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10: In Concert 1:28 AM, Friday Chad slid onto the stool behind a modest drum kit set up in the middle of the living room / kitchen. Taking up the drumsticks laying across the snare drum, he watched as John slipped a guitar strap over his shoulder and Flea held a beat-up bass. Paul, Scott, and Adam stepped into the room and plopped down on the floor space in front of the Chili Peppers. John strummed the guitar in his hands and adjusted the string tension accordingly. Flea ripped off an intense beat before looking up from the bass, at Lloyd, who stood by a dark, narrow hallway. "Whose instruments are these?" Flea asked. Lloyd heaved a sigh. "That bass there you’re holding is my buddy Rick’s." He tossed his left arm into the air, toward the drum set. "Those drums belong to Josh." Josh, who stood in the tiled section of the room, waved when everyone looked at him. "And that there guitar," he pointed to the instrument in John’s hands. Sighing, he said, "That there is mine." John stared at the guitar before asking, "What’s the name of your band?" "Mos Eisley," Lloyd replied, monitoring his shoes. "You know, from Star Wars?" "Mos Eisley," Josh repeated, then quoted the movie. "You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy." "Ya GOTTA be cautious," Lloyd added, exchanging a smirk with his bandmate. His smile faded, his sites returned to the floor. "Just like Mos Eisley in the movie, we’re out in the middle of nowhere, going nowhere." His eyes followed his hand up to the wall, where his fingers traced the hallway corner. "We’ve been playing for years at the Waterhouse, this bar in town. A lot of bands perform there." He glared at Anthony. "If y’all were to go sometime, you’d realise just how much your band sucks! So much damn talent at that place, but who do people notice, huh? Fancy pansy bands with no talent, no originality, no soul." Lloyd shifted his piercing stare to Scott on the floor. "And don’t think I didn’t recognise you and your bandmates, Mr. Creed! Just to let you know, y’all are only slightly better than they are." He thrust a thumb at the Chili Peppers. Anthony stood awkwardly in the middle of the room. He saw Adam and Paul raise an eyebrow to one another and watched Scott unfold then refold his legs Indian-style. Steamed breath escaped Lloyd’s lips. He turned from the scene and walked down the hallway. He marched all the way to the end and slipped into the master bedroom. A chill hung in the air. The heater kicked on, the vent by Anthony’s foot squeaked rhythmically as warm air tossed a loose plate of metal to and fro. Puffs of heat entered the room, never reaching anything but the side of Anthony’s left sneaker. The three by the wall huddled together and shivered in their drenched clothing. Chad tapped out a beat on the snare drum. All eyes were on him until slippered feet pattered down the hallway. A woman slipped into the room. She had strawberry blond fuzz on the top of her head, a layer pale enough to expose white surgical scars across the base of her skull. Her skin was so white that it was transparent. At first glance, Anthony thought she was a teenage girl. She had chubby little cheeks and a cute button nose, and her white terry clothed robe sported Winnie the Pooh on the pocket. Looking into her blue/gray eyes, however, packed years onto her appearance. Anthony guessed that she had spent her whole life in Virginia, in this same city, living in trailers like or worse than this one. Her eyes met with Anthony’s, her mouth dropped open. She turned to her husband, who stepped up behind her. "Wha... how did you...," she glanced back at the Chili Peppers. "I can’t believe this!" Her tired eyes were open as wide as they could; her excitement came off as mild amusement. Anthony saw that she was exhausted. "Sweetheart," Lloyd’s gruff voice smoothened into a whisper, "they’re here to play for you. Sit down, honey, and they’ll play." Lloyd’s wife rested her back against the wall space beside Paul. She eased herself to the floor, heaving a sigh as she settled on the stained gray carpet. She sat across from Anthony, under a standing lamp. The light from it highlighted her sunken eye cavities and the pale purple rings that lined them. She gazed up at Anthony with an adoring smile. Anthony cleared his throat. "Want some water?" the woman asked. Before she could answer, she turned to Josh. "Can you please get them some water?" she asked. Recognition flashed in her eyes when they rested on the three to her right. She raised an eyebrow. "matchbox twenty and Creed are here too?" Scott shook his head. "No, just the three of us." Paul’s eyes widened behind his glasses as he looked her in the eye. "I'd be REALLY confused too." "I know I am!" Adam exclaimed. Josh handed him a glass of water, which he accepted. Anthony took a gulp of his water. Over the glass, he looked at Lloyd’s wife as she looked at him. He lowered the glass and set it on a side table. "What should we play?" "Can I request two songs?" Cracking a smile, Anthony replied, "Girl, you can request as many as you want." She opened her mouth. "I know what you’re going to say, Maggie," Lloyd murmured from where he sat beside her. "That bridge one... ‘Under the Bridge’." She nodded and cuddled