17
KITTEN HAD DISAPPEARED into the night air, but that didn’t mean that the night was over. Far from it. I had other problems to deal with, and they didn’t have anything to do with finishing off our show. In fact, we blazed through our final sets with the crowd surging back and forth between the dance floor and the tables in waves of pulsing movement. No, the problem was avoiding Tanya. She had spent most of the evening lingering at the edge of the dance floor, gazing up at me with an expression that alternated, depending upon the song, between reverence and desire. My precious picking on Stairway to Heaven brought forth a solemn swaying of her head and shoulders, whereas my distorted riffing on American Woman elicited grinding hip shakes and pelvic thrusts. Through it all her eyes stayed on me.
Unnerved by the attention, I managed to avoid Tanya most of the evening by hitting the john and sneaking upstairs with Sam for beers between sets, but I couldn’t avoid her following our last set. Knowing Tanya’s eyes were on my back, if not on my heretofore unappreciated backside, I took my time packing up my guitar, unplugging cords, and checking to make sure everything was turned off. When I finally stepped from the stage, I nearly bumped into her.
“There you are,” she said, fumbling with the buttons of her quilted, brown, Chinese-style jacket. “I’ve been waiting for you.”
“Have you?” My eyes darted around. Besides Mr. Tom behind the bar, only Beanie and Cecil remained in the lounge.
“How ‘bout we go do somethin’?” She continued to work at the buttons. “I got a place up the hill.” Her murky eyes focused and latched on to my face. “Nobody else is there, and we could listen to music or something.”
“Um . . . where’s Rita?”
“Oh, she’s upstairs with Mick.” Finally finished with the complicated process of buttoning her coat, she looked at me and smiled. I thought she might give me another wink, but instead she said, “C’mon. Let’s go. I’ve got some killer pot. We can get high, and ... you know?”
Kitten notwithstanding, I wasn’t used to getting what I assumed was a straight-up proposition, and I certainly wasn’t used to turning one down, but I knew messing around with Tanya would be more trouble than it was worth. She was drunk—that probably explained her interest in me—and I wasn’t drunk enough. And who knew where Kitten lurked.
“Look, Tanya,” I said, half-feigning a yawn, “thanks for the invitation, but I’m exhausted. I think I need some sleep.”
She stuck out her lower lip and frowned, her smudged aqua eye shadow cracking a bit. “Oh, come on, Daniel, loosen up. We could have some real fun.”
I took a step back. “Maybe we could do it some other time.” Another yawn, this one more genuine. “I’m really beat.”
In a flash, her face changed from a sloppy, drunken pout to an image of tight, scrunched-up anger, a frightening transformation that stiffened my back. “Some other time? Like when? I mean, you’ve been staring at me all night, then you expect me to just go home when Rita’s up there in the sack with your buddy?”
“Staring at you? What’re you talking about?
Tanya huffed and swung away, taking a couple of tipply steps backward toward the door to the lobby. “If you wanna be some big loser, that’s your problem. What are you, a homo or something?”
I picked up my guitar and started after her. “Hey, hold on.”
She stumbled to a stop. “What?”
“Look, it’s nothing personal. I’m just really burnt out, and I wouldn’t be much fun tonight.” I gave her as genuine a shrug as I could manage. “You know?”
She obviously knew I was lying. “Whatever you say.”
“Can I at least walk you out?”
She shrugged and started toward the door. I followed and received a sly thumbs-up from Beanie when we passed from the lounge into the lobby. At the hotel’s front door, she turned toward me, and, thinking she was either going to kiss me or slap me, I stepped back. But, instead, she said, “Are you sure you don’t wanna come over? You could sleep at my place.”
I paused, not to reconsider her offer but to think of something safe to say. “Look, Tanya, you’re really nice. And I’d come over in a second if I weren’t so beat.” I tried to smile. “But I don’t think it’d be a good idea tonight.” This was ironic. How many times had girls said the exact same thing to me?
Her face darkened again, going through that quick transformation from soft to flinty. “I guess you’d rather be with Rita or someone like that hardass woman I saw you talking to earlier.” Up went her mascaraed eyes. “She’s probably waiting for you, isn’t she?”
