The Scar Boys (11 page)

Colossal Lie #2:
I was accepted at the University of Scranton, my first choice. Johnny had applied to Scranton as
a safety school and got in. He was too much of a choirboy to want to give me his acceptance letter and packet of admissions materials, but Cheyenne talked him into it. A little creative cutting, pasting, and photocopying, and I made it look like the package was addressed to me. I’d never seen Mom and Dad more proud.

Colossal Lie #3:
I mailed the check my dad wrote to Scranton—for the first semester tuition, room, and board—to the same place I’d “mailed” the application, though I was smart enough to tear the check into little pieces before throwing it away.

It was against this fictional backdrop that I told my father I was going on the road.

“We’ll be gone about a month.”

“But that means you’ll be late going to school,” he said, a bit bewildered. I’d caught him off guard, which was my plan.

“It’ll be fine. I’ll be there for the first day of classes.”

There must’ve been something in my voice, because my dad did a double take. His eyes narrowed, and his usually fidgety hands went very still. His Spidey sense was working.

“Harry, how long have you been planning this? You said you have a van, you made a record, and you booked more than twenty shows, that’s not something you do overnight, is it.”

“I don’t know, I guess a couple of months.”

“And why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“I was afraid you’d say no.”

“But what if I say no now?”

I was silent because we both knew the answer. I was going with or without his blessing. But he was digging for something else here.

“You know, the check we sent to Scranton hasn’t been cashed yet.”

This is the scene in the movie where the prisoner has just escaped from the cellblock and is skulking along the interior perimeter of a giant brick wall when a massive floodlight stops him in his tracks. Busted.

“Huh,” I said, trying to act cool, “that’s weird.”

“I should say so. Tell me, Harry, if I call the school and ask why, what do you think they’ll tell me?”

Stick with the lie
, I told myself,
ride it all the way to the end
. “Probably some clerical mistake,” I said. “I’ll call them for you and find out.”

“Aha!” He pointed at me. My offer to call, or rather my effort to stop him from calling, was the clue he was looking for. “You never mailed the check, did you? You used that money for your band’s little tour!” When he got angry his Boston accent became more pronounced. The “a” in band was flattened, and “tour” became “taw.”

“No! Dad, I wouldn’t steal from you! Besides,” I said, thinking fast, “if I’d used the check, it would’ve been
cashed, right?” This calmed him down a bit.

“Hmm. Yes, yes, I can see where that would be true.” But he still wasn’t convinced. “Then what happened to it?”

“Really, Dad, I don’t know. I’ll call the school and find out.”

“No, Harry, I’ll call the school.” He went to his home office to get the phone number and make the call, leaving me in the kitchen to sit and think.

I figured I had three options:

I chose door number three.

Five minutes later my father came back into the kitchen. I was still sitting at the table. I didn’t look up.

“Isn’t that strange,” he said.

“Did they get the check?” I asked.

“Why you cheeky little bastard,” he said. I kept my head down. “You lied about everything, didn’t you?”

No answer from me. I kept my eyes glued to the Formica surface of that kitchen table.

“The school has never heard of you. Not even an application. You’ve been playing this charade for months. For the first time in my life I wish I was a violent man so I could beat the living daylights out of you.” My dad was just getting wound up. When he stumbled into a morally righteous position, all bets were off. His paternal soul gave way to his political mind as he figured out how best to eviscerate me.

I sat there with my head down as my father spewed a rainstorm of abuse on me. I was so wrapped up in my own world, trying to figure a way out, that I only caught sporadic words and phrases from his rant.

“Ingrate.”

“Thankless.”

“We sacrificed everything for you.”

“Toaster.” I looked up at that one, not sure how a toaster figured into what he was saying, but he was so lost in the brilliance of his own argument that he hardly noticed I was still there. It went on and on and on and on.

Then I heard “failure,” and “loser” in rapid succession. He was probably saying something like “I don’t want you to be a failure,” and “Don’t end up as a loser,” but I didn’t
hear the context and the words were like a trigger. I’d had enough. It was time to play my one and only card.

“You’re right, Dad,” I interrupted him with an edge. My tone caught his attention and I could see that he was shocked I was talking back. “I guess it’s just what us
god damn freaks
do, isn’t it.” I met his eyes and held his gaze.
Let him stare at my mangled face
, I thought.
Let him see his son
.

My dad knew exactly what I was saying. He was the only person on the planet with a more vivid and more painful memory of that day at the lighthouse than me. He knew this was my golden ticket, that there was nothing he could say. And I knew this wouldn’t work for me more than once. At least my deformities had taught me how to choose my battles.

He started to say something almost a full minute later, but then thought better of it. He flopped down into a chair. And just like that, it was over. I had won.

A few days after school ended we were loading equipment into “Dino,” the name with which we’d christened the Econoline. We made trip after trip from my parents’ basement and through the garage to the open and waiting cargo doors of the van.

We carried our cymbals stands, guitars, and amps past the lawn mower, the beach chairs, and the old Schwinn; around the tin saucer used for sledding, the bucket and brush and Rain Dance for washing cars, and the fifty-foot coiled snake of green garden hose; and over a haphazard collection of rakes, shovels, and sawed-off two-by-fours. My father stood guard, trying, but failing, not to scowl each time one of us went by. He was dressed in khaki shorts, a brightly colored, striped polo shirt, and boat shoes. A “NY State National Guard” hat covered his thinning hair. The
skin on his exposed legs was translucent white, his veins and arteries tracing obvious lines down the length of his shin. He leaned on a golf putter, using it as a cane to support his ailing back.

My mom was in the house crying. I knew this because when I went in to say good-bye, she lost it. She wrapped me in a bear hug and didn’t want to let go.

