“Parents let you mov
e off?”
“They were killed in an airplane crash,” Kathy Ann volunteered.
“Oh. Sorry.”
“It’s okay. It was a long time ago. We’re all the family we have now.”
“I know the feeling,” Keefer said. “It’s like my parents went down in a plane.”
“Keefer lives here,” Charlotte Lily said, obviously enjoying our warm conversation.
“Here?”
“In the back,” he said. “I have a small apartment Izzy lets me have. It’s all one room, nothing special.”
“I’m going to the bathroom,” Charlotte Lily declared.
“Don’t do nothin‘ bad in there,” Keefer warned. He looked serious. I waited until she went in and then asked him what he meant by that.
“She’s been known to light up a joint or two or sniff some snow. All I need is Izzy to think I let something like that happen in his place. Ain’t that right, Kathy Ann?”
“Yes,” she said obediently.
“Where do you live?”
“She lives in my complex, upstairs, in Cory Lewis’s apartment,” Kathy Ann answered for me.
He shrugged.
“I don’t know him. So, are you a singer, too?”
“Hardly,” I said.
He laughed.
“You’re probably the only one in Nashville who would admit it.”
Charlotte Lily emerged from the bathroom, apparently having gone in only to check on her makeup.
“Don’t worry,” she said when he glared at her. “I didn’t do anything that would get you in trouble.”
“That’s a surprise. Well, I gotta get back to this car,” he said, more to me than to Kathy Ann and Charlotte Lily.
“Sad when a young man like that is more interested in working on a car than being with us, isn’t it, girls?” Charlotte Lily teased.
He looked back.
“I don’t get many arguments from my cars,” he told her. “And they appreciate what I do for them.”
“Oh, you poor sad boy. Someone done your heart in good. Put that torch to work and mend it,” she told him, laughed again, and sauntered back to the door. “Let’s go, girls, unless you’d rather stand there and watch Keefer make love to a fender bender.”
I glanced back at him. He had his mask on and turned the torch back on. The sparks were flying again.
Not sure myself why I was so reluctant about it, I followed Charlotte Lily and Kathy Ann out of the shop.
“You don’t want to get yourself involved with him,” Charlotte Lily lectured as we started back toward Stumpin‘ Jumpin’. “He’s a loser from the get-go. Quit school, has no family anymore, and never does anything with his old friends. That’s one boy you look at and know that what you see is what you get. Now,” she said, turning toward the dance club, “let’s see if we can entice a few of those college boys. They know what fun is. After all, what’s the point of being young if you’re going to waste it on being responsible, huh?”