Paradise (2 page)

“You sing and you said guitar’s not your thing. What is? Fiddle? Keyboard?”

He pulled something from his bag.

His back was to me, but not to Waylon’s. A whitewash of horror covered Waylon as the blood drained from his face.

Gabe stood up, strapping himself into a red three-row button accordion.

Paradise played squeezebox.

Waylon all but slumped to his knees like some weary nomad finding a pool in the desert only to realize it was a mirage.

I went ahead and stated the obvious. “Well, that’s unexpected.”

“No way is that going to work.” Waylon shook his head. “We’re not a freakin’ polka band.”

Despite the fact that he struggled with singing and had a history of hyperventilating, Waylon Slider maintained a protective vision of the coolness of his own band. A vision built on his bluegrass bloodline and screaming twelve-year-olds at the county fair.

“This is what I play.” Paradise unstrapped the accordion and slipped it back into the bag. “And I don’t sing with people who don’t get it.”

I didn’t know of anything musically that Waylon didn’t get. And Paradise’s comment seemed to irk him; Waylon’s blood boiled back into his face. He could be a hot-tempered imp, holding his breath until he got his way.

But no amount of breath-holding was going to change the fact that if we wanted him to sing, Paradise was going to play squeezebox.

“It’s just an accordion, Waylon.” I tried to coax him as Paradise stood there in his snug jeans and smug attitude. “Think Charles Gillingham with the Counting Crows or Michael Stipe with R.E.M.”

Paradise raised his chin up and for the first time, I got a good look at his eyes—deep pine green with gold flecks that mirrored his earrings.

“Don’t look so surprised.” I strolled past him.

Through the hangar doors, I could see the gray twilight deepening to a dark purple. Rich sunsets were one of the few advantages to being stuck on the less prosperous end of Prosper County and isolated miles outside of the town of Big Wells. I headed out with Waylon and Paradise behind me. “We might be just a hick high school band”—I slid the heavy doors together and padlocked them—“but make no mistake, we know our music. Waylon’s great-granddaddy played bluegrass with Flatt and Scruggs, and he’s been backporch picking since he could walk. Be here next Monday,” I told Paradise. “And be sure you can play that thing.”

I threw my leg over the four-wheeler and turned it on. It sputtered and shook like an old truck on a cold morning. With my drumsticks in my back pocket, I zipped my hoodie and hit the throttle—tearing out across the pasture and into the woods. I didn’t care if he blew on a jug. Everybody has a gift, and if his was pumping an accordion, so be it. Finding Paradise meant we finally had a lead singer and could enter the amateur band contest at Texapalooza. All the bigwigs from Austin to Nashville would be there.

Racing through the piney woods on an old deer run, I leaned low over the handlebars—the damp wind chilling my face and legs. The four-wheeler stalled just as I broke through the thicket into the back pasture. I hit the starter twice and revved the motor. Gassy fumes hung in the dank night air. I squeezed the accelerator hard, speeding along the fence row to our gate. Just to the side of the cattle guard, a round hay bale that Mother had painted with the pink face of the Easter Bunny watched me like some sick funhouse clown.

I sped home. Down the driveway. To our yellow frame house at the end of the blacktop.

I was finally going to get my chance to drum my way out of Dripping Springs and far beyond Prosper County. Me. Running down my own dream. All I had left to do was keep my mother from setting up a roadblock.

CAL’S LYRIC JOURNAL

A HAT LIKE THAT

You can show up in boots, be shrink-wrapped in denim

Karaoke some with Willie and Hank

But you’ll need skills in the saddle, dude

If you’re gonna wear a hat like that.

Your Stetson’s blocking the sun, leavin’ me in the shadow

But I ain’t gonna stay here for long

This guitar’s my friend, the girls love real thunder

I’m no poser, I’m where it’s at

So you’d better own some land, stock some cattle

If you’re gonna wear a hat like that.

I can tell you like black, into symbols

Bet you jam to Jennings and Cash

But they kicked out the lights, shot up a finger

Ain’t nothin’ symbolic about that

So you’d better find a bull, beat eight seconds

If you’re gonna wear a hat like that.

I don’t begrudge you a lid, maybe you need one

Not everyone can grow rock star hair

But if you’re jackin’ an image to hide a weakness

You’re really not changin’ your stats

Wrestle a steer, dude, and get to ropin’

If you’re gonna wear a hat like that.

2

DREAMS DEFERRED

I caught the screen door just before it slammed behind me. Bunnies, some in fancy velvet coats and some in overalls, gawked at me as I slipped into the kitchen. We were a few weeks away from Easter, and Mother was a seasonal decorator.

My older sister Lacey stood with her arms out to her sides and stared vacantly through the kitchen window while Mother hot-glued the last of the pink rhinestones on her wide belt. Despite the fact that it was the spring of Lacey’s senior year, Mother festooned Lacey in sparkles and Spandex. With her ruffled white blouse and tight white jeans squeezing her fat rolls, Lacey looked like the unhappy puppet bride of the Michelin Man.

I ladled a bowl of steamy chicken and dumplings and sat down at the table by my dad. He’d been practicing with the church softball team and had red dirt stains on his T-shirt. “What’s her costume for this time?” I asked.

Mother forced a princess tiara onto a pink cowboy hat and placed it on Lacey’s head. “It’s an outfit, Paisley. An outfit your sister will wear when she has the honor of singing at the rodeo next week.” Then she sighed a haggard breath like I just wore her out every time I opened my mouth. “Anyhoo, it’s not a costume. A costume is that gosh-awful, unflattering man-suit you call a marching band uniform.”

