The Revelations of Preston Black (Murder Ballads and Whiskey Book 3)

by Miller, Jason Jack

  Since I couldn’t leave, I sat on the edge of the stage and watched Nadhima out on the dance floor, as she connected my piles of salt with chalk lines. She had all kind of accoutrements in a circle around the mound of salt in the center: a red candle, a green candle, and a black one, a silver cross with some kind of vine or root bound to it with twist ties, a string of rattlesnake vertebra with the rattle still attached at the end, a skull from a small rodent, like an opossum or groundhog, and two sachets of scented powders—one that smelled like rose petals and one that smelled like feet. While I watched, she opened the sachets, bent down, and sprinkled a bit of powder from each onto the floor at her feet. Before standing she made a cross in the powder with her pinkie finger. When she caught me watching, she called me over with a wave of her long finger.

  “Put this into your pocket, hear me? Don’t take it out and don’t let it go through the wash, neither.”

  I stuffed the rough patch of snake-skin into my front pocket.

  “And this here’s your hot foot powder and goofer dust,” she said, passing me a sachet. “Go on over to the door and make a big old ‘X’ there too. Just like this one. That’ll trick ’em real good.”

  So I did exactly what Nadhima asked as she lit the candles and spilled more powder across the floor. Just before heading back to the center of the room, I helped Jamie get my Fender Twin through the door and over to the stage. Jamie said, “Go ahead and start setting up. Like you’re playing a show. I want to watch Ms. Nadhima.”

  “Why am I setting up?”

  “Because Simoneaux says you’re playing a show.” He patted my shoulder and commandeered my old spot at the edge of the stage.

  When Nadhima threw powder into the candles, green sparks rose from the flames.

  I choked on the smoke as I looked for a power outlet. The smell hit me as I plugged in, and I gagged a little. It smelled like old laundry. And by “old laundry” I mean mostly dirty socks and underwear. Jamie sat there watching everything. I swore he didn’t blink once the whole time. Simoneaux came back in, pulled the blinds down and flipped the light switches, transforming the juke joint into one of those places where time never crawled forward ever again. He gave Nadhima a wide berth while she worked.

  I miked my amp and Pauly’s and set up the vocal mics and the mic for Katy’s fiddle. When I finished, I sat on the edge of the small stage with Jamie. Figured he’d tell me when the time came to get out of the way. It had gotten a lot warmer in the place since we woke up. And I grew more tired. And bored.

  As the noise and pyrotechnics drew down, Simoneaux asked if I’d intended to eat.

  “Didn’t plan on it.”

  “Don’t know when you’re going to eat again. When we get back I’m open for dinner. I want y’all up on that stage.”

  “Playing for the dinner crowd? Not sure they’re going to like our kind of music.”

  “Your kind of music?” he said, as he grabbed my wrist. “What kind is that?”

  He twisted my hand palm up and placed an old silver dime into it.

  He said, “Only one kind of music. I ain’t never heard a disc jockey say ‘shut your radio off because this song is only for a certain kind of people.’”

  “Yeah, I didn’t mean that.”

  “Just busting your balls. Put that into your pocket and don’t take it out. That there’s a Mercury leap year, okay? You want to bet on a slow horse you better have the odds in your favor, right?”

  I studied it for a second and put it into my pocket, right next to the snakeskin.

  “Tell that cousin of yours to set the tables and chairs back up out here. Tell him don’t pay those lines no mind.” Before I could reply, he said, “Me and your uncle are going to finish Dhima’s Drivin’ Away Spell by dropping some of her things off over at the cemetery. You kids get ready to play. My nephew, Calvin, works the bar, so y’all don’t have to worry about none of that. George lends a hand sometimes, but felt his time would be best spent at home tonight, praying. And Sissy and her brother, Marcus, come in at five to work the kitchen. All I want you kids doing is making music, hear me? Get ’em dancing. Music is power and it’s the only defense you got. When I get back I’ll join y’all. Going to be a long night.”

  “That’s what I keep hearing.”

  “Make no mistake.”

  So I ate some of the pork with red beans and rice, washed up and changed clothes then ate a little more. When I came back out to the front of the house I saw people at the tables. Not my crowd. For the first time in a long time the idea of picking up my Tele scared me. Calvin saw me standing there, waiting, and gave me a nod.

