This Is The End, Beautiful Friend

Laughing, Sunny Day took up a seat at the end of the bar furthest from the front door in Jayne’s Korner Tavern on the Northeast corner of the intersection of Merriam Lane and Johnson Drive in Shawnee. There was Jayne, replete in her faux leopard skin mini-skirt, black top, and just-below-the-knee black go-go boots. She had just punched up the jukebox, an old 60’s model. The money for the tunes came from passing around a Coors pitcher with the combined look of “You can have me if you want me” and “If you don’t you can get your ass out of here.” It worked every time. The thing about Jayne was that she was more eclectic in her taste in music than most bar owners. Where most would stock the juke with current top sellers, Jayne preferred the classics. “Jayne, don’t you know that nobody listens to Jefferson Airplane any more?” Sunny whiffed the beer glass in front of him to get the hops aroma before putting about half of it away. It had been a hot, fast ride from Topeka and he already knew it was going to get hotter.
“Oh yeah, Sunny, sure, that’s right, uh-huh in case you didn’t know it, you are listening to Jefferson Airplane and so am I and so is everybody else in this place, so does that mean we all are nobody?” She had a way of inadvertently philosophizing commonplace occurrences into heady argument. It kept the customers on their toes. “Where have you been, my blue-eyed friend?” Sunny looked twice to see who it was he was talking to. Jayne smiled at him. It wasn’t Voice he was looking at but Jayne’s lyrical sound sure made him wonder what was taking place. It was the way she almost sang the question to him. He let the thought go and finished his beer, pushing the glass to the edge of the bar for another. His “Lone Wolf, No Club” black leather jacket smelled musty to him and he wondered if others noticed. He reached for the fresh beer and knocked it over. Jayne scowled. “Sunny, what the …..?”
“Sorry, Jayne, it was a hot ride and I’m a little out of sorts right now, here let me clean that up.” Sunny reached for the bar rag. Jayne pulled it back between her circled thumb and forefinger and flipped it, giving it a pop at the end and catching Sunny on the sleeve of the dirty black jacket.
“My place, my mess, Sunny, drink your beer.” As The Ballad of You and Me and Pooneil played out over their heads, they looked at each other and sang together, “No man is an island, he’s a peninsula,” and high-fived each other, laughing. Sunny gave Jayne the “Can I have you if I want you?" look and she flipped him with the towel again and went off to wash glasses. He followed her footsteps until she turned around, catching him watching her walk. She reached in a bowl and hurled some peanuts at him. He hunkered down to his beer grabbing it with both hands.
“Well look what the cat drugged in.” Sunny turned in his chair to see who was talking but he wasn’t able to see too well in the low ambient light. He saw a form moving from the back room where the fooseball table was. As the shape came toward him he recognized Reggie.
“Reggie, my man, what’s happenin’?” Sunny raised his right hand and caught Reggie’s giving him the Viet Nam soul brother handshake.
“Sunny, don’t be tryin’ to sound like no brother,” Reggie laughed, “You never were good at givin’ it up either, seems like you forgot the handshake.”
“Been too long, man, been way too long.” The two of them had been together in Viet Nam in 1969 and 1970 at Tay Ninh, the base camp that was known as Rocket City. They had run across each other a couple of times since then but it had been years this time since they had seen each other. “Let me buy you a beer, Reg,” Sunny said reaching for his wallet.
“Naw, man, me and Nate back there are trippin’ on some purple flat and beer just ain’t gettin’ it, if you know what I mean.” Reggie looked out over his sunglasses directly into Sunny’s eyes so Sunny could see his dilated pupils to prove he was doing just what he just said he was doing. “Come on back for a while.” Reggie turned and headed back to the fooseball room. Sunny picked up his beer and followed, thinking about when he and Reggie lived in an underground bunker in Rocket City and played in a rhythm and blues band called the Economy Studs. Reggie was an accomplished, classically trained violinist and they played jigs and reels as well as blues numbers. It was a blast as Sunny recalled. He high-fived Nate as he walked through the bead curtain into the fooseball parlor. Sunny drank his beer and watched as Nate and Reggie cranked the handles on the fooseball table. To Sunny it was just a game, but to the other two it was a constant blur of light and sound. Reggie finally lost when he looked up at Nate and saw Nate’s eyeballs drop down on the playing field and roll around, Nate laughing and smacking them through for a final two goals sealing the win. He picked up his eyes and popped them back in, freaking Reggie out and leaving Sunny wondering what the excitement was all about. All he saw was Nate making a goal. Reggie fell back against the wall laughing and Nate reached in his coat pocket for the pint of gin he always carried. Taking a pull he handed it to Reggie who took one and passed it on to Sunny.
“No man, I don’t indulge,” Sunny said pushing the bottle back toward Reggie. Reggie looked at him like “Yeah, you don’t indulge, not after some brother drank from the bottle.” Reggie’s arm rotated toward Nate, handing him the bottle and not taking his eyes off of Sunny.
