Chapter 21: Heading South

October 30, 1981

(continued)

I did a major double-take upon hearing that name; my mind was in a swirl. Inez Trujillo. Did she really say that? Yes, she did.

Maybe she was a different Inez Trujillo? What was the chance of that? How many Inez Trujillos were there in this part of the world? Not many, I'd wager.

And then something else dawned on me. Where had I heard that voice, the one with the slight trace of an accent? Why, it had belonged to the Inez in the other life, the broken down, overweight, homely old sourpuss who'd spit in my face. The one that bore absolutely no other resemblance to the cheery, gorgeous young thing now in our midst.

I was feeling, shall we say, a bit unsettled.

Inez was in the process of telling the others about herself. I put my train of thought on hold so I could hear what she had to say.

"I've been around music ever since I was a little girl," she told us. "I'm from Florida, just outside Miami. I was born in Puerto Rico, and my parents moved to Florida when I was little."

Florida? Puerto Rico? Now, I'd gone from "a bit unsettled" to"downright frightened".

What the hell was going on here?

I still couldn't convince myself that this was the same Inez. Never mind her appearance. What was she doing in college, and here at Rutgers no less? Wasn't she already supposed to have a kid, causing her to forget about college altogether? What about the abusive boyfriend?

I tried my best to tune back in to the conversation. Maybe answers were forthcoming.

"It must be hard being so far away from your family," Evie said to Inez.

"It is," Inez allowed, "but my aunt and uncle live nearby, only about a fifteen minute drive from the campus. They are kind of my family away from home. My cousin, their daughter, is also a freshman here at Rutgers."

Okay, that explained, sort of, why she was here in New Jersey. But that only served to deepen the mystery.

Finally, it was time for her to undergo the same interview process that Bud had gone through.

"Same questions as before, okay?" Paul clarified.

I went first.

"What do you see as your role in our band?" I asked Inez in a businesslike manner.

"I just want to be part of a group of people that accomplishes great things and has fun doing it. Like I said, I do have a lot of experience with music. It's part of who I am, and I take it very seriously. But at the same time, it's important to let loose and enjoy yourself. I'd like to use my experience to help each of you become the best musician you can possibly be, and in return, I hope you'd do the same for me."

Evie nodded enthusiastically as Inez finished her answer, looking as if she was about to burst into applause.

I thought, please, Evie, you're not helping things. I was beginning to get a sinking feeling.

Then came my second question, one that had been specifically designed to trip up Bud, but seemed to have less relevance for Inez.

"What is your view on the effect of alcohol and drugs on a band's productivity?"

Inez giggled.

"Oh my God. Tough questions here." My three bandmates laughed along with her. Not me, though. Inez caught my stern, humorless expression.

"Sorry, Pat. I don't mean to be disrespectful. You might catch me having a beer once in a while. But beyond that, no. Alcohol and drugs are poison in a band environment, as far as I'm concerned."

I glanced over at Dave, and he'd maintained a smile. Holy shit. He wasn't fazed by that remark! It was immediately apparent that in the eyes of Evie, Dave, and Paul, she'd aced my two questions.

Evie, observant as always, took note of my changed demeanor. "You okay, hon?" she asked, smiling sweetly. "You don't seem to be yourself."

"I'm fine," I told her, perhaps a little more curtly than I intended.

Inez did similarly well with the rest of our interrogation. Then, she hooked up her amp and guitar, as Dave and Paul got ready to accompany her.

Up to that point, I'd desperately held on to the hope that this was a different Inez than the one I'd known in the other timeline. But once she started to play and sing, there was no longer any doubt.

She launched into Heart's "Crazy On You". Her guitar work was first-rate. But it was that voice – the one I'd heard before, the one that had amazed all whose ears it graced, even though it had emanated from an ugly middle-aged woman – that transported me to a day in 2007 when I'd first heard it. Now, it was coming from a beautiful girl in the flower of her youth.

It was the same goddamn voice.

No. No. I wasn't buying it. This was bullshit. I was being jerked around, whether by God or Destiny or Fate or Justice or whatever higher power one wished to invoke. This was the same bitch who'd somehow sent me back in time. The same one! I didn't know what she was trying to pull, but I would have none of it.

I made a decision. She wasn't getting into our band, period. I would stop at nothing, even if it put me at odds with my three friends. I was going balls to the wall on this.

Inez finished her audition with a crunching, minute-long guitar solo that had the others stricken with awe. Evie actually jumped up and down, applauding wildly.

"Simply amazing," was all Paul could offer. He was nearly speechless.

Dave was more expansive. He told Inez, "You have the voice of an angel, and you play the guitar like God."

I came forward to weigh in.

"I beg to differ, but my ears picked up a few flaws. I'm not sure if Inez is what we're looking for."

Dave, Evie and Paul all gawked at me as if I was insane.

"And furthermore –" I began, but I never got to finish my remark, as Dave did something completely out of character for him. My normally non-confrontational buddy stepped up to me, smiling severely with clenched teeth. He grabbed me by the shirt and directed me out into the hall.

"Let's discuss this outside," he told me in a no-nonsense manner.

To the others, he said, "We'll be right back."

He closed the door, and glared at me.

"Are you out of your fucking mind?" he shouted angrily. "She's more talented than any of us, by far. Plus, she's a real nice girl. And on top of that, she's a fucking fox! Do you know how popular we'll be if she joins us? You need to get the wax out of your ears, dude, because –"

I interrupted him, breaking away and re-entering the room. Dave followed, shaking his head and muttering in frustration.

