Chapter 6: Fire
"Thank you, thank you!" Elwood and the band bowed for a moment before they launched into a tune called Cheaper to Keep Her. Buster picked up his harmonica and began playing it as Mack went backstage to take a breather for a moment. His song was coming up, Lookin' For A Fox and he wanted to be ready for it. The horn section began playing the intro to the song, vamping for a moment as the other bandmembers kicked in. Melody and Buster stood near the horn section, ready on the vocals.
"When your little girl makes you mad
You get an attitude and pack your bag
Five little children that you're leaving behind
You're gonna pay some alimony or do some time
"It's cheaper to keep her
It's cheaper to keep her
See when you get to staring that judge in the face
You're gonna wanna cuss the whole human race
It's cheaper to keep her
Too much to leave that little girl
It's cheaper, it's cheaper, cheaper, it's cheaper
It's cheaper, it's cheaper
It's cheaper cheaper cheaper cheaper, yeah
"You didn't pay for two dollars to bring the girl home
Now you're about to pay two thousand to leave alone
See another woman out there, you wanna make a change
She ain't gonna watch you 'cause you won't have a damn thing
"It's cheaper to keep her
Cheaper to keep her
The time you get to looking at the judge in the face
You're gonna wanna cuss the whole human race
It's cheaper to keep her
Cost too much to leave
It's cheaper, cheaper, it's cheaper, it's cheaper
It's cheaper, cheaper
Cheaper cheaper cheaper cheaper, yeah
"If you decide to roam
And leave your happy home
You gotta pay the house note
The child support, your insurance
Alimony, morgage 1, morgage 2
"It's cheaper to keep her!"
Mack got up onstage then as the band played the beginning notes of Lookin' For A Fox. Melody went backstage with Buster, preparing herself for Karmastition right after Mack was done.
"Mack is awesome out there!" Buster peered through the curtains as Melody reapplied her lipstick.
"Yes he is, Bus," she checked her reflection in the mirror. "he's got such a great voice and how he uses it is amazing."
"Tonight the sky's the limit!" Mack's voice carried through to them.
"I got some money and I'm gonna spend it!
It's Saturday night and I'm gonna play..."
The song got the crowd all riled up and Melody was prepared to take them all the way there with Karmastition. The song was Alicia Keys's Karma lyrics with Stevie Wonder's music from Superstition worked in.
"Weren't you the one who said that you don't want me anymore
And how you need your space and give the keys back to your door
And how I cried and tried and tried to make you stay with me
And still you said your love was gone and that I had to leave
"Now you're talking bout a family
Now you're saying I complete your dreams
Oh
Now you're sayin' I'm your everything
You're confusing me
What you saying to me, don't play with me, don't play with me
Cause...
"What goes around comes around
What goes up must come down
Now who's cryin', desirin' to come back to me
What goes around comes around
What goes up must come down
Now who's cryin, desirin', to come back
"I remember when I was sittin' home alone
Waitin' for you til 3 o'clock in the morn
Lord knows it wasn't easy believe me
Never thought you'd be the one that would deceive me
"And when you came home you'd always have some sorry excuse
Half explaining to me like I'm just some kind of a fool
I sacrificed the things I wanted to do things for you
But when it's time to do for me
You never come thru
Now you wanna be a part of me
Now you have so much to say to me
Now you wanna make time for me
Whatcha doin' to me, you're confusin' me
Don't play with me don't play with me cause
"What goes around comes around
What goes up must come down
Now who's cryin', desirin' to come back to me
What goes around comes around
What goes up must come down
Now who's cryin, desirin', to come back
"I remember when I was sittin' home alone
Waitin' for you till 3 o'clock in the morn
Night after night knowing something goin' on
Wasn't long before I be gone
Lord knows it wasn't easy believe me
Never thought you'd be the one that would deceive me
and never do what you are supposed to do, no need pose me, boo because I'm over you
"What goes around comes around
What goes up must come down
Now who's cryin', desirin' to come back to me
What goes around comes around
What goes up must come down
Gotta stop trying to come back to me!"
Just as Melody was entering the final chorus, a huge bang exploded from the stage and everyone ducked down amid screams. The musicians heard a taut cable snap and the big tragicomedy faces hanging suspended above the stage suddenly wobbled and came loose. Elwood and Mack did not think, they dived over to Melody and Buster, tackling them and bringing them out of range as the heavy ornament came flying down on one side, performing a swooping arc that would have taken them both out if they'd remained standing.
"The hell?!" Elwood and the others watched as the other cable snapped, bringing the ornament thudding down to the floor with a mind numbing bang. The cable whipped through the air, Mack shouted for everyone to run out of the theater, which they did. Buster stood up and swore as they peeked over the edge of the stage and saw the ornament was splintered into several pieces now. Everyone looked at each other and back down at the remains of the masks.
