Nitro Mountain (24 page)

“He's fine,” she says. “He's with the cops. Sounds like he was a witness to some sort of shit. He asked me if that guy Bob was here.”

“I haven't seen him. If I do…”

“Yeah, I told him no. He also wanted to know if you were here. I said no.”

“Thanks. Yeah, I don't want nothing to do with this. I didn't do nothing. And I ain't about to get questioned on it.”

“I got this real bad feeling,” she says. “Larry kept asking had I seen Arnett. You hear what they found today?”

“No. What?”

“That girl,” she says. “The one that's been missing?”

“Okay.”

“They found her car. In the parking lot of that old Wal-Mart.”

“Where the bus station's at?”

“They been looking for her for months. And now there's her car. Just, there it is. Sat there without anybody noticing.”

“Well, let the cops solve the damn thing,” Jones says. “I'm just drinking.”

People are three deep at the bar. “Who's serving in here?” somebody shouts.

“I got to get to work,” she says. “Don't leave. Please. That Arnett scares the honest hell out of me. And Larry told me to make sure you was safe, if you came around.”

“I ain't going anywhere.”

The Jaguars. Tight denim, western wear, greased hair, busted cowboy boots. Their banner hanging crooked behind them. The singer with a beat-up sunburst hollowbody hanging from a rhinestone strap with clusters of stones missing. He bites open a bottle with a bent tooth and spits the cap into the crowd while the other musicians vamp. “Thank y'all much for taking the time,” he says into the mic. “We'll start with one of our own. We hope you fuck off.”

Jones likes that they're not starting things off with a cover. And right then the pedal steel slides in and the drums click them into time, the bass thumping and everybody yelling. The nice quiet Hickory transforming into dangerous Durty Misty's. He feels blessed to the bones to be here seeing it all, hearing it all, drinking it all. Everything that's going down tonight makes the music that much more real.

Each time Tiff checks on him there's a freshly frosted pint glass full of yellow beer in front of him, and what's he supposed to do, say no? He hadn't planned on drinking tonight but now the cold brew's turning warm in his stomach and this chicken-dance honky-tonking onstage isn't helping any, except it is. All the pickers are younger than Jones. Good thing he didn't do that opening set.

He keeps getting pushed against the bar by all these drunks and smokers and dancers. Larry wouldn't stand for it. But it takes him out of his head, so he doesn't have to think about Leon or Misty's or that poor girl or whatever the hell else. Shane appears out of the wall of bodies, opens his jacket and offers Jones a drink of whiskey from a collapsing plastic fifth stuffed into his sleeve.

Tiff, with her pinwheeling green eyes under those chopped black bangs, is pouring him another pitcher and telling him to turn around. When he does, Natalie's right in his face.

“Let's go.” She grabs his glass from the bar and dumps it down her throat, then hooks a finger in his belt and leads him to a table where they have a good view of the stage. He leans into her ear and says, “Look at your hair.” He doesn't realize until now how drunk he is.

“It's called Car-Wash Crimson,” she says, fluffing it. “Don't be worrying about me, watch them boys up there.”

Cool, so nothing's wrong, just friendly exes hanging out.

He studies the bassist thumping out hand patterns. He's heard about this guy. One of the original Bristol Boys. Man plucks the strings like his hands are floating. Jones shares the pitcher with Natalie until it's gone. “I'm sorry about this morning,” she says. “I been feeling bad about that all day.”

“Feels like yesterday to me,” Jones says. “Don't worry about it.”

“Eads and Terri—they bring it out in me.”

“Then quit letting them stay with you.”

“I know it. That's what I did after you left. I kicked them both out and locked the doors. I'm going to make some changes in my life.”

“So you came out to a Jags show?”

“Changing don't mean you gotta stop living, does it?”

“You end up sleeping with those two?”

“I thought about it. But only to hurt you. That's the only thing I would've enjoyed in it. Then I realized you were gone, so it wouldn't matter to you at all.”

“It does matter. I don't want to see that stuff happening to you.”

