Thunderbowl Read online

  “Okay, okay. I was just goofing. I’m sorry,” Drek apologized. I knew he wasn’t threatening me anyway.

  Just then the girl came up and started talking to me. “I liked your music,” she said. “I think you blew them all away.” She had long brown hair and a funny crooked smile. She said her name was Suzanne. “Can I buy you a beer?”

  I didn’t want a beer. I wasn’t used to drinking. I wanted to go home. I was tired. But it had been so long since a girl, any girl, had been interested in me that I couldn’t just walk away.

  “Be a gentleman,” Drek urged, pushing a ten-dollar bill into my hand. “Buy the lady a beer.”

  So I left the guys and sat down at a table and bought her a beer. And then she bought me one. That’s how it started. We had this incredibly dumb conversation about different guys she had gone out with. They all sounded like slobs or jerks. She said she had even gone out once with Richie Gregg. Now she hated his guts. Who didn’t?

  When I got around to looking at my watch, it said one-fifteen. I was thinking about my parents. I was thinking about the homework I should have finished for tomorrow. I felt a little polluted from the beer. And scared. I’m not sure why. Things were moving too fast.

  The music had made me a lot higher than the beer. I didn’t want to come down. I looked at Suzanne. I looked around at the crowd thinning out of The Dungeon. And I looked again at my watch. I knew that this whole scene was going to be my downfall.

  And I couldn’t wait to get started.

  Chapter Four

  I was still dreaming that I was up on stage when my old man stormed into my bedroom. He walked over to the window and snapped the shade so it flipped up to the top. Sunlight poured in like someone had just turned on a spotlight.

  “Jeremy, get up! Where were you last night?” He was walking back and forth in front of me.

  “Yeah, well… it’s just that… well, the band… we were playing and—”

  “Don’t start telling me Thunderbolt—”

  “Thunderbowl, Dad.”

  “Whatever. We didn’t raise you to be a… a guitar player.” His voice was getting louder and louder.

  “Dad, you don’t understand. Something happens when I’m playing music—”

  “Yeah, I’ll say something happens. You start forgetting about real life. I should never have bought you that guitar. I’m going to put my foot down. You have to get home at a sensible hour or quit the band.”

  He was still pacing back and forth, ranting and raving. I stumbled out of bed and picked my clothes up off the floor. I didn’t want to hear another word. All I wanted was to get out of there. Forget the socks. I put on my shoes and walked out. So I was a few minutes late for home-room. You’d have thought I had just set off World War Three.

  When I got home for dinner, Dad had cooled down. His company had landed a big fat contract, and as far as he was concerned all was right with the world. He had had his talk with me and now he figured I would do the right thing.

  “Well, Jeremy? Have you given some thought to what we talked about this morning?” he said as we sat down around the dinner table.

  “Dad, I can’t quit the band until they find another guitar player.” I was just stalling. No way was I giving up Thunderbowl.

  “But you are going to quit?” he asked.

  I stared off into space and played with my food.

  “We’re just worried that you might be getting into some bad habits,” my mother said.

  “And you are staying out way too late,” my father added. “When I was your age, I had to be in bed by ten o’clock.”

  “Look,” I said, “at night is the only time we can get together to practice. Drek and Al don’t get off work until six-thirty. And we’ve come so far together. You may not believe it, but we are getting really good. I can’t let them down now.”

  There was no way I could tell them the news about our gig at The Dungeon. “But I promise I’ll spend more time on my homework. I’ll bring my grades up in everything. Even math.” I made it sound like I had it all figured out.

  My parents looked at each other. Some unspoken message passed between them. “We’ll give it a try,” my mother said. My dad looked like he had heartburn.

  “Great. Thanks.” We were just one big happy family again. For now.

  I juggled the late nights, the band and school pretty well for the first week. Then the homework and a looming math test got me unglued.

