The End of FUN (37 page)

This was true. He did need my help. The latest edition of the
Daily Intelligencer
(YAY!) arrived, and when I sat down to read it—anything to distract myself—I saw something from the police blotter:

Oso! I'd been so wrapped up in my own worries that I'd completely forgotten about him! I called his number and got voice mail. But then after a minute he called me back from a different phone.

“Hi, Aaron.”

“Where are you?”

“Jail, bro.”

“Jail?”

“Three squares and a bed, bro. This is the right thing for right now. Everything's been simplified. It's just me and these four walls. Eat some food, do some push-ups, meditate…My energy feels more in balance than ever! I was just talking to my lawyer. His name is Peter Juliet, and he's in love with my aunt Rita so he's going pro bono. He might be in touch with you—he says he wants to involve you in the trial.”

“What, like as an accomplice?”

“Nah, bro—character witness.”

And then came the day of
The Birthday Party
. It was a day of much significance. Not only was it opening night of the play, it was also the first day of the Antello International Motorcycle Jamboree, and also Katie's actual birthday. She was turning 23. Nearly a quarter century. I met her that morning for the jamboree—there was no other way around it. I was on full alert for Shiloh. But if I saw her I wasn't sure what I would do. Run?

Katie was in a pretty good mood and kept talking about what a beautiful day it was. It wasn't bad. Blue sky, wispy clouds, sun streaming down, cigarette smoke wafting on the breeze. That kind of thing. You could hear the music from three blocks away. I thought we'd be early and beat the crowd, but I was wrong—not even 10 o'clock yet and already the place was wall-to-wall motorcycles.

A lot of it was a weekend-warrior/suburban-dad kind of vibe, but on the other hand some of these people were the real deal. Anyone can put on a leather vest, and anyone can get a face tattoo, and anyone can smoke meth until their teeth fall out—but not everyone does. I'm talking about the locals. In a weird way I was kind of proud of my hometown. Grandmas in leather. Teen moms with Heinekens. Fat dudes in T-shirts with slogans designed to cut through the courtship crap and get right to the heart of the matter:

FREE BREATHALYZER

BLOW HERE

↓

Predictably, the line for kettle corn was about a half-mile long, but it was Katie's birthday, and that's what she wanted for breakfast.

I'm not kidding about the line.
Endless
. The good thing was, no sign of Shiloh. We stood there with the sun beating down, and after a while Katie took my arm. “Help me. I'm an old woman now.”

“Yeah, right.”

“But you! So young, so innocent. You don't know what it's like to ache and putter about.”

Was she flirting? Teasing? It felt like a little of both, and I didn't want it to stop, but I felt a darkness, too, because it was all so tricky, and what about Shiloh? After we got our popcorn, I convinced her to check out the Gold Angels, a synchronized precision riding ensemble (YAY!). They were in the Bud Lite
®
Action Arena, which was also the convention center parking lot, which was a couple blocks from the main action, which is why I wanted to be there. The better to avoid Shiloh.

A square, maybe half the size of a tennis court, had been cordoned off with yellow caution tape. Four large men on Honda Gold Wings wove noisily around each other in painfully slow circles while a woman in leather narrated over a P.A.

“…Every move choreographed down to the last second….Right now, if you were to look down on this from above, like from some kind of scaffolding, you would see they are presently tracing a beautifully symmetrical four-leaf clover….”

I crammed my face with popcorn and watched them go. The men were fat and they wore outfits color-coded to their motorcycles—red, white, blue, and gold—so they would never forget who owned what bike. Then it was time for doubles. The motorcycles stopped and four women emerged from the crowd—red, white, blue, and gold—and stepped onto the back of their corresponding machines, which then rolled on forward to trace more complex patterns at even slower speeds.

“Wow,” said Katie. “Like danger in slow motion.”

After the Gold Angels there was a demonstration of a Duratek
®
T101 Flameproof Suit (YAY!), and then some kids on minibikes who, even if they weren't on fire, were still pretty cool, and for a moment I almost relaxed. Almost. Then, thank God, Katie had to go get ready for the play. After she was gone, I allowed myself a breath of relief. I'd made it! No Shiloh in sight! But on my way out of there I ran into my dad.

He was sitting on a bench sipping from his canteen and talking to someone on his phone. Bones was there, too. I thought maybe I could sneak by, but the dog saw me and let out a sharp bark. Dad put up a hand, signaling for me to stop. He finished his conversation and returned his phone to his pocket. “Saw you over at the fire demo with Katie. Looked like a good time.”

“It was OK.”

Dad leveled his gaze at me. “Looks like you got a choice to make, buddy.”

I was like,
What? How did HE know?
“Who told you about Shiloh?”

“Shiloh?” he said. “What about her?”

“What are
you
talking about, then?”

“I'm talking about your scheduling conflict—the play and the Battle of the Bands.”

He opened a schedule of events and tapped on the part about the Battle of the Bands. His band, the JC Wonder Excursion, was scheduled to play at 7
P.M.
, the same time as the play.

The man has his flaws, but one thing about my dad—I remembered this now—was he always showed up to my high school basketball games. Which was pretty cool of him, considering most of the time I didn't even play. Not saying he was always sober when he showed up, and I remember more than once turning around and seeing him straight-up snoozing. But he
did
come. And this Battle of the Bands thing was kind of like
his
game, wasn't it?

“Damn, I didn't realize. Maybe I can go to both?”

“They're the same time!”

“Yeah, I see that.”

Dad folded the schedule. “So now what's this about Shiloh?”

“Nothing.”

He scrutinized my face. “Interesting…”

“I've gotta go, OK? I've got some stuff to do.”

I could hear his voice behind me. “You got a choice to make, buddy!”

It was true, I did. The world is full of choices. All kinds of choices. Too many choices. I thought about my choices as I hightailed it out of there. There's just so much crap to choose from in this world. But then sometimes you don't have a choice. Time keeps moving. Stuff keeps happening. You've got to just keep on going on, flamesuit or no flamesuit, as you head on into the fire.

My next stop was the GameCage
®
Gaming Center, and it was a good thing I had some time on my hands, because I had to play nine million games of Skee-Ball until I got enough tickets for the prize I wanted. But the prize seemed so small on its own, so on the way over to the theater I picked some sunflowers from a vacant lot and made her a bouquet.

When I got to the theater I found a gang of biker chicks having a discussion in the lobby.

“Well,
whose
party?” one of them was saying.

“I'm not sure,” said another.

“Someone who thinks they're pretty damn important,” said a third. “To rent out a place like this.”

“Oh, I don't know. It has a certain charm….”

“But where are the decorations? Where's the
cake
?”

“How should I know? The guy just handed me the tickets. He didn't give me
instructions
.”

“Tickets to a birthday party! Who raffles off tickets to their own birthday party?”