Two, One
After a while, the burning feeling stopped. It still hurt like a motherfucker, but the fire had buried itself in the curve of his spine and the faint gasping sounds, Joe's spiked hair poking into his shoulder blades and the ricochet of light in half-empty vodka bottles. At first he thought of Mary, and of playing guitar. But Joe was holding his arms close to his sides, and Joe sounded like he was crying, or choking maybe, and they were so fucking drunk. Billy closed his eyes and thought, Joe is fucking me, and left it at that.
He tours with Jenifur and all the interviewers ask him about Joe Dick. They have open, gaping mouths and zingy one-liners, soundbites and television clips, and his fingers are still stinging from the frets and strings; a post-show buzz. Their fucking microphones, he thinks, their fucking greed. Joe always said it was about the music, and it's like he's the only one who remembers.
They ask, "How close were you two?"
"We were family. He was my, we were family. What do you think?"
They ask, "Do you know any reason why Joe would kill himself?"
"No." Blood and bone on the pavement.
They ask, "What did you do when you first found out?"
Billy flicks his cigarette and takes a drink. He can see the tape recorder from where he's sitting, another mouth to pull him in and in and in. "I stayed sober for thirty-seven hours."
The first real gig they had, the first big one, Billy played with his fingers smelling like bacon grease. Joe fried lunch in a three-day dirty pan and spit crumbs at him, poured whiskey into his open mouth and pounded the van's cracked dashboard with the bottle. Sometimes Billy didn't know who was driving and who rode shotgun.
At the venue, Billy thought there had to be about a thousand fucking cars, and a million people to fill them. Pipefitter went wall-eyed when he saw the crowd, "oh, fuck me, oh fuck me that's a lot of people," and John laughed, and Joe smiled so wide it was like his mouth would tear at the corners.
"Real deal," Pipe said.
"No realer than last time," Billy said. He picked up his shot glass, looked at it, and put it down again. His fingers were shaking a little, not too much.
"Okay, big deal, then."
Joe was sitting at the table, flicking his lighter on and off. He didn't look up. "Fuck you, Pipe."
"Hey, look, all I'm saying is there's a lot of people and we don't want to fuck up, okay?"
"Yeah," Billy said.
Joe looked over. "Yeah? Excuse me, 'yeah'?"
Billy shrugged, because it was true and Joe couldn't fuck with true. The he said, "Well," because it was Joe.
"S'what I thought." Joe stood up, still flicking his lighter. "Man, fuck them, right? Fuck'em, Billy, we're going to kick their fucking heads in."
Billy balled his hands into fists and shook them out. "You are."
"Sure. I'll pop their heads off their necks, and you run cleanup. C'mon." Joe reached out and held the back of Billy's neck, tight so he couldn't move. He leaned over, pressed his mouth to Billy's cheekbone, and bit down.
Billy ran cleanup.
Some fucking freak, ripped shirtsleeves and red streaks painted on his face, tried to vault the stage like a gymnast in the middle of the first song. He went right between Joe and John and got his head shoved into the drumset for his troubles. Billy could see the cords of tendon on his own arms as he played, thin rigid muscle and his fingers like spikes, and the savage chug chug sound of the guitar. His cheek burned for the first three songs.
Billy's forgotten their names, or hasn't bothered to learn them. It's just Jenifur, this gelatinous mass, the pale bulge of them up onstage next to him and he really doesn't want to know their names. He looks directly at whoever he's speaking to, and the bassist thinks he's courteous. If Joe were here he'd steal the groupies' lipstick and draw Joe_Dick on all Billy's shirts. Teach him to forget his fucking name.
Billy looks around. "Where's my guitar?"
The lead singer walks over, her lipstick smeared from sucking off the microphone during warm-up. "What?"
"I can't find my guitar, where's my guitar?" He hasn't seen it by the stage or in the vans. It's not like he's conscientious or anything, but he can't play without his guitar and he shouldn't be the only fucking person who knows this.