  I mean, I never really liked school. I was terrible at math. English was totally boring. French was as much fun as throwing up. And then there was Modern World Problems. Oh yeah, like we were really going to learn to solve it all. So there I was at midnight, sitting at a table in The Dungeon, hunched over my homework.

  “What are you doing?” Suzanne asked.

  “Unreal numbers,” I answered.

  She looked at me like I had just arrived from outer space. “Huh?”

  “It’s a hobby of mine.” I wasn’t going to admit I was still in high school.

  Suzanne smiled her kind-of-cute, kind-of-goofy smile. “Yeah,” she said, “me too.”

  I had a math test second period and I was trying to figure out what an unreal number was. But it was awful hard with her looking at me like that.

  “You really are… different,” Suzanne said.

  I thought she really meant I was a bit of a nerd. She was hooked on the Germ who played guitar on stage. And she didn’t know what to make of the Jeremy who studied unreal numbers.

  I really liked Suzanne, even though she was older than I was. And I was flattered that she was coming on to me.

  The break was over. As I headed back onto the stage, Suzanne blew me a kiss. I picked up my guitar and threw my math book into my guitar case. Then I flicked on the amp and in a flash we were blasting into “Traction.” It was a loud metal song.

  “Kick it!” Drek yelled at me above the roar. He meant for me to get a little mean, a little crazy.

  So I got a little mean. I got a little crazy. I gritted my teeth and scratched at the strings. I kicked on the flanger pedal and bent the strings to make them cry. The music was all about something very powerful. I didn’t know what. But I was good at playing like I was a wild man. Up on stage I could act any way I wanted. And it felt great just to cut loose.

  Chapter Five

  And then there was Richie Gregg. After the big discussion with my parents, Richie showed up to give me some advice too. I was outside the bar, trying to find the strength to heft my amp into Al’s van. Drek and Al were inside wrapping up wires.

  “Come here, jerk,” I heard a voice from behind me.

  I didn’t have to turn around to know who it was. Maybe if I blinked he would vanish back into the shadows.

  Fat chance of that. A bony hand grabbed my collar and twirled me around. I tried to keep the amp from cracking onto the sidewalk.

  Richie pulled me close. He was right in my face and he spat as he talked. “Twerp, you are about to quit your pissy little band,” he said. It was some sort of threat. Richie had this crazed look in his eye. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he was on something.

  I set the amplifier down hard on his foot and he backed off. “You can’t make me quit,” I told him.

  Richie smiled a perfect scumbag smile. “You quit or I’ll bust your face.”

  I was tired, really tired. Everything was such a major hassle. School. My soft-hearted parents. All I wanted to do was go home and go to sleep. Now this.

  Richie was baring his teeth, like the mongrel dog that he was. What could I say to Richie Gregg to get him off my case?

  “Man, you can’t solve anything with violence,” I said out of the blue. I sounded like a saint.

  Richie looked at me like I had just spoken to him in Swahili. I picked up the amp and tried to ignore him.

  Instead, Richie spun me around and planted a fist in my mouth. It was the first time in my life anyone had ever done that to me.

  He knocked out my front tooth, th
e jerk. It flew to the back of my mouth and down my throat. I choked on it for a second, then swallowed it. All the while I was falling backward into the bumper of the van. But it was like slow motion.

  At first there was this satisfied look on Richie’s face. Then he seemed kind of worried. Not scared, just worried. He inched away backward as I closed my eyes and tasted the sweet sticky flavor of my own blood.

  Al drove me to the hospital because I was covered in blood. The hospital called my parents. My mom and dad arrived and found me minus a front tooth. I told them I had tripped over an extension cord. I am pretty clumsy.

  My mother was so upset she could hardly speak. But Dad tore into me on the way home.

  “What are you doing with your life?” he asked.

  “I had an accident,” I answered.

  “Yeah, but Jeremy, something is happening to you. I don’t like it. You’ve got to settle down. Look at your face. You’re a mess.”

  “I’m okay,” I said.