  I took a seat at the bar next to Andre and a guy wearing a Crimson Tide basketball jersey over a grey T-shirt. He drank Tanqueray.

  “Jameson?”

  Calvin shook his head. He looked a little like Simoneaux, but much thicker, like he spent all his time off lifting weights.

  “Bourbon, then,” I said as I scanned the labels. “Whatever.”

  “This mean you’re about to get up there?” He set a pint glass in front of me and poured three fingers into it. “Uncle Simon said not to let you sit on your ass all night.”

  The stage bathed in the golden glow of several recessed spotlights. Nothing big or fancy. Just a riser and a bunch of instruments and a dim cross made out of glass tubes. One older lady in the crowd wore a fancy hat with a peacock feather in the band. Two older men in suits had their porkpie hats respectfully perched on the back of their chairs. Younger, less distinctively dressed people filled out the rest of the place. Cigarette smoke drifted toward the stage lights.

  “I’m supposed to remind you that you have a job to do. My uncle said he didn’t ask for this ‘shit-storm’—his words, not mine. He said you got to start working that mojo.”

  “One more,” I said, before finishing my drink. “Andre, would you mind seeing where Katy and Pauly are at?”

  Calvin poured as I stood. On my way to the stage I ran through lyrics and chords, trying to think of songs they might want to hear. As soon as I set foot on the riser the air got thick, like everybody in the joint stopped eating and drinking at once. I flipped my amp on and slung the guitar over my shoulder, but didn’t turn around. When I hit the PA’s power switch my mic started to feedback, forcing me to spin, grab it, and push the mic stand to the edge of the stage. Now facing the audience, I said, “Check. Mic check.”

  Andre gave me a thumbs-up as he backed into the hallway. It felt like the Delts all over again. I said, “Um, yeah…”

  Somebody in the back said, “Just play something.”

  I squinted, and saw a guy with long blonde hair and sideburns wearing shades— the only white guy in the room beside me. I grabbed the neck and chugged along. A slow steady chick-chick-chick-chick on that D minor seventh.

  Then it hit me—That’s Duane, man. He came, like he said he would.

  In my head I cursed myself. My brain searched for words to go with the chords.

  Stalling.

  With a laugh, I whispered, “Shoot me.”

  Strumming. Slowing the tempo, noticeably, but in a controlled way. Nodding my head and closing my eyes. Slowed by a third. By half. Steady now.

  A fixed tapping on that D minor seventh until the words came. Come Together.

  Some of the audience nodded to the beat. Duane Allman smiled and tipped his glass to me. The rest went back to their biscuits and beans. But I closed my eyes and leaned into it. Maybe it didn’t matter what those folks needed. If my hand wouldn’t have instinctively grabbed that D minor seventh, I wouldn’t have been able to say the song wasn’t exactly what I needed. A return to what I knew after days of not knowing a goddamned thing. A taste of familiar in my mouth after days of eating the bitterness of losing fight after fight.

  And when I closed my eyes, I did it as much to block them out as I did to lock myself into the song. I sang all the way to “shoeshine” with my eyes closed, my head bobbing to that unmistakable groove. The slow slink of a
single guitar with nothing to hide. The last time I played alone on a stage like this…

  Was when I played for Stu the night before he left.

  The same day I met Dani at the record store.

  I shook the thought out of my head and added a premature ‘shoot me’ at the recollection of my dead friend. And the memory of seeing Danicka fall from the Westover Bridge. Watching her disappear into the darkness. Whether the reminiscence of “back then” or thinking about yesterday made me feel this way, I didn’t know. But the last time I played on any stage, my girl played with me and we were on our way to taking over the world. Now I was holed up in an Alabama juke joint worried about what would come busting through that door if all this belief and superstition turned out to be a lot more than belief and superstition. And because I was into the song, I didn’t hear the other amp crackle to life.

  When the sound of Pauly’s E string buzzing against the frets hit me, I stood straight up but did not turn around. Not because I didn’t care. I didn’t turn around, because I knew if I did, I’d see somebody other than my brother back there. Right then and there I knew I had to make it real. I knew I had to turn water into wine. So I stopped playing.

