LITMIR.BIZ

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knees buckled. The other one rushed at Nancy and grabbed hold of her shirt. She screamed, instantly reached up, and gouged at his eyes with her nails. Rich staggered and leapt at the one who’d grabbed her and thudded his fist into the guy’s head.

      “Go!” Rich shouted. Garret yanked Nancy free, and they ran. The pipe finally found its mark over the back of Rich’s head, and he flashed out like the streetlights had been shut off, but Nancy said he never hit the ground. The heavy-set ex-cons snatched him up, blabbering something about guard brutality in Statesville and how they were ’doing this for dem brothas in Statesville.’

      The two men dragged Rich into an abandoned basement and ripped his clothes off with their incredibly strong hands while they muttered, laughed, and grunted.

      Nancy and Garret ran down the alley screaming for help. Then, they cut onto Clark and ran right out into traffic, waving their arms. The cars swerved and screeched around them. Nancy screamed, “Rape!” then, “Fire!” and a light clicked on.

      Rich’s mouth filled with blood. Some slid down his throat, and it gargled there as he begged for mercy.

      Finally, a police squad swerved up to Nancy and Garret. They jumped in and surged into the alley, where they frantically searched for the gangway. They found it thanks to a red hand smear on a wooden garage siding. When they got down in the basement, the men had Rich’s pants down to his knees. The shirtless one was hovering above him, stroking his own semi-hard cock hanging out of his undone pants. The cops pulled out their firearms.

      The ex-cons said it was consensual—that Nancy just got jealous. The cops were reluctant to arrest them, and Rich didn’t pursue it, so they let them go. The cut on the top of Rich’s head wasn’t bad enough for stitches, and the bruises eventually healed. Nothing else ever did.

      •

      MUSIC DOESN’T MEAN MUCH when you’re a little kid; it’s just sounds and the emotions they produce. None of your identity is aligned with what you listen to. You’re a clean pallet.

      I was on my way upstairs to my room when I heard laughter booming out of Rich’s open bedroom door. My head still ached from the fight. I reached up and felt the soft lumps along my forehead, now all purple and blue. I could hear Rich over Pantera’s fast, rippling metal.

      “My baby brother, he was fighting with twenty little niggers at once,” Rich roared, his voice all high, squeaky, and excited. “I came up and saved him and beat the shit out of a few of ’em myself. But, man, I’m telling ya, twenty of ’em!”

      “OK, Rich. Fuckin’ superhero over here. Where is that little rascal, anyways?” I recognized the gravelly voice. It was Sy.

      I reached the top of the stairs. It was early evening, and a bright yellow light radiated out of his doorway. I peered in to see four guys lounged on his little bed. All of them had long dirty hair and ripped-up jeans. Rich stood with his back to me and his arms flailing around as he recounted the fight. There was an American flag tacked to the slanted ceiling that hung with the pitch of the roof. A large Iron Maiden poster hung on the wall near the window that showed the skeletal Eddie the Head in a straitjacket with three chains attached to his iron neck collar. It secured him inside a padded room, and his fierce eyes screamed out at you. It read “Peace of Mind” at the bottom.

      Sy’s hair was a greasy, dirty blond tangle that hung down past his shoulders. His beard was mangy and had a tint of red in it. He wore this threadbare, black Metallica t-shirt, bleached white jeans with rips at the knees, and some white high-top Reeboks. I peeked my head in through the door.

      “Get over here, you,” Sy said, waving me in. “The champ himself!”

      He reached out, grabbed me, and threw me in a head lock. I smelled pot and liquor, but I didn’t know what the smells were then, and I recognized ’em as Sy’s scent. He let me go and stood there. I could feel them all staring at my forehead and eye.

      “Now what happened, Joey?” Sy asked.

      I took a deep breath. “Got in a fight,” I said quietly.

      “Well, I can see that,” Sy replied, grinning. “Did ya win?”

      “Didn’t get to finish,” I said, and glanced over at Rich, who watched me with his arms folded over his chest.

      “Well… Did you get any good punches in?” Sy asked.

      I paused, looked down, and scratched my chin. I riffled through my memory—the haze of punches and shouts—then I remembered Leroy on the pavement, and I looked back up.

      “Yeah!” I exclaimed. They broke up.

      “So he’s coming out tonight, huh?” Sy looked over at Rich.

      “Yep, Ma even said it was alright,” Rich confirmed as he reached over and messed up my hair. “I told her what happened and said it might cheer him up to hear some metal.”

      My mind raced with wild excitement of where we were headed. I was sure it was some dark pit of dragons and snakes, smoke and roaring noise.

      We piled into Rich’s rusty Bronco, and the back was stacked to the roof with large black amps, guitar cases, and a drum kit.

      “Sy, what’s the name of your band?” I asked as we squished in the back seat.

      “The Dead Rat Society,” Sy growled. “Got a problem with that, kid?” He glowered at me. Metallica erupted as the sputtering engine started, and the Bronco sped down Hollywood.

      The show was at a place out on Peterson Ave. called Fautches. I remembered Jan’n’Rose said they had all-ages house music on Friday nights, and they’d even convinced Ma to take ’em a few times. Fautches was a wide one-story converted office space with tall windows that spread across the entire width with tan, vertical track blinds that were always drawn shut. There was a glass door in the middle for the entrance, and the building had a narrow, empty lot beside it that was covered with white stones and garbage. A few bushes lined the club’s cinderblock side wall. As we approached Fautches, Rich swerved right, and suddenly the Bronco barreled over the curb and sidewalk. Everything in the truck sprung up airborn, then it all fell downward on the creaky shocks as the truck bounced. The instruments and amps wobbled. The truck tires rumpled over the stones and stopped near the back of the building next to a steel door.

      “You’re one crazy motherfucker, Rich!” Sy shouted as we piled out.

      Rich got out and swung the rear hatch up. Miraculously, the mountain of equipment didn’t avalanche out.

      “Here, you carry this,” Sy said as he gripped a guitar case, spun around, and bent down on one knee. Then, he lifted it up to me like some sacred relic. “Now you take care of this, champ.”

      “What is it?” I asked, grabbing the smooth wood handle.

      “Excalibur,” Sy declared, his eyes closed solemnly. “Now get in there.”

      I followed Rich, who hoisted a large kick drum.

      We walked down a dark hallway. The roaring yawn of a lead electric guitar spilt into the room. We stacked the instruments and amps on the back of the small carpeted stage. The long, narrow room was about half full with slouchy metal-heads—almost all of whom wore black band shirts, bleached jeans, and combat boots—and most had long mops of dirty hair. There was one black dude sitting atop a tall amp near the side of stage. His long, skinny legs dangled almost to the floor. He had a mohawk made outta finger-length spikes of frizzy hair that spouted down the center of his shaved, glistening scalp.

      I stood steadfast beside Excalibur’s case and gawked at the room. Rich stomped up with a fistful of quarters. “Here,” he said, and poured them into my cupped palms. “Go ahead.” He nodded to the large arcade in the side room. “The show won’t start for a while.”

      The game room was long and narrow like the concert room. It was filled with manic, pulsing lights. Video game machines lined each wall, and a column of games ran down the middle. It was full of racecar and gun games and crazy, themed pinball

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