Asturias (14 page)

At least she felt no pain …

The thought is cold comfort as he approaches the woods a hundred metres from the back door, and sees the look on his brother's face.

He shakes his head. There are no words for what they are feeling. They stand, each staring into the other's eyes, and for a moment neither one moves. Then Juana places a hand on their shoulders.

“We have to go.” The words are spoken softly. But firmly.

With a final look back at the burning house, Manuel turns and follows the others, but already he feels the empty space next to his heart which no amount of years will ever fill.

Alex stops playing, puts the guitar into its case and looks at his watch. It is late. Max will be having kittens.

His grandfather has fallen asleep. His chest is rising and falling gently and he snores slightly. Alex leans over and kisses the old man softly on the forehead.

“Goodnight, Abuelito.”

After the footsteps recede, the old man rolls over and stares out of the window.

“Jus' res'ing my eye, Chico,” he whispers, and wipes away a single tear before it can spill over onto his wrinkled cheek.

26

A STROKE OF GENIUS

CLAIRE'S STORY

I introduced Abuelito to my friend Harry Friedman.

He made me call him Abuelito. He said Mr Moreno made him sound like a stranger, and as he saw more of me than he did of his grandson, I should have the right to act like family.

They'd let him out of the hospital, and Alex's dad — who didn't at all mind being called Mr Rivera — had taken a couple of weeks off to look after him.

With Alex out of town I was feeling a little lost, so I stopped by most days to see if I could help out, but Mr Rivera was a hell of a lot more efficient at most things than I was, and I ended up spending half the day playing
damas
with the old man, and learning how to swear in Spanish.

That was where I got the idea about Mr F.

I ran it past him first — not that I had any doubt he'd agree. Then I made the offer to Abuelito. Who, of course, jumped at it.

Then it was just a matter of organising a “gate-pass” for Harry, and transporting him across town to the Rivera hacienda.

After that, I was a bit redundant. Harry was even more of a challenge at checkers than I was, and they could both talk with a degree of authority about what had happened forty years before I was born. A unionist and a Republican freedom-fighter, they even leaned the same way politically — which didn't stop them arguing about most things, but the arguments were as good natured as they were heated.

Alex's dad was smiling, and I congratulated myself. It was a stroke of genius, though I do say so myself. Even if I was reduced to the role of taxi driver.

I spent a lot of time in Alex's room. He had a small keyboard that he sometimes used to work out arrangements. It was tied into a program on his PC and he could orchestrate experimental backing-tracks for any song he might be working on, so that he didn't have to wait until he met with the others to develop an idea.

I didn't use the hardware. I'm still uncomfortable with anything more sophisticated than my electric toaster. But I did enjoy sitting there in his room, playing music, and imagining him there.

There were some framed photographs on his windowsill. One of a beautiful young woman I guessed was his mother, one of his father and Abuelito, another of yours truly, and a faded black and white one of a young man playing the guitar.

The famous Ardillo.

Alex had mentioned him lots of times. His grandfather's brother, who had died a long time ago. The great guitarist.

I made a mental note to find out more about the mysterious Ardillo — and why Alex should be so interested in a dead and distant relative.

There was so much to talk to him about when he finally got home, but I knew that the first few days would be taken up with talk of the tour.

They'd already “knocked ‘em dead” in four capital cities, and the buzz of sharing the bill with Sonja Vegas hadn't worn off. He called me most nights, and I could hear it in his voice. He was flying, and there didn't seem any way he was going to come down. Not for a long time.

I had to fight the urge to grab a plane and arrive at one of the shows unannounced. But I'd made the decision long before the tour started that I wouldn't go. He didn't need the distraction of having me around. He might be having the time of his life, but the pressure was still intense — on him, and on the whole band — and they needed to focus.

I kept him posted on Abuelito's “textbook recovery”, and told him I missed him. And I let him get on with being the star.

