The Non-Sequiturus Rex
by Lenny Levine
Part 1 appears
in this issue.
conclusion
We were back at work the next day, playing a dozen more of the songs to the same spectacular effect. The only hiccup was when Mitch sang a wrong lyric on “Crossroads.” Instead of “tried to flag a ride,” he sang “tried to beg a ride.” He’d always sung it that way and I’d never realized it was wrong, which just shows you we’re all human.
But Bobby picked up on it and pointed it out. Even then, he couldn’t just say it. He had to say, “Hey, Mitch, you shouldn’t be a beggar. Beggars can’t be choosers.”
“Huh?” we both said in unison.
“Why would you want to be a beggar when you can be a flagger? Google the lyrics, you’ll see.”
So we did on my phone, and he was right.
We resumed, and the time sailed by as we killed it on song after song. During the second verse of “Politician,” I heard the garage door behind me starting to roll up.
Bobby abruptly stopped playing. A look of fear crossed his face. “Oh, crap,” he muttered.
I looked behind me, and there in the open space stood a heavyset man in a t-shirt and cargo pants. He had red hair like Bobby’s, and in his right hand he was holding a gun.
“You changed the locks, but you forgot to change the code for the garage door opener, didn’t you?” he said as he stepped inside and hit the button that closed the door behind him. “Oh, well, I guess you can’t think of everything.”
I couldn’t take my eyes off the gun. He was carrying it so casually, like it was an iPhone.
“Why don’t you clowns move away from those microphones and put your asses against that wall,” he told us, indicating which wall he meant by pointing the gun at it. “I’d like to speak with my son.”
We quickly stashed our instruments and complied.
I don’t know what Mitch was thinking as we stood there against that cold concrete and witnessed what was unfolding, but I was pretty sure I was going to die at the end of it. If not before.
The man stood in the center of the garage, the gun pointed at Bobby.
“What’s your mother doing right now, right at this moment?” he said. “Is she fucking that asshole lawyer in my bed? I saw his car parked down the block.”
Bobby said nothing, his face expressionless.
“And what are you doing right now, right at this moment? Still sitting on your toilet seat and shitting out garbage?” He scowled at Bobby. “What a waste of life you are. You’re pathetic. Maybe you don’t deserve to live either, just like your whore mother.”
My heart virtually leaped to my throat, but Bobby’s expressionless face didn’t change.
“Dad,” he said in a calm, rational tone of voice, “I think, for your sake, that you should go.”
It was the clearest thing I’d ever heard him say.
It made his father crack up laughing. He broke into loud whooping cackles while his face turned crimson, which was as scary as everything else. “Oh, you’re thinking for my sake, are you? Is that how you think?”
He momentarily lost his balance, waving the gun in the air for a second as he regained it. I realized he must be drunk out of his mind. It ratcheted up the scariness to yet a new level.
“Yeah, Dad, it is how I think, whether you like it or not.” Bobby’s eyes were locked on his. “And what are you doing right now, right at this moment? Standing there drunk with a gun in your hand? What good can come out of that?”
Another clear statement; this was definitely not the same Bobby. But it infuriated his father.
“Who the hell says I want anything good to come out of it?” Spittle flew from his mouth. “You little punk. I can still whip your ass, with or without a gun!”
Bobby still seemed unperturbed. “Then why don’t you put the gun down, and you can show me?”
That got a contemptuous laugh. “Listen, asshole, I may be drunk but I ain’t stupid.”
He took a step toward the connecting door to the house, which again made him lose his balance. But he recovered, the gun still firmly in his grip and pointed at Bobby.
“I’m gonna go upstairs now and take care of your whore mother,” he said. “If I get lucky and the lawyer’s there, then I’ll have me a twofer. But I was just wondering whether I need to take care of you first. And, of course” — he glanced over at Mitch and me — “your two buddies over there.”
I felt a chill. Like my insides were cringing. My thoughts were scattered, but basically they were No! No! No! No! No!
The man continued talking. “It’s not that I need to eliminate all of you as witnesses. I don’t give a crap about that because I’m not coming out of this alive anyway. So there’s no reason why I need to kill you, but you know, Bobby? I wonder if I should do it anyway. Just ’cause I feel like it. What do you think?”
I can’t imagine what it took, but Bobby still kept that calm face. “I think I need a better drum head for my snare,” he said. “I really don’t like how this one sounds, even though it’s brand new.”
His father looked at him like he’d lost his mind. “What?!” he sputtered. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“My Snare Drum. It Sucks.” Bobby spaced the words out like he was talking to a child. “What don’t you understand?”
His father’s face again turned crimson. “What don’t I understand?!” He moved toward the drum set, his legs a bit unsteady, but not his gun hand. It stayed pointed right at Bobby. “I just asked you a simple question, you little punk. I asked you why I shouldn’t kill you, and all you have to say is some gobbledygook about your drums? What the hell is wrong with you? Are you high on drugs?”
He’d reached the drum set now. He leaned across the twin bass drums at Bobby. “I’m gonna give you one more chance to save your worthless ass. Tell me why I shouldn’t—”
Bobby suddenly hit the crash cymbal, full force. His father’s head was right underneath it. For him it must have seemed like an explosion.
He instinctively recoiled, staggering backward as Bobby launched himself over the drum set, right into him.
They both fell over, Bobby on top, his father landing on his back as his arms flew out to the sides. The gun came out of his hand, skittering across the garage floor and coming to a stop right at my feet. I stared down at it, like it was a hallucination. Bobby had to yell at me: “Pick it up! Pick it up!” before I finally did, holding it gingerly.
At that moment, the connecting door to the house burst open. Two cops were standing in the doorway with their weapons drawn.
Bobby was still sitting atop his father, who was now glassy-eyed. Bobby looked down at him. “Guess what, Dad?” he said. “Mom called the cops again.”
* * *
“Well, I never thought my life would be saved by a well-placed non sequitur,” Mitch said.
It was two days later, and we were driving to Bobby’s house for our first rehearsal since it happened. His mother, it turned out, had been up in her bedroom alone, with no lascivious lawyer present. She’d been looking out the window, when she spotted her husband’s car pulling into the driveway, and she immediately called the police.
Afterward, when they checked the car, they found a small arsenal inside it as well as a full can of gasoline, which he was evidently going to use to set fire to the house and go out in a proverbial blaze of glory.
“He always likes to get in your face,” I overheard Bobby explaining to the cops. “My only hope was to bait him enough so that he’d move close to the drums, and I’d at least have a chance.”
We’d taken our equipment back home with us afterward, and now it was once again in the trunk and backseat of the Volkswagen as we pulled up to the garage, where the door was open.
This time, Bobby helped us bring it all in.
When we were set up, we just stood there and looked at each other. These were the same positions we were in when the nightmare began. It was so surreal that, for the first time ever, I could not think of a single Cream song to play.
“You call it, Bobby,” I said.
He stared at that invisible thing in the space between us.
“I think we should work on our tans.”
I, of course, had no idea what he was talking about, but by now I was getting used to it.
Mitch just smiled. Then he began to play one of the most legendary guitar figures of all time.
Bobby and I joined in, and we commenced to nail every note of “Sunshine of Your Love” like we owned it.
Copyright © 2026 by Lenny Levine
