Tommy Bedlam Part III: Coffee, It'll cure what ails you.

The walk to the Shop was agonizingly uneventful. I wanted to lash out at something, anything. I wanted to beat someone with my cane until it was merely a collection of bloodied splinters and lacquer, but I couldn't decide who. Gina, for being such a slut? Spider for being, well, Spider? Myself, for being so blind? No. No.....Maybe. The streets of Pine Lake were devoid of traffic, both the wheeled and bipedal varieties, so my darker urges remained unsated. I did run across a stray mongrel, looking half Chow and half Rastafarian. It's coat hung in matted dreadlocks with twigs, burrs and bits of God only knows what clinging to them like sailors amid wreckage.

I guess you're hoping I'll tell you a lurid tale of how I took out my aggressions and frustrations on that poor mutt, pummeling it with my walking stick and kicking it in the head and ribs when I was done. Sorry to disappoint you. I could never bring myself to hit a dog. Besides, that particular specimen of urban decay looked a lot more badass than I felt just then. I left that bastard love child of Simba the Lion and Bob Marley to its business of rooting through trashcans, and continued on to the Shop without further hindrance.

The Shop. What can I say about the place that will really do it justice? It's a late night refuge for freaks of all stripes trying to escape the monotony of small town life, if only for an hour or so. Behind its unassuming brick facade lay a monster waiting for the unwary to enter. A sprawling thing of stainless steel and expanded metal, it's roar is an eclectic mix of music collected by its resident staff of eccentrics. As far as I'm concerned, it's the only real civilization to be found within fifty miles.

The Dead Kennedys Blared over the speakers in greeting to me as I entered. The girl behind the counter, barely sixteen if I didn't miss my guess, smiled and handed me my usual caffeinated brew without having to say a word. I handed her a wad of bills without even really looking at them. After she handed me my change, I stuffed the remaining bills back in my pocket with their brothers and let the change slide of its own volition into the tip jar, producing that lovely musical chaos of glass on metal. After preparing my drink with the usual cream, sugar, and other exotic substances needed to keep the beverage from actually tasting like coffee, I found a dark corner in the back suitable for a good sulk. I'm not sure how long I sat there. I must have been spaced out for a while, though. I think it was the music that spurred my awareness on to claw its way up the steep ascent to the summit of that mountain called Consciousness. Maybe it was because I noticed that I had been drinking tepid nasty coffee for probably half an hour. I'll never know.

Whatever the cause, I roused myself from deepest, darkest reverie and was greeted by the uniquely familiar sounds of a band setting up. Friday! I'd almost forgotten, or tried to forget. It all depends on how one judges these things. The Shop has been the only place for local acts to get gigs since the doors first opened over three years ago. There was always someone playing live every Friday and Saturday night. I'd been avoiding the place like it carried the plague every weekend since coming home from the hospital.

I fled the first twinge of bitterness as I watched their guitarist tune up. My fingers ached to dance across the strings just one more time, damn all else. It seems there are some addictions greater than drugs. I debated getting up and leaving, right then and there. I stood my ground though. Given a choice between which personal devil to face this evening, I chose this one. At least it didn't require me to walk anywhere. I settled back into my seat, realizing as I did that I'd been standing up in preparation to bolt. One can only run away so much or so far before on has to turn and fight. I sat back down preparing myself as I did for a distinctly unpleasant evening. The gods rarely feel the need to disappoint.

A familiar face turned the corner, features framed in blonde barbed wire. It seemed oddly appropriate in a place decorated with the leavings of an ironworks. I thought for a moment that Officer Karen Daniels had tracked me here for some reason. The moment fled, however, and I saw that dazed, deadeyed stare in her eyes. I'd become intimately familiar with it while staring out from the inside of my face over the last few hours. She past me by, unheeding of anything except putting her right foot in front of her left. She settled into an attitude similar my own, but in the opposite corner of the establishment. Instead of nursing her coffee as I had done, she downed it in a gulp. I hoped that drink was iced and cringed sympathetically, just in case it wasn't

The band began their first set, so I pushed everything else out of mind and just tried to enjoy the music. It turned out to be a three piece folk act, and damned good despite that fact. It was easy for me to slip into that place of healing music opened for me. I wondered why I'd been avoiding this. By the time they'd finished their first song I felt somewhat renewed of spirit. Something intangible given and something taken away. I'd like to think I'm a better man for experiencing that moment. I'm too cynical to really believe it, though. Whatever, I think the music was just what I needed.

Their set wound down and I felt a shiver fun hurdles down my vertebrae. The image of eyes crept into the back of my head and crouched, catlike, waiting to spring. I forced myself to turn with slow deliberation and doing so, locked eyes with my watcher, Karen. So she finally had noticed me after all. While I spent crucial seconds deciding what tack to take, she took any decision I might have made out of my hands by coming over and sitting down across from me.

Karen stared at me for a moment, seeming to gather courage before trying to speak. Whatever was bothering her must be big. She came to me, one of her cases in the Department, to vent about it. I chose to wait her out. She'd tell me eventually.

"So Tommy, " She said innocently enough, "Don't you play in a band too?"

I winced as if struck. I'm sure she must have noticed.

"No." I said blankly, "not any more."

This was definitely not a subject I wanted to dwell upon.

"Oh. I'm sorry," she started to apologize. I cut her off with a motion of my hand.

"No," I began, "You don't know what sorry is."

"Sorry is looking at the wall where your father's guitar hands, gathering dust, knowing that you'll never be able to play it again."

"Sorry is waking up in a hospital bed with doctors telling you that your brain was so damaged by oxygen deprivation that you'll be lucky to learn how to walk again.

"Sorry is seeing your dreams collapse right in front of you, and knowing, without any shadow of a doubt that it was all your fault. Before you ever tell me your sorry again, you'd better damned well know what sorry is."

Wow. I didn't know I had that in me. Karen just sat stunned, unable even, to stammer a reply. Eventually I heard something come out of her mouth. Even then, it was a dead whisper.

"I never knew" She said, repeating herself a couple of times. "I never knew."

"Tommy," Karen began again, a new resolve in her voice, "I have a question to ask."

So this was it, her true reason for being here tonight. I let my bitterness slide back to its dark little nest and said a single word in reply.

"Shoot."

This time it was her turn to wince, and mine to notice and wonder.

"I just want to know...What....What would you do if you caught your girlfriend cheating on you?"

Click. Click. Click. The pieces all fell into place. What the hell, Let's see where this goes.

"Well, " I started, a wry grin upon my face, "I ran across town like a maniac, with no real idea where I was going. Once I realized there was only one place I could go, I hobbled here and got a cup of coffee, stopping along the way to molest the ugliest dog I've ever laid eyes on. What's your story?"

"Are you serious?" She asked.
"Yes, " I said, "Well, I make up the part about the dog. He was pretty mean looking. I didn't really want to mess with him."

She leaned across the table and hugged me, kissing my cheek as she broke the embrace.

"I'm sorry Tommy. And this time I do know what it means."

"I can tell, " came my reply, " So, out with it. What happened."

She didn't get a chance to tell me though.

"Tommy! You worthless piece of shit! I knew I'd find you here. And who's this bitch you're with? Goddamit, I just knew you'd been sleeping around on me."

It was Gina, her voice set somewhere between "Yeti" and "Fingernails on a Blackboard." She was here. She was pissed. She had murder in her eyes. This would not end well.