Dashboard Elvis is Dead, page 12
‘Holy shite … that wis fucken mental, man!’ Chic is the only one who speaks. Everyone else looks at him, open-mouthed, not able to take in what has just happened.
‘Everybody aw’right?’ asks Kenny McFadden.
The band members examine themselves for blood and damage.
‘Haud on, where’s Jamie?’ asks Bingo.
They are standing in a tiny store cupboard. Kenny has swivelled two metal beer kegs across the door.
‘Whit ye lookin’ at me for?’ says Reef.
‘You’re the fucken leader, that’s why,’ shouts Chic. ‘You gie’d the skedaddle signal.’
‘He mibbe didnae see it,’ said Kenny.
‘So, whit … ye think he’s still out there strummin’?’ says Reef.
‘Don’t talk shite. Ah didnae mean that,’ says Kenny.
‘Fuck sake. Shift they fucken barrels. Ah’ll go an’ look for him.’
Before they can, the door takes a thud from outside.
‘You’se in there?’ It’s Jamie.
They move the kegs and open the door. Jamie has taken his jacket off and wrapped it around his arm.
‘Ah think ah might need a doctor,’ he says. He steps into the light of the storeroom.
‘How?’ asks Kenny.
Jamie’s face is white as he holds his hand up. There’s blood everywhere and a substantial layer of flesh on his right forearm is loose and ripped open.
‘Ah fuck, son,’ says Kenny McFadden.
Jamie Hewitt collapses.
Reef Malcolm catches him.
Bingo McAllister screams.
Chic Chalmers vomits.
And that is the end of the band.
A State of Independence (7)
Finally, I see her. Stumbling out of the club’s main entrance. Somehow she avoids the violence that has spilled out onto the street. The motorcycles are on their sides. Knocked over like a line of bowling-alley skittles. Police sirens sound from neighboring roads. Squad cars appear at the bar. Screeching to a halt from the opposite ends of Altamont Street.
I can’t leave him, I can’t! Brandy screams. Yanking at her hair in pained helplessness.
We have to go, Brandy … The cops are everywhere. We need to…
NO! she yells.
We can’t go back. We gotta get … I open the driver’s side door and push her inside. She is hysterical.
I wanna be with Matt. Leave me. HERE! Leave m—
I force her head down as more patrol cars pass us. There’s no reason for them to detain us, but I don’t know what else to do. I push her over, across the front seat, and take the keys from her. She opens the door and jumps out.
Brandy. NO! I shout after her.
She runs back to the bar, and I run after her. She won’t be stopped. I reach her and drag her away and towards the quieter door in the narrow side street. We look inside. A full-scale riot is under way. The redneck bikers are clubbing everyone in sight. Brandy, slight as she is, disappears. Through a blur of kicking legs and swinging arms and battered bodies, I see her. A shock of movie-tone Technicolor that doesn’t belong here. She drags Matt up, and although he seems lifeless, somehow she gets him to his feet. I run in and help her get him to the door. Through the door. Into the narrow side street. Shuffling him to the car. Blood pours from his head. Through the wet blackness of his disheveled hair, I feel it. Sticky. Thick. Warm. I see it on my left hand. In my right, I hold the keys. I glance in the rear-view mirror of the convertible. Brandy is wailing in the back. Holding him. If he’s breathing, he isn’t conscious. Her pink top is spattered with the blood from his head wound. Hesitantly, given my lack of experience behind the wheel, I pull away. She pleads with him. Cradles him. Our fallen leader. The end of our little, short-lived Camelot. Fortunately, Larry taught me the basics in a car with a stick shift, and although this one crunches its anger at me, the noisy chaos behind us masks my inexperience.
I haven’t been driving long before we hit the interstate and darkness. I see a billboard. There are words written on it. As we get closer, I make them out:
WHAT IS THE MEANING OF LIFE?
I pull the car off the highway and park it behind the cover of the billboard.
Brandy jumps out. She screams, and I look back, fearful. He sprawls across the rear seat. Blood is everywhere. Brandy lies in the road, pulling at her hair. I get out and shout at her. Slap her face repeatedly.
