Struts & Frets

by Jon Skovron

  We sat in silence for a minute. Then Jen5 said, “Ms. B, are you mad at your father?”

  Mom was quiet for a moment, then she said, “Yes, I am. But not because he beat me over the head with a wrench.” Then she laughed loudly.

  Jen5 looked at me. “I don’t get it.”

  “Welcome to my world,” I said. “Therapist humor.”

  The place felt like the community center where Tragedy of Wisdom used to rehearse. Flat brown carpet, beige walls, lots of little rooms. I had a feeling there wasn’t a dance studio, though.

  At the front desk, we had to get checked off a list and then buzzed through a security door.

  “The entire building is locked down,” Mom explained as we walked down a brightly lit hallway. “Otherwise, some of them would wander off.”

  Then we walked into a huge room. At the far end were a bunch of cafeteria tables just like at school. Some of the old people were sitting there drinking coffee, talking to one another or to themselves. They all seemed very mellow. Or drugged. I don’t know what I’d been expecting. I guess strait-jackets and creepy orderlies all in white. But except for the fact that the doors were electronically sealed and no one was smoking, it was more like a bingo hall.

  To the left of the cafeteria was a big TV. A lot of other old people where lounging in chairs around it, watching Animal Planet. To the right was a nice little Spinnaker piano. And playing the piano was Gramps.

  He seemed peaceful and content as he played his old favorite, “I’m Beginning to See the Light,” but his playing was different somehow. None of his normal trills or embellishments or crazy runs that he used to do. It was just the song itself, simple and even a little stiff, like he was playing from sheet music, although there wasn’t anything in front of him and if there was one song he knew by heart, it was that one. I could see his lips moving. At first I thought he was singing along to the song, but as we got closer, I realized he was actually reciting random lines from a bedtime story he used to read to me when I was little called Goodnight Moon.

  “Goodnight noises everywhere,” I could hear him sing to himself as we got close.

  Mom cleared her throat. “Dad?” she said. “How are you?”

  Gramps continued to play as he looked at us. His voice was very soft and mild as he said, “Good God, girl, what happened to your head?”

  “Latest fashion, Dad,” said Mom drily. “Gotta keep up with the times.”

  He laughed and kept playing. After a moment, he said, “You’re a pretty girl. My daughter Sarah. She’s a pretty girl too. Do you know her?”

  “Yeah,” she said, and I could see her struggling not to show the hurt. “I know her.”

  “Like this one,” said Gramps. He nodded his head toward Jen5 while still playing. “I can tell just by looking at her. Spitfire!” He chuckled. Then his face suddenly got a little pouty, like a cranky toddler.

  “Where the hell is Sammy?” he said.

  “Right here, Gramps,” I said.

  “Damn, boy, can’t you see I need some help here? I’m old and crazy and can’t remember the words to this song! How’s it start?”

  I looked around the room sheepishly. It felt a little weird. Although no one seemed to even notice that we were there.

  “Well?” he said. “I can’t vamp forever!”

  So what else could I do? I started singing:

  “I never cared much for moonlit skies. I never wink back at fireflies.”

  Gramps cackled gleefully and started pounding the keys and added his own quavering voice to mine.

  “But now that the stars are in your eyes, I’m beginning to see the light!”

  He insisted we sing through the entire song. When it was finished, he was all smiles and nods. “Thank you,” he said. Then his face began to glaze over and he mumbled, “I think I’d like to rest now.”

  He got unsteadily to his feet and, without saying goodbye, lurched off to his room.

  We looked at each other awkwardly.

  “Come on, kids,” Mom said. “Let’s go.”

  After we’d dropped Jen5 off, we drove home in silence. When we got to the house, Mom parked the car, but she didn’t get out. Instead she just sat there and stared out the window.

  “You and Gramps . . . have something . . . that I never did,” she said. “You share something. I don’t really understand it, but I know it can lead people to dangerous places. It’s that thing that took my mother away. It’s the thing that can ruin not only your own life, but the lives of those you love.”

  She sat there for a moment still staring straight ahead, and I was sure that some really bad news was about to hit me. I could practically taste it in the air.

  “But,” she said, “that thing, whatever it is, also makes life so much better. What just happened with you and Gramps . . . to me, that was beautiful. And I think that sometimes I try to put my own fears and distrust of this thing on you . . .” She just kind of trailed off, still staring out the window. “And that isn’t right. So, I’m sorry.”

  I realized that I’d been holding my breath.

  “So . . . ,” I said after a while. “Does this mean I can be a professional musician?”

  She smiled. Then she chuckled. Then she full on laughed out loud. “Sure, Sam. Sure. But you still have to go to college.”

  So, tonight Fidgeting had our first real gig. We even got paid for it. Okay, it was at a pizza shop down by the college campus. And we got paid in pizza. But whatever. Because the thing is, we opened for Monster Zero.

  Eric Strom had some friend in the Battle of the Bands contest, so he saw the Tragedy of Wisdom train wreck and remembered me from the coffee shop. Then, through some chain of people I never fully understood, he ended up at some party that Fidgeting was playing. He recognized me again and came over. He gave me some shit about breaking my ax at the Battle of the Bands, and then we started talking music and how he wanted to start building the local scene now that they actually had a little bit of clout around town. They wanted to start having new bands open for them, just a couple of songs to warm up the crowd, and he liked our sound, so were we interested? Well, after Jen5 picked me up off the floor, I said yes, of course.

  I’m not going to lie. When the day of the gig finally arrived, I was terrified. This wasn’t just my friends from school. This was college students and adults, and somehow that seemed official. More real. I wasn’t totally over my fear of singing in front of people. It was always just on the edge of becoming a problem every time we played in front of people.

