The Gift (12 page)

Justin and Tom had finished setting up the equipment by
this point, and then started to check the sound from the mics. Maggie plugged
in her mandolin and Zak’s guitar into the amplifiers and they both played for a
minute or two so Justin could check the sound. Justin told Maggie to turn her
mandolin up a little and then he asked them to sing into their microphones so
he could check the vocal balance. After everything was set up to his
satisfaction, he suggested that they go rest for a bit in the room in the
basement that was reserved for the band and maybe get something to eat. Neither
Zak nor Maggie liked to eat much before a gig, but they needed to have
something to sustain the energy that it took to play for a couple hours.

The waitress came downstairs to the band room and
offered to get drinks for everyone. Maggie and Zak asked for Cokes and the rest
of the band had beer. Everyone had sandwiches and then tuned their instruments.
Maggie did some vocal exercises to warm up and then she started playing quietly
with Zak and Spencer. Maggie found that she was feeling a little nervous. She
was playing in a club where she had been sitting in the audience just a few
weeks ago. She had seen a lot of excellent music there and she hoped that the
audience wouldn’t find her disappointing in any way. She knew they would be
impressed with the other members of the Bayou Blasters, so that helped her
nerves a little. Maggie and Spencer had invited their friends and family, so by
the time the band went on the place was packed.

Maggie and Spencer had decided to wear their country
western shirts that they had bought for the wedding in Mississippi. Zak, Justin
and Tom wore plain black shirts that they had bought in Lafayette. The guys
wore blue jeans while Maggie had put on a denim mini-shirt with a pair of
tights and cowboy boots. Zak thought that Maggie looked particularly radiant
that night, he was having a hard time keeping his eyes off her. Justin thought
that she was looking especially cute too, and he found himself momentarily
wishing that he and Maggie were the ones that were going to be getting married.

Finally, the club manager came downstairs to tell them
that it was time to start playing the first set. They grabbed their instruments
and walked upstairs to hear the manager introducing them to the audience.

“And now, straight from Louisiana, the Bayou Blasters.”

Of course many people in the audience knew that Maggie
and Spencer had played there several months ago with Lost Highway but they
didn’t worry too much about that fact.

The Bayou Blasters walked onstage, plugged in their
instruments and launched off into one of their fast tunes, “Six Days on the
Road”, which was a cover of a New Riders tune. Then they played several tunes
that Zak and Justin had written which featured Zak on the electric guitar. You
could hear the Cajun and zydeco influences in their music, especially in Zak’s
playing. Sometimes his guitar had a percussive sound almost like an accordion.
Maggie pulled out her fiddle for these tunes, she played along in a Cajun style
that she had learned from Jesse the fiddler.

Then Zak asked Maggie to sing “Truck Stop Girl”, which
had been one of the tunes on the demo tape. The crowd loved that one, and
especially applauded Zak’s guitar break. The band decided to bring the tempo
down a little so Zak sang “Kind Woman.” He couldn’t help but look lovingly at
Maggie while he sang it, so everyone in the audience figured out that they were
a couple. They ended the set with another up tempo song, “Louisiana Lady” which
Justin sang.  Zak had noticed that Maggie was looking tired, so he told the
crowd that they were going to take a short break.

When they got down to the band room in the basement, Zak
made Maggie lie down on the couch for a while. Spencer, Tom and Justin had a
quick beer and then they all got ready to go back upstairs to play a second
set.

The second set went even better than the first. The
audience applauded loudly and couples even danced in the aisles. The band
played until midnight and finished with the crowd asking for more.

Spencer, Tom and Justin started packing up and loading
their equipment while Zak and Maggie sat at a table near the exit with a box of
their tapes. A lot of people stopped by to chat with them and buy a tape, so
they made an extra couple hundred dollars that way. The last people to stop by
their table were a man and a woman in their thirties. They told them they had enjoyed
the music and introduced themselves as Abbie and Jerry. They went on to tell
Maggie and Zak that they had a small record company that specialized in roots
music. They said they already had some Cajun and blues bands on their roster
and thought they might be interested in signing the Bayou Blasters. They asked
Maggie for one of the tapes that she had been selling and she was happy to give
it to them. Then they went around and introduced themselves to the other
members of the band and told them that they would be in touch.

