Emma becomes a permanent resident in Julia and Pris' apartment, but finds relationships becoming more confused ... and the music goes on.

Wild Horses

A novel, based on a true story

by Rebecca A .

Chapter Ten.

The next few days went quickly, although it wasn't as though I had
much to do. Julia took the Malibu down to Jackson and sold it
without any difficulty. She gave the cash to Steve but he took me
aside and asked me to hold onto it. "I still have the money Julia
gave me," he said. "You should keep this for yourself. I have a
feeling you'll be better with it than I will."

Julia and Pris decided that I should continue staying with them for
a while, although I desperately wanted to be sleeping with Steve. He
and I were having sex practically every minute we were alone
together, which was at least once a day and sometimes more often,
but -- well, I missed just being with him. We had been together so
closely, for so long, that it seemed incredibly strange to be
spending the nights apart, and I fretted as I tried to get to sleep
in my bed on the fold-out couch.

I had other things to worry about apart from missing Steve. He and
Leon seemed to have something going on, some kind of business they
were involved in that they didn't want to tell me about, and I was
worried about that, since I was sure it was probably illegal. They
hadn't said anything, but there was that sense I had about them that
told me that something was going on. I didn't know quite what it
was, but I didn't like it anyway. Wasn't Steve trying to get a new
identity and make a fresh start? Why jeopardize that?

Pris told me the real reason she and Julia felt I should stay with
them was the possibility of attracting attention. The apartment
Steve and Leon were staying in was above the home of a rather
straight-laced Baptist couple, and Julia and Pris worried that a
girl shacked up with two boys would bring attention from them. I
could visit Steve, but it wouldn't do to be living there with him. I
wondered why Julia hadn't thought of that earlier, when she had
arranged the place for Steve, but I didn't dwell on it. Maybe she
hadn't known I was coming too.

Of course she hadn't known. That's why she was so surprised at the cafe.

The longer I stayed in Mississippi, the more I realized that the
girls did the right thing not letting me stay with Steve. Oxford is
about as liberal a place as exists in the South, but even there, the
idea of two young people cohabiting outside of marriage was looked
upon ... Let's just say that Steve and I would have become a focus
of attention at a time we were trying to keep a low profile.

The plus side of living with Julia and Pris was that I learned a
lot. I might have looked like a girl, but I had never had much of a
chance to hang out with girls before, and the more I did the more I
realized that there is so much more to being a girl than just the
way you look. Girls do everything differently than boys. Well, maybe
not everything. I had noticed that Pris wasn't your typical southern
girl. In fact she was pretty much a tomboy, if you can still be a
tomboy and have a startlingly attractive figure.

So I hung out with the two women, and watched, and learned. When
Julia and I were alone she coached me in a few things, like some of
my gestures. Even though I had been at Brand for a long time, Julia
thought I seemed to have a lot of pretty naturally feminine
gestures, and this surprised me, because I couldn't figure out how,
in the midst of such an awful, masculine place, I could have picked
those up. "Maybe you always had them," Julia said. I thought maybe
she was putting me on, but she seemed very genuine.

Julia didn't seem to study much at all. At least, she hardly ever
seemed to go to classes. A couple of times I saw her reading some
books, but it didn't seem like she was paying a whole lot of
attention to her studies. Most of that first week she and I sat
around the living room in the apartment, and she showed me how to do
stuff like braid my hair, and apply eyeshadow, and paint my
toenails, and stuff that seemed silly and superficial to me but
which I found I kind of enjoyed. She said she did, too. "Emma, I
always wanted a baby sister. Do you mind?"

I still didn't know how much Pris knew about me. At first I figured
she knew everything, since that first night I had been in the
apartment Julia had been so weirded out by me. But as the days went
by I started to wonder if maybe Julia hadn't kept my secret from
Pris. There were a couple of things she said that just didn't make
any sense if she knew. For example, she got her period about three
days after I got there, and it seemed just the most natural thing
for her to ask me whether it was as bad for me and didn't I hate it
as much. I blushed and didn't know how to respond. I settled for
making her a cup of tea and we sat on the couch together and talked
about her childhood.

I liked Pris. She was a real no-nonsense kind of girl. I got the
feeling that some of her seemingly straightforward manner was really
a way of gliding over intimacy with people, but in so many other
ways she was so giving and warm that I felt very comfortable with
her anyway.

On the fourth day I was there I got to meet Julia's boyfriend, Pete,
the one who was the artist. He seemed like a pretty clean-cut guy
for an artist, I thought, as we were introduced. I had been
expecting some kind of wild man with long hair and dirty clothes,
but Pete was clean and trim and good-looking. From some of the
remarks he made in conversation he seemed like he might be kind of
wild underneath, though. He and Julia went out for dinner and Pris
and I hung out together and watched TV until Steve came over, and
then Pris excused herself and went to her room and Steve and I made
love on the couch as quietly and discreetly as possible.

When the weekend came Steve and I spent all day Saturday together,
on our own. Steve borrowed Julia's car and we drove out to a pretty
place on the river out of town a ways. We had a light picnic lunch,
and a few beers, and some sweet, slow, gentle sex that went for
hours and hours. I was worried at first that someone would see us,
because even though the spot was isolated it wasn't very well
screened by trees or anything. But Steve just had that way of
touching me and I forgot my inhibitions quickly. I sound like such
an easy lay, but that day with Steve was very special. We were free,
and in love, and Steve made me feel like I was the most beautiful
woman in the world. At least he kept telling me that, and I think
after a while I started to think it might just possibly be true. He
could be *very* persuasive.

On the way back to Oxford around dusk we stopped back in at the cafe
in Abbeville where we had first met Julia. Jesse and Evelyn, the
folks that ran the place, remembered me. "It's not every day a young
lady collapses in our store," Jesse said gravely, before Evelyn
admonished him and served us both up a piece of pie. We stayed a
while and chatted with them. They had lived in the area for years
and knew everyone there was to know, and Jesse enjoyed entertaining
us with stories about some of the more eccentric characters they had
met.

Evelyn had managed to talk Steve into another piece of pie when a
couple in their early-twenties came in and Steve spent a long time
talking to them about the local music scene. Their names were Brett
and Lisa Page. Lisa was warm and friendly and although Brett was
kind of quiet he seemed like a nice enough guy. She was quiet and
blonde and pretty in that overdone Southern way, but there was
something in her eyes that told me she could be tough when she
needed to be. He was thin and dark and energetic, with hands that
windmilled around to make a point. They had been living in Abbeville
for a couple of years after Brett's uncle died and left him a
house, they had come to Abbeville to take care of his estate.
They had liked the place so much they had stayed. Lisa taught
elementary school in Oxford, and Brett worked as a linesman for the
phone company.

It turned out that Brett was something of a musician himself.
"Nothin' serious," he said. Mostly he jammed with friends. He and
Steve talked about bands that were playing locally, and where to go
to hear some good sounds. "Y'all are welcome to come 'round tomorrow
and hang out with me and the boys," he said to Steve.

"I don't have a guitar right now," Steve said.

"Heck, Brett's got three," Lisa said. "I can't see as how he can
play all of them at once."

So on Sunday afternoon Steve and I showed up at Elroy's, a joint out
on the road to Tupelo. Brett and his friends formed a kind of
unofficial house band there, filling in on nights that Elroy
couldn't book someone. Since Elroy didn't make a whole lot of money,
Lisa told me later, that was nearly every Friday night. Saturday
nights Elroy got a minor 'name' band in. He let the guys practice
there all they wanted whenever the joint wasn't open.

Brett's band was a five piece outfit: guitar, that was Brett; bass,
Jim; keyboards, Rick; drums, Bo; and Jeff on trumpet when he
bothered to show up, which Lisa said was about once a month. It was
an odd combination of talent, to say the least. They'd never thought
to give themselves a name -- people referred to them generically, as
'The House Band'.

I was kind of nervous when we first entered Elroy's. I hadn't known
whether it was a good idea to go with Steve, but I always liked to
hear him play, and I wanted to spend more time with him because we
had seen so little of each other while I was staying at Julia's.

As we walked in and I could see Brett smile and walk over to shake
Steve's hand, I could see the other guys' eyes giving me the once
over. They weren't exactly predatory, but I still wasn't completely
used to having men look me over in that way. It gave me a strange
feeling in my stomach whenever I saw that kind of look from a guy. I
wished Julia was there -- then they would have ignored me and stared
at her instead.

I was the only girlfriend there, as it turned out. I had hoped that
Lisa would show up with Brett, but apparently she didn't even go to
the gigs very often anymore. So I sat over at the side of the bar,
and watched and listened as Brett's band went through a raggedy
version of 'Skinny Legs and All'.

They were terrible. But they were terrible in a good way. They each
had a lot of enthusiasm, and Brett had a good technique, but it was
like they were playing in separate bands. Rick and Jeff seemed to
want to give the song the R&B treatment it needed, but Jim and Brett
seemed to think they were playing straight rock and roll or maybe
something that hadn't been invented yet.

Brett could sing pretty well, though. At least better than Steve.
Steve was clearly a better guitarist, but he didn't have any range
in his voice. He could do blues okay. Brett's timing probably wasn't
as good, but he had a voice that was suited to a much broader range
of material.

Brett wanted Steve to play with them straight away, but Steve
demurred, saying he wanted to listen to them for a while since it
had been a long time since he'd played with other people.
Fortunately nobody questioned why that was the case.

