“But a pap, on the other hand. Every boy needs a pap like he needs a dog or a guitar. That’s why I’m here, isn’t it?” He said it like one word—‘Innit.’ “You know your Uncle Jamie would gladly be sitting up with you right now, sharing a drink. Or Mick. It’s not the same and we both know that, but you have plenty of people hanging around you who’d love it if you came to them with a problem like this.”
“I hope you aren’t saying ‘goodbye?’ That’s what this is starting to sound like.”
He stood, and wouldn’t sit back down. “I suppose I am. What else can I say? You know the crossroads bollocks is all a metaphor, right? Time has come to change your fate instead of letting it push you around the block.”
“So, grow up and stop making music and get a real job?”
“Is that what I said? Don’t be a bastard.” He laughed and shook his head. “No good can come from growing up. Growing up is our punishment for following the rules, but loads of adults get paid to make music.”
I met him at the end of the bar.
He said, “Take care of business. These people really like you. And they like what you do for their Katy. But she’s going to need more. She puts on a good front, but it wears her down. She may want kiddies. She may want consistency. She may not. Either way, she wants to know that you’re capable of keeping a lid on when the brew gets too hot. She wants to be taken care of sometimes, Preston. She doesn’t want to be the queen. She wants to be the princess. She wants a prince.”
I couldn’t say anything because I agreed with him. But I wanted to touch him. I wanted a handshake or a hug to let me know everything was okay.
He added, “Before I go, you should know that I think you’ve done the best you could so far. You’ve built something, and people like you. That kind of thing didn’t come because you had a pap. That all came from who you are, and who you love. Don’t forget that.”
I wanted some kind of physical contact, but he backed away at a steady pace. “Be careful, brother. The world ain’t going to look out for you.”
And when he waved goodbye and bounded down the steps I just stood in the doorway and waved back.
Everybody stumbled into the afternoon at their own pace. Tension forced a noticeable quiet into the air, but it freed me to pick up my guitar as a way to kill the rest of the day. It gave me time to think, time to go through chords and scales and exercises as a bit of noisy meditation.
Simoneaux was the first to join me on stage. I didn’t know whether it was for my sake or for his own, but I turned to face him all the same. I sat on the edge of my amp and tweaked the volume to match the volume of his kit. I played weird little chord progressions to match his weird little beats. Diatonics and whole note scales and Arabic scales. I tried unusual chords in new ways. Keeping up with him almost felt like some kind of game. Like, as soon as I pulled something new out of my hat he threw something else at me. He kept nodding for me to stop, but whenever I backed out he’d pull me back in, jumping in and out of syncopation, back and forth between twos and threes.
After a while he waved his hand across his throat for the last time. I shook out my hands and stood up. I asked if he wanted a drink.
“Nah, Pres. We need to talk.” Wiping sweat off his brow with his forearm, he said, “It’s all about the ritual with the types we’re dealing with out there. They been doing things a certain way for thousands of years. It ain’t up to you to decide when to come in and do something different. You skip a step and the whole deal’s off. Kaput. They keep you on the hook for your end of things while they walk off into the night like they was looking for a lost dog. They rely on the way things are said—wording means everything to them. You have to understand this, Preston. The step-by-step is important. Just like putting together a little rhythm, like we did now.”
“I don’t suppose I’m going to put myself into a position where I’m going to have to worry about that.”
“You don’t know. Ain’t none of us knows what’s going to happen. Too easy for a guy like you to lose everything. That’s how come you ain’t lost everything already.”
“Because I didn’t follow the proper steps?”
“Maybe. This one’s like a tick. You don’t pull at it with tweezers because you might not get the head out. You hear?”
“I do. Thanks for looking out for me.”
Jamie drifted out to investigate. I waved him over.
Simoneaux said, “That’s all we’re doing, man. Looking out for you. Remember the ritual. Sign of the Cross, ‘body of Christ’ and all that. Same thing—ritual and step-by-step. This is a different side of it.”
