Bygones

  Michael took her breasts in both hands and went on convincing her. “You'll sleep better afterwards, you always do.”

  “I won't have any trouble sleeping at all.”

  “Cruel woman.”

  She drew back and smiled lovingly. “Michael, we'll have plenty of time for that, and I really am tired, and I don't want to antagonize Randy any more. Let's do the sensible thing.”

  He caught her hands and stepped back. “All right, I'll go home like a good boy. Will I see you at the hospital later?”

  “Around two or so, I thought.”

  “Okay. Walk me to my car?”

  She smiled and walked with him, holding his hand, outside into the yard, where full dawn was staining the sky a spectrum of purples and golds and a faint breeze was stirring the tips of the maple leaves. The hydrangeas in front of the garage were heavy with great white blooms and the scent of heavy summer was rising from the warming earth.

  At his car, Michael got in, closed the door and rolled down the window.

  She leaned inside and kissed him. “I love you, Michael,” she said.

  “I love you, too, and I really think we can make it this time.”

  “So do I.” He started the engine, still looking up into her eyes.

  She grinned. “It's hell being mature and having to make sensible decisions. For two cents I'd drag you up to our bedroom and ravish you right now.”

  He laughed and said, “We'll make up for it, just wait and see.”

  She stood back, crossed her arms and watched him back out of the driveway.

  Chapter 18

  THE BAND QUIT PLAYING at 12:30 A.M. It took them one hour to load up and over five hours to drive back from Bemidji. Randy got home at seven to find his mother still asleep and a note on his bed.

  Lisa had a girl, Natalie, 9 lbs. 12 oz, at five this morning. Everybody's doing fine. I'm not going into the store but hope to see you at the hospital later. Love, Mom.

  But the way it worked out he was unable to make it to the hospital that afternoon. He was still asleep when his mother got up, and she was gone from the house by the time he rose, groggy, at 12:15 to get ready for his afternoon gig, which started at two in White Bear Lake.

  These town celebrations paid well. Every little suburb around the Twin Cities had them at some time during the summer: the Raspberry Festival in Hopkins, Whiz-Bang Days in Robbinsdale, Tater Days in Brooklyn Park, Manitou Days in White Bear Lake. They were all the same: carnivals, parades, bingo, beard-growing contests and street dances. Some of the dances took place at night but many, like today's, were scheduled for the afternoon. Bands liked the bookings not only because they paid well but also because the afternoon scheduling gave them a rare Saturday night off to catch a decent stretch of sleep or to go hear some other band play, which every professional musician loved to do.

  White Bear Lake had a pretty little downtown—shady, with trees springing out of openings in the brick sidewalks; fancy, old-fashioned storefronts painted candy colors; flags hanging from the sides of buildings; a little town square.

  The entire length of Washington Street was barricaded off, and a bandstand was set up at the south end, facing a turn-of-the century post office building with its surrounding green grass and flower beds. While the band set up, little girls sat on the curb and watched, licking ice-cream cones or chewing licorice sticks. Pint-sized boys wearing chartreuse billcaps and hot-pink shorts maneuvered their skateboards back and forth, deftly jumping the thick electrical cables that snaked across the blacktop. From several blocks away the sounds of a carnival drifted over on the whims of the wind—an occasional tinkle of calliope music, the revving engines from the amusement rides. From nearer wafted the smell of bratwursts roasting on a pushcart in front of a ladies' wear shop midway along the block.

  Randy stacked a pair of drums and lifted them from the rear of the van. He turned to find a boy of perhaps twelve years old watching. The kid was wearing sunglasses with pink frames and black strings. His hair was jelled up into a flattop, and his high-top tennis shoes had tongues nearly as big as the skateboard on his hip.

  “Hey, you play those things?” the kid asked in a gruff, cocky voice.

  “Yup.”

  “Cool.”

  Randy smiled at the kid and took the load up the back steps onto the stage. The boy was still there when he returned.

  “I play drums, too.”

  “Yeah?”

  “In the band at school.”

  “That's a good way to learn.”

  “Ain't got any of my own yet. But I will have someday though, and then look out.”

