The Silence Of The Storm by Willow Croft

The Silence Of The Storm

By Willow Croft

Forty-three dollars and twenty-three cents. That’s how much we scored today. Enough for the punk show and for burritos after.

“Told ya,” Mercedes said. “Told ya, it’s always better to spare change with a girl. ‘Me and my sister, we’re so hungry.’ Better than having to babysit Little Jimmy.”

“Sure, that, and this spot Sean here suggested. Surprised that old bitch didn’t call the cops. She was glaring at us from the window,” I said.

“Oh, her? Naw, Billy, she’s cool. One day, somebody was trying to steal some of her old jewelry. I tripped them as they ran out and they dropped all the jewelry. ‘Course it was an accident. I was just lacing up my boot. Brung me lemonade and cookies after that. I call her Grandma Bell.”

I looked in the window. She looked kind of sad. Fuck, I didn’t want to get old. But at least I wasn’t lonely, like her. I had Mercedes. She’d talked me into hitching down to Florida where we met Sean. He was squatting in this abandoned office building behind the antique store and said we could stay there too. Then Little Jimmy showed up. His mom had OD’d on his twelfth birthday. Our family.

“I’m hungry,” Little Jimmy complained.

“Anybody else hungry?” Stupid question. We all were.

Four one-dollar burritos later, and we were full. Kind of.

We walked out to the warehouse district where the band was playing. We should start our own band, I thought. Better than this crust punk shit. But it was fast and loud, and the pit was brutal.

“Stay here on the wall,” I told Little Jimmy. “Or I’ll kick your ass.” Either way, he’d get his ass kicked, but better it came from me, than by the other punks in the pit. I slipped the rest of the money into his hand. “Go buy a sticker. Or a patch. I’ll sew it on for you.”

“Wow, Billy, thanks.”

I watched him, his mohawk already falling down, and flapping as he ran through the crowd.

We snagged warm beers off the tables before the waitress could clear them and drank them in the bathroom. By the end of the show, we were all shitfaced. Except for Little Jimmy. He was curled up in a corner, fast asleep. I carried him all the way back to the squat and handed him through the window to Mercedes.

“Stop hogging the carpet square.” Sean shoved Mercedes into me. I shoved her back.

“Cut it out, you’ll wake Jimmy,” Mercedes said.

I dreamed I was still in the pit, being kicked over and over again. I was punching and kicking back, with all the rage of a storm.

“Ow,” Mercedes said. “Wake up, you bastard. It’s already afternoon.” She kicked me again with her Docs, right under the ribs.

“What the fuck,” I said. My head felt like bricks had been dropped on it. “What the hell is your problem?”

“Jimmy.”

“What about Jimmy?”

“He’s gone.”

“Probably just went out to pee.”

“We checked. All around the building. Sean’s walking up and down Main Street, looking for him. He’s out there, just calling and calling. Been out there for hours. I think he’s lost his shit.”

“You know how hungry Jimmy gets. Maybe he’s out hitting up restaurants for more food.”

Sean crawled back in the window.

“Did you find him?” Mercedes asked.

He shook his head. “What should we do?”

I heard sirens racing up the street.

“Did anybody see you crawl in here?” I asked.

Sean shook his head again.

“Fuck, somebody called the cops. Grab your stuff, guys, we gotta get out of here,” I said.

They didn’t move. “Not without Little Jimmy,” they both said at once.

“Well, he’s not here. So, let’s go look for him.”

We waited until the cop cars had passed and then crawled out the window.

“How come I still hear sirens?” Sean asked.

“Let’s go the back way, down the alley,” Mercedes said.

“Those sirens are getting louder,” I looked around the corner of the building.

“Shit,” I said. “Cops are all over the dumpster behind the antique store. Crime scene tape and everything.”

“Well, then, they won’t notice us.” Mercedes pushed her way past me into the alley. Then she froze.

“What the hell is she doing?” Sean whispered.

“I don’t know, but we gotta follow her. Stick together.”

Something about the look in her eyes freaked me out.

“Mercedes, what is it?”

She didn’t answer, just stared at the cop cars. Sean and I looked, too.

A cop was handing something out of the dumpster to another cop. Not something. Someone.

I recognized the floppy mohawk. Little Jimmy.

Mercedes started to run. Sean and I grabbed her, just in time.

“Let me go.” Boy, she was strong. Then she suddenly sank to the ground, pulling us down with her. The cop was zipping Little Jimmy up into a black bag.

Nothing we could do for him, now. Poor fucking kid. “Come on, guys, we gotta go.”