I said, “You know the procedure, don’t you? How to make a deal that sticks?”
Jamie brought a chair onto the riser with him.
Simoneaux said, “I know how to bake a cake and you ain’t eating cake now, are you?”
Nodding, I said, “I got you.”
“So, what do you think she is? You spent a lot of time with her.” Jamie looked over his shoulder to make sure nobody else heard. “Is she a maligned spirit or what?”
“Jesus, Jamie.” I closed my eyes, but wanted to roll them. “If she’s not The Devil or a devil then I don’t know what she is.”
“Do you remember any strange smells, or sensations from the time you spent with her? Noises or voices in a different language?”
“Like na zdravi? Yeah, I heard her speaking other languages. Honestly, even after everything that happened out there and back in Morgantown, I’m still inclined to say she’s a woman. I know that ain’t an answer you want to hear.”
“Preston, I spent a lot of time working on this,” Jamie said, his tone making me think he was trying to find a way to put it mildly. “See, there’s a Kabbalist mystic belief that all words contain secret syllables. When uttered in the right sequence, they have magical properties. Maybe some songs even work that way—like the one, four, five chord progression? Makes sense, right? So if you could learn her real name, we could figure out what she is and gain a little leverage over her. Does that make sense?”
Ben and Pauly ate at the bar, alone together. Katy and Chloey and Rachael ate by candlelight at a table in the far corner. Andre and Calvin and the rest decided to take the day off. I couldn’t blame them.
“It does, but I already told you what I think. And what if she isn’t The Devil?”
Simoneaux said, “If she ain’t, we’re lucky, son. But if all this goes on like a rain that don’t stop, it may not matter.”
“I understand.” I stood as my belly rumbled. “Jamie, part of me is afraid you’ll only ever see me as a flaky guitar player, the kind of guy who’ll wear the same T-shirt for days in a row if there ain’t somebody around to tell him to change it. But I want everybody to be able to go back home okay with the idea that they didn’t have to worry about Katy anymore. You all are going to see that I’m capable of being a wall when the time comes.”
I put my hand on his shoulder. “I’m going to wipe away the memory of me stealing the guitar from Mick even though I already worked everything out with him. I want you to respect me the way you respect Ben and Henry. I’m going to leave it at that and eat now.”
“Now, Preston, that ain’t fair…”
I turned and drifted toward the kitchen before he could change my mind or fill me up with patronizing sentiments. On the stove Simoneaux had a pot of cold grits congealing next to a pan of red-eye gravy. In the oven a tray of corn bread warmed. I grabbed it with an oven mitt.
Through the service window I heard Katy and Chloey laugh at something, and smiled as I buttered the sweet, dry cornbread. It smelled like August county fairs. The butter had softened from sitting next to the stove. The knife pushed it deep into the pores, where it turned into liquid that soaked all the way down through to the plate. I put a big spoonful of grits next to the cornbread, then covered them with the red-eye. After thinking about it for a second, I dipped the ladle back into the gravy and dumped it onto the cornbread too.
But one bite was all I got. One taste of the salty butter-soaked cornbread, before I heard the clamor of chairs in the front room.
“Preston,” Katy yelled as I ran out of the kitchen.
Jamie and Simoneaux were peering through a gap in the boards of the window closest to the stage. Rachael and Pauly shared the other.
Ben had gotten the baseball bat from behind the bar. He handed it to me and said, “Nobody gets through,” as he ran back to the storeroom. I knew he went back for his guns.
The thunder of motorcycles drowned out the rumble of all the pickup trucks and vans. Without walking all the way over to the front door or window, I knew. I put my arm around Katy. She called the police.
“There are so many…” Jamie said.
“They won’t send a radio car.” Simoneaux said, “Once you give them this address they put you on a waiting list.”
“Chloey, Rachael. Why don’t you both come on back here?” I said, leading Katy with my hand on the small of her back. “Maybe even head back into the storeroom and lock yourselves in.”
Chloey nodded, and the three of them took cover.
