It was only then that he realized the little party in the parking lot had been thrown in his honor.
“Why?” he asked.
“Well,” Arizona said quietly, “no one could find you…”
“For, like, hours, man!” Roscoe added.
“Looks like everything’s OK, Officers. Thanks so much,” Bobby Lee said to the highway patrolmen. “He’s back, safe and sound.”
“We have to complete our Lost Child Report,” one of the cops replied. “Young man, I’m Officer Densmore and this is Officer Bernal. We need to ask you a few questions if you don’t mind.”
But suddenly Oats did mind.
“Hey, I just went out for a walk. I was never lost.”
The cops didn’t buy it, apparently feeling that due diligence was required to make sure no children were being kidnapped by a bunch of child-molesting bluegrass musicians.
Bobby Lee said, “Oats, please cooperate with the officers,” before dispensing one final hug and suggesting to the rest of the band that they go practice or something. There were high-fives all around and the group dispersed, leaving Oats, Bobby Lee, and Arizona standing there with the cops.
It took some doing, but they finally convinced Officer Densmore and Officer Bernal that everything was OK. Bobby Lee helped convince them that Oats wasn’t being kidnapped by showing them a program from one of the festivals with a photo of the band. Then Oats had to explain walking farther down the road than he’d meant to and getting a ride back on Melody’s bus. The officers were full of questions: where and with whom did he live, how did he end up on Bobby Lee’s tour, how did he know Arizona, on and on and on.
They asked why he had taken off without telling anyone, and for what seemed like the fifteenth time, he said he just felt like taking a walk. He glanced up at Arizona and she looked relieved. She smiled and winked over the cop’s shoulder. Oats thought he might just melt right there into the pavement. Finally, the officers left.
Bobby Lee motioned him over to a bench just outside the restaurant to have the inevitable serious talk.
“You know, Oats,” he said after clearing his throat a few times, “we were really worried about you.”
“I’m sorry, I really just went for a walk. I guess I lost track of the time.”
“OK, but you know…I promised your folks I’d look after you, dude. You can’t go running off.”
“Yeah, I know. But you could trust me a little bit, too. How long was I gone, a couple of hours? You could have called my cell phone if you were worried.”
“It was a lot more than a couple of hours, and we tried to call, but Bus Driver Dave heard your phone ringing in his own damn back pocket.”
“Oops.”
“Oops is right.”
“Hey look, I just needed a little space is all. I promise it won’t happen again.”
“OK.”
“So, we’re cool?”
“Yeah,” Bobby Lee said quietly, “you and I are cool. There’s just one thing, though.”
“What?”
“Well, I guess we all kind of panicked a little bit.”
“You didn’t call Pete, did you?” Oats was horrified to think that they might have bothered Pete in his hospital room while he was trying to recover from a stroke.
“No, but we did call…” And he didn’t even have to finish his sentence, because right then a cherry-red minivan came screeching into the parking lot—a minivan that contained Oats’ mom, his best friend Eddie, and the world’s most annoying human, Hank Wilson Pixlie-Carson.
If a thirteen-year-old blues harp player takes a hike and loses track of the time for five hours, then gets a ride with thirty-seven teenaged Christian musicians and two chaperones, at fifty-five miles an hour for eight miles, in the middle of cow-dung country, while his mom thinks he’s been kidnapped or worse, how much trouble can he get into? There’s a story problem for you.
Bobby Lee and Otis Ray Pixlie had some explaining to do.
*
Arizona watched the pretty, red-haired woman slam the door of her car with a sudden sense of recognition. Now she knew why Oats looked so familiar. Grayson Lathrop’s company had negotiated with Sarah Jean Pixlie for some song-usage rights back when they thought
Fang!
would be filmed in a rural location with a country-western bar as one of the sets. Sarah Jean had originally made a name for herself with a song in a movie soundtrack, and she had a reputation for being easy to work with—as well as not demanding top dollar. Arizona had been asked to find out everything she could about the singer, and remembered Sarah Jean and her good-looking drummer husband from a couple of hours of intense Internet research. This had taken place during Arizona’s first month on the job; but now she remembered finding photos of Sarah Jean and her family on Google and having a lively phone conversation with her about the possibility of working together on the soundtrack.
