by Maddy Wells
It sounded like a demotion. Kirby and Tim were the first friends I ever really had and I had to let them both go. Now I saw what happens when you let people out of their boxes. They run away.
Captain Kirby frowned. “I just hope Carmen feels the same way. She is so together. And I have a lot of loose ends.”
It was the first time I ever heard Captain Kirby express any self-doubt. “How could she not love you?” I asked. “You charmed Marjewel, you charmed Mrs. Valliere. Granny O’Reilly said you were street smart and I never heard her say anything nice about anyone. Everyone loves you. Even I love you…as a friend, of course. So what’s your problem?
“I didn’t start out completely honest with Carmen, and I’m worried she’ll think I’m a complete bullshit artist when I tell her the truth, and I’ll have to sooner or later, and maybe she’ll never trust me.”
Kirby was the most up front person I’d ever met so I couldn’t imagine that it was anything game-changing. “So, what did you lie about?”
“I told her my name was Janet Kirby and that me and my ma were on our way to New York when we stopped in Milltown to visit some friends and she got a great job as a make-up artist and that’s why we stayed.”
I repeated what she said in my head. “So, which part is…”
“A lie?”
I nodded.
“Most of it.”
“But your mother is a make-up artist…”
“Was.”
“And you do live in Milltown…”
“But we didn’t stop there to visit anyone. You know that. We stopped there because my mother kidnapped me. The court said she was an unfit mother and gave me to my father. I mean, it’s ridiculous because he didn’t want me. I bought us phony ID from some Mexicans I knew in East L.A.—boy are they good—and we changed our name to Kirby.”
“So your name isn’t ….”
“No. I mean my dad doesn’t care, which is the funny part. But we’re both in the system, and if I used my real name the FBI would be all over us and my mother would end up in jail. Technically, she abducted me, even though it was my idea. I just have to stay hidden till I turn eighteen.”
We sat on the island stools for a long time.
“So, did you actually call your father about Jonah’s and Zina’s TV show…?”
“Oh, yeah, that was real. He’s real. He was totally on board with it. He wished me luck with my new life and said I could count on him for help. Pretty funny, huh? It’s kind of too bad that Zina screwed that up, but I’ll find something else. You will, too. There’s always something else.”
“So,” I said, “What am I supposed to call you?”
“Look, Mercy, can you forgive me? I didn’t know I’d get so involved in your life or I would have been straight with you from the beginning. It was a mistake and I know it. And I made it with Carmen too. I never had any real friends before. No one but you knows that me and my mom lived in a freaking funeral home. You’re more like me than anyone I ever met. I mean, your mom is a nut job and your dad likes you as long as you don’t come within a thousand miles of him. I knew I could trust you. I was going to keep it just me and my mom until I turned 18. I thought I could wait till I was 18 to start being a human being.”
It was always just me and Jane, too. We didn’t have to lie about our names, but we did about everything else, trying to make people believe we were normal. “Sixteen. Eighteen,” I said, “What’s the difference, huh? It’s a long time to wait to be real.”
Marjewel called from the front door, “If you girls don’t come out right now, the bus is going to leave without you!”
“Oh my god! It’s gotten so late!”
I stood up to go but Captain Kirby pinned my hand on the island under hers.
“So?” she said.
I wriggled my hand out from under hers. “The only thing I couldn’t forgive you for is if you made me miss a ride to The Griffin’s concert on his band bus.”
Chapter 60
The band bus was parked in the circular driveway with its engine running, speakers on the grill blaring out a song I’d never heard, probably one The Griffin just wrote. The paintings of The Griffin, Bang, Raymond and Isak on the bus’s side looked brand new, like they’d just been detailed.
I asked the bus driver about the song as we boarded. “He calls it Plan B Black Hole. The Griffin’s on fire. This is a new beginning for him,” he said. “He wrote it yesterday.”
Tim was already in the back. I sat down on The Griffin’s orange Barca Lounger. My heart was pounding so hard I put my hand over it to slow it down. Marjewel gave me a disapproving look as she walked by me.
“I’ll get up when he gets on,” I said. I wanted to be part of it all by osmosis even if the reality was that I wasn’t. I squirmed around in the chair to rub some of The Griffin’s mojo off on my pants and shirt, which I knew I would never wash again.
“You having a heart attack or what?” Captain Kirby asked, sitting down on the lounger’s arm.
