Nitro Mountain (11 page)

T
he oak trees in the center of Bordon turn silver in the wind. Streetlamps blink on as another thunderstorm flashes the horizon. The pawnshop that used to be the antique shop along the square is closing; a shirtless man pulls in the sidewalk chalkboard, its slogan,
You Lost It We Got It,
smearing and running. The stoplight swings, turns red and a car runs right through it as the librarian watches, standing there by a shelf of free books. She stomps the wheel-lock open and rolls the cart back inside. A slinking cat pours off the top of a trash can and runs into the street, the same car missing it by inches.

Carol drives north up 231. Leaving the town limits, she glances over and spots a pack of hounds standing in the field. A practice hunt, this time of year. The hunter has parked his Tacoma on the shoulder. He drops the tailgate, opens the cage and calls for them with a two-fingered whistle when she steers around him. Rain slashes the road, then her windshield. A few miles farther a lane peels off to the left with a row of low-income ranch houses sinking into the earth. The last one is hers. She pulls into the driveway, gets out, eyes heavenward, and asks where her boy went off to this time.

A turkey vulture glides over her house in the oncoming gale and then it's gone, pulling more clouds and rain along behind it. “An omen,” she says out loud. Lightning flares, capturing each iridescent drop in its moment of falling. She remembers summer storms, but none like this.

The vulture leaves Carol below, slipping upward in a warm whipstream over pastures and forests and fields toward the ridge, the foothills dipping and rising and rolling, streams and train tracks crossing and racing one another, flying higher until the town of Bordon is a spot of mold in the earth's green carpeting.

The vulture shelters in a tree-hole before the storm crashes in. Finally, with the sky opening, the rain easing, it flies again. Sensing something at the top of the ridge, it circles, finds a towering dead pine and takes roost in the bare branches. A figure in the woods below. The bird turns its head, helmeted in red scalded scar-flesh, toward the scent of carrion.

I
nside Larry's Hickory Honky Tonk, Jones rests an elbow along the copper bar. He's got Hank moaning through the old cathedral-shaped jukebox.
When tears come down, like falling rain
. Quarters bulge out his pants pocket and he's patting them to the beat of the song. It's happy hour, not late at all, but outside the rain's pouring down.
You'll toss around, and call my name
. Water gushes over the back windows. Out there, Larry has a makeshift marina, the dock made from planks and barrels, enough space for a couple bass boats. There's also a spot for the pontoon he used to own; it sat in the water and served as the outdoor stage that Jones and his band used to play on. They packed this place during the summer months. But that's not the deal anymore. Tonight the listening room's empty, and it's a goddamn shame—everybody staying home because of a little flash flood warning. Back in the day, folks braved tornadoes to hear Jones Young play.

The tour with Marshall Mac ended on a low note, the band hungry and tired, Jones doing all the driving. After they'd played their last gig in Ohio, he drove Jerry and Matt back to their girlfriends' houses in central Virginia and decided to take his time getting back south to Ashland, his old home place. He traveled around for a few days in the Econoline, gigging at dives to prove to himself he could still do it. That's what he did all through high school. And compared to the big rooms he opened for Marshall Mac in, it's what he prefers. The van's paid off and he's been writing his own songs. They're good, people say. About to finish another one soon. Who needs a band anyway?

“What're you drinking?” Larry says.

Jones goes over and thumbs more quarters into the jukebox. “Dickel.”

“Come on, don't start that. Tell me what you want.” Larry points to the line of craft beers on draft. He stopped serving liquor here because of the noise it caused. Somebody would be onstage, and then here comes some loudmouth, half a bottle deep and thinking it's his or her turn with the mic. The Hickory's main course now is music, beer for a side. He'll throw together a few burgers too.

“It's raining,” Jones says. “Let me bring in my whiskey. It won't cost you nothing. Nobody's showing up tonight, man.”

“Must've been too long of a tour for you.” Larry turns his head and studies the rain, like this is something he might make sense of. Then he pats the bar with his left hand, the one that's missing its peace fingers.

“
Too
long,” Jones says. “Marshall Mac and the Fuck-You-Tees.”

“How was Nashville? You make any contacts?” Larry's always getting at Jones about keeping up with the business side. He lost his two fingers in the line of duty, he claims, and soon after, when he realized he'd never be able to play guitar again, he left the force and started the Honky Tonk. Wanted to put his money back into something he loved. Give local and touring musicians a place to play. At the Hickory's first show, when he heard young Jones stumbling through Tony Rice's “Old Train,” he came up to him afterward and said he was a boy he could teach to pick like he used to, if Jones'd just listen to him for a minute.

“Hell no, I didn't make any
con
tacts,” Jones says. “Some of the band was still trying to figure out the arrangements. There we were, onstage, looking like a bunch of assholes. That's how Nashville was.”

Larry turns his back, takes a glass and pulls beer into it. “You'll like this one. Unfiltered IPA. Almost strong as that stuff you like.”

“This shit hurts me,” Jones says, taking the cloudy pint.

“I was expecting your band to be with you.”

“The last bass player we had sucked worse than the one with the broken arm.”

