Shine Until Tomorrow by Carla Malden

Author:Carla Malden
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Rare Bird Books
Published: 2020-11-13T20:54:34+00:00

CHAPTER

14

“Why am I not surprised?” says Nina when Jimmy and I appear back at the house. I don’t even care that she’s so rude. Her whole tough-guy persona doesn’t scare me anymore; she has receded, like in those documentaries where the background shrinks into the distance so that the person the movie is about—the Nazi hunter or the anti-bio-engineered food crusader—stands out like a sort of paper doll 3-D cut-out.

“Whatever,” says Nina. “Move your ass. The guys are setting up at Frizzie’s. He’s giving us a slot.”

“Tonight?” asks Jimmy.

“Yup. And we have to make it great if we’re going to be ready for the Fillmore.”

—

Frizzie’s turns out to be a dingy coffee house, little more than a run-down room, movie theater dark, with a spit of a stage at one end. The voice coming from the stage is unmistakable: that sandpaper rasp. When I can finally focus in the darkness, I see Royce on stage, making love to the microphone clutched in his hand, one foot planted firmly on the base of the mic stand as if to prevent the thing from swooning under his spell. He doesn’t have a great singing voice, but it does have a quality that’s kind of compelling: something threatening, even dangerous, though his voice is not exactly what he’s selling.

I stand in the back of the room with Jimmy and the other guys, and Nina, too, listening as they talk to Frizzie, a gangly hippie with electrified hair. He’s giving them the low-down, explaining that they will have to set up fast, right after Royce. He nods in my direction. “I didn’t know you had two chicks in the band.”

“She’s not in the band,” Nina snaps. She cuts through the tables toward the front where Royce is finishing his set. There’s decent applause, enough so that when he leaps off the stage and struts past Jimmy, he says, “Follow that.”

P.J. and Sam take the stage along with Nina. Boo-Boo positions himself behind the drums.

“Wish me luck,” Jimmy says to me.

“Good luck. You’re going to be great.” He squeezes my hand in the dark, then kisses my forehead and bounds to the stage, leaving me alone in the back of the place, feeling strangely like half-a-something with him no longer at my side—a feeling that stomps all over the independence I’ve cultivated so painstakingly. But it also makes me feel more powerful, like it actually makes you stronger to feel connected to somebody else.

From the stage, Jimmy motions for me to sit up front. I weave through the tables, take a seat, and look up at him. If I saw some random girl sitting at some guy’s feet with the look on her face that I feel taking over my face right now, I’d make fun of her. Plain and simple. I would turn to Sarah and say, “Look at that nitwit. I mean, get a life.” But at this moment, I am that girl, which proves beyond a doubt that I have slipped through

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.