Rude is waiting by the van, tapping his foot. I don’t even have the door closed before he’s spraying gravel. At the end of the driveway, Mom pulls up. She idles at Rude’s window, all sad eyes and blond bob and Burger Barn wrappers crumpled on the passenger seat.
“Where are you two going?”
“I am taking Ritchie for the golf. We will chase small white ball around course. Be back in one hour.”
Mom looks dubious. She doesn’t like Rude. Why would she? He and Dad Sudden went to high school together. They used to be friends.
“Where’s Looper?”
“Right this second? Hard to say.”
“Try harder.”
Rude considers. “Unplugging someone’s drain? That is one guess. Adjusting someone’s pH balance? There is another.”
Mom nods. “And you’ll only be gone an hour?”
“Is possible less.”
She raises her window and inches up the driveway. Rude holds out a hand for a high five, which I decline. He laughs and punches my arm instead. On the highway, there’s a ton of traffic. I kill time thinking of the worst song title ever, finally deciding “Cuts Like a Knife” is the winner. What the hell else would it cut like? A banana? A softball?
“You are having the female problems?” Rude asks.
“Ex-cuse me?”
“By the way you sit, I can tell.”
“Trust me, I’m fine.”
“You are not fine. Is clear. I wish to give you a truth.”
I sigh. “Lay it on me.”
“Women? They want romance. But also manners. The door open, the seat held out, the flowers on day of Valentine’s. Men? They want to empty paste on bare thigh. Is law of nature.”
“Paste? Did you say paste?”
He shrugs. “Is simply facts. Do not shoot messenger.”
“Oh my god. Can the messenger just keep his eyes on the road?”
“This is possible,” Rude says, turning up the radio.
When we finally get into the city, he pulls into some sort of zone. The sign has been heavily graffitied, but it’s clear you can’t park there. He’s got two wheels up on the curb before I can even say anything, so I don’t bother.
The guy at the door doesn’t want to let us in. It’s a fancy old theater, ornate, like they once had vaudeville, guys juggling pies and wrestling bears and singing in barbershop quartets. Rude flashes his VIDEO MONSTER OWNER’S PASS, and the door guy, with his shaved head and ham-size biceps, says in an unexpectedly high voice, “Fine, whatever, you’re holding up the line.”
The lobby is inlaid with beautiful pink tile. Beautiful pink women hold champagne flutes and finger their pearls and laugh at jokes about hedge funds and Ponzi schemes. Rude elbows his way to the buffet. There’s quiche and fruit and scallops and ham. His translucent bangs dangle inches above the food. He takes a popcorn bucket, empties it into the trash, and then leans over the shrimp platter, netting about four pounds.
“C’mon, Ritchie.”
We find our seats. Rude tosses shrimps in the air, catching them in his mouth. The movie is fairly predictable. The devil desires the blonde, as all devils do. She has her shirt ripped off a few times, then air-screws an invisible demon. Dolph is an ex-Marine with a chin like an anvil. Bosworth is an ex-boozer priest with a heart of gold. They challenge the devil to a game of chess, with the world and the girl in the balance. Dolph wins. The devil takes some screaming stockbroker guys back to hell with him. Bosworth artfully expires. The blonde and Dolph rent a U-Haul and move to Connecticut. She’s about to give birth in the final scene. Angel baby? Satan spawn? Poor excuse for a sequel? Roll credits.
“Is such ridiculous piece of shit!” Rude says, drunk on shrimp.
No one laughs.
“I place only single order. In fact, I put sign next to register saying every rental donates to Al-Qaeda!”
No one laughs.
“But, yes, if I am honest I suppose I, too, would air-fuck devil for nice house in Connecticut.”
No one laughs.
I drag him through the lobby. Security mumbles into their walkie-talkies as we pass. When we get back to where the van was, it’s not there anymore.
“Is strange.”
“Yeah, you think so?”
“I am sorry, Ritchie, but you must find other way home.”
“Story of my life.”
