Tommy

My friend Tommy died in 1969.

Tommy was a hippie. He had leukemia.

They ran do more with it these days.

After the funeral, there was a reception at Newman Center.

That's what his folks called it: a reception.

My friend Phil said, "Isn't that what yon have after a fucking we€lding'?"'

(His folks were nice people. So hummed.)

We all went to the reception.

There were sandwiches to eat and grape stuff to drink.

My friend I'hil said. "What is this shit?""

I said it was ZaKex. 1 recognized it, I said, from M^ F.

"What's that shit?" asked Phil.

"Methodist Youth Fellowship." I said.

"I went for ten years anil once ilid

a flannel hoard of Noah and the Ark."

After the sandwiches and tin- ZaKex, Tommy's parents went home.

I imagine they cried and cried.

In those days I couldn't understand what it must he like to lose a kid.

Now I guess I know better. Although mine have lived (at least so far).

After Tommy's parents went home, we all went to 1 10 North Main.

We cranked up the stereo. I found some Grateful Dead records.

I hated the Dead, of Jerry Garcia I used to say, "I'll he grateful when

he's dead"

(turned out 1 wasn't), hut Tommy liked them. (Of course he also liked Kenny Rogers.) We smoked dope. We smoked Winstons and Pall Malls. We drank beer.

We rapped about Tommy.

It was pretty nice.

And when the Wilde-Stein Society showed up—all eight of them—we let

them in. Tommy had leukemia and Tommy was gay but it was the leukemia that

killed him. (That was before AIDS.)

We all agreed his folks had done him righteous.

He wrote what he wanted, anil they pretty much gave him what he wrote.

He was dressed in his best as he lay in his new narrow apartment.

He wore his hellbottom blue jeans and his favorite tie-dyed shirt.

(Melissa the Hig Girl Freek made that shirt.

I don't know what happened to her.

She was there one day. then she wasn't.

I associate her with melting snow.

Main Street in Orono would gleam so wet and bright it hurt your eyes.

That was the winter the Lemon Pipers sang "Green Tambourine.")

Mis hair was sham) ed. It went to his shoulders.

Man. it was clean! I bet the mortician washed it.

Or maybe in those days they had a beautician on call who specialized in

hippies.

In any case, he was wearing his headband.

Tommy's headband had a peace sign on it. It was stitched in white silk. I don't know if Melissa the Big Girl Freek made it or not. I forget a lot about those days, now that my hair is gray.

"He looked like a dude." said Phil. He was getting drunk. Jerry Garcia was singing "Truckin"." It's a pretty stupid song. "Fuckin Tommy!" said Phil. "Drink to the motherfucker!" We drank to the motherfucker.

"He wasn't wearing his button," said Indian Scontras.

Inilian was in the Wilde-Stein Society. He's not an Indian, hut he is gay. These days he sells insurance in Brewer.

"He told his mother he wanted to he huried wearing that hutton. That is so hogus."

"It's there." I said. "His mom just moved it under his vest. I looked."

It was a leather vest with silver Imttons. He hought it at the Free Fair.

I was with him that day. There was a rainhow and

from a loudspeaker Canned Heat sang "Let's Work Together."

The hutton his mother moved heneath the vest said i'm hkkk \m> I'm «.)! KKR.

"She should have left it alone." said Indian Scontras.

"Tommy was very proud. He was a proud <picer."

Indian Scontras was crying. Now he sells estate policies and has three

daughters.

Turned out not to he so gay alter all. hut selling insurance is rery queer, in my opinion. "Yes. hut she was his mother." I said. "She kissed his scrapes when he

was young." "What does that have to do with fuck-all?" asked Indian Scontras.

He stalked away.

"Fuekin Tommy!" said Phil and raised his heer high. "Let's toast that

motherfucker!" We toasted the motherfucker.

That was forty years ago.

Tonight I wonder how many hippies died in those few sunshine years.

Statistics say it must have heen quite a few. There always are. I'm not talking ahout !!THE WAK!! either. Car accidents. Drug overdoses. Alcohol. Bar fights. Suicides. Disease.

All the usual suspects, in other words. How many were huried in their hippie duds? This question occurs to me in the whispers of the night. Statistics say it must have heen quite a few. It was Heeling, the time of the hippies. Their Free Fair now is underground. There they still wear their hellhottoms and there is mold on the full sleeves of their psychedelic shirts.

The hair in those narrow rooms is hrittle hut still long.

The Man's harher has not touched il in forty years.

No gray has frosted it.

How many hippies in hcadhands?

W hat ahout the ones clasping signs that say hki.i. \o w K w on't <;o?

What ahout the one huried with a McCarthy sticker on the cofHn lid?

What ahout the girl with the stars on her forehead?

(They have fallen now. I imagine, from her parched parchment skin.)

Girls with ('her hangs.

Boys with Sonny howls.

These an1 the silent soldiers of love who never sold out

or sold insurance.

These are the fashion-dudes who never went out of fashion.

Sometimes, at night, 1 think of hippies asleep under the earth.

Here's to Tommy.

Stephen King's latest novel is Under the Dome.