan Sapphire, pussy connoisseur, needs a new outfit every time he blesses the stage.” He stopped, never taking his arms off either of our shoulders, then threw his head back and laughed maniacally. “How is that fucker Ivan? He still alive? He still getting pussy by the busload? He still gets that burning sensation every now and again?” He laughed again.

  Tommy smirked. “Actually, this one I can answer. Ivan – he goes by his real name, Jamie Ryan, now. Doesn’t quite get pussy by the busload – apparently he’s been a luta continua for his late lady, someone named Angelique, for a number of years – and he defected from the Cabal to form the Uprising…”

  “No shit?” Steele stopped and dropped his arms, then rooted around in his pockets and fished out a pack of cigarettes. “You kids smoke?” he asked, pointing the pack in each of our directions as we politely shook our heads. “Nah? Your loss.” He lit a fat, unfiltered, slightly yellowing cigarette, then inhaled deeply and began hacking violently. “Don’t smoke kids, listen to your Uncle Steele. It’ll kill ya. I mean, look at me!” He pointed to himself and cackled maniacally as he exhaled a steady stream of smoke from his mouth and nose. “So! The Uprising, eh? Ain’t that something.”

  “You’re not a Cabal loyalist, are you?” I asked.

  Steele threw back his head and let out a wheezing cackle that alternated between a cough and a laugh. “Fuck no, Evanora! Does your Uncle Steele look like a Cabal loyalist? Fuck no! Look at these monkeys here” – he pointed to the legion behind him, which was met with another grunt from Chainsaw – “not a one of them can stand that goddamn blowhard in the city. Not a one!”

  I took Uncle Steele’s hand. “Then can we count on you to help us with the Uprising?” I asked, gently.

  Again, Uncle Steele laughed maniacally. I was beginning to think that there was nothing on Earth that could make Uncle Steele have any other reaction except maniac laughter, despite his initial threatening stance. “Now, Uncle Steele can’t give you money for the Uprising, doll,” he said, laughing, “because Uncle Steele here, like the rest of the Ouroboros, lives off the land and what it provides. Matter of fact” – he reached into his back left jeans pocket, produced a butterfly knife that flipped into a full blade in seconds, and impaled a rather huge and nasty-looking cockroach that came seemingly out of nowhere – “I’m going to have a snack. You hungry?” He offered the roach kebab to us and laughed as our faces registered the sheer horror of being offered vermin as a snack. “Don’t worry, kids” – he bit into the body, crunching loudly – “you get used to the taste after a while. Excellent source of protein, too.”

  Tommy wiped his mouth, licked his lips, and swallowed loudly. “I’ll take your word for it. But no, Uncle Steele, we don’t need any money. And I think we’re alright on the food.” He looked at the cockroach – or what was left of it – rather worriedly. “We just need to know you’ll join us. And we need to know what happened to the rest of the members of Faust,” he said.

  “Hmm,” said Steele, who went uncharacteristically quiet as he stared, blankly, at the remnants of his crunchy snack. “Well, clearly, you know what happened to Jamie and Jordan.”

  “Yes, I know,” I said. “But Jimmy Webb wrote that William Lynn and Tom Newman came out to the Ouroboros. And to come see you, because you’d know where to find them.”

  Steele nodded, then looked over at Rock. “Rock here knows what happened to Newman. Rock! You wanna tell these nice kids what happened to Tom Newman?”

  Rock looked at us, rubbed his greying beard, and sighed. “Tom Newman had a nasty cocaine habit when he came to the Ouroboros. We did our best to get him clean, but, unfortunately, we just couldn’t do it. One night, he went deep into the Ouroboros – into what used to be known as Queens, actually – looking for his fix and, well, he never came back alive.”

  “He wandered off into an area called 40P,” Rush volunteered. “And that’s not a place where nice boys and girls like you go if they want to live to tell the story.”

  “Not at all,” added Rock. “Chainsaw is good with a few people in there, so we send him in to go get Tom’s body. After all, we had to give him a proper burial and all. Right, Chainsaw?”

  Chainsaw grunted.

  “Right. As he said,” said Rock. “So, Chainsaw comes back on the bike with the body, and we give the kid a proper Viking funeral. Put him on one of the old bikes, put our flag on him, floated him out in the Gowanus Canal, and just lit that bitch up. Whoo. Went up like the night, Tom Newman did. Great way for the drummer of Faust to go out, I tell you what. He went out like a champion. You’d have no idea, looking at that funeral, of what he’d become – but that’s what we do for our own here in the Ouroboros, we take care of our own. We fight amongst our own, but we take care of our own, too.”

  I frowned and looked down at my shoes, which suddenly seemed too big for my feet. “How long ago was this?”

  “Oh,” said Rock, counting on his fingers, “I wanna say maybe 10 years ago? Yeah. 10 years ago. Not right away. He lived for a little while after Jordan died. Although I’m not sure if you would call what he was doing ‘living,’ since he was going from one drug den to another…not that I blame the fucker…” His voice trailed off and he stared off onto the horizon, where the sun was slowly starting to set, and the sky was starting to darken into a deep burnt sienna color. “Blood moon. Haven’t seen one of those in a while. War’s coming.”

  I looked out into the same sunset and shrugged my shoulders, taking it as a good sign that Uncle Steele and the Ouroboros would, in fact, join the Uprising, and would in fact be a great asset to the movement. Certainly, we didn’t have to worry about feeding them too much…

  “Uncle Steele,” I asked, “what about Willie Lynn? What happened to him? Is he still alive?
”

  Steele was absently picking his teeth with the butterfly knife. “No idea. Saw him for a little bit many years ago. Don’t know if he’s still alive or not. Word on the street is that he’s still alive, but I can’t tell you for sure.”

  “Willie Lynn?” asked Rush. “Isn’t that the skinny guy, blond-ish hair, guitar, kinda looks like an underwear model?”

  “Yep,” answered Steele, still picking his teeth and sucking on the resultant finds. “One in the same.”

  “I think Chainsaw knows him,” said Rush. He was tinkering with something on his motorcycle, playing with various gears and gadgets and gizmos, but I couldn’t figure out what he was doing for sure. He looked up from his tinkering and glanced over at Chainsaw. “Chainsaw, remember? Willie Lynn? I think you had that broad that went gaga for him – left your ass for him too, if I remember correctly. What was her name? Rosalyn something?”

  Chainsaw side-eyed Rush, then grunted.

  “Yes,” said Rush. “Very helpful, Chainsaw. Thank you.”

  Steele flipped the butterfly knife into its closed position and replaced it in his back pocket. He then turned on his Ducati and waved Tommy and me over. “Well,” he said. “I tell you kids what. I’m going to find out what happened to Willie Lynn one way or another. Meantime, I’m gonna bring you kids back to the island and go talk to Jamie, say hello, catch up on old times, see about this Uprising business. Been too long since I’ve seen that fucker and it’d be good to say hello.”

  I cocked an eyebrow over at Steele. “Uncle Steele, how are we gonna get back? We walked here.”

  “You did? Well shit, kid,” he said, laughing maniacally. “Not that I want to deny you the right to a sensible diet and exercise, but if you wanna get back to the island before you turn 40, I suggest you take the easier way and get on the bike.” He tapped the back of his motorcycle seat and scooted forward, indicating that I would be riding in the seat behind him.