This seat was where The Griffin sang songs to me when I was little and he came to town. This was where The Griffin sat to dole out Christmas presents, even if we didn’t get them till February. This was where Jane probably sat on The Griffin’s lap while I was growing inside her. It was even maybe where I was conceived.
“Fine. I’m fine,” I said.
Tim sat down across from us. He was grinning like an idiot.
“Ready for your close-up, Tim?” Captain Kirby asked him.
“Absolutely.”
I could see he wasn’t nervous. All the weird shit he’d gone through with his crazy survivalist father and grandfather, somehow it hadn’t taken control of him and somehow he hadn’t needed to take control of it. He was honest and he wasn’t afraid. That was his secret.
“You’ll be great,” I said.
“You’ll get your chance too,” he said.
“Maybe.”
Was Mercy…Me! a good song? If you measure the worth of a song by its power, the answer was definitely yes. I would get my chance, but I didn’t want to jinx it by saying it aloud.
I felt my phone vibrate and I looked at it. It was a phone number from Pennsylvania. Jane!
“Mom?”
“Mercedes! I was hoping you’d pick up. Put it on speaker, I can’t hear you, there’s a lot of noise in here.”
“Is something wrong?” I asked her.
“I was feeling lonely and wanted to hear your voice, that’s all. Silly, right? Dutton let me use her cell phone again. She’s a really good person.”
“You’ll be okay, Mom,” I said.
“Do you think so, Mercedes? Really?”
“I’m leaving tomorrow. I’ll be there for your sentencing, Mom.”
“Where are you? What do you mean you’re leaving tomorrow? How come you’re calling me mom?”
“You’ll never believe this. I’m in Houston! I’m on The Griffin’s bus! We’re going to his concert!”
“How did you get to Houston?”
“It’s a long story. It’ll have to wait.”
“I guess I have no choice. Be careful, honey. You know what happened to me when I was sixteen.”
“Don’t worry, Mom. I’m cool.”
Jane sighed. “You are. You really are. We’re the Two Cool Society, right?”
I laughed. I would explain to Jane when we were finally together that the Two Cool Society was disbanded, that you can’t go back to how things used to be, like Captain Kirby said. But here’s the thing: why would you want to? “I’ll record the concert for you on my phone. As much as I can get on it.”
“Dutton wants her phone back. I’ve gotta go. I love you, Mercedes.”
Captain Kirby had been listening in. When I paused she kicked my foot.
“I love you too, Mom.”
Chapter 61
On the drive into town—now that I knew I was just an accident he’d decided not to repair and that he thought I was just a little kid with a penchant for geeky charts
and graphs—I was thinking that I didn’t know how I was going to react when he boarded the bus, but here’s what happened, it was exactly the same as always. When he climbed up the stairs into the bus and filled the aisle with his presence, spreading his wings for us to admire him, I didn’t see the gimmicky part: the fake feathers, fake tail, the glue holding everything together. I saw The Griffin who was capable of making thousands of people go wild with joy over his music. I knew then that it had been ridiculous to think that he could ever be a regular dad and cut the lawn or pay attention to my insecurities as noted on PowerPoint or buy Jane flowers or even pick up the phone every time I called like other dads did for their kids, because he wasn’t like other dads. He was The Griffin, larger than life. He was a crummy dad, but a great Griffin. And knowing that broke my heart, but the fact is my breaking heart gave me my first real song.
Gonna leave me?
Make me cry?
Try to hurt me?
I don’t die
Was it a fair trade? I would have to find out.
Everyone fussed over him and he peered out from under his heavy make-up and errant feathers, and looked at me expectantly, and I rushed to him and he enveloped me in his eagle wings, whispering in my ear: “You’re my favorite, girl. You’ve always been my favorite girl.” and I looked at him with tears in my eyes and he said, “No crying. This is a big night for me, Mercy. A new start. For you too,” and before I could ask him what he meant by that he got involved in a discussion with Tim that I tried unsuccessfully to eavesdrop on.
He was right. It was a new start for me too. As of right now, I was stepping out as a special and talented me—Mercy O’Reilly. Just me. Without the weight of my special and talented family holding me back.
Raymond, Bang and Isak came to the front of the bus and were the first to get off when we pulled through giant garage doors into the back of the Toyota Center. A crowd of groupies was being held back by policemen. The Griffin grabbed my hand as I got off. He walked a few steps toward them, took me in his arms, and covered me with his wings. He really knew how to play the crowd. They went crazy and if it hadn’t been for the policemen arms linked holding them back they would have run me over.