up to his chest. "You know me too well, honey. And?" She peered at him from under his chin. "‘Breaking the Girl’." Maggie nuzzled her head into his neck and smiled serenely. John and Flea picked out the first few chords of "Under the Bridge", heads down, immersed in the music, one with it. Then Anthony came in: "Sometimes I feel like I don’t have partner Sometimes I feel like my only friend Is the city I live in, the city of angels Lonely as I am, together we cry" Chad’s gentle drumbeat slid in and slipped into place. "I drive on her streets ‘cause she’s my companion I walk through her hills ‘cause she knows who I am She seems my good deeds and she kisses me windy I never worry, now that is a lie" Anthony flopped onto the floor, inches away from Maggie’s folded legs. She watched him, staring deep into his eyes, tears in her own threatening to spill down her porcelain face. Anthony closed his eyes and poured himself into the chorus, his body shaking as he sang: "And I don’t ever want to feel Like I did that day Take me to the place I love Take me all the way I don’t ever want to feel Like I did that day Take me to the place I love Take me all the way -yeah Ay - yeah" Flea slid onto the carpet diagonally to Anthony’s right. His legs stretched out in front of him, the bass propped on his legs. He never missed a beat. "It’s hard to believe that there’s nobody out there It’s hard to believe that I’m all alone At least I have her love, the city she loves me Lonely as I am, together we cry "And I don’t ever want to feel Like I did that day Take me to the place I love Take me all the way I don’t ever want to feel Like I did that day Take me to the place I love Take me all the way yeah yay yeah..." John sunk to his knees in front of Adam, strumming away on the guitar. His face muscles tightened, his eyes closed, as he belted out, "Under the bridge downtown..." "Is where I drew some blood" "Under the bridge downtown..." "I could not get enough" "Under the bridge downtown..." "Forgot about my love" "Under the bridge downtown..." "I gave my life away..." John and Anthony sang together to the beat, until the song wound down, the last drum beat resonated, the last strums of the guitar faded out of existence. Four of the five sitting against the wall broke into applause. Anthony opened his eyes to find Maggie watching him. A sniffle from his left turned Anthony’s attention to the men seated there. Adam was wiping tears from his cheeks when he realised he had an audience. His hands dropped to his sides, and he looked John in the eye. "You rock," Adam stated. Shaking his head, John replied, "It’s the spirits that rock. They speak to me through emotions, and I play how I feel." Lloyd laughed. John stared at him, the look in his eyes laced with confusion. Shrugging, he turned back to Adam. "That’s how I see it," he informed the rhythm guitarist, then sat back on his heels. ***** As "Breaking the Girl" faded out, tears were streaming down Maggie’s face. She rubbed her eyes, sniffling. The three to her right were clapping insanely. When their applause died down, she whispered, "I’m sorry. That song just brings back a lot of memories." She pulled closer to her husband, who wore the same scowl he’d sported most of the time the Chili Peppers played. Maggie gazed up at him. "Lloyd, honey, what’s wrong?" Thrusting his left index finger at Anthony, he asked, "You connect with HIS music, right?" He spoke the word "his" with disdain. Maggie nodded. "But, baby," she replied, "It’s not just his music. It’s the four of them together, and that their sound," she held her right hand to her heart, "makes sense." "Fine!" Lloyd scoffed. "THEIR music!" "Lloyd?" All eyes fell on John, who was pulling the guitar strap off his shoulders. Handing the guitar to Lloyd, he stated, "You should play now." Raising an eyebrow, Lloyd accepted the guitar. "Okay, fine. But we’re playing MY songs." He got to his feet and plodded down the hallway. He emerged from a side room with a handful of paper. He sorted through the pages, pulled out a few, and handed them to Chad. "And here are the tabs," he mumbled, passing some pages to Flea. The two looked over the sheets as Lloyd sat down beside his wife. He and Flea strummed the first few chords, Chad tapped out the beat, and Lloyd sang: "You can search far and wide You can set sail with the tide Look under rocks and in trees In far off countries - overseas You can search imagination For the man of your creation But what you’ll find in all you see Is inaccessibility ‘Twas just your fantasies" Lloyd went into a guitar riff, his eyes steady on his wife as his fingers raged across the strings. "The only man who's here is me One you know will never leave Even when you wake from dreams And find he’s nothing as he seems When pop bands all disappear You know that I will still be here "And so will come your search’s end For I have always been your friend And I will always be your man" Chad sat back. Guitar strings ceased to vibrate. Maggie and Lloyd gazed deep into one another’s eyes, both crying. She flung her arms around her husband’s neck and breathed, "Honey, that was beautiful." He leaned in to kiss her when sirens resounded in the distance. "Oh, sh**," Scott muttered under his breath. "I forgot I’d called the cops." |