After our set, I spread Paper Fire’s albums and T-shirts out on a sticky black table by the bar. Lucius presided over our merch from the back of the booth, the red-and-white beer light glowing off his white football jersey. He sipped a brown-bottled beer, actively ignoring me while I stood by the table. It was a good show, but he was clearly unhappy with the evening’s demographics. A hundred people had watched us play, gawking, nodding their heads or bouncing on their toes, and they were all white, an ocean of moons spreading back through the small club.
A dozen boys crowded around the booth, bought a record or a shirt, clapped my sweaty shoulder, and said, “Nice show.”
“Nice show” is a greeting and a compliment among the punks. You can only respond with a thanks or a self-deprecating, “But we (broke a string/messed up a bunch/played better last night),” because acting like you know you rock is to imply that you’re above the audience, and that’s not punk.
But it also means nothing. You could improvise an hour of free jazz country covers and everyone would still say, “Nice show.”
I felt guilty for thinking something that snotty, and for looking down on these kids for having a good time, and even for deciding that something that saved my ass as a teenager wasn’t good enough now that I was old enough to buy beer.
By the time the record-buying crowd dispersed, Mason and Russell had moved all of our equipment offstage to the corner by the back door. After the last band, we’d form an assembly line and load the van, lingering by its open doors and chatting with the locals to see if there was a party.
I picked up the beer I’d been nervously sipping and sat by Lucius.
“Been a minute,” I murmured, under the heavy metal that was pumping on the house system.
“Whose fault is that?” he asked.
I sipped again, still nervous.
“I see you takin’ some steps,” he continued. “But the records you play at home don’t count for much. If you go out and you’re the blackest one there,” he gestured around the room, “it ain’t black.”
I sighed and nodded in agreement.
“And, it’s the new millennium.” He clapped on the last two words. “Why’re you playing records, anyway? Ain’t you got CDs?”
“I like records!” I said, waving my hand over the Paper Fire records. “They’re cheap. And cool.”
A punk kid walking past gave me a sarcastic thumbs-up.
Lucius rolled his eyes. “Look, being black is bigger than whether or not you play old-school soul at home or scream music for a bunch of teenagers at the club. You know your Black Card’s set to expire. You ain’t done much to keep it.”
Heavy metal growled. I sighed.
“So, what do I do?” I asked, holding my head in my hand. “Head to M.L.K. Boulevard and ask the first brotha I see if I can kick it?”
“No, man. No.” He drummed his fingers on the table. “You gotta know you’re black. Then the rest will fall into place. Every time I see you in a group of white folks, it looks like you’re running from being black.” He scissored his elbows like he was running. “It’s time to stop, or it’s gonna let you get away.”
Since Lucius gave me the Black Card, I’d figured it was settled: I was black. I shook my head, starting to get worked up.
Mona would quiet this static in my head. This was my first time out of town since I’d started crushing on her, and I kept scanning the room for that soft baby-blue T-shirt she wears, willing her to appear with that Tupperware of salad she’d always bring to our shifts. Instead, I saw a room full of punks, mainly male, all white. I slugged my beer and wiped the condensation from my hand on the thigh of my damp jeans.
I pulled my phone out of the little shoulder bag I’d carried into the show.
Mona 7:43 pm
Tips were ok. How was your concert?
It’s called a show and I loved that she didn’t know that.
9:45 pm
Pretty good. Think we’re going to a party next.
Thanks for covering my shift.
JJ, the bassist for Kill All Their Infernal Soldiers, the local band whose name was longer than their songs, walked up. He skipped the southern summer punk uniform of limbless black tees and work pants in favor of a dirtbag raver look, featuring a scraggly goatee, faded baggy jeans, and a visor from a fast-food pizza place. We’d snuck a couple beers in his hatchback during the nine-piece high school ska band who’d opened the show, and he’d told me about his funk side project. The fact that he stood out, even in a goofy way, made me like him and even wonder if his funk friends weren’t white. Sometimes I get jealous of white dudes with black friends because, hey, if they can pull it off, why can’t I?
“Nice show, by the way,” he said.
“Thanks.”
“So, I think y’all are staying at my place tonight,” he said.
“Cool, thank you.”
I immediately started guessing what his spot was like. It’s a reflex after going on a couple of tours. You look at your host’s grooming and guess how dirty their floor will be. If they’re smoking, you assume they do it inside and that your sleeping bag will stink the next day. If they say they’re having a party, you hope they live in a big house so you can get loaded fast then sneak upstairs to sleep. He wasn’t smoking and he had a quiet air of having his act together, but I couldn’t get a read on him.
“Well, not my place.” He shrugged. “I live with my dad.”
“Oh, cool.”
Parents’ houses meant clean and quiet, extra beds and blankets, and an adult who might cook cheese eggs in the morning.
“Well, not really cool,” he said.