Smolder (The Road to Rocktoberfest 2024)

5. Chapter Five

Chapter Five

Skyler

As I was considering whether I needed to show Sandy Kensington that I could take care of myself and didn’t need him to train me, Marshall returned to the front porch with a cocky smile.

“Okay, guys. Skyler, you’ll need to pack up your stuff. Hope said you’re riding the couch in your brother’s room, but I’ve got a better idea. You’ll need somewhere to work and—what do you use when you compose?”

“Piano or guitar are my preferred. I can get by with a keyboard, but I’d rather use an actual piano. A six-string guitar works in a pinch.” I had use of the upright piano at school, but that was back in West Peoria, and I was definitely not .

“Okay. Hope said the garage has been converted into a recording studio, but it hasn’t been used for a while. I’ll get someone to come check it out on Monday to ensure all the equipment is functioning. I think it would be better to record here rather than take everyone to Los Angeles. I’ll have the piano delivered to Sandy’s place in San Jose on Monday.” Marshall’s phone rang just as I was about to complain.

“Does he think I’m going to stay with you?” My eyes met Sandy Kensington’s. No way was I staying with such a Grumpy Gus.

I appreciated a much calmer lifestyle than I was sure the large football player enjoyed. He was a jock, and my mind kept replaying movies I’d seen with athletes and what they liked to get up to when they all turned their caps backward and hung out, drinking beer and burping.

Sure, it was a stereotype, but the jocks at West Peoria High only served to reinforce it, based on what I witnessed when my band kids were pushed off the field by the football team as we tried to practice for halftime shows. The team, led by the vicious Coach Sutter, made so much fun of my kids that I wanted to pummel them.

I wasn’t a fighter, believing harmony was always the answer, but I could defend myself, and I would defend my kids. However, I firmly believed nothing ever came of violence.

Sandy’s expression was one of pure confusion. He stared at me for a few seconds before jogging around the side of the house, chasing his brother. I walked to the corner and watched him, laughing as he kept yelling “Marsh!” and his brother stuck his finger in his other ear so he could hear whoever had called him.

The football player did have a nice, tight…rear end, especially in the navy linen suit pants that had to have been tailored to his form. He was wearing a white dress shirt without a tie or suit coat. The long sleeves on his shirt were rolled up to his elbows, showing off strong forearms covered in ink. My first thought was how I wanted to be closer so I could thoroughly inspect each one. Maybe trace them with my tongue?

When he’d picked me up at the airport before dawn, he’d been wearing a gray suit my foggy mind barely remembered. I was sure the guy could wear a burlap bag and be attractive.

Marshall was leaning against the wooden fence that separated the yard from the paddock where Mom kept larger rescue animals. Currently, there was a miniature donkey eating hay from a haybox nearby.

Once Marshall ended his call, he and Sandy began shouting at each other. The donkey glanced up, seemingly unhappy about having his dinner interrupted. It was all quite comical.

The sound of crunching gravel caught my attention, and I turned to see Mom getting out of her pickup truck with Jeanne and River following behind in Jeanne’s small SUV.

“You don’t get to invite people to stay with me, Marshall. It’s my house, and you haven’t started paying part of the mortgage, as far as I know. Find somewhere else for him to stay. Not with me.” Sandy stomped by me and hopped into his fancy car, not waiting for Marshall, who stopped to talk to Mom and Jeanne.

It was all too much for me. I’d been up nearly twenty-four hours, so I went to my duffel and grabbed clean shorts and a T-shirt. After I changed, I went to the hallway closet to get a blanket and pillow. There was an old couch on the back porch where Mom and I used to sit when I was young. We’d listen to the band practice in the garage, and I’d fall asleep there every time.

Those were the memories I wanted to focus on, not the times when Regal was nowhere to be found.

Something was licking my face. “Bess, please stop!” The stupid mutt didn’t listen. I opened my eyes to see it wasn’t one of my mother’s two rescue dogs—a golden retriever and pit bull mix named Bess and a brown collie mix named Midnight.

What was licking my face was one of the disgusting goats, which was just cringeworthy. “Get away, you big gross-out.”

I got up and walked into the kitchen to find Marshall Kensington sitting at the table with Mom, Jeanne, and Dusty. They were having coffee and chatting with a batch of warm everything cookies my mother must have made that morning. They had any kind of seed that could be consumed by humans mixed into an oatmeal base.

Sometime during her life, my mother got on a health kick and became vegan, but I knew she snuck a cheeseburger on occasion. I wasn’t vegan—not even close—though Mom had tried her best.

“Good morning.” I went to the cabinet and pulled down a mug, filling it from the old-fashioned percolator that had been my grandmother’s.

I turned to the group. “What are we talking about?” Obviously, it had something to do with me because they all clammed up when I walked into the room.

“Sandy and I came to an agreement regarding his assistance with getting you ready to play the five concerts coming up in late summer. He’s also agreed to give you space in his basement to work on ‘Bury Me’. Harmon Pictures wants to hear the intro by Monday. I realize this is short notice, but—”

“But your dad and I have been working on it, and it’s not right. I’m not sure how we take an eighties hair band anthem and make it into a screaming, headbanging song worthy of mosh pits and busting guitars,” Dusty said.

