4

The windows of her house were lit up as she glided into the garage next to her father’s car, Ruby The Hatchet blaring over her headphones. From inside, she could hear the rumbling of voices—her mom, her dad, and someone else, someone with a deeper register. A glance into the street confirmed her fear—the Hokeses’ hideous maroon SUV was parked across from their house. At least it wasn’t Edgar’s truck, traded in years ago. That would’ve been too on the nose.

She entered through the front door and was hit by a wall of hot air and the smell of stew coming from the kitchen. She hoped to get to her room before anyone else could see her, but no dice—Janelle Hokes emerged from the hall bathroom and nimbly intercepted her.

“Fiona,” declared Janelle, throwing her arms wide and yanking Fiona into a bear hug that made something in her back pop. Damn, the woman was strong.

“Hey, Janelle,” she said, doing her best to inch away. “How are you? How’s the store?”

“Ah, you know,” she said, “mismanaged by the idiot men in my life.” She held Fiona out at arm’s length and smiled at her. “Sweetheart, you are too pretty. We’ve got to find you a man. If only Calvin were right for you. We should get that boy a tattoo or something.”

Fiona did her best to laugh sweetly, but inside she shuddered. The Hokes twins, Calvin and William, were polar opposites—William was huge, loud, boorish, while Calvin was clean-cut, polite, boring. Each of them sucked in their own special way: Will was the guffawing jock, Cal the prudish square. At least she could blow off Will’s shallowness as pigheaded male posturing, but Cal stared at Fiona’s boobs like it was his job. If there was ever a living metaphor for the dark side beneath Hamm’s polite face, it was Cal Hokes, the nice guy with the creepy gaze.

There wasn’t a tattoo in the world cool enough to make Fiona like him.

“Fiona?” Her dad came into the front hall, a scowl on his face. “You’re late. You knew I was making stew tonight.”

Anger flared up in her, and she did her best to swallow it. She knew the visit to the winery sign was making her more emotional than she should be. But still, Robert Jones’s need for order, routine, and things to operate according to his standard always infuriated her. As a little girl, she’d seen him as strict; as a teenager, she realized how narrow-minded he was. Like not setting the table for stew was some symptom of moral degradation in her.

“I’ll be down in a minute,” she said. “I just need to change.”

“All right, but hurry up,” he said and cocked an eyebrow. “Wow, where’d you get that ratty sweatshirt? That design on the back is hideous.”

Thankfully, before Fiona could fire back at her dad, Janelle’s bossiness intervened. “Robert, stop it. Lord knows what we wore back then. Edgar had this pair of acid-washed jeans…” Fiona used the distraction to duck away and bolt upstairs, Betty on her mind.

Her room was full of slept-in blanket smells and had comforting shadows in every corner. The walls were papered with posters, stickers, flyers, and scotch-taped pinups from various magazines—Spin, Revolver, Juxtapoz, Decibel, Rue Morgue, and of course Guitar World. Memories of Horace from the previous night were scattered throughout—the tangle of blankets, a hair on her pillow, the faint sneaker smudge on her windowsill from where he’d climbed in after her parents had gone to bed.

But she had more important needs right now. The record sleeve and the trip to the winery sign had left her unsettled. She knelt down, reached under her bed, and pulled out an oblong, black leather box. It was beaten and flaking at the corners and peppered with band stickers—cool beyond any possible description.

Fiona unlatched the buckles on the side and opened the lid.

“Hey, Betty,” she said.

Betty stared up at her: black face, white pickguard, two DiMarzio humbuckers, rosewood fingerboard, pure mahogany, an ebony Gibson Les Paul Standard named after the grandmother Fiona had never met, a woman her father referred to as “that tough broad.”

Betty had been a stray, near death when Fiona had spotted her in the back of the thrift shop—only two strings left, one of her tuning knobs rusted beyond repair, her finish scratched and her paint coming off on the far end. Aunt Emily dutifully reminded her that they could buy three beginner’s guitars down at the Target for the asking price—a fact that Robert Jones had repeated when Fiona had come home carrying the leather case—but Fiona was insistent, and Emily had quieted Robert simply and sadly: “I think Jake would’ve liked this one.” Then she’d gotten teary, and Fiona’s dad had backed off.

It had taken time and effort, but Fiona had been patient. She’d spent every cent of babysitting, dog-walking, and gutter-cleaning money she’d ever made on nursing Betty back to health; while the rest of her friends saved up for down payments on their own cars, Fiona chose to ride a bike and instead dropped big bucks on new pickups and a real Marshall amp that had once been played by Pantera. And as Fiona gave her new life, Betty had responded by being Fiona’s emotional conduit through her many ups and downs—the first crush, the failed tests, the brief period where Fiona was obsessed with A Day to Remember for some reason. They’d grown up together and knew each other inside and out.

Carefully, Fiona lifted Betty out of her velvet bed and plugged her into her amp. She tuned her for a bit and then let her fingers walk up and down the scales. Once she had warmed Betty up, she closed her eyes and began strumming out chords, letting the sound fill the air and work its way into her body, heart, mind, and soul. With each note, the emotional clutter in her brain uncoiled like a pair of tangled earbuds in patient hands.

