Sharon gave a low whistle. The band whistled back.
“Xavier Desmond High School Jazz Band, please take the stage.”
“Play great,” Michelle whispered to Adesina. Adesina gave her a nervous smile, then followed Sharon.
Michelle, Robin, and Wally waited in the wings. The band settled into their chairs and put their music on the stands provided. Adesina and Asti plugged into their respective amps. Antonia set up her snare and played a couple of experimental riffs, then adjusted the provided drum kit to her liking. Marissa and Ghost played a few bars of “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing),” which made the kids in the audience laugh.
“If you’re ready,” said Dr. Smith.
Sharon raised her right hand, and the band immediately gave her their attention. Then she gave an upbeat and the band came in playing a medium-tempo version of Thelonious Monk’s “’Round Midnight.”
The bass laid down a soft beat with the drums. Asti started playing his guitar on the second bar. Peter, Sean, and Marissa each came in on subsequent bars. Peter stood and began playing the song’s haunting melody. Playing it straight at first. Then gradually looping around it, changing it, playfully manipulating it.
He handed the solo off to Ghost. Michelle had expected her to play the sax, but she was on the clarinet instead. Ghost didn’t toy with the melody as Peter had; instead, she played it straight, but so sad and mournfully it made Michelle want to cry.
Asti came in as Ghost finished her last note. Where her solo had been a virtuoso performance of wringing feeling from every simple note, his was complicated, building on some kind of internal variation of the melody he was channeling.
Then Asti stopped. A few bars later Marissa had her turn. Her fingers flew over the keyboard. Like Asti’s, her solo was complicated, but where his had been strangely discordant to Michelle, Marissa’s made sense to her uneducated ear.
As Marissa’s solo ended, the band locked back into a tight groove. They played the original melody a few more times. Then they slowed and each instrument dropped out one at a time until only Adesina’s bass remained. She played for another bar, then stopped.
There was appreciative applause from the audience. Everyone in the Mob broke out in big smiles. Michelle let out a sigh of relief.
But there was no time to wait between songs. Sharon counted them in and they zipped into a hot and fast rendition of “Jetboy Jump.” As with “’Round Midnight” each musician took his or her turn at a solo—even Adesina. Between solos, the band would stop and they would all sing “Jetboy Jump” in unison, then whip back into the music.
This time after each solo, the audience applauded. At the end, they got whoops and yeahs! in addition to enthusiastic clapping.
As the Mob grabbed their music and started to leave the stage, black smoke suddenly began pouring into the auditorium, coming from beneath the stage. Profoundly stinky black smoke.
Are all the rotten eggs in here? Along with a generous topping of cat pee? Sweet baby Jesus! Michelle thought.
“Okay, guys,” Michelle said, holding her hand over her nose and breathing through her mouth. Now it felt like she had rotten eggs and cat pee in her mouth. “We need to get out of here. Who knows what’s going on. It might be a fire.”
Sharon began whistling and signing.
Despite this admonition, the kids picked up their instruments and scurried offstage.
Just then, there was an ominous creaking overhead. Michelle looked up. The bank of lights just behind the setup for the bands was swaying. Yeah, that’s so not good.
“Look out!” Then Robin was sliding past her, stretching himself under the lights like a giant flesh pillow as they came crashing down.
The lights bounced off him and slammed into Michelle. They gave her a little whap and her belly pudged out with some fat. It felt wonderful.
What didn’t feel wonderful was the stinking smoke, which seemed to be getting worse. It burned the hell out of her throat. She started coughing, then got up to see if Robin was okay. He’d pulled himself together into the semblance of a human shape and was pushing himself up from the floor. He didn’t look quite right. Michelle grabbed his arm to steady him.
“Let’s get out of here,” she said.
Robin nodded. His face was contorted and squishy. “What an incredible smell you’ve discovered,” he replied as he began coughing, too.
“Funny guy,” she said. “Are you just trying to earn your geek badge of honor?”
They ran down the stage stairs and up the aisle toward the lobby doors. “Nope,” he said, half coughing, half laughing. “Already got that one.”