  Randy smiled and pulled another load of equipment to the rear of the van.

  The kid offered, “Want me to help you carry some of that stuff?” Randy turned and looked the kid over. He was a tough-looking little punk, as tough-looking as it's possible to be at a hundred pounds, without much for muscles or whiskers or body hair. His Dick Tracy T-shirt would have fit Mike Tyson, and he had an I-don't-care way of standing inside it that reminded Randy of himself at that age, about the time his father had left: Screw the world. Who needs it?

  “Yeah. Here, take this stool, then you can come back for the cymbals. What's your name, kid?”

  “Trotter.” He had a voice like sand in ball bearings.

  “That's all? Just Trotter?”

  “That's enough.”

  “Well, Trotter, see what you think about being a roadie.”

  Trotter was as good as his name, trotting up and down the steps, hauling anything Randy would hand him. Actually the kid was a godsend. Randy was zoned, operating on four hours of sleep and too much pot last night. God, how he needed to chill out for a solid sixteen hours but that hadn't been possible all week. Their traveling schedule had been horrendous, and they'd been rehearsing a lot, too. All that on top of setup and breakdown—which totaled two and a half, three hours a gig—left damned little time for Z'ing out. Now he faced four hours of playing when his feet would scarcely lift to carry him up the steps and his head felt like a bowling ball balanced on a toothpick.

  With the help of the tough little groupie, the last of the equipment got to the stage.

  “Hey, thanks, Trotter. You're okay.” He handed the kid a pair of royal-blue drumsticks. “Here. Go for it.”

  The kid took the sticks, his eyes huge and filled with worship behind his shades.

  “For me?”

  Randy nodded.

  “Bitchin',” the kid marveled softly and moved off, already jiving to some silent beat.

  “Hey, kid,” Randy called after him.

  Trotter turned, one of the sticks whirling like a propeller through his fingers. “Stick around. We'll send one out specially for you this afternoon.”

  Trotter saluted with one drumstick and disappeared.

  Pike Watson came around the back of the stage carrying a guitar case.

  “Who's the punk?”

  “Name's Trotter. Just a kid with big dreams, wants to be a drummer someday.”

  “You give him the sticks?”

  Randy shrugged. “What the hell, keep his dreams alive, you know?”

  “That's all right.”

  “I didn't tell him he'd have to learn to sleep and drive at the same time if he wanted to play with a band.”

  “You droned, man?”

  Randy shook his head as if to wake himself up. “Yeah. Major droned.”

  “Hey, listen, I'll do you a solid. I got some really good shit here.” Pike tapped his guitar case.

  “Cocaine, you mean? Naw. That stuff freaks me.”

  “How do you know? One little snort and you're goddamned Batman. You can stop trains and start revolutions. What do you say?”

  Randy looked skeptical. “Naw, I don't think so.”

  Pike gave a mischievous grin. “I guarantee you'll forget you're tired.” He spread his fingers and fanned them in slow motion through the air. “You'll play like freakin' Charlie Watts.”

  “How much??
??

  “Your first hit's on me.”

  Randy rubbed his sternum and tipped his head to one side. “I don't know, man.”

  “Well . . .” Pike threw his hands up and bounced a couple times at the knee. “If you're scared of flyin' . . .”

  “What's it do to you—bad, I mean?”

  “Nothin', man, nothiiin'! You get a little zingy at first—anxious, you know—but then it's strictly superfly!”

  Randy rubbed his face with both hands and flexed his shoulders. He blew out a blast of breath that made his lips flop and said, “What the hell . . . I always wanted to play like Charlie Watts.”

  He snorted the cocaine off a mirror in the back of Pike's van just before they started playing. It made his nose sting and he rubbed it as he headed onto the stage. He felt wildly exhilarated and invincible.