“And so it begins,” Marjewel said, edging me out of the way to be at the Griffin’s side as his entourage made its entrance.
The groupies’ screaming bounced off the garage walls. It was like that night at the Trap, but the adoration felt more intense, almost frantic. It was freakin awesome.
The band was already in costume, so there was no need to go into dressing rooms, and we were a half hour late anyway. We walked down a long tunnel under the tiered seats—I’d googled the Center and kind of knew what it looked like and I could see the brightly lit arena at the end of it. As we got near the end of the tunnel lights started flashing like crazy and an announcer was shouting something that I couldn’t make out and a throbbing noise began. We came out on the side of the stage. Security guards were waiting there and they escorted me, Tim, Marjewel and Kirby down some steps and into a row of seats right in front of the stage that had been saved for us. The flashing lights were so bright and were flashing so fast that we were all basically half blind and the security guards had to hold our hands or we would have tripped over each other. Bilbo and Clarisse were already seated there and they gathered Tim between them, shouting stuff into one another’s ears. The throbbing noise had subsided and was replaced by moans and boos. My eyes began to adjust and I stood up to look around and what I saw was so scary and thrilling that I’ll remember it for the rest of my life.
Isak had said he was a little worried that they wouldn’t get the numbers if Aerosmith wasn’t involved—this was The Griffin’s first concert without them in ten years—but he shouldn’t have been. I’d told Mrs. Big Hair that the concert was already sold out, and it was. I’d googled the Center’s capacity, 18,000 seats and it looked like every one of them was filled.
And then something else began that was more scary than it was thrilling. Bang came on stage and the roar started again then diminished. Then Isak walked on stage to mixed “who is that?” shouts. Then Raymond emerged and a roar turned into loud chants of his name. The three musicians went about the business of checking amps, testing mikes, connecting wires, tuning guitar strings, acting as if they were on the stage alone not in front of 18,000 fans, and the crowd quieted if you can call it that. It was like the in-between of crashing waves when you know another is coming. Raymond looked at Bang and Isak and nodded his head and the group leaped into a jacked up version of Hotter than Hell and 18,000 people began to sing the words and I got caught up in it and Tim and Kirby did too and even Marjewel sang along and we were looking at each other and laughing and even Bilbo and Clarisse were clapping and laughing, then we stopped because a roar went up that was so loud, so deafening, that you didn’t just hear it—you felt like it was coming from inside you and would split your skin. The Griffin had come on stage. He walked to the front—apart from the other band members who were looking at him and each other and laughing—letting the crowds’ adoration wash over him for what seemed like a very long time but was probably only a minute and I was thinking, how do rock stars feel facing thousands of maniacal worshippers with nothing separating them from the crowd but the stage and a dozen security guards? They were there to make the crowd believe that their awe of them was justified. Only music could do that.
The Griffin spread his wings in such a way that the crowd knew to quiet down. Some girls seated right behind us were screaming out the names of their favorite songs. I turned my phone on to record for Jane.
From the speakers came a faint sound like someone was sobbing, and I felt my pulse race with recognition, then I felt a ripple of anticipation go through the crowd as they strained to give a name to what they were hearing. The sobbing got louder and louder as the sound tech played it in a loop and the sobs went on and on and I heard the girls behind us start crying. Then the sobbing stopped and there was no sound at all coming from the speakers and only a few shouts rippled across the heads of the silenced listeners. But then all of a sudden the speakers emitted a scream that was so heart-broken it was almost unbearable and it went on and on and repeated itself and repeated itself until the audience began to scream and I knew who was screaming. It was me. It was the back-up tape of me from the studio. Isak must have taken it with him when he left and played it for The Griffin. The scream finally stopped and Bang starting banging his drums and Raymond and Isak began playing the chords, my chords, the chords to Mercy…Me! and the audience erupted. And it was for me. I felt the audience’s love and I let it envelope me.
The Griffin came to the edge of the stage and pointed at me and two security guards lifted me onto the stage and Isak handed me my Fender which I strapped on. The crowd was going berserk and I felt a new emotion, a feeling of incredible confidence because the crowd was chanting my melody—my melody!—and it created something I had never felt before—the feeling of possibility so big that even this colossal theatre couldn’t contain it, the feeling that anything could happen because it was my life now and it felt… wonderful.
I turned to look at The Griffin. He was waiting for me, playing the bridge for me to walk across into my song.
I smiled.
He raised his finger to cue the band, then looked at me and nodded.
Write to Maddy Wells at [email protected]