Outside, God’s Weenies were in full swing. Their ranks had swelled to fifty and in unison they were chanting: “Jokers are scum! Keep us pure! Jesus hates jokers! Jokers are scum! Keep us pure! Jesus hates jokers! Jokers are scum! Keep us pure! Jesus hates jokers!”
New signs were on display: JOKERS WILL RESIDE IN HELL. JOKER LOVERS WILL RESIDE IN HELL. HELL IS FOR JOKER SCUM.
Oh, c’mon, God’s Weenies, you can do better than that, Michelle thought. How about JOKERS ARE ICKY AND WE DON’T LIKE THEM. Or maybe I’M AFRAID I MIGHT TURN INTO A JOKER, SO I’M BEING A BIG WUSS. Hmmmmmm, too wordy.
It occurred to her that God’s Weenies might have had something to do with the stink bomb. But she couldn’t figure out how they could get into the building and set it off without someone seeing them.
Coming up the drive in front of the auditorium was a police officer on a bike. He looked sweaty and tired.
“Who’s in charge here?” he asked wearily. He took his helmet off and mopped his forehead with a bandanna he’d pulled from his back pocket. Dark hair was sweat-plastered against his head. Across his forehead was a dark red mark where his helmet had rested. He had a broad nose, tawny skin, and walnut-colored eyes. And he wore the police bike patrol outfit: short-sleeved shirt and shorts that showed off his well-muscled legs.
Michelle looked around. All the other chaperones were with their bands and she couldn’t see Dr. Smith anywhere.
“I guess I am,” she replied. Her Committee voice kicked in. It seemed to be doing that a lot since they had arrived in San Antonio. “At least for now. And you are?”
“Officer Reyes. I got a call there was a disturbance here. Is it them?” He jerked his thumb toward God’s Weenies.
“Well, they are being a pain,” Michelle replied. “But the reason we called the police was because a stink bomb went off in the auditorium.”
The officer gave her a long-suffering stare. “A stink bomb?” he said. “Really? You called the police for a prank?”
Now that he was saying it like that, it did seem a little bit of an overreaction. “Well, a bank of lights also fell on the stage right after the stink bomb went off.”
“So, one of the lighting techs screwed up.”
“It could have hit the children. I mean, the Mob had just finished playing. And they’re jokers! And those ass clowns hate them.” She pointed at God’s Weenies and took a deep breath.
“Okay, tell you what. You and I will go back into the auditorium and we’ll look around. You can’t get hurt, right? You’re the Amazing Bubbles, right?”
“Yes,” she began. “But…”
“Ma’am, let’s just get this over with.” He sighed. “I don’t know what I did to get the cycle shift and the kiddie calls, but here we are. You get a bunch of teenagers together, there’s always going to be one idiot in the crowd.”
Michelle pointed at God’s Weenies. “Well, what about them?”
Officer Reyes got off his bike. He dropped the kickstand. Then he walked over to God’s Weenies. “Okay,” he said loudly.
The Purity Baptist Church continued to chant, “Jesus hates jokers!”
“For crying out loud, y’all settle down!”
God’s Weenies just chanted louder.
“
Protesters, move away from the auditorium stairs,” he said again. “Or I’ll make sure the press doesn’t come close to here if you don’t knock it off!”
The chanting stopped abruptly.
“Now move away from the steps, please,” Officer Reyes said. God’s Weenies shuffled down a few steps. “Now you know that’s not what I meant. Go on down to the bottom, then down the driveway a piece.”
“We might as well go home,” said one of the protesters. Michelle recognized him from the other day: Earl Walker.
“That’s right, Officer,” said Betty Virginia. She wore an acid-green pantsuit today and her hair had a large magenta-colored, jeweled bow stuck in the middle of it. “We’re just here doing the Lord’s work. And also trying to make sure those jokers don’t infect our city any more than it has been.”
“It’s wrong for our police to come and make us stop!” said the twins in unison. Today they wore T-shirts that had the word “Joker” with the universal sign for “No” superimposed over it.