  “Jeremy, it’s not just this. I ran into Mr. Langford, your English teacher, and he told me you are on a downhill slide at school. You can’t throw your life away. School is too important. And now… now this!”

  “Give me a break, Dad!” I said. I really didn’t need the hassles.

  Somehow it seemed more important than ever that I stay with it. I couldn’t let Richie think that he was going to get his way. Besides, I was hooked on the music.

  “No,” I said. “I’m not quitting.”

  Chapter Six

  Eventually the tooth came out of me the only way it could. Just like the doctor said it would.

  My dad sent me to his buddy, Dr. Hol-gate, who fitted me with a fake tooth that I could pop in and out. When I showed it to Suzanne, she said, “That’s really cute. I like it.”

  Thunderbowl was working on some new tunes. We were really pushing ourselves. The music had taken over and I loved every minute of it. I was becoming a better guitar-ist from all the practice and performance. And I kept pushing my limits, trying new things.

  But I kept falling asleep in school.

  “Try some of these pills,” Drek said, pouring some out of a little box into my hand one night.

  “No way. I’m not into uppers,” I told him.

  “Shoot. You buy this stuff over the counter. Not drugs. Just caffeine. Like in coffee.”

  I hated coffee. But I tried the stuff Drek gave me. It worked for a while, but it wasn’t enough. I couldn’t find time for fifty pages of reading in Modern World Problems. I had lost my grip on every important verb in the French language. My average in math was a lowly fifty-five, and I just couldn’t seem to find the time to get at Langford’s term paper, “Alternatives to War.”

  I didn’t fit in at school and I sure didn’t fit in at the club. All I really wanted out of life was music and sleep.

  Then one day I was sleeping my way through Langford’s class. The bell rang and I didn’t wake up. Everyone left but me. Langford tapped me on the shoulder.

  “Truth time, Jeremy,” he said.

  I woke up from a dream where I was running away from something. There was a long empty hallway. I don’t know what was after me. I was in a daze. I pulled my fake tooth out of my mouth and looked at it. I couldn’t remember where it came from.

  “Just mellow out for a minute,” Langford said.

  I yawned. “If I was any more mellow, I’d be dead.”

  Langford looked unhappy. “Jeremy, what happened to you? It’s like someone scooped out your brain and threw it in a ditch. You fall asleep in class. Your grades are in the sewer.”

  “Mr. Langford, I should tell you, I’m thinking of quitting school.” This had been building for a while. It had to be school or music. Not both.

  “Why?” he asked.

  “You wouldn’t understand,” I said.

  “Try me. I’m all ears.”

  “It’s just something I have to do.”

  Langford looked upset. He shook his head and didn’t say anything else. Then he walked away. I was left alone in a big empty classroom.

  That night, driving to The Dungeon with Al and Drek, I told them what I was thinking about school.

  “Forget about school,” Drek advised me. “You don’t need it. You’re going to be a legend in your own time.”

  Drek had hated school and quit. He had always been a failure in school even though he was smart. Drek could read music and electronics magazines twenty hours a day. But school just never clicked.

  “Stay in school,” Al told me. He acted like a father sometimes. “Summer’s coming soon and you won’t have no homework to worry about.”

  “Summer’s six months away,” I said.

  “Well, hang in there.”

  Great advice.

  Chapter Seven

  You know, I thought that would do it. Quitting school. Or at least my decision to quit school.

  But I kept putting it off. Langford knew and the guys in the band knew that I had decided. I wanted to wait for the right time to tell everyone else. Truth time, like Langford had said.

  I decided to tell Suzanne, though. She always wanted me to talk to her, but I never felt like I had anything to say.

  “Suzanne, I’ve decided to quit school,” I said.

  “Jeremy, I didn’t know you were in college.”

  “High school. I still go to high school.”

  Suzanne gave me one of her goofy smiles. “You’re not telling the truth.”

  “No, I’m younger than you. I should have told you. I’m not supposed to be playing here. Or drinking this beer.” I took a long hard swallow.

