A Song to Die For (22 page)

Creed heard Dixie's familiar twang, and felt the grin melt from his face. “Turn it off, Boss.”

Luster trotted to the Ford and turned the key. “I hear you. The only music I want to listen to right now is diesel music.” He grabbed two beers out of a cooler in the back of the truck. “Fire that puppy up, Creed!”

Creed shut down the shop heater blowing on the engine block and walked to the front of the bus to turn the key and crank the starter. “Cross your fingers, Boss.”

“Just crank it, son!”

Creed turned the key and listened to the starter chirp, way in the back, behind the rear axles. It cranked long enough for him to think of Dixie cruising down the road in her brand-new Prevost, a host of buses and eighteen-wheelers chasing her down the highway to her next sold-out concert. Then, before he had time to worry over it, the old diesel sputtered, popped, turned over, and began rumbling.

“Voilà, maestro!” Luster roared in his country twang. He began laughing, and tossed one of the cans to Creed.

Creed caught the Buckhorn Beer—it must have been on sale—and pulled the tab on the can. He guzzled about half the brew to wash the thoughts of Dixie out of his head, and began looking forward to the gig tonight. As he dragged his sleeve across his mouth, and breathed in an aromatic cloud of black diesel smoke, he saw Lindsay's Impala driving into the bus yard, Metro hanging out of the back window. Tump had a gangling elbow stuck out of the front passenger side, and that had to be Trusty Joe in the backseat behind Lindsay.

Luster let down the tailgate of his pickup to reveal an assortment of cleaning supplies he had thrown into the bed of the Ford: water hoses, buckets, brushes; bottles of Windex, Endust, Pine-O-Pine; brooms, cleaning rags, paper towels …

The band got out of the Chevy and gawked at the bus for a while. It probably wasn't what they had expected, Creed thought.

Suddenly Trusty Joe leaned over, hands on his knees, and panted. “Man, I need to ride in the front next time, Tump. I get carsick in the back.”

“Not unless you call shotgun first,” Tump replied.

Lindsay gently patted the fiddler on the back. “You can ride bitch, beside me, Joe-Joe.”

Metro was the first to comment on the bus: “Cool, man!” He grabbed the water hose out of the bed of the Ford and dragged it toward a spigot sticking out of the side of the shop.

“A little elbow grease, and this thing will shine up like a Roll-Royce!” Luster declared, reaching into the Igloo cooler for another Buckhorn Beer.

Trusty Joe, shaking off his nausea, grabbed a large bucket and squirted in some liquid soap from a plastic squeeze bottle. “Hey, Luster, can I give Baldy a bath tomorrow?”

“Sure. Maybe he'll kick some sense into your head.”

Tump flicked a cigarette butt into the gravel driveway and found a spray nozzle in the back of the truck. “Hey, kid!” he yelled at Metro. “Screw this on.” He tossed the nozzle to the drummer who caught it over his shoulder, like a football player going long.

Lindsay was still shaking her head. She grabbed a broom, the Windex, and some paper towels from the truck, giving Luster a stern look. “This is the only time you will
ever
see Lind-SAY Lock-ETTE doing windows. You have an hour and a half of my time before I have to go home and start putting on my makeup.” With her cleaning supplies in hand, she sauntered toward the open door of the bus.

“Good work, Creed,” Luster said. “You know I'm an optimist, but I had my doubts about this battleship.”

“Channel your optimism toward the transmission,” Creed said. “We haven't put it in gear yet.”

“All right, gather around here,” Luster ordered. “Lindsay, get off the bus! We're having a band meeting!”

The band members gathered in a circle like a huddle for a six-man football team.

“I don't care if you think Christ was a conman,” Luster said. “We're going to say a prayer for this bus, and I want you all to mean it! Now, bow your heads!”

“I don't bow my head,” Tump said. “I lift my face to the heavens. The spirits have no respect for a man who cowers.”

“Suit yourself,” Luster replied.

“I'm agnostic,” Trusty Joe said.

“You're going to Hell,” Lindsay warned.

“There is no Hell,” Trusty groaned.

“This ain't a theological debate!” Luster shouted. “What would it hurt to pray for a bus?”

“Okay, I'll fake it,” Trusty said.