Shane and Tiny Tina drop by the table, their secret bottle becomes no secret at all and Natalie's starting to grab at Jones. Well, why not? One more round. He can taste her lipstick on the mouth of the bottle and then he's draped around her middle and sweating onto her breasts. His face is numb. They're dancing. He doesn't notice much of the music anymore. She's kicking him in the shins with her boots, telling him to hold her and swing her, and Jones can smell cigarettes in her hair and her body odor. That web of freckles spreading across the bridge of her nose. Her nipples poking through when she presses into him. He puts his arms around her and she pulls his hands back up around her waist and keeps kicking him until he starts moving to his own song, away from her and out the door.

He sits down on the ground in the parking lot, pulls out his cigarettes and falls over. He lies there smoking, little bit of rain coming down.

He hears shouting, props himself up on an elbow and sees two men swinging at each other, connecting every now and then. Oh, that's nice, like the old days. It really is a beautiful thing.

Natalie's standing near the action. “Kick his ass!” she's saying. “Kick his fucking ass!” Somebody pulls her back and drags her away. There's his girl. No changing that.

Cruiser lights strobe the trees and the building and the cars in the lot. A lady cop stands over Jones. “Are you okay, sir?”

“Just sobering,” he says. “I'll be fine. You wanna get married?”

“Sure, just a sec.” She walks away to help make the arrest. By the time the fighting men are cuffed, they're talking like brothers. Which they might be. The cops go inside and Jones hears the music stop, the drummer giving a final crash.

Tiff comes out after a while. “Oh my God, there you are.” She crouches down and peers into Jones's face. “Damn. All right, you're sloshered.”

“Where'd the music go?”

“The Jags had to quit. The cops are really pissed and sent everybody home. They're asking around about Misty's and nobody's saying nothing.”

People are standing around, boots and shoes kicking around in the wet gravel. Jones lies there watching everything. The cops finally leave, and Tiff says, “Come on inside, before you get soaked.” She pulls him up, helps him get against the building where it's dry, wipes his face, brushes him off. “Could've burned yourself too,” she says. The cigarette he's smoking falls out of his mouth and she lights one of her menthols for him.

Jones looks around at people smoking, drinking, laughing, crying, drinking, getting ready to go home. “Where's Natalie?”

“In worse shape than you, guaranteed. Long gone.”

“Shit, man. I should've made sure she didn't get like that.”

“She ain't your problem. Let her go. You're enough for you to worry about.”

A man tries pissing into the ditch and falls face-first into his own puddle. A couple leans against a truck, entangled. It's a lonely feeling not to be the cause of this trouble. He misses coming out to parking lots after playing shows, smoking a cigarette and knowing he was to thank for all the mess. “You know that kid who used to play bass for me?” he says. “That's who I'm worried about.”

“You're starting to act like Larry,” Tiff says.

“That kid's missing too. Except maybe he's been found, I don't know. Larry told me he saw Arnett burying somebody on East Ridge. He told the cops all about it.”

“So
that's
the deal,” she says. “Then I guess they're sorting it out. There's nothing you can do now except be glad
you
ain't missing.”

Yellow. That's what Jones sees right now. Streaks of sunlight on the wall. He's crashed out on Tiff's couch, cocaine still beating through his brain. She shared some with him and Shane and Tiny Tina behind the bar after the Jaguars packed up and everybody went home. One minute he'd been on his back in the parking lot, then the next Tiff was helping him inside while he was crying and carrying on about Leon, and before he knew it he was bent over behind the bar, sniffing lines across the scratched chrome of the cooler. And now here. Pain in his bones. Too tired to even give himself hell about it. Just close your eyes again and sleep it off. But he can't.

Natalie. Goddamn. Jones, who do you really love? And is it possible to make it stop?

There's a loud explosion in his sleep and he jumps awake to all the yellow gone.

“You're talking a whole lot,” Tiff says.

“Was I? I was. What day is it?”

“Sunday. Sounded like you were dreaming.”

“Just thinking.”

“About me, I hope.”

