FAME and GLORY (37 page)

Rebecca saw the two vehicles stop in front of her house.  Jimmy was eating his breakfast at the bar in front of the kitchen, so she shooed him into his bedroom with his cereal.  Normally, food in the bedroom was a no-no, so Jimmy was only too happy to comply with this surprising request.

Rebecca quickly smoothed her hair before she opened the door.  Truth be told, she had always been a little intimidated by Brandee's physical beauty.  This time, though, she didn't have anything to worry about.

Brandee looked rumpled.  Her face, without makeup, looked pale and drawn, and there were worry lines around her eyes.  She stepped up on the Flurringer's porch, a mere shadow of the sexy young songbird that she was on stage.

“Hello Rebecca.  It's nice to see you.”

“Hi Brandee.  Come on in, all of you.”

Brandee started to make introductions when they got inside, but Rebecca held up her hand.

“There'll be time for that later.  I have some bad news.  Jake isn't here.”

Brandee's shock showed in her face.  “Where is he?”

“I don't know.  My husband is out looking for him right now.  When I got up this morning, Jake was already gone.”

The members of the group looked at each other.  Bruce raised his hands from his side, but then let them flutter back down.  He wouldn't know where to start in a search for Jake in this strange city.  He was powerless.  Tears of worry and frustration appeared in Suzi's eyes.  She was out of ideas.  Diane looked down at the ground, willing herself to come up with an idea to help matters.  Nothing came to her.

“If Tad finds him, he'll call me.  It won't do us any good to go out and look.  My three year-old is still asleep, and you guys don't know Tacoma.  Please, have a seat.”

Her guests sat down, and introductions were made all around.  Rebecca offered coffee, which everyone except for Brandee accepted gratefully.  Diane especially needed a caffeine jolt.  The group had driven 260 miles in three and a half hours, including a gas stop and a stop at the Portland Greyhound Station.  Diane's hands were throbbing in time with the throbbing in her head.

***

Jake's head was throbbing, too.  He didn't notice it, though.  His headache had been a constant companion since he had seen Brandee and Janelle in the hotel room.  He stood still, looking at the shimmering lake under the full moon that hung, seemingly suspended, over Wapato Lake.  He stepped to the edge of the water and reached into his pocket.

***

Tad was about out of ideas.  He couldn't see the point of driving aimlessly around anymore.  Anywhere Jake would go would have to be by accident.  As far as Tad knew, Jake had only been in Tacoma once, and that was right after Tad and Rebecca had gotten married.  Jake had brought a load of household goods with him when Tad and Becks had moved to Washington.  He had spent one night and headed back to California the next morning.  Jake had been seeing Sandra Marseilles at the time, and hadn't wanted to be away from her for long.

“Where are you, Jake old boy?” Tad said aloud to himself.  “Come on, friend!  Show yourself!”

Tad rolled slowly by Meadowbrook Golf course, keeping his eyes peeled for Jake.  He realized that he hadn't even asked Rebecca what Jake had been wearing.  Not that it mattered.  Jake may well have changed clothes before leaving the house.

Still no sign of him
, Tad thought.

***

Jake pulled the jewelry box out of his pocket.  It seemed an eternity ago that he had purchased the beautiful necklace as a token of his love for Brandee.  Now, he opened the box and looked briefly at the piece of fine jewelry inside, then closed it with an audible snap.  He reached behind himself as far as he could, transferred his weight from right foot to left, and threw his best fastball into the still waters of Wapato Lake.  The box disappeared into the night and splashed softly into the cold water.

Jake turned away from the water and walked toward a stand of tall trees that provided shade for happy picnickers during the day.  When he had walked the hundred yards to the stand, he stepped around one tree and over the root system of another.  Finally, he sat down against the trunk of a stately oak.

***

Tad called home.  Rebecca answered.  She was happy on more than one level to hear the phone ring.  Mostly, it meant that maybe there was some news about her brother.  Secondly though, the atmosphere in the living room was a little tense.  She didn't know what to say to Brandee.  The singer had asked if she and Jake had talked, and when Rebecca had said that they had, Brandee had just responded by saying, “Ah” and nodding a little.  Rebecca didn't know where to go from that point.

She knew that to blurt out, “where's your lover?” would be bad form.  So she just stayed quiet, and waited for Tad to call.

“Has he shown up yet?” Tad said when his wife answered.

Rebecca's face fell visibly, to the dismay of the others in the room.

“No.  You haven't found him either, I guess.”

“I'm going to come home.  Is Brandee there?”

“Yes, and the members of the group are here too.”

“I'll be home in about twenty.  Love you.”

Tad hung up.  “At some point, I need to know what's going on,” he said.  “Please God; let me find Jake, so he can be the one to tell me.  At least then, I'll know that's he's safe.”

***

“He hasn't found him,” Rebecca told the others.  “He's on his way back home.  We can decide what to do then.”

Just then, Jason Flurringer started to cry in his bedroom.  Rebecca got up and headed into the boy's bedroom to see what was going on with her youngest.

Brandee stood up and walked around the living room, not knowing that she was looking at the family pictures in the same order that Jake had seen them earlier that morning.  Diane spoke from the corner of the couch.

“How are you holding up, Brandee?”

“I'm too nervous to sit down.  I wish I knew something to do.”

Brandee continued her tour of the picture gallery.  The three musicians looked out the window, hoping beyond hope that Jake would come walking up the driveway.

