Last Licks

“As you say, that can make male cats a little frisky. We used to have a lot of them running around the house when I was growing up.” Suddenly Luke knelt to open his guitar case. “Yeah, I thought I had a little bottle in here.”

“Little bottle” was a perfect description. He held up one of those miniature booze bottles usually found in minibars or on airplanes. With this one, however, the label was long gone, as was the booze. Now the bottle held a thick, yellowish, viscous . . . something.

“Mom’s all-purpose lotion,” Luke explained. “I keep a bottle of this stuff and an emery board around to deal with torn calluses.”

He held out his hand. The fingertips he used on the fretboard of his guitar were all heavily calloused. “Screws up my chords and hurts like crazy, when one of these suckers tears free. So I use Mom’s lotion. She taught me how to make it over our stove. For a long time, she had a thing for guitarists, so she was very popular.” Luke laughed. “Mom used to call herself the ‘hippy-dippy chippie.’ We lived in a commune in California. She was the local healer, making all sorts of potions and lotions. When she passed away, she left me all her secret recipes.”

Sunny looked dubiously at the contents of the bottle. “What’s the secret recipe for that?”

“Ham fat and herbs,” Luke promptly replied, and then scratched his head. “Or was that her secret recipe for scrambled eggs?” Sunny laughed, and Luke smiled at her.

“Just put a little on your finger and rub it on the end of one of those scratches,” he said. “It kills any germs and takes the pain away.”

Sunny took the bottle, unscrewed the top, and let a tiny driblet of the yellowish stuff fall on her left forefinger. Then she gingerly dabbed it on one of Shadow’s scratches.

“Wow!” she said. Almost immediately, the ache was gone, and her skin felt cool and comfortable.

“Amazing, isn’t it?” Luke said.

“Can I use a little more?” Sunny asked.

Luke waved. “Keep the bottle. I’ve got plenty more at home. Put a bandage over those scratches for now. But when you get home, when you go to bed, just cover them with the lotion. Let them breathe.”

Sunny took a little more of the yellow stuff, put it over the other scratches, and flexed her hand. The pain was gone. “I don’t know how to thank you.”

“I can make a suggestion,” Luke replied.

She looked at him suspiciously.

“I have a gig tomorrow evening,” he said. “And I’d love it if you could come.” Did he mean, like on a date? Sunny didn’t know how to answer.

“And if you could bring other people, that would be wonderful,” Luke went on, not even seeming to notice her hesitation. “It wouldn’t hurt if the manager thinks I can draw a crowd.”

“Well, sure,” Sunny said. “Where is it?”

“A bar called O’Dowd’s,” Luke said.

“O’Dowd’s?” she echoed. “Why would you want to play in the worst dive bar in Elmet County?”

“Where were you when I did the deal?” Luke teased. “One bar pretty much looks like another when they’re cleaning up the morning after. I stopped by, they agreed to give me a shot, and that was that.”

“I’ll do what I can, but it’s not going to be easy to get people to go down there.”

“All I can ask is that you try.” Luke snapped his case together and picked it up.

“I have one more thing to ask you,” Sunny said, “something that came out of the stuff you talked about with Will yesterday.”

“What?” Luke’s brown eyes got a little wary.

“You said somebody gave you the heads-up that Reese was going after people for reports. Where did the warning come from?”

Luke looked a little relieved. “Rafe Warner. He’s a pretty decent guy.”

And a pretty busy one, Sunny added silently. She thanked Luke again for the lotion, and made sure the bottle was tightly capped before putting it in her pocket. He said good-bye and headed off to the front door.

Sunny glanced to the nurses’ station, where Camille was beckoning her over, holding up a gauze pad and a roll of tape.

If only a few drops of magic lotion could take care of everything,

Sunny wistfully thought as she went to get bandaged.

*

Mike Coolidge almost dropped his remote when Sunny came home, joined him on the couch, and told him about Luke’s upcoming gig.

“O’Dowd’s?” Sunny’s father said in disbelief. “What was the kid thinking?”

“I think he was just happy to find a place where he could play.”

Mike frowned. “The crowd down there will eat him alive.”

“Maybe not, if some friendly faces turn up,” Sunny said hopefully. “Would you mind coming? Maybe you could ask Mrs. Martinson, too.”

“Helena? In O’Dowd’s?”

Sunny tried to imagine the fastidious Mrs. Martinson in a rowdy joint like O’Dowd’s, but the picture just wouldn’t come. “All right,” she said, shrugging in defeat, “that probably won’t work. But you’ll show up for Luke, won’t you?”

Now it was Mike’s turn to shrug. “I wouldn’t mind hearing him do something besides ‘You Are My Sunshine.’ Just remember, I’m not as good at barroom brawls as I used to be.”