Red Hot Blues

by Rachel Dunning

  I kept my eyes on Cowboy Hat, made sure I radiated the vibe She’s mine at him. He frowned. I smiled. I talked to her more, and then we did a set.

  I hadn’t planned on doing a set with her. But when that scent hit me...

  Well, I got into character.

  That was before the voice, of course.

  Peace.

  I wanted to kiss her, right up there on stage. I wanted to run my hand through her dark hair and undress her. This is why:

  She has sex appeal. Raw, pure, human, sex appeal.

  I’ve never seen it before. Sure, I’ve seen plenty skanks, plenty sluts, plenty “sexy” girls. None of them had raw, fleshy, carnal sex appeal. That’s a whole different quality. All of them had allure. All of them had something that made my cock twitch and react. But that’s not sex appeal.

  I always thought sex appeal had to do with how tight a girl’s ass is, how long her legs are, how firm her tits are.

  It has jack to do with these things. It has to do with the whole package.

  Was I going to stay in Nashville? Not a chance. I was just riding through. But I want to see her again. I’m not really sure what I want after that. I could get her into bed. I know I could. It’s just something...I’m able to do. I’m not trying to sound like a chauvinist. It’s just...something I’m good at.

  But I won’t do that. Because I’d hurt her. I’m bad for her. She’s not the one-night type. I can see that.

  I might be good at getting a girl into bed, but I’m good at nothing else.

  Sex, Rock n Roll, and pain. This is all I have to offer the world. Story of my life, and that’s why I’m on the road.

  Because I ain’t got nowhere to go.

  -18-

  I’ll kick it up in Memphis for a few days. I heard Beale Street is awesome. Great blues, great whiskey. Maybe I’ll hit Chattanooga, check out Lookout Mountain or Rock City, the Market Street Bridge. And then I’ll come back here. Tuesday. To play and sing with Ginger. The girl with the blue eyes, the long wisps of curling black hair in front of her ears, and that carnal appeal.

  The girl who has no idea how sexy she really is.

  The girl I promise not to take to bed, but with whom that’s all I want to do.

  The girl whose voice brings me such screaming peace.

  I never said I had my head on straight. That’s another reason I’m on the road.

  -19-

  Cowboy Man was heading straight for her after the encore. Swaying is more like it. I walked directly into him, grabbed his shirt, pushed him outside with my chest. He almost fell over. He didn’t know what hit him. I stood in his way. He swayed.

  It would be too easy, so I didn’t hit him.

  Would I be hitting him for Ginger, this girl I’d said three sentences to and sung four songs with? Nope. I wanted to hit him because sometimes I just need to hit someone. I needed to hit someone after Dad told me I was a “no good sumbitch for lettin your country down, son! This country was built by men who went to war! Heroes!”

  I’m not a military man. But my dad is. And so was his dad. And so was his. My damn family rocks it all the way back to the Confederate Army. Not my game, but it’s daddy’s game. And as his only son—two girls and one boy—I’m a disgrace to him. I’m not keeping up the Family Tradition. My poor father almost had a fit when he’d heard I was playing the guitar; and then not to be playing country music on top of it! I still remember his face, red and angry. And that vein, popping up on his head.

  And his belt, as he removed it slowly, quietly, always glaring me down. “Don’t you play that nigger music in my house, boy! Don’t you dare!”

  And then he belted me. And punched me. I remember his fists. The crunch on bone. I remember going to the good ole Southern Virginia doctor, a proud Confederate man like my father, and my father saying to him behind closed doors, thinking I couldn’t hear him, “Nigger music, can you believe it?” And the good Southern doctor saying, “Sometimes you just gotta take it to em like the Good Book says, Logan. A firm hand and high discipline.” And daddy: “You’ll keep this between us?”

  “Of course.”

  And then a chuckle—a good, southern, hearty, fried-chicken chuckle.

  My ribs were broken, my eye was blue, my lips were swollen to the size of my nose.

  I was eleven then.