"Which one?"
Billy presses his teeth together so his jaw aches. "The one I like."
"Oh, that" she says. "I think Charlie has it."
He's at the foot of the stage while the roadies take it down, crawling around him like a mass of worker ants. Billy's long over being amazed at how fast they can assemble and disassemble the stage, but it still raises the hair on his neck, just a little. Because, see, who would build a whole stage just to watch them prance around on it for a night? The Greeks used natural amphitheaters to hold their performances, not that anyone cares and especially not him. But really, they could at least try to play on something solid, something that's been here for more than a few fucking hours. Every time he stands up it feels like it's gonna fall out from under him.
Billy'd give anything, he thinks, to just stand up on a bartop and play, three inches from falling off and smashing his face on somebody's boots, five inches from Joe, two seconds from exploding at the noise in his fingers and his chest.
"So which one's Charlie?"
She looks at him, narrows her eyes a little and tips her head down. "He's the drummer."
"Oh, so it's not, um. Not a roadie 'Charlie' or something, right?"
"No, not a roadie Charlie."
She's still looking at him funny, but she's not Joe and nobody but Joe could ever catch him lying, so it doesn't matter. Billy shrugs and smiles. "Okay, right," and he goes to look for Charlie.
Joe got smashed and passed out around midnight, still holding the bottle. His feet were bare and somebody, probably Pipefitter, had put a pair of red mittens on his hands, one of them shoved down over the bottleneck. Billy was just drunk enough that standing was hard work, and the only chair that didn't have John's or Pipe's shit on it had Joe's foot propped on the edge. When Billy sat, Joe's toenails pushed into his hip.
Joe woke up at one. Billy'd been tracing the veins on his foot, feeling the soft raised lines, blue and red, nasty neon colors garish under the pale flesh, and he could feel Joe's leg twitch when he woke.
Joe's eyes opened halfway. "Hmm?"
"Lightweight," Billy said.
"Yeah, fuck you, too," Joe said, but it came out slurred and soft, tired. He pressed his foot harder into Billy's side. "And what the hell's this? Why wake me up, you fuck? That's not buddies."
"You passed out."
Joe flipped him off weakly, looking conked. "Was I going into a coma?"
"No."
"Well, was I?"
"No," Billy said.
"And I didn't look like I was about to choke on my own puke or something."
Billy shrugged, hands still on Joe's feet. "No, you didn't."
"Okay, then," his head started tipping forward, eyes closed. Billy jerked at his toes and started humming "Danny Boy," loudly. Joe grunted and pulled his head up. "Stop it. Lemme sleep."
"You love it," Billy said, and dug his fingernails hard into Joe's instep. Joe hissed and kicked out, knocking Billy's chair backward, and laughed as Billy sprawled like a starfish on the ground. "Oh, you fucker."
"Hey, now," and Billy could barely hear it, Joe sounded like he was whispering. "You, Billiam, are a sadist, and deserve whateverthefuck you get."
Billy rolled on his side and pushed himself up, hands already curled into fists. He could just see it, Joe's smile crushed into broken teeth and his jaw hanging lopsided, dislocated. Maybe his lips ground into pulp, maybe an eye swollen shut, and Billy was up and over to the couch and ready, so fucking ready for a fight. He swayed a little on the way and by the time he got there Joe was passed back out, his eyelids stuck closed with rum and spit and sweat, the mittens twisted around on his wrists.
Billy straightened the mittens (fucking mittens) and pulled the bottle out of Joe's hand. He sat at the other end of the couch, leaning against the arm. He wanted to crawl under part of the blanket with Joe, or steal the whole thing, because it was fucking freezing and he wasn't nearly drunk enough for this shit, but instead he just tucked his feet under the edge of it and fell asleep.