I chuckled because that had been my same concern.

River came into the kitchen in his boxers, scratching his right butt cheek and scrolling on his phone. His dark-brown hair looked as if he never combed it.

“River!” Jeanne hissed at him.

The poor kid glanced up from his phone and gasped. “Shit. Sorry. I didn’t know anyone was in the house. What’s going on? Is Dad all right?”

It was weird to hear River refer to Regal as Dad, but then again, it was probably stranger for me to refer to him as Dad . I wasn’t jealous of River because he was a kind, decent young man. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to know him. But my mother hadn’t kept me up on the changes that led Regal, Jeanne, River, and Mom to live in the same house because they were broke.

“Yes, River, your dad is fine. We are trying to figure out how to help Skyler with the work he needs to do on ‘Bury Me’,” Jeanne said.

All of them were helping me? That was new information.

“Wait? What’s going on? Dusty, you and the guys are going to help, right?”

Dusty turned to me, his face red. Why?

He cleared his throat. “We’ll help as much as we can, but like I said, we don’t think we can get it right. We need you, River, and JD Horn, Ripper’s son, to work on it together. You young guys write it, and we’ll perform it for the movie.”

I drank my coffee, staring at the rest of them. “That’s a great idea. Get JD and River to help.” Mom offered her placating smile, which upset me. Heavens, I hadn’t even agreed to actually rewrite the dang song.

“Can JD play an instrument?” I glanced at Dusty.

“River sings and plays guitar, and JD does too. He’s hell on the bass. Maybe the three of you will understand what it needs better than us old farts?”

Dusty had never had children. Based on how kind he’d been to me, I was sure he’d have been a great father.

“Wait… We only agreed to pay Skyler. These other two…” Everyone turned to look at Marshall, whose eyebrows were somewhere in his hairline. I could imagine he was about to swallow his tongue regarding two more people being added to the payroll.

“I don’t need money—” River’s eyes darted to Marshall and back to me. “I wanna help.”

“Yes, you do need money,” Mom and Jeanne said in unison.

“How about I write the new melody, and after that, I’ll meet JD and River here so we can go into the studio and work out the rough edges.” I looked at River. “You got a six-string?”

“Sure.” He left the room and returned a few minutes later with clothes on, which was good, and an old six-string guitar that had seen better days. If it worked, I’d be fine.

“I’ll be ready to go to your brother’s house in half an hour.” I held out my phone to River. “Put your number in. Do you know JD Horn?”

“Sure.” River took the phone and tapped in his number. The device on the counter rang, and he shut it off, took a selfie, and then pecked in something else before handing it to me. I looked at the screen and laughed. Younger, Smarter, & Better-Looking Bro .

I chuckled. “Yeah, well, I’ll reserve judgment until I hear you play. You got access to an electric guitar?”

“He can use one of mine.” Dusty stood and hugged us both. “I’ll call JD and give him a heads-up. Thank you, guys.”

Dusty left, and I went to River’s room to grab my stuff, changing into jeans and a T-shirt with West Peoria All-Star Band on the front. It was part of a fundraiser we’d held the previous fall so band members from each grade could travel to Carbondale to perform at a Saluki football game during halftime. I was so proud of my kids. They competed for the spots and went through tryouts to win their place in the band, which wasn’t easy for the younger kids. They worked hard and were proud of themselves for the great show they put on. I missed them.

Once I was dressed and had my duffel and River’s six-string, I went to find Marshall. Mom was standing on the back porch, so I walked over and put my things down. “I’ll be in touch. I just need a little time to get this started, and then I’ll come back and work in Regal’s studio. Call me if anything happens.” I hugged Mom and then Jeanne. She was a nice woman who got caught up with my father. It wasn’t her fault she’d succumbed to Regal Ashe. Many had.

After goodbyes, I went outside to find Marshall still on his phone. I stopped beside the SUV he was driving and put my things in the back seat before I got into the front passenger seat.

Marshall got in and gave me a fake smile. “I need to return to LA tomorrow for a meeting at the office, so I’m going to leave my rental for you so you’re not stuck. Pay absolutely no attention to Sandy. He’s been in a bad mood since he left the Breeze. I hope he’ll snap out of it eventually.”

“Forced change is hard to accept—just like what you’re forcing me to do.” I hated to be so angry, but I had a life, and here I was, being bullied into doing something I really didn’t care about. I needed to quit whining about it, but I’d had a nice, calm summer planned, and now everything was going down the drain.

“Look, Skyler, I know you may not want to do this, but your family needs you. The record label is building a whole thing around this song that could relaunch From the Ashes. Your parents need the money, and I’m sorry to say if this doesn’t happen, the label will drop the band and my management company will be forced to do the same. Then where will they be?”

If Marshall Kensington thought he was good at a guilt trip, he’d never had the pleasure of having Hope Ashe on his trail. I laughed. “I said I’d do it, and I don’t go back on my word, Mr. Kensington.”

Marshall nodded as he kept his eyes forward. Hopefully, I’d be able to get the rewrite done relatively fast, refine it with JD and River, and then get the whole band together for practice for a couple weeks. That should put me back in West Peoria in late July if Regal took care of himself and was able to play for the tour. That was the goal.