Maggie had heard of Abbie and Jerry before. They had
both attended the same college as Maggie and she had read about them and their
company in the alumni magazine. She knew they lived in Somerville, so it would
make sense that they would go to Jimmie D’s to check out bands. Maggie had no
idea if anything would come of it and they were just at the beginning of their
tour, so she tried to put it out of her mind for the moment.

The other members of the band were interested in this
development, but they had been approached by record companies before with
nothing coming of it. They just tried to play well at their gigs, hoping to
establish a good reputation and perhaps gain a following from that.

The manager of Jimmie D’s came over to Maggie with the
band’s share of the money from the cover charge. The club held 300 people and
they charged a $10 cover. The manager paid them 50% of the money from the cover
charge, so they were paid pretty well for the evening’s work. He told them that
the response had been very positive and he wanted to book them again, maybe in
a month or two.

The band had a couple days off until their next gig in Northampton MA, so they went back to Maggie’s house and the apartment to recover.  Maggie
had set up the tour so that they could use the house and apartment as a sort of
home base, staying there in between their gigs.

While they were waiting to play their next gig, Zak
decided that it was time to have his cumbersome cast removed. Maggie drove him
over to her family doctor one afternoon and he cut it off. Zak was extremely
relieved because the cast had been bothering him during the summer heat. Zak
was also happy that he would now be able to stand to play guitar for their
gigs.

The following Friday, they drove out on the turnpike to
their gig at the Iron Horse in Northampton, Massachusetts. This club was packed
too, mostly with students from the five colleges in the area. The gig went
well, and they sold even more tapes. They were worried that they would run out
of tapes before the end of their tour, so they decided to arrange to have some
more sent to them.

They followed the gig at the Iron Horse with more gigs
in college towns, in Providence, RI, New Haven, CT and Keene, NH.  They were
supposed to finish the tour by playing several gigs in Maine and Vermont, but Maggie started feeling increasingly unwell. She woke up the morning after the
gig in Keene with cramping and some spotting. She was alarmed by this and so
was the rest of the band. Zak insisted that he drive her back to her parents’
so that she could be seen by a doctor.

Zak accompanied her to see the obstetrician, even
holding her hand while she was being examined. Maggie was terrified. Although
she hadn’t intended to get pregnant, she was starting to look forward to having
the baby. The doctor told her that she was fine but that she would need to
limit her activities. She told him that she was on tour with a band, which
entailed long hours in the car traveling from city to city, and standing
several hours a night while she played mandolin and sang. He frowned and shook
his head. “Young lady, I suggest you figure out where you want to have your
baby and you stay there until the baby is born. If you don’t follow my advice
you’re jeopardizing the baby and your own health.” Zak looked extremely
concerned at this and he told the doctor that he would make sure that Maggie
took it easy. The doctor told Maggie that she had better take it easy or he was
going to have to put her on bed rest.

Once they got to the car, Maggie started to cry. She had
worked hard to set up the tour and she looked forward to playing the dates up
in Maine and Vermont. She told Zak that the band should just go on without her
and she would stay with her parents. Zak wasn’t sure he liked that idea
however, he wanted to be with her in case anything happened.

Maggie and Zak went back to her parents’ and then called
the motel up in Maine where the band was staying. Spencer answered the phone
and Zak explained the situation to him. He told Spencer that Maggie couldn’t
continue to travel and that he wanted to stay with her. Spencer suggested that
they get in touch with Michael who had been the lead guitarist in Maggie’s old
band Lost Highway. He thought Michael might be able to fill in for Zak for the
remaining gigs.

