Desert Nights

1

Even before her life began Tiny knew this was how it would end. Alone. In the dark. Damp and hot. Her own rapid breathing the last thing she would hear.

Hunkered in the space underneath the stairs with her bare, dirty feet too close to the furnace, she sweated and quaked.

The door opened above her, the steps creaked one by one.

“Tiny,” Kyle, her ex-boyfriend called, elongating the “I” like he was calling a dog. “C’mon out. I know you’re down here, Puppet.”

Kyle stopped halfway down the basement stairs and whistled. “Whoo! It’s hot down here.” After a few more moments: “You can stay down here and starve.”

The door at the top of the stairs slammed, then the furnace blazed so Tiny scurried away to avoid being singed. Kyle was steadily nudging up the temperature, no doubt shutting and sealing the vents above to force all the heat to remain in the cellar. He was trying to smoke her out.

Tiny was down to her underwear, groping in the dark for a viable weapon, trying to think through dehydration, focusing on scraping together enough energy for a confrontation. She tried her best to concentrate, try her hardest to figure a way out of this situation, but her brain was churning through the past few days events. Her mind was trying to fit together puzzle pieces that would never fit flush, from two different sets: the Tiny she was with Kyle, and the Tiny she was today.

Tiny met Kyle in Santa Rosa, CA about five years ago, and their relationship sparked and set fire immediately. Kyle always used Puppet as a term of endearment when they were dating. She liked the nickname at the time. Looking back, though, she realized she should have taken the name as a warning sign and got out sooner.

It felt especially vicious that Kyle had broken into her home and trapped her inside. He had broken in through a window last night, in the wee hours, and made his way to Tiny and Yael’s bedroom. It had been almost four years since Tiny last saw him, but Kyle looked just the same. She’d moved into this house two months earlier with Yael, and things were going so well in their relationship Tiny began to distance herself from the person she had been before. From the creaky floorboards to the black and white tiling in the bathrooms, she immediately loved this house. Loved it too much. She figured anything she adored to this degree was bound to betray her. So here she was, trapped alone in its belly, sweating herself to death.

Most of Tiny’s tools were locked in the shed out back, so she sat on the stone floor clutching the only real weapon she could find: a small claw hammer she used to construct a birdhouse for the goldfinches that frequented the yard.

She recovered the bucket she and Yael used to collect compost and shoved it over to the spigot on the water heater. Every so often she replenished the hot water in the base, letting it cool before she dipped her hand in and drank. The water tasted like spit from a drunk and though her stomach rolled, she knew she needed to swallow it.

Over the past day and a half, she had a lot of time to think and she realized memory of her short life was quite sporadic, as pocked with holes as the surface of the moon. Pieces floated, disconnected from her current reality. She tried in the past to fit the mosaic of her life together, but without success. This, she reasoned, was why she began categorizing memories by epoch: home, foster care, adolescence, speed, nomad period, booze and pills, big blank space, etc.

The big blank space seemed always to follow her around, creeping closer or fading back, depending on how deep she got into whatever or whoever piqued her fancy at the time. Eventually, though, the stalking amnesia pounced and engulfed her, and then she woke up in a brand-new epoch.

Tiny met Kyle in Santa Rosa, CA about five years ago, and their relationship sparked and set fire immediately. Kyle always used Puppet as a term of endearment when they were dating. She liked the nickname at the time. Looking back, though, she realized she should have taken the name as a warning sign and got out sooner.

The thought of a fast, short life never troubled Tiny. She found like-minded people in the local punk scene in Santa Rosa, back when she met Kyle and was a drummer in a few bands. She liked club atmosphere and meeting the people milling around the bar or huddled together outside to smoke, their backs to the wind coming in from the ocean. But even in all the revelry, between the warm, buzzy first few shots of whiskey and the last cigarette on the corner, with her head spinning so hard she almost fell into traffic, she still felt like she was three feet away from everything. Any hug, kiss, even a strange fuck seemed like it happened to someone else. She thought that distance was a product of her lifestyle rather than the fuel for it.

People were dropping out of the scene all around her then, getting knocked up, going to rehab, dying. They all just ceased to exist for her so she learned not to get particularly attached because the moment, the people, were all ephemeral. Even her.

So she used to party -- rage, really -- all night and into the morning, waking up in strange places with strange people beside or, occasionally, on top of her. She thought it was inevitable that among all those people she met, someone perfect for her would stand out. When she met Kyle she thought her search was complete. He was naked the first time Tiny met him, strutting through the unused lot her band’s van was parked in. For months after that they rarely wore clothes when in each other’s company.

Kyle had an easy smile, and dark, attractive features. He told her once he had some Native American blood in him, so he was slightly swarthy, and tanned easily. He also had flat, well-shuttered eyes that occasionally made her feel like nothing was behind them, like Kyle was a wooden doll brought to life. Sometimes she felt that Kyle was just mirroring her in social situations. She read once that mirroring was an unconscious sign of affection, but maybe not in Kyle’s case.