The guys played a few more songs, mostly old R&B standards, with a
country-style song I didn't know thrown in for good measure. They
were better on the country stuff, I thought, except that Jeff sat
there like a shag on a rock while they played it because there
didn't seem to be a way to work a trumpet into a country piece like
that.

"How 'bout you join in, Steve," Brett said.

"What are y'all up for next?" Steve asked, as he picked up a guitar
and plugged in to an amp. But Brett had already begun the opening
notes to 'Sin City,' and everyone picked it up right away. Except
for Jeff. There's no place you could fit a trumpet in 'Sin City,'
either.

I'd really like to be able to say that Steve's influence on the band
lifted them to new heights, but the truth was that they were all
pretty much still doing their own thing instead of acting like a
band, and it came out in an unholy mess. Their enthusiasm and
obvious enjoyment made it a much more pleasant experience to watch
than to listen to. They completely messed up 'Steady Rollin' Man'
and a few blues-tinged numbers I didn't know. Then they played some
more modern stuff, including a Bruce Springsteen song that took me
by surprise because I hadn't figured they would be into that sound.

After a few more songs the guys took a break and opened up a few
beers, and Steve kept picking away add odd fragments of music while
they all shot the breeze about a bunch of stuff I wasn't much
interested in. Fortunately I had found a year old copy of 'Rolling
Stone' tucked behind the curtain that hung behind the "stage," so I
had something to read.

When Steve started playing 'One Hundred Years From Now' the
conversation ceased and Brett joined in. The country flavor of the
song suited them much better, and then all of them went back to
playing for a while, sticking mostly to country-tinged numbers.
After about another hour of playing they broke up. Rick and Jeff
left, and the others went out on the porch of the bar and sat
drinking a few more brews.

Once they were out of there I walked over to the acoustic guitar
that Brett had standing to one side and picked it up myself. It had
been a few weeks since I had done any practice at all, and I didn't
want to get too rusty since I was really glad Steve had been
teaching me.

After about ten minutes Steve came back inside. I think he was
probably feeling guilty for having ignored me for so long. He
listened to me pick my way through some fairly simple tunes, and
then sat down next to me. "So what'd you think?"

I smiled at him and raised my eyebrows. "Well, it looked like you
were all having a good time, I guess..."

He smiled back. "Yeah. well, it was fun." Then he reached for the
guitar I was holding and began to play one of the songs the two of
us most loved, 'Ain't No Sunshine.' What a great song. He played,
and we both started singing, and I decided to harmonize over his
voice, and it was great. We moved straight into the next song, one
that Steve had written himself when we were at Brand, and then
another and another. At the end of the fourth song Brett, Bo and Jim
came back in, but instead of joining in they listened and watched
and sucked on their brews. I immediately got kind of nervous about
them listening to me singing, and my voice wavered and I quit.

"No, no, keep going," Brett said. "That was great."

"Uh, no, thanks," I said, beginning to stand up.

"Really, Emma," Jim chimed in. "That was fantastic. Steve didn't
tell us you could sing like that."

"See?" Steve said to me softly. "What'd I tell you?"

"I... um... I don't sing in front of people," I said to everyone in
general.

"Hell, honey, we ain't people. We's just some bums in a band," Bo
said, smiling.

"Sing something else," Brett suggested.

"I'm kind of nervous," I said.

"Take your time, then. Whenever you feel comfortable."

I looked at Steve, who was still sitting down on the edge of the
stage with the guitar in his hands. He smiled at me and nodded.

I looked at the other guys, who were watching me expectantly.

"I'll sing if you guys are playing too," I said. That way we could
all make fools of ourselves.

The guys came over to the gear and Steve played a few bars of a song
he knew I liked, "American Girl," which was fast and loose and hard
to think too much about. It was a good choice. I got right into it
quickly.

"And if she had to die trying she,

had one little promise

she was gonna ke-ee-ee-eep,

oh yeah, alright,

take it easy baby,

make it last all night."

It turned out that Brett had grown up with one of the guys from
Mudcrutch, Tom Petty's first band, and he knew most of Petty's stuff
very well. They all joined in on the line "make it last all night"
and we finished the song smiling and laughing. We did a couple of
Petty's other songs, and then we did some Stones covers, some Neil
Young, and some more recent stuff. Then I suggested a song that the
guys had heard but hadn't played, 'Mohammed's Radio.' It's not a
really difficult song musically, but you need to get the timing
right when you sing it or it sounds bland. I had practiced it a bit
these last few weeks with Steve in the little time we hadn't devoted
to sex.

"Dang, girl, Linda Ronstadt'd be pissed if she heard you do that so
well," Bo smiled after we finished it. I liked Bo. I knew he was
just being nice, but nice guys are hard to dislike.

Steve suggested we do a quieter number he knew I also liked, and
then another. I could tell he was trying to bring my singing to the
fore, but I was much more relaxed now and I wasn't worried about
embarrassing myself in front of the guys.

We tried some pop -- including Alex Chilton's 'September Gurls,'
which must be one of the best pop songs ever written, even if it
really needed another girl to harmonize with me. Then we finished up
by trying to do Van Morrison's 'Sweet Thing.' It was way beyond any
of us. I couldn't remember all the words, and Jim and Bo couldn't
get the timing right. It was fun, but we were going to need to
practice that one to pull it off.

"That one's for another day," Brett said as we finished our ragged
attempt.

"Sure 'nuff," said a voice from the back of the bar.

"Hi Elroy," Brett said. "Didn't hear you come in."

A tall, craggy giant of a guy in his early fifties came into the
light. "Oh, I bin here a while. Girl," he said, turning to me, "you
sure do have a pretty voice."

I blushed, and shuffled, and looked over at Steve.

"Can sing, too," said Elroy. "I liked the faster numbers, myself.
Ain't too many girls with a sweet voice like yours can pull off a
rock song."

"I, uh, I guess I had a good teacher," I said, indicating Steve.

"I reckon you did. Brett, ain't you gonna introduce me to these
young people?"

Brett did the introductions. I thought to myself as he was doing it
that an awful lot of people were being introduced to us by our real
names, which seemed kind of stupid since Steve had an alias worked
out, and although my name wasn't the one I was born with it could be
traced by Grieves pretty easily.

Elroy wanted to hear us play some more. "Just you two," he said,
indicating Steve and myself. Steve and I both looked over at Brett
and the other guys, to see if they were offended we were going to be
singled out, but it seemed that they all kind of looked to Elroy as
'the boss' and deferred to him.

I was nervous again, and Elroy got a little impatient. "Just sing
something you like," he said. So we did a soft, gentle song to start
with, 'The Face of Appalachia,' which was lyrical and sweet and gave
me good opportunity to show off my range and for Steve to show off
his skills as a guitarist.

When we finished the guys all made polite noises but it seemed
obvious they were waiting for more, so after a brief conference we
did another song Steve had written, which felt good.

"When the chips are down

I'll still be around

No matter what

These walls here won't be stopping me

When the chips are down"

Steve had written several songs with me in mind, and while we were
going through that one I forgot where we were and what we were doing
and scrunched my eyes up tight and thought of how we'd made love the
night after he'd first played it to me and we'd practiced it.
Everything flowed smoothly and I just let myself go with the song. I
was thinking about Steve and sex and all the other things the song
was about, and -- although I didn't realize it until I finished --
my nipples got hard and I felt that same feeling I always felt when
he took me in his arms and kissed me.

Music is interesting like that. When it's really good, that is. When
it sends shivers up your spine and makes you go all gooey inside.
Even rock songs can do that to me; at least they could do that then.

When we finished there was a silence and I remembered where we were.
Slowly I opened my eyes and noticed the guys standing at the side of
the bar still watching us. Then Elroy began to clap and the other
guys joined in. I blushed bright red and turned back around to
Steve, who hugged me and guided me off the stage. Brett clapped him
on the back and complimented him on the song, and on his playing.

"Dang, girl, how'd you get to sing like that so young?" Bo said, and
I blushed again. It was nice that these guys liked to hear me,
because I liked to sing, but until now it had always been a private
thing between Steve and me, and I wasn't used to the praise. Jeff
handed me a beer and I took a quick swig from the bottle, then another.

I was saved from further embarrassment when Brett took Steve back to
the gear and got him to work through a few of the changes he'd rung
in the last song, so the focus went off me for a while. Jim and Bo
started rolling cables.

Elroy talked to me a while about where I was from as the boys packed
up the equipment. I tried to give mostly non-committal answers, and
asked him a lot of stuff about himself to divert attention. He was a
pretty nice guy. I was getting the feeling that most of the folks
I'd meet in Mississippi were more relaxed than the people I'd grown
up with. I learned that Elroy was a musician, too, and pretty easy
with a range of instruments. He'd played with some pretty big names
when he was younger, even with Elvis once.

Elroy had bought the bar after the settlement from a car accident.
He indicated a long scar on the side of his face "That's how I came
by this, too." He changed the subject back to music and we talked
for a while longer about that. Then the two of us fell silent and
watched as the guys came back in and removed the last of the stuff.

"You old enough to be drinkin' that beer on my premises?" Elroy
asked me in a friendly voice to break the silence. He had a really
nice fatherly kind of manner -- like I'd imagined fathers should be,
not like my father was.

"I guess not," I said, guiltily.

"That's alright, we're not open." He had a twinkle in his eye and I
could see he was just winding me up.

The guys came over to where Elroy and I were sitting. "Brett, I'd
like a word with you for a moment," Elroy said.