We need to get him to the ER, I shout. Brandy! Now. Or he’ll die.
And instantly she stops. She stands. She takes the keys from me and gets in the car.
Get in, she commands.
And I do.
We drive. Something digs in my ribs. I reach into a pocket. It’s the Polaroid of the guitarist in the band. In the picture, he is smiling.
After the Razzle Rodeo Club incident, we drove. Simply to get as far from Altamont Street as possible. Matt and Brandy had robbed gas stations and liquor stores. Brandy was convinced the cops would see them as the instigators of the riot and would be on our tail. We reached Wickenburg, a small town in Maricopa County. There was a local all-night medical center, located next door to a motel. I remained out of sight.
Brandy persuaded the doctors that Matt had been randomly attacked. He was stabilized, assessed, and then taken to an Intensive Care Unit. Because the hematoma could’ve enlarged, he wasn’t taken into the operating theater for a few days. Brandy talked of a measure called the Glasgow Coma Scale. I couldn’t believe it. His head injury was evaluated as moderate. His chances of recovery rated as 50:50 at best. I wondered just how much money Matt and Brandy had accumulated. Because his treatment wasn’t cheap and she paid for it – and our residence in the motel – with cash. But I didn’t ask searching questions. And then we moved, the three of us. Here. To a low-rent apartment on – ironically – Frontier Street.
More than any other emotion, guilt can change a person. You’d think I would’ve said sorry and goodbye, and carried on my way to California, wouldn’t you? But I stayed – to help Brandy, to look after Matt. Why? you might ask. It was simple: they needed me, and I hadn’t felt needed before.
Each of us has our role, and very quickly we settle into a simple routine. Matt’s only role is to give us a purpose. Brandy earns from a waitressing job that offers flexibility and as many hours as we can manage. I take care of Matt while she’s out. I spend any free time in a small local library just across the street from the apartment, picking out books to read to Matt. Books, I now appreciate, that only reinforce what he has lost.
Our initial optimism wanes. Those first few weeks it feels like every day brings a tiny improvement. But it’s an illusion. The only change is in our growing acceptance of a situation we aren’t in control of. And that, ultimately, isn’t positive. Two months pass. Each week brings greater challenges, not fewer. Brandy is like a caged animal. Desperate to be free. She doesn’t wear commitment well, especially in these confined circumstances. But she can’t leave. We argue regularly. About the little things primarily. And gradually, I no longer feel needed. Selfish though it sounds, I feel taken advantage of. It’s like I’m back in Humble. Something needs to give. We both know it. Perhaps even poor Matt does too.
I’m sat on the edge of a single bed. Matt is propped up in front of me. He can’t eat by himself. I’m feeding him from a spoon. He grips my small, plastic dashboard Elvis as if summoning enough strength to rub it would grant him three wishes and a way out of this purgatory. Unusually for Arizona in the fall, it’s raining heavily outside. It’s a tiny space. Cold, and closing in on us. But I can’t complain about anything. I wanted to go to that redneck bar. I wanted to see the band. I wanted to absorb the vibrancy of these two people – wanted some of it to rub off on me. But now I feel trapped again. A carer for a lifeless man whose eyes plead for a pillow to end the torture. I’m now further away than ever from the big-city dreams I’d fostered. Resigned to reflecting on the fateful circumstances that brought me … us, to this place. I desperately want to get out of here.
The front door opens. The interruption drags me back to the situation. I haven’t been paying attention. The food has spilt. It dribbles off Matt’s chin. It falls onto his T-shirt.
B … that you? I shout, needlessly. I scrape away the evidence.
Yeah. Only me. Sorry to disappoint, she replies. She comes into the room. She smiles warmly at both of us.
Hey, handsome, she says. She leans over and kisses Matt’s forehead.
How’s he been? she asks, as she does every day when returning from her shift.
Well, we watched some Captain Kangaroo, an’ then we read On the Road. An’ then we listened to some music. Didn’t we, Matt?