When Billy scrubs at his hair, little flakes of skin fly off in all directions like snow. Before he goes onstage he shakes his head out and they catch the light, but during shows he's too sweaty and they stick to his scalp, insulating and making him sweat more. There's a little white ring under the brims of all his hats, and he won't let the groupies touch his hair, 'cause it's not like you want someone's skin coming off in your hands while you fuck them.
Billy's been taking pills, but that doesn't help. The air's too dry in the States, that has to be it, making him cough and choke even when he hasn't been smoking, drying his nose and throat like jerky. He doesn't want to go to the doctor; none of them take any responsibility here. It's always psychosomatic this and outside stressors that, and Billy feels like an old man when he thinks that, but he doesn't particularly want to stop.
"Hey, um," Billy snaps his fingers, trying to remember.
The roadie nods and says, "Mark."
"Mark, yeah. Mark, do you have any kerosene?"
Mark looks surprised. "No, we run on diesel and gasoline, and we have electric heaters. There's no need for --"
"Yeah, okay," Billy says. "How about, do you have any rubbing alcohol?"
"Yeah, in the first aid kits. Do you need some?"
Billy nods his head, and feels dust settle on his nose. "Please."
Mark gets rubbing alcohol, almost a full bottle. Billy doesn't wait for him to leave but just pours the alcohol on. He starts scrubbing at his scalp, hard fingers and those tiny burning shocks when the liquid hits open wounds. Half of Billy's head's been scoured and he notices that Mark is still there. He's just standing at the edge of the tent like an idiot while Billy pours more of the liquid onto his head, as it spills over the side of his face.
If it were Joe, he'd lick Billy's forehead, just to fuck with him, and maybe wipe the rubbing alcohol off his neck before the burning drove him nuts. He'd whack Billy's hands away and take over, pushing just hard enough into the back of Billy's head for it to feel good. Billy tries to push hard, too, but his head keeps tipping forward.
Without moving his arms or lifting his head, Billy leans toward Mark and says, "Um, can you --?"
"Man, that's not healthy."
Billy's hands fall to his sides. "It always works," he says. "Joe'n me, it always worked for us."
"Doesn't mean it's not," Mark's feet make shuffling sounds on the gravel. "Doesn't mean it's good for you."
"Fine, whatever. Freak." He can hear Mark walking away, but who the fuck cares? He probably wouldn't've done it right anyway. Billy tries to finish, but it's like the difference between jerking yourself off or getting a chick to do it for you; someone else's hands are always better.
After the alcohol comes Vaseline, rubbed into the skin until his entire head feels like a greased bowling ball. Joe used to always take a big gob of it in his fingers and try to stuff it up Billy's nose, or wipe a trail down his chest, slimy like snails and boogers, and laugh. Billy's nose itches and his throat aches, more dry American air.
John was going nuts, babbling on and on about how in the end it's love, and Billy could've said "No fucking way" but he didn't. He was looking right at Joe and blood seeped between his teeth, dribbled down his chin, and Joe'd just fucking attacked him and he didn't say it. And that should've meant something. It should've.
Some kid is behind the stadium, a couple hours after the show ends, playing a slide guitar. The metal shines a little in the floodlights; the boy's head is down, and his hair falls in a greasy mass past his eyes. He's got each individual finger pointed like he's playing by feel, and Billy sits on the curb to watch. The music glitters, a counterpoint to the ringing in his ears, raw and uncluttered and nice, so nice, not at all like Joe.
"No, listen," he says, and the kid twitches; he probably didn't know Billy was there. "Your third string's too loose, when you do the progression." The kid nods and tightens it. "Where'd you learn to play?"
He says, "Home. My dad can play the mandolin and the banjo, acoustic guitar, and this one. He's trying to teach me spoons, too, but I said no way."
Billy lights a cigarette and uses it to point to the guitar. "Good choice," he says.
"I thought so, yeah." Kid looks down and Billy can see his shoulders rise and fall, rise and fall under his jacket. "I saw you play, tonight."
