The Last Days (11 page)

Read The Last Days Online

Authors: Scott Westerfeld

Tags: #Juvenile Fiction, #Horror & Ghost Stories, #Performing Arts, #Music

BOOK: The Last Days
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The rest of them stumbled to a halt. Pearl was staring at her friend, alarmed. Moz was staring at Minerva too, and for a moment his expression was unmistakable: the boy was dripping with desire.
“Why’d you two stop, man?” the burly dog-boy cried. “That shit was
paranormal
!”
I blinked, looking down at empty hands. No trembling, just like after any good session. I felt no need to tap my feet or touch my forehead. There was nothing in the air but the hiss of amplifiers, a barely visible ripple in the corners of my eyes.
But I still felt it in the soles of my feet, the beast we’d been playing. Something was rumbling in the earth, deeper than six stories below. Answering Minerva’s song.
“You can smell it too, can’t you?” she whispered to me.
“No . . . not smell. But sometimes I see things I shouldn’t.” I swallowed, clutching at my pill bottle through my jeans, by reflex spilling out the speech they made us memorize at school, in case the police ever thought we were on drugs: “I have a neurological condition that may cause compulsive behavior, loss of motor control, or hallucinations.”
Minerva raised an eyebrow, then curled back her lips in a sneer that showed too many pointed teeth. “
Spasticus . . . autisticus
.”
I nodded. That was more or less me.
But what the hell was she?
12. THE TEMPTATIONS
-MOZ-
Her uncovered face was radiant, shining with a brilliance that liquefied me.
She’d worn her shades until that moment—a total poser, I’d figured. But I could see now that she
had
to wear them, not for her protection, but for ours, to shield us from her eyes.
What she had wasn’t beauty, it was something a thousand times scarier, something that gnawed at my edges. I’d already heard it in the music, felt it in the way she’d wrenched us all into her wake—the whole band sucked up and totaled by her magnetism, or whatever you’d call it. Something
charisma
was too small a word for.
Something overriding, bottomless.
Suddenly, this was
her
band, not mine or Pearl’s. And just as suddenly, I didn’t mind.
Minerva put her sunglasses back on.
 
I picked up her notebook from where it had fluttered to the floor.
What covered the open pages wasn’t writing, more like the scroll from a lie detector, or one of those machines that inscribes the shapes of earthquakes. Ragged black lines undulated in impenetrable columns, smeared and spattered with drops of water. A few smudges were rusty brown, like old blood.
I offered it to her, but Minerva was still staring at Alana Ray—
glaring
, her gaze dangerous even through dark glasses. I felt like I should say something to calm her down, since I’d brought Alana Ray here and Minerva was angry at her about . . . something.
Because Alana Ray had dropped her sticks? But Minerva had freaked out before the Big Riff had broken down. I opened my mouth but found myself silenced by the memory of Minerva’s naked eyes.
“Min?” Pearl said.
I closed my mouth. Let Pearl handle this.
“You okay, Min?”
“Yeah, sure.” Minerva leaned across to take the notebook from my hand, pressed it close against her chest. “Sorry about that. Didn’t mean to have a hissy fit. I was just kind of . . . into that song.”
“I’m sorry too,” Alana Ray said quietly. “My condition sometimes leads to performance complications.”
I swallowed, trying to remember what Alana Ray had confessed about herself . . . something wrong with her brain? All of a sudden, she was talking funny, with microscopic pauses between her words. Little twitches traveled across her body as she stared back at Minerva, as if her nervous system was unraveling inside. I opened my mouth again to say something.
“Hey, no problem,” Zahler said first. “You were fawesome. We were
all
totally paranormal!” He turned to Pearl. “Right?”
“Yeah,” Pearl said softly. “We were.” She gave me a questioning look.
I held her gaze, something I hadn’t done in two weeks.
It had all clicked—our music, this band. Pearl’s strange, electric friend had pulled us together and forged us into something as brilliant as she was.
“That was great,” I said, nodding at Pearl. “Good going.”
Her face brightened in the dark practice room. “Well, okay, then.” She turned to Alana Ray. “You need to take a break?”
Alana Ray blinked one eye, then the other, then shook her head like she had water in her ear. “No. I’d rather keep playing. I think my . . . complication is over. But maybe a different song? Sometimes the same stimulus can provoke the same reaction.”
“Uh, sure,” Pearl said, then shrugged. “How about Piece Two?”
Zahler and I just nodded, but Minerva smiled, pulling the microphone closer to her mouth. Low, soft laughter, touched with reverb, scattered about the room.
“No problem, Alana Ray,” she whispered, opening her notebook. “I’ve got about a million stimuli to go.”
 