He pokes through his wallet and then hands me some cash.
“Happy birthday.”
A five and five ones.
“How’d you know it’s my birthday?”
He punches my shoulder and walks away.
“Hey, Rude!”
At the corner, he turns and cups his ear. “Yes, huh, what?”
“Did Dad Sudden put you up to this?”
“Naw, man. Is no chance.”
“Cut the shit. He called you, didn’t he? Said take a roadie, see if I’m all right?”
Rude strokes his chin, shrugs. “Yeah.”
“Well?”
“Well, what?”
“Am I all right?”
Rude gets a green light, bends forward like a crab, and hustles across six lanes of traffic.
My cell goes off six times. The ringtone is the first eight bars of Sweet’s “Teenage Rampage,” Brian Connolly going, “All over the land the kids have found it’s time to get the upper hand. They’re out on the streets, they turn up the heat, and soon they could be completely in command!”
I’m still half asleep. I paw around for the phone, knock it on the floor, curse, half grab it, push it farther under, slide off the mattress, land on my back, and finally flip it open just as Elliot’s voice wavers through. It’s like one of those Kevin Costner movies where Kev talks to his dead father through a toaster.
“Dude, I’ve been thinking.”
That’s funny, I’ve been thinking, too. Like, about how out of nowhere Dad Sudden decides to stick his beak back into my life but is too lame to do it in person, sending Rude as the world’s smartest emissary instead. I had to walk forty blocks back through uptown and down skid row. Past guys in nice suits and guys in tracksuits. Past girls in cut Spandex and girls in Kate Spade. I finally reached the station, waiting on a hard orange bench for the last bus. Got back to Sackville at four in the morning. Made a call. Two rings. Looper came. Didn’t ask why. Didn’t bitch. Just came.
“I talked to your boss,” I told her, shivering. She had the heat cranked. Inside, the van was nice and warm.
“Oh, yeah? About what?”
“Dad Sudden.”
There was a pause.
“What about him?”
“He’s been making inquiries.”
Looper lit a smoke with one hand, all Jenny Depp, cool as fuck. “Lemme guess. He wants to know how strapping you’ve become but is too lame to ask himself?”
I laugh.
She laughs.
Which totally fails to hide the fact that both of us are scared to death Dad Sudden might actually come back.
Meanwhile, I can hear El Hella breathing into his phone.
“Dude,” I finally say, “you blew off practice.”
“What’re you talking about? I came by and you weren’t there.”
“I called Lawrence. He said you took off in a car with someone.”
“I was downstairs running scales! I was packing up gear!”
I picture him getting into Angie Proffer’s car.
“Lawrence said—”
“Who gives a screw what Lawrence said? Jesus. Lawrence thinks it’s 1941. Lawrence thinks Mussolini is president. Lawrence thinks any day now someone’s going to invent shortwave radio. Is there a reason we’re still talking about this?”
Let alone a percentage in it?
“Sorry. No. You were saying something?”
Five Things Our Band Needs (to win Rock Scene 2013):
1. A name
2. A drummer
3. A drummer
4. A drummer
5. A drummer
&
nbsp; “I was saying if we’re going to win Rock Scene 2013, we probably need a drummer.”
I almost squeal, but manage to go pure deadpan instead. “I dunno. Are you sure?”
Elliot coughs. “It now occurs to me, despite my earlier… position on the matter, that to truly crush Flog and Angelo, to grind them down to fecal dust, to pack them like cold lunch meat into an old Ziploc bag, a duo’s not enough.”
“Hmm. Good point. I hadn’t really thought of that.”
“Besides, once we’re on Real Godz of Hollyrock, they’re gonna make us have a drummer anyway.”
“Oh, yeah. First thing the producer says.”
“And so it would be unwise for us to continue in this percussionless fashion. Do you agree?”
“Entirely.”
“So go get us a snare-banger.”
“Fantastic. But why do I have to do the legwork?”
He clears his throat. There’s a woman’s voice in the background. It doesn’t sound all that much like the Black Widow.