"Yeah?" Billy can't believe he cares. This is just some little kid who's never gonna get out of bumfuck nowhere and Billy will be playing venues till he's eighty, it's not like he's talking to Time magazine or something. But he can say he's curious, and the kid has a good sound, and it's better than playing fucking gin rummy in the back of the bus.
"I thought it was cool. You guys are, you know. It was cool." He strums a few chords. "Where'd you learn?"
Billy says, "Joe Dick taught me," before he thinks about it. The kid blinks and nods again.
He finishes his cigarette and stabs it out on the sole of his boot. His back cracks as he stands, and he wishes the kid luck while he stretches his arms out, reaching into the dark. The kid nods and keeps playing, eyes closed, fingernails scraping on string. Billy walks slowly back to the vans, and he's halfway through the bus door when he realizes the kid doesn't even know who the fuck Joe Dick was.
They stopped off in Toronto in the middle of the tour. Joe called it a "rest" but really it was because the driver quit, 'cause Pipefitter wouldn't stop fucking with the brake lines when they parked at venues. The driver dropped them off at a motel on Avenue Road and left the keys in the bus. Pipe bought a tub of craft glue at the nearest plaza and locked himself in his room, and whenever Billy knocked he said, "I'm fucking getting high here, fuck off," so Billy stopped knocking.
Joe went out and came back, and, "there's this, I don't know, fucking street fair, something. They're throwing knives in Eaton center -- shut up, I went there by accident, not like I meant to -- and there's a parade or something downtown. We could fuck with the tourists, c'mon." Joe had a film of glue peeling off his fingers, and his eyes were red.
"You fucking idiot," Billy said. Joe lit a cigarette and used it to burn the glue flakes into ash.
"What?"
"We have coke in the bus fridge, clean shit, good shit, and you're getting high with Pipefitter on fucking macaroni glue?"
Joe flicked cigarette ash into his hair. "I was saving the coke for you. Be grateful, fucker."
Joe didn't have any damn sense, but he was right about the fair. All through downtown Toronto, winding like a snake, was a rush of fat people with cameras and skinny people with straw hats and ugly little children with ice cream. There was some weird music with trumpets playing out of a portable loudspeaker, and along the sidewalk were little stalls selling tee shirts and potted shrubs, and other stupid shit.
"Oh, look," Joe said, trotting over to a little stall that wasn't any different from all the other little stalls, so Billy didn't know why the hell he picked that one, and smiling like a kid. What the fuck was in Pipe's glue? "Corn-dollies." He picked one up and waved it around. "Remember those?"
"They'd make a good show," Billy said. "We could light them on fire and throw them at people."
Joe smiled even wider and patted him on the cheek, barely missing his eye with the lit cigarette. "You know I love you for your brains," he said.
The man running the stall nodded at them. "Are you boys in town for the fair?"
"Nah," Joe, the asshole, answered him before Billy could. "We're the musical entertainment."
"The what?"
Billy dug his fingers hard into Joe's arm and said, "Yeah, we're the band. All the people here, they came to see us. They came for the show, you know. It's a ritual-march to the stage area."
"Better than virgin sacrifices," Joe said, nodding.
"Oh," the man said, looking confused. "And, er, what do you play?"
"Klezmer," Joe said, pointing to the loudspeaker. "We're the Klezmorim; they're all here to listen to us. C'mon, Billy, we should get ready for the show." He pulled Billy's arm and they folded themselves back into the crowd. Joe was still smiling, wobbling a little as he walked and he really was an idiot. Billy wanted to hit him so fucking hard, but he didn't think Joe would remember it later, and then what would be the point? "You're quick, young William. I might have to keep you."
"Fuck you."
"C'mon, man, you loved it. You like bullshitting better than I do. Besides, I knew you wouldn't leave me hanging like that."
"I swear, I'm fucking making you play that Klezmip shit at the next show."
"Klez-mer. You want to speak to our minority demographic, you pronounce the words right."
"You're so fucked."
"My right-hand man," Joe said, and opened the door of the van for him.
