Sugar -- A Tale of the Runoffs(50)

T

he first Monday of the month is the last money-day of the month. The current bills are either paid or spiked. We might as well party.
         The Stacks Volunteer Corpse plays in the Flush Bowl. Every sixty to ninety days, the Drainage District reverses flow. Tons of garbage are carried back and directed to this common point. The water flows over the edge, then through screened drains, leaving the trash in this vast canted bowl. A week later, the District sends in a crew. The surface they leave is polished, semi-elliptical and acoustically perfect. Places on the "toilet seat", the rim and the broad apron above the overflow edge, are first-come.
         The logo of the Volunteer Corpse is a scruffy Union soldier in a crude open coffin, narrowed at both ends. A strat-bodied no-name six-string with a curved ammunition magazine protruding from its lower edge is slung over his shoulders. His elbow is propped on the machine head so that his hand is raised, but limply.
         The band has been tinkering and tuning for twenty minutes. I can hear Bruce, on lead guitar, urging a ragged figure in a worn suit.          "Almost time, man. Get up, do your thing."
         "Nah, I don' think so."
         "Then gimme back the sawbuck."
         "You ain' gotta be that way!"
         "Yeah, I gotta be that way."
         "Jeez, awright." Halfway to his feet, he gets stranded, and Bruce wraps a huge tapered hand around his upper arm and hauls him upright.
         "Ladies and gentlemen, our own Vino Veritas!"
         The comic clears his throat, turns to spit. When his eyes meet Bruce's, he swallows. His voice is ragged, but clear.
         "You need a lawyer. Somebody stubbed your toe, or broke your back, or broke your heart. You are entitled to recover damages." The audience launches a cascade of cheers and catcalls.
         The comic's voice strengthens. "I will get you the most money in the least time, I promise." Roo-ooo, a low moan, swelling.
         "I will get you in front of the most liberal judge, I promise." Longer, lower and louder.
         "I will never take more in fees and expenses than your case is worth, I promise." Louder yet.
         "You can find me on Facebook, Twitter and Pornhub." A genuine laugh, scattered applause.
         The comic's voice drops. "I am a non-attorney spokesperson. I squeaked through law school, but I don't have the balls or the bucks to take a third shot at the bar exam. So fu-uck you!"
         We all shout, "FUCK YOU!" The approbation of the crowd reverberates in the Bowl. Vino drops on his butt, tumbles onto his back. He does an angel in non-existent snow.
         It wouldn't be a Volunteer Corpse concert without Vino Veritas.
         Bruce defines the playlist as "Classic, man, before rock was a bank of synths and four guys in funny hats." The band sings of the hour the lights go down in the city, baywater dawn. They do the song about the sweet-loving woman, the one about the night ... Beyond the standing crowd, they dance, those who can only hear the music.
         Even for her slender frame, seating along the rim is too tight to admit Minerva. I slide back to make her a lap. She folds her legs under and turns to speak into my left ear. She weighs most of nothing. On the thickness of my leg, still, she looks up to catch my eye.
         "They took Sugar."
         "Yeah, who took Sugar?"
         "The guys, those guys in the ... the camos."
         "You saw?"
         "No-o."
         "Anybody see?"
         "No, but ... Meric, she was doing so well!"
         "Did she break down and tell you about herself."
         "No. Uh, not yet."
         Half a lie is still a lie. "She bolted. They do that, you've said."
         "Yeah, and I should blush. But only if I'm wrong. Ask yourself, what if I'm not?"
         I shrug, because that always works.
         Minerva shoves me back against someone's legs and begins to crawl up my abs. She plants a foot, just misses my groin.
         The band slows for an acoustic set -- some anonymous horse, a truckload of bananas, a sad case on a payphone who doesn't even want his dime back ...
         She lied. Women and all of their crap, fine. Until a lie.
         "We intro the band before the finale, because nobody'll pay attention after." A precise ticking starts in the background, wooden stick on the chromed rim of a snare, or maybe a trap, heartbeat of a wind-up moose. "Starting on the Rolands and the Yamaha, Billie Barrie Elton." Billie is a petite brunette in high heels and short skirt. She has the witchy look of thin lips, nose bump and deep-set eyes -- over a taunting, sexy smile. tk-tk ...
         "Behind me, the only living bass player of the last fifty years, Lee Sklar." The bassist appears to be a Maori warrior, but retired. "All the rest of us just fake it over his canned tracks." tk-tk ...
         "On the Guild modern lute, Damiano de Angeles." He's younger, image of a Lord Byron-ish Berkeley undergrad. A sussurous of feminine sighs eddies around me. He touches off a few twanging notes, then leans into his mike. He intones, "Creole, baby." He sounds a little, a very little, like Elvis. tk-tk ...
         "On the player pee-yana, Fast Eddie from Callahan's." We all shout, "Everybody knows Fast Eddie!" tk-tk ...
         "On the stomach Steinway, Rhysling the Space Lawyer!" The instrument hanging from his shoulders sounds definitely rock-and-roll, definitely not polka. I think back to an isolated mention of David Gilmour and a pedal steel. Something about removing the E string ... tk-tk ...
         "Far end of the stage, on the sexyphone," and the audience groans, "Blackbird Rafe!" He plays a riff and we know he'll always keep moving, know he's never gonna stop moving. tk-tk ...
         "Pounding away in the back, Silent Karen. She don't wanna work --" Karen does a fast round of complex beats, then blows up her bass drum, BOOM, Boom, boom. The band shouts, She just wan' to bang on de drum all day! tk-tk ...
         "And that was our vocal crew, the Soloist's Choir! I'm Bruce "Springs" Deen! We do one more, and that's our show, and we will never be here again. So take it easy, everybody!"
         But what if Minerva is not wrong? I'd had to settle for a small piece of those guys. I've never liked to settle. Hell, I've heard this song before. I give up my seat.