California Diaries # 11: Dawn III: Missing (8 page)

thought I could hear Ducky breathing on the other side of the table.

From somewhere behind me an announcer said, “Ladies and gentlemen…

JAX!”

The room exploded in applause and whistles and cheers. Then it grew

quiet again as the members of Jax – three guys and two girls – filed onto the

stage. Pierre was the fourth one to appear, and he was the only one who looked

out at the audience, looked at us with those piercing, gentle, sincere eyes. Then

he looked RIGHT AT ME.

I swear he did.

And he smiled. (AT ME.)

A moment later Pierre and the other band members glanced at one

another, nodded once, and BLAM! They burst into their first song. It was like the

room was so quiet and then al of a sudden it was this fireball of sound. Pierre

stood off to the right with one of the girls, and you could tell that as they sang,

they just totally lost themselves in the music. Pierre closed his eyes, of course.

He always does when he sings. He hardly ever opened them, no matter how

much he jumped around (although Jax did not leap up and down the way the

warm-up group did). I knew that he had to be off in his own world in order to stay

involved with the music.

The first song was loud and wild from beginning to end.

The second song was quiet. It was a bal ad, a love song. Pierre sang this

one on his own. And his voice was so filled with longing. He told the story of a

guy and a girl who fall in love and go off to London to spend the rest of their lives

together. But then the guy fal s for another girl and he feels terrible because he

realizes he loves both of them. At first he doesn’t know what to do, but final y he

decides his first love is his true love, except that by then she has found out about

the other girl so she leaves the guy and then he has no one.

By the time the song ended I was crying. Tears were just rolling down my

cheeks. I soaked through four napkins trying to get control of myself.

Oh, Pierre, I thought. If you and I were those true loves, I wouldn’t leave

you. Maybe I’d want to have a big talk about faithfulness, and maybe I’d lay down

a few ground rules for you to follow, but I wouldn’t leave you.

I gulped and sniffled and blew my nose again. Then I looked hard (yet

lovingly) at Pierre, hoping he’d open his eyes even just a flicker. I’d send him a

message with my own eyes – a message of love and trust to let him know that I

wouldn’t treat him the way the girl in the song treated him. I mean, the way the

girl in the song treated the guy in the song.

Saturday evening 3/6

By the third song, the audience had relaxed a little. We were still under the

spell of Jax, but we were no longer transfixed. People began to get up and move

around again. (Rick and the girl delivered another shot to our table, but I barely

noticed.) The small dance floor in front of the stage started to fil up. I saw people dancing in groups of three or four, or in pairs, or even alone. One guy stood at

the edge of the dance floor with his eyes shut, swaying in time to the music for

nearly half an hour. Girls danced together, guys danced together, people drifted

around and dance with people they didn’t know.

For the entire first half of the concert I was glued to my sear, gazing at

Pierre (who rarely opened his eyes.) Final y Ducky said to me, “Want to dance,

Dawn?” (Sunny was off dancing with someone else, someone I’d never seen

before.)

“Sure,” I said to Ducky.

We edged through the sea of tables to the dance floor. I’d never danced

with Ducky and he turned out to be wild. He was all over the place (at least as

much as he could be in that small, crowded area), but he was really good.

People turned to look at him. After awhile, I couldn’t keep up with him, so when

this girl and this guy sort of started dancing with him, I signaled that I was going

to head back to our table. When I got there, I found that both Sunny and Amalia

were off somewhere. So I sat alone in my seat next to the cluster of shot glasses

and lost myself in Pierre’s world.

Sitting alone at our end of the table, with most of the people in the room

either dancing or just listening to Jax, I could fantasize endlessly about Pierre. I

mean, there he was, in the same room, just yards away from me.

This was my best fantasy of the evening:

The concert ends a little earlier than we have figured, which is good

because we don’t have to call Dad right away.

I say, “Let’s go to the back entrance and see if we can see Jax when they

leave.” Of course, I am thinking that maybe I would get to speak to Pierre.