“Hey, look, it’s not that.”
“You think you’re a hot-shit rock star, don’t you?” She started to turn. “Well, there’ll be another band here next week, so see ya around, loser.” Then, presciently it turned out, she added, “And you know where Rita is. Guess you won’t be getting much sleep tonight.”
She walked through the door but abruptly stopped, turned, and thrust her mood ring into my face. “Look!”
I glanced at the stone, which, like Tanya’s face, had darkened.
“It’s turned black!” she said. “And it’s all your fault.”
With that, she shoved through the door, slamming it on the back swing. I turned and trudged upstairs, wondering what the hell was going on. Why was everyone suddenly trying to get something from me? Was I being too distrustful? Was I just being a cynical jerk? Or were we all just trying to exploit each other? Wasn’t that, in essence, what Nita had jokingly asked me in the van the night of the party?
But at least Nita had been smart and honest enough to say that out loud. As I hit the top of the stairs, I suddenly missed her, and it was like a sudden blow to my chest. But how could I miss somebody I’d only met once, whose face I had a hard time remembering? My eyes closed, and I tried hard to recall Nita, her blonde hair, her eyes ... but try as I could, it was only Kitten’s face that came to mind.
SAM AND ROB were sitting against the far wall of the room with their feet up on the ice chest, drinking Olys and talking, when I walked through the door. Perpendicular to them on the bed, Mick and Rita lay sprawled out with their backs against the headboard. Rita had one bare leg lying across Mick’s; he had his arm around her. Oh, boy. I grabbed a beer and sat on the floor near Sam and Rob. Mick caught my eye, arched his eyebrows, and tilted his head toward the door, like “Why don’t you blokes get the hell outta here?”
With Tanya’s angry face in mind, I didn’t need much prompting. “How ’bout we go down to your room, Rob? This one’s getting a little crowded.”
Rita giggled, and Mick said, “Brilliant idea.”
We grabbed the ice chest and carried it down the hall to Rob’s room. Yogi was lying fully clothed on one of the twin beds, his nose stuck in a copy of Popular Mechanics. “What’s up?” he asked, looking up from the magazine.
“Mick wanted to be alone with Lolita,” I told him.
“And he better watch where he puts his pecker,” Sam said. “Her daddy could be the chief of police for all he knows. Man, she’s barely outta her diapers.”
“That’s crude,” Yogi said, his ears reddening.
“You want crude? Just go down to the room in a few minutes.”
Rob ignored us and pulled a plastic baggie out of the toe of his spare pair of shoes. He rolled a joint, twisted the ends with a flair, and lit it. Sam and I sat on the end of the bed, and Rob pulled up the room’s only chair, and we passed the joint among the three of us, with Rob and I eyeing each other with each pass. We finished the first joint, and Rob, his face starting to relax into his preferred hippie nonchalance, started rolling another. With a casual lift of his eyes, he asked me, “You found another bassist yet?”
I leaned back on the bed. “I don’t think I’ll need to.”
Sam’s eyes darted between the two of us. “What’re you talking about?”
Rob fattened up the reefer. “Didn’t Daniel tell you? I’m getting out when we get home.”
&nb
sp; Overhearing us, Yogi tossed his magazine aside and slid down the bed. “You’re what?”
“He’s getting out,” I answered for Rob. “At least he thinks he is. I think he’ll change his mind after we play the Heart gig.”
Rob grinned. “I don’t know, man. Maybe you’re planning to replace me with that woman from the bar. She looks like she’d keep the band happy.”
“What woman?” Yogi asked, looking suddenly concerned. “You’re not talking about Evangeline, are you?”
“No, Yogi.” I reached across and took the joint from Rob. After taking a long hit, I changed the subject. “You’re losing your mind, Rob. The truth is you can’t live without us.”
Rob took back the joint. “We’ll see. But I know I won’t miss places like this.”
“Maybe,” I said, “but I know you’ll miss all this fun.” I barely attempted to hold back the sarcasm. “Who else you gonna get loaded with on a weeknight at two a.m.?”