Luster closed his eyes. “Lord, you've cursed me with a band, and blessed me with a bus. Now, we pray in the name of all the saints and holy relics and guardian angels, please grant us a transmission! Amen!”

“Amen!” Lindsay sang.

“Is it ah-men, or ay-men?” Trusty Joe quizzed.

Luster sighed. “Creed, put this thing in gear before Trusty pisses God off again.”

Creed stepped on the bus, sat down, and stepped on the clutch pedal.

“Remember to jiggle it a little in the middle!”

Creed nodded, and added his own silent prayer. He wiggled the gearshift lever and felt it slip into first as he heard a clunk in the rear of the bus. He made a mental note to adjust the clutch linkage. It seemed a little loose. Gradually, he let out on the pedal and revved the motor, and the old Silver Eagle began to roll!

Creed heard applause and hallelujahs from outside as he eased across the parking lot. He motored out onto the side street and shifted into second. Again, the gearbox clunked, but shifted. He rushed into the third gear, then fourth, just to make sure they all worked, then made the block back to the bus yard.

By the time he returned, Junior had joined the band in a Buckhorn Beer toast. Creed shut the bus down and jumped out to join the celebration. Even Tump saw fit to pat him on the back. Lindsay gave him a marvelous hug and Metro forced some kind of barrio handshake on him.

“This is a dream come true,” said Trusty Joe, fighting back a sob. “I'm gonna see some blacktop through the windshield of a Silver Eagle! First Baldy, and now this!” He began to cry.

Luster shoved a beer at him. “Drink that and shut up. Any more blubberin', and you're fired. Pukin' is optional.”

 

20

CHAPTER

As the sun set down a two-lane stretch of U.S. 71, a clean, vintage bus—gears grinding—pulled into the entrance of Bud's Place, trailing a cloud of black smoke. An assortment of pickup trucks, cars, and motorcycles already filled half of the parking lot. The band began to load into the back door as Luster and Creed stepped in to look things over.

Bud Frazier, a big man with a big smile, busy tending his own bar, spoke up as he poured a beer from a tap. “That's him! That's Luster Burnett!”

Luster soon found himself swamped with admirers, so much so that they stormed the stage, seeking autographs.

Creed was trying to get his amp in place onstage amid the fans. He grabbed Luster by the sleeve and spoke into his ear. “Boss, if you'll go up front, we can get the gear set up while you sign autographs,” he suggested. “Don't let 'em wear you out, though. Go hide in the bus if you have to.”

Luster grinned. “I've been hiding long enough, son.” He turned to the fans. “Folks, I am here to declare that the legendary Luster Burnett is
back
!”

A cheer burst from the small crowd.

“Come on, now, get off the stage so my band can set up, and I'll sign some of these albums y'all brought with you. That'll make 'em worth a nickel more in the garage sale.”

As Luster cleared the crowd, Creed shook hands with a sound engineer named Tony and began explaining what the band would need. “If you don't mind, I'll set the PA with you,” Creed said, trying to avoid stepping too heavily on Tony's toes.

“It's all yours, man,” said Tony, a toddy of some kind in his hand.

After almost an hour of stumbling over one another, four band members had drums and amps set up, each staking a claim to a portion of the stage. Lindsay arrived in her Impala, dolled up like Black Barbie.

“I'm going to need some more room here, Metro, honey,” she purred.

“
No problema
.” Metro began moving his entire kit over toward Creed's amp to make room for Lindsay's.

“We missed you on the bus,” Tump said.

“I wasn't sure that thing was gonna make it,” Lindsay admitted.

Creed was running mic chords to the stands. “Oh, ye of little faith,” he said.

“I got faith galore,” she replied. “In this band, you got to have faith.”

Creed smirked and nodded his agreement. “Let's get some mic checks. Trusty?” He trotted to the mixer board, located at the side of the dance floor.

Trusty, looking rather nervous and green, tapped on his mic, then spoke into it. “Check, two, check, two, check, one, two, three, check, check, check…”

Creed found Tony turning knobs on the wrong channel. “He's channel five,” Creed said, pointing to the strip of masking tape that ran along the bottom of the control console, where he had written Trusty's name under his channel.

“Oh. That's Trusty? I thought the drummer was Trusty.”

“No, that's Metro.”