Tiny put her hand against the cool, stone wall of the cellar and stood on her toes to brush the underside of a cardboard box she purposely put up on a shelf out of her reach. She eased her weight onto the bottom shelf and pushed up, using one hand to tug the box down and the other to steady herself. When the dust and metal flakes from the rusting shelving unit flittered down into her face she sneezed, dropping the box on the floor.

She opened the lid and took one of her old journals in her hands, running her fingers over the water-damaged cover. She wondered why in hell she kept them; maybe she always knew there would be some sort of reckoning for her past. The sheer volume of her sins seemed too unwieldy to outrun. She dropped the journal back in the box and shuddered in the oppressive heat. She dipped her hands into the water bucket and splashed her arms and neck in an attempt to cool down.

She heard the locks on the other side of the basement door engage, meaning Kyle was leaving the house. He left the basement door unlocked when he was there, no doubt sitting within eyeshot of it, waiting for her to emerge and admit defeat.

The frame of the house shook when Kyle slammed the front door, and Tiny pressed her face to the closest vent to call for Yael.

2

September 2, 2011

Las Cruces, NM.

Door earnings: 350

Merch earnings: 75

Mileage to Tucson: 275 mi at 15 mi/gallon

Shirt Inventory:

Medium: 23

Large: 15

XLarge: 17

Buttons: 45

EPs: 40

“What’re you writing?” Dean asked from the driver’s seat.

Mikey caught his bandmate’s eyes in the rearview from where he sat in the van’s first bench seat. He chewed idly on a honey stick he bought for a quarter at a gas station on the edge of Arizona. It was sharp with prickly pear nectar.

“Just keeping track of what we’ve got,” Mikey mumbled around the plastic tube clenched in his teeth. “I think we’ll make it to Tucson with a little bit of spending money.”

Mikey was a skinny guy, pale, with a mop of dark hair and dark eyes that were never still. Those eyes always gave him an air of scrutiny, as though he was always judging or calculating.

Mikey typically kept careful track of things on tour. A group of four mid-twenty-somethings wasn’t particularly responsible without a tight schedule, budget or boundaries. While on the road he balked at creating any strict rules, but Mikey became OCD about cash-flow because there were so many other variables he couldn’t control.

He riffled through the Las Cruces Sun he grabbed on the way out of the motel room he shared last night with his bandmates and tore out an article.

“You still collecting stories on your boogeyman?” Dean asked.

“Yep.” Mikey took the honey stick out of his mouth after he taped the article to the notebook page, making sure the day and date were visible. He collected articles from the local papers in every town the band visited, whether they were about a maniac attacking people and leaving them for dead, or local ads about car dealerships. The tour log. The log held inventory, important for making sure they didn’t return from the road in the hole financially, and the articles, ads and Polaroids documented the often-blurry experience for prosperity.

“It’s almost like we’re following his trail,” Mikey mused.

“Coincidence.”

“No such thing as coincidence.”

“No such thing as— Are you fucking kidding me? Random stuff happens all the time.”

Mikey wasn’t a man of hard stance. He didn’t know if the universe had a plan for everyone or if we were all just spinning on a slowly-dying planet for no reason. But he did enjoy getting under Dean’s skin.

Dean was the band’s All-American man, the lead singer, naturally. His smile always seemed genuine, his bright, greyish eyes sparkled with enthusiasm, and he had a slim, muscled physique that looked honed by little-league baseball. When a show was tanking he would take off his shirt and hug the mic, somehow projecting his endless positivity to the crowd. Mikey often wondered how in the hell Dean got into punk music, and most importantly, how he remained so invested in the scene.

“It’s not random,” Mikey replied.

“Of course it is!”

“Can you guys cool it?” Rail asked. He was reclined on the back bench seat. “I’m trying to sleep.”

Mikey glanced back toward Rail, then at Gunther, who was sleeping in the front passenger seat, mouth open, head leaned against the window.

“Alright,” Dean said in a quieter voice. “I know singers and drummers rarely see eye-to-eye, but I can truthfully say I fucking hate you half the time.” His tone was serious, but Mikey caught a glimpse of a smile in the side-view mirror as Dean changed lanes.

“Yeah, well, don’t forget I can huck sticks at you all through a show and you’ll never even see it coming.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Dean replied. “Did you ever hear back from that guy in California? What was his name?”

“Finn. I asked him to let me know if he figured anything out, but there’s nothing to tell…”

“Dude, do you ever sleep?” Dean asked, in a sudden change of topic.

