by JL Bryan
“Sh!” Jason said.
“Come on, come on!” Mitch yelled from the rusty van.
Over at Mrs. Dullahan’s van, Mortimer had opened the side door, and a wheelchair lift slowly unfolded to the ground. Mrs. Dullahan was watching Jason and his friends closely as Mortimer wheeled her onto the hydraulic platform.
“What are you waiting for?” Mitch slapped the side of the van. “Let’s go, let’s go.”
Jason didn’t want to open the rear door of the van and give Mrs. Dullahan a look at all the instruments inside. He opened the side door and saw Erin sitting in one of the two back seats. She smiled at him, and for a moment, he completely forgot what he was doing.
“Jason, did you miss the part where we’re running really, really late?” Dred asked.
Jason shook his head. He glanced at Mrs. Dullahan again, who rose up as the platform lifted. Then he climbed in and slid his guitar case between the back seats, and dropped the backpack on the floor. He finally remembered to smile back at Erin.
“Close the door!” Dred said. She threw it in reverse and backed down his driveway while he hurried to slam the door.
“Who’s that lady?” Erin asked.
“Mrs. Dullahan.”
“What’s she doing at your house?” Dred asked.
“Having coffee with my mom.”
They pulled into the street. When Dred put it in drive, the side door of the black van closed. The black van immediately started following them. Mortimer must have already been in the driver’s seat, though Jason couldn’t tell for sure, because the windshield was tinted black. Jason was pretty sure that wasn’t legal.
“Isn’t this exciting?” Erin asked him. “Our first show, Jason!”
“Yeah, it’s great,” Jason said. He couldn’t stop looking out the rear window at the noiseless black van that followed them like a shadow.
“I’m so nervous. Aren’t you nervous?” Erin asked.
“Yeah, very nervous,” Jason said. He looked at her and tried to smile through his fear. He’d expected Erin to be cold after she’d rejected him, or treat him like a freak. If anything, she was acting friendlier than usual to him. Maybe she felt sorry for him.
“Why is Mrs. Dullahan following us?” Dred asked.
“Is she going to the show?” Mitch asked.
“Didn’t you tell me you snuck into the fairy world through a door in her yard?” Erin asked.
“Yeah, I did,” Jason said. “She’s the guardian of the gate. She’s kind of supernatural, or something.”
“A monster!” Grizlemor appeared in a puff of smoke next to Erin’s feet.
“A monster!” Erin screamed, pulling away from him.
“No, not me,” Grizlemor said. “The dullahan. I’m a goblin, not a monster.”
“What’s the difference?” Erin asked.
“Hmph.” Grizlemor sat on the floor.
“Uh, Dred,” Mitch said. “There’s a little green man in your van.”
“He’s with me,” Jason said. “He’s okay.”
“Why do you call her ‘the’ dullahan?” Erin asked.
“That’s what she is. One of the most dangerous sort of darkfae,” Grizlemor said.
“Dangerous sort of what?” Mitch asked.
“Some fairies are drawn to evil magic,” Grizlemor said. “Fairies being power-hungry nutters. The more they use the evil magic, the more it twists them into monsters.”
The black van stayed close behind them as they drove away from Jason’s neighborhood. Now Erin was watching out the back window, too.
“Is this something we should worry about?” Erin asked.
“If she follows us all the way to Minneapolis, yes,” Jason said.
“So, what’s with the goblin?” Mitch asked Jason.
“He comes with the instruments.”
“A ‘roadie,’” Grizlemor said, winking at Jason. “That’s the correct term, right?”
“Oh, cool, a built-in roadie,” Mitch said. “Man, these instruments just get better and better.”
Grizlemor rolled his eyes.
“So Mrs. Dullahan is an evil fairy,” Dred said. “Awesome. What does she want with us?”
“She’s trying to figure out who used the fairy doors she’s supposed to guard,” Grizlemor said. “Because somebody trampled around breaking things, not being cautious like me.” He glared at Jason.
“So she’s after Jason?” Erin looked alarmed. Weirdly, that made Jason feel better. For somebody who didn’t want to date him, she really seemed worried about him.
