I Am Machine

Chapter Four

Brad Walst -

        'That was a great performance. It was fun. You had fun playing music, Brad. And you left them. You left them to their own devices, with only a kid on bass.' I felt my mind tormenting me as I drove along the California Interstate 5 towards LAX Airport.

        "You were a boy when you fucking started! They'll be fine!" I yelled to no one in particular as the songs on the radio changed. The clock on my dashboard turned to 3:00. I had been driving all night and I was tired, and pissed as all hell.

        I had decided that I was going to go somewhere out of the country. Somewhere in the tropics. I still had a passport from a few years back on that trip to the Bahamas that Neil and I went on. Maybe I'd get there, find a boat. Just sail, wherever the sea would take me.

        'You know next to nothing about boats, Brad.' My mental co-pilot felt the need to point out. It doesn't matter. I'm sure I can find someone to teach me real quick. I could sail in a random direction, explore some of the islands around there. It's hard to get lost in that area, there's islands every couple miles.

        As I drove up to the exit advertising LAX, I made a hard right and started driving down the curving road to the metropolis of Los Angeles.

Valentine -

        "You are NOT going on tour with that... that... that band!" My father yelled, saying the word like a curse. My mother stood on the threshold of my bedroom, shaking her head in disapproval as I loaded up my backpack with clothes.

        "There's no reason I shouldn't. I'm eighteen now. I don't have school, I just graduated. If you still remember. The ceremony was last week." I snapped back, angrily shoving my flip-open pocket knife into my black jeans.

        "You need to stay and apply to colleges! You have to be a mechanic, it's in your BLOOD!" He bellowed, furiously scratching the scruff he had acquired on his back over the years.

        "I've told you this once, and I'll tell you again," I replied softly, walking up to the man who had 'raised' me, "I. Am not. A mechanic."

        He drew back his hand to hit me, as he had done so many times before, but my knife was out and poking his beer gut before he had fully cocked his fist.

        "Do it, father. I dare you." The band's tour bus honked impatiently. I was supposed to be out fifteen minutes ago.

        He swallowed and dropped his fist. "You can threaten me all you want, son. But that doesn't mean we're not still family."

        I rolled my eyess and pushed him out of my bedroom door, knocking him up against the wall as I casually grabbed by bass and my other personal belongings. Heaving them out of my room, I turned and looked at the man who had fed me for eighteen years as I put on my black fedora. "Son?" He said, trying to extract pity from me so I'd stay.

        "Father." I answered, tipping my hat. I turned around to leave, then remembered something that I had been meaning to do for years.

        "I'd like to give you something." I told him, approaching him once more. He had stood up now, and was his entire 6'3 height at the moment.

        "Yes?" He replied hopefully.

        I punched him hard in the jaw, knocking multiple teeth out. He dropped like a sack of potatoes and I once again picked up my baggage and began walking down the stairs. That felt... good. Really good. I threw my house key towards the kitchen table, into the mouth of one of the many beer bottles that had piled up over the past months. I shook my head and exited the house, to the warm, welcoming arms of my new family.