Free Western Swing by Tim Sandlin Page A

been told I wanted, yet none of them looked miserable because of it.
    Suddenly, in a white flash of teen enlightenment, I realized that people completely unlike me outnumber people like me. KaBoom. Second insight. They were not worth less than people like me.
    I stopped in the middle of the sidewalk on Second Street. “Roxanne,” I said, “the people not like us outnumber the people like us.”
    â€œOf course. There’s Neb. Wow, his friend is cute, we may have to trade.”
    â€œAnd the people not like us are just as good as we are.”
    â€œWhoever said they weren’t? Hey, Neb, over here.”
    â€¢ • •
    Neb’s friend was kind of a nice guy, in an angular sort of way. His face wasn’t scarred and all his teeth seemed to line up right. I didn’t catch whether his name was Mel or Del. The face matched either one.
    â€œSo you’re Hot Rox’s cousin,” he said with a grin that might have been a leer.
    â€œI’m not a bit like her.”
    â€œOh.” Mel or Del looked disappointed.
    Roxanne laughed hysterically at something Neb said and he put his arm around her shoulders as we walked through the double doors.
    The Baxter is a wonderful place for a concert. I’d love to sing there sometime. Hardwood floors, high, dark ceiling, small tables scattered around like a real ballroom. We sat toward the front on the right. No one checked our IDs or anything. It was great—my first experience at being treated like a grown-up.
    A waitress in a low-cut blouse and square-dancing skirt gave us each a funny hat and a toy that clicked when you spun it or unrolled when you blew in it. The guys grabbed up the toys you blew in and started zipping us in the ears and tits.
    Roxanne jumped right into the spirit, but I hung back some, it all seemed a bit stupid to me.
    Without even asking, Neb ordered four tequila sunrises. I caught him winking at Mel or Del.
    â€œWhy did you wink?” I asked.
    â€œGot sawdust in my eye.”
    I didn’t see any sawdust, but what the hell, why push it? If Roxanne wanted to be hustled, that was her business. What pisses me off is a man thinking he can seduce someone who doesn’t want to be seduced. All the charm and tequila in Houston wouldn’t trick me into doing something I didn’t think up first.
    Roxanne laughed every time Neb opened his mouth whether he meant to be funny or not. And whenever she laughed, she touched him—on the arm, the hair, the side of the face, somewhere. It grated my stomach. The laugh she used around boys was nothing like her girl laugh. It was all shriek and no sincerity. There are certain women that I like fine until you get them around men and then I can’t stand to be anywhere near the bitches. Roxanne is one.
    As soon as the lights dimmed, my date—sure wish I knew his name—grabbed my hand and held it between both of his. He didn’t intertwine fingers, but held on like a double handshake.
    The first band was called Thunder Road, and Mickey was in it. He sat behind a flat thing that looked like an electric bicycle rack, grinning, chewing gum, scanning the audience with this self-satisfied look. The band broke into a fast instrumental, sort of a Texas polka. I liked it.
    â€œWhat’s that thing the guy is sitting behind?” I asked.
    Mel or Del stopped gazing at me long enough to check the stage. “The drummer?”
    â€œNo, the other guy.”
    â€œThat’s a pedal steel. You never saw a pedal steel before?”
    â€œUh-uh. What’s it do?”
    â€œLike a guitar strung across an ironing board. You play it with your hands, knees, and feet.”
    â€œAll at the same time?”
    I sometimes wonder why I chose Mickey. He seemed so worldly, leaning over his steel, nodding his head more to the chewing gum than the music. Maybe not worldly, but Houstonly. I’d just discovered a huge mass of people with a value system different