Chapter 1

Gil stood there looking around at the crowded, hot room with a bottle in his hand and the microphone stand before him. We'll be back in forty minutes, he told the beer-wielding crowd and turned to head back to his station by the amp. Finn was inconsolable over on his side of the stage and he sat crumpled upon his stool with his Les Paul strapped across his shoulder. Gil tried to signal him but he didn't catch it. He unplugged his Martin and went over. What's up? he asked. You doing alright?
Finn shrugged. No, I guess not.
He drank from his bottle and so did Gil. You sounded good.
Did I? I have no idea how I even sounded, to tell you the truth.
They both laughed or, rather, Gil laughed and Finn tried to: his eyes did not participate. You sounded good, I can tell you that. You did.
Finn didn't seem to believe this or had had too much to drink and it fell upon lubricated ears.
Phoebe move her things yet, bud?
Nope.
No? When might that happen?
I don't know. Tomorrow.
Gil looked at him. Oh? Well, that'll be hard. I feel for you.
Finn drank at his beer and sighed. It was a sigh of great weariness that spoke of private bouts of anguish and too much booze. Finn stared at the crowd and the crowd stared back. It was drinking, too and he seemed to perceive this and it protected him. It was like foam insulation and as he sat there on his broken stool and drank, Gil had the thought that his friend was a raisin embedded in a large bowl of jello that the milling crowd with their pints and bottles and conversation generated. He could barely see his friend. He was sunk within the by-product of the setting. He was cipherous but indispensable, a sublimate, a pawn.

Gil begged off and headed across the plankboards