  They started the first set and Randy played with his eyes closed. When he opened them a moment later, he saw Trotter out in front of all the others on the street, sitting on his skateboard with his eyes riveted on Randy, playing along on his knees with the blue drumsticks. Yeah, it was hero worship, all right, and it felt sensational. Nearly as sensational as the high that was coming on. Some teenage girls stood at the front of the crowd, too, dressed in shiny biking tights with an inch of their tan, flat stomachs showing below their itty-bitty crop tops. One of them, a blonde with a spectacular mop of curly hair that exploded clear down past her shoulder blades, kept her eye on him without letup. He could spot them every time, the ones who were easy marks. All he had to do was return her gaze a few times, give the little hint of a smile she waited for and at break time stand nearby—not too close, just close enough for her to know he knew—and wait for her to sidle over. The conversations always went the same.

  “Hi.”

  “Hi.”

  “You're good.”

  He'd let his eyes overtly explore her breasts and hips. “So are you. What's your name?”

  After he'd learn it, he'd make sure he dedicated one song to her and that's all it took to get in her pants.

  Today, however, the dedication was for Trotter. Randy put his lips to the mike and said, “I'd like to send this song out to one terrific little roadie. Trotter, this one's for you, kid.” Trotter actually smiled, and while Randy rapped out the pickup beat to Pretty Woman, he truly forgot about the pretty woman standing behind the kid, and reveled in the genuine admiration he saw beaming up at him from the boy's face.

  It happened as they began the second song. One minute Randy was watching the kid idolize him, and the next he was struck by an illogical shock of apprehension. His heart started racing and the apprehension became fear. He turned as if to seek help from Pike but all he saw was Pike's back, in a loose black shirt, diagonally bisected by a wide guitar strap as he stood with his feet widespread, playing.

  Sweet Jesus, his heart! What was happening with his heart? It was pounding so hard it seemed to be lifting the hair from his skull. The kid was watching . . . no breath . . . hard to keep playing . . . people everywhere . . . had to make it to the end of the song . . . dizzying anxiety . . . oh-oh, pretty woman!

  The song ending . . . “Pike!” . . . everything inside him vibrating . . . “Pike!” . . . and pushing outward . . . Pike's face, leaning close, coming between him and the crowd . . .

  “It's all right, man. It always happens at first, you get a little uptight, scared-like. Give it a minute. It'll go away.”

  Clutching Pike's hand . . . “No, no! This'z bad, man . . . my heart . . .”

  Pike, angry, ordering in a fierce whisper, “Let it ride, man. There's a couple hundred people out there watching us right now. It'll be better in a minute! Now give us a goddamn lead-in!”

  Tick, tick, tick . . . the sticks on the rim of his Pearls . . . the kid watching from down on the pavement, playing along with the blue sticks . . . dizzy . . . so dizzy . . . kid, get outa here . . . don't want you to see this . . . Maryann, I wanted to change for you . . . his heart fluttering fast as a drumroll . . . everything tipping . . . tipping . . . the floor coming up to meet him . . . the crack of his head as he landed . . . the stool still tangled in his legs . . . looking straight up at the blue sky . . .

  The band continued playing for several measures until they realized there was no more drumbeat. As the music dribbled into silence the crowd pressed forward, lifted up on tiptoe and murmured a chorus of concern.

  Danny Scarfelli reached Randy first, leaned over him with his bass guitar still strapped over his shoulder.

  “Jesus, Randy, what's wrong, man?”

  “Get Pike . . . where's Pike?” Danny caught two of his guitar keys on the edge of a drum as he shot to his feet.

  Randy lay in a haze of fear with the sound of his own heart gurgling in his ears.

  Pike's face appeared above Randy's, framed by the blue sky.

  “Pike, my heart . . . I think I'm dying . . . help me . . .”

  A jumble of voices.

  “What's wrong with him?”

  “Has he got epilepsy?”

  “Call 911!”

  “Hang on, Randy.”

  Pike leaped off the front of the stage and took off at a run. “Where's a phone? Anybody! Where's a phone!” Before the frantic question left his lips he saw a policeman coming toward him at a run, his silver badge bouncing on his blue shirt.

  “Officer . . .”

  The policeman ran right past him on his way to the stage, and Pike did an about-face to follow.

  “Anybody know what's wrong with him?” the policeman asked, bending over Randy.

  Pike said nothing.

  The others said no.

  Randy mumbled, “My heart . . .”

  The man in blue grabbed the radio off his belt and called for help.