"Sure thing," Brett said, and the two of them went into the small
office at the back of the bar. The guys and I sat and had a beer
together and talked about the other places in the district that had
decent music. There sure seemed to be a lot of places to play. That
might sound kind of obvious, but this was back when disco was
killing live music at places on the coasts, and I had thought it
might have made an impact in Mississippi, too. If it had, it wasn't
a big one.

Eventually Brett and Elroy came out of the office. Brett asked Steve
if he could have his phone number to call him next time they were
jamming. We all said our goodbyes and went out into the night.

***

Chapter Eleven.

Brett called Steve the next day and asked him whether we'd like to
play with them on Friday night at Elroy's. Elroy had pretty much
insisted on it, Brett admitted.

Steve told me later he was hesitant at first, mostly because we
hadn't put in any *real* practice on Sunday, so he asked Brett to
read him their song list. Since the band played all cover material
it would be pretty easy for Steve and me to brush up on the songs
before then. We were both still worried, though.

I was nervous as all heck. For one thing, I didn't know whether I
was going to be singing harmonies or lead on any of the songs. Steve
hadn't asked Brett about that when they had their conversation, and
I gave him a lot of grief over it.

"Em, I'm sorry, okay? I can't be any sorrier," Steve said.

'Well, you can just call Brett back and see whether we can get
together before Friday to find out."

"I don't have his number. He called me," he said sheepishly.

I was pretty pissed with Steve and he knew it, and he wisely made
himself scarce Tuesday night. Julia was out with Pete and Pris and I
had the house to ourselves. We prepared a light dinner together and
Pris even opened a bottle of wine. Over dinner I told her about the
session at Elroy's and the forthcoming gig, and she promised to come
along to offer some moral support.

After dinner the two of us sat on the couch and watched some
television while we finished the entire bottle of wine. I got up to
go to the bathroom and realized I was unsteady on my feet. "Cheap
drunk." I said, and we both giggled.

When I came back Pris was spread out on the couch, but she put her
feet down and sat up straight as I approached. When I sat down she
put her arm around me. At first I was kind of startled, but nothing
else happened. We sat there watching television, and I put my head
on her shoulder. It was pretty nice, if you want to know the truth
of it. I hadn't ever been that close to a woman who wasn't my
mother. When the movie finished she gave me a kiss goodnight on the
cheek and she went to bed.

By Thursday I was still anxious about Friday night, but I had given
up trying to stay pissed with Steve. Whatever it was he and Leon had
been getting up to during the days, Steve didn't have anything
planned that day, so I went over to his apartment and we made love
for most of the day, before he took me out to dinner that evening.
After I let him kiss me and begin to fondle my breasts I wasn't
angry with him at all.

Steve was kind of cagey about what he did when we weren't together,
but a large part of his time on the evenings he wasn't with me
seemed to be spent searching out music. He was very enthusiastic
about some of the stuff he had heard at little holes in the wall
here and there. Mississippi is the kind of place you can find some
startling blues in little cinder block shacks with no windows, he
said. "It's the real thing, Em. God, it makes you feel so alive.
Although they look at you awful funny if you're a white boy in
places like that," he added.

On Friday Pris and I went shopping in Oxford. I had one thing I
wanted to buy for Steve, and she said she wanted to do some window
shopping for other stuff. Our first stop was the music store
downtown. I had the money from the sale of the Malibu, and I wanted
to get Steve a guitar of his own. He could use Brett's Stratocaster
on stage most of the time, but I wanted to get him a good acoustic
guitar that he could play when we were together. Of course he could
use it on stage too, but I thought if it as a kind of intimate
present between us. The time we had spent playing and singing at
Brand was incredibly intimate, and I missed hearing Steve play when
we were alone together.

I didn't know much about guitars at all, but the guy who ran the
store was pretty helpful and surprisingly candid about his stock.
His name was Levon, and he told us he was pleased to have two pretty
girls in his store and he'd knock ten percent off right away if it
meant we'd be coming back in more often. Coming from anyone else
that might have sounded sleazy, but Levon was a wiry old guy with a
great smile and a good line in bad jokes and Pris and I laughed and
joked with him as he demonstrated various guitars to us. He was a
pretty mean guitar player himself.

I settled on a vintage Gibson 12 string that had a beautiful warm
sound. Levon sang its praises very loudly, complaining because
Gibson had stopped making 12 strings altogether. When he played it I
was sold. It was more expensive than a lot of the other guitars
there but I knew how much Steve needed a guitar and I wanted to get
something he would like. Anyway it wasn't even half as expensive as
some of the guitars there. I knew if we kept playing with the band
that Steve would have to get a really good guitar, and I guessed
some of the money from the Malibu should be set aside for that, too.

Levon made a couple of sweet remarks about my dedication to Steve
and said he'd like to hear the guy who was lucky enough to have
pretty girlfriends buying good guitars for him, and I blushed.
Because I'd let slip about being in a band Levon asked me about it,
and it turned out he knew Brett and Jim pretty well. I guess owning
the only music store in town meant he got to meet most local
musicians. We talked for a long time about the kind of music we
liked, and Levon had me try out another guitar myself and sing few
bars of one of the Neil Young songs I'd learned at Brand. He loved
my singing, which made me feel good. "Emma, I'll definitely be out
there to see you tonight."

The rest of the shopping trip with Pris was low-key, but fun.
Neither of us had any money to spend on clothes, so the rest of our
shopping was very different than the time I had been out with Julia,
but we had a good time all the same. Pris was a real down to earth
kind of girl. I started to think of her as a real friend.

When Friday evening came I didn't know what to wear. I tried on
about ten things and none of them seemed right. I still wasn't too
sure about what the right thing was to wear to any given occasion. I
said as much to Julia, and she reassured me. "Emma, every girl I
know spends forever thinking about what she's going to wear on a big
occasion, like a date or something."

We settled on a basic black shift dress. I thought maybe a dress was
going overboard for a place like Elroy's, but Pris said it made me
look more grown up than pants and a top. Anyway, it was a very
simple style, so it wasn't like I seemed overdressed or anything. I
was more worried about the shoes I was wearing, the black sling backs
that I'd bought on that first shopping trip with Julia. They only
had a two inch heel, but even that seemed like a lot to stand up in
all night.

Julia's boyfriend Pete offered to drive us all out to Elroy's in his
Microbus. We all got together an hour before it was time to leave,
and as we were walking out the door he pressed a small envelope into
my hand. Inside the bus I opened it. Inside was a driver's license
in the name of Emma Donaldson. It was hard to see how good it was by
the streetlights as we drove through Oxford, but it seemed like it
must have taken an awful lot of work, and I was very grateful to him.

Pete took me aside as I alighted from the van outside Elroy's. "That
was the best I could do, Emma."

"It looks great, Pete. Thanks." I looked across at Julia, who was
smiling, and then stretched up to give him a kiss. Pete seemed kind
of awkward about it, but I thought at the time that maybe that was
just because he had to bend over so I could reach his cheek.

"What was that all about?" Pris asked me as I walked over to where
she and Julia were standing. I suddenly thought that if Pris wasn't
in on my past I couldn't really explain fully what Pete had done for me.

"Fake ID," I said, hoping Pete had also changed the date on the
license -- I hadn't been able to see by the streetlights yet.

"Cool," Pris said, and she turned to Julia "Hey, if we get some
makeup on her, I bet we can take her out anywhere."

We went in through the back door to Elroy's, along a hallway and
into a small none-too-clean room that was reserved for whatever band
was performing. Bo called it a green room for reasons I didn't
understand at the time -- I found out later that's what television
people call backstage rooms where artists congregate before shows.
This one was painted pale blue and was barely big enough for ten
people to stand in, let alone sit. I had a feeling it had been a
storeroom in a former life.

As soon as we walked in -- make that squeezed in -- I could feel Bo
and Jim almost undressing me with their eyes, and I wished I had
worn pants instead of the dress. But Bo was smiling his gentle
relaxed smile and I knew that he was no threat to me, and Jim smiled
and turned away when I met his gaze so I knew I didn't have anything
to worry about from him tonight either. Besides, I could see their
eyes bug out when they saw Julia and I knew I wouldn't be foremost
on their minds.

Steve kissed me hello, and then Brett introduced Julia, Pete, Pris
and I to two guys I hadn't met before, Dave and Wendy. Wendy's real
name was Wendell, and he was maybe the least androgynous guy I'd
ever seen after Leon, but he didn't seem to mind being called that
so I didn't laugh. He wasn't as solid as Leon, but he was at least 2
inches taller. He reminded me of that actor who played the bad guy
in 'Urban Cowboy', Scott Glenn. He had a weather-beaten, craggy
looking face and a lean, tough looking physique. Wendy was going to
be mixing for us tonight, Brett explained, and Dave was going to sit
in for Rick on keyboards, since Rick had come down with the flu.
Jeff had opted out for the night, but apparently that wasn't unusual.

We all exchanged hellos and Steve introduced Julia and Pete and Pris
and Leon. I tugged at Steve's arm and pointed to the guitar case
that I'd placed beside the door as we came in. "What?" Steve said.
"Whose is that?"

"It's yours," I said.

He loved it. I knew he would. He was cross with me for spending the
money, but he knew I knew how much music meant to him. After he'd
taken it out of the case and played a little and retuned it and then
set it aside he grasped me to him and lifted me off my feet. "I love
you, Em," he said as he held my face level with his and kissed me. I
was giddy from the experience. He was so strong, and I felt so small
when he did that. He set me down again and we kissed the way we
normally did, with me on my toes reaching up to him. Then we
remembered we were in a crowded room and I blushed and we separated.
Everyone was smiling at us.