“Mrs. Dullahan doesn’t know it’s me for sure,” Jason said. “She only suspected me because my mom made me offer to do yard work for her. I don’t think she actually saw me when I went in and out of the door.”
“She didn’t,” Grizlemor said. “She was away on the Hunt. That’s why you were able to get in and out of Faerie without her stopping you.”
“What Hunt?” Jason asked.
“It’s a darkfae entertainment. You don’t want to know more.” Grizlemor shuddered. “That’s one thing about the Queen hiring these monsters. Darkfae are dangerous, but they aren’t the most diligent employees.”
“I think she’s turning away,” Erin said.
Everybody looked back. The black van glided off down a narrow wooded lane, towards Mrs. Dullahan’s house.
“She’s going home,” Jason sighed.
“So we’re good?” Dred asked.
“I think so,” Jason said.
Dred stepped on the accelerator. As they left town, Dred played some Prince over the stereo, and their mood began to lift.
Chapter Twenty-Five
A security guard stopped them at the parking area near the Sculpture Garden. The area was packed with vendor booths selling food and drinks, plus a row of Port-A-Poopers. People were everywhere, most of them Jason’s age or slightly older.
“This lot’s closed,” the security guard told them, leaning in at Mitch’s window.
“We’re supposed to play tonight. We’re the Assorted Zebras,” Mitch said, pointing toward the stage that had been built for the event. Another band was playing there now, a dozen people using a wide assortment of bells and whistles. According to the banner hanging behind them, that was the band name, Bells and Whistles.
The security guard stepped away and spoke quietly into his walkie-talkie. After a minute, a second man arrived. He had long black hair and a turtleneck shirt, headphones with a big antenna and a built-in microphone, plus a clipboard thick with papers.
“Yes, I am Franco,” he said, in some kind of European accent that wasn’t quite French and wasn’t quite Spanish. “I am ze stage manageur. You are ze Angry Zebras, yes?”
“The Assorted Zebras,” Mitch corrected.
“Ah…you should be ze Angry Zebras. More passion! More fire!” Franco made a fist.
“We’ll think about it,” Dred said. “Can you tell me where to park?”
“I zaw your videos, no?” Franco said. “The music was, how do you say, muy fantastique.” Franco kissed his fingertips at Mitch. “Ze use of cinéma vérité technique, ze destruction of suburbia…it was quite ze statement.”
“I’ll tell Tadd you said that,” Mitch said. “Parking?”
“Zis parking area is all full,” Franco said. “You are very late. You must park in ze alley across ze street. I will send ze stagehands to help with your gear.”
“That won’t be necessary.” Grizlemor hopped up onto the middle console. He had changed his appearance a little, making his skin less green and more of a pinkish human color, and his pointy ears had shrunk, their tips tucked under his cap. “Whatever these guys can’t carry, I can.”
“Your friend,” Franco said. “He is a dwarf, no?”
“A dwarf!” Grizlemor shouted. “I hate dwarves! I sneak up behind them and pull their pants down at public events! Dwarf, indeed. I’ll make you a dwarf!”
“He prefers the word, um, ‘midget,’” Erin said.
“Midge
t? Is midget not ze more offensive term?”
“He’s a little odd,” Jason said. “We’ll be right back.”
Dred drove across the street and parked in the alley. The four band members took everything they could carry, Erin and Jason helping with the keyboards and drums. Grizlemor stacked the remaining black instrument cases into a wobbly tower on top of himself, so that only his dirty leather shoes could be seen under them.
They walked across to the park, where Franco was waiting with his arms crossed, tapping his feet, checking his watch, doing everything he could to let them know they were taking too long.
“Right zis way,” Franco said when they caught up with him. He showed them where to leave their instruments near the stage. People were everywhere—stagehands, security, musicians, electricians. A huge stage had been built overlooking the lawn around the Spoonbridge and Cherry sculpture, which was a giant spoon holding a giant cherry in the middle of a pond. The Garden was full of giant sculptures, but that one was the most famous.
