Hurricane #11: The Band (Patreon)

“Hey!” Carl clapped his hands in front of Serrano’s face close enough to make her jump. Given how tiny the stage was at the Independent, that could be actively dangerous.

“Dammit, Carl.” She glared at her keyboard player. Well, the keyboard player. As the serval frequently reminded her, they were billed as “Serrano with the Iron Spikes,” not “Serrano and the Iron Spikes.” They’d been a band—Carl’s band—before she hooked up with them, and they still played gigs on their own. Until yesterday, tonight’s wasn’t going to include Serrano. Carl’s expression made it clear he was having second thoughts about taking pity on the coyote’s sudden loss of side income.

“We expect Jake to be in outer space, not you, dog girl.” Jake, the maned wolf on drums, flipped Carl off. “That’s like the fifth time somebody’s asked you a question and you’ve just flatlined.”

She grunted. “I have a lot on my mind right now.”

“Yeah, I can imagine.” He softened his voice.

“You can’t.” She shook her head. “What’d you ask?”

“If you wanted to open with ‘Heal It Up.’”

“Close with that. It’s our biggest hit.”

“Yeah, you bring that up a lot, don’t you.” Gene, the lead guitarist. Like usual, the tiger had his ears back.

“You know I don’t mean it like that, Gene.” She did mean it like that, but only because it was true. Gene and Carl would say there were three Iron Spikes albums, but the reality was there were two Iron Spikes albums and one “Serrano with…” album. Two hadn’t gone anywhere; one had two singles that (barely) made it to the alternative rock charts. Guess which were which.

“How about this. We do two sets. The first one with Serrano and the second one on our own. This was supposed to be a Spikes gig anyway, and the fans aren’t here for her.” He jerked a thumb at Serrano. “Let her open for us.”

“With you as my backing band? You’re going to open for yourselves? Sure, that makes fucking sense, Gene.”

Gene stomped over to her, scowling down. “Take it or leave it.”

“Carl?” She looked over at the serval.

Carl sighed. “Give us a minute,” he said to Gene and Jake, and motioned Serrano to follow him off-stage toward what passed for the place’s green room. After she did, he pushed the door to, taking a deep breath, and looked at her. “Look, Gene thinks you kind of suck up the oxygen in the room. I’m sorry he’s being a dick about it, but he’s not wrong, and your attitude doesn’t help.”

Serrano crossed her arms. “He’s been pissed off for a year that you guys do better with me than without me, but I didn’t think you were, too.”

“Thanks for demonstrating the attitude.” He shook his head. “There’ve been rumors for a while that you’re looking for another band, or going to get into something with your cousin.”

“I don’t want to get into a band with her. I’d just fade into the background.”

“And with us, you can be the star and we can fade into the background, right? Serrano Layotl and the guys in her backing band.”

“That’s not what—”

“Don’t bullshit me.” He rubbed his face, then looked at the ceiling. “I see the difference when you’re here and when you’re not, Serrano. It isn’t just that you love the spotlight. It’s that the spotlight loves you back. Gene’s an asshole to you because he thinks you just see us as stepping stones, that you figure you’re going to get bigger without us than with us.”

A little wave of vertigo hit her. Oh, you can’t imagine how big I’ll get, but you’re way too fragile to use as stepping stones. You’ll just pop like bubble wrap under my paw. She bit back a horrified giggle.

“You think that’s funny?” Carl narrowed his eyes.

“No. Never mind.” She put her hands on her hips. “Look. I’m not gonna make promises about the future that might be lies. Right now, though, we need each other, and you know it. So pull the cactus out of your ass. The Iron Spikes go farther with me than without me.”

Carl stared at her, scowling, then turned away. “We’ll see how the new album does,” he muttered.

He meant the new album they’d just finished recording mostly without her; it was going to be billed as just “The Iron Spikes” again, with three of the ten tracks listed as “featuring Serrano.”

“Yeah, I guess we will.” She sighed. “I don’t wanna do this opening set bullshit tonight, I just want to do a show with you. If it’ll smooth things over with Gene, let him pick the playlist.”