Pete and Julia and Pris and Leon excused themselves and went into
the bar to wait for our performance. Julia gave me a kiss for good
luck and Leon even gave me a little squeeze on the shoulder just
before he left.

In a sudden rush of panic I suddenly thought that the reason Pete
was embarrassed when I kissed him to say thanks was that he knew
about me. Julia must have told him something to get him to make me
up a fake ID, right? My face burned as I wondered what he must have
thought about me.

I opened my purse to retrieve the envelope Pete had pressed into my
hand and looked at the ID. Pete had given me a totally different
birthday. According to the license I was nineteen. That was odd --
it wouldn't get me a drink in any bars. The name on the license was
Emma Donaldson. He had changed my name, too.

Brett and Steve looked over the playlist and the guys discussed a
couple of things to do with ending a few songs. I looked it over and
saw, with relief, that I knew all the songs on it, and none of them
seemed very complicated. As I learned later, the Friday night
audience at Elroy's wasn't there to think too much -- basically they
wanted to dance, drink, and hopefully fuck when they got home. If
the music was good while any of that happened it was considered a bonus.

Then it was time to go on. No sound check, nothing. Brett reassured
me as we walked out that he and the guys had played here so often
that they didn't need to do sound checks, but I wasn't convinced. I
was worried about more than the music, though. Even though I had
begun to become used to people around Oxford treating me like a
girl, and I had even come to enjoy hanging out with Pris and Julia
as 'one of the girls', I was still terrified about appearing in
front of a bunch of total strangers in a dress.

The emptiness of the place reassured me. It was only 8.00pm, and
there were less than three dozen people in the place. None of them
paid us any attention at all as we walked up to the stage area. I
could see Julia, Pete and Pris standing over at the bar. Pete raised
his beer in a mock toast as a show of support. I smiled back,
nervously. If he knew about me then he sure was being a nice guy
about it. Julia gave me a "thumbs up" signal and Pris smiled.

Once on the small stage the guys plugged in their various
instruments and Brett and Steve plucked a couple of notes while Jim
ran through a bass riff and Bo thumped around on the drums once or
twice. I just stood there feeling awkward. Then Steve began to pick
out the opening notes and Brett stood up to the microphone and began
the first line of our set. "Ooh Las Vegas, ain't no place for a poor
boy like me..."

The first half of our performance that night wasn't a complete
debacle, but it was close. The reason we were terrible was pretty
obvious -- no practice. I started off singing harmonies, but Wendy
didn't have any proper levels for my voice, so it took him a couple
of songs to get that right, and he seemed to have trouble getting
the cheap desk to deliver enough of the vocals to stay above the
guitars. That was made doubly difficult because Steve and Brett were
supposed to be swapping off on guitar, but since they hadn't spent
enough time together the result was confusion, and the two of them
seemed to be playing over each other more than with one another. My
harmonies with Brett were terrible, too. A couple of songs on the
list seemed like they were 'girl' songs -- I don't exactly know how
to describe why I felt like that except to say that I was surprised
to hear Brett trying to do a slow number like 'Dark End of the
Street'. I thought when I saw a few of them on the list that it
meant that Brett wanted me to sing lead and he would do harmonies,
but instead he just sang right along the whole song. Whenever I
tried to harmonize above his voice on those songs he would just
follow me right along -- which sounded *disgusting*. We stunk up the
place unbelievably bad.

At least it wasn't too crowded. There was a feeble smattering of
applause after each song from a couple of people who were either
tone deaf or unbelievably polite.

We took a break after an hour or so and went backstage. Nobody said
anything at all. Steve and Jim went straight to the ice bucket in
the corner where Elroy had thoughtfully provided a couple of beers,
and we all sat down and looked around awkwardly at anything except
each other. Jim passed the beers around, and I went to the ice and
used some of it to wipe over my neck and shoulders. It was hot out
there. We didn't have much in the way of lights, but it was hot all
the same.

After about ten minutes Elroy came in. We all looked guiltily at the
floor as he walked over to the ice bucket and checked to see how
much beer was left. "I thought since you was all playing so loose
out there maybe you'd bin drinkin' more than you should," he said to
Brett.

We all continued to look at the floor. "Shoot," Elroy said. "This is
s'posed to be fun, you morons. T'aint nuclear physics. Anyone'd
think someone had died up there on that stage for all the fun you
looked like you were having."

"We should have practiced more," I said guiltily.

"That's as may be," Elroy said. "But it's too late for that now. God
save us, if you're gonna be that bad out there with your second set
maybe it'd be best if you just called it a night."

"We'll work it out, Elroy," Jim said. "We're just not used to
playing together. Me an' Steve, I mean. And Emma."

"I can see that," Elroy said. "So why don't you play what you know?"

"We don't know much. I mean, we haven't practiced much," Steve said.

"Well, I heard you play at least a dozen songs last Sunday. Y'all
seemed to enjoy yourselves then," Elroy responded. "Why don't you
just play those?"

"All of them?" Steve asked.

"All of 'em. That should fill up at least an hour set."

"But, you know, the other day we finished up with just Steve and
me," I said.

"Ain't nothin' wrong with that. Is there Bo?" Elroy said, looking
for some support.

Bo looked surprised. "Uh, no. No. Fine with me."

"Brett?" Elroy asked.

"Fine." He didn't seem too concerned, which surprised me since Elroy
seemed to be taking over his band.

I must have looked doubtful, because after looking at me for a few
moments Elroy sighed and asked Brett for a copy of the song list for
the second set. He studied it for a few moments, probably listening
to the songs in his head as he read them.

"Okay. Emma," he said. "I heard you do some Warren Zevon the other
day, that 'Mohammed's Radio' song. You know the words to 'Lawyers
Guns And Money'?"

I nodded.

"Well, y'all can make that your second-last song, after you 'n Steve
have done your quiet stuff. The boys here were playing it a couple
of weeks ago so they won't have any trouble with it, but it'll be
more interesting with you out front. Then you can close by singing
backup for Brett on 'Albuquerque'. You up for that?"

"I guess so," I said. "Brett, is that okay?"

I should have realized that Elroy really ran things around here, but
I felt bad about muscling in on Brett's status as the lead singer.
Having Brett sing lead on our final number seemed like a good idea.

"Sure thing, Emma," Brett said. He seemed genuine. "Heck, I'd much
rather listen to you sing than me, any time."

"That's settled, then," Elroy said firmly. "Shoot, Brett, when I
suggested you get Emma and Steve here to play with you I didn't mean
you should just tuck them away on the sidelines, okay?"

"Yeah, Elroy. I know."

"That's m'boy," Elroy said, clapping Brett on the back. Everyone was
all smiles now. Elroy cracked open one of the beers and passed it to
Bo before repeating the gesture with everyone else, and we all
downed the beer quickly to try to relieve whatever tension remained.

When we went back out I was surprised to see that the size of the
crowd had grown. The place wasn't anywhere near full, but all the
tables were taken and all of the bar was blocked up with guys
leaning against it.

"Well, at least most of these people weren't here for the last set,"
Brett mumbled as we walked out.

"With any luck they'll be drunk," Bo grunted.

We stepped up to the tiny stage and in a few moments Steve was
ringing out the opening notes of 'American Girl'. I stepped up to
the mic and let myself go. "She was an American girl, raised on
promises, she couldn't help thinking that there, was a little more
life somewhere else..."

After we'd ripped through about five songs we were all feeling
*much* better. We even got some pretty good applause. Steve and Bo
were grinning madly, and even Brett was smiling when he didn't have
his face screwed up thinking about what he was doing. Everything
came together, and suddenly Brett and I knew, just knew, who should
carry the main melody and who the harmonies, and we swapped off on
three more songs before Brett told me to take over completely. After
Julia and Pete made the first move a few other people had come up
front to dance, and I could see a couple of the guys at the bar
tapping their hands on the bar. Pris was over at the side near one
of the speakers, singing along with me on most of the songs, though
of course nobody could hear her above the racket we made.

Soon enough it was time for Steve and I to do 'our quiet stuff' as
Elroy had called it. Bo stayed behind to add some very light
percussion, but Brett and Rick headed over to the bar to get a beer.
Without the mad rush of all the guitars I felt kind of nervous
again, and I closed my eyes for a moment to block out everything
before I started singing one of the songs Steve had written when we
were in Brand together. Bo had heard it when we played it on Sunday,
and he laid down a sympathetic gentle brush.

The audience got really quiet and I tried to concentrate on what I
was doing instead of thinking about everything that was going on
around me. As I had on Sunday, I tried to think about the time Steve
had first played the song to me, and about the wild, unbelievable
sex after that, and the way his hands had felt as they ran over my
breasts...

We finished the song, and there was a horrible moment of silence.
They hated it. I thought the audience had hated it. But then they
erupted in applause and I opened my eyes and everyone was looking at
me like I was -- it's hard to explain what it's like when an
audience likes you, but when they *really* like you there's this
feeling you get that's not just about the applause and the noise and
all that. There's some mysterious connection between you and the
audience.

I looked across at Steve and he was still smiling. Before the
applause had even begun to die down he started the first few notes
of our second song together.

The rest of the set passed incredibly quickly. After Steve, Bo and I
had done some slow numbers Brett and Rick came back and we rocked
out with 'Lawyers Guns and Money' and a final slow, poignant version
of Neil Young's 'Albuquerque'. Then we were offstage and back in the
pale blue "green" room. The audience wouldn't stop. They kept
yelling and clapping and whistling, and after thirty seconds they
were still at it.