I did ask about Marco, but there wasn't much he could tell me. The kid was tough, and he was performing miracles every night on stage. But the real miracle was that he could function at all. The hospital was keeping him posted, but the only news was “no news”. He talked with his mother when she was up to it, and to the nurses when she wasn't, but the tour was nearly over, and soon he would be able to visit her again.

Tim was drinking too much and disappearing until far too late some nights, but it hadn't affected his performance.
Yet.

Alex didn't add the word, but I could sense it by the way he spoke. Chrissie would have her hands full dragging him back into line after the tour was over, but she was the only one with enough of a hold over him to have any chance at all.

I just hoped that the people who were watching the tour with such interest were only interested in what was happening on stage. The big break was so close. It would kill them to blow it now. And it would take so little to do just that.

They were finishing with four concerts in Sydney at the Entertainment Centre, on the week of the twenty-fourth, then Sonja Vegas went back to the States, and things went back to normal. Whatever that was.

Alex had reserved three seats for the final concert. Front row, centre. There are certain advantages to being a dedicated groupie …

27

HOME TURF

When the opening riff of “Falling into the Sun” pounds out across the Entertainment Centre, the audience goes wild. For forty-five minutes the momentum has been building, and such has been the power of the performance that it is easy to forget that Asturias is there merely to support. That the singer they have paid their money to see has yet to appear.

It is also easy to forget how young they are.

Standing up at the back of the huge auditorium, Max Parnell begins to relax. Only two more songs to go and the tour is over. But not the dream.

Already the word has reached the faceless movers in New York, and the vibrations are all positive.

He drags his attention from the stage and gazes around the tiered seats. The reaction has been the same at every concert.

He remembers the months of preparation, and the times when it had seemed like a dangerous gamble to risk a career on. And he wishes he could see Symonds' face at this moment.

But the fat man would never stand at the back to watch the show.

Alex hits the solo before the final chorus, and Tasha takes the most direct route from one side of the huge stage to the other. A one-handed cartwheel that sends her amazing hair fanning out so that it shines like a pure white halo in the spotlights.

The audience goes wild again, and the guitar screams.

CHRISSIE'S STORY

There's no way to even come close to describing the feeling. It's like a wave of sound washing over you, and the emotion in that wave is as powerful as the Pacific Ocean.

Maybe it was just that it was the last concert, or because it was on home turf, but the feeling beat anything I'd felt, even in the past three weeks.

A stadium concert isn't like any other gig you'll ever play. On stage, the lights are so bright, and the special effects are working overtime, so it's almost impossible to see the audience except as a vague blur behind the glow. But you can hear them.

Not while the volume is cranked up, like in “Falling into the Sun”, but between songs, when the amps are silent, and the applause has a chance to register. That's the time you know if it's all working.

They were still cheering when Alex started to play the first quiet chords of “Stairway to Heaven”, and it was like he'd turned a switch. For a moment there was a pause, then a short cheer of approval, then silence.

It's a truly amazing song.

Twenty-five years old, and an all-time classic.

I remember when Alex first suggested recording it. I wasn't sure about it — until he played the first few bars. Then I knew we just had to do it.

It was the only song in the set that wasn't an original, but we'd done so well with it the year before that it felt like ours. And it always brought the house down.

That night was no exception.

By the time Tasha sang the final line, with her voice hanging in the air, unaccompanied, like the voice of an angel, there wasn't a sound in the whole of the huge auditorium.

We'd experienced it before, and it was eerie, like the whole massive crowd was holding its breath …

ALEX'S STORY

Marco's timing, as usual, was perfection.

For a couple of heartbeats he waited, sticks raised, then, just a split-second before the lull turned into applause, he launched into his mind-blowing drum solo. Four bars of two-handed wizardry, which rode over the applause of the audience, and carried us into the concert version of “Simple Minds”— complete with an extended opening riff that fed into the formless noise of the applause, and moulded it into a rhythmical pounding; a ten-thousand-hand percussion section that picked up the pulse of the bass and drums, and became a part of the performance.

