Troll Bridge (6 page)

Jakob could hear his father's chair scraping on the floor. Having gotten off the killer last line, the interview was clearly over.

Galen escaped out the door without looking back. He walked stiff-shouldered down the hall. When he was far enough from the door, he finally slumped.

Erik got to him first. “My hero!” There was admiration in his voice, along with an echo of their father's sarcasm.

“Let's get out of here. Now!” Galen said. “Before the general changes his mind.” Though their father had only been a colonel when he retired, not a general, they all called him that.

“Duffels are packed and in the town car, sir,” Jakob told him with a mock salute. “Chocolate, too.”

They almost ran out the front door, past the pillars of the fake plantation porch, racing down the five steps as if they'd just robbed the house that their own royalties had bought.

A tune plunged through Jakob's head. Tunes always did that, especially when he was stressed out. He'd been stressed out since he was nine years old and their first record, recorded in their basement on a borrowed ADAT, had been picked up by Virgin Records and gone platinum.

They piled into the car, Jakob in the back with the cooler, Galen in the driver's seat. At nineteen he was the only one of them old enough to drive. Erik would serve as navigator. No roadies, no sound man, no chauffeur. And especially no Mom or Dad. Just the three of them on their own.

How long had it been since that was possible? Jakob couldn't remember.
That's how long.

“Go! Go! Go!” Erik urged and the motor came alive, purring. Galen swung them around the circular driveway and out along the lake road.

They were free.

*   *   *

THE FIRST FEW MINUTES THEY
were all elated, but by the time an hour had passed, elation had given way to a kind of pleasant numbness. They listened to music, mostly Top 40 tunes and spent raucous moments dissing most of it. The shows were interrupted often by odd bulletins about missing Dairy Princesses. Twelve of them, disappeared somewhere north of Duluth. Seemed the girls had gone AWOL two days earlier.

“Maybe we should listen to the news more often,” Galen mused.

“Nah … too depressing,” Erik said, and they both laughed.

Jakob barely paid attention to them. Instead he was staring out the window. As usual, music was running through his head. He tapped on the window in six-eight time, matching the music, and watched the shining expanse of Lake Superior slide past.

Erik noticed the tapping fingers and poked Galen on the shoulder. Then he pointed back at Jakob.

“You got something?” Galen, asked. He looked at Jakob in the rearview mirror.

Jakob nodded at Galen, unruly dark hair with its several cowlicks falling into his eyes as he did. He brushed it away with his left hand. His right kept tapping. He was ambidextrous, a useful trait for a guitar player.

“No words though, right?” Erik asked, a touch malicious, a touch jealous. He never had music come into his head unasked. Even asked, it rarely made an appearance. Just words. Rhymes. Bouncing, bumping, sometimes even inventive. But not music. And all he wanted to do was be able to write tunes that people could sing. He moaned about it all the time.

On the other hand,
Jakob reminded himself,
I have music running through my head constantly
. Though, unlike Erik, he could rarely seem to fit words to it. Sometimes a phrase or a line. But only occasionally a whole lyric. Jakob didn't think any of Erik's lyrics were particularly deep, but that didn't stop people from buying their CDs. Enough to go platinum again and again.

And Galen …

Well,
Jakob thought,
Galen is pretty.
Their mother's high cheekbones, their father's deep dimpled chin, and the only set of teeth in the family that hadn't needed serious remodeling from the orthodontist. Plus the ability to charm audiences single-handedly.

And that,
he thought with a wry smile,
is the secret to the Griffson Brothers' success: great music, catchy lyrics, and a real pretty frontman who can kind of, sort of sing and strum the requisite chords
. There were worse boy bands—like all the rest.

He let the new piece of music wash through him. Fingers tapping, he gave himself over to the tune. That's what he did best. And, after all, he didn't need to worry about anything else. Their manager father, their publicist mother, and a whole passel of producers, engineers, sidemen, promoters, sponsors, and roadies took care of the rest, and the music sold in the millions. A teenage boy's dream.

