This page hosted by
Get your own Free Home PageBack To School
The next three days were spent practicing every chance we got, trying to get me worked into the band's groove. I had an advantage that most players didn't, though; I'm empathic. It's nothing spectacular, but it's enough to allow me to slip into the groove with other players a lot more quickly and easily than the average. By the end of the third day I was locked in and going strong; I could have been an original member of the group, to outside eyes and ears.
The thing that bothered me the most about things was the fact that Wish was nowhere to be seen; I could only guess that she was staying away deliberately, to keep her presence from distracting me from my work...at least I liked to think that was it. Of course, an equal possibility was that she was staying away in order to avoid Razor; Tommy had said she'd stopped riding along with the tour after Razor had joined the group...I could understand why. Razor was the most pathetic excuse for a human being I'd ever encountered; he was a transplanted British punk rocker, for starters, which automatically meant he was going to be loud and rude and crude...but he seemed to take a great delight in being just as monumental a pain in the backside as he could possibly be to everyone but Tommy. To Tommy he was almost civil; in comparison to the way he treated everyone else, he was actually nice to Tommy. And worse yet, he seemed to have only a nodding acquaintance with the concepts involved in personal hygiene; I think the man's outlook on the matter of bathing ran parallel to that of Moonbeam McSwine, in the old Li'l Abner comic strips---meaning, she took a bath once a year, whether she needed it or not. Razor looked - and worse yet, smelled - as if he hadn't shaken hands with a wet bar of soap in months. When he bothered to take his jeans and shirt off before crawling into the sack, both of them all but stood up by themselves, they were that encrusted with filth. There were times I wondered if the other members of the band had any sense of smell left, by then...
So, it was most logical to assume that Wish was avoiding Razor, and that her absence had little, if anything, to do with me trying to get into the groove with the band. I didn't blame her one bit.
I did my best to put her absence out of my mind and concentrated on my playing and fitting into the group; I was successful, for the greatest part, but thoughts of her kept creeping in at odd moments and setting off these sweet/terrible pangs that always took me completely by surprise. It was almost as if I'd been in love with Wish for years, and we'd been separated for some reason, and I was nearly desperate to get back with her again. I didn't understand the reactions---I just experienced them, and put up with them as best I could; how a woman I'd met only once - and only for a couple of minutes, at that - could be affecting me the way she was...well, that was completely beyond my understanding.
The bus pulled off at a rest stop around noon of the fourth day, and we all piled out to take advantage of the fresh air, the greenery, and the picnic tables (the kitchen accomodations on a tour bus are so small that only one person can fit into them at a time; any kind of elbow room is a welcome change of pace).
After we'd eaten, I retreated to one of the courtesy benches set up along the edge of the rest stop's lawn area and settled back to unwind a little; the weather was unusually warm for early spring; the sun was bright and perfect for basking purposes, and everything was so all-around pleasant that I found myself drifting off.
I'd just gotten down into a good drowse when a shadow fell across my face; I roused to find Tommy standing over me. He had his acoustic guitar strapped across his back as though he wanted to jam a little (he owns three; a six-string acoustic, a six-string electric, and a double-yoked six-and-twelve-string electric; he plays all three well enough to make Pete Townsend and Eric Clapton worry about competition; at the time, he was considering buying and learning how to play a steel guitar as well), but no one comes to jam with an armload of books. And one of those books was big enough to make a mule balk at the load.
He glanced back toward the bus, apparently decided we had a little time to spare before we had to climb back aboard and hit the road again, and handed the stack of books to me without preamble. He looked a little uncomfortable, as though he weren't accustomed to doing this sort of thing, and told me, "You need to read these."
I looked up from the books - they weighed a good fifty pounds, all told, and represented a lot of reading - and grunted, "Huh? What for?"
He shook his head, as if he didn't quite know how to explain things. "It's hard to explain, but it's important."
I looked back down at the books. "What are they?"
He just waved a hand at them in invitation, so I had to look for myself. The top book was about talking boards; the second was on dream interpretation; the third, large and soft-bound, more than six hundred pages, was titled The Encyclopedia of The Paranormal; the fourth and final book was a big, personal-journal kind of thing, untitled and done in a neat, feminine longhand---not a professional publication of any sort.
I just looked question marks at him about that one. He explained, "This one's the most important---but you need to read it last. Wish wrote it a few years ago; it's a journal of her psychic experiences."
I started to hand the thing back to him. "I can't read Wish's diary!"
He pushed it back at me. "No---she asked me to give it to you."
I hesitated. "You're putting me on." My tone was so dry it would have dehydrated watermelons.
He shook his head emphatically, took the journal back, produced a pen from somewhere behind an ear and under several pounds of hair, and scribbled something on the inside of the front cover. "Like hell I am. Look---here's her phone number. Call her."
He shoved the pen back into hiding and pushed the journal back into my hands. It was obvious that this was important to him, so I sighed, "Okay---but I'll have to call her first, and get her personal okay on it."