  I didn’t play that night because it hurt too much to play. But two weeks later, I got my guitar—Josephine was its name, given to me by my friend Aaron Johnson, farmhand for my father since he was sixteen, born and raised on the farm—and I hauled up right under my dad’s window, outside, on the grass. And I fucking played so he could hear me right and good. I played John Lee Hooker. I played B.B. King. I played Elvis. I played Jimi freakin Hendrix (not very well; I was eleven, remember?) I played until my dad was furious and he came down the stairs in his pajamas and he beat me again. And then, two weeks later, I played again. He beat me another time, harder. It took four more weeks to recover that time. And when I did, I played again. And again.

  And again.

  Eventually, he stopped beating me so often. Because he knew he couldn’t stop me. I won by carrying on. I’d won.

  So, instead of hitting me, he started drinking. But when he got drunk, he did something else. And after he started doing that, I did stop playing. At least in front of him.

  Because when he got drunk, he beat my mom instead.

  -20-

  It went on for years.

  Aaron kept my guitar at his place, a small bungalow house about a mile away from the main house on the tobacco farm. I know what you’re thinking: Slavehands. And you’re right to think that. Aaron’s ancestors were indeed slaves in this state, maybe even for the Travers family. I often asked him why he didn’t leave my father, and he’d say to me: “He treat me well. He feed me. He feed mah family. Where else I goan go? An unejjucated man like me? I’m happy here, boy. I got all I need. My girls are goin-a school. They can read. They goan make summin o’ their lives.”

  I didn’t get it at first. But I realized later that my father treated Aaron better than he treated me, or than he treated my mother.

  To water down my father’s wrath against my mother, I’d escape the house and go and play with Aaron so my father wouldn’t hear. Aaron never said anything to him, and pops knew not to push Aaron too hard because Aaron’s a good worker. And Aaron don’t take no shit. Aaron, in my eyes, is my real father, the one who taught me to stand up for myself, to be a man. To have pride. To stick up for what I believe in.

  One night, when I was sixteen, after a night of playin it up with Aaron, I got home and heard my momma screaming. I ran up the stairs and found my pops on top of her.

  Raping her.

  Or getting ready to.

  She still had her clothes on, but he had her hands clasped down above her head and she was kicking and telling him to get off her. He was calling her a bitch and telling her she gave birth to a sissy boy—

  I took one of his trophies. And I cracked him on the head with it.

  Blood poured. I watched him fall off the bed. I thought I’d killed him, and I didn’t care. Momma didn’t seem to care either. I looked over at her on the bed. She was hustling up to the headboard, frightened, terrified, a look of horror in her eyes. Her fingers shook at her mouth, her eyes were black. She trembled. My breathing was heavy, hard. I looked down at my father. Blood ran like a river, marring the white sheets, staining the off-green carpet.

  He was breathing. But he needed treatment. Fast.

  I looked up at her again, asked her, “Do you want me to call an ambulance?”

  She knew what I was really asking.

  After a moment that lasted forever, she gave me her answer, and although I wasn’t happy with it, I respected it.

  I called the ambulance.

  Pops had a concussion. Momma made up some story about him falling or some bullshit. Old School Tie. Everybody knows and nobody does anything. That’s the way of it where I grew up.


  Pops was up and running three days later. And three days later, he kicked my ass. I couldn’t walk for a week.

  I started lifting weights. I’d always played football as well, but now I started taking it seriously. I knew my dad could physically kick my ass, but not for long. I worked out, I pumped iron, I threw pigskin, and I tackled men. I never got huge, because I never did juice, but I got strong. I only went out when my sisters were out as well. My youngest sister was coming of age, and sometimes I had thoughts that... Well, I wasn’t gonna let that happen to her. I might not have been big enough to take on my dad, but I was sure big enough to put up one helluva stinking fight if I had to.

  Bobby, Jed, and Lewis. My “friends” at that age. Idiots. They’d pick up girls, fuck em, leave em. They’d break their hearts. I didn’t particularly care about girls with broken hearts. Broken hearts happen. It’s life. And I played a similar game, but with a key difference: I never told any of these girls I loved them.

  Because I didn’t.