“You had a broken-arm bass player?” Larry says. “Now that's country music.”

“It was, man. I hated letting him go. Jerry replaced him with a jazz guy who wouldn't quit walking the neck—bompa-bompa, bompa-bompa—and he had this fretless stick-bass thing that sounded like a synth. And worse, his intonation was haywire. It was embarrassing. I really started missing that first guy.”

“What's his name?”

“Leon. Just some boy from Bordon, you wouldn't know him. Dude was in trouble, man. He couldn't hardly even think straight. Don't know how he played a lick, and that arm was the least of his problems. But I liked him.”

“Your worst picker's as good as the band will ever get. That's what your dad used to say.”

“I know it.”

“He'd be proud of what you're doing.”

“Maybe.”

“He believed in you, Jones. And he was right about most things.”

“I don't feel like talking about him.” Jones slugs the rest of the thick brew. “This shit's awful.”

“All right,” Larry says. “Bring your whiskey in.”

Jones runs out to the van, hoofing through puddles in his cowboy boots, and comes back soaking wet and carrying a tall bottle of tan-label sour mash. Larry sets out a taster and Jones pours a jigger. “To my father.” He lifts it up and waits for a toast.

“Shoot, now. There you go with that talk.” Larry brings out another taster and pours himself one. “To your father.”

They clink and drink. The whiskey sizzles the tip of Jones's tongue, and he dumps the rest down.

“I'm going to put this bottle back here and regulate your intake,” Larry says. “That all right?”

“Yeah, just give me one more pour before you do.”

“So you're going solo?”

“Till I find some guys who fit my playing.”

“Pretty hard around here.”

“Maybe it'll give me a chance to try out some new songs,” Jones says.

“Originals, that's what the agents want.” Larry scoops some ice, drops it into Jones's glass and pours him another one.

“Right, the fucking agents.” Jones tips the glass up. “Do me a favor, no more ice.”

“I'm excited to see how it goes for you, Jones, just you and your guitar. I think it could be good. Strip it down, you know.”

“I'm working on a new song.”

“Glad to hear it. You sleeping in your van?”

“No,” Jones says. “Yes.”

“You know there's an empty room at my house.”

Jones pushes his glass out and Larry gives him a generous vertical turn of the bottle. “Last one.”

Jones shoots the big drink down his throat and drops the glass back onto the bar. This should be a good evening at the Hickory. Nobody here to impress except Larry—good luck with that—so why not have a few pops before the set. “I appreciate it,” he says.

“What're you doing tomorrow? You got anything booked?”

“Did.”

“I got the Jags in here tomorrow night. You want to open? It'd be only for tips. But hell, far as tips go, you can play happy hour every day this week if you want to.”

“Might, might not. Thanks, though. I just feel like bumming around a little bit more. Probably go see Natalie, since I'm officially back in town.”

That's his ex-wife, who lives down the road. Larry shakes his head. “She ain't been doing well.”

“Drinking,” Jones says. “Messing around every night. And, let me guess. Coming over here during shows and making a racket. That song wrote
me
.”

“Try not to start nothing if you see her. Every time she comes in here she's hellfire.”

“I'm just going to swing by and check on her, see what's up. Well, that and she's still got my guitar case. If she's drinking that much, I better get it before she burns it to ashes or something.”

The wind sends the branch of a poplar scraping across the side window, which creaks and cracks and then breaks. “There she goes,” Larry says.

“There she goes again,” Jones says.

“I got to take care of that branch tomorrow before it kills the tree.”

Larry's good at getting shit done. Can't not be busy. He even fronted the money for Jones's first demo. About half the CDs are still behind the register in cardboard boxes. And they're not really all that bad. Ask any of the thirty-three dopes who bought one.

Jones gets up, goes behind the bar and grabs the bottle. “Let's do one more. You and me.”

The whiskey glugs from the long-barreled neck into his glass. Jones sets it down in front of him, points at it and says, “Who you think you looking at?” He turns to Larry. “You gonna let this guy talk to me like that?”

“What's he saying?”

“He says I'm too chicken to drink him. He's sitting right here calling me names. He don't even know me.” Jones stands up, adjusts his belt and sits back down. “And I just heard him say something about my mama.”

“Ah, shit.” Larry rubs his eyes.

“You know what I'm about to do to you?” Jones asks the glass. “I'm about to suck your ass
down
.”

Larry walks over, opens the front door and leans out for some air. Jones tips the bottle up to his mouth, pulls it away, looks around, then takes it up once more and screws on the cap.

“I saw that,” Larry says.

“Just making sure I can take care of his friends before I start dealing with him.”

“You need some backup?”

“Might,” Jones says. “Yeah, shit. I'm down and they're kicking me.”

Larry comes over and drinks the rest of it. Jones unscrews the bottle and pours another short one. “This guy's been talking shit too.”

The uneven floor around Jones's stool allows him to rock along to the music. He's only thirty but has real sympathy for these old songs. He looks into his drink.
Staring through a glass of bourbon straight
. He grabs a bleach-white napkin from a chrome box on the counter, writes that thought down and puts it in the back pocket of his jeans. “My next song's about nobody but you,” he says to his drink.