by L. B. Dunbar
On this particular day, evidence of our demise was apparent when Lansing entered Arturo’s apartment. We were having a meeting with Kaye Sirs, our manager.
“Nice of you to show up,” Kaye laughed bitterly, as Lansing entered the room.
“What?” he responded looking at Tristan, who only shook his head to ignore Kaye.
“Kaye wants to cancel the tour,” I answered.
Lansing was silent for a moment before he asked, “What are you suggesting?”
“Cancellation. We’ll have to fully refund,” Kaye stated plainly.
“What?” Tristan choked.
“What do you recommend? We don’t know where Arturo is. I’m gonna kill Mure Linn, if I ever see him again. That dirty old man knows something and he isn’t sharing,” Kaye’s voice rose in frustration.
“What about Ingrid?” Lansing asked.
“What about her?” Kaye defended.
“What does she know?” Lansing questioned, as if he didn’t believe in Ingrid’s innocence.
“She’s talked to Mure Linn, but she claims she doesn’t know anything. Mure assured her he would handle everything, which is a clear sign he does know something.”
“What does this mean?” Tristan asked.
“Fuck if I know,” Kaye said slapping the side of his leg.
I remained quiet. I wasn’t usually the talkative one in the group anyway. My phone vibrated in my pocket while this conversation transpired. I pulled it out and quickly noticed that Hollister had texted me again.
“Who is she?” Lansing barked at me.
I looked up at him when I realized his question was directed at me. I didn’t answer.
“She must be really special. Was she worth it? Was it worth it to kill Arturo for her?” Lansing yelled. His face was turning red in his anger.
“Hey,” Tristan warned.
“We don’t know that he’s dead,” I replied calmly.
“Well, we don’t know he’s alive either,” Lansing added bitterly.
“He’s not dead,” came a soft voice from the corner.
We were all frozen by her tone, and my heart broke at the sadness in Guinie’s presence.
“How do you know? How do you know that, Guinevere?” Lansing whined.
“I just do,” she said defiantly as she glared at Lansing.
“How can you know? Has he contacted you? Do you know something, just like Mure, just like Ingrid?”
“That’s enough.” Kaye stepped into the mix.
Guinevere stood taller against the wall corner. Her eyes narrowed.
“Do you think for one minute that I would let this happen, if I knew something?”
“Let what happen?” Lansing glared back at her.
“Concerts cancelled, without a reason. The band arguing and falling apart. Losing a baby.”
“You lost a baby?” I asked shocked.
“Perk,” Tristan warned me.
“Where the fuck have you been? She lost a baby. Arturo’s baby!” Lansing was yelling again.
I looked at Guinevere and she seemed to understand my sadness for her.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know. Why didn’t I know?” I looked around the room.
“You’ve been busy,” Tristan snorted.
“Not that busy,” I replied under my breath.
“Can we get back to the business at hand? The concert?” Kaye used his authoritative tone. “I suggest we cancel. Full refund. In the meantime, we need to figure out what to do about the album. Do you want to replace Arturo?”
“What the fu…?” I began, but Kaye silenced me with his hand. That was out of the question, in my opinion.
“Replace him. Finish the album with only the three of you. Or scratch the album altogether, which I highly do not recommend.”
“No,” Tristan’s tone was firm.
“Well, these are all things to think about. Concert is a done deal, though.”
We were all silent for a moment and the room felt like someone had died. We were dead. Arturo might be alive. In Guinie’s mind he was, but I didn’t feel it anymore. I didn’t feel anything. I sensed loss and emptiness. The band was a total disconnect for me, I didn’t have a purpose any longer. My journey had been to find Hollister SanGrael and make sure she was safe. Arturo promised to help me accomplish that goal, and he didn’t disappoint me. At that moment, I felt as if I had disappointed him.
“What the fuck is your deal?” Tristan addressed Lansing after Guinie exited the room.
“I…I don’t know,” Lansing replied, scrubbing his hands down his face.
“When was the last time you were laid?” he asked.
“Fuck off.”
“No, dude, that’s what you need. To fuck. Off.” Tristan laughed, and I looked up at both of them.
“What about you?” Tristan eyed me.
“What about me?”
“Did you do her, yet?”
I moved quickly with an anger I’d never imagined inside me. I had Tristan in the air, off his drunken ass, and face to face with me.
“Don’t you ever talk about her like that.”
“Whoa. You got it bad. We got another Arturo here. Have you fallen in love?”
I wasn’t falling in love. I’d been in love. I’d been in love with a girl that only seemed to exist in my fantasy.
The band in the forest ten years ago…meeting Arturo King
[Perkins]
When I left Arturo’s apartment, shortly after almost throttling Tristan, I needed to ride. I needed to get out of the city and just feel free for a while. I was a wanderer by nature. I needed to roam. The day was chilly, but not cold, and the fresh air would do me good. As I hit the Boulevard¸ heading out of the city, my thoughts travelled to when I first met Arturo King and he made me promises.