***

Jake was sitting on the ground with his purchases from Walgreen's scattered around him. He had purchased four boxes of extra strength sleeping pills and two bottles of Nyquil.  He opened up the boxes, one by one, setting them down carefully beside him.  He opened up one of the bottles of Nyquil, and placed it beside him on the side away from the boxes.

Then he got out the pad of paper and the pen that he had picked up on his way to the counter of the drug store.  He tested the pen on the paper, and started to write.

***

Tad got back to the house just at the time that he had said that he would.  He greeted the members of the band with handshakes, and greeted Brandee with a hug.  Then he stood in front of the group.

“There's no sign of him.  Why don't we have some breakfast and talk.  Sometimes when people just talk, ideas come up organically from the conversation.  I don't have any other thoughts than that.”

“I'm not hungry, and I doubt any of the rest of us are either, Reverend Flurringer,” Bruce said.  “But you make a good point.  Maybe one of us will have an idea.  I don't know what it might be, but it's worth a try.  Anything is worth a try.”

“Call me Tad, Bruce.  We're all family right now.”

Tad and Rebecca went into the kitchen and started working together on breakfast for five.  Bacon was fried and eggs were scrambled.  The smell wafted through the house.

If the Flurringer breakfast had been cooked outside that morning, the southerly breeze could have almost carried the smell to Jake.  As the crow flies, he was only about 300 yards from the Flurringer home.  As it was, though, he finished with what he was writing and, before he had time to think about it, ate his own breakfast.  Within a few minutes, his eyes closed in sleep.  The last thing that he saw before going to sleep was the full moon looking down upon him.

“That's a harvest moon,” he said quietly, to no one that could hear.

***

Tad and Rebecca fed their guests.  No one ate much, though they all pushed the food around on their plates. The members of the group thanked the Flurringers for their hospitality and remarked at how cute the Flurringer boys were.  Jimmy showed Diane a picture of an airplane that he had drawn, while Jason sucked his thumb and looked at Bruce's beard.  Tad was clean-shaven, and Jason didn't know what to make of the bewhiskered man that was at his breakfast table.

Afterwards, Rebecca started on the breakfast dishes.  “Go out and be with them,” she said to her husband.  “Make them talk.”

Tad joined the members of the group in the living room, and engaged them in conversation.

“How well do you all know Jake?” he asked.  “Obviously, Brandee knows him best of all, but how about the rest of you.”

“I think we know him pretty well,” Suzi said.  “We've traveled together for a while, and before that we got together for rehearsals and making the
Brandee
CD.”

“Jake has been nothing but a good friend to all of us,” Diane said.  “Now I wish I had gotten to know him better, though.  Maybe I would have an idea what he would do now.”

“Jake and I have been having some trouble,“ Brandee said.  “I wish it weren't so, but it is.  I feel like this is my fault.”

“Don't get ahead of yourself, Brandee.  For all we know, he just went for a walk while it was still dark and got lost trying to find his way back.  He may call at any time.  Guys don't like to admit that they're lost, you know.  But keep talking about him.  Maybe we'll hit on an idea.”

For the next hour, Brandee and the rest of the group talked about some of the things that they had done together since the formation of
Brandee.
  They talked about the Nissan breaking down twice, once in Ukiah, and again in Sacramento.  They studiously avoided any discussion of Janelle, but eventually got to talking about Suzi being pregnant and how Jake had been so happy for her.  That gave Suzi an idea.  She snapped her fingers.

“Bruce, you talked with Jake when he and Brandee first got into it about having a family.  Do you remember that?”

“I do,” Bruce said.  “We went for a walk in a park in Grand Junction.”

Diane turned to Tad.  “Is there a park around here?  He went to a park when he was upset then.  Maybe he went to another park now.”

Tad quickly said, “Wapato Park is just a few blocks away.  I didn't think to go there because it was still completely dark when I left the house.  I went to places where it was light.  Do you think he might have gone to a park before the sun was up?”

“I don't know,” Brandee said.  “But we don't have any better ideas, and one idea is better than sitting here with no ideas.  Let's go!”

Tad grabbed the keys to the Jeep Wagoneer that he drove when he needed room for a group.  He kissed Rebecca and said that they were going to take a run through Wapato now that it was light outside.

“I'll pray that you find him,” she said.  “I've been praying for that all along.”

Tad drove quickly to the parking lot of Wapato Park.  It was still too early for the vehicle barricade to have been lifted, so he parked outside the gate.  The group skinnied through the same opening that Jake had gone through hours before.  They spread out in teams.  Bruce and Suzi went to the left, toward the walking paths.  Tad, Brandee and Diane went straight ahead, toward the lake shore.  Brandee got to the water ahead of the others and scanned the shoreline.  Both teams were shouting, “JAKE!” as loud as they could, and then being quiet to hear his answer.  Nothing could be heard but the muted sounds of birds in the branches of the trees.

Ten minutes later, the terms re-convened at the shoreline.  Tad said, “I'm going to go check those trees.  It's hard walking, though. Why don't you come with me, Bruce?  Ladies, you wait here.  Maybe he heard us and will come down here.

“Suzi and Diane are plenty to wait here.  I'm going with you,” Brandee said to Tad.

Tad nodded and set out at a fast walk for the stand of trees.  Bruce was beside him, and Brandee was a half-step behind.  They maneuvered around the stand, looking for a likely opening.  After a minute or two, Tad gave up looking for a comfortable entry and barged through some low hanging branches, Brandee close behind.