I shoved a fat dumpling in my mouth. Mother had long ago given up the fight with me and choir and sequined outfits. She hated the fact that I chose to twirl drumsticks instead of a baton, and the only reason she tolerated my being in the school band was because I had to have a fine arts credit. Mother would certainly have a cow if she knew I played drums in the Waylon Slider Band.

Lacey took off the hat. “This is mashing my hair down,” she complained.

Honestly, nothing could mash Lacey’s hair down. She’d hot-rolled, backcombed, teased, and plastered her thick blond curls into a warrior-like helmet. But I couldn’t blame her for trying to come up with an excuse not to wear that phony pageant-girl hat.

I tried to help her. “Looks better without the hat.”

Mother kept her back to me and bobby-pinned the hat to Lacey’s hair. They were almost mirror images of each other, wide in the hips and meringue-high hairdos. “You were too late getting home today, Paisley. If you want to continue to work for L. V., then you better be home before dark.”

I scooped up another dumpling. Somehow, I’d managed to convince my mother that I cleaned her brother’s house every day after school. She always said Uncle L. V. and I were cut from the same cloth, and she knew that I liked being around him. But she’d pluck that privilege quicker than spit if I interfered with her plans for Lacey or if she got wind that I used L. V.’s old drum set to rehearse with the band. Mother held fast to her own notions about our futures. She just couldn’t seem to let go of her fear that Lacey and I would end up pregnant in high school and stuck in Prosper County. Just like her.

“Your mother sure did miss her calling.” Dad took a big bite of buttery cornbread then crumbled the rest into his bowl of dumplings with one hand. He ran his other hand under the table and jerked the drumsticks out of my back pocket.

I froze. Spoon in midair.

Dad tucked the sticks under my leg.

“Honey, I think you could’ve had one of them cooking-and-decorating shows on TV.
Cooking and Crafts with Diane Tillery
,” he said, never missing a beat.

I got rhythm from him.

“Coulda, woulda, shoulda,” Mother mumbled with a mouthful of bobby pins.

I eased the drumsticks under my hoodie.

Dad knew about the band. I was pretty sure. Somehow the four-wheeler was gassed up every afternoon. But he never mentioned it. In my house, being tight-lipped equaled honesty. No need to mention. No need to lie. No need to send Mother into a tailspin.

Lacey, in her pink-and-white cowgirl getup, grabbed her neck and started some coughing, throat-clearing drama.

“I—I—I—I,” Lacey barked like a sick sheep, “ne—ed to rest my vo—oice.”

Mother tripped over her own feet rushing to the sink to fill a glass of water. She held it to Lacey’s lips. Lacey took a couple of sips, fanning herself the whole time.

“Lacey’s got to rest her voice,” Mother announced as if Dad and I should put our dinner on pause for a moment of silence.

Dad picked up a ceramic bunny shaker and peppered his dumplings. I heard Lacey cough and hack her way down the hall to her bedroom.

“Good golly golly! I hope she’s a hundred percent by rodeo time.” Mother sorted rhinestones and bobby pins and sequins into the tiny compartments of her toolbox. “You know Reba McEntire got her big break singing at a rodeo.”

But I bet Reba actually wanted to sing. I wasn’t so sure about Lacey.

Mother snickered then shook both her hands in the air like she’d made some life-changing discovery. “Oh, oh, oh and get this one: When I signed Lacey up, I heard them talking about trying to get that white-trash Waylon Slider to play some a-coustic version of ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ on a guitar.”

The hair on my arms went stiff as porcupine quills.

“I said right quick,” Mother quoted herself, “‘I don’t think so, Scooter. You can just back up off that. Everybody knows that song don’t mean nothing without the words. What are people gonna do? Put their hands over their hearts and hum?’” She threw her head back and cackled. “They said that boy was getting some band together to go play at that Texapa-
loser
thing in Austin.”

The comforting smell of chicken broth filling the kitchen suddenly soured. With that comment, she’d just slammed the lid on any fantasy I had about having a come-to-Jesus meeting with her and being honest about my musical intentions. Mother held a permanent grudge against Waylon and his family because they were actually a musically gifted bunch. For years, the Sliders won every county-fair talent competition with their banjo-picking bluegrass, and they ruled our annual church Christmas program. Mother had to work overtime to secure Lacey a part as a humming angel.

“Can you imagine?” she continued. “I don’t care who his daddy is. A redneck high school runt thinking he can go from the Big Wells’s marching band straight to an Austin grandstand!” With that, Mother wound the cord around her glue gun, shoved it in her toolbox, and snapped it shut. “He thinks he can just advance to go and move his little shoe around the board and skip on by everybody else.”

I thought about Paradise and his red accordion. She’d absolutely have a runaway fit with that information. But I kept quiet. A four-wheel drive and a winch couldn’t pull that out of me. I washed down her slam on Waylon and the band with a gulp of sweet tea, then kissed Dad on his forehead. I had to get out of the room before I defended Waylon and gave my mother a reason to snoop. “I’m going to check on Lacey.”

Mother chimed, “Don’t bother her with a bunch of questions, Paisley. She’s got to rest. There’s a lot riding on that rodeo performance.”

I kept my arm close, pressing the drumsticks tight against my stomach. “I understand,” I told her. “I understand.” I knew something about having a lot riding on a performance. Texapalooza was one combination on the lock that released me from Prosper County.

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