For four minutes and thirty-five seconds — they timed it for the live CD — there was no “us and them”. The song rolled out over the audience, and they shouted it back with one voice.

In all the concerts we'd done until that moment, I'd never felt that kind of power.

And I knew I had to feel it again. I had to ride the wave for as long as it lasted.

CLAIRE'S STORY

I was sitting between the only two people in the entire audience who didn't make a sound during the final song.

Mr Rivera just looked stunned. It was the first time he'd seen the band at all.

He'd heard the records, of course. How could he help it? But he'd never had the time to see a live performance, and I don't think he could take it all in. This was Alejandro, the son who shared his house and cared for the old man when he couldn't be there to do it himself.

This was the boy who had made music in the bedroom, all those years, when he should have been studying. Who had something to do with the songs he had been hearing on the radio. That the men at work all asked him about.

But
this
…

This talent who could make so many people forget themselves, and share in something beyond the music.

He just sat there shaking his head in disbelief.

Abuelito wiped the tears from his eyes, and just laughed.

And me?

I fell in love, all over again.

And I stood with the rest when the song ended and the crowd roared them off the stage. What else could a girl do?

At the end of an hour on stage, Sonja Vegas sits on a tall stool in the centre of the stage, and stares out into the space beyond the lights where the audience lives.

Behind her the band is silent, and she waits, holding her public with the power of her presence. The cheering slows and fails, and the clapping ceases.

Finally, she raises the microphone to speak.

“For the past three weeks,” she begins, “I have shared this final part of my world tour with a group of incredible young people I
know
are going all the way.”

She pauses and allows the applause to swell and die away.

“But tonight, my friends, for the first time, I would like to bring them back on stage with me. Because tonight we are ready to give you something absolutely new.”

She stands and moves to the edge of the stage, weighing the silence like gold.

“In a few days I will be heading home, and next month we go into the studio to record a new album. I can tell you now that the first song we will be putting down, was written for me just a couple of weeks ago by a young guy called Alex Rivera. It is called
“Broken Dreams”, and with the help of the composer and his friends, I would like to sing it for you now.”

As she has been speaking, the lights behind her have dimmed. Now a single spot picks out a young guitarist, standing alone at the corner of the stage.

It is as if the light ignites him. He raises the neck of his instrument as a salute to the woman at the centre of the stage, then begins.

The notes are clear and sweet, and the chords fill the huge space. As the rest of the band comes in, the lights rise, and Sonja Vegas begins to sing.

“I've had enough of promises, and all the broken dreams
…”

At the back of the stadium, Max Parnell finds a step to sit on. He shakes his head, and stares down at Alex, who plays without looking at the strings, and casually holds the gaze of a megastar.

“Nice one, kid.”

He whispers the words to himself, and wipes his hand over his face.

“Symonds is going to have an orgasm
…”

28

REQUIEM

CHRISSIE'S STORY

Three days after the final concert, Melina was dead.

Marco phoned me from the hospital and I rushed over in a cab. All the way, I had a strange feeling that I couldn't quite put my finger on. Apart from sympathy for the kid, and a sense of relief that Melina was finally out of pain, I guess it was the feeling that something in his voice wasn't quite right.

I know. That sounds really dumb. A kid's mother dies, and “something isn't quite right”.

But that's how I felt.

It was his voice on the phone. There was no emotion in his words.

“Mum's died,” he said. “Could you come to the hospital?”

Like he was asking me to run down to the shop. I know there are no rules to grieving, but it worried me. No one — especially not a fifteen-year-old kid — should be that calm.

I called Alex on the mobile, and he arrived at the same time I did. He lived closer to the hospital. I was glad to see him; I wasn't sure how I was going to handle things.

“I've called Claire.” He kissed me as I stepped out of the cab — not the sort of gesture you would normally expect from him — and I knew he was as nervous as I was. “She'll be here as soon as she can.”

We moved inside.

They'd moved Melina by the time we arrived, and Marco was sitting in a waiting room just off the main corridor, sipping a cup of coffee and staring out of the window at a small flock of pigeons on the lawn below.

