Jimmy and Crash Survey the Universe (Writeoff Extended Remix)

Somewhere in Edmonton, November 1983

"Marry my sister, marry my horse, marry my mother 'cause she's di-vorced - I belong to the I-WW...."

 Billy'd ejected the tape from the cassette deck two miles ago, but Joe was still hollering the words to the song as they coasted down the street. 

Billy was driving, and he wanted to focus on driving, but he reached out with his right hand to try and yank Joe back into the van. His head was sticking out the window. 

Just another mile to Debra's house. Just another mile. 

Skunk and Debra were a couple that put on all the punk shows in Edmonton, and they'd agreed to give Hard Core Logo a date at the end of their tour. Shit, they were happy to have them: nobody, but nobody, played in Edmonton. 

Unfortunately, Skunk and Debra were a couple - like, they'd broken up right after they'd made the booking. 

So Skunk and Deb had broken their lease and left that house with a big garden they used to live in together, and the Trojan Club didn't allow vans to park overnight, Which meant that after loading all the gear into the van, Billy had to drive all the way over to the house Deb lived in now with three other scary punk girls on the other side of town. 

It was meant to be Joe's turn to drive, but he'd excused himself from driving duty by pulling out a bottle of whiskey during the show. Then John and Pipe had gone on strike when it came time to load out, and Joe was too paralytic to try and lay down the law. So Billy had let John and Pipe get into Deb's car and gone off to pack the van in bad grace. 

Joe had tried to help him, but he had not been very helpful. Unless cracking one of Pipe's cymbals counted as helping. 

"I looked at the world, the world looked wrong, I started singing a protest song - I be-long to the IWW, I - hey!"

Billy'd hooked Joe's ragged mohair sweater over the cup holder, leaving him suspended inside the van. 

"Quit your whooping and hollering," Billy said. "You're disturbing the good people of Edmonton."

Joe thumped back down into his seat. "You're no fun." 

Billy's good mood snapped. "Do you want to get us fucking arrested?" He demanded. "What, once wasn't enough?"
Joe crossed his arms and looked out the window and said nothing, which meant he knew Billy was right. Cops in hicksville would take any excuse to hassle touring punk bands with dirty clothes and funny looking hair. Ask Billy how he knew. 

"Dink," Billy said. 

They'd had enough trouble at the US border - drug-sniffing dogs and cops with guns.

It could be worse: at least Hard Core Logo didn't have a political band name. Mike from Thin Blue Firing Line said they hadn't been able to get across to their date in LA at all, after the border cops saw their merch. 

"I am not a dink," Joe said. "I'm exuberant. Edmonton makes me exuberant - " 

Billy snorted derisively at this.

 He was pretty sure that no one was exuberant because of Edmonton, or in Edmonton. Exuberant in spite of Edmonton, maybe. 

 "- But I can see I'm going to have to keep my exuberance to myself," Joe said through gritted teeth. "Excuse me for having a good time. You asshole."

They drove on in silence. Billy fiddled with the radio for a while, but the only stations they were receiving were swamped in static. Sounded like gospel music anyway. Billy could dig gospel music, but not white gospel music, and in the great state of Alberta that was all you got. 

He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, chasing the memory of some melody he'd heard or dreamed or thought up during the night. Not one of their own, he was pretty sure, or not theirs yet, anyway. 

He tried to put the day to rest. Images flashed through Billy's mind. Road signs and stop signs and billboards for churches. A jar full of pickled silverskin onions, spilled next to the beer taps at the bar. The plate of cold cheese and salad the venue manager gave them to share when they asked about the meal. She'd peered dubiously at them, like she wished the bar could book a Greek folk act for once instead of whatever this was. 

Joe had tried to turn on the charm with her, but Joe looked even more disreputable than usual at the moment. He'd got a spiderweb pattern painted onto the grown-out sides of his mohawk in the last town, and he was wearing a t-shirt for their last support band, Desire Armed, which had a lewd cartoon on the front of gay cops sucking and fucking each other in a kind of fascist orgy. So Pipe had stepped in to make sure they could get some Pepsi and a soundcheck before the gig. 