  Were they hot? Damn straight. Did I wanna get it on with them? Uh-huh. Was there gonna be a second night? Not a goddamn chance. They knew it. I knew it. We were all on the same page.

  Bobby and Jed and Lewis played it a little differently. They lied.

  If you can’t get a girl without lying, then you just can’t get a girl. Period.

  No, I didn’t care about broken hearts. But I did care about how these boys played the chicks. It just wasn’t cool. It’s one thing to be smooth, it’s one thing to flirt, it’s one thing to look at a girl in such a way that she wants to drop her panties for you. It’s another thing to tell her you love her when you don’t.

  That just ain’t cool.

  So I told them.

  They made fun of me.

  So I fucked them up. Each one. I took on all three of them, and I had it good for a few rounds, landed some good shots. But three guys is still three guys. And eventually they got me down, kicked me a few times on the ground, not so bad. I’d been kicked worse, much worse. Daddy had taught me how to take a beating. When I picked myself up off the ground, and when they realized I was ready for more, they ran. A week later they got their brothers involved, big brothers, military brothers.

  I didn’t win that one.

  Pops laughed at me, but I didn’t care. I was becoming a street fighter. I was learning through experience.

  It wasn’t gonna be much longer that he’d hold physical sway over me.

  More years rolled by. I was nineteen now. Janice (pronounced Janeece), my youngest sister, was now fourteen, and “developing.” Pops would look at her in a way that made me uncomfortable. I never left her alone in the house. It was just a gut feel I had. Fiona, my other sister, was seventeen. But Fiona has always been his pride and joy. Pops would never hurt his precious Fiona.

  Fiona and I don’t get along. She’s very much like my father.

  Then it happened. The fucker just couldn’t keep it to himself. He thought I’d left the house, because I’d wanted to catch him in the act, so I’d pretended I was out and had made a big deal out of it; and I heard it, heard him, behind Janice’s door. And I heard her saying, “No, no,” just softly, lightly. Fragilely.

  I exploded.

  But I’d planned for this.

  You must remember this is NRA country we’re talking about. Sweet Virginia. Welcome to the South.

  This wasn’t gonna be no “fist in the face and then it happens again some other time” kind of fight. In this case, Logan Travers, my father, was going to learn to back the fuck off or else he was gonna lose his crown jewels. Violently. I busted the door open, because it was locked. And I cocked his rifle in my hand. And I said, slowly, “Get the fuck away from her.”

  Pops was sitting on her bed, his hand on her bare leg. She was lying in her nightgown, shivering. They always shiver. Always. Mom had also shivered. But mom had made a choice to be with him. Janice had made no such choice. Even from eight feet away I could smell the liquor on his breath. He was unshaven, white hairs peeking out from his chin and cheeks.

  “What the fuck are you gonna do with that thing, boy?” he bellowed, thinking I didn’t have the guts.

  He got up, walked in my direction. I put the rifle to his chest, and pushed him back with it. “Try me, old man.”

  Reason dawned in his eyes. He knew I was serious.

  “You’re gonna regret this, little boy. Oh you’re gonna regret this!”

  “Janice, pack a bag,” I said.

  She didn’t move. She was in shock.

  “Janice, pack a fucking bag NOW!” I realized I’d been harsh. I was stressed. She was probably freaking out. I was freaking out as well. “Baby, I’m sorry, just please back a bag, OK?”

  Dad chewed, shook his head. He was livid, ready to kill. But I was the one holding the gun.

  Dad has other guns around the house. Plenty guns. A good Southern Military man. But he didn’t carry one on his person when he was inside the house. At least not in those days.

  Janice started crying. “What should I pack, Ace?”

  “Anything, baby. Anything you want. You and me are gonna go out of town for a bit.”

  “That’s kidnapping, boy,” he growled.

  I growled back. “You fucking try me, old man. You just. Fucken. Try me.” I pushed the rifle against his chest harder. Pushed him back. He stayed still. My finger squeezed tighter on the trigger, almost pushing it to the point of no return. In that instant, in my mind’s eye, I even saw the spray of red blood behind him against the window and the wall, gray matter, pieces of smoking flesh...