Maggie and Zak felt enormously relieved. They decided
that they would stay at Maggie’s parents’ until the wedding and then they would
go back to Louisiana to await the birth of the baby. Maggie and Zak told
Maggie’s parents that the obstetrician had told her to take it easy, so her
parents decided to simplify the wedding plans even further. They had already
reserved the small chapel at Maggie’s church for a Sunday afternoon wedding.
They then planned a dinner for everyone at the Hyatt Regency in Cambridge. There was a small function room that was available and Maggie and Zak could
spend their wedding night at the hotel.

In some ways Maggie thought that she’d rather spend her
wedding night at the house in Louisiana. She had started thinking of it as her
home. She thought that perhaps she shouldn’t get too attached to the house
because they rented it. Maggie was starting to feel like she wanted a home of
her own that she could share with Zak, the baby and Chère. She had to admit to
herself that her fantasy included having Justin around too. She enjoyed his
friendship and easy humor, she knew she would be sad when it came time for him
to move out.

The next important decision that Maggie had to make was
what she was going to wear for the wedding. She had never liked the fancy
wedding dresses that she had seen brides wear at other weddings, and something
like that would probably be inappropriate at a small afternoon wedding anyway.
She didn’t really know exactly what she had in mind, so she decided to go out
to some stores to look at dresses. Maggie’s mother suggested that they go to
Priscilla’s, a fancy bridal shop on Newbury Street in Boston.  But Maggie knew
that was exactly the kind of place that she didn’t want to go to. She thought
that maybe she would go over to Filene’s at the mall and see if they had any
simple long dresses.

Maggie asked Zak if he would take her out to buy a
dress. She valued his opinion and unlike her mother, he wouldn’t try to push
her into getting something that she didn’t like. So one afternoon, they drove
over to the mall. She looked through the formal dresses at Filene’s, but they
were mostly prom dresses. She liked some of them, but she was having trouble
finding a white dress. Finally at the end of the rack, she found some Gunne Sax
dresses. Maggie had always liked these dresses, they were flowing and romantic
looking. There was one in ivory that she especially liked. It had an empire
waist, which she thought might disguise her pregnancy, and a low neckline which
she thought was very sexy. The sleeves were long, and sort of puffy although
tight around the forearm. There was just enough lace on the bodice to make the
dress look special without being too fussy. She took the dress into the
dressing room and it fit perfectly. There was a little room in the waist that
would accommodate any extra girth that might occur due to her pregnancy.

 She walked out of the dressing room so she could show
the dress to Zak. She could tell that he liked it because his face lit up.

“Maggie, you look so beautiful in that dress” he said. “And
unbelievably sexy.”

Zak put his arms around her and kissed her.  “I think
you should get this dress,” he said.  “It’s perfect for you.”

The next topic of discussion was what Zak would wear. He
was not a big fan of suits, but he wanted to wear something special. Maggie
finally came up with the idea of a Mexican wedding shirt. It was made out of
white cotton and had pleats down the front. It looked dressy and yet still
masculine. She knew that they could find one in Harvard Square, so they planned
a short shopping trip into Cambridge.

Maggie was starting to feel like everything was under
control regarding the wedding. She just had to pick out the menu for the dinner
and finalize the flower selection and then everything would be done and she
could relax a little.

However, she was still trying to think of something that
she could give Zak as her wedding present to him. She loved the Gibson F-5 that
he had given her. It was a beautiful instrument and demonstrated his respect
for her as a musician. Also, it had brought them together, it was one of the
reasons she had gone back to his place when they first met in New Orleans.
Maggie thought long and hard, she would like to give him something similar, a
special instrument that he could play for the rest of his life. Finally, she
decided that she would buy him a Dobro. He had always wanted one and he could
play it at their gigs.

Maggie called up the Music Emporium, a music store in Cambridge that specialized in acoustic instruments. She asked them if they had any Dobros
and they said yes, they had a used roundneck one. So she called up Spencer and
asked him if he could take her over to the store. Spencer drove them over to
the Emporium and put the guitar through its paces so that Maggie could hear it.
They both liked the guitar a lot, it had a metal resonator cone which made it
sound loud and bright. Maggie knew that Zak would love this guitar, it was
perfect for playing acoustic blues. So Maggie spent most of what was left in
her bank account on the guitar.