  Randy lay ringed by faces, looking up at them, terror in his eyes. He grabbed a shirtfront: Danny's. “Call my mom,” he whispered.

  * * *

  Blissfully unaware of the events happening at White Bear Lake ten miles away, Bess and Michael met at the hospital, stole one brief kiss in the hall, smiled into one another's eyes and entered Lisa's room together, holding hands. She and Natalie were there alone, the new mother asleep in her hospital bed, and the new baby making mewling sounds in a glass bassinet. The room was filled with flowers and smelled like oniony beef from the remains of Lisa's lunch, which was waiting to be collected.

  Bess and Michael scanned the room from the doorway, then tiptoed to the bassinet and stood on either side of it, looking down at their new granddaughter.

  They spoke in whispers.

  “Oh, just look at her, Michael, isn't she beautiful?” And to the baby, Bess said, “Hello, precious, how are you today? You look a lot prettier than you did last night.”

  They both reached down and touched the baby's blankets, her downy cheek, rapt in her presence. Michael whispered, “Hi there, little lady. Grandma and Grandpa came to see you.”

  “Michael, look . . . her mouth is just like your mother's.”

  “Wouldn't my mother have loved her.”

  “So would my dad.”

  “She's got more hair than I thought. Last night it seemed as if she didn't have hardly any but today it looks quite dark.”

  “Do you think it would be okay if we picked her up?” Bess looked up into Michael's eyes. He smiled conspiratorially, and she slipped her hands beneath the soft pink flannel blanket and lifted Natalie from the bassinet. They stood shoulder-to-shoulder, inundated by love as pure and exquisite as any they had ever felt, stunned once again by a sense of completeness, by the idea of leaving their mark on the future through this child.

  “Isn't it something, how she makes us feel?”

  Michael kissed the baby's forehead, then straightened and smiled at her. “Wait till you're one or two or so. You'll come to our house to stay and we'll spoil you plenty, won't we, Grandma?”

  “You bet we will. And someday when you're old enough, we'll tell you all about how your birth made your grandpa propo
se to me and brought us back together again. Of course we'll have to edit out the part about the condoms and how your grandpa threw them all over the steps but . . .”

  Michael smothered his laughter. “Bess, these are delicate ears!”

  “Well, she comes from a randy lot, and if—”

  From behind them, Lisa spoke. “What are you two whispering about over there?”

  They looked back over their shoulders. Lisa looked sleepy but wore a soft smile.

  “Actually, your mother was talking about condoms.”

  “Michael!” Bess shouted.

  “Well, she was. I told her Natalie was too young to hear such things but she wouldn't listen to me.”

  Lisa boosted herself up. “All right, what's going on between you two? I wake up and you're whispering and giggling . . .” She reached with both hands. “And bring my baby here, will you?”

  Lisa pressed a button that raised the head of the bed, and they went to take her the baby, then sit one on each side of her and lean over simultaneously to kiss her cheeks.

  “She was awake so we didn't think we'd get in trouble for picking her up.”

  “She's been a good girl . . . haven't you, Natalie?” Lisa fingered the baby's hair. “She slept five hours between feedings.”

  They talked about how Lisa was feeling, whom she'd called, who'd sent flowers (she thanked them for theirs), when Mark was expected to return, the fact that Randy hadn't called or stopped by, the probability of his visiting that evening, and Grandma Dorner, too. They admired the baby, and Bess offered reminiscences about Lisa's birth, and what a good sleeper she'd been, and what a lusty set of lungs she'd had when she decided not to sleep.

  After all that, while they still sat one on either side of Lisa, Bess glanced at Michael and sent him a silent message. He captured her hand and, resting it on the bedspread covering Lisa's stomach, said, “Your mother and I have something to tell you, Lisa.” He let Bess speak the words.

  “We're going to get married again.”

  A radiant smile lit Lisa's face as she lunged forward, the baby still on her right arm, clasping Michael with her left as Bess, too, bent into the awkward, three-way embrace. The baby started complaining at being squashed between two bodies but they ignored her, allowing the moment its due, cleaving to one another, their throats thick with emotion.