And I’m talking to him like he is an infant. Because that’s what he’s been reduced to. An immobile six-foot infant. And every time we do this, every time she comes home still hoping for the tiniest sign of a change for the better, a little bit more of her dies inside.
But there’s something different about her today. I see it – or imagine it – in a glance she throws my way.
I interpret this as a signal that ‘three’s a crowd, and you’re out’, although I know that wouldn’t be her intention. And even though it’s secretly what I want, it feels like I’m being robbed of the opportunity to decide what’s best for me.
Help me in the kitchen, Jude? she says. I follow her through to the little side room.
Jude, I’m gonna drive you to San Francisco. We’ll go the day after next. Mrs Forde will come in an’ stay with Matt till I get back, she says.
Angry and embarrassed that I’ve somehow become an additional burden to her, my immaturity shows.
What are you talkin’ about? I’m not leavin’ you, I say, stunned at the suggestion.
We can’t keep doin’ this. This ain’t no life for you, girl. You need to go back to school, Jude. I don’t want you makin’ the same mistakes I did, she insists.
What if I already have? I shout.
Jude, keep your voice down, she says calmly.
You can’t look after Matt on your own, I tell her.
I can. He’s my responsibility. I’m startin’ a different job soon. Workin’ better hours. A lot more money. I can pay for regular care for us. Proper care, she says. You need to live your life … be happy.
Tears are forming in my eyes. When I was back in Humble, I never expected happiness. Until AJ Carter came along, I never anticipated life being joyous, or exciting, or dangerous, or magnificently unpredictable. And then Brandy and Matt materialized and in a few spectacular days I knew it was all those things and more.
I just want to be like you, I say. And the tears flow, for that admission alone.
She puts her arms around me and pulls me close.
You’re better than me, Jude. Much better, she whispers.
I just want stability, I say, sobbing.
How is this stable? she asks.
I have no answer to give.
There’s somethin’ more than this for you. You’re gonna go stay with Momma Em. She’ll look after you, she says.
Momma Em was Brandy’s foster parent during the period of her life before she hit the road. Before Matt. Her name has been raised regularly in the weeks leading up to this point. It’s now apparent that Brandy’s decision is final. Despite this…
No! I yell.
YES! Jude. You need to listen to me now.
If that’s it, then I’d be as well off back in Humble, I say.
No. Don’t ever look backwards. Go to Em’s place. I’m telling you.
I’ll fucking decide. You’re not my…
Your what? Your mom? No. No, Jude, I’m not, but that’s what you need.
She’s becoming angry. Struggling to keep her voice low for Matt’s sake.
I don’t want you here no more. I can’t fend for Matt and you at the same time. An’ he’s my priority, she says.
And that’s the end of it. She goes into the bathroom, slamming the door behind her. I’m left staring through the doorway at Matt.
There’s a massive difference between moving forward and moving on.
The following day, we leave. It is still raining. I sit, petulantly, in the back, jabbing the dashboard Elvis into my thigh. I took it from Matt when Brandy wasn’t looking, convincing myself that it’s to remember him by. But I’m punishing him. If I can’t have them, Matt can’t have the Elvis.
Brandy drives, ignoring my melodramatic sighs. It takes us thirteen hours. We pass through more anonymous, dull, monochrome industrial wastelands, improved only by the white dusting of an unseasonal snowfall. And we pass through colorful neon-lit nightlife, buzzing with activity, happy faces outside, people enjoying life.
We reach Ingleside, and the most recent house the teenaged Brandy lived in, and even though it’s dark, and she should be in bed, I meet little Rabbit. She runs towards me, excited to show me two teeth that she has wrapped in a cotton pad. And, despite my desultory mood, I’m immediately entranced.
PART TWO:
Jamie – Down and Out in Glasgow and London
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. The courage to change the things I can.
And the wisdom to know the difference.
1
Hello. My name is Jamie. And I’m a cunt!