He looked up as we entered.

“Thanks for coming,” he said, but it was almost a formula response, like something they might say behind the counter at McDonald's.

“Marco, I'm so —” I began, but he cut me off.

“Don't be. She's better off. The pain was …” He looked out of the window again. “It's been four years since she was really well. That's a long time to fight that kind of pain.”

Alex moved over to stand beside him.

“Is there anything we can do?”

“Just be there. You're the only family I've got.”

For the first time, I thought I caught a trace of emotion in his voice. But maybe I was just hoping.

He sat down, picked up one of the magazines from the coffee table in the centre of the room, and began leafing through it like he was waiting for a haircut. I think that action scared me more than anything.

“Do you have somewhere to stay? I don't think you should go home. Not on your own.”

Alex was taking charge, and I was grateful. For once I was feeling completely out of my depth.

Marco didn't look up from the magazine.

“The social worker said she was going to phone Child Welfare. They can't let a minor fend for himself. It's the law.”

He sounded as if he could care less.

“Well, let's go see her. You don't have to “fend” for anything. You can come and stay at my house. At least until you can sort yourself out.”

We saw the social worker, and told her where Marco would be. She seemed relieved. One less case for the “too hard” basket. Then we waited for Claire to arrive.

The first thing she did was to put her arms around him. I watched him tense, as if he was about to pull away, but he'd always liked Claire, and I guess he didn't want to hurt her feelings, because he stood there and let her hug him.

Even though there was no comfort for him in the contact.

ALEX'S STORY

For a week after the funeral he went through the motions.

We had a short holiday from rehearsals and anything to do with the band. It had already been planned, but it came as a god-send. There was no way any of us could have done anything constructive. We'd got close to Melina, in our own different ways, and we were all feeling for Marco.

Except Marco himself.

He seemed to have been drained of emotion, and I was ready to call in professional help. But in the end it didn't work out that way.

I was out when Claire arrived.

She'd brought Harry Friedman over to visit my grandfather, and she'd found Marco in the back garden.

Just sitting …

CLAIRE'S STORY

“Want to talk about it?” I asked.

I knew how worried Alex was getting, and it seemed like the ideal opportunity to talk with Marco, with no one around except two old men who were too interested in getting the better of each other in checkers and politics to take much notice of anything else.

He looked up at me.

“No.”

“I think it's time you did.”

I'd never had the experience of being a big sister, but most of my friends who had seemed to handle it by being bossy.

“Nothing to talk about. She's dead, and I'm not. That about sums it up.”

It was the most words he'd said in a week, but still, it wasn't a very positive start.

“No one can help you if you cut us off. I —”

“Who said I wanted any help?” This time he shouted the words — a breakthrough of sorts. At least it was an emotion of some kind.

“Do you think your mother would have wanted you to be like this?”

He ripped one of Abuelito's tomatoes off the plant next to him, and hurled it at the wall of the house. It burst in a small red star.

“How the hell do
I
know what my mother would want? She's dead. She couldn't stop it happening, and
I
couldn't stop it, and the bloody doctors certainly couldn't … Shit happens. So don't bring my mother into it.”

“But she
is
in it, Marc. She's what it's all about. Don't you see …?”

“You don't have a clue what it's all about! You or Alex or Chrissie … any of you. Why can't you all just piss off and leave me alone. I'm fine.”

“Yeah,” I said, more to myself than him. “You're just great …”

Sometimes instinct is the only way to go. I took a step towards him, and slapped him as hard as I could across the face.

The suddenness of it shocked him.

“What was that for?”

I looked at him for a moment.

“I just thought you might like to know how it feels. You've been slapping the face of just about everyone who cares for you for the last couple of weeks. These people love you, you idiot, and you shut them out, like …”

I struggled to control my frustration. Anger wasn't the right approach. I sat down on the bench next to the barbecue, and patted the space next to me.

“Come here.”

He came reluctantly, and sat down.

