The building was maybe a century old or so, smallish, originally built of gray stone that had seen better days. A lot of the exterior was in disrepair. Inside, beyond the entrance vestibule, there was the big main room, along with a small office, a washroom, and a tiny renovated kitchen. Most of the original wooden pews had been removed, but there were still three rows of them at the back. Some of the walls were partly deconstructed. There was exposed wood everywhere, a high arched ceiling, and a big, gorgeous stained glass window, which, like the rest of the place, had been hastily repaired over the decades but still held a kind of timeless, awe-inspiringbeauty.
Where there would have been some sort of altar there was now just a large, low stage area blanketed with worn Persian rugs and lined with an intimidating wall of Marshall amps. Other music gear was strewn around, including several of my brother’s guitars and one of Dylan’s massivedrumkits.
Best of all, the church sat on a corner lot butted up against an auto wrecker’s lot and a stretch of farmland on the other side; no neighbors to complain about thenoise.
“It’s fantastic,” I told my brother as he gave me the tour. “How did yougetit?”
“Brody found it for us last summer,” he said. “Apparently it hasn’t been used as a church for about two decades. It’s a bit of a drive, but I like it. I just make sure I go off rush hour and use the time to clear my head, work on writing andstuff.”
“What happened to the other place?” The band’s old rehearsal space was a studio right in the middle of town, not far from my brother’shouse.
“Gave it to Katie,” he said with a grin. “She’s using it as her art studio. But we moved out here before that happened anyway. Wanted a bigger space.” Then he plugged in a black-on-black Fender Strat and let his fingers fly—and raw, twisted, gorgeous music roared out of the amps behind him like some pissed-off beast awakening from its beautysleep.
Holyhell.
My brother was a totalrockgod.
I plopped back on a stool to listen as warmth flooded my chest, like I’d just downed a shot of good whiskey. I had memories of Jesse rocking out when we were kids. He was good then; really good. He’d always been a gifted guitarist, but he was better now than he’deverbeen.
I could hear itrightaway.
I could hear how his playing style had developed over the years, matured… his sound mellowing out around the edges and growing more substantial in the middle, fattening up… and it wasn’t just the better, more expensive equipment. I didn’t even know how to describe it, exactly. All I knew for sure was that when my brother took a stage and started working a guitar, my hair blew back and even I could see why girls threw themselves at him, half-naked, at his shows. Jesse had matured along with his music, and my once-annoying but cute big brother had grown into a rather beautiful, force-to-be-reckoned-with typeofman.
I loved watchinghimplay.
I’d seen him in concert over the years, here or there, but I’d always been careful to stay away from his shows unless I was one hundred percent sure Brody wouldn’t be there. Which meant I missed out on many more shows than I ever attended. I’d also missed out on a lot of hang time with my brother, the time we might have spent together if I wasn’t always so nervous about running into Brody. But today, treated to a private show and a front row seat, watching him play while his wedding ring gleamed on his finger, I really got to see and hear the man and the musician my brother hadbecome.
There was also something fresh, new and alive in his playing, like I really hadn’t heard since we were kids, and I was pretty sure that had a lot to do with Katie. My brother was crazy in love; I could feel a kind of unbridled bliss dripping from his fingertips as he played. And I couldn’t stopsmiling.
“Shit, brother.” Jesse stopped playing as Zane walked in, a big grin on his face to match my own. “Is it okay that shit gave me aboner?”
“Since when do you care if anyone’s okay with your dick being up?” my brother said, throwing him a look. “And if it is, don’t sit next to mysister.”
Zane didn’t sit next to me. He sat in a pew, next to Maggie, who ignored him as she worked on her laptop. A short while later, when Zane joined Jesse and I onstage to jam and he promptly made the mic his bitch, belting out his sexy, angsty version of The Beatles’ “I’m a Loser,” Maggie put on coffee and settled in withamug.
Jude was there too, but he was in and out of the church, on his phone a lot. If he wasn’t directly working in his capacity as Dirty’s head of security—which probably kept him busy enough, what with managing a security team to cover the asses of four mega-famous rock stars—he was working something else. I was pretty sure when he was in town he did work of some kind for his brother’s motorcycle club. And maybe when he was out of town, too. I didn’t ask. I’d learned many years ago not to ask those kinds of questions. But I was used to having them all around—Jude, Piper, all the security. The constant entourage. And I loved that they all had my brother’s back. That he was so loved. Jude had been a permanent fixture in our lives since my brother met him at age ten, and Zane since a couple of yearsbeforethat.
This was my brother’s tribe.Mytribe.
I’d never realized how much that was true until I sat back in an old church and listened to Zane and Jesse jam on a bunch of old songs; just stuff they used to play together for fun in Dolly’s garage when we were kids, or around a fire as we grew up. CCR’s “Have You Ever Seen the Rain?,” The Box Tops’ “The Letter,” Van Morrison’s “Gloria.” I played along on my fancy new guitar, just keeping up wherever I could. Which wasn’t really happening, but I had funtrying.
Where I was more useful was adding my backup vocals to the mix—and generally fangirling over my brother and Zane. Because seriously. These two got together to make music, it was like clash of the Titans. Just sit your ass down, try to keep up, and try not to get slaughtered by falling debris. The two of them together had always had crazy, off-the-hook energy, and chemistry throughtheroof.
Not only were they an extraordinary musical match, but their lifelong rivalry added an edge to everything they did. They were constantly competing, as far as I knew, for everything under the sun—other than women, which was probably a really, really good thing, and the only reason they’d managed to keep it together as a band—their friendship riding that delicate, serrated edge between soulmate and nemesis. It was kind of a love-hate-lovething.
They loved eachother.
They hated eachother.
They loved eachothermore.
By late afternoon, we were all caught up in the music, playing original stuff for each other, bits of whatever we’d each been working on since we last jammed together, which in my case, was a hell of a long time ago. They played me the few songs they’d already written for the new album, which were pretty killer, though I was eager to hear them played again when the whole band was here. For my part, I really hadn’t been writing much these last few years, or at least I thought I hadn’t been. But once I’d pulled out my phone and started sharing all the little bits of lyrics, poetry and general ramblings I’d been making notes of whenever the mood struck, there was a lot more of it than I’dthought.
“It’s mostly a bunch of verbal vomit,” I told them. “You know, shit I come up with in the shower to entertain myself.” I’d just finished singing them some bits and pieces that I thought I might develop into a full song, but I hadn’t yet. “I don’t really write full songs anymore. Other than when Jesse held me in a room at gunpoint and ordered me to write them for his soloalbum.”
“Right,” Zane said, his expression thoughtful. “Same thing he did to get Katie to marry him, Iguess.”
Yeah. Childish burns like that… all day long. My brother just threw a drum stickathim.