Then the gig.

Pipe broke a pair of drumsticks. Billy had been hunched at the front of the stage, trying to protect his gear from the thrashing, slamdancing, stage-diving kids. John had been pulled into the moshpit and came out with the sleeve on his shirt ripped, using his bass like an axe to clear his way. Billy was pretty sure he'd seen him swinging from a lamp at one point, when Joe handed him the microphone and let him go all out on "Why Don't You Do Me Right". 

Joe, as always, managed to stay in the eye of the storm, above and apart from the crowd. 

The crowd. Eyes flashing, teeth glinting, throwing themselves across the room and crashing into the walls. Screaming and hollering, singing along. They'd been like a hundred-legged, hungry, mindless beast - mostly boys in the spiky-hair-and-flannel-shirt uniform, and girls with awkwardly misshapen haircuts and buckets of black eyeliner. Billy had spotted some little fourteen-year-old rat-girl punk staring at them from the back of the crowd, all teeth. 

The crowd had been -  Scary. Ridiculous. One of the two.

A car horn blared.

Billy blinked. He'd been hypnotized by the white lines. As he looked around, he realized that they were almost at Deb's house - Billy recognized that street sign. 

Beside him, Joe was staring ahead through the windshield, eyes blank and glazed, grinning to himself. Quietly mouthing the words to a song.  

It would be warm at Deb's, Billy told himself. There would be food, and people, instead of whatever they could shoplift and the same three guys that stank of BO and spunk. They might even get to sleep in a bed instead of on the floor. 

Debra and her roommates lived in a rackety old two-storey house with a porch and a balcony - looked like most of the wooden railings were broken. All the lights in the house were on and there was music blasting so loud you could hear it even through the closed windows. 

As they pulled up there were a couple people outside the house, stragglers who were arriving or leaving. Billy was tired and was starting to feel the couple drinks he'd had, so he was excessively careful parking the van. Hopefully he hadn't accidentally run anybody over. 

Joe had somehow fallen asleep with his head on the dashboard. Billy thumped him to try and make him wake up, then gave up and just grabbed him and dragged him out of the front seat as he opened the door.

Joe was mostly ambulatory by the time they got out of the van - shambling, staggering, like a newborn deer that was learning how to walk just seconds after being born.

Billy laughed out loud at the thought. There wasn't much very bambi-like about Joe. 

"Fuck are you looking at, asshole," Joe said darkly. 

Billy didn't reply. It was always better to say nothing. 

He went around to the back of the van to unlock the doors and get his bag and his guitar. 

He almost left Joe's bag behind - if Joe didn't care enough to go get his own shit, then he could just do without his book and his walkman and his toothbrush and his drugs.

The thing was though, that the amount of whining Joe would do would be so annoying it would ruin any petty pleasure Billy might get. So he grabbed Joe's bag as well. 

Billy locked the van again and slung the chain with the keys around his neck. Their van wasn't worth shit, but between road tax and insurance it had cost a bit of money, and most punks had even less money than them and might be willing to steal the van and sell it. It only took once, and any money you might have made back on the tour from gig take and merch sales would be wiped out in an instant.

Joe was just standing on the porch staring up at the sky, tilted back so far he looked like he might fall over. Billy threw his bag at him and he caught it. 

"My God, it's full of stars," Joe said.

"Get the fuck inside before you fall down and die of exposure," Billy said. 

He felt funny, like his bones were turning to liquid.

Right then, looking at Joe, Billy felt an incredible affection for him. He wasn't really sure why. 

The front door of the house wasn't locked. They traipsed in. 

It was loud in there. 

Billy wondered if Debra's neighbours were all deaf, or dead, or if they just liked the Dead Kennedys as much as Debra did. At least, that sounded like the Dead Kennedys blasting on the stereo.

Not the new record, the first one. The economy is looking bad, let's start another war ... 

The Dead Kennedys were one of the few bands Billy and Joe could agree on. Usually Billy thought the bands Joe liked were vomit-inducingly fast or unlistenably bad, but those guys could really play. 