“Fine.” The serval turned and headed back to the stage.

Serrano clenched her fists, then pulled out her phone, checking the time. The set started in about eighty minutes. Hopefully, someone would tell her what she was going to play. Or just sing, the way that had gone. She was a better keyboard player than Carl, and he did not like letting her show that off on stage. Jake didn’t seem to care that she was a decent drummer, too. He’d have shared the limelight. But he didn’t call the shots.

She left the green room, slamming the door pointedly on the way out.

Gene’s playlist had Serrano on only backing vocals or just offstage on ten of the fourteen songs, and as expected, she didn’t get to play any instrument. It still went over with the crowd exactly like she knew it would: they were thrilled she was a “surprise guest,” and went wild for the songs she took lead on. Gene didn’t say anything about that after the show, but he saw it as plainly as she did. In fact, he did have them close with “Heal It Up,” as clear an admission of Serrano being the star as he’d ever make. His ears still went back when she had the audience sing along with her, holding the mike out toward them and forcing the band into an extended vamp—something Jake and Carl picked up on immediately, but Gene almost flubbed. Fuck him. It wasn’t her fault he had no sense of showmanship.

Twenty minutes after they’d left the stage, the crowd had thinned out, but she still got applause, yells, and whistles as she made her way through the bar area. Tommy was pouring her scotch and soda as she walked up. “Great set, kid.” The portly, eternally disheveled squirrel couldn’t have even been forty yet, but he called everyone “kid.”

“Thanks.”

“Didn’t know you were playing with the boys, but you stole the show.”

She sipped her drink and grunted. “Don’t tell Gene that.”

A soft voice to her left murmured, “He’s right, though.”

“Thanks, but—” Serrano turned and stopped, brows lifting.

The other speaker was another coyote woman, a few inches taller, built like a willow and dressed like a goth fashion model: black skirt and tightly laced vest over a billowy white blouse, high open-toed boots, fingerless gloves. “There’s no ‘but.’ You’ve always been good, but on that last number you were a powerhouse.”

“What are you doing here?”

Chiltepin set her glass down, something pale-colored in a martini glass that didn’t smell like a martini. “If you mean why am I in Mensura, I’m here with what I have of the new band for a couple of months to do some songwriting and hopefully lay down some test tracks over at Marvinsound, because it’s one of the best studios in the country.” She crossed her arms. “Also, this makes it harder for you to say ‘no’ when I ask you to join us, because you’ll have to say it to my face and you’re not good at confrontation.”

“I’ve been practicing.”

Her cousin laughed. “Come on, Serrano. You don’t mesh with that group. And they’re keeping you at arm’s length. I can see it in the way you all play.”

“They’re not my band. We do our own gigs without each other. It keeps us from being locked in. Like I would be if I joined the Layotl Five or whatever the hell you’re trying to put together.” Technically, she wasn’t lying, but she’d only done maybe ten gigs total without the Spikes. And six of those had been with Jake.

“It would be our band, Serrano.” Chiltepin waved toward the stage. Carl was still there, squinting suspiciously at the two coyotes. She gave him a cheerful wave, lowering her voice to a murmur. “You’re out of the Spikes’ league, and you know it. They know it, too, don’t they?”

“And you’re offering to graciously lift me up to your level? Awesome.”

Chiltepin sighed, finishing her drink. Then she turned back to Serrano. “Do you know who Franklin Woods is?”

“The bass guitarist for the Alphas?”

“Yes.”

“Come on, that’s not a trick question. They had like six triple-platinum albums. State Street still makes lists of the best rock albums of all time.”

“Almost as if who you surround yourself with matters.” Chiltepin stood up and rested a hand on Serrano’s shoulder before walking away. “I’ll be in town for a couple of months. You have my number.”

• • •

Note: “Heal it Up” is a real song by the 80s/90s alternative rock band Concrete Blonde. Serrano’s singing voice is basically that of Johnette Napolitano, their lead singer.