Byrd Read Free Page A

him. When he talks, he’s a star.
    He doesn’t wear his hair long. He doesn’t wear T-shirts or jeans to school. His mother, Pet, won’t allow it. Pet is famous for her rules. Roland has to wear corduroy pants, shirts with collars.
    He doesn’t complain or apologize when he talks about Pet; he talks about her like she’s a character in a book. His Pet stories make him popular. Because of her, people are kind to him. Girls especially.
    â€œI mean, if it’s okay,” he says to Addie. “I don’t mean to be presumptive.”
    â€œPresumptuous,” she says, and hands him her notebook.
    A red-haired woman sings the blues
to skinny boys in lace-up shoes.
She sings because they ask her to.
She sings and they applaud her.
    She sings “My Baby” by request—
they always like the slow ones best.
You’d think by now they would have guessed
she’s Janis Joplin’s daughter.
    He reads slowly, moving his lips. His bangs fall in his eyes. He pushes them away and they fall again. He pushes them away and looks up. “Have you ever tried putting your words to music?”
    â€œNo. I’m just trying to write poems.”
    â€œThis is good,” he says. “This is good enough for a song. I play guitar, you know. I’ve got lots of ideas for tunes but no lyrics. Maybe we could write something together.”
    â€œMaybe,” she says. They’ve never had a real conversation and here he is, asking her the most personal thing imaginable. Write something together .
    â€œWhat are you doing this afternoon?” he says. “I’ll be practicing, if you want to come over.”
    This is how Roland’s mother greets her: “Is Roland expecting you?” Pet has a sharp face and beauty-parlor hair—frosted, with tight curls. She doesn’t offer Addie a drink—no Tang or iced tea or lemonade or tap water—even though it’s a warm afternoon and Addie has walked a long way.
    The Rhodes house is in Country Club Hills, a brick house with green trim—not grimy-schoolroom green like Shelia’s, but a clean, pale, yellow-green Roland’s mother calls celery. Everything inside, too, is celery—walls, carpets, countertops, vinyl floors.
    â€œRoland’s in the basement,” Pet says, and leads Addie to the stairs.
    What Pet calls the basement is actually a giant sun-filled room with sliding glass doors that open onto a patio. There’s a wet bar and a fireplace and a TV and a console stereo and all the furniture you can think of, plus Roland’s guitar and amplifier, and still so much empty space you could turn a cartwheel across the floor.
    â€œYou came,” Roland says. “I didn’t know if you would.”
    He puts on the Allman Brothers, At Fillmore East , and plugs in his guitar. This is how he practices, playing along on “Whipping Post” using Pet’s brown glass Valium bottle as a slide. He sits on a bar stool, bent over, his dark bangs hiding his eyes, as if he has to go to some secret place to find the song. He plays fast, putting in lots of extra notes, filling every space with sound.
    Addie slips off her shoes, draws up her knees, and basks in the moment—sun slanting in, the plush celery armchair, Roland playing for her. A moment as unlikely as it is perfect.
    It’s a long moment. “Whipping Post” is a twenty-two-minute jam, all of side four. When the song ends, the tone-arm on the stereo retracts, and Addie applauds. “You’re amazing,” she tells him. She feels like a Beat woman, except Roland really is amazing, worthy of applause.
    He sets his guitar in its stand. “Too much, wasn’t it? I got a little carried away. I’m not used to an audience. I need a cigarette.”
    She follows him out onto the patio, into the yard, to a shady spot behind a tall row of boxwoods. He lights a Camel, takes a drag and passes it to her.
    â€œWho do