He started to head back to the bus, hesitated in mid-stride and turned back to me with an uncertain look on his face. "Uh---"
I raised an eyebrow at him. "Yeah?"
Suddenly he seemed more like an uncertain little kid than a grown man; he did everything but clasp his hands behind his back, hunch his shoulder, duck his head and dig a toe into the dirt, "So, d'you---uh, like Wish?"
The change in attitude took me completely off-guard. I'd been all set to be defensive with him; now I found myself being honest with him, instead. "Yeah, I do. The question is, is that good news to you, or bad?"
He laughed; it was a kid's laugh---almost completely innocent, completely lacking in deceit. "Hell, yeah! I gave you her phone number, didn't I? Don't you think she's pretty? Don't you want to date her?"
The word that came out of his mouth was "date", but I swear what I felt from him at that point in the conversation came across as "marry". Talk about mixed messages! I was tempted to think he was being sarcastic, but it just didn't feel that way, and I'd learned to trust my feelings when they were that strong. But I still wasn't straight on the nature of his relationship with Wish; since they weren't blood relatives - his last name was "Green", not "Pentacle" - and they seemed extremely close..."emotionally brother and sister" was what Professor Pentacle had said...I needed to be certain of just what his feelings for her were. Just then, the best way to find out for sure seemed to be the direct approach, so, I risked putting my foot in it clear up to the knee and asked, "Tommy, are you in love with Wish?"
He went bug-eyed and slack-jawed, let out an explosive sound that almost classified as the word Huh??...and then cracked up, royally. His knees buckled on him, and he had to drop onto the bench, sideways, before he fell and damaged his guitar.
When he could speak intelligibly again, he gasped, "Wow! Are you ever screwed up!"
To my surprise, I found myself laughing along with him. "So, unscrew me!"
He started laughing even harder---so hard that he nearly fell off the bench. I could almost feel his guitar cringing in anticipation of being smashed under his falling body.
"'Unscrew' you? Now, that's funny!"
He finally managed to get himself under control, rubbed at his mouth and looked up at the sky as if beseeching the gods for aid. "Me, in love with Wish? Oh, man, that blows me clear into the ozone!"
He finally looked down and around at me and put on a serious face. "No way, nohow, no sir, no chance in hell!! Look---you know about Wish and me, 'cause the Prof filled you in on us---right?"
I shook my head. "Not enough. He told me that you're not related by blood, and that the two of you are soul mates, of sorts, but that's about all he's told me of it."
He sighed and shook his head disgustedly. "In-ever-lovin'-credible! The Prof's got an IQ somewhere in the stratosphere, and he can do things that would scare the Pentagon into declarin' a Red Alert, but there are times when he develops holes in his memory that you could drive the Exxon Valdiz through---sideways! Look---here's the straight dope."
I thought, At last! Some long-overdue answers! and urged, "Please---go on!"
He flashed me a crooked smile, swung his guitar around front so he could lean back on the bench and said, "Plain and simple, Wish is my sister, and that's it. Period. You askin' me if I'm in love with her is like talkin' about incest, or somethin'."
He shuddered a little. "I mean, she's a beautiful woman and all, but in here---"
He tapped his chest, right over the heart; "---she's my kid sister, and that's it! End of story."
Despite these reassurances, I still wasn't quite certain in my own mind and heart. "Sounds good enough, as far as it goes, but the Professor said something about you being soul mates; what's that supposed to mean, exactly?"
He shrugged offhandedly. "Yeah, well, that pretty much fits, but it's not as simple as all that."
Never a straight answer! My patience slipped a couple of dozen notches in one jump. "Why are you and the Professor so damned vague about things? I mean, I ask you a perfectly straightforward question, and all I get are half-truths and evasions! I deserve the whole truth! What are you keeping from me?"
His expression and voice both went icy. "Right. So it ticks you off. You want to know it all, and you think you can handle it? Like hell, man! You've gotta trust us, Sanders; we know what we're doin'! Now, read the damn books, and then we'll talk!"
He got up and stalked away toward the bus, radiating upset on all frequencies. I watched him go, thinking, Jeez! For two cents, I'd chuck this whole thing and go back to Malibu...if it weren't for Wish. And that Creepshow act Castevet, living next door to the beach house.
Once we were back on the road again, I shoved the books under my bunk and crawled in to get some rest.
I was right on the verge of sleep when a sound remarkably like that of someone knocking on a tick-tock with a pair of chopsticks roused me again; it was followed by an agonized yelp. I rolled over and peered through the crack in the blackout curtains to see what was going on. Tony was standing behind Tommy, drumming on his head with his drumsticks...something he did to irritate the other members of the group when he was feeling bored, which - according to the other guys in the band - happened way too often. Tommy was flailing his hands over his head in an effort to get him to stop, yelping, "Ow! Knock it off!"
