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Authors: Jim Bernheimer
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hitters out there. Get on her good side and you’ll never want for steady work.”
“That sounds like a really good name to know,” I said, filing it away in my mental rolodex.
• • •
Time passed. Despite Kenneth’s tutoring, I wasn’t very good at martial arts. I’d say that I was a lover and not a fighter, but I really wasn’t much of a lover either. The meditation was nice though, I’d never done much of that before. I always used to study with loud music on. Growing up, there were dueling garage bands on my block; and in my late teens, I took up the drums and contributed to the noise pollution. Until my studies started taking up too much of my time, I played in a couple of cover bands during college.
Once I joined the real world, I never really had time for it anymore. Now, I had lots of spare time and they had a beat up drum kit in the rec room. It was something to do.
Kenneth listened to me do the drum solo from Golden Earring’s Radar Love , which always helped me blow off some steam. “You’re not half bad, Calvin.”
“I’m still shaking off the rust. It might be my only shot at real employment when I get out of here. Most bands would be willing to overlook a felony conviction. Their only real requirement is the ability to play. Of course, most bands treat their drummer like they’re part of the road crew. For some, it would probably be a draw— Our drummer’s a supervillain! How wicked is that? ”
“Veritably,” he replied, always willing to use a five cent word when a two cent would do.
“You know I could teach you to play. You could make a cover band with your fungus creatures and be a Stones cover band.”
He laughed and said, “I suppose I could call it Moss on Rolling Stones.”
“See, now you’re getting the idea!” If I had his powers, I’d be looking for a way to cash in on them without ending up in prison. It would definitely have gotten me on Letterman’s Stupid Superhuman Tricks Segment.
“How long have you been waiting to use that, Calvin?”
“A few days now,” I admitted.
“I suspected that much. Still, even though I’d enjoy being a sideshow, novelty act, I’m afraid I have enough hobbies as it is, without taking up another.”
Smiling, I started into Bob Seger’s Still the Same , which lacks something when there isn’t a piano playing. The last band I played in had a guy who sounded a bit like the man from Detroit and we covered a whole bunch of his songs. We called ourselves The Silver Blanks instead of his Silver Bullet Band.
Despite my requests, we never did Biz Markie.
As I played, he made a pair of miniature moss soldiers and had them doing some kind of waltz, as I cut into Seger’s version of Little Drummer Boy , while wondering if The Gardener had to learn the female steps too in order to make his constructs perform.
Kenneth wasn’t our only Eurotrash. We had a Frenchman, whom everyone avoided, named Simple Simone. He had this annoying field of mental energy around him that made it difficult to concentrate. When he focused it on someone, they’d turn into a gibbering idiot until he stopped.
As bad as the bleached smell of my prison cell was, I’d still take The Gardener over that guy any day.
“From the amount of energy you’re expending, I take it you didn’t receive good news from home?”
“Dad finally wrote back to basically tell me to stop writing them.”
“I assume that you intend to keep writing them?” he asked.
“Every stinking day now! At least until I get a fan club like yours.”
It was true; Kenneth had good looks and an English accent going for him and got a ton of women writing him. I’d never understand it.
“True,” he replied. “I had two marriage proposals last month. Things always pick up around the holidays.”
“The brunette with the fuzzy dice tattoos looked like a keeper.”
He shrugged and made a dismissive gesture while saying, “Doctored, I wager both the picture and the body. She’d
“That sounds like a really good name to know,” I said, filing it away in my mental rolodex.
• • •
Time passed. Despite Kenneth’s tutoring, I wasn’t very good at martial arts. I’d say that I was a lover and not a fighter, but I really wasn’t much of a lover either. The meditation was nice though, I’d never done much of that before. I always used to study with loud music on. Growing up, there were dueling garage bands on my block; and in my late teens, I took up the drums and contributed to the noise pollution. Until my studies started taking up too much of my time, I played in a couple of cover bands during college.
Once I joined the real world, I never really had time for it anymore. Now, I had lots of spare time and they had a beat up drum kit in the rec room. It was something to do.
Kenneth listened to me do the drum solo from Golden Earring’s Radar Love , which always helped me blow off some steam. “You’re not half bad, Calvin.”
“I’m still shaking off the rust. It might be my only shot at real employment when I get out of here. Most bands would be willing to overlook a felony conviction. Their only real requirement is the ability to play. Of course, most bands treat their drummer like they’re part of the road crew. For some, it would probably be a draw— Our drummer’s a supervillain! How wicked is that? ”
“Veritably,” he replied, always willing to use a five cent word when a two cent would do.
“You know I could teach you to play. You could make a cover band with your fungus creatures and be a Stones cover band.”
He laughed and said, “I suppose I could call it Moss on Rolling Stones.”
“See, now you’re getting the idea!” If I had his powers, I’d be looking for a way to cash in on them without ending up in prison. It would definitely have gotten me on Letterman’s Stupid Superhuman Tricks Segment.
“How long have you been waiting to use that, Calvin?”
“A few days now,” I admitted.
“I suspected that much. Still, even though I’d enjoy being a sideshow, novelty act, I’m afraid I have enough hobbies as it is, without taking up another.”
Smiling, I started into Bob Seger’s Still the Same , which lacks something when there isn’t a piano playing. The last band I played in had a guy who sounded a bit like the man from Detroit and we covered a whole bunch of his songs. We called ourselves The Silver Blanks instead of his Silver Bullet Band.
Despite my requests, we never did Biz Markie.
As I played, he made a pair of miniature moss soldiers and had them doing some kind of waltz, as I cut into Seger’s version of Little Drummer Boy , while wondering if The Gardener had to learn the female steps too in order to make his constructs perform.
Kenneth wasn’t our only Eurotrash. We had a Frenchman, whom everyone avoided, named Simple Simone. He had this annoying field of mental energy around him that made it difficult to concentrate. When he focused it on someone, they’d turn into a gibbering idiot until he stopped.
As bad as the bleached smell of my prison cell was, I’d still take The Gardener over that guy any day.
“From the amount of energy you’re expending, I take it you didn’t receive good news from home?”
“Dad finally wrote back to basically tell me to stop writing them.”
“I assume that you intend to keep writing them?” he asked.
“Every stinking day now! At least until I get a fan club like yours.”
It was true; Kenneth had good looks and an English accent going for him and got a ton of women writing him. I’d never understand it.
“True,” he replied. “I had two marriage proposals last month. Things always pick up around the holidays.”
“The brunette with the fuzzy dice tattoos looked like a keeper.”
He shrugged and made a dismissive gesture while saying, “Doctored, I wager both the picture and the body. She’d
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