"Think this was an accident?" Willie started.
Just then, a loud fizzing and popping noise drew their attention to the stagelights hanging above them. One of the lights had shorted out and was spitting sparks everywhere. As they watched, the sparks ignited and the stage became an inferno. Everyone grabbed their instruments and ran for it as Buster sprinted for the exit. Melody tripped over wires and crashed into the door that led off the stage, stunning her for a moment. Seeing stars around her head, she fell back, raising her hands to her head. Buster realized she was still behind the door, wheeling around and grabbing her hand. With a power brought on by pure adrenaline, he hoisted her up and steered her through the maze of halls.
"Come on!" Buster grabbed her hand when he saw her starting to falter and led her through the smoky stage to the backstage area where the smoke was even thicker. The teenager had to let go of Melody's hand and wrestle a door open, managing to squeeze through it to the outside, narrowly avoiding a falling beam that blocked the door completely. He looked all over for Melody, hoping to get her to climb over the beam and run the risk of getting burned, but he could not see her anymore.
"Mel!" he screamed, but had to turn around and run to the other bandmembers, who were signaling him wildly.
"Buster, where's Mel?" Elwood hugged him.
"I don't know! I thought she was behind me!" the teen cried out as the sirens came closer.
"She's still in there?!" Alan gazed at the burning building and had to restrain himself from not going in there after her. "Melody!" his throat hurt from the smoke or he would have stood there calling for her until the fire finally stopped. The bandmembers, flushed from the heat, were glad to hear the sirens coming up to them as the fire engine pulled up.
"There's someone still in there!" Mack told the fire chief. "You gotta save her!"
The chief and his men put on their equipment and armed with axes and a paramedic, went into the inferno. Elwood and the others heard the men chopping down the doorframe and kicking in the splintered wood as the smoke billowed out all around them. More sirens wailed in the night eerily, coming closer as Buster clung to Mack and Elwood, overwhelmed. Alan watched the flames licking up into the night sky, praying that Melody would be all right as Steve cuffed his shoulder.
"Buster, was she all right?" Elwood tried to sound neutral for the band's sake, but everyone knew that he loved Melody like a sister.
"Elwood..." Buster shot a glance at Alan, who was nearby. "she got hurt. I don't know how but she didn't act like herself."
"Oh boy." they glanced at the trumpet player who didn't appear to have heard them. Alan had in fact heard them but dimly, as he was inwardly praying for his fiancee's safe return to him.
Melody had managed to get turned around in the confusion and the smoldering heat. She was sweating profusely and swearing more than anyone had ever heard her. Giving up, she sat down near a cool spot on the floor as her head throbbed dully. "Looks like I'm joining you, Jake." she said with a rueful laugh. Of all the ways to die, she had dreaded fire most of all. Melody hoped Alan would be able to start over without her and find someone worthy of him, as undoubtedly she would leave a hole in his heart. Warm blood trickled down from a shallow cut on her forehead and she dabbed it away.
"Like hell you are," Jake appeared in front of her. Melody squinted, wondering if she had either fainted or had begun hallucinating. "after all you've been through, you're going to let fire kill you?!"
"Ugh," she mopped her brow. "I'm so hot, Jake."
"Fight it!" he argued, taking her by the shoulders. "They're coming for you and you need to make some kind of sound to let them know where you are!"
"I..."
"Scream!" Jake didn't want to do it, but he grabbed a burning ember and stabbed her with it, giving her a second degree burn on her upper left arm. Melody recoiled and screamed like he wanted her to.
"Good girl! They're coming!" her eyelids closed as Jake swore.
"Now I'm gonna take away at least some of your pain!" he closed his hand around the cut on her forehead, making a bright blue light glow from it for a moment. When he removed his hand the cut was gone. Melody's eyes opened up and her mind seemed to clear so she was able to discern an exit not far away. Jake saw her staring and nodded encouragingly. "Go for it, girl!"
"You're damn right I can do it!" Melody got up and ran for the door, avoiding a falling ember of fire. The engineer rammed hard with her left shoulder, ignoring a small flare of pain from the burn. She rammed and rammed, but it didn't get her anywhere. Light headed now, she tried kicking the door down, which produced a loud cracking noise. Melody, high on adrenaline, launched another attack on the door and it finally gave way. She jumped through to the other side and saw Jake in front of her as she took a ragged breath.
"Run for it before the whole thing collapses!" he urged and Melody lost no time in obeying.
"Hey, what's that?" Murph shielded his eyes against the glare of the fire. "Alan, look!" the trumpet player turned around and recognized the silhouette running towards them.
"Melody!" he embraced her very tightly and kissed her on the cheek. "Don't scare me like that!"