  “I bet you’re a virgin, too,” she said.

  “What?”

  “Sex,” she said. “I bet you haven’t had any.”

  “How would you know?”

  “I’m just guessing,” she answered. The conversation had turned weird awful quickly. And I wasn’t going to own up to the fact that I had never had sex.

  “Just because I’m young, it doesn’t mean I’ve led a totally sheltered life,” I said, maybe a bit too defensively.

  “I believe you,” she said. She bit her lip. “And I don’t care how old you are. I like you just the way you are.”

  “Well, I’m glad that’s out of the way.”

  “But I think it’s fine you’re quitting school. I never felt free until I was out of school.”

  “You finished?”

  “Well, yeah. But I didn’t have anything better to do.”

  The break was over. Time to crawl back into the music. “Just don’t tell anyone, please,” I said.

  “I won’t.” Suzanne went back to her drink. I went up on stage. Thunderbowl began to wail.

  Halfway through the set, I noticed that a guy had sat down with Suzanne. It was Ike from the Dogs. He had ordered a whole table full of beer. I started getting worried.

  Then I saw Ike pawing at her. At first she didn’t seem to mind. But I did.

  Now, Suzanne wasn’t exactly my girlfriend. And I was probably just one in a long string of her favorites. That’s the way she was. But I didn’t trust anyone in The Dungeon. Guys came here to meet girls. Al called the place “the meat market.” And Ike was not among my trusted friends.

  I saw Suzanne start to push back from him. Ike wouldn’t leave her alone.

  “Drek, let’s take a break now. I need to take care of some business,” I said.

  “Stewy won’t like it,” Drek answered.

  Al saw what I was worried about and backed me up. “Let Stewy twirl it in his ear.” Al announced our break. I unplugged my guitar.

  I walked over to Suzanne’s table, sat down behind the army of empty beer glasses. Suzanne looked like she’d had enough to drink.

  “How are you, Ike?” I asked.

  “I was fine until you showed up,” Ike answered.

  “Sorry to hear that,” I said.

  Suzanne started to giggle. Ike grabbed her wrist. Now what? I wondered.

  She was p
ulling back from him, but he wasn’t letting go. Man, I was getting mad. I knew I was about to get in over my head. I started to count my teeth with my tongue.

  “Let go of her, Ike, or you’ll be sorry,” I said. I was surprised at how convincingly it came out.

  “Who’s gonna make me?” he snapped. I suddenly noticed how much Ike looked like a caveman.

  “We’ll give it a try,” said a voice from behind him. It was Al, the steamroller. Alongside of him was Drek.

  Ike was ready to blow. Al would have had him out cold on the floor in ten seconds. I could have just stood back and watched.

  Just then, Stewy walked up. “Every-thing okay here, boys?”

  I smiled. “Yes. Just fine, sir.”

  “Good, good. I like all my customers to have a good time.”

  “Well, we were just leaving,” Suzanne said in a slurred voice. She grabbed my wrist and pulled me toward the door.

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “We’re leaving,” she said, fishing her car keys out of her purse.

  “Hey, I’ve got to play another set. Besides, you’ve had a lot to drink. You shouldn’t be driving.”

  Suzanne gave me a look that could burn through concrete. “Well, I’m leaving. With you or without you.” She was wobbling as she walked away. I couldn’t let her drive off like that.

  I followed her to her red Trans Am and got in. As soon as I sat down, she leaned over and kissed me hard on the mouth. She stuck her tongue halfway down my throat. I thought I’d choke. But I can’t say I wanted her to quit.

  Just as quickly she pulled away from me. She fired up the car. “Watch this,” she said and put the car in reverse, pushing the gas pedal to the floor. We lost a year’s worth of good tire tread in thirty seconds as she squealed out of the parking space. Next she jammed the Trans Am into first gear and tore out of there. I was sure we were going to get killed.

  “Slow down,” I yelled.