"Fuck, man, they want a freakin' *encore*," Bo said wonderingly. The
guys all stood looking at one another as though this was the first
time that had ever happened. I found out later it was only the
second in the whole time they'd been playing together.

"Let's do it!" Brett said, and we all walked back out to even more
applause.

"Hey, guys," Steve said. "Wanna do me a favor? Just follow me for a
moment."

They all looked at him dubiously, but when he started in on a
distinctive opening riff they all smiled and joined in. I just stood
there and smiled and danced, since there wasn't a lot for me to do
on such a ripped up version of 'Purple Haze', but Steve had the time
of his life. It was a really dumb song to play after all the rock
and country numbers we had played throughout the evening, but people
seemed to like the contrast and everyone was smiling.

Except for Steve, but he looked more interesting. Wow. He looked so
sexy up there with his face all scrunched up, looking like he did
sometimes when we made love face to face and I put my feet up on his
shoulders and he exploded inside me in a scary, lose-everything kind
of way. I looked over at Pris, and saw her grinning wildly. She
winked at me and looked back at Steve.

They finished 'Purple Haze' and the audience still wanted more. We
did the old Zombies song 'She's Not There' and they still cheered
for more even after we screwed it up pretty badly. We went into a
small huddle trying to figure out what we could do that we all knew.
Before the applause died down Brett made an off-the-wall suggestion
that everyone agreed to instantly, and so we closed the show with
the old Buddy Holly song "Well Alright." It was a good choice.

"Well alright so I've been foolish,

Well alright let people know

About the dreams and wishes you wish

All alone when the lights are low."

In the green room I hugged Steve, and then Bo and Brett and Rick as
well. We were all grinning our heads off. Elroy came back and he was
grinning from ear to ear too. "*That* was more like it," he yelled.
"Best dang Friday night we've had in years." I gave him a hug for
good measure. He seemed to like that.

After we had wound down with a beer we all went back into the bar.
The crowd had thinned out since we had stopped playing. Pris was
over at the side of the bar talking with a some people I didn't know
but who seemed to know her well. Leon was standing with Pete and
Julia, and Steve introduced them all to Elroy. A table over at the
side of the bar had become vacant and we all went to sit there. I'd
been standing up in these two inch heels for most of the night so I
was glad to rest my legs. Everyone made polite noises about our
performance, and Elroy got everyone a round of drinks, including me.

As the drinks arrived I whispered to Julia. "I have to talk to you!"
We excused ourselves to go to the ladies room.

"What is it?" Julia said as soon as we were inside.

I looked around to see whether anyone else was in the room. "You
told Pete about me?"

"No! No. Of course not!" Julia seemed offended.

"So why did he make me the ID?"

"Because I asked him to," Julia said. I had no doubt of Julia's
powers of persuasion, especially when used on a man. "He makes a lot
of IDs."

"So he doesn't know?"

"No. Why would he?"

"Well, why didn't he make me older?"

"Pardon?"

"I can't use this for ID in bars -- it says I'm only nineteen."

"We didn't think we could convince anyone you were twenty-one, Emma."

"What's the use of it, then?"

"Do you have any other ID at all?"

"Uh, no, I guess not."

"We thought it might be a good idea if you did."

That made sense. "Why did he change my name?"

"What's it say?"

I handed her the license and she looked it over in the dim light.
"Hmmm," she said. "I don't know the answer to that, you'll have to
ask him."

"Okay, sorry. I'm grateful and all, Julia. I was just kind of
freaked out that maybe you..."

"Emma... I'm not going to tell anyone."

"I know," I said, feeling guilty for having doubted her. "I'm sorry.
I'm just kind of nervous about tonight, I guess."

Back at the table Brett had joined in the conversation and I sat
down with Julia on one side of me and Steve on the other and all of
a sudden I felt really good about life. Here I was, with a good
friend and a great boyfriend and people seemed to like me. Life sure
had been a whole lot worse. Then Brett took Steve and me aside and
gave us each twelve dollars, which was our share of the Band's
earnings for the night. "Whoo hoo! We get paid!" Steve said to
Brett. "Man, I don't want to tell Elroy, but you know I'd do this
for free."

Pris came over to tell Julia and me that she was going to get a ride
with some friends, and Leon drove home with a girl he met and so
Steve and I got a lift back with Julia and Pete in the Microbus. The
night was bright and clear and we sat close in the back and looked
out at the stars. Steve had one hand on my breast and was lightly
stroking it most of the way home as he nuzzled my ear and the back
of my neck with his mouth. By the time we got there I was so aroused
I could barely wait for Pete and Julia to disappear into her room
before I threw myself at my man.

***

Chapter Twelve.

In the next few weeks we managed to fit in some practice every
Sunday so we had a more robust set of songs for the Friday night
gigs. At Brett's suggestion we started including more of Steve's
original stuff. "That's what really makes the audience go for us,
man," Brett said one day during practice. "Cover bands are
everywhere, you know, but if we have good original material it makes
us... special." We kept the quiet numbers Steve had written
especially for me, but Steve contributed a few hard rocking numbers
that needed the full band and he and Brett collaborated on a few
songs that had more of a pop feel. Brett was getting influenced by
some of the English music that was just beginning to become popular
-- stuff like the Buzzcocks and Nick Lowe. It made for an odd mix
with some of the looser, more blues tinged rock we played, but we
were certainly developing a distinctive sound.

When we had first begun playing together I was singing backup for
Brett, but now every new song we performed had me up front with the
guys backing me.

The second Friday night at Elroy's went better than the first, and
the following week Elroy arranged for us to do a Saturday night gig
at a bar down in Jackson. It meant we had to drive for hours to get
there, and Pete volunteered to take our gear in his Microbus with
Julia and Pris, who wanted to come along to see us play again. Wendy
and Rick took Wendy's near-new Ford pickup while Leon drove the rest
of us crammed into an old Chevy Biscayne he'd picked up somewhere.
"Did he steal it?" I whispered to Steve when I first saw the car.
Leon heard me and grinned and reassured me it was perfectly legal
even though he'd bought it in a false name. I wondered where he got
the money to buy it from, and then realized I probably didn't want
to know.

After a stop for gas on the trip down I swapped with Pris and rode
with Pete and Julia in the Microbus. I wanted to find out why he had
used a different name on the drivers license he had made for me. I
wasn't sure how to get around to asking about it, because I was
still afraid that he knew the real reason I needed the fake ID, but
Pete brought it up himself. We were listening to some really weird
music on his tape deck -- some of it was Frank Zappa and some was
Captain Beefheart -- and when I confessed that I had never heard
anything like it Pete started to tell me all this stuff about
alternative lifestyles. I didn't know what that had to do with Frank
Zappa, but Pete started off on a tear about his feelings about the
world, and about the need to subvert 'the system'. He said he was an
anarchist. I had that mixed up for a few moments with the
antichrist, and Pete laughed hysterically and said that in
Mississippi they might just as well be the same thing so far as most
of the population was concerned. He had to explain anarchy to me. I
thought it sounded kind of unworkable, but I kept my opinion to
myself. I wondered what Julia thought, but she wasn't venturing any
opinions.

I told Pete he looked like a pretty straight guy for an anarchist,
and he said that looking straight was just another way of messing
with people's expectations. "People expect artists to look wild," he
said, "so where's the fun in that? I'm thinking of getting back to
button down collars and buzz cuts to really make a statement. You
know, the astronaut look. The artist as astronaut." He mused on that
a while as Frank Zappa sang a song about molesting young girls.

Eventually Pete got around to the subject of fake ID's, and said
that he did them to help screw with the system. "Yours is a beauty,"
he said. "It's fake, but it's real." I asked him what he meant and
he said he had taken the name from a dead girl, "just about the only
other Emma I ever came across, I reckon." I told him I felt kind of
weird, using the name and license of a dead girl, but he said it was
only the name and details he had used -- the license was something
he had whipped up. "I like to think of all this the way Dali did,"
he said. "He goes around signing his name on all the forgeries of
his work, so that no-one can tell the forgeries from the real thing,
and all the dealers get confused. This is just IDs, but I figure if
everyone has multiple IDs then it's harder for the system to put us
all in neat little holes."

Pete was a stranger guy than I had imagined, and I wondered what
Julia saw in him apart from his good looks. She laughed, and seemed
to treat his ideas as some kind of entertainment. Maybe she liked
him because he represented everything her Dad was against. Who
knows? It seemed clear from our discussions, though, that he had no
idea about my past, and he didn't seem especially interested. That
was cool with me.

When we got to Jackson we did a sound check. While we were setting
up Brett said we had to think of a name for the band. That was
*hard*. 'The House Band at Elroy's' wasn't going to cut it in
Jackson. The guys all started throwing out really asinine
suggestions that sounded more like names for jet fighters than rock
bands, and I gave each of them the withering raspberry they
deserved, until that became more annoying than the dumb names they
were coming up with. Brett tried variations on the name 'House',
none of which were too successful. Bo was being kind of sweet and
suggested that since I was such a big draw with the crowds the name
should have something to do with me. Blondie was just beginning to
break on the US charts and he was searching for something to do with
my hair. Somehow red hair didn't quite lend itself to appropriation
as easily. Jim suggested Red House, as a kind of combination of the
two ideas. At that moment a fire truck passed on the street, and
Brett and Bo said simultaneously "Firehouse". Everyone mulled it
over and agreed it had the right kind of ring to it.

The Jackson show went well -- the audience loved us and we were
approached after the show by a guy who said he was a writer working
for Billboard. We started buying the magazine after that but didn't
see anything about the show or about Firehouse. Maybe he was a
bullshit artist.