"Like I could help it?!" she shot back. Alan noticed the burn on her arm and took her to the ambulance waiting nearby. "All right, I'll be good." she sighed and sat down on the bumper while a paramedic tended to her wound. "My left arm is bothering me anyway." the trumpet player noticed a wheeze to her breathing and he worried about a possible attack of her asthma coming on, but Melody glanced up at him and forced her breathing down to a regular rhythm again, heading off the potential attack before it got started.
"Not going to rain is it?" Elwood joked as the rest of the band came up to her. All of them were familiar with her left arm, which she had broken several years ago, and it tended to ache and get sore when rain was on the way. It didn't impede her singing, but it did interfere with her mending broken equipment. Alan was familiar with the drill and usually brought her ice packs to soothe the discomfort away.
"In Nevada?" Melody teased back as the paramedic flushed her burn with saline and began to put a salve over it. "That smells good, what is it?"
"It's menthol and eucalyptus with vitamin E to help your skin grow back." he explained as he saturated a few gauze strips and layered them over the burn site.
"A wet to dry dressing, eh?"
"You're very smart."
"Thanks. My aunt was a nurse." the paramedic taped down a dressing and gave her some bandages and a can of spray saline in order to keep her wound clean.
"Did you inhale any smoke?" Melody asked Alan, who admitted that he did. "Would you auscultate him?" she inquired to the paramedic.
"Certainly."
Alan looked like he'd been told he would have to submit to an internal probe. "What are they going to do to me?"
"It's nothing. Hike your shirt up in the back." the paramedic checked Alan's lungs and told him that they sounded fine. "Time to get going back to the hotel. What's going on with the gig, Elwood? We've only been here what, 3 days?"
"Around that somewhere," Elwood checked his cell phone. "no text yet, but I bet Sline will call soon. We'll probably get paid for the 3 days and then we have to get booked in another venue."
"Progress report tomorrow?" Steve and Duck started walking towards the hotel.
"Right on. Breakfast meeting." Mack clarified as the rest of them started walking back as well. Alan took Melody's hand as Buster took the other one, giving her a little smile and receiving one in return.
"I'm glad you're OK, Mel." Matt turned to give Melody a smile. "Man, you scared the shit out of us!"
"Amen to that." Duck agreed. "Don't go doin' that again, ya hear?"
Melody gave a little laugh and squeezed Alan's hand, her code that she had to tell him something in private. He understood and returned the squeeze back.
The walk back was short and after the ambush of the previous night, nobody was willing to drop their guard in case the insane man came back and tried to abduct Buster again. The teen's real father was dead, but he didn't know it yet, so Elwood was the one who wanted to tell him in person, but he kept putting off the moment. Knowing he couldn't delay it anymore, he elbowed Mack in the hallway and told him what he was about to do.
"Do you want me there, El?"
"You can be if you want, Mack. The kid might want us both there, I have no idea how he's gonna take it."
"Right." they said goodnight to the band and after Buster had changed and was sitting on his bed, Elwood sat down next to him.
"Buster, I put this off for long enough," he began. "it's about your real dad."
"What about him?" the teen's eyes narrowed, obviously thinking the attacker from last night really was his father.
"That guy wasn't him," Elwood told him quickly. "your real dad was named August Charles and he died in a car crash two years ago."
"August?" Buster wrinkled his nose. "Horrid name!" Elwood had to laugh.
"Your mom died shortly after you were born. The nun and I have been doing some research and Mack here helped a lot too. Your mom was named Tamara Bradley, she was a drug addict, your dad was too, so it was a match in druggie heaven. Apparently your dad never knew that you were adopted and a part of this group, so if someone knows, we can just deny it."
"What about the drunk guy last night?"
"His name is Elton Kelley and he won't bother you again. The assault on you and me were proof that he broke probation and he's back in the slammer for at least 10 more years."
Buster beamed and hugged Elwood. "I'm glad. I don't want anything to happen to any one of us again!"
Just then, Elwood's cell phone rang. "It's Sline."
"Yo."
"Hey Elwood, shame about the gig," Sline sounded cheerful. "I got a proposition for you guys that you might like."
"What is it?"
"Since the venue is canceled, you'll be hoppin' the state line and going down to Long Beach, California. Ever heard of the Queen Mary?"
"The ocean liner now turned hotel?"
"Yup. The people who own her are throwing a really big shindig to promote the upcoming tourist season and you guys are who they want. I said you'd consider it."
"How long is the gig?"
"Four days. You stay on the ship if you want to free of charge. I know Melody is big into hauntings and this would be up her alley."
"She is. I'll tell the band tomorrow morning. Will text you to let you know."
"All right. Goodnight, Elwood."
"Bye." he hung up.