Beaver was sprawled on the couch, the Domino’s box balanced on his stomach. The little garage was equipped with a patchwork denim beanbag, a ratty couch covered in oatmeal tweed, Beaver’s drums, and a secondhand amp. “It is true your Grandma was a Doors groupie?” They had named their new band “The Windows” in a respectful tribute to the iconic rockers.
J shrugged, his guitar held tenderly in his arms. “That’s what she says. Hey, you know what tomorrow is, right?”
“Saturday? Our first gig?”
“It’s March the first, man. You got it now?”
“Uh, something about Julius Caesar? He got stabbed in the eyes?”
“Beaver, I swear. The Doors, man. The Miami Incident. Remember now? When the noble Jim showed his pride to the screaming crowds. Damn, that was righteous.”
“Oh, shit, yeah. Remember what he said on Youtube? It’s all about artistic freedom. Jim had it right. Artists, we’re a different breed.”
“Damn straight.” J raised his Mountain Dew in a salute. “To Jim Morrison. May that dude live forever, wherever he is.”
***
In celebration of March first, J talked Beaver into testing out the weed just a bit before the gig. “Ask Grandma, man,” J said. “Rock and Roll is wreathed in Mary Jane. I mean, shit, you ever hear Janis? Chick had a throat burned into a fine musical instrument with Jim Beam and reefer. That’s what I’m talking about.”
“What?”
“What do you mean, what?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Beaver, you got to get it together! This is a holy day for The Windows.”
***
The Windows garage band’s debut was set at the Boise Teen Community Center, sponsored by the Interfaith Coalition. Teens were invited in off the streets for some music and companionship and light snacks, and chaperonage was provided on the holy day of March first by the LDS crowd.
Looking back on it later, J wasn’t sure if it was the excitement of their first gig or the smiling faces of so many pretty Mormon girls, staring up at him on the stage. Something caused him to do it. Beaver thought he was channeling the spirit of the noble Jim himself, because certainly his guitar playing reached a peak of perfection that night it had never achieved before in their practice jams. Whatever the reason, he felt the flush of rock and roll fever come over him, and his hand inched down to the zipper of his orange bell bottoms, the ones with the brown stripes that Grandma had found. She told him they were authentic.
He shouted out the question, just like Jim had done, and the pretty Mormon girls gasped, then surged forward, fumbling in their bags for their little cell phones. It was the lights from all those cell cameras that temporarily dazzled his eyes, so he didn’t see the beefy chaperones barreling up on the stage, fists raised.
***
Grandma came out to the garage with an ice pack and a bottle of Tylenol. J was on the bean bag, feeling moody, and Beaver was lying on the couch, wrapped up in the chenille quilt. The random nature of violence was the topic of their conversation. She stood in the door, studying them, then settled the ice pack on J’s forehead. “Boys, I just can’t tell you… I swear you make me feel young again, a couple of tough rockers like you nursing your hangovers. You two remind me of Jagger and that fellow Richardson. Did I ever tell you about that time in LA? It was after Altamont. Those were dark days. I could tell you some stories.”
Beaver sat up, pulled the quilt around his shoulders. His face looked as damp and white as a steamed dumpling. “I think I’ve got food poisoning.”
Grandma gave him a cold Mountain Dew from the little dorm fridge. “You boys checked out Youtube this morning?”
J waited until she was back in the house, then he and Beaver scrambled for the laptop. He still felt vaguely betrayed, and he was thinking Grandma was somehow to blame for the whole shit-kicking he had taken, in front of a room full of pretty girls.
“Dude! Would you look at that?” Hey! He looked hot! The guitar clutched against his crotch, his beads and bell bottoms looking freaky-deaky in the lights of the little cameras. Grandma had been right about the pants, after all. Beaver took a long pull on his Mountain Dew. “We need to get going on My Space, Facebook, Twitter, pronto. This is the headline: ‘The Windows Shatter Boise!’ Get it? Windows? Shatter?”
J gave him two thumbs up. “Oh, man. Jim would have been proud.”
Sarah Black is a fiction writer.
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19 Responses to “THE WINDOWS SHATTER BOISE • by Sarah Black”
Comments
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April 27th, 2009 at 4:14 am
That was a hilarious story, Sarah. You managed to fit in the pre-concert, the concert and the aftermath in such a small space. I’m glad that you didn’t bog it down with too many characters.
A couple of quirky knuckle heads that take their cues from Youtube and an old rocker grandma…sounds like fodder for a novel.
April 27th, 2009 at 5:08 am
Aside from a few really minor technical quibbles, this one was top-notch. Perfect voice, nice pace, funny characters.