Nobody freaked out for the rest of rehearsal.
We played Piece Two, a long jam wrapped around a looped sample from an old vinyl record of Pearl’s, then our third song, which didn’t even have a working title yet. Alana Ray never stumbled again, just accompanied us with psychic comprehension. With every new section she’d follow along for a while, then slowly start to build us up, adding structure and form, staring at invisible sheet music hovering in the air, somehow
seeing
what we needed her to do.
I didn’t catch a single word Minerva sang, but every time she opened her mouth, she injected us with brilliance. Her voice had an uncanny magnitude, as if her notebooks were full of incantations for making the ground beneath us rumble. I couldn’t take my eyes off her, except when I closed them and listened hard.
Between songs, I kicked myself for not having gone out to Brooklyn that morning. I finally saw how stupid the struggle between Pearl and me had been. Neither of us were rock stars—we were backups, sidekicks, allies. Good musicians, maybe, but Minerva was luminous.
The anger that had been dogging me the last two weeks was spent, leaving nothing but contentment. I had an awesome band, a place to rehearse with no one yelling, “Turn it down!” and a 1975 Strat with gold pickups in my hands. I’d even cracked the money thing and was saving a few bucks for myself every day. I couldn’t remember why being miserable had seemed so important.
Minerva had changed everything.
 
