Long Way Gone (13 page)

Even now, when I hear myself repeat those things, it stings.

Life at seventeen seemed so clear.

I stood on the highway, out in front of the packed parking lot, and just shook my head. It was evident that I'd not thought this through. I couldn't fight my dad. I knew he was right. I also knew I hated the fact that he was right. I'd had all I could stand. Next to me was a bridge crossing a roaring river. I walked to the railing and threw that Fender as far as I could out into the water. The bubbles swallowed it and the current flipped it, turned it, and then smashed it on a boulder, snapping the neck off the body.
Fitting,
I thought. Then I unscrewed the cap on the flask, turned it upside down, and emptied the remainder of the whiskey into the river.

Then I walked the five million miles back to my father.

That night, after we'd straightened the chairs, swept up, and emptied the trash, I found myself staring at the piano. Sitting in the dark. Fingers touching the keys but making no sound. The piano bench was the only place where the argument inside my head fell silent. Where I knew which voice was lying and which was telling the truth.

Dad found me there. Neither of us said anything. He was hurting. I was hurting. I knew I'd betrayed him. This was on me.

He started. “I ever tell you about the time your mom found me drinking?”

This was not where I thought this conversation was headed. “What?”

He stared up at the mountains beyond us. “We were up at the cabin, we'd just found out we were going to have you, and for reasons that are still a little foggy, I'd gotten pretty far down into a Mason jar of moonshine. There was a cigar in there somewhere, but that too is foggy. Given that I don't really drink or smoke, I was drunk as a skunk. The world was spinning like a top. Your mom found me out on the ridgeline walking around in my birthday suit. Stumbling like a pinball from tree to boulder. Naked as the day I was born.”

“So that old rumor really is true?”

“Every word.” He nodded several times. “The way your mom told it, I was actually howling at the moon.”

The thought of my enormous, naked, drunk father howling at the moon lifted a chuckle up and out of me.

“If you ever needed proof that your father actually did let his hair down at one time in his life, that would be Exhibit A before the jury.” He shook his head. “I woke the next morning with a sledgehammer cracking open the top of my head. It took me an hour to roll over. Your mom finally pried one eye open and said, ‘You alive?' I think I grunted something, stood up, fell down, stood up again, and finally made my way to the creek, where I just fell in. After the shock of thirty-four-degree water shook some sense into me, I put together the fact that I had to preach in a few hours. She wrapped me in a towel, fed me some coffee, and told me to brush my teeth.” He laughed at the memory. “She kissed my forehead and said, ‘Cigars are not your friend.' ”

“You had to preach?”

“And to make matters worse, it was Easter.” He palmed his face. “I'm still sorry about that.”

I looked out across the empty seats. “What'd you say?”

“The truth. It was written across my face, and I couldn't have hidden it had I tried. So I told them what happened.” We were quiet awhile. Then he sat next to me. “Sing me something.”

I folded my hands in my lap. “Don't much feel like singing.”

“Trust me, that's usually when you need to.”

I played a few chords. Tried to make light of it. “Any requests?”

Dad rested Jimmy on his knee and said, “You lead, I'll follow.”

I knew he was hurting. I was too. The tone of our voices spoke the pain in our hearts. But between Dad and me, we always had music. It was the concrete bridge no fire could burn. I played the intro and then started quietly singing. He joined in at “Tune my heart . . .” I held it together for a couple of verses, finally choking up at “Bind my wandering . . .” When I got to “Take and seal it . . .” I quit singing altogether.

That was the night I learned the value of an old hymn. How something so old and “out-of-date” could say words my heart needed to hear and didn't know how to say.

I wiped my face with my forearm and then slid that empty flask out of my pocket and laid it on the top of the piano. We both stared at it.

Dad's tone was soft, as were the notes he was quietly picking. “And then there's that.”

“Dad?” I extended my hands, palms up. The recording and the drinking were minor. We'd get over that. The trust thing ran much deeper. “How do I raise dirty hands?”

“I asked your mother that same question on Easter morning as the sun was boring a hole through my pupils. I'll tell you the same thing she told me.” He set Jimmy down, stood, raised his hands as high in the air as he could reach, and said, “Both at once.”

Several hours later, as the first rays of sunlight cracked the mountaintops, I was still playing. When the words “sung by flaming tongues above,” came out of my mouth for the umpteenth time, I actually heard what I was singing. Flaming tongues. The words painted a picture, and the picture got me to thinking. If someone had written that, then they'd thought that. Seen it in their mind's eye.

Which was good. It meant I wasn't crazy after all.

I
would like to tell you that the conversation with my dad solved all our problems. It did not. A year passed. I turned eighteen, grew another two inches, which brought us nearly eye to eye, and my head swelled due to constant comparison of my talent with others in a relatively small talent pool. The record companies kept calling, and pretty soon I was letting the same anti-dad voices live rent-free in my mind. Fueling my discontent. Wanting what they were offering, which was money and the promise of adoration. I silently grew angry and bitter. I wanted my own stage. That stuff circled around in me, creating a tornado that had only one eventual place to go—out my mouth. Ezekiel 28 was the story of my life.