Arturo King was present, after all, at Mure Linn’s home near the lake. He exited the house shortly after Kaye’s altercation with the girl. Frustration clearly on his face, he appeared older than his sixteen years, with his dark hair and deep eyes. His presence seemed powerful at such a young age, but as he kicked loose gravel in his temper, he seemed more adolescent than the notorious guitarist extraordinaire.
“What’s wrong now, Arturo?” Kaye asked.
“He did it again,” Arturo responded, kicking at the dirt in the drive again.
“Who did what?” Kaye asked sounding bored.
“That asshole stole my iPod again. He knows we record our music on it, and he’s taken it again to steal our sound.” Arturo’s tone proved his exasperation, but the look on Kaye’s face was pure displeasure.
“Damn it. I hate that kid,” Kaye swore. “He needs to be taught a lesson.”
I was still standing behind Kaye, not even being introduced yet to Arturo, when Arturo spoke to me.
“Who are you?” Dark eyes sized me up. He wasn’t unkind, just curious.
Kaye looked me over, as well, before his lip lifted in a sneer.
“He’s no one.”
“I’m Perkins Vale,” I interjected.
“Alan Vale’s son?” Arturo raised his eyebrows in surprise.
“Yes,” I lied, not knowing yet the truth of my words.
“Are you friends with Kaye?” Arturo’s puzzled gaze moved from me to Kaye.
“No. I’m here to meet you. Lansing Lotte sent me.”
“For what?”
“To play.”
“I’m a bit old to play games,” Arturo scoffed and Kaye laughed outright.
“Play the drums,” I said, trying to hold my head high.
Arturo’s eyes narrowed. “Do you play?”
“I will learn,” I spoke confidently.
“You’re a big guy,” Arturo said stating the obvious. “While it takes power to play the drums, it takes a certain amount of reserve as well. You need…finesse,” he closed with emphasis, as if I was too large, too stupid, too clumsy looking to possess this quality.
“What about the iPod?” Kaye interrupted as Arturo continued to ass
ess me.
“I’ll have to go get it, somehow,” Arturo sighed, pulling his thoughts away from me and addressing the bleach blond beside him.
“I’ll do it for you,” I spoke. I didn’t know where the offer came from or why I offered, but I knew I would do anything to prove my worth to that kid.
“How?” Kaye and Arturo said in unison.
“Just tell me who and where to find him,” I demanded with a confidence I didn’t own.
After Kaye Sirs directed me to the clearing near the lake, I paced in anxious anticipation.
Reddington Knight.
I’d heard of him. I’d witness what he could do. I’d been on the receiving end of his taunts. Quite simply put; he was a bully, but I hadn’t seen him for a while. Something about getting kicked out of school and placed in juvie for a bit. I was no longer certain what to expect, so when a large kid with bright red hair and a horrendous scar entered the field, I was shocked at the difference some time had made for the oversized teenager with an ugly disposition. He was not the kid I remembered. Something about this situation seemed unsettling as the large thug approached me, his arms held wide at his sides as if he couldn’t put them down. Two others followed closely behind him, as if a guard of some type to the creature before me. He wasn’t going to tower over me as we seemed matched in height and stature, but I didn’t have the meanness in me that emanated off the guy approaching me.
“What you want, punk? I’m here to meet Arturo.”
“I’m here in his place,” I said with a bit of a shaky voice. My tone betrayed my nerves, and I clenched and unclenched my hands to calm myself.
“Ha. Arturo is such a pussy he sent you in his stead. He’s a wimp.” The creature before me laughed and his young teeth were yellow.
“He wants his iPod back,” I demanded.
“And you expect me to just give it to you?” he scoffed.
“I do,” I said.
“Why would I do that?”
“Because it’s the right thing to do,” I answered honestly.
“Well, that ain’t going to happen,” he laughed and his friends laughed beside him. I was outnumbered as the two smaller guys approached slowly, coming next to their master after slinking behind this hulk of a kid, as if they were his minions. On the outer edge of the clearing I saw an older man. Not old, but definitely an adult.
“Get out of here,” Reddington laughed. “You’re wasting my time. I need to search out that punk Arturo, instead.”
“Why? You have what you want from him.”
“Arturo knows I want something else.”
My anger was rising, as I didn’t see the justice in stealing from someone and still wanting more from him.
“Whatever you want, you may ask me. I’ll speak to Arturo.”
“Ha,” he laughed again. “What I want from Arturo, you don’t have.” His eyes roamed my body before he spit at me. I don’t know where the fury came from, but I reached out and grabbed his neck. Reddington’s eyes opened wide in surprise and then I heard a click. A switchblade was raised and my wrist was sliced. I wasn’t used to the ways of fighting and I dropped my arm immediately, wrapping my other large hand around my arm to stare at the blood.
I sensed the blow before it hit me, and I ducked as the air swished over my head. Reddington had tried to strike in my confusion at the pain on my wrist. I stood to my full height and tackled him. We crashed to the ground with a thud. The wind knocked out of the ginger as his back hit the dry meadow earth. I raised my hand to strike and paused, for the briefest of seconds, before I socked his throat instead of his face. Reddington choked then sobbed before I struck his nose, which burst into red flames of blood.