"The problem I have," I said to the group at large, trying to keep my cool, "is that no one takes a female lead guitarist seriously." A sexist remark that screamed of desperation, was destined to get me in trouble, and most certainly did.

Now, it was Evie's eyes that flashed with anger.

"Patrick O'Malley, is that really you speaking?" she hissed. "How can you say a thing like that?"

Paul spoke up. "I vote Inez joins us."

"Seconded," Dave declared.

"And thirded," said Evie, her eyes still full of fire.

I had one more card to play. I hated to play it, but my misguided bandmates had left me no choice. At the same time, an all-too-familiar emotion was beginning to overtake me. Namely, anger. My old enemy was paying me another visit. And when anger came to play with me, the results were never pretty.

"This is my band," I said, raising my voice, waving my hands around for effect. "I came up with the idea, I suggested it first, and did most of the planning. You three have a choice. You can have her, or me. You can't have us both. The choice is yours. What say you?"

None of them answered immediately. Perhaps, in retrospect, I was a bit hasty in concluding that they'd chosen Inez. Perhaps they were too stunned by my behavior to think it through. Perhaps they thought me mad, or didn't think I was serious. But I took their silence as an indication that they'd united against me. My temper rose, and finally boiled over. My thought process became irrational. Time seemed to slow down to about one-tenth its normal speed. The traitors! How dare they stab me in the back like that?

And I went so far as to give voice to that sentiment. Quite loudly.

"You're all a bunch of fucking traitors!" I screamed. "Sellouts!"

I headed for the door which led outside, in a seething rage, looking for something to take it out on. My eyes happened to fall upon an unfortunate target: Dave's drum set.

With one solid kick, I put my foot clear through his bass drum. I picked up a snare drum and tossed it across the room. Then, a cymbal went flying in the other direction.

As I moved toward the exit, I happened to glance over my shoulder. The whole scene appeared to be unfolding in slow motion. Paul was physically restraining Dave, who was trying to charge after me, shouting profanities, with a murderous glint in his eye. Meanwhile, Evie had turned her back to me, and was tending to Inez, who appeared to be in tears.

Then I left. And I didn't look back again.

October 31, 1981

I stood over the sink and splashed cold water in my face, several times. I'd just showered and shaved, having slept in late. Last night, I'd gone straight back to my dorm room and crashed, my mental state having gone from meltdown to shutdown.

I picked up my towel and dried off my face. I wrapped the towel around my waist and traipsed back to my room. Benny, my roommate (or half-roommate, if you will), was of course home for the weekend. Thus, I had the room to myself, something I relished at this point.

A thought had just occurred to me. An explosion of anger, a band activity, and Inez Trujillo. The last time a confluence of those three things occurred, I'd been transported to another place and time. How did I know for sure the same thing hadn't just happened?

Well, I knew I was in the same place. This was unquestionably my dorm room, and a quick glance out the window confirmed that I was indeed still at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. And I was clearly still in the same body. But I suddenly felt a need for more confirmation that I hadn't gone backward or forward in time.

I turned on the TV, and found little else but Saturday morning cartoons. No help at all. So, I got dressed, put on my coat, and marched by myself over to the dining hall. Outside, it was chilly, windy, and overcast. It was late in the morning and by now, they'd be serving lunch instead of breakfast.

I happened to come upon a machine that dispensed newspapers for twenty-five cents a copy. A quick glance at the front page of the paper displayed in the window confirmed that it was indeed October 31, Halloween morning, 1981.

Yes, I was still where I'd been the previous evening. I had not been switched to yet another timeline. Although, in many respects, I wished that I had.

I'd remained in mental shutdown mode since last night's events. Now, I briefly reopened my mind, at least enough to allow me to analyze what was going on.

Today was Halloween. I didn't believe in witches, ghosts, and the like. Don't get me wrong, I firmly believed that things occurred that were outside the realm of human comprehension. In fact, I was of the strong opinion they happened on a regular basis. We humans aren't nearly as all-knowing as we think we are. My time travel experiences were a shining example of that.

But witches and ghosts? Nothing more than figments of human imagination, created as a means of explaining the unexplainable. Further proof of human ignorance.

But then ... how to explain the Inez phenomenon? She'd showed up, out of nowhere, on the night before Halloween, sang a song titled "Crazy On You", and then, my whole life turned upside down again. Hidden in the corners of my mind was the realization that this time, I'd brought much if not most of it on myself. But outwardly, I was firmly in denial on that matter.

And what did this mean with regard to the assumptions I'd made about this new timeline? That everything outside of the realm of my family was the same? All of that had now been thrown into question. At the very least, it seemed apparent that Inez, an entity well separated from the O'Malley family, was living a life that was quite different from the one she'd lived in the other timeline. How could someone so beautiful at nineteen turn into someone so ugly at forty-four? And that wasn't even mentioning the personality differences. I believed that there was more to her situation. So, what was she? A fly in the ointment, a swizzle stick in the coffee, a rogue variance whose sole purpose was to drop in periodically and screw things up?

No. If she wasn't a witch, she was something of that ilk. All of this was on her.

And I suddenly felt just as confused and disoriented as I'd been that day I'd awakened in the middle of a field, near a smoking tree, right before a driving thunderstorm. All that had transpired since then seemed meaningless.

On top of all that, there was the matter of Evie, Dave, and Paul. I knew things would never be the same with them. I was astonished that Dave had not yet come calling, seeking payback of some sort for what I'd done to his drums. I didn't know what to make of that. Last time, it had taken Dave and Paul a full year to forgive me after my blowup. And what I'd done this time was far less justifiable. Evie had stuck with me last time. But now? Who knew what was on her mind?