Сара Пинскер: A Song for a New Day

What would Gemma say? I channeled her to mutter, “If and when the hotel bills us for damages, it’s coming out of your salaries. You shouldn’t need a babysitter when I leave you alone for one single day. I’m supposed to be the artist here. If anybody is entitled to pull shit, it’s me. You’re supposed to be the professionals, dammit.”

Neither of them responded, if they even heard. That was as far as I needed to take playing grown-up. It was the label’s fault they hadn’t sent a new tour manager, and the label’s fault the band got stuck at a suburban hotel all day while I left with the van to do promotional work solo. My jealousy that they kept bonding and I kept getting left out was best tamped down.

I took their tequila with me and went next door. April lay on the far bed, her back to me, though I had a feeling she was pretending to sleep. The bed looked tempting, but my face broke out if I didn’t scrub off my makeup, and I reeked of the podcaster’s unfiltered cigarettes. I kicked my smoky clothes to the corner and stepped into the shower. Closed my eyes and let the water hit me. Shampooed my hair, eyes still closed.

I didn’t immediately recognize the next sound. Like a school bell, except it kept on signaling. My hazy brain took more than a few seconds to declare it a fire alarm.

“Shit,” April said, loud enough for me to hear over the shower. “What is that?”

I shut off the water and regretfully pulled my smoky clothes back onto my wet self. Ditched the underwear, stuffed the bra under my arm. Shoved my feet into my boots, sans socks. “Fire alarm. Though if those yahoos in the next room turn out to be the cause, we’re leaving them here and moving on as a duo.”

My backpack still lay at the foot of the bed. Wallet, phone, van keys, laptop, tour bible were all in there. I dropped the smoky bra into it, then slung backpack and guitar bag over my right shoulder. If we were talking real fire, those were the possessions I meant to keep.

April trailed me down the hallway, where a flashing light joined the clanging bell. We ran into the guys in the stairwell. JD was naked except for his boxer shorts, gig bag, and tattoos. Hewitt wore the hotel bathrobe, covered in paint; he hadn’t grabbed his guitars. One look told me neither of them had pulled the alarm. Other people joined us on the stairs, hurried but not panicked. They gave the guys a wide berth.

The stairs spilled us out into a side parking lot. A crowd already milled on the asphalt, watching the building. A few people sat in their cars, a better idea. A gust of cold wind hit me as I hit the pavement, plastering my wet clothes to my body.

“Get in the van,” JD said. “Can’t let our singer get sick running around with soapy hair.”

“Says the bassist in boxers.”

He shrugged, though goose bumps had risen on his arms and legs.

He, April, and I walked past the crowd to where I had parked the van in the brightest spot available when I got back an hour ago—had it only been an hour ago? I fumbled for the keys in my bag, and we piled in.

“Where’d Hewitt go?” I asked, turning on the van and cranking the heat. My suitcase was still in the room, along with any warm clothes I had with me.

“He hung back to figure out what was going on,” JD said.

“So it wasn’t you guys?”

“Ha-ha. You think we’d pull a stunt like that?”

“You do remember that an hour ago you were showing me a DIY hotel paint job, right?”

“That’s different. It didn’t hurt anybody. I’d never.”

I could have pointed out they’d cause problems for whoever was responsible for cleaning their room after we checked out, or that they might hurt my relationship with the label. But I knew what he meant. Leave these guys too long and they’d get into some stupid human tricks, but they wouldn’t have risked panicking sleeping kids. They wouldn’t have wanted somebody tripping and falling down the stairs because of a prank. I was pretty sure. I’d only been playing with them for eight months now, but I thought I knew them at least that well.

The back door slid open and Hewitt climbed into the third row. “It’s not a fire. Bomb threat.”

JD frowned. “Maybe we should get out of here.”

“We can’t go,” I said, giving him a look. “Most of our stuff is still upstairs. Besides, if it’s a bomb threat, it’ll look bad for us to leave, considering everyone in that stairwell was already giving you guys the side-eye.”

JD wasn’t calmed. “Shouldn’t they be moving people farther from the building if they think there’s a bomb? Or going through it with robots or dogs or something?”

Hewitt nodded. “They’re waiting for a bomb team.”

“Are bomb-sniffing dogs a thing?” April asked. “I thought they were just for drugs.”

“There are definitely bomb-sniffing dogs,” said JD. “Also bomb-sniffing bees and bomb-sniffing rats, but I think those are used in combat zones, not hotels.”

A thought nagged at me. “Wait. Where are the fire trucks? Or the police? I thought I heard sirens, but they aren’t here.”

Hewitt shrugged. “Busy night, I guess.”

We watched for a while. I guessed the people still standing in the parking lot hadn’t thought to bring their keys out. A few parents juggled children from hip to hip. I leaned my head against the window and closed my eyes. The others did the same, except JD. He sat tapping a foot against the frame, hard enough to make the whole van shake.

“Will you stop?” April tossed an empty soda can at him. “Try to get some sleep.”

That wasn’t going to happen. I nudged him. “Grab your bass.”

He cocked an eyebrow at me. “What?”

“Your bass. Come on.”

I climbed into the backseat and returned a moment later with my little practice amp, the one I’d bought with babysitting money when I was fifteen, along with my crappy first guitar. It wasn’t the best-sounding amp, but it would do for my purpose. About fifty cold, scared-looking people still stood in the parking lot, the ones who hadn’t grabbed their keys or their wallets, who couldn’t escape to their cars. If they were stuck, the least we could do was distract them for a little while.

JD found an outlet on the cement island by the parking lot’s gate, and we both jacked our guitars. A couple of people reoriented themselves to watch us instead of the hotel.

“What are we playing?” JD asked.

“You pick,” I said. “Something cheerful. Something that’ll work even if they can’t hear the vocals. ‘Almost Home,’ maybe?”

He didn’t answer, but instead started playing the opening bass line. I followed with my guitar part, and then started to sing as loud as I could without straining my voice. I hadn’t noticed April following us, but when the second verse started, a scratchy beat locked in with JD, and I glanced behind me to see she was playing a pizza box.

The parents brought their kids over—I imagined them grateful for any diversion at that point—and then others followed. The hotel must have appreciated the distraction, too, since they didn’t stop us. The police might have taken issue with a two a.m. concert, but they still hadn’t arrived.

We had the crowd now. When we played “Blood and Diamonds,” a teenager said, “Mom! They’re from SuperStream! They’re famous!” My surge of pride accompanying that statement had gotten more familiar, but I still wasn’t used to it. I’d never expected anyone to know my songs.

Hewitt had discarded the bathrobe somewhere. I made a mental note to make sure he found it again so we didn’t get stuck paying, then remembered it was covered in paint, so we probably owned it now in any case. He danced in front of us wearing a kilt and a band sweatshirt. At least that way the crowd knew who was playing for them. If I were a better shill—if I didn’t feel self-conscious doing it—I would have told them about our show the next night at the Peach.