  We started with a song that Alexander and I cowrote called “Theodore the Vampire.” It’s a perky, upbeat song (Alex’s influence) about a vampire who is lonely because he keeps killing all his friends (my influence). It has a weird dark/light sound that people seem to really connect to. Plus it has this peppy chorus that goes:

  But he never has ’em for too long

  Things always seem to turn out wrong

  His tummy starts to get hungry

  And he can’t help but kill them all!

  It loses something on paper. But trust me, it’s hilarious when Alexander and I sing it into a single mic like doo-wop girls or something. And it features a hand-fart solo. Seriously. It’s just for eight bars of music, but we cut everything else, so it’s just Alex, phfip-phopping into the mic in dead silence, then we go crashing back into the chorus.

  Anyway, I was wound pretty tight with that campus crowd watching, and about halfway through the song, my voice started going out on me. My throat was just so dry from nerves that it came out squeakier and squeakier until by the time the song was over, I was barely making a sound. But then, some random dude that I had never met before just walked up to the stage and handed me his soda. Thinking about it now, it was like in some cheesy TV commercial, but at the time, I was just so grateful. And kind of surprised.

  Right up until that moment, I guess I always thought of a performer’s relationship to an audience almost like it was a conflict, like they were jus
t waiting to expose me for the wannabe poser that I was. Maybe that was why I always got so nervous. But in that moment, I realized that a lot of people didn’t actually think of me as a wannabe. They weren’t really judging me at all. They just wanted to hear some good music, and hoped I could provide it. They were just looking for a little of that reach-for-the-moon magic. It was that simple.

  Whether it was the soda or that realization, my voice was fine for the rest of the set. In fact, Eric asked if we were interested in opening for them again, and maybe even doing a mini tour with them during the summer.

  I don’t know if this is the start of something big or not. And honestly, I don’t really care. Well, okay. I care a little. It would be nice to make some real money playing music. And every once in a while, I give in to the stupid little fantasies about album covers and T-shirts. But that’s not the main thing. Most of the time, instead of thinking about being a musician, I just play music now.

  “Idiots Rule,” by Jane’s Addiction

  “Communist Daughter,” by Neutral Milk Hotel

  “I’m Beginning to See the Light,” by Edward Kennedy “Duke”

  Ellington, Don George, and Johnny Hodges

  “Someday You Will Be Loved,” by Death Cab for Cutie

  “Take the Skinheads Bowling,” by Camper Van Beethoven

  “Wake Up,” by Rage Against the Machine

  “Only Shallow,” by My Bloody Valentine

  “Breathe,” by Pink Floyd

  “How High the Moon,” by Nancy Hamilton and Morgan Lewis

  “I Just Wanna Get Along,” by the Breeders

  “Monkey Gone to Heaven,” by the Pixies

  “Caring Is Creepy,” by the Shins

  “Wave of Mutilation,” by the Pixies

  “Haven’t Got a Clue,” by the Flaming Lips

  “Interstellar Space,” by John Coltrane

  “Yerself Is Steam,” by Mercury Rev

  “Car Wash Hair,” by Mercury Rev

  “Just Like Heaven,” by the Cure

  “La La Love You,” by the Pixies

  “Taste the Pain,” by the Red Hot Chili Peppers

  “Summer Sketch,” by Russ Freeman

  “Overpowered by Funk,” by the Clash

  “Addicted to Fame,” by Subset

  “Just Like Honey,” by the Jesus and Mary Chain

  “Everything in Its Right Place,” by Radiohead

  “Sins of the Father,” by Tom Waits

  “Burning Inside,” by Ministry

  “I Hate Rock ’n’ Roll,” by the Jesus and Mary Chain

  “The Moon and Antarctica,” by Modest Mouse

  “So Far I Have Not Found a Science,” by Soul Coughing

  For more music suggestions, go to

  strutsandfretsbook.com.

  There are so many people who were directly or indirectly responsible for the creation of this book. Thank you of course to my agent, Emily Sylvan Kim, who suggested I try my hand at young adult fiction and without whom this story would have remained only a text file on my computer. To my editor, Maggie Lehrman, who pushed this story to a richness I hadn’t realized was possible until she pointed it out to me. To Chad W. Beckerman and Melissa Arnst, who somehow conjured up the perfect book design. To Zach Morris, Mark Levine, and Scott Pinzon for their thoughtful criticism and enthusiasm in early drafts. To my mother, Gini, for giving me my first guitar, and my stepfather, Tom, for giving me my first album. To my wife, Gretchen, for her endless support, encouragement, and patience throughout the writing process. And to my sons, Logan and Zane, for being a constant reminder of why I must write.

  Lastly, I want to thank the real Tragedy of Wisdom, Fidgeting, Monster Zero, and all the other bands who inspired me back in the day when I made music, as well as all the amazing artists coming out of unexpected places today.

  is a music geek who can play nine instruments, but none of them well. This is his first novel. In his spare time, he writes technical manuals and tries to forget about his sordid past as an actor. He lives with his wife and two kids outside Washington, D.C. To learn more about him, the book, or the music, visit him at strutsandfretsbook.com.

  and designed by Chad W. Beckerman. The display type was hand drawn by Melissa Arnst. The text is set in 12-point Adobe Garamond, a typeface based on those created in the sixteenth century by Claude Garamond. Garamond modeled his typefaces on ones created by Venetian printers at the end of the fifteenth century. The modern version used in this book was designed by Robert Slimbach, who studied Garamond’s historic typefaces at the Plantin-Moretus Museum in Antwerp, Belgium. The jacket and interior photographs were taken by Jonathan Beckerman.