The Pit Viper was back. That meant something, and it frightened her. The events surrounding the DJ, from poor Jake and the council meeting all the way to Horace handing her the record, felt like a string of mystery that had been plucked nine years ago, the vibrations only reaching her today, like a radio broadcast in space.

The chords Fiona played turned darker, projecting storm clouds and doom in her mind. She felt her brow furrow as Betty tapped into her heart. Why now? This morning, she’d been in love with Hamm and Horace and her boring, dishonest, small- town life. Now even last night with Horace felt like a part of it, their first time together a stepping-stone toward something else. What did it mean? For her, her family, her town?

The final note, melancholy and discordant, hung in the air, and she let it fade into a soft whine of feedback that felt like a cold washcloth on her neck as it dissolved into the buzz of her amp.

Her eyes opened, and the sanctuary of her room, the bits of Horace’s presence strewn everywhere, greeted her like a reliable friend. Free of chaotic emotion, the world came to her with clarity. Downstairs, her mother’s laugh made its own sort of music, and the savory smell of stew seeped through the floorboards and into her nostrils. She was back in her head and ready to face life again.

“Thanks,” she told Betty. As usual, the guitar was silent as a sphinx, but Fiona couldn’t help but feel like the instrument gave her a nod. You’re welcome. Any time.

“Fiona!” came her father’s voice. “Dinner!”

“Coming!” Fiona placed Betty in her case, slid the box under her bed, and headed back out into everyone else’s world.

…

As always, her dad’s stew was great, served piping hot on top of a pile of buttery egg noodles, and after having burned off the day’s frustration with Betty, the conversation wasn’t as bad as she’d dreaded. Janelle Hokes was kind of a fun guest, loud and in your face. Edgar was a little unnerving to talk to, but that had been the case since long before Fiona had seen him put a boot to someone’s skull. Hokes was a huge man with a slab of a face whose sense of humor was buried deep inside him. Something about Fiona’s dad brought it out—over dinner, he chuckled and called Robert on his exaggerations—but when Fiona spoke, Edgar looked at her like he was humoring her by letting her talk.

Midway through dinner, Fiona’s phone buzzed in her pocket. Horace was texting her—doughnut tonight? She had to bite her lip to keep from grinning, but her joy must have been obvious, because her mother rapped a knuckle on the table near Fiona’s plate.

“No texting at dinner,” said Kim Jones, all short red hair and turtleneck.

“Sorry,” said Fiona.

“Oh, let her answer it, Kim,” said Janelle, taking a sip from glass of wine number seven (seven! Dear God, Fiona would be singing show tunes on the floor! How did the woman do it?). “It’s not her fault she’s so popular.”

“It’s rude,” said her mother calmly. “Besides, these kids spend too much of their lives on screens. They need a break from it.”

Janelle rolled her eyes. “Bunch of squares, Fiona. Don’t listen to them.”

“It’s all right,” replied Fiona, picking at a soft chunk of carrot and hoping that the conversation would end there.

No dice. “Who’s texting you?” asked her dad. “One of the girls? You should tell them to come over. How’s Rita, anyway?”

“It’s no one,” said Fiona.

Robert raised his eyebrows. “Is it that boy?”

“Robert, he has a name,” said her mother. “He’s been her boyfriend for a long time now.”

Robert squinted suspiciously. “Then he’s that patient boy.”

“Dad.”

“I know all about teens these days,” said Robert, shooting Edgar a wiseacre smile. “With their dubsteps and their random hookups! I read the Tumblrs! I’m hip to the major hashtags!”

“You are the lamest person I know,” said Fiona, shaking her head and rolling her eyes.

“The Palmada kid?” asked Edgar Hokes.

“That’s him,” said Kim. “Cesar and Helena Palmada’s boy, Horace. He and Fiona have been dating a while now. He’s very sweet.”

“Right, right,” said Edgar. “Calvin told me he and Fiona are very friendly. A shame his parents never sat in on a town council meeting, but I guess not everyone feels the need to participate.”

Fiona’s cheeks burned. Of course Calvin would have mentioned it. Of course he was reporting back to his dad, dreaming of his own role on the town council.

Her father seemed to sense Edgar’s weird tension and interjected. “Cesar and Helena’s restaurant has always done great stuff for the street-fair fundraisers, haven’t they?” Edgar shrugged, but Janelle and Kim nodded profusely, and Fiona mentally thanked them. “Good for them. Is he coming over later?”

She could tell by his tone that her dad was in a good mood (stew had a way of doing that to him), and for a moment she even considered inviting Horace over for yet another terse conversation with her father. But she didn’t want to subject him to Edgar Hokes, and besides, she needed to get out of this house ASAP.

“We’re going out to Chance’s later for a doughnut,” she said.

Robert smiled. “A Hamm institution,” he said. “Those doughnuts sure are good.”

Fiona couldn’t help but smile back. Sometimes, for a brief moment, her dad would say something like that, and she could forget who he really was.

Edgar said nothing but leveled a stare at Fiona that left her severely skeeved. Like Calvin, he also viewed her as an object to be manipulated, but it was obvious that his intentions were different from his son’s. It was the same way he’d stared at the Pit Viper, as though Fiona were a nuisance that might need to be dealt with at a moment’s notice.