Mikey blinked a moment, staring at his reflection in the window. He squeezed his eyes shut and dug his thumb and forefinger into them until he saw stars. The speed pills were burning a hole in his pocket; he knew they were why he was edgy, but there was not much to do and, conversely, so much to worry about on the road. A little jolt kept his brain sharp enough to get through the day.

“Sometimes,” he replied.

“Yeah, well, sleep’s important. You can easily be overcome by everyday things when you’ve gotten no sleep. You’re just not alert enough.”

“That’s what the meth’s for,” Mikey replied, drumming a rhythm on his idly bouncing knees.

“I’m just trying to help.”

“Thanks, boy scout. Just cuz you earned your Eagle Scout bullshit doesn’t mean you’re better than me.” He pointed, even though he knew Dean wouldn’t see. “That’s our exit.”

“I didn’t say I was better than you.” Dean took the off-ramp into downtown Tucson.

“You didn’t have to.”

“Fucking cool it!” Rail yelled from the back seat.

Mikey turned around. “Fuck off. We’re here, anyway.”

Rail sat up, rubbing his knuckles against the short-buzzed hair next to his fading red mohawk. Tour did that sort of thing: faded everything until no one was sure if anything was a dream or reality. Rail was a solid man, not quite stocky, but substantial. He had gutter-punk leanings, cycled through about three black t-shirts and always wore the same black jeans. He was always interested in the local vagrants (he claimed they knew the best bars to hit) and if anyone ever fucked with the band he was the person they had to answer to.

“Tucson,” Rail hiccupped, sounding like a chicken’s call. “This is just … in the middle of the desert, isn’t it?”

“Pretty much anything in Arizona is,” Dean replied.

They found the club easily, just off the main drag.

Though the sun was still sinking, there were already people in and around the bar, smoking, drinking, and trying to look as cool as someone could in 100-degree heat. The walls were red, the floor black, and the surface of the bar had pictures of naked and scantily-clad women plastered beneath a protective Plexiglas covering.

Gunther studied the photos, particularly women who looked at the camera from beneath a sharp cut of bangs. Mikey didn’t know why, but moody, black-haired Betty Paige look-alikes were the pinnacle of intrigue to Gunther. Perhaps because they were his opposite – Gunther had light, almost white-blond hair and piercing blue eyes. When Mikey stepped up to the bar after him for a drink he noticed Gunther’s hands left moist, foggy prints on the bar top.

The manager directed them to an area to park their van to unload. They were early so the other bands hadn’t shown up yet.

“I dunno if I could deal with actually living here,” Rail said, squinting in the still painfully-bright sunlight.

“You kidding?” Gunther asked. “The girls are magnificent!”

“But it’s so hot. What if your car broke down? You would die before you could walk to a service station.”

Gunther scratched his blond head, his eyes following a pencil skirt passing by. “Hitch a ride.”

“Oh sure. Would you pick my ass up?”

Gunther checked out Rail’s spiked hair, neck tattoos to match the full sleeves on his arms, and steel-toed boots. His subtle German accent, which he was slowly losing, cropped up. “Would I pick you up?”

“Exactly,” Rail said, nodding.

**

Mikey and Dean unloaded the van while Gunther and Rail sweet-talked the crowd. Mikey’s nature precluded him from being social. Dean, being Second Gunner’s lead singer, would have to endure a lot of attention after the show, so now was his much-deserved respite. The bandmates didn’t speak to one another; it wasn’t a tense silence, but a deliberate one.

The second band was already playing, so they were on next. It was well past midnight and the cold air was chilling Mikey’s legs. He always wore shorts to play shows, but ever since they drove west of the Corn Belt, the nights didn’t hold the heat of the day like they did back East. He folded his arms to keep them warm and looked in through the back door at the uninterested crowd. The band on stage sucked. When they were done, Mikey helped the onstage drummer move his kit so he could set up faster.

Mikey was anxious to start drinking, but he couldn’t until the job was done. The set began with him. Mikey did a couple stretches just off stage, popped a pill, and then peeled off his sweatshirt. With a slight smile he walked up the steps, sat down and ripped into an aggressive opening riff. He was still crunching on bitter grit when Dean broke the wailing feedback from his guitar to play the opening notes of their first song.

Dean always faced Mikey at the beginning of the show, his eyes cast down at the kick drum, watching the beat as he felt it. Gunther rarely faced the crowd at all, turned away even from the band as he lit the crowd up with the lead-guitar solos remembered long after Second Gunner moved on to a new city.

Rail had a funny pull on the ladies that Mikey hadn't quite figured out – inexplicably, even the most prudish women just seemed to want to take off their pants around him. Maybe women were drawn to his smile, or maybe to his gentle manner despite his tough façade. When he jumped off the stage and played in the crowd during one of their more rockabilly songs, Mikey could see a few girls admiring Rail’s command of the walking bassline.

Originally there was doubt among the band members if they would get along well enough to pull off this tour.