I don't like talking about what happened next.

It was a Wednesday. We'd been in New Mexico. Dad had driven through the night to get me home for my four-hour lesson with Miss Hagle. I was working on a Bach piece, and it was important to him that I finish it. Miss Hagle worked days, so my lessons ran six to ten, and then I hung out with a few buddies. I'd get in between midnight and one, and Dad was usually asleep. I figured I'd see him the next day.

Wrong.

I got to the light at Main and Highway 24. Miss Hagle's house sat a few blocks east through the center of town. But when the light turned green, I turned right and drove like a bat out of Hades to Salida, where my band was tuning up for a show. I hadn't been to Miss Hagle's in three
months, and while I knew the Bach piece forward and back, I had little interest in playing it. Ever.

I skidded to a stop outside Pedro's Mexican Restaurant and Bar, burst through the back door, grabbed my Fender—which I'd bought at a pawnshop with the money Dad had itemized for Miss Hagle, along with another thousand that I'd skimmed out of the cash box over the last year—jumped up onstage, and played two and a half hours of some really good rock-and-roll.

About a year before, some guys from high school had formed a rock-and-roll/country band and asked me to play lead. We'd been playing at Pedro's for about six months and crowds were growing. Tonight the place was packed, standing room only, an hour wait at the door, and Pedro was smiling like a Cheshire cat.

Three months earlier, some music critic happened to be on vacation around here when he and his family stopped in for Mexican food. Turns out he was a columnist for several popular guitar magazines. When the article came out, he compared the speed of my fingers on the neck to hummingbird wings. My face had graced the cover and the headline had simply read: “Peg—The Next Great One.” The good news was twofold: my name was getting out there, and the magazine was such that my dad would never see it. At least not until such time as I returned the conquering artist and proved him wrong with awards and accolades draped around my neck. I could not have scripted this any better.

We played three hours. Pedro was ecstatic. The room was stuffed way past the fire marshal's regulation, and the crowd chanted for three encores. When the show finally ended, I was nervously studying my watch and calculating how much time it would take me to drive home plus stop for a roadside bath to get the smell of smoke off me. I handed my guitar to my drummer for safekeeping, told the fellows I'd see them next week, and spun gravel out the parking lot. Just outside of Salida, I pulled off and bathed in the moonlight in a shallow pool. I stuffed the smoky clothes in a trash bag, put on the stuff I'd left the house in, and redlined the truck, getting home about twelve thirty. I shut the door and walked up the steps
to the porch. There were no lights on. The only thing out of place was the smell. There was something different in the air.

I pulled on the screen door, and Dad spoke to me from a chair in the corner of the porch. The dark corner. “Some dinner in there for you. It's hot.”

“Oh, hey.” I paused and let my eyes adjust. He was sitting there with a plate on his lap. A napkin tucked in his collar. I tried to speak calmly. “What're you doing up?”

He took a bite of something, then spoke with his mouth full. “How's Miss Hagle?”

I managed a fake laugh. “Still slapping me with the ruler.”

“How's Bach?”

More laughter, hoping Dad didn't detect the nervousness. “Dead.”

He pointed the fork toward town. “You pay her?”

“Yep.” The weight of the bald-faced lie wrapped around my neck like a millstone.

This time his fork motioned toward the kitchen. “Can you eat?”

I was famished. I could have eaten a cow. I also needed an exit from the conversation. “I can eat a little something.”

He took another bite. “It's in there waiting on you.”

I walked into the kitchen and turned on a light, and my stomach jumped into my throat. I nearly threw up. Dinner was takeout. Takeout from Pedro's.

I experienced several emotions at once: a searing pain in my heart, embarrassment, shame, and rage.

I stood in the kitchen wondering what I was going to say when I heard the screen door open behind me. Dad walked into the kitchen, pulled the napkin from his shirt collar, wiped his mouth, and leaned against one countertop while I shoved my hands in my pockets and leaned against the other. The two of us stood there awhile.

I couldn't look at him. After several minutes he said softly, “Anything you want to talk about?”

I didn't respond. Just walked into my room and shut the door. On
the bed was a copy of that stupid magazine that stupid writer had sent to the house. My stupid-looking face was staring up at me. My goose was cooked, and no sweet little singsong with my dad would ease the pain of this betrayal.

I didn't sleep much that night.

Dad was gone by the time I got up the next day. We were slated to hold a service at the Falls that night, and he was no doubt setting up. Churches were busing in kids from all over Colorado. Many were coming to see me. I arrived late to standing room only. Must have been a couple thousand cars and fifty buses. I parked the truck and meandered toward the side of the stage, where Dad was in the middle of his “Why Are You Here?” sermon. That just ticked me off even more, because I knew he was speaking it directly to me.

I leaned against the back wall with my arms crossed. I'd heard it all before.