  But those low bass notes stuck to my teeth like black Twizzlers. I nodded in time to the beat. When I stepped up to the mic Pauly joined me.

  Last verse.

  Our words fought for space in the PA. They elbowed and pushed each other as they streamed out of the speakers. His breath smelled like bourbon. Stunk like mine. To see if it was real I let my head fall back. And even though it was faint, I felt it. He leaned over and bumped his head into mine. A small bump. Just a tap. Such a Pauly thing to do.

  I smiled as I soloed over the outro. A few of them bobbed their heads while they lit smokes and drank. I turned to Pauly and said, “Like John Lennon would, to let us down tonight.”

  At the end I paused, used to the type of applause paying audiences dished out. And the smattering stung, but it didn’t hurt. I looked at Calvin for a few more drinks. He nodded and I turned to Pauly. “Your turn.”

  “Let’s do ‘Bluebird,’” he said with a smile.

  “No, man. They don’t want to hear any of my shit.”

  He retreated from my blow-off with a flinch. “Fuck it, then. Do whatever you want.”

  I put my hand on his arm. “Sorry, man. I mean it. I thought you were telling me what you thought I wanted to hear.”

  Duane shouted, “Freebird!” and laughed with the people at the next table.

  “Do whatever you want then.”

  “Pauly…” I said, hoping to talk it out. But he didn’t have any fight left in his eyes. I could feel him trembling. “Let’s do it.”

  His arms remained crossed over his chest for a long, quiet minute. He stepped up to the mic and said, “Katy. Would you mind joining us up here? Please?”

  I looked for her amongst the tables, back behind the bar. Pauly said, “Andre, would you mind trying again, please?”

  I said, “Want to play something until she gets here?”

  “Simoneaux said we all had to be up here. He said a table with two legs can’t stand.”

  So we waited, despite the anxious conversation from the people on the other side of the dance floor. I tried not to look, because I didn’t like what I saw out there. They weren’t just bored. They were fucking bored.

  “C’mon, boy!” Duane yelled. “You’re making it real hard to keep this buzz going.”

  “Katy?” I said, into the mic. “Why don’t you put your hair up and join us?”

  I turned to Pauly. “‘Beast of Burden.’ She’ll pick it up when she gets up here.”

  “No way, man. That ain’t what Simoneaux said to do.”

  I looked back at the bar and held my palms up. “Andre?”

  With a laugh, Andre answered. “She said, ‘hold your horses,’ and that she ain’t ‘playing a note without changing clothes first.’”

  I turned my back and Andre added, “Don’t worry, Preston, these folks ain’t going anywhere,” and a few of them laughed.

  “Yeah, Pres,” Duane said, “We ain’t going nowhere unless you can get us out of these seats.”

  “Hell with all this.” My face got hot and I knew I’d blushed. Like I wanted Duane Allman to see me make a fool of myself. I mumbled, “Sugarplum fairy, one two three…” and launched right into “Shake Your Hips.”

  I tried to gain a little cred by not mentioning the Rolling Stones at all. “Here’s a little Slim Harpo. For Duane back there.”

  From the back of the room Duane whooped and raised his glass.

  Pauly said, “Here she comes,” but I’d already moved into the verse. And before she even made it up to the stage I saw heads bouncing and feet tapping.

  Pauly’s bass notes floated up to that old corrugated tin roof, shaking it like a giant subwoofer. Katy was still putting her hair up when I sang about meeting a pretty girl in that little country town. She didn’t smile when she stepped up to her mic.

  But when I heard her little fiddle playing the harmonica fills through the PA I knew it was all good in the hood. This train picked up speed. People weren’t on their feet. But they were at the edge of their chairs.

  Before anybody—and I meant Katy or Pauly, really—could object, I segued right into Bo Diddley’s “Who Do You Love?” Seemed like an appropriate tune for tonight. Made me think of the snake-skin in my front pocket. Folks drank and smoked and laughed more freely. And those who wanted to dance, danced.

  Standing there with Katy on one side and Pauly on the other showed me exactly what Simoneaux had meant about a table with two legs. Once we locked into that groove, white hot positive energy flew through me, hit the crowd and flew back magnified a hundred times. At the last verse, Pauly and Katy signaled each other to wrap. I shook my head to keep it going. I knew better than to stop now. Katy put her fiddle on her hip, objecting the only way she could. But she never had to play a frat house. She didn’t know what to do with a crowd like this.