It wasn't until we'd been playing a few weeks that I figured it was
much more sensible to choose one or two outfits just for playing,
and keep my other clothes separate. Spending that much time in smoky
bars, under hot lights, meant that I had to wash the clothes I wore
on stage every day, and the constant washing took its toll on them.
My main outfit became a pair of jeans, a black halter top covered in
shiny black beads and a black suede jacket, although the jacket came
off pretty quick after the first two or three numbers. At first I
was kind of reluctant to wear the halter top, because I couldn't
wear a bra with it, but Julia talked me into it. "Em, honey, you
sure as heck get their attention in that!"

"I don't want them looking at my tits, I want them to be paying
attention to the music," I said irritably. I had been getting
irritable a lot in the past few weeks, for no good reason.

"We'll they'll be listening, too, but it doesn't hurt to be a hot
looking singer," she smiled.

I looked at myself in the halter and I had to admit I didn't look
too bad, really. Even though my breasts weren't huge, the top
brought them together with quite a lot of cleavage and the shiny
black beads shimmered as I moved. The beads helped, I decided. You
couldn't see my nipples under them. It was going to need to be
hand washed after every performance, though.

"I feel kind of naked wearing it," I said. "But I guess I feel kind
of naked on stage all the time, so what the heck."

Steve loved it, of course. He loved anything that showed my breasts off.

***

I missed Cee. I guess we had gotten much closer at Brand than I had
realized, and although I couldn't stand him at first we had become
very firm friends after Pangianis had dumped him. There was stuff we
could talk about when we were together that I couldn't tell *anyone*
else, not even Steve. I had no way of knowing if he had made it to
California, or if I'd ever see him again. I still had the names of
his friends in Memphis, though.

After we played Jackson Leon told Steve he thought he'd better be
moving on, too. Steve was disappointed, because he and Leon had been
close for a long time, but Leon didn't really fit in around Oxford
and he needed to find a way to make some money soon.

In the meantime the shows at Elroy's kept getting better and better,
and the crowds got bigger and more enthusiastic. Julia was right
about guys wanting to see me. Brett and Steve and Jim developed
little fan clubs of women who hung around after the shows wanting to
talk to them (poor Bo and Rick and Jeff didn't get much attention),
but I was slowly becoming the big draw card so far as our
performance went, even if I do say so myself. It was most evident in
our quieter numbers, which were pretty intense. The amazing thing
was that nobody, I mean nobody, thought of talking while I was
singing those quiet songs. You have to know the Mississippi bar
scene to know how unusual that was. People stopped and paid
attention. It was scary, but I have to admit I liked it.

Guys occasionally tried to hit on me after shows, and so I took to
being more open about my relationship with Steve while I was on
stage, to try to give them the hint. Oddly enough that didn't deter
the guys, but several women commented that they thought our act was
wonderful because it was obvious the two of us were in love and they
thought that made the passion in the songs come through more strongly.

It might have been obvious to them but I was starting to get worried
about Steve. He seemed distant several times when we went out
together in the evenings, and one evening he was an hour late. I
didn't want to intrude into his life too much, but I worried about
whatever it was that he was doing during the day. One evening after
we had made love I tried to ask him what was going on, but he shied
away from the subject.

It wasn't money that was bothering him; at least it didn't seem to
be. We didn't make much from the gigs at Elroy's after the band's
money was split six ways, but Steve always seemed to have cash
whenever we went out. I figured Julia was slipping him a share of
the allowance she got from their parents. Then again, when I asked
Steve when he could get another place so that the two of us could
live together he told me he couldn't afford it yet, and I had to be
patient a while longer. Elroy offered me a job cleaning the bar a
couple of days a week while the guy who usually did it was off with
a broken leg and after I sorted out a lift over there, with one of
Brett's linesman friends who went to Tupelo three times a week, I
got a little cash from the cleaning to help us by too.

For a brief time I worried that perhaps Steve had met another woman
and that was the reason for his occasional moods with me. After all,
I thought to myself, when we had first begun being intimate I was
the nearest thing to a girl around. Now he was surrounded by women,
why would he settle for me?

Every time I got really concerned about him and began to think that
things might be over Steve would bounce back cheerfully and my fears
would be assuaged. When he was feeling good he lavished attention on
me, and praise, too. The one time I mentioned my fears about not
being enough for him any more he put his finger to my lips to stop
me speaking. "Emma, you are the most beautiful woman I have ever
met. Ever," he said. "There won't ever be anyone else."

How I wanted to believe him.

***

After one of our practice jams on a Sunday Elroy and I were sitting
at the bar and he was joking about our performance, which had been
sloppy. The guys were packing away the gear. Elroy suddenly turned
serious and started talking to me about a career in music. "Em, you
have a great voice, and you're getting better and better at using it."

"Thanks."

"You've really turned Brett and the boys around."

"Well, I don't think it was just me. I just sing, you know?"

"Steve is great with a guitar. There's no doubt about that. But
these guys are just good ol' boys who like music. They needed
someone to get behind to become a band."

"Maybe."

"I know what I'm talking about, Emma. This band is really happening
now. I think we can book you on a road tour."

"Don't you want us to play here?"

"Emma honey, I'll be the happiest man in the world each time you
grace the stage here, you know that. But you have talent, girl. You
were a hit down in Jackson, and you need to be playing lots of
places. You guys could go places."

"Thanks for getting us the Jackson thing."

"My pleasure. I wish I could get you more, you know. Management's
not really my thing, though. Y'all need someone with more contacts.
If you're interested I'll see what I can do."

"Elroy, thanks for everything." I leaned over and gave him a kiss on
the cheek. "Really. I still can't believe people want to pay to let
us do this."

"Emma, honey, you have no idea of how much people will pay when they
realize how good you are. Just try to keep ol' Elroy in mind when
you're rich and famous, okay?"

The guys bought their girlfriends and wives to our performance the
following Friday, which was a rare thing. Each of our shows was more
popular than the last, and people were jammed out into the parking
lot out front trying to get in. The police showed up around eight,
before we went on, and Elroy had to go out front and pacify them
because it was illegal for people to be drinking outside the
premises but there was no way they could all fit inside.

Fortunately the police never came inside, and we didn't know they'd
been in the parking lot until after they left. Steve went white when
it was mentioned later, and I wondered what would have happened if
they had come into the "green" room while we were there. Were they
still looking for us in Oxford?

After the show Elroy brought a young guy back to the green room, and
introduced him as Ray Curran. He was short and weedy looking and
wearing a black suit jacket over a t-shirt and a pair of jeans. He
didn't look like much at all, but Elroy clapped him on the back and
said to us "I want y'all to listen to what Ray has to say. He's done
a power of good for a lot of people in this business, and I think
y'all will be interested in his ideas."

I didn't pay as much attention to Ray as I should have, because I
was concerned about Elroy. There was something bothering him that he
was trying to suppress. I wondered whether it was something to do
with the cops. He caught me looking at him and he averted his eyes
and I made a note to myself to talk to him soon.

Ray began haltingly to describe some of the bands he had worked
with. None of the names meant much to me but I could see Brett and
Steve and the boys recognized them. He told us he liked the show
he'd just seen. "Do you have more original material?"

"We've been working on it," Brett said. "Steve'n'me have a few new
songs we haven't worked into the sets yet."

"Well, if you think you can include more original material and fewer
covers, I'd like to see about booking you guys a few places. If
that's alright with you."

We all retreated to the bar, and over beers Ray outlined what he
thought he could offer us if he was our manager. It all sounded
great, but somehow I couldn't get myself enthused. I listened to Ray
talking about taking us on the road, and into the studio, and it all
sounded like -- it sounded like some of the stories I had heard at
Brand, the kind of stories the guys told one another about what they
were going to do when they got out. I could see Lisa and some of the
other girlfriends were taking Roy with a grain of salt too.

Eventually I excused myself from the table and went over to Elroy's
office, where he was counting the night's takings. "Elroy?"

He looked up from the cash. "Yes, Emma?"

"I guess since you introduced him to us that you think Ray is okay,
huh?"

He smiled. "I guess so."

"He seems to think we're going to be the next big thing."

"Welcome to the music business, honey. All managers say stuff like
that. Heck, I got promised a number one record by my manager back
when I was Steve's age."

"Really? What happened?"

"What happened is I can't sing. Never could. Seemed like a minor
impediment to my manager."

"Elroy?"

"Hmmm?"

"Do we need a manager? I mean, can't we just keep playing here?"

"Sure you can, Em. If that's what you want, I'm honored. And I've
gotta say, business is booming thanks to you guys. I make more on a
Friday now than on Saturday, and I have some big names playing here
Saturdays. I think you can do better than this place, though."

We had a another drink together and Elroy turned all sentimental on
me, and then, as our conversation progressed, almost moody. I asked
him what was wrong and at first he was reticent.

"Is it something to do with the cops who were here earlier?"

"The cops? No, Emma, nothing like that. Those guys are alright."

Elroy could see I was still curious about what was bothering him,
and he sighed deeply and then opened the drawer to his desk and
retrieved a photograph. In the photograph a younger Elroy, sans
scar, was standing with his arm around a petite blonde woman. A
red-haired girl about ten years old stood in front of them. It was
clearly a family portrait.

"Eight years ago today," Elroy said. "It's not your fault, Emma, but
sometimes you remind me a lot of her, and since she would have been
around your age by now... sometimes I look at you and..." He shook
his head sadly.

