Rock 'n Roll Heaven by Shawn Inmon

Author:Shawn Inmon [Inmon, Shawn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy
Publisher: Pertime Publishing
Published: 2014-03-25T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

It was still fully light outside. Maybe Jim Morrison was right, and the days really did last forever here.

They climbed the stairs up out of the cellar and stepped back onto the golden road. Pertime and Buddy led Jimmy further on into the sixties section of Rock ‘n Roll Heaven, past other clubs big and small. They all looked dark and closed up. In most cases, Jimmy knew instantly who belonged to which club. Mama’s Place had to belong to Cass Elliott. Canned Heat Blues? Bob Hite or Alan Wilson. Now and then, he had to ask his guides. When they walked by Hamlet, which looked like a typical '60s nightclub, Jimmy couldn’t make any connection to a combined Shakespeare buff and rock ‘n roller.

“Hamlet belongs to Richard Manuel, from The Band,” Pertime said. “He named it after the dog he had when he lived up at Big Pink with Bob Dylan and the rest of The Band.”

“To be, or not to be…” Jimmy left it at that.

The next mystery was a huge grass hut with a wooden sign out front: Neptune’s Cocktail. Jimmy puzzled over it for a few moments but gave up. “That’s Dennis Wilson’s place," said Pertime. "I don’t know what a Neptune’s cocktail is, but it won't get you drunk, since it's here.”

Buddy said with a wink: “But if anyone was gonna figure out how to make booze around here, it just might be Dennis. Let’s go ask him.”

“Is he there?” Jimmy asked. “Man, I loved the Beach Boys.”

“Only one way to find out,” Buddy said.

They stepped off the golden road and immediately onto sand, which flowed all the way inside the hut. It was light outside, but murky inside, lit only by tiki torches.

Behind the bar was man with a bushy beard and long, unkempt hair. He wore an unbuttoned shirt and board shorts, feet bare. Sitting on a stool across the counter was a black man in slacks and a subdued herringbone sport coat. “This is Dennis Wilson and Sam Cooke," said Buddy. "Boys, this is Jimmy Velvet.”

Dennis Wilson came out from behind the bar with athletic grace, and he and Sam Cooke both shook Jimmy’s hand. Dennis said, “Welcome to the land of the non-living. I’d offer you a drink, but there is no such thing here. We do our best without it.”

Jimmy smiled and said, “I don’t think I’ll ever get used to this. Meeting you both is something special.”

Buddy leaned in and said, “We’re taking Jimmy on the tour. He asked us why you call your place Neptune’s Cocktail, and we had to admit that we don’t know.”

“Yeah, well, it’s a surfer term. When you’ve surfed for a while, you learn that when you’re going to wipe out, you hold your breath so you don’t swallow a bunch of salt water. Before you figure that out, though, you end up with a belly full of ocean—Neptune’s Cocktail. When I first got here, I felt a lot like I didn’t belong, so I thought that was a fitting name.

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