Rob just smiled and said, “It’s Friday, or have you lost track?”
Sam shook his head and cracked his knuckles.“Shit, Rob, maybe you better hold off until we see how the Heart gig goes. We won’t be staying in shitholes like this forever.”
“It won’t matter. I’m out. Daniel’s plans are too big for me.”
Sam and Yogi looked at me. I shrugged and said, “Let’s see where we’re at when we get home. Things may change.”
With the sense that everyone was still staring at me and waiting for me to say something more, I stood up and wandered away, leaving Sam and Rob to finish the joint and for Rob to explain his reasons for quitting. The room had a small balcony extending over the back parking lot and I stepped out onto it. The cool air slapped my stoned face and the humidity worked at the rubber band holding back my hair. I sucked in the coolness and held it, released it, and pulled in another, forcing the oxygen into every cell of my body, but I couldn’t hold on. Too many thoughts ran through my head for me to grab on to one.
Within a few minutes my hands were lifeless, cold and white. I stepped back into the room, and the scene had changed. Rob was still in his chair, but Sam was hovering over Yogi on the bed. “O.K., give it up,” Sam demanded. “I know you’ve got a stash in here somewhere. Where you hiding the picnic basket, Yogi?”
Yogi tried to hide his round face and protruding ears behind the magazine. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” But I saw a paper bag stuffed under the edge of his bed and pointed at it with one of my stiff fingers.
“Aha! You Bogart.” Sam sprang forward. Yogi rolled over to grab the bag, but Sam was quicker, pinning him to the bed with one hand and clutching the bag with the other.
“No!” Yogi yelled, pulling the bag away from Sam and rolling toward the far side of the bed. But Sam went with him, thrusting himself onto the bed in pursuit of the bag. He was about to put Yogi into a headlock when the whole thing—the bed frame, the box spring, and the mattress—collapsed sideways, sending Yogi and Sam onto the floor on top of each other in the space between Rob and Yogi’s beds.
From his chair, Rob looked down at them and asked dryly, “Would you two like us to leave you alone?”
Sam ignored Rob and pushed himself to his feet. “Yes!” he exclaimed, hoisting the bag in triumph. He turned it over and shook it. Two bags of potato chips, a bag of animal cookies, and various candy bars spilled onto the collapsed bed. “Bingo!” he said, ripping into a bag of Ruffles. Yogi flopped back onto the floor and groaned.
SIX BEERS AND two joints later, the empty remains of the potato chip bags and three candy bar wrappers littered the floor. Yogi surveyed the damage from the mess of his bed. “When’re you guys leaving?” he asked, apparently hoping the carnage was over.
“Good idea,” Sam said. “Let’s go see if lover boy is finished.” We wobbled down the hallway and around the corner to our room and listened at the door for a second. Then I knocked. Nobody responded. I knocked harder.
“What?” came Mick’s voice, laced with irritation, from behind the door.
“Hey, Mick, it’s late, man.”
We heard some rustling and the door opened a crack.
“Bloody hell,” Mick said through the vertical opening. “What do you sods want?”
Sam pushed his face against the door. “Whadda you think we want, you moron? We wanna hit the sack, O.K.?”
The door opened a little more. Mick’s shag haircut was standing straight up and a blanket was draped around his bare shoulders. “Don’t be wankers. Can’t you see I’m busy?” A high-pitched giggle came from the darkness behind him.
“What’s the problem, Valentine?” Sam asked. “You’re usually done in, what, thirty seconds?”
“Sod off, chubby.” Mick slammed the door, and the lock clicked shut.
Sam looked at me and I shrugged. “You can’t rush art,” I said. “Let’s give him thirty more minutes.”
“And then I bust down the door and smack him.”
“Right.”
“Thirty minutes, asshole,” Sam yelled through the door.
We returned to the other room. Yogi was just getting under the covers of his flattened bed and Rob was half undressed. “That jerk,” Sam announced upon entering their room. “We’ve gotta hang out here till he gets rid of her.”
