A Fistful of Rain

“I’m not in the band anymore,” I reminded him. “Even if I was, I wouldn’t have any say in it.”

“You could talk to Van.”

I shrugged, thinking that the way Mikel went through women was just another residual of our shared childhood. I couldn’t remember ever having had a romantic relationship that lasted more than a month myself, and the only one that lasted that long had been almost ten years ago, during high school. But Mikel’s news sobered me; it had looked like the thing with Jessica was serious.

I’d bought beer even though Mikel had given me the hairy eyeball while I was doing it, and as I put the last of the six-packs in the refrigerator, he dropped the bomb. It was probably part of the reason he’d insisted on accompanying me, and he must have been waiting from the moment we’d finished breakfast, but it had taken him almost three hours before he could do it.

“Tommy’s out.”

I stared at my newly stocked refrigerator shelves, at a box of Land O Lakes butter. I wasn’t certain I’d heard him right.

“What?”

“He’s out,” Mikel said. “Got out three months ago.”

I did the math in my head, closing the refrigerator door. “That’s not right, he’s supposed to be in for another five years.”

Mikel had been folding the paper grocery bags, making a stack of them on the counter. He smoothed the last one down, shaking his head.

“Paroled?” I asked. “If he was paroled there should have been a hearing, Mikel. I should have been notified. I should have been able to attend.”

“He wasn’t paroled,” Mikel said. “He’s out, he’s done. All finished.”

“He was supposed to do twenty years.”

“There’s this thing, it’s called a buy-back or time-served or something like that. For every day of good behavior in prison, the state takes a certain amount off your sentence. It’s how they deal with overcrowding.”

“That’s not right.”

“He did fifteen years, Mim. That’s a long time.”

I was practically spitting. “Fuck that. Mom’s still dead.”

“And he’s still our father.”

“No, my father’s dead.”

“I’m not talking about Steven—”

“Good, you better not.”

He took a soft breath, looking away from me. I waited, then decided I didn’t want to wait for what he might have to say, and found my cigarettes. I lit one and flicked angry ash into the sink.

“He’s been staying with me, Mim. He’d really like to see you.”

“He’s what?”

“He didn’t have a place to stay. He’s staying with me until he can get on his feet.”

“Ex-con Tommy living with my drug-dealing brother? Are you out of your mind?”

“It’s not like that. I’m just helping him out. He’s having trouble finding a job, you know, with the economy the way it is.”

“Hard to get a gig when you’re an alcoholic killer,” I said. “I’m really torn up for him.”

“He was in prison for fifteen years for what he did,” Mikel said. “He’s not the same man he was when it happened, he’s not the same man he was when we were in that house.”

“Bullshit.”

“Maybe it’s time you stopped inventing history, Miriam, and saw Mom a little more for who she was, rather than this sainted martyr you want her to be. Maybe you ought to give Tommy the benefit of the doubt.”

“You saw it happen,” I said, softly. “You saw it, too.”

“I know that, but—”

“You saw it, too!” I screamed at him.

It pushed him back a step, surprised him. I smoked more of my cigarette.

“He’d like to see you, just to talk with you.” Mikel picked up his keys from where they were lying on the counter. “I think if you can give total strangers twenty minutes at Fred Meyer, then he’s not asking all that much.”

“You’re leaving?”

“I’ve got shit to do, you’re tired, and I don’t want to get in the way of your drinking.”

“Hey, fuck you, big brother.”

He started down the hall, to the front door. “I’ll give you a call tonight or tomorrow, to check up on you. You might want to call Joan, let her know you’re back.”

I caught up with him at the front door, as he was moving onto the porch.

“He’s staying with you?”

“I told you already.”

“Right now, Tommy’s there right now?”

“I don’t know about right now. He’s been picking up construction work where he can, so he heads out pretty early.”

“Do me a favor? When you see him?”

“What?”

“Make a point of telling him I hope he burns in hell,” I said, then slammed the door on him.

CHAPTER 6

I cracked a beer, then fetched my flight case from the hallway. The alarm panel said the system was “ready,” so I armed the system, and when the panel sang its three-tone alert, I actually felt safe and tight in my house. Then I took the case down to the basement, to the music room.

The contractors had done as I’d asked, sealing the windows and replacing the entry door with a heavier, reinforced version. There was padding now down over the concrete, and acoustic tile on the ceiling, and my gear was there, too, my amps and other guitars—the ones that hadn’t come on tour with me—and my keyboard. In a pinch, the space could serve as a passable recording studio.

I worked the combination on the flight case and snapped the locks up, then checked the Tele. It had traveled fine, secure in its bed, dry and happy and cool to the touch. It wasn’t my first guitar and it wasn’t my newest, but it was my favorite electric. Leon Fender and George Fullerton started making Fender guitars in 1950, and their first model was called the Broadcaster, but they had to change the name because the Gretsch company made drums also called Broadcaster. They renamed their guitar the Telecaster, and it’s been pretty much the same instrument ever since; the only real difference you find is in the quality of workmanship and materials, who did the building, what was used to construct the guitar.

My Tele was made in 1954, body of ash, neck of maple, black pick guard, still fitted with its original hardware, a gift from the label after Nothing for Free went gold in the U.S. They’d given Van an emerald and gold necklace from Tiffany, and Click a set of Keplinger snare drums. The Tele was almost fifty years old, now, and to this day I’ve never met an electric that plays as sweetly. It had the original pickups, but the input jack had been replaced, and the fingerboard refretted, a custom job that made it less collectible but let it play like butter under my fingers. Fabrizio did some other minor work on it while we were on the road, as well. Before each show, he would string every one of my guitars, replacing the old ones with the new. He was utterly tone-deaf, and relied on an electronic tuner, and each and every time he handed me a guitar, it was perfect. I’d fiddle with the tuning heads just for show, but he and I both knew it was garbage.

Holding the Tele and thinking of Fabrizio, I realized that Van hadn’t even given me the opportunity to say good-bye.

I put the guitar in its stand, next to the Gibson SG, got out the soft cloth and gave every instrument a wipe- down, then put the case and cloth away in the storage closet. I had to move a couple boxes to make room, and