“Go where? Where the fuck we gonna go? We have nowhere to go. We’re nothing. We don’t fucking count.” Mercedes yelled.

One of the cops turned around and started to walk towards us.

“Shit. Sean, help me get her out of here.” We each took one of her arms and dragged her back to the squat. I shoved her in after Sean, and closed the window. We hid in bathroom on the upper floor; squished into one of the stalls. Even fucking holding hands. We were all just kids, I realized. Not just Jimmy. Scared and alone, too.

#

For the second time, someone was kicking me awake. A wrinkled face was looking down at me.

“Grandma Bell?”

She stopped poking me with her cane. “Kids, we have to go. Haven’t you heard? Somebody’s been killing street kids. Been trying to keep an eye on you tonight, but I fell asleep watching TV.”

“You knew we were here?” Sean asked.

“ ‘Course. It was my husband’s office. Now, kids, we have to go. Somebody’s downstairs. And I don’t imagine it’s a social call. There’s fire escape stairs outside the rear office—it’s how I got in.”

I could hear somebody moving around downstairs. Flashlights bounced off the staircase. Would killers really have flashlights?

“Now,” Grandma Bell said. She waddled down the hall. “You three go first. Hurry.”

I looked at the steep stairs. How the hell had she gotten up here?

There was no way to be quiet on those old metal stairs. They clanged and screeched under the weight of our boots. The streetlights were out in the alley, and I couldn’t fucking see. Old Grandma sure could, though.

“This way,” Grandma Bell said. “To my store.”

She unlocked the door. It squeaked open. Stairs led up. “Hurry up, kids. I have to turn off the alarm.”

She set the security system behind us. “Just in case.”

We were on the first floor of a fancy apartment. Filled with antiques. Fancy kitchen. Fancy dining room with crystal chandeliers. Fancy living room with a big TV. Almost took up the whole wall.

More stairs led us to a carpeted hallway. Most of the doors were closed, but the hall was lined with concert flyers. Shit. Can. Wire. Dead Kennedys. Agent Orange. TSOL. The Damned. CRASS. On and on they went. I looked closer. They were all signed.

“Grandma Bell, are these original?” Mercedes asked before I could.

“Yes, child. I moved to L.A. in the late 70s from London. The punk scene was barely getting started in the U.S. My soon-to-be husband worked for a record company. Back then, it was actually records, you know.” Grandma Bell smiled. “We met at one of my shows.”

“Wait, you were in a band?” I couldn’t believe it.

“Come, I’ll show you.” She led us to a bedroom. Still full of antiques. Then I saw the large framed poster above the bad. It had creases in it where it had once been folded into a record sleeve. A tattooed punk girl was screaming into a microphone. “Smash the Patriarchy,” the poster read, across the top, with an anarchy symbol and the female symbol on either side.

“Grandma Bell, you were in the band Pussywhipped?” I looked at Mercedes and Sean. Their mouths were hanging open.

I saw Grandma Bell pull up the sleeve of her white sweater. I looked back at the poster. Yep, the tattoos matched. Little Jimmy would have loved to meet her. His very own punk rock grandma.

My vision blurred. Just fucking tired, I told myself.

“You kids need some rest after what you’ve been through,” I heard Grandma Bell say. “Come, there’s cots up on the third floor. I don’t get much company, so they’ll have to do until I can ready some rooms for you.”

I followed her up another set of stairs. Mercedes and Sean were hanging behind me, still looking at all the flyers. “Hurry up,” I told them.

This floor was painted all white. I looked into the small rooms that lined the hallway. All grey.

Soundproofed rooms, I realized. The whole third floor was a recording studio. At the end was a larger soundproofed room. It was filled with instruments, amps, microphone stands, and several boxes. Cots were folded up against the wall, sheets still on.

“It’s probably not very comfortable,” Grandma Bell said. “I started to use this room for storage after my husband died.”

“It’s fine,” I said. But Grandma Bell wasn’t in the room anymore. She was at the door to the room.

“I didn’t mean to hurt Jimmy. He tripped and hit his head when he was trying to get away.”

“You killed Jimmy?” Meredith ran past me to Grandma Bell, fists raised. But the door was already swinging closed. She started to punch and kick at the door. I didn’t stop her.

A small panel in the door slid open. Grandma Bell’s face appeared in the slot. “I’m sorry I had to do this. I just missed the music.” She smiled that same old-lady smile. “Get some sleep, kids. Your first practice starts tomorrow.”

This story was previously include in Issue #4. Pick up a print copy here: https://www.etsy.com/listing/639457118/the-rock-n-roll-horror-zine-4

See more of Willow Croft's work here: https://willowcroft.blog/