Yogi groaned. “You guys already ate most of my food and wrecked my bed. You’re not gonna keep me awake all night, are you?”
Rob belched. “And good food it was, Yogi.”
“Shit,” Sam said, “this sucks. Maybe Rob’s right about all this bullshit.” He stomped off through the door to the balcony. I followed him outside, where Sam stood with arms braced against the balcony rail, peering out into the night. An almost full moon burned through spotty clouds, eerily lighting up the back wing of the hotel and the parking lot.
“What’d you mean, ‘Maybe Rob’s right’?”
Sam continued to stare across the parking lot. “Don’t worry about it. I’m not gonna quit, unless Mick keeps fucking with me.” But he seemed distracted by something off in the distance. He pointed left, toward the end of our wing of the hotel. “You know, you can see the window of our room from here.” Sure enough, you could see the window, the last one on the wing, maybe forty or fifty feet away, clearly illuminated by moonlight. The blinds were shut and no light came from the room. I stared at the window but didn’t understand the significance of Sam’s discovery.
The door to the balcony opened, and Rob’s head poked through. “Damn, it’s cold out here. Look, why don’t you guys sleep in our room. There’s plenty of space on the floor.”
“Might as well,” I said. I’d be on the floor anyhow. “Let’s go get our sleeping bags, Sam.”
We went back down the hall, but this time Sam got to the door first. He smacked it with his fist loud enough to be heard throughout the hotel. “Open the damn door, Mick!”
“Naff off!”
“We want out damn sleeping bags!” Sam pounded on the door again. “And we’re not going away.”
“Bollocks,” we heard Mick mutter. A couple of creaking steps came toward the door, then a bump, followed by, “Ow! Shit!” Then came a giggle, some rustling sounds, and the door cracked open.
“Here’re your bloody bags.” Mick pushed mounds of sleeping bags through the halfway-opened door. “Now piss off.” He slammed the door shut.
Sam pounded on the door again. “And we want our damn pillows!”
“The pillows!” I yelled, stifling a laugh. “Out with the pillows!”
The door yanked open and two fluffy objects came flying through the opening. We ducked, and the pillows smacked against the wall behind us, and suddenly I was in a dreamlike tunnel of whispy whiteness. Slowly my pot-addled brain hooked onto the fact that the threadbare pillows had burst open, filling the hallway with an explosion of feathers. “It’s snowing,” I heard myself murmur as I squinted across at the door, where I saw Mick’s head poking through.
With the feathers continuing to swirl through t
he dank air of the hallway, Sam sprang into action. He grabbed one of the pillows, still partially filled with feathers, and started to jam it through the cracked doorway above Mick’s head. Mick threw an arm into the air to block it, but the arm and the pillow met directly above his head, and rest of the feathers spilled down all over him.
“You wanker!” Mick yelled out, frantically brushing feathers away from his face. Rita’s head suddenly appeared behind Mick’s shoulder.
“Hah!” Sam yelled back, turning to grab the other pillow, which was on the floor at my feet. Mick saw him and sprang backward, crashing right into Rita. Somehow he managed to slam the door shut before he and Rita went down, followed by two thumps on the floor and a high-pitched scream.
We jammed our ears against the door, forcing down our laughter so that we could listen to the scuffles and curses coming from behind the door. When things finally quieted down, Sam turned and looked at me with the biggest grin I’d ever seen on his face.
“Sweet dreams, Valentine,” Sam called through the door before we brushed the feathers from our hair and clothes, gathered up the sleeping bags, and started down the hallway.
“Quick thinking with the pillows, man,” I said. “You really got him.”
Sam lips curled up crookedly. “Whatta ya call that?” he asked as we turned the corner at the end of the hallway. “Boner interruptus?”
I thought about that for a second, but the comment was gone before I could fix on it. “I’m really loaded,” I said.
Sam grinned at me. “Me too.”
We burst into Rob and Yogi’s room and tossed the sleeping bags into the air. One of the sleeping bags landed on Yogi’s head.
“Shut up,” he pleaded, but he couldn’t have been sleeping with the light still on in the room.
Getting in Tune Page 16