"I'm sorry, Elroy." I walked over beside his chair and put my hand
on his shoulder. He put his own hand up to grasp mine and hold it to
him and we stayed like that for a good ten minutes before I bent
down and kissed him on the cheek and went back out to join Steve and
the boys while he resumed counting the money.

When I got back to the table Ray had left, and the guys were
discussing his ideas heatedly. Brett and Bo obviously thought he was
great, Jim, Rick and Jeff weren't so sure. As usual, Steve was
holding back from talking until everyone else had their say. The
heart of the discussion was whether or not everyone wanted to get
serious about the band. Brett and Bo were all for total commitment.
Lisa wasn't sure how Brett could fit in his job and more time with
the band, and the other girlfriends echoed her thoughts. Jim kept
repeating that he had a family to support, and Rick, after seeing
his girlfriend Jenny's reaction, said over and over that there was
no way he was giving up his day job. Jim and Rick were both adamant
that the band was fine as it was, that playing Friday nights at
Elroy's was as far into the music business as they wanted to get.
Unstated in their objections to taking on more gigs was the idea
that Steve and I had somehow hijacked the band when Elroy got us to
join -- but even though it was never said aloud the sentiment was
definitely lurking beneath the surface of the discussion. I'm sure
it was a big influence on Jeff.

Elroy closed the place up and gave us our share of the take and we
continued the discussion in the green room, without the wives and
girlfriends, as we began to stow away the gear. Eventually Steve
spoke up with a compromise. Over the next few months Ray would book
us occasional gigs, no more than a half-day's drive away. If they
worked well we could think about doing a road trip for a couple of
weeks after that, and see whether or not we had any appeal to
audiences beyond the Ole Miss frat crowd. Brett, Jim and Rick all
had holidays due from work, and Bo, Steve and I were currently
unemployed. If the others could be convinced to take their holidays
in the same two week period we could spend it on the road as part of
a test to see how viable a full-time commitment to music could be.

Jeff said no right away. He thought the band was headed in the wrong
direction, and he thought it was probably time for him to go his own
way if this was what everyone wanted to do. I felt a little sympathy
for him when nobody tried to persuade him to stay, but then he'd
never played big part in the band and he missed most of our practice
sessions.

I was surprised when Jim and Rick agreed to the plan, but I think
maybe Jeff leaving crystallized things in their minds. This wasn't
going to be like Brett's old gang just hanging out at Elroy's. Ray
was going to try to take us to a wider audience, and it seemed all
of a sudden like an all-or-nothing proposition. There was always the
chance to go back to the way things were, but would we know whether
we were really up to it unless we tried?

After the gear was packed away everyone gathered outside the front
door and the deal was done. It was a trial arrangement for six
months. Over the next few weeks we would play gigs in the major
cities within three or four hours drive, and then if that worked out
in about four months we would go on a road trip for two weeks, with
Brett, Jim and Rick taking leave from their jobs. Before then Steve
and Brett would finish a few more songs they were working on and Ray
would get us some studio time. Ray would get paid ten percent of
whatever we earned, but we would have to pay for posters and the
studio and all the costs of going on the road.

If the whole thing was a miserable failure after the first few gigs
we would ditch Ray and come back to Elroy's every Friday night. We
would still play there anyway, except for our time away on the road
trip.

All the guys shook hands on it. I noticed Lisa and Jenny, Rick's
girlfriend, looked unhappy about the arrangement, but I suppose they
were mollified by the fact that it was all a trial. We said our
goodnights and Steve and I got into the car with Leon to drive home.
Just as Leon started the engine I remembered something I had to do,
and I asked them to wait. I ran back inside through the back door,
and found Elroy still sitting in the office. He still had the
photograph of his family on the desk. He looked surprised to see me,
and stood up. "What's up, Em?" he asked. I didn't say anything, but
I went up to him and hugged him tightly. When I finished the hug I
made him bend down, and then I kissed him on the cheek.

"I know nothing's going to bring them back, Elroy, but if it's any
consolation, there's still a lot of people who love you," I said.

He looked at me and I could see him fight back a tear. I stretched
up to kiss him on the cheek again and then went out to the waiting
car to go back to Julia's.

***

True to his word, Ray organized us a gig in Memphis for two weeks
time, in a big place, with second billing. Getting any sort of
billing at all seemed like a bit of a coup, since we were unknown in
Memphis, although I found out later that we got the slot because
another band backed out late.

Ray also booked us some studio time. Brett and Steve had spent a lot
of their free time writing, and Steve and I worked on two songs
together as well. I liked working on songs with Steve. It reminded
me of our time at Brand together, and although I had hated being at
Brand I thought of that period as the one in which Steve and I had
been closest.

Julia was spending a lot of time with Pete, and so there were quite
a few nights when Pris and I had the apartment to ourselves. I was
getting to like Pris more and more. We did lots of dumb stuff
together, like listening to really sad songs and crying our eyes
out, and telling each other scary stories late at night and doing
stupid quizzes in Cosmo. When I mentioned one night that I had never
had much practice dancing, Pris and I practiced for hours and hours.

Pris started teaching me to cook, too. After just a couple of nights
I took on most of the cooking duties. I liked it. It made me feel
like I was at least partially giving something back to Julia and
Pris for having me there.

Steve's moodiness increased in frequency, and a couple of nights he
never even called to let me know what was going on. I called him a
lot, and it seemed to me at one point that I was the one doing all
the work in the relationship. But the next time I saw him he
reassured me that he loved me, and apologized for neglecting me.
"There's just some stuff going on," he said. He wouldn't elaborate.
I didn't really understand it since we had lived together for years
at Brand and he hadn't been at all moody then, but I didn't push the
matter. Then, the very next night when he had said he would call to
arrange to take me to dinner, I didn't hear anything from him at
all. I called his place at 7.00pm and there was no-one home. At
first I was worried, but then I just became pissed at him. He'd been
all talk, lately. We hadn't even been having sex as often as we used to.

I was angry and sad and I just wanted to mope around the apartment,
but Pris dragged me along to a party that one of the fraternities
was having. I was reticent about going, because I hadn't mentioned
it to Steve and I hadn't been out a lot socially without him, but
Pris said if I wouldn't go with her she wouldn't go at all. So I
gave in. She helped me do my makeup, and the way it worked out she
said it looked like I was older. I wore a coffee-colored silk blouse
and a black skirt and Pris lent me some jewelry.

At first I was intimidated at the party. It was being held in the
garden of the Frat house, and there was a live band as well as a DJ
to cater to the disco crowd. Everyone else there seemed very
sophisticated -- well, except for the guys on the football team, who
lived up to the stories I had heard Julia and Pris tell. Most of the
people there seemed like they came from well-to-do families, and all
the women were much better dressed than I would have expected
college students to be. They weren't dressed up, but you could tell
their clothes were expensive.

Pris hung close by me for an hour or so but eventually we got
separated and I found myself hemmed in almost immediately by a cute
guy named Wiley who had a voice just like Steve's and a smooth
southern accent to match Steve's too. Wiley was even taller than
Steve, and had dark hair, and although he wasn't quite as good
looking as Steve his manner suggested gentleness and courtesy even
though his eyes suggested he'd like to undress me. I was getting
used to guys looking at me like that, and I liked him in spite of
it. Early in our conversation I dropped the hint that I was attached
to another guy, but that didn't faze Wiley at all. "Is he here?" he
asked, and when I admitted Steve wasn't he simply said "Dumb guy,
letting such a beautiful girl out alone."

We danced, and I drank way too much of the sweet-tasting and very
alcoholic stuff they were calling 'punch' that night. I didn't think
much of the band, and I told Wiley so. He seemed to find that very
amusing. After one long slow close dance Wiley guided me off to a
dark corner of the garden. Uh oh, I thought. I was drunk as can be,
and he knew it, but he was a perfect gentleman. There was a brick
retaining wall there about four feet high, and he picked me up
around my waist and sat me on it so our faces were almost level.
"There, that's better," he said. "You have a pretty face, Emma, but
you are a tiny little thing, aren't you?"

"I'm not that short," I protested. "It's just that you're enormous.
Are you on the basketball team?" I asked. He was definitely tall enough.

He shook his head. "Football."

"I've been warned about guys like you," I said.

He smiled. "Emma, I'm sure everything you've heard is true. But I'm
more interested in hearing about you."

I blushed. I hadn't had much experience with guys apart from Steve.
It was strange to be getting this attention. I felt guilty, as
though I was somehow betraying Steve just by talking to Wiley, but I
liked being with him, and I liked the way he looked at me.

I made up some stuff about having come to Oxford to visit a friend.
That was sort of true. I didn't mention she was my boyfriend's
sister. I told Wiley about "Firehouse" and then he understood my
criticism of the band at the party -- he had smiled because
according to his friend the band at the party was just a bunch of
frat boys who got together to play,, and Wiley thought they sucked
too. "Maybe they can book your band to play next time," he smiled.
"I sure would like to hear you sing, Emma."

I wasn't very comfortable talking about myself and so I steered the
conversation toward Wiley. He was studying engineering in Atlanta,
following in his father's footsteps to take over the family
business. He had come to Oxford with a friend, just for the ride,
and was headed home in three days time. From his comments I gathered
that his family had money, but he wasn't boastful about it. The more
I listened to him talk the more I liked him. He was softly-spoken
and courteous and not at all like I'd imagined from the stories Pris
and Julia had told me about football players. Maybe Atlanta football
players were better than Mississippi ones, I thought.

"What are you studying?" Wiley asked.