“You coward. Stealing. Cutting. You’re nothing but a worthless bully.”
I pushed off him to stand, shaking in my anger and my surprise at the strength I didn’t know I possessed. Reddington lay crumpled on the ground. His two friends had run away at the sound of a gunshot. I looked up to see the barrel pointed in the air and held by the older man on the edge of the field. He approached slowly as I stood still, thinking he was going to shoot me.
The older man held my gaze. My face betrayed my guilt that I hurt someone else.
“I saw everything,” he said, as he walked the final steps to me. “You okay?”
“I…I’m fine. He cut me, though.” The words sounded weak, and my voice quivered with the pain radiating up my arm.
“What happened?”
“He stole. From a…a friend, and I was trying to get it returned.”
“This punk has been slinking around, lately. Nothing but trouble. You seemed to hold your own. You’re a big kid, but I didn’t want it to go too far.”
Reddington whimpered from where he laid on the ground. My lips trembled and my eyes were liquidy. In my embarrassment, I tried to turn away in shame and a tear escaped.
“Ever been in a fight before?” the man asked gently.
“No,” I said with a voice that squeaked.
“Well, you done good. My name’s Goneman. What did he steal from your friend?”
“An iPod,” I replied looking down at the body of Reddington, who was still curled up and shaking as he covered his face.
“Where’s the gadget?” Goneman demanded and Reddington pulled it from his jacket, tossing it on the ground.
I bent to pick it up.
“Seems stupid to fight over a toy,” the old man laughed.
“Oh. It’s not a toy. My friend used it to record his music. He needed it back so the songs can’t be stolen.”
“Music, eh?” Goneman narrowed his eyes at me, moving them down to the device in my hand.
“He makes music,” the man repeated in a softer tone, as if his mind was drifting off in memory.
“Yes. And I plan to learn to play the drums so I might make music, too,” I said, standing a bit taller as I stared at the iPod in my hand.
“What’s your name, son?” his voice was kind and curious.
“Perkins. Perkins Vale.”
Goneman gasped and raised an eyebrow high onto his forehead.
“Perkins, my boy. I’ve been waiting for you to come of age.”
It was immediately after that introduction that I learned of my heritage. My father was Alan Vale, the infamous musician who overdosed in a hotel room he shouldn’t have been in, and Goneman was one of his band brothers. He’d been vacationing in the woods, checking up on me, as I didn’t know yet that I had been hidden there.
The memories invaded my mind as I raced through the outskirts of the city, with no particular destination. I sped through small towns and suburbs as the leaves blew off trees and the colors began to change. The world was in transition and so was I. I had changed once. Discovering music, meeting Jon Goneman, and joining Arturo had all caused a huge metamorphosis in my life, but one thing had still been a constant: my search for Hollister SanGrael.
The call…
[Perkins]
I didn’t know why I called her after those two weeks. Maybe it was the argument with the band. Maybe it was the guilt I felt again over separating from Arturo. Maybe it was that I just wanted to see her and hold her again. I wanted to feel something solid instead of all those loose ends.
My voice betrayed my exhaustion, but I hoped it didn’t hint at a deeper need. I stayed quiet as I picked her up and we drove to my home. I was determined that the course of the evening would not follow a wayward path. I ordered us Chinese food from a place that was familiar with my home. As we sat at the island, I served her food, and she finally broke the silence.
“What happened today?”
I looked up at her, lost in thought again. It wasn’t that I forgot her presence. Quite the opposite, I found comfort in her being near me, even if we didn’t speak. My eyes searched hers. I wanted to know so many truths. My life had been a mystery to me. I didn’t know who I was until I was fifteen. I didn’t know the talent that I had until then either. I didn’t know the ways of women; I only knew
I desired one. And not just anyone, but Hollister, who I both admired and cursed at the moment.
“I got in a fight with the band today,” I sighed, placing my elbow on the island and resting my head in my large hand. I cupped my forehead, squeezed my temples, and stared down at my plate.
“Why?”
“I was accused of killing Arturo.”
She sucked in air then breathed out a heavy, “No,” and reached for me. Her small hand clamped my wrist, and I noticed her staring at the scar across my skin in an even slice.
“Lansing accused me.”
“Why would he say such a thing?”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” I said.
“It wasn’t your fault. You know this,” she said tenderly. “Perkins. This was not your fault. We already talked about this. You didn’t cause that accident.”
“But I did,” I sighed again. “If Arturo hadn’t followed me. If he hadn’t come with me. If he hadn’t signaled for us to separate…” My voice drifted off.
“You didn’t do this,” she said, slowly rubbing my arm. My eyes shifted from my plate to her hand on my skin. I watched in awe as she continued to gently stroke me.
As if using this motion to focus my thoughts, I continued, “For the longest time, I’ve had a…mission: a quest, if you will. I wasn’t thinking, I never thought anything could happen to him. He was so good at outrunning, outsmarting the media. He has secrets he’s been able to keep from them for years. And I just never thought…”