Jenifur tours in New York City, two concerts in three days, and then to another city and do the same dance again. The dirt and the smell of piss remind him of Joe, the savage eyes of the homeless, everything does. When Billy blows his nose there's nothing but soot on his handkerchief.
"Fucking watch it," everyone screams at him, as if he didn't know when not to cross the street. As if he cared.
Taxicabs almost run him over, that is when he remembers how to whistle, and then he has to fight with people over a little yellow door and a dirty fake leather cushion and it's too much fucking hassle. He doesn't have time to waste swearing at people.
"Yeah, take it," he says, and this is the third time in ten minutes but it's not like he was going anywhere important. If Joe were here he'd punch the greedy old ladies when they pulled their shit, or try to climb through the little glass window into the front seat. If it were Joe, they'd have the van and Billy'd sit next to him.
"We could share," the woman says, gesturing at the door. Billy nods and they get in. "Thirty-fourth and eighth," she says. "And you?"
"Near there's fine."
The woman looks at him and opens her mouth a little, like a fish, like she's about to say something, and Billy wishes he'd waited for another cab. "You look familiar. What's your name?"
He knows it's pretty fucking dumb to give your name to a stranger in the back of a taxi cab, but fuck it. It's not like it's his real name anyway. "Billy," he says.
"Billy what?" She asks as if it were any of her fucking business.
Billy tries to say "Boisy" and "Tallent" at the same time and ends up choking on his tongue. He settles for saying, "Mulgrew," enunciating clearly, and stares out the window for the rest of the ride.
Billy got a knife for his birthday and all the card said was "I paid a whole fucking lot for this so you'd better like it." Joe looked away when he opened it, and only looked back when he thanked John, almost sincerely, for the wonderful gift. The first chance Joe got, after Billy was done cutting grapefruit and scaling fish, he took the knife and balanced it, horizontal, with the tip resting between his eyes.
"It's all about trust," he said, "see? John, commere." He rested the knife against John's forehead, one finger pushing the other end of it, lightly, and the blade making a faint crease in John's skin. "Johnny trusts me, so it works. If it were Pipe, he'd twitch too much and I'd end up skinning him or something. You should try it."
Billy shook his head. "No fucking way."
"William, I'm hurt. You don't trust me?"
"You're fucking high, man. You're shaking; I'd be stupid to trust you right now."
Joe walked over. "That's what's wrong with the world, no faith in your comrades. Okay, here look, gimme your hand." Billy jerked his arm away, but he did it slowly and Joe was fast enough to catch him. The point of the knife went right up to Joe's forehead, and he pressed Billy's index finger to the other end, letting him take control of it. "Feel that?"
Billy thought he could; thought he could feel the twitch of Joe's pulse through the metal, the rise and fall of his chest, feel it when Joe wiggled his toes or blinked. He said, "Sorta." "That, my friend, is trust, which you don't have." Joe smiled smugly and closed his eyes, and Billy was just about to do the same, just letting the knife rest between them, when Joe's arm came up and slapped him on the side of the head, hard. His hand jerked and the knife dropped, slicing into Joe's nose, and Joe said, "Ow. Dammit. You dink."
Billy rubbed the side of his head. "What the hell? I could have cut your fucking eye out, moron."
Joe picked the knife up. "I was giving you a reason," he said, and licked the blood off. Billy got a towel for his nose, and put the knife back in its case.
Billy says, "I'm not going to play," and he fucking means it.
The drummer's eyes bug out. "What do you mean, you're not going to play?"
"I'm not." Billy balls his hands into fists as he says it.
"You're under contract."
The drummer's holding his sticks like switchblades and he looks like he wants to shove one of them through Billy's skull, which is just fine with Billy because he is so fucking ready for this fight. He shakes his shoulders out. "I told Ed months ago, he was supposed to tell you. I'm not playing tonight. I'm just, I'm not."
