Bittersweet Chronicles: Pax Read Free Page B

everything Uncle Joss taught me about song structure and lyric formation, but sometimes, I can’t help but just wing it, going with whatever flow hits me. Not much is hitting me today though, except the memory of Carly’s lips, so pretty soon, I pack it up and decide to head over to the bar early.
    **
    The place I’m playing at tonight, The Taphouse, is a smaller bar. Some basic bar fare for food, a modest stage, and the South’s best selection of craft brews outside of Ashland, North Carolina, where New Belgium rules the South’s microbrew market.
    The owner, Blake, is a good guy, and he has me in to play once or twice a month. Their live music is usually booked Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays. Most weeks I do a Thursday here, sometimes a Friday, saving my Saturdays for Burn, the biggest, most popular venue in town.
    I walk in the front doors, standing still for a moment to give my eyes a chance to adjust to the lower lighting inside.
    “Pax!” I hear Blake call from his station behind the bar.
    I blink a couple of times then turn and walk over. He high-fives me over the bar.
    “The usual?” he asks.
    I nod and watch as he makes up my club soda and orange juice. Then I set my guitar down on one barstool and my ass on another. Blake hands me the drink and I take a sip, relishing the sting of the bubbles from the soda water as they work up into my nose.
    The memories this drink brings slam into my chest without warning. I see him sitting at the long table my mom always set up outside our Portland house in the good weather. It seated fifteen, and my dad would be at one end, Uncle Joss on his left, and then Mike and Colin on his right. Dad loved those long summer dinners with family and the band. My Aunt Mel would always be lurking around with her camera, snapping shots of the various kids as they ate and ran around the backyard. My mom would be bustling, bringing out huge platters of food that my Nona DiLorenzo had made.
    And whenever I’d sidle up to Dad, wanting to get my share of his attention, wanting to be one of the guys with him and Joss and Mike and Colin, he’d pull me over next to his chair, put an arm around me, and hand me his glass. “You want to make a toast, Pax?” he’d always say. “Say cheers to everyone and remind us how lucky we all are.” I’d make a toast, often something outrageous. The guys would cheer and clink glasses, and then I’d get to take a big swig of my dad’s club soda and O.J.
    My dad’s an alcoholic, and he hasn’t had a drink since the night I was conceived—yeah, that was more detail than I needed about it too—so his O.J. and Club is a family tradition, and it’s been my favorite drink since before I was even old enough to say ‘Orange Juice.’ I have the occasional beer too, but because of my dad’s disease, I’ve always been very careful about my own drinking, and honestly, ninety-nine percent of the time, I’ll choose the O.J. and Club over alcohol anyway.
    “So how’s everything going, kid?” Blake asks as he wipes down the counter.
    “Good, man. I’m playing at Burn Saturday and Jayz next week.”
    He pitches the rag he’s been using into a utility sink behind the bar. “That’s great but I’ll tell you kid, you get too comfortable here in this tiny town and you’ll never make it. You have to go where the market is, and it ain’t in two-bit Bittersweet.”
    “I know you’re right, but I’m set up here, man. I’ve got gigs and friends.” I sigh, my thoughts straying to Carly yet again. I’ve known her for all of five hours. Nothing to do with her should be in my mind when I’m considering my career, but when I do think of her, Bittersweet seems even more appealing than it did this morning. “I also have a place to live, and I’m not sure my dad would help me with that again.”
    My condo is the one thing I’ve accepted from my parents since I left home. It may seem hypocritical, but when they told me that if I were going to college