They’d ended up going in another direction on the music and Sarah Jean had been gracious and understanding about the whole event. Arizona had forgotten the encounter almost immediately, caught up in the movie-studio fast lane. She could only hope that Sarah Jean had forgotten, too. The last thing she needed right now was to have her cover blown, either with Bobby Lee Crenshaw’s band or with Mr. K.
“Oh my God, you’re OK!” Sarah Jean rushed over to Oats and began to smother him with hugs and kisses. Hank Wilson nudged Eddie in the side, as Oats’ face turned deep scarlet. Sarah Jean pulled her older son against her and turned her full attention to Bobby Lee.
“How could you have let this happen?”
“Um, well…”
“I can’t believe you could be so careless! I should have known I couldn’t trust you for five seconds.”
“Sarah Jean, I…”
“Oats, get your stuff. We’re going to the hospital to see Pete, then we’re going home. By the way, where is Pete? What hospital? Unless of course you’ve forgotten him, too! I wouldn’t be surprised.”
“Sarah Jean…”
“Never mind. I won’t bother you to come up with that information. You’re too busy hiring assholes and losing people’s kids. Eddie, here’s my cell phone. Call information and write down the names of all the hospitals and clinics within thirty miles of here. Don’t forget to get directions. I said now.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And you!” She turned to Hank Wilson. “Go help your brother pack. I want him ready to leave in ten minutes.”
“But Mom, I’m hungry.”
“Hey,” said Arizona. “Where are our manners?” She stuck her hand out to shake Sarah Jean’s. “I’m Ari Rosenblatt. I work over there in the gift shop at Murphy’s and Oats has been helping me out stocking shelves and whatnot. You must be his mother.”
Arizona hoped that the introduction might distract Sarah Jean from any memory of their former conversations. She needn’t have worried. Sarah Jean was so enraged over the band’s treatment of her son that she wasn’t likely to remember anything else.
“Yup,” Bobby Lee said. “Miss Arizona has really taken a liking to Oats. They’ve been spending a fair amount of time together.”
“I’m Sarah Jean Pixlie, and I hope you’ll forgive my bad manners, but I am royally pissed at these morons.” She shook Arizona’s hand awkwardly. “At least you made an effort to look out for Oats, unlike some lame-ass people. I suppose I should be grateful.”
“No need for name-calling, Mom,” Otis Ray piped up. “There have been some extraneous circumstances.”
“You mean extenuating,” said Eddie.
“Whatever, and anyway I’m hungry too.”
“Hey,” Bobby Lee said, “the least I can do is take everyone to dinner, my treat. We can figure out a plan after y’all have eaten. What do you say?”
“Please, Mom?” Hank Wilson begged. “Please?”
Sarah Jean looked around at her two boys, at their friend, at the lovely young woman who was trying so hard to be helpful. The only person she couldn’t quite manage to look at was Bobby Lee Crenshaw, because she was afraid of his beautiful pleading eyes, afraid that she’d soften. So she looked down at her boots instead and thought things over for a minute. It had been a bad scare, but Oats was safe after all. Who would it hurt to stay for dinner?
“OK,” she said softly. “Dinner it is. Then we’ll go see Pete and hit the road.”
Bobby Lee grinned. “Who needs a place to wash up first? My room’s right over there.”
“The restrooms in Murphy’s will do just fine,” Sarah Jean said stiffly, pointing in the direction of the restaurant.
“All right, y’all, come on then.” And Bobby Lee opened the door to the restaurant with a flourish, motioning to everyone to step inside. The boys went first, then Sarah Jean. Arizona saw Bobby Lee touch Sarah Jean’s shoulder as she walked past, and she stiffened as she turned and glared at him, then stalked off toward the restrooms. He looked after her for a moment with moist, sad eyes—or was Arizona only imagining the tears? Either way, Bobby Lee looked at Sarah Jean the way she, Arizona, looked at Bobby Lee—and the way Oats looked at her. One thing was clear as could be. There was a lot more going on here than anyone was saying, a lot more than met the eye.
*
“Woof! Woof!” Arizona’s thoughts were interrupted by her barking phone.
“Kira, hey, what’s up? How’s the new business going?”
“Oh, great. Meryl already placed an order for six outfits. But I need your help.” Kira sighed. “I am just having the hardest time here.”
“You couldn’t find the blouse, huh?”
“No. I need you to come home and take me shopping.”
“You know I can’t do that right now, Kira. Come on, there must be something else you can find to wear. Don’t you have any other pretty-colored drugs around?”