This won’t come as a shock. I suspect you know it by now. And, let me warn you, it gets worse before it gets better. I’ve always been a cunt. When the opportunity to act differently has presented itself, I’ve always chosen the way of the cunt. Can there be salvation for the absolute cunt? Well, I certainly hope so. Otherwise, all of this is pointless; this reaching into the darkness of the soul to see if there’s anything worth salvaging. The point, I’ve been told, of committing it to paper is for me to start to confront the consequences of my cuntishness. Nothing more.
Thanks to David F. Ross – another monumental cunt – you may think you know the facts surrounding the demise of my band, The Hyptones. You don’t. Well, not all of them. The violent end of the American tour was described faithfully, but the underlying tensions, while charted, were not fully explained.
His piece about the band stimulated the following confessional, and there is a certain irony to this that only he and I are party to.
I instigated the carnage at the Razzle Rodeo Club. Between the matinee and the evening slot, Kenny McFadden revealed to me that our showcase gig in San Francisco at the end of that horrendous jaunt across hundreds of miles of sweet fuck all was going to feature us and four other bands. A ‘battle of the bands’ competition with a Seymour Stein-sanctioned record deal going to the winner. A talent show, boys … Opportunity fucking Knocks.
We’d only been in America for a week, and we were sick of the sight of each other. We hadn’t properly rehearsed. And I was paralysed with an anxiety that I couldn’t control. I couldn’t cope. I couldn’t deal with the pressure. I just wanted to be home, back in Glasgow. For the madness to stop immediately.
The Razzle Rodeo Club was a disaster waiting to happen. The end of the band was coming. I guess I thought I’d just be helping it along. We were about to go on. When no-one was looking, I threw a bottle from behind one of the amps into the aggravated crowd, a weird mix of fucking hillbilly bikers and these young, punky kids. The resulting chaos may have happened anyway, but my action was the spark that ignited it.
I remember a young girl being nice to me. I remember her taking my photograph. I remember a big guy in a fucking denim waistcoat and a Stetson dragging her down from a table and across the front of the stage by her hair. I remember swinging my guitar and her being free of him. I remember looking at my arm. The blood. The ripped flesh. The exposed tendons. After that, everything remains clouded in an opioid blur.
The band continued on to San Francisco. Bingo told me later that Kenny McFadden took a cab to the Amoeba Records store in Haight-Ashbury, desperately searching for a guitarist who could fill in for me. The cheeky bastard. He came up short. The Hyptones had no choice but to pull out of the gig that could’ve changed our lives. It’s hardly surprising they blamed me for the misfortunes that followed. Our money had run out. Kenny McFadden bought a plane ticket with what we had left and flew home on his own. The others had to wait, sleeping in Jesus Castro’s van until Ronnie Mason sorted their airfares from Glasgow.
My expensive stay in a Phoenix hospital lasted a week. I was discharged following surgery to reconnect the severed flexor tendons. My fingers and wrist were placed in a bent position to keep tension off the repair. A tight boxer’s dressing and a plastic splint would maintain the shape for three months. Another surgery, I was warned, would be likely once back home in Scotland. I didn’t get it. Didn’t see the point. My strumming hand had no movement. There would be no more guitar sounds, jangly or otherwise, for the foreseeable future.
I also found myself in San Francisco. That’s not an acknowledgement of some personal enlightenment; I just don’t recall getting there from the hospital almost a fortnight after the rest of the band had flown home. I had flight tickets. I had money, which, once again, thanks to Annabelle’s dad, had been wired to us. I had Ronnie Mason’s daughter with me, and we had time to kill. As if I had emerged from a period of amnesia, I suddenly had a different relationship with the Masons.
2
Reef concocted this wild, romantic story that fate had brought him and me together. I went along with it – that he’d randomly broken into a house in Dennistoun, had seen my Fender Jaguar copy propped up against an armchair and, rather than stealing it, had threaded a note through the strings:
I’M GETTING A BAND TOGETHER. YOU IN?
The apocryphal tale concluded with me calling the telephone number on the flipside, and him paying for the damage to the back door he’d jemmied.
Had this been true, my da would’ve killed him, resurrected him, and then fucking killed him all over again. But it was a cool story, and when the records started selling, the NME and Melody Maker and Sounds, and all the others, lapped it up.