“I was fishing. Fishing with the boys and catching largemouth. They'd hit the spinner and go dancing across the water. And then something way too big was bending my rod into the water, and I couldn't let go. We were casting off Larry's old pontoon.”

She kneels down next to him, eye level. “You been sleeping all day.” Her hand wipes sweat off his forehead. “C'mon, I'll make you some coffee.”

“It ain't but morning.”

She makes a buzzer noise with her mouth. “Wrong again. I got to go into work pretty soon.”

“Guess I'll be heading out, then, if I can just rest a while longer. That damn coke screwed me all up. Where the hell you get that stuff from, anyway?”

“You need to come over to the Hickory with me.”

“How come?”

“You got a tab to settle up on, big boy.”

“Aw, shit. Let me just pay you and you can take it over. I thought you said I didn't owe you nothing.”

“You didn't, until you about drained the keg. Larry's called me five times now. Says not to let you leave without settling up.”

“Jesus Christ.” Jones drops a leg off the couch. “This is crazy.” Even the carpet beneath his foot feels like sandpaper. “People dying and shit burning, and Larry's worried about a few beers? What do I owe him?”

“Seventy-five.”

“Can't pay it. Won't.”

“He knows. Says he'll let you play it off.”

Blue sky through the picture window above the TV. “Did he say he'd be around?”

“No, didn't happen to.”

“All right, then. Let me give you a lift over.”

Driving to the Hickory, he's still rubbing the sleep and drugs out of his eyes. All that shit going down last night, and what was he doing? Getting fucked up, just like he promised himself he wouldn't. And then you went and got too fucked up to even help the man who's helped you so many times. But what should you have done? Nothing, except not get so fucked up. All right, let's play this one off.

Nothing's as sad as the sound of happy hour ending.

Jones taps the vocal mic to see if it's coming through the PA. Two black-carpeted Peavey cabinets on either side of the stage. Fifteen-inch Black Widow speakers with a horn in each. This is Larry's investment and it sounds good. The highs are clear and the bottom's low—like the water last night in his dream. He taps again. “Can you hear me in the back?” he says. “One more time, are you getting it in the rear?”

One of the two men still at the bar laughs, and Jones ducks his head to see if he can make out who it is. Light glints through the pint of amber ale in front of the man.

“Good to know I'm not the only one,” Jones says.

Larry comes onto the stage wearing unironed slacks, a white shirt and a loosened tie. “Watch your mouth, Jones,” he says. “Kind of place you think this is?”

“After last night, I got no idea.”

“Yeah, I've been cleaning up the remains. Heard you were in unique form.”

“Not that unique. It's good to see you, Larry.”

“You too. Glad to have you. You heard about Misty's? Arnett must've purely lost his mind.”

“That's what Tiff said. Have you heard anything about Jennifer? She okay?”

“All I know is they caught Arnett last night. Ran him right off Buzzard Hollow Road.”

“And he's still alive?”

“Apparently a tree caught him. Lucky he didn't roll.”

“We'd be better off if he had.”

“I know that's right.”

The man at the bar gives a two-fingered whistle. “Let's go! Let's hear it!”

Jones leans into the mic. “Don't make me send the bossman down after you.”

Larry pats Jones on the back. “I'll let you get to it. We can talk later.”

One mic is aimed at Jones's guitar, a little ahead of the soundhole, and the other at his mouth—the other soundhole, Natalie used to say. He's still shaky from last night and hopes that doesn't translate into the music. He wants to sound good for Tiff, whatever she's worth, and for Larry, except Larry's busy. Maybe it's just his own self he's nervous about.

He plays through the form of one of his older originals, “Kudzu Vine,” and the dude at the bar starts clapping.

Jones remembers the chords okay. The words, though. He hasn't played this song in probably a year. He quits playing and says, “Just checking the levels,” then leans over and pulls the lyrics to the new song from his back pocket. The paper's barely holding together and he tapes it to the mic stand. He reads through the lyrics. Yes. But let's do it right.

“Could I get some water?” he says into the mic. “Water with lots of lemon. A thousand glasses, please.”