SO we wait by the back door (miraculously, we are the ONLY ones waiting

by the back door), and soon the members of Jax start to leave. They are dressed

in their regular clothes, which so not look all that different than their concert

clothes, but you can tel they are more relaxed and comfortable now.

I look directly into Pierre’s eyes and find that he is looking directly into

mine.

And we just melt. Both of us.

“Hello,” Pierre says to me in his wonderful low voice.

I can barely speak, but I do manage to squeak out, “Hello.”

The next thing I know, Pierre is inviting me out for coffee, and we are on

our own.

That night he proposes to me.

We go steady until I am old enough to get married.

Meanwhile, I manage his career, and thanks to me he remains wildly

successful. We are partners for life.

Late Saturday night 3/6

The concert ended after a mere five minutes. That’s how it felt, anyway.

So I was surprised to look at my watch and see that it was almost 1:30 A.M.

I was in heaven.

Until the lights came up and I looked across the table at Ducky. I don’t

know when he had stopped dancing and returned to the table. But at some point

he had, and now he was sitting before the shot glasses, his face weary and his

eyes glazed.

“Whoa, Ducky,” I said quietly.

Ducky looked up at me slowly with hooded eyes. “What?”

“How much did you have to drink?”

Next to him Sunny made a face at me. “Wel , let’s see,” she said. “Let’s

count the shot glasses. One, two, three, four, five. Five shots of tequila, and

Ducky and I were both drinking, so now let’s do the math. I had three. Five minus

three. My. That’s difficult. I almost need a calculator. But – ”

“Oh, shut up, Sunny,” I muttered.

Sunny shut up.

I looked at Ducky. I looked at Amalia. “Two shots of tequila,” I said to her.

“Plus that other thing.”

Amalia nodded. Then she said, “Ducky, are you wasted?”

Ducky grinned tiredly. “I may not be wasted, but I’m definitely wiped.

Maybe I shouldn’t have danced so hard…Plus, I was so tired to begin with. I

guess that doesn’t mix well with a few drinks. Nurse,” he said, turning to Sunny.

“What time was my last shot?”

“Ducky, this is serious!” I exclaimed.

“Ducky, this is serious!” said Sunny.

“Sunny,” I said warningly.

“Sunny,” Sunny said warningly.

“Stop that!”

“Stop that!”

“Ducky, she’s acting like a six-year-old,” I cried.

“Ducky, she’s acting like a six-year-old,” Sunny cried, then let loose with a

belly laugh.

I turned to Amalia. “What are we going to do?”

“What are we going to do?” Sunny asked Amalia.

Amalia took me by the arm and pulled me away from the table. “Let’s let

Sunny and Ducky calm down a little,” she said. “We don’t have to leave right

away. Maybe we could hand around the back door and wait for Jax. That would

be fun, wouldn’t it?”

According to my daydream it would be more than fun. But I didn’t think we

had the time. “Amalia, we can’t. I have to call my father and tell him we’re on our

way home.”

“Why? Cal him at two and tell him the concert ended then.”

I looked at my watch. “That’s only twenty minutes from now. Do you really

think Ducky will be ready to drive at two o’clock?”

Amalia and I turned to look at Ducky, who was now slumped in one chair

with his feet resting on a second chair and his head propped up on his hand. He

looked ready to fall asleep. He also, suddenly, looked sad.

Amalia made a little face. “I guess not.”

“We have to talk to him,” I said.

“Okay. And if Sunny bothers you, just ignore her.”

Amalia and I returned to the table and sat down across from Ducky.

“Ducky?” I said. This time Sunny remained quiet.

“Yeah?” said Ducky.

“Are you okay?” Amalia asked him, and I could tell she meant more than

simply, “Are you okay to drive?”

The room was emptying out around us, and I watched people slide by as I

waited for Ducky’s answer.

Sunday morning 3/7

Ducky didn’t even lift his head from his hand. “I’m just really tired,” he said.

“I’ve probably never been more tired in my life.”

Well, he had probably never been so wrung out and emotional and then

had a drink plus two shots of tequila, and danced like a madman.