“I’m sorta busy.”
“Cougar hunting?”
“Not funny.”
“Out trolling for desperate housewives?”
“Just shut up and do it.”
“Fine. I’ll put up a flyer at the café. Any other solemn dictates or personal wishes you need fulfilled?”
“Well, there is one other thing.”
“There’s always one other thing.”
“No dicks.”
“Come again?”
“If this theoretical drummer is a dick, it will not fly. Sin Sistermouth will implode. I don’t care if the guy is all Neil Peart with the time signatures or hung like hair-bag Tommy Lee. No dicks.”
“No sweat. I’ll make that the first line, black marker, all caps. This band is a dick-free zone.”
“Actually, don’t. People will think we’re eunuchs.”
“Even better. Everyone wants to be in a eunuch band these days. Don’t you watch the Internet? Going sans-ball is total fashion. It’s the new tight pants and trucker cap.”
“The ladies are said to dig it?”
“I imagine there’s a newfound sense of lightness.”
“A diminishment of distractions?”
“Testosterone is so yesterday. So Super Bowl. So bar fight.”
“Whatever. Just get us a drummer, stat.”
“Consider one found.”
“Good. I gotta go.”
“Say hi to Lawrence.”
“Hi to Lawrence.”
“Say good night, Gracie.”
“Good night, Gracie.”
“Say it with flowers.”
There’s a murmur in the background, then a giggle, then a dial tone.
Night Flight
a new song
by Ritchie Sudden
A grim organic motor pulses in my head.
A grim organic motor pulses, pulses.
A grim organic motor pulses in my head.
A grim organic dread.
A dead muscle slows my heart.
A dead muscle slows, slows.
A dead muscle slows my heart.
A dead muscle grows.
A crunching static fills my ears.
A crunching static fills, fills.
A crunching static fills my ears.
A crunching static still.
An angry need jangles my bones.
An angry need rises, rises.
An angry need tangles my jones.
An angry need surprises.
A roof to leap from lightens my feet.
A roof to leap lightens, lightens.
A roof to leap from lightens my feet.
A place to land in the middle of the street.
“It’s beautiful,” Lacy Duplais says, like she’s about to cry. At first I think she’s kidding, but she’s not. We’re in History of the Americas (what the totality of Americas actually means being explained by Caucasian, omelet-eating, never-been-south-of-Cleveland Dice). Lacy’s sitting close enough to wear my cologne. She ditched the grandma sweater for big hoop earrings, leather boots, and a tight skirt. Either it’s my imagination, or Lacy Duplais has gotten some serious style together.
“Can I have it?” she asks.
“The song?”
“Um, yeah.”
I was going to give it to Elliot, see if he could come up with a chorus or two. Instead, I tear the page out of the textbook, where I’ve written the lines in between two Venn diagrams, and hand it over.
“I sincerely hope that was not your textbook, Sudden,” Dice says without even turning from the board. He’s writing ANDREW JACKSON in chalk with one hand, spinning the knobs of his Teaching Tower with the other. We’re going over the basics of how Old Hickory ended up on a twenty-dollar bill, despite being a genocidal maniac, with Graceland as background music.
I take a deep breath, close my eyes, and attempt to destroy Dice with the deadly power of thought. With wave after wave of pure brain-hate. I mentally will him to melt. To burst into flames. I clamp down and demand that he deconstruct and then re-atomize as a roof shingle. As a loaded diaper. As a hermaphroditic squid.
When I open my eyes, Dice is still there. Whole and composed and, if anything, even shinier than usual.
“No, sir,” I say.
Lacy winks, letting her hand dangle between our seats.
Lonely.
Unheld.
I do not lean over and take it in mine.
Her bottom lip trembles, almost imperceptibly. A recent poll shows I feel 44 percent more like an asshole.
Dice drones on about the Dreyfus Affair. Some people giggle at the word affair.
Dice drones on about the Trail of Tears, which he makes sound like an unfortunate but necessary corrective.