“Don't y'all have any normal names in this band?”

“Not a one,” Creed admitted, worrying about Tony cranking knobs.

Trusty Joe was still stuttering, “Check, two, check, one, two, check, check, check…”

Creed equalized the vocal toward the closest thing he could find to a sweet spot, considering the PA and the room. “Okay, that's good,” he said, cutting Trusty off in mid-check.

“Can I have more monitor?” Trusty Joe asked.

“Sure.” Creed pretended to adjust the monitor, though he actually did not turn the knob at all for fear of causing feedback onstage. “How's that?”

“Check, two, check, two. Perfect.”

“Lindsay?”

Lindsay sang her mic check: a stirring a cappella verse of “He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother” by the Hollies. Creed went back to the stage and talked Tony through the settings for his own mic and Luster's. Then he got the band to try an intro to a song, begging Tump to turn his bass amp down.

“I guess that's the nearest thing to a sound check we're gonna get,” Creed lamented. “Let's go to the bus for a band meeting.”

“Band meeting?” Tump complained.

“This is our first public gig,” Creed reminded him. “I want us all to start out on the same page.”

Tump sighed, and probably rolled his eyes behind his shades. “Let me smoke a coffin nail first, then I'll be there.”

“Me, too,” Lindsay said, putting a Virginia Slim to her lips. “You got a light, Tump, baby?”

He pointed to the back door with a nod of his head.

“I need some fresh air,” Trusty Joe blurted, charging outside.

Creed pushed his way through fans to extricate Luster from the crowd that had gathered around him. “We need you in the bus, Boss.”

Still, it took a good ten minutes to move Luster from the bar to the bus, as every fan there had a story and a handshake for him. Boarding the old coach, Creed shut the door and found the band waiting in complete silence. Luster must have noticed, too.

“Which one of us were y'all talkin' about?” Luster said, knowingly. “Anybody want a beer?” He opened the refrigerator.

“That thing doesn't work yet,” Creed said.

“Damn. That's the most important thing.”

“I carried the Igloo in.” He pointed to the cooler, which Tump was using as an ottoman.

Luster brushed Tump's long legs aside and began passing out beers.

Lindsay took one. “Tump, baby, can you open this for me. I just put on these nails.”

Luster looked at Metro. “How old are you?”

“I'm old enough.” Metro reached out his hand.

“In Mexico, maybe.”

“I'll take it,” Tump said, handing Lindsay the beer he had opened for her. Taking the next can from Luster, he handed it to Metro behind Luster's back.

“Let's pace ourselves on the drinkin',” Creed warned, putting on his band leader's hat. “We can get drunk as a bunch of hoot owls after the gig. Just play like we do in rehearsal, all right? Play the songs like the records we've all heard for years. Remember, these folks came to hear Luster sing, so let him sing. No noodlin'. Don't step on any lyrics.”

The musicians nodded their agreement.

“Well, let's go do it,” Creed said.

“Oh, I forgot to tell you,” Luster said.

Now what?
Creed was thinking. “Yeah, Boss?”

“I want you to open for me.”

“Huh?”

“Play that hit song of yours, ‘Written in the Dust.'”

“We didn't rehearse it.”

“Oh, hell, it's a hit. Everybody knows that song.”

Creed looked at Tump. “Do you know it?”

Tump sighed. “I've played it a thousand times, in a dozen cover bands.”

“Metro?”

“I think I've heard it.”

“I'll talk him through it,” Tump said.

Before Creed could even ask, Lindsay said, “I can sing Dixie's part. I've heard it a million times on the radio.”

“There ain't no fiddle part,” Creed said, apologetically, looking at Trusty.

“Thank God. I've got enough to worry about. This is not easy for me, you know.”

“Let's just go do it,” Creed allowed.

As the band filed out of the bus, Luster held Creed back.

“Yeah, Boss?”

“Are you carryin'?”

Creed lifted his shirttail to reveal the grip of his forty-five automatic sticking out of the front of his Levis. “I'll put it in my guitar case once we're onstage.”

Luster pulled the snub-nosed revolver from the top of his boot and tossed it nonchalantly onto the table in the bus. “You're in charge of security.”

Creed nodded, and they left the Silver Eagle for the smoky bar.