turned off the amplifier and bowed to Devi. “I’ll take it. Thank you. You have helped me greatly.”
“You’ve changed a lot,” said Melinda.
Christa eased the wagon through midday traffic. Behind, on the cargo deck, was the speaker cabinet and head, two digital delays, and her guitar. “Have I?”
“Oh, come on. I take you to one rock concert, and suddenly you’re Denver’s next guitar hero. What happened?”
“I liked what I heard.” Christa smiled at Melinda. She tried to remember when she had last had a friend besides Judith, drew a blank. Maybe her father. Maybe Dennis Hempson, the old blind harper who had helped her with her English. No one else. Had she been alone that long?
“You’re not telling me everything.”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. So I won’t.”
Melinda cast her eyes upward for a moment, shook her head. “Where did you say you were from?”
“Ireland.”
“No: I mean, what planet?” Melinda laughed. “Where to now?”
“Soundtrack. I need a good stereo. Kevin told me to start listening to as much rock as I could—so as to develop my feeling for the idiom.”
“You’ve got bucks, lady.”
Christa shrugged. Two hundred years of thrift—and a little prescience—had given her a fair-sized bank account. She was making a sizable dent in it today, but she would have given up everything for Judith. “I want to thank you for all your help.”
“No problem. Glad I can do something.”
Christa pulled into the parking lot. “Excellent. You can do even more: you can help me carry the Laney down to my basement, and set up my stereo.”
“I can? Gee, thanks.”
“You’re most welcome.”
Melinda spread her hands. “You going to feed me?”
“Oatcakes and the champion’s portion of the beef.” And though Melinda stared at her, Christa laughed at her own joke.
In all her days at the school in Corca Duibne she had never dreamed of this: that she would spend a day driving the streets of Denver in the company of a woman as audacious as the most wild-eyed hoyden of the Gaeidil, enjoying a world far stranger even than that of curdled milk oceans and meat-clad doorkeepers in the dream of Anier Mac Conglinde.
She was opening up, and the darkness of her endless twilight memories of the Sidh had been riven by the blue sky of Colorado and the bright lights of a rock concert.
Renouncing at last the anesthetic life that had kept her loss from overwhelming her with grief, she was crawling out from behind her harp.
It was early evening by the time Christa pulled into her own driveway, and, with Melinda helping, she muscled the equipment inside and down the stairs. She had spent the last several days cleaning out her basement, trashing the accumulated rubbish of eighty years of Denver living, pitching old furniture, out-of-fashion clothes, cardboard boxes gritty with the talcumlike dust of the past. Now the sheetrock walls were covered with carpet scraps to keep down the echoes, and the otherwise empty room was soon occupied by the Laney, the delays, a new stereo, and several stacks of records that Melinda had insisted on lending to her.
“You’re going to have to get used to listening to this stuff, Chris,” said Melinda as she staggered down the stairs with a foot-high pile of cardboard and vinyl in her arms. “Might as well start now.”
Melinda made Christa do the actual hook-up of the amplifier and the stereo, insisting that if she did not start learning about electronics immediately, she would be lost in rock and roll. Sitting amid a tangle of wire and patch cables, Christa puzzled through the directions while Melinda translated the unfamiliar terminology.
“Positive to positive and negative to negative,” said the bassist. “Otherwise your speakers will be out of phase.”
Christa held the speaker cord up to the light and examined the bare copper ends. “Energy is energy, Melinda. What is this positive and negative?”
“Take it on
“You’ve changed a lot,” said Melinda.
Christa eased the wagon through midday traffic. Behind, on the cargo deck, was the speaker cabinet and head, two digital delays, and her guitar. “Have I?”
“Oh, come on. I take you to one rock concert, and suddenly you’re Denver’s next guitar hero. What happened?”
“I liked what I heard.” Christa smiled at Melinda. She tried to remember when she had last had a friend besides Judith, drew a blank. Maybe her father. Maybe Dennis Hempson, the old blind harper who had helped her with her English. No one else. Had she been alone that long?
“You’re not telling me everything.”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. So I won’t.”
Melinda cast her eyes upward for a moment, shook her head. “Where did you say you were from?”
“Ireland.”
“No: I mean, what planet?” Melinda laughed. “Where to now?”
“Soundtrack. I need a good stereo. Kevin told me to start listening to as much rock as I could—so as to develop my feeling for the idiom.”
“You’ve got bucks, lady.”
Christa shrugged. Two hundred years of thrift—and a little prescience—had given her a fair-sized bank account. She was making a sizable dent in it today, but she would have given up everything for Judith. “I want to thank you for all your help.”
“No problem. Glad I can do something.”
Christa pulled into the parking lot. “Excellent. You can do even more: you can help me carry the Laney down to my basement, and set up my stereo.”
“I can? Gee, thanks.”
“You’re most welcome.”
Melinda spread her hands. “You going to feed me?”
“Oatcakes and the champion’s portion of the beef.” And though Melinda stared at her, Christa laughed at her own joke.
In all her days at the school in Corca Duibne she had never dreamed of this: that she would spend a day driving the streets of Denver in the company of a woman as audacious as the most wild-eyed hoyden of the Gaeidil, enjoying a world far stranger even than that of curdled milk oceans and meat-clad doorkeepers in the dream of Anier Mac Conglinde.
She was opening up, and the darkness of her endless twilight memories of the Sidh had been riven by the blue sky of Colorado and the bright lights of a rock concert.
Renouncing at last the anesthetic life that had kept her loss from overwhelming her with grief, she was crawling out from behind her harp.
It was early evening by the time Christa pulled into her own driveway, and, with Melinda helping, she muscled the equipment inside and down the stairs. She had spent the last several days cleaning out her basement, trashing the accumulated rubbish of eighty years of Denver living, pitching old furniture, out-of-fashion clothes, cardboard boxes gritty with the talcumlike dust of the past. Now the sheetrock walls were covered with carpet scraps to keep down the echoes, and the otherwise empty room was soon occupied by the Laney, the delays, a new stereo, and several stacks of records that Melinda had insisted on lending to her.
“You’re going to have to get used to listening to this stuff, Chris,” said Melinda as she staggered down the stairs with a foot-high pile of cardboard and vinyl in her arms. “Might as well start now.”
Melinda made Christa do the actual hook-up of the amplifier and the stereo, insisting that if she did not start learning about electronics immediately, she would be lost in rock and roll. Sitting amid a tangle of wire and patch cables, Christa puzzled through the directions while Melinda translated the unfamiliar terminology.
“Positive to positive and negative to negative,” said the bassist. “Otherwise your speakers will be out of phase.”
Christa held the speaker cord up to the light and examined the bare copper ends. “Energy is energy, Melinda. What is this positive and negative?”
“Take it on
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