Punctual

Beats

Photo by Marcos Luiz Photograph on Unsplash

Every brake light caused panic.

Cullen Entlein belched. His breath smelled like fish to him. Raw, nasty, dead on a beach fish.

No time to stop for gum. The old breath mints in the center console had spilled last night and were now resting, tiny white beacons of despair, on the muddy floor mat where Osberger’s boots had been.

An agonized fuck, shot from his Cullen’s throat, one syllable, but long, very long. An operatic fuck.

Nerves started to kick in.

Belinda Mayer was the best guitar player in the whole scene, hotter than the surface of Mars in August- Does Mars have August? Cullen’s mind was a nitrous tank on a cafe racer going downhill with the wind at its back.

Why do I have to be late all the time?

You’re a drummer in a three chord glam band, dummy, of course you can’t keep time.

Belinda had invited him to her mom’s college graduation as Belinda’s guest/date/companion, whatever she wanted to call it.

Cullen pulled up to the ivy covered building at Gillaud Academy Art School.

Not a soul outside. 

Cullen parked in a tow away zone and ran.

After he entered the building a 200-year-old oak door slammed behind him.

The whole crowd turned back and looked at him. With eyes still on him he checked his fly. It was down, of course, because the zipper was busted. But he looked great in lime green.

He scanned the aisles. 

Old people.

Art Freaks.

A few weird but cool hats.

Belinda staring through his corneas. He blinked. Shivered.

She didn’t look mad. 

Annoyed? Probably.

She could have any straight guy in the whole Riverview music scene.

Someone at the podium was talking about transformative spaces.

Cullen didn’t know what that meant but thought it sounded like a prog rock album, and prog rock sucked.

He sat in the empty seat next to Belinda.

Not wanting to talk over the speaker, he leaned and kissed her as a way of apologizing for being late. He had never kissed her before. He had never touched her before, but he did buy her a beer after her set at Andjeleski’s, where headline bands got free beer anyway.

Belinda Mayer snorted softly, but kissed Cullen. She liked the confidence.

He smelled like salmon, and she loved salmon. He smelled like beer, too, and Belinda loved beer.

Belinda sat back and slipped her arm around Cullen. He looked like shit in lime green, but she was happy he was here.

As the commencement speaker blathered, Belinda eased her phone out of the pocket of her sweater, and with one thumb she texted Rory Visk, Cullen’s bass player.

He WAS late. I owe ya ten bucks

***

Author’s Note:

I’d like to dedicate this one to my longtime drummer, Cliff Hill, known affectionately as Cloph, Clifford T, and The Reverend Cleophus T Hill.

I’m gonna guess that over the course of his career he played for over 500,000 people in North America and Europe with a variety of bands including The Almighty Lumberjacks of Death, Shock Therapy, Mew, Country Bob and the Bloodfarmers and Panic or Pain.

Drummers are often the butt of jokes, but he was a damn good one.

Music was his life, and the lifestyle that generally surrounds musicians ultimately ended his life. I’m sorry he’s gone, but I’m certain that he wanted to go out that way, and never wanted to slow down the tempo.