A mother's love

Chapter 26

The next morning they went shopping for everything they were going to need when they moved into their new house. The house was being rented with a fully equipped kitchen but nothing else. To get everything done in one go they were going to Wal-Mart and from there would go straight back to the house to begin their stay there, their room at the Value Lodge having become unaffordable for Brenda. Until she got her first paycheque and had some breathing room financially she would only be buying the essentials: a bed and bedding, a television, a washer and dryer, cutlery, crockery, toiletries and other miscellanea.

Brian got bored with the shopping very quickly. Brenda noticed his interest waning while they were shopping for all of the miscellaneous goods they needed and when she asked him "What do you think of these?" about some crockery patterns that she was showing him, to which he responded "Mm?" she decided to spare him from any more boredom and told him he could roam around the store while she took care of the rest of the shopping, a completely spontaneous exchange between them that was identical to what a real mother and son would say to each other under the circumstances that, once she had gotten over her disappointment at Brian not wanting to shop with her, she was delighted by. That he was acting his age meant that he felt comfortable enough about his life with her to grant himself license to behave as an ordinary teenage boy would.

Brian roamed about the store aimlessly until he got to the section where they sold musical instruments. A girl was there, sitting on a guitar amp and playing an electric guitar. She had long blond hair with pink highlights, black nail polish on her fingernails and deep red lipstick on her lips. She was wearing a black T-shirt, black jeans, black cargo boots and on the middle finger on her right hand, the one in which she was holding the guitar pick, she wore a ring with a skull that went all the way down her finger in the shape of an arrow. Brian stood and watched her, transfixed. She was so absorbed in her guitar playing that even though her eyes were open and Brian was standing right in front of her she didn't notice him. The tune that she was playing was slow and simple but it was deep, Brian liked it a lot and listened with great concentration.

"You play?" She abruptly stopped playing and asked him without shifting her gaze to him.

Startled, it took Brian a few seconds to answer "No, I'm just here shopping with my mother and I got bored."

"I hear that, that's what I'm doing here too."

"I wouldn't have guessed that you were here with your mother."

"That's what happens when your band breaks up and you have nowhere else to go."

"You were in a band?" Brian asked, unable to get over how cool she was.

"Hollow Point, we were an all girl band playing a combination of thrash and heavy metal; there were five of us, we were together for two years but things didn't happen for us and we decided to go our own ways and do our own things; I'm getting by giving guitar lessons and picking up some session work, plus I do some solo gigs to keep my name out there. The way things are going I'm probably not going to make it, my mom keeps pushing me to go back to college but I can't see myself doing that, I don't get what the point would be."

"Where were you going to college?"

"Berkeley School of Music; I dropped out after my first year because I didn't feel like school was doing anything for me, I mean I could already play the guitar and I was writing songs so it was just like 'what's the point?' you know? Then I saw this ad that Hollow Point had posted saying that they were looking for a second guitarist and from there it was just this crazy ride of going out on the road and working odd jobs to scrape together enough money to pay for studio time to record demos to send out to record labels. Nobody showed any interest, but the touring was amazing, we even did a couple of shows in Tokyo, best crowds I ever played in front of."

Brian listened to what she said with the utmost attentiveness, committing every word to memory. He was mesmerized by the effortless coolness of this girl.

"I just realized that I've told you almost my entire life story and I don't know your name."

"It's Brian."

"I'm Mickey."

"Are you buying that?"

"No, I already got one, it's not as cool as this Gibson but it gets the job done; I just came here to get some strings; how about you?"

"We just moved here from Florida, so we're buying pretty much everything," Brian answered, telling the lie about their origins that Brenda had told him to tell.

"Where are you staying?"

"Sheppard Street, it's in..."

"I know where it is, we're a couple of streets over on Newton; if you'd like I could show you around the city, get you caught up on all the places you need to know about."

"Sure, that'd be great," Brian answered without giving any thought to what Brenda would make of him spending time with this girl who he couldn't imagine being any cooler.