I joined Pauly at the window and gave him the bat. “This is for you, man. Take the first shot. You deserve a little payback.”
“What about you?”
“Pool cue or mic stand? One is poetic, one is classic. What do you think?”
He gave me a small smile. “Mic stand.”
Jamie watched Ben roll out of the back hallway. I couldn’t quite read Jamie’s expression. Based on the way my own interactions with Ben had been for the last few days, I’d say it troubled him to see his son enjoying this. Ben gave his dad a revolver.
“Listen up,” Ben said as he moved to the center of the room. He took his pistol off safety and snapped the slide back to make sure there was a round in the chamber. “I want to give them the door. Keep the lane clear and I’ll unload on them as they pop through. Once they hear shots they’re going to back off. I guarantee it.”
“You saw these guys at the river, man.” I said. “They’re like zombies. Bullets didn’t stop them back there.”
“You just worry about yourself, Preston. I got this.” He positioned himself at the end of the bar and set two extra clips there in front of him.
“I don’t think we should give them the door. Give the cops time to show up,” I said. “If anything, we can reinforce the door to buy time.”
Jamie added, “Maybe Preston’s right. We need to try to keep a lid on this situation for as long as possible.”
Ben’s face got red and he kicked a stool over. The noise made me jump.
After a long pause, I said, “Jesus, Ben, you do what you want. This is your gig. I’m going to go back and see how everybody’s doing. I’m not going to fight you too, man.”
I wasn’t being sarcastic, and didn’t say it with any kind of passive-aggressive tone. “When I come back out I’ll do whatever you tell me to do.”
He took a deep breath and released it without saying anything.
I said, “We good?”
“We’re good,” he replied low enough so nobody could hear. “Just trying to keep everybody safe, Pres.”
“I know, man.”
“If there’s something I’m good at—”
A crash from the back cut him off and sent us both running for the storeroom at the same time. Ben yelled, “You guys keep this secure up here,” as he passed by the kitchen’s service window.
Near the office we could see the orange glow from a sodium vapor light falling across the tile—the first sign the door had been kicked down. A cool breeze blew in from the night. As my eyes adjusted to the change in brightness, Ben raised his pistol. I stopped a few steps behind him.
He said, “I got the storeroom.”
I waited for Ben to give a sign. As soon as he pointed at the door I rushed into Simoneaux’s office, catching one of the men from the church by surprise. A tall, wiry guy with a bit of a gut lunged at me. I swung the chrome boom from my mic stand and caught his forearm as he tried to shield his head.
He took a step back and I swung again, this time hitting his right temple with a thud. He dropped to his knees and crossed his arms over his face. The purple, hemorrhaged skin on his forearm jiggled like a water balloon. Blood and watery puss dripped out of puncture wounds that skipped, two by two, from his wrist to his elbow. Patches of stiff, black skin on the palms of his hands cracked and bled around the edge.
I swung the metal mic boom as hard as I could and hit his elbow with a snap. He tucked into a ball on the floor. I took a step to the side, lined up my shot and hit him again in the ribs. He held up a palm in surrender as a brown snake slid out of his jacket pocket.
Adrenaline made me bigger than I’d ever been in my whole life. My arms felt huge, like they’d burst through my shirt. My breathing came faster, which scared me. I broke the snake’s back with a quick tap from the boom and backed into the hallway to tell Ben how I’d taken care of the man in the office.
The storeroom door hung wide open. I nearly tripped over a woman sprawled out on the tile. Blood ran out of her hairline onto her face. She had the same purple blotches all over her arms and hands as the man in Simoneaux’s office. But something else hid there, amidst the blood, and I had to look to see it. Tattoos on her palms. And when I looked at her face again I saw that blood wasn’t real. Right below the black ink that represented a spiky crown of thorns.
On the floor near the woman’s feet lay a dead rattlesnake. The front third of its body appeared flat and shapeless.
I immediately made eye contact with Katy to see if she was okay. She spoke with somebody on the phone, which didn’t really make sense to me.