“Come on, Nate, let’s slide on up to my crib and mellow out.” Sunny made note of Reggie’s use of the word “crib” and made a mental note to add it to his repertoire. He punched Reggie on the shoulder and looked him in the eyes. Reggie smiled and punched him back. “Later on down the line, my man, later on.” Reggie and Nate walked out the back door past the Shawnee patrol car and the two cops, waving to them as they went by. The cop on the driver’s side rolled down his window.
“Hey Nate, what’s happenin’ man, long time no see.”
“Nothin’ brother, we’re bookin’ over to Reggie’s crib, why don’t you two slide on by.” Nate opened the door to his red Mercedes 450 SLC and slid in.
“Hey, we just might do that if it won’t upset the neighborhood too much.”
“Naw, you guys are all right,” Nate laughed and pulled out onto Merriam Lane and squealed the tires. “It’s good to have connections with the Man,” Nate high fived Reggie as they headed on down the road to Reggie’s place.
Sunny heard the commotion up front and parted the bead curtain to see what was up. He couldn’t really make out who or how many people were involved so he made his way past the pool table and juke box to get a better view. His eyes adjusted to the brighter light and he saw four people in a heated discussion with Jayne. Sunny thought he recognized the big guy in the coveralls and black silver-studded hat. The others he wasn’t sure of until he got closer and verified that it was Rafe and it was Slim, two old acquaintances from Western Kansas. It had been over a year since he had seen them back in Jetmore where he had hidden out on the old farm place next to theirs. The other two, a man and a woman, looked familiar but he couldn’t tell for sure because they were behind the big man who was gesticulating wildly and doing some sort of poetry rap. As he got closer, he realized that Rafe was reciting his favorite Lord Byron much to the amazement of Jayne who was now leaning back on the beer cooler with her arms crossed waiting for him to finish. “Rafe, Rafe,” Sunny said as he put his hand on Rafe’s shoulder. Rafe spun around raising his left fist high in the air, ready to bring it crashing down on whoever it was that had touched him. When he saw it was Sunny Day he stopped in mid-verse and relaxed.
“Sunny, man we’ve been trying to find you forever.” He gave Sunny a bear hug that squeezed the breath out of him, then Rafe put him down. “Hey, man you know Slim here, he was trying to get a cold Mickey’s and the lady insulted him and we didn’t take kindly to that insult.” The other two sheepishly peeked around Rafe to get a look at Sunny. Jenny’s face lit up with the realization that she knew him, but the preacher with her had no clue who he was even though Sunny now recognized him as the preacher from Jetmore that he had seen in the tavern.
“Slim, you still drinkin’ that green shit?” Sunny clapped Rafe on the back and stuck out his hand to shake hands with Slim. Sunny looked over and smiled at Jayne who lifted both arms palm up as if to say she didn’t have a clue what the guy was talking about.
“Yeah, I guess Kansas City is behind times, even Jetmore has Mickey’s,” Slim grabbed Sunny’s hand and shook.
“Only because you drink all of it,” This time it was Jenny who spoke up. “Say didn’t you used to play guitar for the Economy Studs?” She asked Sunny.
“That was a long time ago, little lady, but I remember you singing at Coyas Castle years ago. You were hooked up with the Fat Man. Are you singing now?”
“No, I’m on some kind of weird trip with these yayhoos and it’s getting really strange now, you see, we’ve been visited by the Star People and . . .” Slim gave her the sign to stop talking about it and looked at the preacher who, so far, had not said a word. All of them stopped talking and looked at Sunny who motioned them back to a back table. Jayne got the sign from Sunny to bring a round of beer and she and Slim seemed to have come to an understanding about the availability of Mickey’s Big Mouth. Starting with the preacher, each one told their story to Sunny, and then Sunny told them his. Right on cue, the front door opened and they all looked up as the daylight streaked into the bar, illuminating their table. They held their hands up to shade their eyes to see who it was. Two people walked in. Sunny immediately recognized Nuke but couldn’t make out the woman behind him. Then he gasped. It was Voice. Nuke had this sheepish grin on his face as they walked back to the table and pulled up two chairs. Everyone there knew this was a cosmic meeting. Even Jayne had some sixth sense knowledge about what was going on. She looked at Voice and stuck the Coors pitcher for the jukebox offering out toward her. Voice looked at the money that was already in the pitcher. She gazed at it and a dollar bill floated up and out toward the jukebox. It glowed as it went in the slot and the jukebox lit up. Buttons rapidly pushed themselves and a record cued up. Voice looked at them all as she sang along with Jim Morrison.
“This is the end, beautiful friend the end. Of our elaborate plans, the end.” And when she had finished, the green glow of her eyes illuminated them all. Jayne dropped the pitcher as she looked at the empty table and chairs. The jukebox turned itself off and they were gone.