After an hour and a half, we’d played every song we knew as many times as we could and ground to a reluctant halt.
“Hey,” Zahler said. “We need some new tunes, don’t we?”
“Yeah.” I looked at Pearl. “We should get together soon. Work on some more stuff for next Sunday.” Suddenly I had fragments of a million songs in my head.
Pearl smiled happily. “More tunes? No problemo.”
Minerva frowned. “
Problem
a.
Pero masculino
.”
“Huh?” I said, glancing at Pearl.
“Um, Min’s been studying Spanish, sort of.” Pearl pulled out her cell phone and frowned at it. “Speaking of which, I think we need to get back to Brooklyn for your, um, lesson.”
“You’re studying Spanish?” Zahler said, grinning. “
Mas cervezas!
”
“
Prefiero sangre
,” Minerva said, her teeth glimmering in the darkness.
“Yeah, okay.” Pearl turned to Alana Ray. “Listen, it was great to meet you. You were brilliant. I mean, especially for paint cans.”
“Paint buckets,” Alana Ray said. “It was good to meet you too.”
“So . . . you want to play with us again?”
Alana Ray looked at me, and I nodded—at seventy-five bucks she was a bargain. She smiled. “Yes. This was very . . . involving.”
“That’s us. Involving.” Pearl swallowed. “Sorry that Min and I have to run, but you’ve got the room until eleven. If I go reserve it for next week, can you guys handle breaking down?”
“What about your mixing board?” Zahler said.
“They keep it locked up downstairs. Here’s my key.” She threw a glittering chain across the room to Zahler and grabbed Minerva’s hand. “Come on, Min. We really have to motor.”
Zahler shouted goodbye, but Pearl was already pulling Minerva out of the door, yanking her along like a five-year-old who didn’t want to leave the zoo.
I followed them into the hall, running ahead to stab the elevator button.
“Thanks,” Pearl said. “Sorry to leave you guys to clean up. It’s just . . .” Her voice faded into a sigh.
“Smelly Spanish lessons,” Minerva said. From all around us, the mutterings of bands leaked out, the thump of drums, muffled stabs of feedback.
“Don’t worry about it.” I wondered what their mysterious rush was really all about. Not Spanish lessons, obviously. I tried to remember what Pearl had said on the phone that morning. Something about
ninjas
? “You’ve done everything so far, Pearl. It won’t kill us to put some stuff away.”
“Not everything. You guys found Alana Ray. She’s incredible.”
“Yeah, I guess she is.” I smiled. “Listen, I’m sorry I was so sleepy when you called this morning. Next time, I’ll be glad to help out . . .” I glanced at Minerva. “With whatever.”
“Oh, cool,” Pearl said softly, her smile growing. She was staring down at the floor. “That’s great.”
The elevator came, and when they stepped on, I did too, wanting a few more seconds with Minerva. “I’ll come down with you guys, if you don’t mind, and then ride back up.”
“We don’t mind,” Minerva said.
It was quiet in the big freight elevator, the walls padded with movers’ blankets to protect them from the ravages of dollies, amps, and drums.
I cleared my throat. “Listen, Pearl, I’ve been kind of a dickhead.”
“About what?” Pearl said, and Min’s eyebrows rose behind dark glasses.
“About everything; about you. But this band is finally coming together, and I feel kind of stupid about the way I’ve been acting. So . . . I’m okay now.”
“Hey, Moz. It’s my fault too.” Pearl turned to me, her face a little pink, almost blushing. “I know I can be sort of bossy.”
“She’s got a point there,” Minerva said.
I laughed. “Nah. You just know what you’re doing.” I shrugged. “So me and Zahler should come over tomorrow? Get some new tunes worked up before next Sunday?”
Pearl nodded, still grinning. “Perfect.”
“You coming?” I asked Minerva. “I mean, you’re the singer and everything.” I pointed at the notebooks she still clutched to her chest.
“Um, probably not,” Pearl said. “She’s kind of—”
“It’s very
intensive
Spanish,” Minerva said.
“Oh. Sure.”
The elevator doors opened, and we stepped out into the lobby, Pearl still pulling Minerva along. A couple of guys were rolling a dolly full of turntable decks into the building, negotiating the bump between stairway ramp and marble floor with extreme care.
Pearl stepped up to the front desk, pulling out a credit card and talking to the guy about next week.
Minerva turned to me and said softly, “See you next week.”
I nodded, swallowing, suddenly glad she was wearing those dark glasses. I wondered how many fewer stupid things I’d have said in my life if all pretty girls wore them. “I’ll totally be there.”
Okay, maybe not that many.
But Minerva just laughed and reached out with the hand Pearl wasn’t holding. Hot as a freshly blown-out match, her fingertip traced my arm from wrist to elbow. Between her parted lips, I could see teeth sliding from left to right against each other, and then she mouthed a silent word.
Yummy.
She turned away from my shiver, back to Pearl just as she finished up and flicked open her phone.
“Elvis? We’re ready.” Pearl snapped the phone shut and looked at me. “See you guys tomorrow. Call me?”
“Yeah. I’ll tell Zahler.” My breath was short, the line Minerva had traced along my arm still burning. “See you.”
They waved, and I watched them walk through the door and out, then make their way toward a huge gray limo—a
limo
?—that slid into view. Minerva’s mouthed word still echoed in my head, so unexpected, more like a daydream than something that had actually
happened
. My brain couldn’t get hold of it, like a guitar lick I could hear but that my fingers couldn’t grasp.
But she turned back toward me just before she ducked into the car and stuck her tongue out. Then her smile flashed, wicked and electric.
The limo slid away.
I swallowed, turned, and ran back to catch the elevator’s closing doors. The guys with turntables were piled inside, leaving just enough space for me to squeeze in. As we rode up, I was rocking on the balls of my feet, humming one of the strange fragments Minerva had left in my brain, bouncing off the blanketed wall behind me.

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