“Do you want to talk about anything?” Amalia asked him gently.

Ducky smiled. “Yes. But not when it’s almost two o’clock and I have to get

al you guys home.”

“Can you get us home, Ducky?” I asked. “Are you okay to drive?”

“Of course he’s okay to drive,” spoke up Sunny. “I could drive us home

right now. And I had more to drink than he did.”

“Okay,” I said. “A, you are three years away from getting your license, and

B, you are not in any condition to drive, either. Ducky, do you think you can drive

us home?” I asked again.

Ducky looked at the tabletop. “I’m awfully sleepy,” he admitted.

“But can you drive?” asked Amalia.

“And I feel like al my bones have slipped out of my body.”

“Oh, god,” I muttered.

“I guess I better not drive,” Ducky finally said.

“I could drive!” Sunny said brightly.

Amalia looked at her and rol ed her eyes.

“No, real y. I could,” said Sunny. “I’ve watched people drive millions of

times. And sometimes when my parents aren’t home I drive the drive up and

down the carway.”

I glanced at Amalia. I almost smiled.

“Sunny. Did you hear what you just said?” asked Amalia.

“What?”

“You said ‘drive the drive up and down the carway.’”

“Well you know what I mean.”

“Yeah,” I answered. “You mean that if you COULD drive – and you can’t –

you aren’t in any condition to.”

“And neither am I,” Ducky said again.

I almost felt relieved. Relieved that Ducky had admitted this and now we

wouldn’t have to risk getting in the car with him and finding out that he couldn’t

drive – but when it was too late, like when we had just collided with a semi on the

freeway. Now, however, I was going to have to call Dad and tel him what bad

judgment I’d exercised by thinking that I could trust my pal Ducky, and that Dad

was going to have to pay for my bad judgment by getting dressed and driving al

the way to North Palo at two in the morning.

Even so, I said, “Wel , I have to call Dad now anyway, so I guess I’ll ask

him to come pick us up. Ducky, you can leave your car here, and you and Ted

can drive back tomorrow in Ted’s car to get it. It should be okay overnight. Dad’s

not going to be happy about – ” I stopped talking. Sunny was gaping at me.

“What?” I said.

“Are you crazy?” Sunny burst out. “Are you CRAZY?”

“No…What?”

“We are NOT calling your father and asking him to drive here and get us

like four little babies. You must be out of your mind.”

“You’d rather get in the car with someone who’s incapable of driving?” I

said hotly to Sunny.

“I am really drowsy,” interjected Ducky, “and I read somewhere that

drowsy drivers cause more accidents than – ”

Sunny cut him off. “You can drive just fine,” she said. She stood up. “Get

up,” she ordered Ducky. “Come on. If Dawn doesn’t want to come with us she

doesn’t have to. She can call her father and he can pick HER up, but the rest of

us don’t have to be humiliated.”

“Sunny, keep your voice down!” I cried softly. I had just realized we were

the only people left in the room.

Sunny glared at me.

Later Sunday morning 3/7

I wondered if we were going to get kicked out of the club, but when a

couple of busboys came into the room a few minutes later, they just started

clearing tables and didn’t pay any attention to us, which was a good thing,

because Sunny started this HUGE fight with me.

“Dawn, quit telling me what to do!” she cried.

At first I couldn’t think what I had told her to do. Then I remembered telling

her to keep her voice down.” I don’t tell you what to do,” I said.

“You’re always telling me what to do – how to dress, how to act, who to

hang out with, to visit Mom more often, to be more responsible.” Sunny’s list went

on and on.

It went on for so long that I lost interest and tried to get back to the matter

at hand.

“There is no way that I am getting into the car with Ducky at the wheel,” I

announced as soon as the list was finished.

“Good. I just said you didn’t have to. Go call your father. He can pick you

up. Amalia and I will go with Ducky. Ducky you’ll be a friend and drive us, won’t

you?” pleaded Sunny.

“Oh, man,” said Ducky sleepily.