Ben turned and said, “Hold this while I get the first aid kit from the office.”
“Holy shit.” I dropped to my knees and held a bloody mass of white paper towels against the skin above Chloey’s collarbone—too close to her neck. “Chloey, you okay?”
Rachael, fighting to maintain her calm, handed me another wad of paper towels. “She needs to get to an emergency room.”
“I knew her, Preston.” Katy looked at the woman on the floor. Her voice sounded a little weak. “She acted like we were friends.”
“Did Ben kill her?”
“Ben didn’t do shit,” Chloey said, with a bit of a smirk. “She came at me with that big old knife and Katy hit her with a can of beans.”
“This is an emergency,” Katy said with a weak smile meant to keep Chloey calm. She held her hand over the mouthpiece. “The dispatcher says there’s a major accident over on I-59. It’s going to be a while.”
“Bullshit,” I said.
“Here,” Ben said, cutting me off. He signaled for me to get out of the way. “They got dad and me blocked in with their trucks.”
“Listen.” I wracked my brain to come up with a plan. “Maybe Andre can get you guys to a hospital. I’ll tell Pauly to call him. Just stay on the line with 911, okay?”
“You and me are still going to need to clear a path to the street.” Ben said, “Tell Pauly to have Andre come down the alley to the back door. Might be a little better than taking Chloey out the front.”
“Go out there and fight those people face-to-face?”
“Maybe,” Ben said. “You’re going to have to get your hands dirty sooner or later.”
I bent down and gave Katy a kiss on the forehead. Chloey watched me with sad eyes, so I bent over and gave her a little kiss on the cheek. “We’ll take care of this.”
“I know.” Katy took my hand when she said it.
Just before splitting I said, “I’ll make this right.” I turned and looked back at Katy. “Stay on the line. Somebody will have to come, right?”
“I will.” She looked at me with her watery blue eyes. “Preston?”
I couldn’t make eye contact with her.
“Don’t do anything you’ll regret.”
“I’m making a vow to you right now, with your mom and baby s
ister as my witnesses that I will fix this.” I backed away slowly, taking a last look at the woman on the floor. The sight filled me with anger and disgust. Figured I needed a little extra fuel if I expected to hang with Ben out there. “Were you going to tie her up?”
Katy said, “One thing at a time, Preston.”
Ben interrupted, “Tell my dad to come on back. He can help take care of Chloey and watch the door.”
Thunder pealed in the distance like a kettle drum boom. Wind blew a moist chill in from the night.
“On it,” I said before turning and running to the front.
In the bar nobody spoke. Simoneaux sat on a stool at the window, watching the scene on his sidewalk. Pauly sat at the foot of the stage, bouncing the baseball bat off his toe.
“Jamie, Ben needs your help back there.”
He stood and walked toward me. “Everything okay?”
“You’ll see.” I relaxed my grip on the mic boom and let it fall to my side.
Simoneaux said, “Are the girls okay?”
“Well, I got one of them bastards in your office and the girls got one in the storeroom.” I rubbed my eyes, because saying it finally made it real. “But she got Chloey first. Pauly, can you please call Andre and see if he can come around back to pick Chloey up? She needs a hospital.”
“Shit.” He pulled his phone out of his pocket and dialed immediately. “All over it.”
“Tell him back door as fast as possible.”
“He can’t get back there with all those people,” Pauly said while the phone rang.
“I know. Ben wants me to help him clear a path.”
“Good luck with that,” he said as Andre picked up. Pauly relayed the info to Andre using almost the same phrasing I’d used.
I said, “Anything new out there?”
“No man,” Simoneaux said. “Lots of freaks. Lots of snakes. More coming all the time.”
“Where’s Boggs and his gang?”
“Don’t see them,” Simoneaux said. “Their rides are still there, but they ain’t.”
I peeked through a gap in the old two-by-sixes. In the distance the dark sky glowed with the lightning of an oncoming storm.
The Revelations of Preston Black (Murder Ballads and Whiskey Book 3) Page 24