I was embarrassed, and it must have showed. "I haven't had a whole
lot of school, Wiley" I said.

He seemed surprised, but it didn't diminish his interest in me.
"Why's that, Emma? You seem smart enough."

"Family stuff. You don't really want to know."

"Yeah, I do."

"No, you don't," I said firmly. He didn't push the issue. Instead he
asked me about the music I liked. It turned out we had similar
tastes. I wouldn't have picked him for a fan of women
singer-songwriters. Somehow that didn't go together in my head with
the stuff that football players were supposed to like. Wiley sure
was an interesting set of puzzles.

At around 1.00am Pris reappeared to tell me she was heading home.
After all the alcohol I'd consumed I was almost tempted to tell her
to go on ahead, since I was having such a good time with Wiley, and
I briefly toyed with the idea of doing something to make Steve
jealous, but that wouldn't have been fair to either Steve or Wiley.

As I began to say goodbye to Wiley, Pris walked back into the house
to give us some space. I reminded myself through the fog of alcohol
that there was no point encouraging Wiley anyway. What would he have
thought if he knew the truth about me? Encouraging him might lead to
some unpleasantness for both of us. Anyway, he was only in town for
a couple of days.

Good sense prevailed, but he must have noticed my change in mood as
I reminded myself I wasn't enough of a woman for a guy like him.
"Hey, Emma, what's wrong?" he asked.

"'S nothing," I said. "I'm okay. Too much to drink, I think."

"Want me to take you home instead?"

"No, Pris is ready to go, and ... I don't think it would be right,
Wiley."

"You're kind of old fashioned, aren't you?"

"No! I just..."

"It's okay, Emma. I like it. So many girls I meet, you know,
they're..." He evidently thought better of trashing the other women
in his life. "Could I call you sometime, Emma?" Wiley asked.

"Wiley," I said gently, "I did tell you there was someone else."

"Yes, Emma, but I'm a persistent guy, And you're the most beautiful
girl I've ever seen" He smiled.

I blushed. I had to admit I liked Wiley, and he made me feel
wonderful. "I'm flattered, but no, thank you."

"But I'm only here for a few days."

"All the more reason to say no," I smiled.

"I'm also not very smart when it comes to women," he said jokingly.

I didn't believe that for a moment, but I nodded. "You need to
concentrate on the available ones."

He smiled, and scribbled his own number on a scrap of paper. "If you
ever change your mind, Emma... You should come to Atlanta some time."

I accepted the paper and smiled back, then went to find Pris.

When we got back Julia was already home, asleep. Pris and I tiptoed
around the apartment, trying to be quiet until I tripped over one of
Julia's shoes and knocked over a chair. "OOoow!" I hissed, and Pris
cracked up. I hit my shin on the chair as I knocked it and I hopped
around until Pris led me over to the couch. "A little too much
punch." I muttered.

"Are you okay?" Pris put her arm around me and guided me down to
sit. She was still laughing.

"'S not funny," I grumbled.

"I'm sorry," she cackled. "It *looked* funny."

The two of us collapsed back onto the couch. Pris kept her arm
around me. It felt good.

"He's such a bastard, Pris," I said.

"Ah, but he's a handsome bastard, Em. And you do love him, I know that."

"I thought of going home with Wiley tonight, just to teach him a
lesson."

"Well, you made the right choice."

"Pris?"

"Yes, Em?"

"How come you didn't go home with anyone?"

"Pardon?"

I was drunk enough to be rude. "You're a good looking girl, and that
guy I saw you talking to tonight seemed keen enough. You saving
yourself for marriage?"

Pris smiled. "Just haven't met the right person, I guess." She
reflected for a moment. "Or the people I'm interested in are the
wrong people." She mussed my hair. "Stand up and we'll get the bed out."

We dragged the bed out and made it. I had a lot of trouble with the
bedding because the alcohol was really getting to me. As we finished
I stumbled again and Pris grabbed my arm to steady me. "Thanks," I
said, and I hugged her. She felt good. She was so soft, so different
to hugging Steve, and she smelled good, too. Not better than Steve,
just very different. I took a half step back and looked up at her.
She smiled down at me. My thoughts were kind of confused, but I
can't pretend I didn't know what was happening. I hugged her again,
then lifted my head and kissed her on the cheek. She went to
disengage but instead I guided her head with my hand and kissed her
on the lips instead. She kissed me back. It was lovely. She tasted
sweet and clean, and although it felt very different than anything I
had ever felt before I enjoyed it.

Pris broke the kiss off before I did. "You're drunk," she said.

"Yes," I said evenly. "Guilty. So what?"

She looked at me uncertainly and kissed me again. I liked it a lot.

I don't want to sound like a total idiot, but as all of this went on
I was behaving like one. Honestly, it sounds unbelievable, but over
the weeks I had been living with Pris and Julia I had started to
think of myself as a girl. Apart from the times that I felt
inadequate with Steve, I never thought about myself in a guy way,
and since I never had any erections any more the way my genitals
looked didn't mean much to me. In the alcohol and the excitement, I
honestly had forgotten that I had anything to hide from Pris. When
she kissed me again, my brain suddenly started working and I
realized what would happen if all these nice things continued.

I sat down on the bed abruptly, and she sat down next to me. "Are
you okay?" she asked.

"Yes. I'm just not very smart."

Pris seemed confused. "Emma, I --"

I hugged her again. "Pris, you're great. I really like you. I'm
sorry I kissed you."

"Well, I'm not," Pris said. "I enjoyed it, if you want to know the
truth."

"So did I," I said. "But I need to think about... things. Is that
alright?" I straightened up and looked her in the eye.

"Of course," she said, as she pushed my hair back from my face.
"It's okay, Emma. You don't have anything to be worried about." She
clasped my hand in hers.

"Thanks, Pris."

"Sometime when you're not drunk maybe we should have a talk."

"Okay"

"In the meantime you *are* drunk, so what say we put you to bed,
huh?" She smiled.

"Okay. I need to pee first, okay?"

I went off to the bathroom and stripped off and changed after I'd
peed and brushed my teeth. I was pretty unsteady on my feet. I put
on a large football top that Julia had given to me a few weeks
earlier to use as a nightgown and went back to the living room. Pris
helped me into the bed and then tucked me in, and bent down to kiss
me goodnight, on the lips. I wriggled in the bed. I liked it. She
broke off with a grin. "Well then, Miss Sobriety, I'll see you in
the morning."

She left and turned out the light, and I felt the room spin a few
times before I got to sleep that night.

Steve came over early the next day and was bright and charming and
tried to get me to go out with him. I was dark and surly and
hungover and said no. Pris was terrific, and let everything that had
happened the night before pass without comment. It took the rest of
the day before I felt well enough to leave the apartment, and
fortunately Steve was still in good form that evening. We had dinner
in a little cafe, and made love in the apartment while Pris and
Julia were out with friends.

The next evening I managed to get Julia and Pris together to discuss
something that had been bothering me. We sat around the table with a
pot of tea I had made. "I need to get another place to live," I
began tentatively as I poured for the three of us.

"Why?" Julia asked.

"Well... doesn't it bug you that your living room is a bedroom now?"

"Nope," Julia said. "Not at all. I won't pre-empt whatever Pris
wants to say, but I like having you here."

"But you must want to be able to use the space, you know, as a
living room."

"Not really, Emma. If I want to be alone with Pete I'll go to his
place."

"What about you, Pris?" I asked.

"Emma honey, you're no imposition at all. Hell, I'd be offended if
you left us."

"But..."

"Do you want more privacy?" Julia asked me. "Is it too difficult for
you this way?"

"No, no, that's not it. You guys are great, you know that."

"Emma," Pris said seriously. "We like having you around. If you want
a room of your own maybe we should all look for a bigger place."

"No. I'm sorry. I just thought --"

"-- Is it because you want to live with Steve?" Julia asked. "You
know, Emma, we discussed that, and it's really --"

"-- No. Yes. Maybe that's part of it, but it's not most of it. I
guess I just feel guilty. You guys have been so good to me."

"I think we've gotten a lot more than we've given," Pris said.

"Yeah," Julia smiled. "Where else could I find such a cool little
sister."

I was momentarily overcome, and had to blink back some tears. These
women were so good to me. "I'm not sure I deserve all this," I said
hesitantly. Then the tears did flow. Julia reached across to take my
hand. I tried to smile through the tears but I couldn't cope with
the idea that there were people other than Steve who really did like
having me around. I hadn't had a woman in my life that I could talk
to since Mom, and I realized as I cried that it meant so much to me
to be accepted by other women now.

"Well, that's settled I think, Julia," Pris said as she stood up.
"We need to get a place with space for the three of us," Pris said.

She walked around behind my chair and began to rub my shoulders.
"Ooh, honey, you need to relax. Don't you go getting in a knot
worrying about what might offend Julia and me. We'll tell you if
you're bugging us, don't you worry about that.

"In the meantime, you *are* a part of this household and I won't
hear any more talk about you leaving because of us. If you ever want
to leave it should be because you want to for yourself, not because
you think you're some stupid inconvenience."

I looked up over my shoulder at her. It didn't feel right that she
was so good to me and she didn't even know I wasn't really a girl.
But it didn't seem like the right time to go into that. I dried my
eyes and stood and hugged her, and then Julia, and no more was said
about me moving out.

(continued)

Distribution: Feel free to archive or otherwise distribute, provided
it (and this preamble) is unedited and no fee is charged for access.
This story may not be distributed from any site that charges money,
is members-only, or uses that ridiculous "adult check" thing (or any
similar system).