“Well, there’s nothing here to protest,” Officer Reyes continued. He sighed. “I imagine things are over for the day.”
With an impressive amount of whining, God’s Weenies began walking down the driveway toward Auditorium Circle.
“Mrs. Pond,” Officer Reyes said, “this is the way we prefer to deal with things of this nature here. I think we’ll try and keep this as low-key as we possibly can.”
“I realize that I may have overreacted,” Michelle said acerbically. She did not like being on the defensive. “But they were threatening the children, some of them are armed, and all I did was restrain them harmlessly for a few minutes.”
He shook his head. “Ma’am,” he began. And now he sounded so long-suffering that it irritated the hell out of her. “Ma’am, this is Texas, where almost anyone can be armed. But restraining people against their will, now that’s a crime.”
“It’s only a crime if there isn’t a threat,” Michelle said. She was bullshitting, but hoped he wouldn’t want to get into it. “I’d argue they were acting in a threatening manner.”
The cop shrugged. “I agree that you could see it that way,” he said. “But let’s face it, you scared the piss out of them and you are one hell of an ace. It’s hardly a balanced situation. It being asymmetrical and all.”
This really irked Michelle. “They weren’t threatening me! They were threatening those teenagers. They had guns!”
“Ma’am,” he said, “I shouldn’t even be here. Childish pranks are childish pranks. But I’d like to get into some air-conditioning. It’s beautiful weather, right up until you’ve been riding a cycle all morning.”
The stench from the stink bomb was horrible, but not quite as bad as it had been. The AC had been cranked up to the meat locker setting. And after a few hours of looking for any other threat, she had to admit that Officer Reyes had been right about it being a prank.
“Are you going to talk to the kids?” Michelle asked.
“Naw,” the officer said. “I think whoever did this is probably scared as hell. Let’s just let it ride. Teenagers can be idiots.”
“I still think that light bank falling is suspicious.”
“Ma’am,” the officer said, “sometimes a stink bomb is just a stink bomb. And sometimes people forget to cinch the pulley tight enough. Good thing the bomb went off when it did or someone might have been hurt by those falling lights.”
Michelle crossed her arms. She’d been around enough hinky shit that this was pinging her something’s-going-on sense. But she had no proof. Maybe she was being paranoid.
“I think we’re done here,” Officer Reyes said as they walked out of the auditorium. He put on his helmet and snapped the chin strap down. “I’m going to go file an incident report. Here’s my card. Call and leave a message if you need to. But I think you really don’t have a problem here.” With that, he rode down the handicap ramp and out of sight.
Just then, Priscilla Beecher arrived. “Miss Pond,” she said. She was a little out of breath, as if she’d been walking fast. “I’ve spoken with Dr. Smith. This incident is just a hiccup. Tomorrow morning she’ll announce the bands who are moving forward in the competition.”
Beats, Bugs, and Boys
Part 3
“WERE ANY OF THE jokers hurt?” LoriAnne asked with undisguised worry.
“They’re all fine,” Mr. Sloane reassured her, but his face stayed tense as he hustled them out of the Tobin Center and toward his vehicle.
LoriAnne desperately wanted more details, but she held back the rest of her questions. She’d never ever seen Mr. Sloane this angry. The jokers weren’t even his students, and he’d been ready to tear apart whoever had set off the smoke bomb and dropped the lights.
A shiver raced down her back. Someone could have been killed! What kind of monster attacked kids?
Everyone piled into the SUV then remained silent as Mr. Sloane drove out of the parking lot. A small cluster of protesters huddled on the sidewalk, but they didn’t do anything but watch Mr. Sloane drive past. LoriAnne had the feeling that if they’d set one toe on the street, he’d have gladly run them over.
After a couple of minutes he blew out a long breath, as if letting the anger go. “Y’all did a great job of keeping your heads back there,” he said, glancing at them in the rearview mirror. “I was very proud of how you stayed calm and followed instructions.”
“’Cause we’re aaaaawesome,” Greg said, preening.
Cassie frowned. “Mr. Sloane, you missed the turn for the hotel.”
His eyes crinkled. “We’re taking a little side trip.”