“Ze hospitality tent is down here.” Franco led them to a huge shaded tent with mesh walls, nodded at the security guard as they entered. Inside, the large tent had clusters of folding chairs where the bands were all lounging, cooled by electric fans. Franco led them to an unoccupied cluster of chairs near the back.
“Help yourselves to ze craft service table,” Franco said. He indicated a picnic table piled high with Doritos, Snickers, boxes of Reese’s Pieces, and rolled-up sandwiches cut into circles. A plastic tub of ice was filled with Red Bulls, Cokes and Yoo-hoos.
“Wow!” Mitch said, grabbing Doritos and Reese’s Pieces on the way to a chair.
“I trust zis is to your liking?” Franco asked.
“It’s awesome!” Mitch leaned back in his chair, while Dred swiped a bag of ranch Doritos from him and tore it open.
“Let us know if you need anything,” Franco said as he walked away. “I will alert when it is time for your set-up.”
“Thanks!” Jason said.
“How’s everybody doing?” Mitch asked, in the general direction of the nearest band. They ignored him, though, and kept talking among themselves.
“This is so exciting!” Erin said. She flung her arms around Jason’s waist, and Jason hugged her close. He couldn’t help his feelings for her, even if they weren’t exactly welcome. She hugged Mitch and Dred, too.
Soon, Erin’s friends Parker and Kennedy arrived, chatting happily, and bustled Erin to a chair away from the group. They pulled up their own chairs and opened bags of cosmetics they’d brought with them.
“How do you want your eyes?” Kennedy asked.
“All I can think is, put some color all around them, like an old glam-rock thing,” Erin said, grinning. “Just the eyes, though. I don’t want my whole face looking like that.”
“You’ll need tons of glitter,” Parker said, setting out tubes of it on the counter.
“Hey, Dred, want your make-up done?” Erin asked.
“Yeah, we have everything here!” Kennedy waved at the bags.
“Nope,” Dred said. She tied on a kerchief printed with cartoony pink skulls. She wasn’t wearing any makeup. Her baggy t-shirt, shorts and sandals were a contrast to Erin’s thrift-store dress with its faded psychedelic floral print.
“It’ll look great, I promise!” Parker said.
“Nah, I don’t want it sweating all over me,” Dred said, leaning back and propping her feet on another chair. “Nobody looks at the drummer, anyway. Erin’s our front man.”
“Where’s Zach?” Kennedy asked.
“Is he here yet?” Parker asked.
Jason sank to a chair facing Mitch and Dred. He wasn’t going to get in another word with Erin, with her friends hovering around her.
“He can’t make it,” Erin said. “He’s starring in a commercial in Chicago. Uncle Otto’s Authentic German Pizza.”
“That’s so hot,” Parker said.
“Awww!” Kennedy squealed. “I bet he’ll be sad he missed all this!”
Jason tried not to listen.
“Are you ready for this, Jason?” Mitch asked.
“Doesn’t really matter, does it?” Jason said. “The instruments will take care of everything.”
“Mitch and I were talking about the set list,” Dred said. “We think it would be good to begin and end with cover songs, just to be safe.”
“Safe?” Jason asked.
“People like songs they already know,” Mitch said. “We’ll do a couple of those songs we used to goof around with.”
“Those don’t always turn out well,” Jason said.
“The instruments will know what to do,” Mitch told him. “They’re smart like that.”
“That’s why the dullahan is so eager to find them,” Grizlemor said. He was sitting on the grassy ground, stuffing peanut M&M’s into a rolled turkey sandwich. He took a big, crunchy bite and talked with his mouth full, spraying bits of sandwich and candy. “The fairies invest a lot of magic into their music.”
“The dullahan is after our instruments?” Mitch asked.
“Oh, of course,” Grizlemor said as he chewed. “Even if she doesn’t return them to the Queen, she’ll want them for her own nefarious purposes.”
“What Queen?” Dred asked.
“The fairy queen,” Jason said. “Let’s not worry about it right now. I like the idea of doing the cover songs, that’ll juice up the crowd. Let’s do that.”