I held his gaze for a moment, and he waited. Finally the words came.

“For a long time when my parents broke up, I went into my shell. I wouldn't speak to my mother, and I wouldn't answer the phone when my father called. I thought I was angry with them, for failing. For not living up to the ideal I had set out for them.”

He was listening. His eyes never left my face.

“In the end, I realised that it wasn't
them
I was blaming. It was me. There must have been something I should have done, or something I did that I shouldn't have. It's not logical, but it happens.”

Still he didn't speak, but there was a life in his face that had been missing for too long. I pressed on.

“You can't keep punishing yourself. There was nothing you could have done that you didn't do. And you didn't do a thing wrong. You said it yourself … Shit happens.”

For a moment I thought he was going to say something, but then I saw the tears begin to well up and he stood and ran into the house.

I didn't know whether to follow, or to quit while I was behind.

In the end I took a deep breath and went in after him.

He was in the room they'd made up for him at the back of the house. The door was closed, and the only sound I could hear from inside was a sort of dull thumping.

In another part of the house the two old men were absorbed in their game, unaware that there was anything going on. I listened to the murmur of their voices, and hesitated.

Finally I knocked. There was no reply, so I eased the door open, moved inside … and stopped.

Marco was standing in the comer between the wardrobe and the back of the room, slamming his fist again and again into the wall. The plasterboard had collapsed under the onslaught, and his hand was covered in the white powder, which was slowly staining pink with the blood from his tom knuckles.

But still he didn't make a sound.

I went across to him and pulled him away from the wall with both hands. There was no resistance. I spun him around to face me, and I saw the tears pouring out of his eyes and spreading a liquid sheen across his cheeks.

“Marco?” I said, not trusting my voice to say anything more.

He wiped his damaged hand across his face, leaving a dark stain on his cheek. I looked into his eyes, afraid of what I might see there. But there was no madness, only a terrible despair.

“You're wrong, Claire.” His voice was distant, and though he spoke my name, I felt like a stranger. “There was a lot I could have done.”

He moved across and sat on the bed, staring at his hand as if it belonged to someone else. I stood next to him, but he didn't look up. He just kept talking in that strange, distant voice.

“Three weeks … She was dying, and I spent three weeks away from her. I hardly had time to say goodbye, and then she …” The words trailed off, and I didn't know how to cross the silence that was stretching between us.

I waited for him to continue, but he remained silent. Eventually I sat down next to him. Our legs were touching, but he didn't pull away, so I tried again.

“It wasn't your fault. She wanted you to go. It would have killed her to see you throw away your future just to sit by her bed and wait for her to die. She was so damned proud of you … She told me —”

“You went to see her?” For the first time since he had sat down, he held my gaze.

“Most days, while you were away. She was happy, Marc. Contented, even. She knew she couldn't be around to share in your success, but it wasn't as terrible for her as it could have been.”

I paused, but he waited for me to go on.

I was looking at the picture of Melina that he kept on his bedside table, and suddenly I could hear her voice, struggling for volume but strong in spirit. And I knew what to say.

“She told me once. ‘Claire,' she said, ‘I did a good job with the boy. Whatever happens, he'll make it. He's strong.' “I looked at him. “Was she wrong?”

Wrong?
He was the strongest kid I'd ever met, but
he
had to realise it.

He held my eye, and I felt the tension drain out of his body. I reached out and touched his hand. He didn't seem to mind, so I took hold of it and squeezed.

“I didn't blame myself,” he said, “when my father left. He was a bastard, and I was glad he was gone. Then it was just Mum and me. And that's how it's been ever since. Until …”

“She was proud of you. That's what you have to hang on to. Guilt will kill you, kid.”

“I never told her, Claire. In all those years …” He brushed his hair from his face and looked at the photograph. “From the day she threw his things out of the window. For all those years, I was proud of her, too.”

I put my arm around him and pulled him towards me. He laid his head on my shoulder, and after a few moments I could feel him sob, as the healing tears began.