"The show's in twenty fucking minutes. You have to play," and he's yelling now, loud enough that the roadies stop working with the microphone wires or whatever it is that they're doing, and watch. "This is a concert. tour. Not some goddamn bar gig in the fucking Yukon. They came to see you, and we can't get a replacement in twenty minutes."
Billy shrugs, and leans out. If the guy takes a swipe at him, he wants to be able to dodge it. "Reschedule. I'm not going on tonight."
"No fucking way, there's not enough time. And what the fuck, man? We gave you your birthday --"
"I didn't want my birthday."
"We gave you Christmas --"
"I didn't fucking want Christmas."
"You come to the venue --"
"To tell you I'm not gonna play."
"And just because some fucker caps himself a year ago and you're a fucking morbid prick does not give you the right to back out of a concert twenty minutes before it starts."
Billy feels like he can't breathe. "Joe wasn't. I'm not playing."
The drummer gets right up in Billy's face, so close Billy can smell his breath and choke on it, close enough to ball his hand up in Billy's shirt and smile at him like there's nothing in the world he'd like better than to grind him into powder, and Billy's hands are still curled into fists but they're not doing anything. They're like lead weights at the bottom of his arms. Maybe he can't play, maybe he'll get onstage and his arms'll just fall off when he strikes the first chord. Because if they were ever supposed to do anything it would be tear this guy's fucking face off, and he can't even move his fingers.
"You are," the drummer says, still smiling crazy. "You, Billy Tallent, are under contract and you, Billy Tallent will play tonight, otherwise Ed'll have your balls. And when he's done, I'll feed the rest of you to my fucking dogs." The drummer walks away before he can answer, and Billy feels so heavy.
Joe looked up one day, the blood on his lip bright like paint and his fingers unbroken, which was crazy considering how many fucking fights he got into in the course of a day, and said, "We should start a band." He'd been thisclose to breaking his guitar on Billy's head just a second ago, and Billy sat on the floor and watched as he wiped the blood off his face.
He couldn't see them ever being good at anything but beating the shit out of each other or being friends. Besides, just two guitars didn't make a band, and they didn't have anybody else, and they couldn't even write. But Joe said, "We could do it, too. Trust me, we'll be huge," and it was Joe, so he nodded.
Bruce walks over, carrying a bottle, and says, "Uh, Billy, I. Um," and Billy's five seconds from breaking his face open with the camera. He knows he said he'd gotten rid of his anger, but Billy heard the gunshot same as everybody else, and if anything is extenuating circumstances then this is. And really, just fuck everybody, just fuck everyone. Fuck Joe and his brains painting the side of his face, fuck everyone else for breathing.
"Shut up," he says, poking at a piece of broken glass with his shoe. He could take it and start at Bruce's collarbone, dig in deep and rip down and cut him right in half. If Bruce says another word, he just might.
Bruce just stands there, looking down, holding the motherfucking bottle. Billy points, "S'at his?"
"Yeah."
"S'ere any left?"
Bruce hands it to him, thick wavy glass, no cap; just like every other night and Joe had his hands on this last. Before the gun, of course. It's empty, and that's fine, that's better than fine, that's perfect. Joe earned it, every drop.
He says, "Gimme the film," and Bruce grips the camera tighter, like it's a fucking blankie or something. "I got a contract, I'll pay you for the, for whatever. Go home."
"Billy, um."
Billy really fucking wants to kill him, no joke, no lie, and he hopes Bruce can see that because he doesn't have the time to waste, telling him. "Really? Are you sure, Bruce? 'Cause if you're not sure, then what fucking good are you?" Bruce is still just standing there, and Billy's not gonna kill him because Joe owns killing now. Joe took it, and Billy can't have it anymore.
Bruce walks away and Billy's left holding the bottle. Billy's all that's left.
Billy would break time in two, into Before Joe and After Joe, and mark everything that's ever happened, but there's no point. The After Joe doesn't really matter, and the Before Joe is, it's. He can't even listen to their songs.