“Good, we agree. Go tell Erin.” Mitch opened a Yoo-Hoo and picked up a Snickers.
“If the chatterbrains will shut up for a second,” Dred whispered.
Jason looked across the room at Erin. After a minute, Kennedy and Parker left for the bathroom, giggling and chatting with each other nonstop. Jason didn’t know how they could hear each other, when neither of them ever stopped talking.
He approached Erin, who was checking her dark red lips in a cosmetic mirror. With all the glittering make-up, she looked almost like a different person, some model from a magazine.
“Erin?” he said. She smiled brightly at him in the mirror.
“Hi, Jason. Want to sit down?”
He took the chair beside her and told her Mitch and Dred’s ideas about their set list.
“Sounds good to me,” Erin said. She turned and looked him in the eyes. “Is there something else?”
“Yeah.” Jason fidgeting in his chair while he reached into his jeans pocket. He took out a square of folded notebook paper. “You know I don’t really write songs, right?”
“Right…”
“But this one I’ve kind of been working on. I thought you might like it, or you might take a look at it, or something. It’s called ‘Angel Sky.’”
“You wrote a song? That’s really cool.” She smiled at him, holding his eyes with hers, while her hands unfolded the page.
“You don’t have to read it now or anything,” Jason said.
“I want to.” Erin looked at the page. As she read, her smile faded, and a serious look came over her face. She looked up at him. “Jason, is this—”
“There’s our girl!” Kennedy said as she and Parker returned. They took up posts on either side of Erin, as if to block Jason from getting too close to her. Their endless conversation took over, and soon Jason moved back to join the rest of the band.
“Grizlemor was saying maybe we should go easy with the instruments, if we don’t want to wreck any more buildings,” Jason said.
The goblin, who hadn’t stopped stuffing his face, gave a thumbs-up.
“We want to blow this crowd away, though,” Mitch said.
“We don’t have to try so hard,” Jason said. “Just play kind of lightly. Let the magic do its thing.”
“Sounds good to me,” Dred said. “I don’t want to make any more earthquakes, with all these people around. And I’d really hate to be the person who broke the Spoonbridge and Cherry.”
They heard the sound of instruments tuning out on the stage, and then a huge crowd scre
aming.
“Who’s the next act?” Jason asked.
“Programmed Chaos,” Mitch said. “Some local band.”
“They’re great,” Dred told him. “Their songs are like social and political criticism with an ironic pop overlay.”
Jason shrugged. “Okay. Sounds good.”
Eventually, Programmed Chaos began to play their first song, “The White House is Their House,” which had gotten some attention from college radio stations across the Midwest, as well as NPR.
“Oh, Programmed Chaos!” Erin said, jumping up from her chair. Her friends followed her toward the stage.
“Their singer is so cute!” Kennedy said.
“He really is,” Erin agreed. Then she stopped at the door. “Are you coming, Jason?”
“Me?”
“Yeah, let’s go watch,” Dred said as she stood up.
Jason caught up with Erin, while Dred and Mitch followed. The six of them left the room, leaving Grizlemor alone to wolf his way across the refreshment table. Mitch tried again to wave to the other bands, but nobody would look at them. Jason wondered if they resented how the coordinator had kicked out another band to make room for the Zebras, who hadn’t even auditioned.
They stood to one side of the stage, watching the band. Erin and her two friends danced along with the music.
Jason looked out at the quiet, bored-looking audience of thousands, most of them teenagers. The show had sold out and the park was packed, but nobody seemed to be getting into the music.
Programmed Chaos, which consisted of three college-aged guys, finished their first song. They received sparse applause and scattered boos.
“Rough crowd,” Mitch said.
The band went into their second song, and the whole crowd starting booing halfway through. By the third song, the crowd started chanting “Ze-bras! Ze-bras!” and stomping their feet.
“Oh no,” Erin whispered. “I feel bad for them.”
“I feel bad for us,” Dred said. “We have to play for this audience, too.”
The band hurried through another song while the crowd drowned out their music, chanting for the Assorted Zebras. The crowd pelted the band with lemonade cups, soft pretzels, and shoes.