April 27th, 2009 at 5:35 am
Boy, is this NOW! Is this good! Inspired.
April 27th, 2009 at 6:08 am
This is PROBABLY a good story … if you have the foggiest idea what it’s about!
But it loses a lot if you don’t listen to rock or know squat about the “Doors” or “Jim Morrison” or any of that rock stuff. I had to Google “Jim Morrison March 1″ to be sure what the story was talking about. Stories based on obscure fields of knowledge like Rock Music (or “Zelda” a few weeks back) kind of fall flat for a lot of readers.
(Just to show where I’m coming from, my cell phone ring tone is Mozart’s 40th.)
April 27th, 2009 at 6:32 am
Loved it. Great stuff, Sarah.
April 27th, 2009 at 6:36 am
Jim Hartley –
I like rock music, but don’t know much about it either. It’s not necessary to know the details about it, all that has to be known is that it exists and is an obsession for some people. What the story is really about is “beefy chaperones.”
Although I am a perpetrator in the “Zelda” controversy, I must, in honesty, agree with you that it was too limited a known reference for the generality of EDF and should not have been mentioned. It was one of my mischievous temptations. Apologise to all of EDF’s readers.
April 27th, 2009 at 6:37 am
Mozart’s what?…I see where Jim is coming from. My greyish hair is a testament to the fact I may have 1 or 2 Doors albums in my collection…I recall hearing about an event of indecent exposure by the “Noble Jim” and therefore knew what was being alluded to in this story. Though, it might not be clear to all readers.
Statements like “Jim showed his pride to the screaming crowds” and “…his hand inched down to the zipper of his orange bellbottoms,…” helped to clarify it a bit.
April 27th, 2009 at 6:41 am
I saw Jim Morrison, Janis and the rest from a few rows back (had a friend in the ticket offices), and I still don’t get it. Not sure what is happening here or what the point is. Is this supposed to be some kind of tribute or just a day-in-the-life of wannabe rockers? Where’s the story?
April 27th, 2009 at 7:07 am
Joyce –
I think it’s about three things. (1) Not all muses are good. (2) If you have a bad muse, be careful; the girls will call in their beefy chaperones. (3) It will be reported on all the blog splaces, but each blog space will contain only a shattered partial report except for the biggies on ***.xxx .
April 27th, 2009 at 8:32 am
I loved it and I’m not even that big of a Doors fan! I think it’s a slice of life kind of thing, anyone can remember being young and feeling like these boys, at least I think so.
April 27th, 2009 at 8:35 am
For those who don’t know, Jim Morrison pulled his penis out at a Doors concert in Miami. He landed in lots of trouble for doing so!
Cute story, Sarah, full of that rock and roll spirit that keeps us all young. Love the rocker Grandma, still feeling that spirit! And the Julius Caesar line, “stabbed in the eyes.” Very funny. Great job!
April 27th, 2009 at 8:39 am
Geesh guys! It’s a rock ‘n roll story-and–things were spelled out pretty clearly!
5*****, no ? about it!
–dj
April 27th, 2009 at 8:52 am
Rock and Roll, Sarah. We ALL know those Mormon girls wanted to see it.
There IS a bit of a stagger for me where it says that Rock and Rock is wreathed in Mary Jane. While I get it, I believe it should be Rock and Roll.
At any rate… Right on.
April 27th, 2009 at 10:39 am
Congratulations, Sarah. A great title and a great story, thanks.
April 27th, 2009 at 1:53 pm
Fun fun fun…read it twice…got a 5 from me.
April 27th, 2009 at 3:38 pm
Is it really necessary to single out the Mormons for ridicule? That schtick is getting old to me. (And no, I am not one.)
April 27th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
I wasn’t ridiculing the Mormons. If I had been a chaperone, I would have been barreling up to the stage, too. And Mormon girls are very pretty, ask anyone who lives in Boise.
I love my adopted hometown of Boise, I love the Mormons who work so hard and do so many happy and healthy things for the kids, I love the nitwit dopers who want to grow up to be Jim Morrison, I love the ex-stoner gramdmas who were Doors groupies, and I especially love the noble Jim himself, wherever he may be. I’ll probably sing along to a few Doors tunes tonight.
April 29th, 2009 at 6:38 pm
A real rider on the storm, this one. Wishful sinful. ‘The Windows’ is great, as is the stoner dialogue and the grand rocknroll thing with all that light and beef and pretty mormon girls. Five star stuff.
January 7th, 2010 at 8:49 pm
“Rock and Rock” corrected to “Rock and Roll”; thanks, Kevin!