Dice drones on about the role of mindless droning in our nation’s educational system.
“Lacy,” I whisper.
She won’t look over.
“Paging Miss Duplais.”
She won’t look over.
“Yo, homegirl.”
She won’t look over.
“Lacy!”
“What?” she says, way too loud.
Dice looks up. Graceland’s diluted ethnicity goes soft.
Even softer.
He sighs and strokes his goatee.
“Is there anything you’d like to share with the rest of the class, Mr. Sudden?”
I nod. “How about some cigars and a bottle of whiskey?”
Young Joe Yung holds his big overalled belly and guffaws. Pretty much everyone else just stares in disbelief.
Dice smiles, as if he doesn’t really mind a little midlesson repartee. Having a sense of humor, after all, helps him relate to the kids. But his eyes don’t fool me, hard and black and flat.
His forehead is tight.
The chalk in his hand begins to crumble.
Do I care?
I do not.
After all, I have a new song called “Night Flight.”
Dice does not have a new song called “Night Flight.”
In fact, I’d be willing to bet Dice will never have a song of any kind at all.
“You’re a poet,” Dr. Benway says, finishing “Night Flight.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Then what are you?”
“A lyricist.”
“And the difference is?”
“One gets you zero cash, no respect, and frequently beat up. The other gets chicks and drugs and royalties.”
Dr. Benway looks at me for a very long time.
“Have you ever read Keats?”
“No.”
“Or Yeats?”
“No.”
“Or Frank O’Hara?”
“No.”
“Or Bukowski?”
“No.”
“Well, even hotshot lyricists would probably be wise to spend a little time with the classical poets.”
“That would be your professional recommendation?”
“It woul
d.”
“I have a theory,” I say.
“Which is?”
“Every dude in here is in here for taking bad advice.”
Dr. Benway opens her tiny bird mouth and laughs and laughs and laughs.
Beenie Sloat and Young Joe Yung are in the caf, at the vegan table, slouched hard in their hemp pants and hemp sandals and dirty T-shirts that say RAW HEMP ROCKS! Beenie’s not big on soap and combs. In fact, he’s thin and pale and looks like he just stepped out of a long, hot cigarette shower. It makes you want to stuff raw hamburger in his gill slits just to get some niacin into his bloodstream.
Joe is leaning over, whispering. They’re in intense negotiations. I spin a chair around and lean over the back, like a homicide detective.
“And what might you dudes be rapping about?”
“Liquid A,” Beenie says.
“Assets?”
“No, acid.”
“No shit?”
“No, sir.”
“What about it?” I ask.
Joe Yung’s grin is pure serenity. You could snip off his toes with a bolt cutter one by one and he’d keep smiling all the way down to the pinkie.
“I read where you can put it directly on your eyeball with one of those… uh…”
“Eyedroppers,” Beenie says.
“Yeah, eyedropper. Supposed to make the hallucinations way more intense. Supposed to, dude, be, like, exponential cartoons.”
“Read where?”
Young Joe shrugs. “I dunno. Maybe I dreamed it.”
“Awesome, right?” Beenie says.
No, not awesome. It sounds beyond terrifying. But I don’t tell them that, because that would make me sound uncool.
“Anyhow, I’m doing two drops,” Beenie says with a yawn. “One in each eye.”
“I’m doing three,” Young Joe counters. “Left, right, left.”
Beenie raises an eyebrow, like, Can you believe this crazy but ultimately lovable guy?
“Okay, four.”
“Five.”
“Six.”
Joe Yung considers long and hard. His twenty chin whiskers are set. His eyes are fierce.
“I can name that trip in seven drops.”
Beenie doesn’t want to give in, but he knows he’s beat. He fishes a peanut butter Tiger Bar from his fanny pack, sharing it with Joe, and then opens his palm. There’s a tiny vial with clear liquid in the center of it. “Wanna come for the ride, Sudden?”
Wise Young Fool Page 8