Monday Update

Headphones on paper.Now to pull it all together and make something cohesive out of it! 

After much consideration on where to start, this is my opening page: 

Chapter 1—what the cold brought in

January 2015

Reaching over the bar easily with his long arms, the lanky man helped himself to the tap, topping off his beer as he looked out at the floor. One more set and the band was calling it quits. They were two weeks away yet from the beginning of spring semester. That, combined with the colder than normal temperature, meant a quiet crowd. He chuckled to himself when he spied the local Priest and Rabbi visiting at the back table, glasses of wine in hand. Another sure sign of a slow night! A rush of cold air on his neck announced someone making a late night entrance and he turned his shaggy head towards the door.

A young woman, surely not far out of her teens, made her way to the nearest table. Pulling her gloveless hands out of her pockets, she rubbed them together. She looked oddly padded and when she pulled the zipper down he could see a thinner coat under the heavy parka. She pushed the hood back, uncovering a pair of headphones strapped across her head, barely visible in her wild hair. Not modern slim and streamlined headphones; no, they were the big bulky kind that had been popular in the ‘70s. There was no sign of a boombox or walkman, just a dangling cable with a heavy metal connecter swinging in front of her as she bowed her head and stared at her hands.

The battered state of her clothing, what he could see, anyway, hinted that she’d been living rough. He wondered if the headphones were meant to keep her ears warm. That inner voice that liked to whisper people’s secrets to him told him he wasn’t even close, that things weren’t that simple. Still, he put the questions aside for the moment.

Because of the small crowd, Richard had sent most of the help home an hour earlier. With the one remaining waitress busy with the last few patrons, the man sauntered over to the girl. She peeked up at him through her bangs when he greeted her. “’Evening. Can I get you something to drink? Or maybe something to eat?” Her eyes widened as she shook her head no. Just as he suspected, then. She’d come in merely to get out of the cold. Still, he could feel her hunger. “How about I buy you a burger, maybe some fries?” Desire washed over her face, and yet her reluctance to accept was plain to see.

“Coming right up, then.” He didn’t ask her name. With that extra sense that absorbed other people’s pain and pleasure--some defining bit of character that his friends told him was more than empathy--he knew she wasn’t going to tell him. At the window to the kitchen, he put in a double order, one for her, one for himself, and snagged his beer and a Coke for her from the cooler as he rounded the end of the bar. He sat down and slid the soda across the table. She reached timidly for it, her head still tucked down as she watched him, careful to not look him in the eye. The slight hunger cramps he could feel from her were compounded by her leeriness. He didn’t blame her; if she’d been living on the street, she probably had good reason to distrust a strange man.

“Food will be up in a minute. By the way, I’m Lenny. I’m with the band,” he said as he gestured to the stage and its equipment.

She lifted her head to study the man that sat on a stool, bent over his guitar as he worked out the fingering of a song only he could hear, but before she could get a good look at him, slim fingers with painted nails clunked stoneware plates onto the table, knocking some of the fries off the edge. She glanced over as the man took the seat next to her. He retrieved the strays and winked as he stuffed them into his mouth. Dark hair hung loosely around his shoulders and eyeliner framed wide eyes, while a tight tee enhanced his flat chest. With a smooth voice that he directed at Lenny, he nodded up towards the stage. “Richard and Mick decided to call it early. Mick wants to take a few minutes to run through the new songs and then we can skip practice tomorrow night.”

“Cool,” Lenny said around a mouthful of burger. He shook a couple of fries towards the young man. “This satin-haired sex-on-a-stick is Jay Montgomery.” He chuckled at his own words when Jay grimaced at him, but then continued. “He’s our keyboardist. Came all the way from California to join our little group.”

Jay snagged a few more of the girl’s fries and stuck them in his mouth. “Don’t believe him.” The words were garbled as he chewed, and he swallowed to clear his throat. “I ended up in this collegiate hell because my girlfriend got a gig that she thought was going to make her famous.”

Lenny cocked an eyebrow at the man. “You didn’t have to stay here after you broke up.”

“What can I say? Ohio grew on me! Besides, you needed my youthfulness to bring a fresh perspective to your set list.” Jay let the side of his mouth slip upward as his blue eyes sparkled, even in the dim light of the bar.

The girl lost track of the verbal sparring that passed between the two band members when the man on the stage finally looked up and surveyed the room. It was only a moment, and then his chin dipped as he concentrated on the cords he was trying to work out, but it had been enough for her to see he was older, probably mid-thirties. Neither man noticed when she dropped the uneaten half of her sandwich back onto her plate with her mouth gaping open. Without a word, she stumbled from her chair and made her way to the stage, trying to keep out of the man’s peripheral vision.