“I know your father is upset,” she told me, “and you shouldn’t have lied to us. But Harry?”

“Yeah Mom?”

“I’m so incredibly proud of you.”

That’s when the waterworks started, from both of us. I hugged her again, and she shooed me away. I composed myself and went back outside.

Cheyenne was walking out with her bass, and that was it. We were packed and ready to go.

“We’re all set, I guess,” I said to my dad. “See you in a month.” His stern gaze stopped us all in our tracks.

“Remember,” he said very seriously and very suddenly, “think with the head on your shoulders.” We must’ve seemed confused because he added, “Not you, Cheyenne.” Then he shoved a small wad of bills into my hand, and disappeared into the house. I shrugged my shoulders and turned away.

It was probably the most personal and tender moment my father and I ever shared, and I clung to it the way a dying
man clings to a priest’s robes. The advice and the money were proof that his love was unconditional—twisted and weird proof, but proof just the same. And like the Grinch, my heart, at least the way it felt about my dad, grew a size or two that day.

Then my father was gone and the gears in my brain lurched back to the Scar Boys. We piled into Dino, certain we were ready for whatever the world was going to throw at us.

Richie was driving the first shift with me in the passenger seat. Johnny and Cheyenne were in the back, their knees, elbows, and shoulders touching. Chey was affectionate like that—a light touch on the bicep, a passing squeeze of a shoulder muscle, even the occasional peck on the cheek was par for the course. When I was the lucky recipient, which wasn’t often, it was the highlight of my day. I would lie awake at night remembering her touch, no matter how insignificant, and dream about the next time it would happen. Strike that. I would dream bigger dreams, dreams of Chey and me together, of going to movies, going to dinner, holding hands, kissing. I knew it was a fantasy, but as long as she gave those small, physical cues, there was hope. And hope is a dangerous thing. But in the weeks leading up to the tour she’d stopped all signs of affection with everyone except for Johnny.

I pretended not to notice.

I turned the radio on as we drove down my parents’ street into an uncertain future. One of the only AM music stations left on the dial was playing “Join Together” by the Who. I took it as an omen that big things were in store for the Scar Boys.

“You were awesome, dude,” Richie said to me. It was fourteen hours after we’d left Yonkers and we were sitting in an all-night diner in Baltimore, congratulating each other on what we thought was a great first gig on the tour. “I don’t know how you got the feedback coming out of your amp to screech like that, but man, I could feel it in my sneakers.”

I just smiled. It
was
a great gig. There weren’t a whole lot of people there, but that didn’t matter.

The four of us were sharing two plates of French fries in brown gravy; something we had never tried before, but that the waitress had assured us was a Maryland delicacy. It was good, but because we thought it was exotic and cool, we were convinced it was incredibly, unbelievably, maniacally good. That was the feeling we all had that night.

The gig had been in the back of a bar in the Pimlico
section of the city, close to the racetrack, and closer still to check-cashing, gold-buying, and liquor-selling storefronts, all of them covered with steel shutters at this hour.

We were one of three bands on the bill, and other than the manager of the first band and the girlfriend of the drummer in the second band, the only people in the bar seemed to be neighborhood regulars. They sat on their stools with their baseball caps pulled low; they gave off a vibe of being pissed off. Either the owner of the bar was lousy at promoting gigs, was trying live music for the very first time, or there was somewhere a whole lot better to be in Baltimore that night.

We were the first band to take the stage, and no one seemed to care. The neighborhood regulars sipped their drinks and didn’t do much else. But as we played deeper into our set, we saw their attention shift from the TV suspended above the bar to us. Before long toes were tapping, heads were bopping, and faces were smiling. When we finished, we got a nice round of applause. There was no encore, but the mood in the room was unmistakably good.

“You know,” Cheyenne offered as she scooped up a gelatinous glob of gravy, “a night like tonight is the reason I joined this band in the first place.”

“Not me,” Richie said, tongue firmly in cheek. “I’m in it for the chicks.” Johnny and I laughed.

“All I’ve ever wanted,” Chey continued, ignoring us, “is
to play music that would make people feel good. We did that tonight.” We were all quiet for a moment.

It’s funny. I’d never really thought of it that way before. I’d only ever thought about how playing music made me feel. But Chey was right. The real magic comes from the audience. Music, it turns out, is more about giving than receiving. Who knew?

“I’ve always wondered,” Johnny asked Chey, “why did you want to play the bass?”

“I didn’t.” She didn’t offer more. That’s how Chey was. An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, covered by a blanket or whatever the hell that phrase is.

“Then why do you?” Johnny persisted.

“Because I can’t play the trumpet.” We all looked at her sideways, which is pretty much what Chey wanted, and she laughed. “I started playing the trumpet in the fifth grade. All the other girls chose the flute or clarinet, but I didn’t want to be like the other girls. I wanted to be one of the boys, so I took up the trumpet.” Again, Chey stopped, like we were supposed to know the rest of the story. Like we’d all read her biography.

“And?” Johnny asked.

“Braces.”

“Braces?” Richie asked.

“My teeth were crooked. I got braces. I had to give up the trumpet.”

“Okay,” Johnny said, “but why the bass? Why not the piano, or guitar?”

“How the hell should I know?” Chey was annoyed that Johnny had finally gotten to the heart of the matter, had pierced her protective shell of misdirection and confusion, and he let it drop. This was classic Cheyenne. Anytime the conversation turned to her, she would run you in circles, and just when you thought you were getting somewhere, she would leave you scratching your head harder than when you started. It drove us all nuts, and made us all like her even more.

“How about you, Harry, what’s in all of this for you?” Cheyenne asked, waving her hand at the four of us.