Tony raised the drumsticks to parade rest, keeping them at the ready in case Tommy didn't do whatever it was he wanted. "Okay---for thirty seconds of pain-free life: What's Mr. Holier-Than-Thou doing hanging out with us lowlife types, anyway?"
And then something strange happened: Tommy leaned back, reached up, snatched the drumsticks from Tony's hands and snapped them over a knee, all in one motion that went by so quickly I was barely able to see what happened!
I blinked in astonishment: I'd never seen anyone move that fast before in all my life; I found myself wondering if it was some sort of paranormal thing. If it was, it was one of the most amazing paranormal things I'd ever seen; it looked as if he'd somehow accelerated his own personal temporal rate for an instant...
He slapped the remains of the sticks back into Tony's hands and growled, "Bein' a pain, just like you!"
Tony blinked at the shattered drumsticks owlishly, tossed them aside as if they were of no importance whatsoever - apparently he was used to Tommy's abnormal quickness, by now; he probably figured it was just some sort of sleight-of-hand trick - and asked, "Why? What's wrong?"
Tommy settled back into his seat a little more comfortably, giving Tony a look that promised mayhem if he came up with another pair of drumsticks anythime soon. "Well, it has to do with Wish."
Razor, who had been on his way to the soda machine, stopped dead in his tracks. His head swiveled around what looked to be about three hundred degrees at the mention of Wish's name. "Are you by any chance talking about your very fine sister? Is she coming back here?"
I swear, drool was forming at the corners of his mouth.
Tony's eyes lit up. "Yeah---is she? I'd like to meet her!"
Razor's face lit up in a lecherous grin. "Ever seen her pic, Tony? I mean, she's some gorgeous piece of---"
Tommy held up a hand and favored Razor with a look that would have turned an alligator into a matched set of luggage. Apparently, not being an alligator gave him partial immunity, because all it did was slow him down a little. "Okay, Razor! That's enough; that's my sister you're about to get killed for insultin'!"
Razor actually had the good grace to look abashed. Not very much, I'll admit, but it was at least detectable. I never would have thought he had it in him; considering the way he was always at odds with the rest of the band, I was beginning to understand why the others had nicknamed him "Damn".
And watching Tommy face down his best friend on his "sister's" behalf---well, that was kind of surprising. I found myself thinking, Huh! Maybe there are some redeeming qualities to him, after all!
"Okay, man; sorry and all that! She's damn fine, is all I meant."
Tommy favored him with a look only slightly less venomous than the one he'd just hit him with. In a very grim tone, he growled, "Uh-huh. Make sure that's what you tell her to her face, if you want to keep yours."
Razor made a funny noise---part gulp, part protest---and wisely resumed his trip to the soda machine.
Tony stepped in to get Tommy's mind off Razor before something unpleasant happened. "So, is she coming here?"
Tommy shrugged and settled back into his seat again, casting a glance toward my bunk. "I don't know. Sorta depends on how it goes with Sanders."
Razor was back by then, twisting the cap off a cold beer; half the soda machine was stocked with a variety of soft drinks; the other half was stocked with a variety of beers for the benefit of those who preferred getting wasted when they were bored out of their minds. He scowled at the mention of my name and growled, "Oh, God! She's not dating that geek, is she?"
Tony turned a withering look on him. "Shut up, Razor."
Razor made a disgusted, huffing noise and headed forward---probably to give the driver some grief, for a change.
Tommy tossed Tony a grateful look.
"Thanks, man." Apparently his irritation over the drumstick incident had already been forgotten...or at least forgiven.
Tony smiled sourly. "You're welcome. You told him to shut up those last three times, so I figured it was my turn."
Tommy sighed and scrunched down into his seat a little more, starting to look bummed out. "Well, I'm grateful."
Tony obviously didn't like the look of Tommy's descending mood and changed tacks abruptly, putting on a Curly face and voice, as if we'd all been dropped into a Three Stooges movie. "Truly?"
Tommy took one look at that crooked, beaming, Curly-esque smile and promptly fell into the game, taking on the role of Moe. "Truly!"
That big, crooked Curly-smile grew even bigger and crookeder. "Truly and sincerely?"
Tommy's Moe-face grew more ascerbic. "Undeniably so!"
Tony's smile threatened to split his face in half. "So, are you saying that your gratitude is heartfelt?"
The pitch on that last word threatened to climb into the high-C range.
Tommy's Moe-face became long-suffering. "Indubitably!"
"Gee!" Tony's voice dipped upward from high C toward the lower end of the ultrasonics in the middle of the word.
Tommy made a sour face, shook his head flamboyantly and wiped a hand down his puss, somehow managing a near horse-whinny of comedic disgust for good measure.
They couldn't keep the act up beyond that point; both of them lost it and cracked up.
I rolled back over in my bunk and settled back down to try to get a little more sleep, thinking, Oh, brother...I've booked passage on the Ship Of Loonies!
Get your own Free Home Page