The room was full of people. Punks, hardcore kids, metalheads, a couple skinheads, and the uncommitted who thought they were too good for a label. Joe's lumpenproletariat army. 

Joe'd bullshitted some article for his party's newspaper a few years ago about why punk was a radical force. They were still living that one down. One band wrote a song called Shove Your Facile Sociological Analysis (And Your Dumbass Trotskyist Vanguard Too). 

There were a few normal people at Debra's  - you could pick them out 'cause their clothes were new and their skin tone was healthy. Billy didn't know what they were doing here - they liked the music, he guessed. 

Billy had kind of thought people would come up to them and tell them what they thought of the show, but Billy and Joe's arrival was pretty much ignored. The party just went on around them, like the Edmonton kids were having too much fun to pay too much attention to the big shots from out of town.

He wasn't sure if he liked that or if it pissed him off. 

Deb came over and told them she'd help them carry their bags upstairs. She yanked the bag Billy was holding out of his hands with the grim determination of a woman who'd been told "No, pet, that's way too heavy for you" too many times. 

Upstairs was kind of dark, and cold, and they dumped the bags and gear in a room with a double bed.  

After that, there was nothing for it but to head downstairs, grab a couple beers and get stuck in.

Food wasn't up to much: the picked over remains of a party buffet. Debra saw the expression on Billy's face and opened the fridge. Macaroni cheese for the oven, and two leftover slices of cake. 

"My mom came around yesterday," Deb said. "She always bakes something for touring bands." 

The cake even had orange icing like the cover of their EP. Billy felt weirdly touched. 

Joe just grabbed the cake and started eating his slice immediately, because he's a dink. He was in heaven: sugar and alcohol. 

Maybe Pipe and John had got all the praise earlier, 'cause they were the centre of attention now. Pipe was showing off his trick where he cracked an apple in half with his bare hands. John was telling his stories from the road, surrounded by avid listeners.

As Billy looked around, he noticed Joe, crumbs and icing around his mouth, was making a beeline for the table with the cans of beer on it, like he wasn't drunk already.

Billy wondered sometimes why Joe did that. Billy drank because it loosened him up, made it easier for him to talk to people, made him laugh more. Joe came to parties already kind of buzzed and then drank with a single-minded determination until he blacked out. 

Billy'd tried to ask him about it but he'd clammed up. Joe normally loved to talk about himself, but he hated to talk about his drinking.

Billy thought it might be down to nervousness. That didn't really make sense, given Joe could happily get up on stage in front of 500 people and start talking shit about them, just to get a reaction. 

But maybe that was actually what the problem was. There was no stage here. 

The Dead Kennedys record was still spinning at maximum volume. Billy's ears were still ringing a little from the show, but as his hearing adjusted he decided that it sounded like 'Holiday In Cambodia', which meant the next song was the last song on the record, then someone would put something else on.

Sure enough, next song was Viva Las Vegas. I'm turning day into night, I'm turning night into day...  And then nothing. 

Billy went and got a beer. Then he found Deb: always best to be polite to the promoter. 

It was around then that he found out about the bed situation. 

Debra's roommate Charity was meant to be in Calgary doing work training, but she came home a day early. She was understandably unwilling to let a guy from a punk band take her bed, or share her bed.

That meant there were only three beds, not four, for the band. 

"You guys can share, right?" Debra pleaded. Billy wasn't pleased about it, but he thought it would be fine. Yeah, OK Debra, you're twisting my fucking arm here, but we can share.

That was Billy and Joe who could share, obviously. Billy would walk out the door and lie down in the snow to die of hypothermia before he slept in the same bed as Pipe. 

Strangely, Joe wasn't happy with this. Joe, who was usually unconcerned by these kinds of niceties; Joe, who boasted about being able to fall asleep on a floor, in a car, on a bus ("yeah, while driving it," someone always said, and Joe would complain "that was one time!") - he was the one who protested. Said he could sleep on the floor, said there was a sleeping bag in the van he could use. 