He waved his hand across the audience. “Why are you here?” He paused. He loved to throw “book learning” around from time to time, and I knew what was coming next. He said, “What is your
ray-son-day
trah
?” He chuckled. “That's French for ‘reason for being.' ” He set his Bible down on the stool and paced across the stage. “Think about it.” He pointed to his throat. “Vocal cords. You ever wondered why the Bible calls them ‘pipes'?”

He paced across the stage, clapped his hands once. Then he clapped again, louder. Then a third time. “Now you do it.”

The audience clapped once in response.

“Why do you think God made your hands to do that? Seriously. Of all the things to do with your hands, why add that to the possibility?” He then turned, shot both arms straight up in the air, and walked to and fro across the stage. “What's this remind you of? Football game? A rock
concert where your favorite big-hair band is playing?” Laughter rippled through the audience. He picked up his Bible. “I've read this thing a few times through, and I can find no place in here where it talks about worship that does not include a movement of the body.”

He waved his hand across the audience. “What is it you're looking for? What's your dream? To make some money? Own a nice home? Drive a nice car?” He paused. “I'm not against any of those things, but I don't think they're your reason for being.” Dad walked to the edge of the stage and picked up a huge framed collage of magazine covers showing entertainers and public figures.

He held it up to the audience. “Is this why you're here? To see your name in lights?” Then he walked back a second time and picked up a large framed mirror. He paced back and forth along the edge of the stage, showing the audience their own reflection. “What if this is your reason?” he said.

Dad paused long enough to let the question settle. It was also at this time that he saw me. Or rather, he let me see that he'd seen me.

Then he turned, slung Jimmy over his shoulder, and said, “I'm not the best player, and I know others with far better voices, but let's you and me do something. Let's sing something together.” Dad began strumming, the audience recognized the tune, and five thousand voices joined in. “Come Thou Fount . . .”

I wanted to vomit.

After the first verse, Dad stopped strumming. “Okay, that was good. But be honest with yourself. If the One who made the moon and stars, this mountain behind me, the One who gave your eyes their color and made your fingerprint unique, who gave you your own specific voice unlike that of any of the other several billion people on the planet . . . if He were right here . . .” Dad pointed at the stage. “Standing here. What would you be doing?” He knelt, raised both hands, and bent slightly. “Probably something like this.” He slung Jimmy around behind him and lay facedown on the stage. “Or this.” Dad stood. “Right?

He resumed strumming lightly. “What if this were a rock concert?” he asked. “What would you be doing? You'd be hopping around like a dancing chicken. Music is its own dimension and it reaches people at a level that is beneath their DNA. Nothing else brings about a corporate reaction like music. It exposes what and who we worship.”

Dad pointed at the audience, making a wide sweep with his finger. “Every one of you is a custom-designed instrument with one singular purpose.” When Dad's arm finished his arc, his hand was pointed my direction and his eyes were drilling a hole in me. “Worship.” His voice rumbled out of his belly and his eyes were a crystal sea. “It's your
ray-son-day-trah
.” Dad set Jimmy in his stand and then stood looking at the two framed pictures. “Question is, what and who do you worship?”

I was done listening.

I marched down the aisle, climbed the steps, and strode across the stage. I grabbed Half Pint out of his stand, walked to the center of the stage, and slammed him like an ax into the center of the mirror. Then I swung him into the framed collage of magazine covers. And then I walked up to my dad and struck him as hard as I could across his face, and my oak ring split his lip. As the blood trickled down his chin, I spoke through gritted teeth.

“I'm done with you and I'm done with your traveling circus.”

I slid the ring off my finger and threw it as far as I could, over the trees and toward the river alongside the cliffs. I then grabbed Jimmy, hopped off the stage, and walked toward the truck, the audience parting like a wave as I passed.

Behind me, I could hear Dad speaking. There was no anger in his voice. Only sorrow. “Sing with me,” he said. Big-Big began playing, and five thousand voices joined in with Dad's. “When peace like a river . . .”

When I got to the parking lot I kicked open the bus door, grabbed the cash box, slammed it open on the floor, and took the zippered leather case that held all the money Dad used to pay our expenses from
weekend to weekend. Usually about two thousand dollars. I climbed into the truck, cranked the engine, dropped the stick into drive, and floored it, leaving two ruts in Mr. Slocumb's pasture. When I glanced in the rearview, Dad was still standing on the stage. Watching me leave. Blondie was still sitting on top of the piano.

I didn't care if I ever saw either of them again.

Five hours south, I pulled over and stared at a sign lit by my dim headlights. Literally, the road forked. The road to the right would take me to Los Angeles. I didn't care too much about the big-hair bands and giant pyrotechnic shows coming out of LA or the makeup most of the guys wore. Some had talent that impressed me, but most of it sounded angry, and I couldn't understand half of what they were saying anyway. The road to the left would take me to Nashville. And while I wasn't a die-hard country music fan, I felt like the music I wanted to make was more closely akin to what was coming out of Tennessee than from California or New York.