Daron's Guitar Chronicles: Vol 4

284 WHERE IS MY MIND?

WHERE IS MY MIND?

No one said much of anything on that bus ride. Then again everyone was asleep for most of it. Everyone except me, anyway. I kept thinking things might get stressful and so I really ought to get as much rest as I could, and that just led to me worrying about not sleeping, and, well, not sleeping. So I rattled around alone in the back lounge for a couple of hours. I sat down and wrote a handful of crappy lyrics. None of them were going to make good songs, but maybe I could use the rhymes later.

I was just thinking about getting into my bunk and at least pretending I was sleeping when we pulled off the highway. It was about four in the morning, and I assumed this was just a pit stop. But the bus made a turn and went down a block, then another.

We pulled up outside something that looked to me like a government building, like the White House, or more likely an IRS office. I went forward to ask Marty what it was.

"Too early for coffee," he said when I stuck my head forward, just as he was parking the bus at the curb.

"Yeah, I guess. Is this the place?"

"This is the place." He turned off the main engine, but kept the generator running for the A/C. "Best get some shut eye."

For a second I thought he was giving me advice, then I realized he meant for himself. "Right. Good idea."

I climbed into my own bunk and shut the curtain. I surprised myself by actually falling asleep pretty quickly.

A couple of hours later I was woken by the sound of someone banging on the bus door. Carynne was first to get there. By the time I stuck my head out of my curtain, she was saying "All right, okay. When we pulled in there was no one to tell us. We didn't know. We'll move it right away."

Apparently we weren't supposed to park where we were parked. Marty was roused from his bottom-level cubby: I hadn't realized that was his bunk down there. It had a sliding door instead of a curtain and I'd thought it was a storage cabinet. We pulled around the building to a dock where I saw our equipment truck. Another truck was next to it, presumably Megaton's. No sign of their bus, though. I wondered if they had somewhere local to stay.

This time Marty looked at the bags under my eyes and said, "Coffee."

I just nodded at him and followed him out of the bus.

We hoofed it several blocks and it wasn't too stiflingly hot yet, only the high seventies. He led me to a big hotel, through the lobby, and into the hotel restaurant.

I had a plate of eggs with my coffee. Mediocre eggs, but I wasn't really there for gourmet food. Marty had coffee with his coffee. I paid in cash and when we were getting up he added in another dollar in tip for the waitress above what I'd left.

We really didn't talk, more like just made the occasional comment to each other. That suited me just fine and seemed to suit him as well.

Walking back to the venue, the heat had noticeably risen and the back of my shirt was soaked with sweat by the time I got back in the bus.

The next three hours were uneventful in that horrible way where I had nothing to do but was too restless to focus on doing something. It was too hot to want to walk around and explore the city, and I kept expecting they'd let us in to the building any minute.

It was noon when they let the crew in, and just when I was ready to investigate the building myself, Carynne reminded me a car was coming to take me and Ziggy to a radio station.

"Just us?" I asked. "Not all four?"

"Well, you can all go, but they only want to give two people microphones, so I told them it would be you two."