“Dang, I'm tired,” Galen said, turning his head a little and smiling that infectious grin.

“Dang?”
Erik laughed. “We're not being interviewed on TV, Gale. You can actually swear.”

Galen grinned some more. “I'm saving it for something big.”

“Big as Dad?” Erik teased.

Galen ignored him. “How would you like to drive so I can get some rest, you little pest?”

“Hey, you remember what Dad said, ‘Provisional license means
I
set the provisions.'” Erik bellowed the last bit like a drill sergeant. “You know I'm not supposed to drive without him in the car.” His hands went up in the air. “But if you're
that
tired.” He winked at his big brother.

“We're all tired, Galen,” Jakob said. “Just like you told Dad.” He knew Galen had only been speaking the truth, the truth the three of them had agreed upon. After all, they'd been touring for eighteen months straight and their father had been getting ready to book them for eighteen more after two months in the studio. Sometimes a dream can become a nightmare.
Well, they now had one week free.
It was more than they'd expected. Their father had never fallen for Galen's charm before.

Galen pulled the car over to the side of the road. “Your turn, kid.”

“I'll get my full license in two—” Erik began.

“Two more months and five more days,” Jakob broke in.
Two more months and five more days
. Like a lot of musicians, he was mathematically inclined. Erik was nearly seventeen.
Two more months and five more days.
He liked the rhythm of that and a new tune snaked into his head. He liked it even better than the first one.

Meanwhile, Galen got out of the driver's side, Erik out of the passenger's side, and they changed seats.

“Hey, hold on,” Jakob called, swinging open his door and jumping out after them. “I've really got something.” He ran to the back of the car, then leaned around it and called, “Erik—pop the trunk.”

Erik reached down by the driver's seat and pulled up on the little handle. Once the lock clicked, Jakob lifted the trunk door, then dug around, tossing duffels and sleeping bags aside until he found his guitar. Only the one instrument. His brothers had left theirs at home. “This is a vacation,” Erik had said. “Why would I want to bring my work tools along?”

But Jakob was never without his guitar any more than he could be without one of his limbs. Pulling the Taylor from its case, he sat on the back bumper, strumming chords, searching for the right key.

Erik got out again and strolled around the car. “All right,” he said. “Let's hear it.”

Jakob didn't respond. He had found the key, and was playing what was in his head. Six-eight and major, the melody danced on the high strings while he plucked a walking baseline on the low E with his thumb.

“That's really good,” commented Galen. Jakob hadn't even noticed him come up. “Sounds kind of old timey.”

“Yeah.” Erik cocked his head to one side, thinking. “Needs some contemporary lyrics to set that off. Something out of the news.” He listened for a minute more.

Jakob changed keys for a bridge, then drifted back into the main theme.

“I've got it!” Erik said. “That news story we just heard on the radio.” He began to sing to Jakob's tune.

Twelve dairy princesses, where did they go?

Twelve dairy princesses, I'd really like to know.

The Devil snatched them from thin air

So they couldn't make it to the fair

And now's he's gone and taken them below.

Erik's voice had just finished its change, and it sounded pretty rough. But Jakob knew Galen would probably be the one to sing this song, anyway. The lighter, funnier songs were his. He couldn't carry a really beautiful ballad but was perfect with the humorous tunes. Jakob honestly liked the words so far. They were topical—but had imagery, too.

And he was singing:

What's better than a butter girl?

Badder than my better girl.

Best when I'm not buttered up as well.

What's better than a butter girl?

Badder than my better girl.

Best that I just take them all to Hell.

Jakob sighed.
So much for liking the lyrics,
he thought.
But that's probably the part of the song everyone will sing along to. It'll be our next big hit: “The Badder Better Butter Girl.”
Especially if the girls are found. His dad would probably do a deal with the Dairy Princesses and get them to dance on the video in their tiaras and long dresses and …

Galen had caught the melody now and was roaring out the butter girl chorus with Erik who had shifted to harmony, which, even with his rough voice, sounded pretty good.