“Well, there are these little black capsules.”
“Perfect. Everyone loves a little black dress, right? And you can accessorize like crazy.”
“I guess. Listen, Ari? I was thinking of getting away for a few days. If you want, we could go to Rancho La Puerta or someplace, my treat. What do you think?”
“It sounds lovely but I’m going to be slammed with catch-up when I get back to town. Why don’t you go anyway? The change might do you good.”
“Maybe I will. Or a road trip might be nice. I was thinking I haven’t been to see my family in a while.”
“That sounds great, Kira. Listen, I have to go. Keep me posted.”
“What, and Quit Showbiz?”
14
“So then the drum set blew entirely off the stage and we had to leave. Remember that?” Oats said, encouraging Bobby Lee to add his two cents to the story, desperately trying anything he could to make his mother change her mind about dragging him back home; he thought some funny gig stories with an enhanced sense of camaraderie might do the trick.
“What I remember most about that day was Oats kicking ass on ‘Orange Blossom Special,’” Bobby Lee said thoughtfully. “There’d been some serious wood-shedding going on there. The crowd went wild.”
“That was right before Jeremy’s steel guitar almost blew off the back of the flatbed truck,” Oats giggled. “I’ve never seen wind like that ever in my life.”
“Sounds like a blast,” Sarah Jean said sarcastically. The pun seemed to go over everyone’s head except Eddie’s. He chuckled to himself, then quickly put a lid on it as he realized that Oats’ stories had not yet managed to lift the somber mood around the table.
“Then there was the time we found Dickie in his bunk with a girl…” He saw Bobby Lee’s warning eyes a moment too late.
“…a girl kitten, yeah, a cute little kitty,” Oats finished lamely. “Me and Melody found a whole litter of baby kittens out behind a Best Western in the bushes.”
“Who’s Melody?” asked Hank Wilson.
“Oh, just this girl I know. She’s a baton twirler in a Christian marching band. In fact, they’re the ones who gave me a ride back here from my walk earlier today—the Angels of the Lamb Drum and Bugle Corps. Melody is only in middle school but she gets to march with the high-school-aged group because she’s really good at twirling. She can do this routine with two flaming batons at one time. It’s pretty awesome.”
“How did you meet someone in a Christian marching band?” Sarah Jean asked, just as Eddie said, “Is she hot?”
“They’re on the same circuit we are, only in the children’s area…and yeah, she’s sort of hot but really, really Christian, too.”
“I hope you’re being respectful of other people’s beliefs and traditions,” Sarah Jean said.
“Don’t worry. You should have seen me not kicking any ass at all on ‘Onward Christian Soldiers’ on their bus this afternoon. Does anyone else there think that’s a really lame song, though? Really?”
“I’ve always preferred the peaceful hymns myself,” Bobby Lee said, “like ‘Down by the Riverside.’”
“I love that one,” Sarah Jean replied.
“Me too!” said Bobby Lee, as he looked right into her eyes for the first time since she’d shown up. “It’s right up there with ‘Waltz Across Texas.’”
“I don’t remember that being a gospel song,” Sarah Jean answered and she looked down, concentrating on tearing her bright green paper napkin into tiny little pieces. Everyone could tell that something had happened, but no one could figure out exactly what, so everyone sat staring at the menus. The awkwardness of the moment was saved at last by one of the Millies, who came over to take their order.
During dinner Sarah Jean asked a lot of questions about Pete, and Bobby Lee did his best to answer them, but he couldn’t come up with too much of the information she wanted, especially when she pulled a piece of paper out of her purse with a list of medical-type concerns written in Perle’s handwriting. It was clear she had been coached by a pro, and Bobby Lee looked increasingly uncomfortable as she kept battering him with stuff like “Did you ask the doctor if they did a computer tomography scan or magnetic resonance imaging?” and “Is he on Altaplase or Heparin?”
“I have an idea,” Arizona piped up as Helen cleared the plates away. She had been so quiet during dinner that Sarah Jean had forgotten she was there. She looked at her, kind of startled. “What’s that, honey?”
“How about paying Pete a visit?”
“That’s a great suggestion,” Bobby Lee exclaimed. “I’ve been promising Pete I’d bring Oats over to say hey. We can all fit, if we take two cars.”
“I’m game,” Eddie said.
“Me too!” Hank Wilson piped up.