To everyone’s delight, the destination turned out to be an ice-cream parlor on the River Walk. “My treat,” Mr. Sloane told them, and even got a triple-scoop cone for himself. Once everyone had ice cream, the Folsom Funkalicious Four sat by the river and watched the tour boats and people go by. By unspoken agreement, no one mentioned the competition or what happened or when they might find out which two bands would get the axe this round.
LoriAnne kept the skeeters away from her bandmates and let the roller-coaster tension of the day leach from her body. After the band finished their treats, they wandered the shaded paths along the River Walk, unhurried and with no particular goal in mind. When they grew bored of the river, they headed over to the Alamo, since they could hardly visit San Antonio without seeing it. The Alamo was a lot smaller than LoriAnne expected, but she took lots of pictures and read the various information plaques.
It was nearly six P.M. by the time they made it back to the hotel. Mr. Sloane gathered them by the elevators and praised them once again for how well they’d performed. “Dinner is at eight in the ballroom, and curfew is at ten for all competitors,” he reminded them. “Everything else is free time. Y’all are good kids with good heads on your shoulders. Just remember, if you ever start to wonder if you’re doing something stupid, there’s a good chance you are.”
Howard bumped Greg with his sax case. “That’s easy for Greg. He’s always doing something stupid.”
“That’s right!” Greg said.
A pained expression swept over Mr. Sloane’s face. “Try to keep it to a minimum this week. For everyone’s sake.”
Housekeeping had cleaned the room, made up the beds, and opened the curtains wide. While Cassie carefully put her things away, LoriAnne dumped her stuff on the bed and went to the window. They’d arrived after dark yesterday, so this was her first chance to see San Antonio from the room.
“Well, we have a great view of a parking lot,” LoriAnne said with a laugh. Her gaze dropped lower. “And we’re right over the pool.” Oh man, a swim would be awesome right now. Not only did she still feel a bit grimy from barely showering this morning, but thanks to the smoke bomb, her mesquite-scented hair now also smelled like a rancid Fourth of July.
But best of all, there were jokers down there. Even from the seventh floor, LoriAnne had no trouble picking out shapes that weren’t quite standard human. Sure, she’d
succeeded in having a sort-of conversation with Antonia, but she still didn’t have any answers.
“I think I’ll go for a swim,” she said, then, to be polite, added, “Wanna come?”
“Maybe next time,” Cassie said, sorting through the books in her pack. “I’m going to do a little more sightseeing before it gets dark.”
LoriAnne hid her relief. Under any other circumstance she’d be totally okay with doing pool time with Cassie, but how was she supposed to pick joker brains with her bandmate listening in?
Decision made, she dug through her suitcase and silently thanked her dad for insisting she pack a swimsuit. He’d managed his worry about having his baby going so far away by making meticulous lists in order to be absolutely sure nothing was forgotten. It was why she had fourteen pairs of underwear. For a weeklong trip.
“Extra undies don’t take up much room,” he’d told her when she protested packing so many. “There’s nothing so sad as having a pile of dirty undies when you want clean ones.”
Her dad was full of golden advice-nuggets like that.
She hurried to the bathroom to change, tugged on shorts and a T-shirt over the suit, then stuffed a towel, her phone, and her keycard into her backpack.
“You’re taking your sticks?” Cassie cocked her head toward where they protruded from the side pocket.
“Just the practice ones,” LoriAnne replied, and tried not to sound defensive. Truth was, she brought her sticks darn near everywhere and practiced beats whenever possible.
Cassie gave her a teasing smile. “And I thought I was a nerd.”
LoriAnne grinned. “Dude, we’re in band. We’re all nerds.”
She took the elevator down, amusing herself with images of band-nerd jokers. As she approached the door to the pool area, a boy who couldn’t have been much older than LoriAnne stepped through and held it open for her.
“Hey, a bit of advice,” he said, and jerked his head toward the pool. “The jokers are out there, so you probably don’t want to go in the water.”
LoriAnne knew exactly what he was implying, but went ahead and offered him a perplexed look. “Why is that?”
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