And then,
Jakob thought,
I'll hate it. Hate it like all the others.

He played the song twice through, knowing that the tune, at least, wouldn't change at all now that he had it firmly in his hand. He'd never forget it.

Head and hand. That's how his music was stored. His mother hired transcribers to write it down for them. Write the music down and package it into thin books that sold to teenage boys just starting to strum. But that was just another piece of the Griffson moneymaking machine.

Jakob certainly never looked at the books. He had no need to. And Galen couldn't read music well enough to use them. Erik, either. And they wouldn't write this one down for a while yet. There was sure to be another verse or two, whatever happened to those poor missing girls, gone to Hell—or wherever.

7

Jakob

Back in the car, Jakob stared out the window, idly strumming his guitar and singing the butter girl song softly. His voice occasionally broke, which still embarrassed him. He'd had a gorgeous falsetto until last year.

“Where are we going?” He didn't recognize the landscape. But then he never noticed such things. Life on the road was like that. Travel dulled all his senses, especially his sense of direction.

Now in the front passenger seat, Galen turned around. “Why, we'll do what Mom and Dad used to do when we were younger. We'll go without a plan. You've probably just forgotten.”

Jakob tried to remember a time when they hadn't been traveling for a purpose. Get to a gig, a talk show, a press conference.

Banging a hand on the steering wheel, Eric added, “We just figure it out as we go along, little brother.”

“That's right!” Galen crowed. He ran a hand through his hair. “We're leaving Duluth now. Heading up the North Shore.” He paused. “Looking for oddballs and oddities.”

Not one to miss an opportunity at alliteration and wordplay, Erik said, “Chaos and carnivals!”

Galen looked over his shoulder expectantly, and Jakob suddenly remembered the word their parents had always given to describe their early journeys, all five of them and their gear stuffed into an old station wagon, going where a sunset or a river or an odd old barn led them. A word they'd used before fame and fortune overtook them.

“Serendipity,” he said. “Surprise and serendipity.” As he said it, a new song burst into his fingers, and he gave himself over to it. Galen glanced back at him and then exchanged knowing smiles with Erik, but Jakob didn't notice. He was caught by the muse and played frenetically for nearly an hour before placing his guitar gently on the seat next to him, and dropping into an exhausted slumber.

*   *   *

JAKOB WOKE WITH A FUNNY
snort. The sun was sinking behind the trees, and the sky shone with a red-orange glow. The car was inching along. “What's going on?”

He released his seat belt and leaned forward, peering out the windshield. They were no longer on a major road, in fact they were hardly on a road at all, only a dirt drive with barely enough room for two cars to pass. Pine trees crowded the roadside, leaning over as if trying to peek into the car.

Erik spun the wheel sharply and the car turned left onto an even smaller path.

“Wow!” Galen exclaimed.

A short distance ahead was a clearing with yellow police ribbons, like tattered banners, all around, but no policemen in sight.

“That's bizarre,” Erik said.

At one end of the clearing lay a small stone bridge arching over a river. The bridge appeared old enough to have been built by the first Norwegians to enter Minnesota. Pocked and lichen-covered, the bridge was lined with low stone walls. At either end stood stone gargoyle sentries, slope-shouldered, gape-mouthed, and hideous.

“Look!” Jakob said, pointing. Directly in the middle of the bridge sat the largest fox he'd ever seen. Bright cinnamon and bushy-tailed, it was in profile to the car. Slowly it turned its head to stare at them. The fox's eyes were jet black, but Jakob was sure it was looking right at him. It had to do with the way its head cocked to one side, then slowly straightened, its eyes never leaving his. Then, giving its head one dip, the fox leapt to its feet and dashed toward the far side of the bridge.

Follow.
The word popped into Jakob's head unbidden. As if in a trance, Jakob said aloud: “Follow!”