"What are you gonna do? Lie on the bed in your sleeping bag?" Billy said. "Don't be fucking dumb." 

Joe had looked at him all angry, but didn't do shit. Probably didn't want to look like an idiot in front of Debra and Josie and Spike and Spike's girlfriend Laura.

Billy just hadn't really got it. Joe wasn't usually squeamish or prudish - chance, he thought, would be a fine thing. Plus Billy and Joe had shared a bed before, years ago. With no traumatic results, other than the trauma Billy experienced from the smell of Joe's feet.

And Joe eventually said fine, whatever, who gives a fuck. He went back to drinking, then disappeared upstairs about half an hour later. 

Billy stuck around the party for a while longer. He wouldn't have to share with Joe if he met a hot chick.

It was a loss, though. There were plenty of girls, and Billy tried to talk to them, but Debra's roommates and their friends were more like "castration squad" punk girls than sex-kitten groupie punk girls.

Billy'd been up and down Canada, and into the United States, now, but he still hadn't met any of the mythical punk sex-kitten groupie girls.

He was starting to think they didn't exist. Maybe they stuck to bands that made more than the minimum wage.

Maybe they had their own bands now.  

So he went to bed.

When he came into the room, which was still dark and still cold, Joe was lying on the bed. On top of the covers, still in his clothes, with only his boots removed and neatly lined up by the side of the bed. Maybe the struggle to yank his feet out of the eleven-hole Dr Martens had exhausted him. 

Billy took off his boots and his jeans (mud on the cuffs: this was his last pair of jeans, too, he'd have to ask Deb if there was a laundromat anywhere nearby in the morning) and got under the blankets. 

 He thought Joe was already asleep,  but then he heard Joe say "Hey". 

Billy made a vague noise. 

"Hey, I hate this shirt," Joe said. Billy looked over. 

Joe's hands were twisted in the t shirt he was wearing, the one with the gay cop suck-and-fuck. "I hate this shirt," he repeated, his voice sleepy. 

"Then take it off," Billy replied, kind of baffled. "Why do you hate it?" 

Joe didn't say anything. Billy glanced at his face. Joe looked like he was frustrated, like he was trying to speak but the words weren't coming. Joe was rarely at a loss for words - chance would be a fine thing, to be honest. So that was kind of interesting, but not that interesting. Not at 3am. 

A minute passed. Billy relaxed. Joe must have fallen asleep, or was on his way there.

Then:

"I think I'm gay," Joe said. 

"Oh," Billy said. "I'm sorry." 

Joe looked at him despairingly. Billy ran over what he'd said in his head again and, oh yeah, that was probably the wrong thing to say. 

He rolled closer to Joe to show there were no hard feelings. 

"I think I'm gay," Joe repeated, staring up at the ceiling. "I'm not gonna make a big deal out of it, though. I don't want to fuck things up for the band." 

Yeah, trust Joe to think about that before anything else. 

"What if you got a boyfriend, though?" Billy asked. He was genuinely curious.

Billy'd met a lot of gay people, and he'd got drunk in a few gay bars, but he wouldn't say he knew a lot of gays. Except for Joe, he guessed.  

"I'm not going to be getting a boyfriend," Joe scoffed. "Who the fuck do you think I am?" 

"Anyway," he added, "It wouldn't work with the band. We're touring all the time." 

And that was true. The laws of time and space applied to gays as well as straights. 

"Nothing is gonna change," Joe said. "Nothing is gonna be different."

And maybe that was true. Joe had been an anarchist, then a socialist, then a communist, then an anarcho-communist, then a Maoist, then Catholic for an eventful two weeks, then socialist again. And Hard Core Logo had been a rock and roll band, then a punk band, then a new wave band, then a hardcore band, then new wave again, then punk, then rock and roll, and ultimately nothing had really changed. So maybe this would be the same, and Joe would stay Joe.

Joe cast Billy a meaningful look then, but Billy didn't really know what the look was meant to mean. So he just patted Joe on the arm, then rolled over again and went to sleep. He could figure it out in the morning.