  Using the same chords and same rhythm, I went right into “Ring of Fire” like the two songs had been separated at birth, which they may as well have been. Cash and Diddley were born three-hundred miles and four years apart. The people on the floor didn’t act like they noticed or minded.

  When Simoneaux came in with Jamie and heard our music, his head whipped right around. He smiled and raised a finger as he shuffled over to the bar, which took a while because he stopped to talk and shake hands. I figured he’d go get his guitar too. While we worked through an instrumental break he poured himself a drink and made his way up to the stage. The rest of the folks who’d been sitting down stood and shuffled toward the floor in anticipation of Simoneaux’s turn in the spotlight.

  While Katy took a verse, I watched Simoneaux settle into the stool behind the small drum kit and tug the neon cross’s pull-string. A blue glow fell onto us like a gentle snow. The moment he picked up the sticks the room changed, like a rabbit about to run. And when he joined us mid-verse, I felt it too. Never figured him for a drummer.

  He worked that simple little kit like he didn’t have a weak hand, pounding out that Bo Diddley beat on the snare while that high-hat sizzled like it was frying in hot oil. I couldn’t believe my ears, and wanted to turn around and watch. His left hand kept tapping out these weird sequences of threes, fives and sevens that made me forget the rest of “Ring of Fire” completely. I tried to think of Johnny’s next line, but for some reason “Junco Partner” kept jumping into my head. And just like that my lips were talking about serving eighty-five years in Angola. I could hear Simoneaux laughing behind me.

  We blew through seven or eight more songs without even stopping to drink the drinks Calvin poured for us after “That’s How I Got To Memphis.” We’d pause after each number and I’d ask Pauly what we knew and before I realized, Simoneaux shouted out a song. I’d tell him I didn’t know it, and he’d say ‘the hell you don’t,’ and start playing. And sure enough I didn’t stu
mble over lyrics after that.

  After a short break we tried “Statesboro Blues” and I avoided eye contact with Duane the whole time. Simoneaux didn’t like how I played it, and yelled, “Where’s your bottleneck?” as I sang the last verse.

  I didn’t want to tell him that it embarrassed me to attempt any slide at all with Duane in the room, so I said, “Didn’t feel it. I have to work on it a little. That’s all.”

  “Pres, we got hellhounds all through these hills tonight. Heard ’em myself on our way back from the cemetery. You have to get some of them slide blues working or they’re going to eat us right up. Go on, get your bottleneck.”

  So I dug it out of my case and juiced my Twin a little. Last thing I wanted was for Simoneaux and Duane to see how nervous I was. I said, “Man, I don’t know if I got it.”

  “Ain’t nothing to it. You make that guitar moan and wail like the wind through the trees. That’s all them old blues guys did. Make it sound like pain. Make the devil think he already been there and got everything worth taking.” Simoneaux threw down his bourbon then chased it with a pint glass of ice cold water. The glass left a wet ring on his pants where he’d set it on his knee. He wiped the glass across his brow and said, “Try that ‘Little Red Rooster.’”

  I stepped up to the mic, but I didn’t feel it anymore. Without stepping away, I turned around and said to Simoneaux, “You think this ain’t working?”

  He shrugged. “Don’t feel like it is.”

  “Okay. Let’s try this then.” I looked at Pauly and said, “Give me some of that John Paul Jones.”

  He smiled, his fingers walked that slow, descending progression right down into “Dazed And Confused.”

  I expected to see a smile from Simoneaux. Instead he rolled his eyes.

  “Whatever, man. This is what you wanted.” I turned that slide loose on the strings. Letting it squeal like my guitar talked to them hellhounds directly.

  The crowd responded with indifference, but I didn’t care. I figured if part of this supernatural stuff had anything at all to do with me, I’d play what I wanted to play. During the instrumental breaks I stepped over to Pauly to get some sort of confirmation that he was okay. His playing sounded strong, almost like he’d never put the bass away. But his eyes looked for something in me that I couldn’t give him. I think he wanted me to tell him everything would to be okay.