  “Tell people we’re on vacation. I got nothing to lose. If mom and Janice are OK, I don’t care what happens to me. And I sure don’t give a damn what happens to you.” With the rifle between us, he knew what I was talking about.

  “Janice, you done?” I asked.

  Janice wept some more. She’d packed a messy bag with pink and white things dangling out of it. She was still in shock. She sat on the bed.

  “Janice, baby, come over here to Ace.”

  She wept more.

  Pops saw his chance. “Janice, tell Ace here he was just mistaken. Tell him you and I were just havin a little talk.”

  His tone was threatening. He was trying to scare her. Bastard.

  Janice got up slowly, walked around my father’s outstretched hand, and joined me at my side.

  A part of me melted there, knowing she was counting on me, knowing I was her only hope. I almost shot the fucker right there.

  It was in that moment I decided to get my tattoo. This was the defining moment of it, the design, the quote, something Aaron always used to say to me—it all formed in my head. Right there.

  We eased out of her bedroom, down the stairs. Mom was out for the night, with some friends. Just like I’d planned my own night, so had dad. He’d been all alone with Janice.

  My finger tightened again on the trigger instinctively.

  I took the keys to his ’67 Pontiac, grabbed a few hundred from his wallet, picked up my guitar, and Janice and I drove, and drove, and drove. Seven hours later we were in New York, at my aunt’s house. Brooklyn. And not the rich part, either.

  Aunt Nola, my mother’s half-sister, is no fool, no pushover. She took Janice in, threatened my father to high heaven with social embarrassment and legal threats, and dad backed down.

  No one fucks with a New Yorker.

  -21-

  I stayed in New York for a bit. Virginians say I’ve lost my accent. If that’s true, it was here that it happened.

  New York’s not a great city for a country boy, because everything’s cramped up and the people dress funny. I was used to the wide open spaces, but I needed to work, and I needed money. I found a job that required muscle, and I saved up. Aunt Nola let me stay with her if I helped her with the cooking, which I did. I didn’t know how to cook at first, but I learned. “All good men need to know how to cook,” she’d say to me.

  I was in no position to argue. I really
had nowhere else to go. So, by day I’d haul ass and sweat like a monkey, and by night I’d put on an apron and slice garlic and dice tomatoes. Aunt Nola’s really into the Mediterranean food.

  Weekends I’d call home, just to make sure everything was OK. As OK as it could be, all things considered. Mostly I just wanted to talk to my mom. But sometimes dad picked up. He’d berate me for not joining the army, for being an asshole, for being a “nigger-lover,” and any other colorful terms he’d like to use for me. When he was done, he’d put mom on the phone. He might play it tough, but I think he knew I was missing a few marbles, and if I wasn’t certain my mom was OK, I’d take him out without fear of criminal repercussions.

  These are the hard, cold truths of life.

  Talking to my dad always made me angry, so angry. And when I got angry, I wanted to run. I stayed because I had to stay. I stayed because of Janice. I stayed because of the promise I’d made to her, to myself, by putting that ink on my right arm, the ink of Justice.

  But staying was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.

  If I hadn’t found the underground fight clubs, I would have never made it. Hitting, and getting hit, kept me sane, kept my marbles together. If I don’t run, I wanna throw my fists. If I don’t throw my fists, I wanna run.

  If there’s one thing I learned how to do when I was growing up at home it was getting my ass kicked. So that’s pretty much what happened when I did these underground fights. I got my ass kicked. Sometimes I got my ass kicked on purpose, because it paid more.

  When I didn’t talk to my dad for a while, things actually felt “normal.” At Aunt Nola’s we had a grand time. We were actually happy, the three of us. It’s funny how being in such a heavy environment for so long can give you a pessimistic view of life, making you think everything is evil and horrible and terrible. But being away from that monster actually cleared my head, made me think more positively.

  Janice was doing well at school, making friends. Pops never did call the cops or child services about what happened that night with her—about the fact that I’d “kidnapped” her.