The two of us met Edgar a half hour before Socks was supposed to show up. Edgar had been playing his bass all afternoon and looked pretty exhausted when he arrived and sat down.
“I’m really glad we found somebody. The songs are shaping up and it would be nice to be able to get together and actually try to play something,” he said.
“I don’t know,” I said. “This guy sounds like kind of a loser to me.” I explained to Edgar the way the flyer had been worded.
“So what if he wants to rock? He sounded perfectly nice on the phone,” Fern said, lightly slapping my hand and giving me a grin. “I mean, when it comes down to it, we want to rock too, don’t we?”
Edgar laughed. “I wonder why his name is Socks.”
“Maybe because he stinks,” I said.
After a little while, the bell above the tea shop door jingled, signalling the arrival, presumably, of Socks. We knew right away that it couldn’t be anyone but him. He was tall and burly, with long shaggy brown hair and a long goatee. He wore a metal shirt pulled down over his substantial belly and long black shorts. And bright white socks pulled up high on his shins.
“Oh, wow,” Fern said.
He scanned the room for a moment and when he caught sight of us, his face lit up and he raised his hand in greeting. “Hiya!” he said brightly, turning the heads of the other tea shop customers as he came to our table.
We all stood up to introduce ourselves and shake his hand, and then he pulled up a chair and we all sat back down.
“So, yeah, it’s great to meet you all,” he said. “I’ve been playing metal since I was a kid. I just got out of school and I’m looking for a band to play with, get back into it.”
“We’re just starting out,” Edgar said.
“You must be bass, right? Fern here told me it was two girls on guitar and vox, and a dude on bass.”
Vox? I had to prevent myself from shuddering noticeably. I didn’t want to offend him. He did seem like a nice guy.
“Yeah,” Edgar said, grinning. “Fern’s guitar, and Rachel does vox.”
I smiled, probably showing too much tooth as I tried to make it as genuine as possible. “That’s right.”
“Can you wail?” Socks said to me, very seriously.
I hesitated as Fern and Edgar both covered their smiles and awaited my answer. “Uh, yeah, sure I can. I can wail.”
“Well, that’s good then.” Socks sat back. “A band’s only as good as their singer, you know. And a girl singer in metal, well, that’ll be somethin’ else. Don’t come across that too often.”
We asked him some questions about himself. He was a few years older than we were, having just graduated from high school. He was working for his father’s construction company and had been playing drums for years.
“Why do they call you ‘Socks’?” Fern asked.
“’Cause I always wear nice white ones,” he said, lifting his foot and pointing at the socks we had all noticed when he walked in. “Guess it’s kinda my trademark.”
Socks invited us to his house to hear him play. He lived a short drive from downtown and had a minivan parked outside the tea shop. “You can’t have a drummer without a vehicle,” he said as we walked to the van. “Gotta have some way to carry your stuff. It’s not easy like a guitar case!”
As we drove to his house, he chatted about how he’d been in a few bands while he was in school. “Nothing serious, of course,” he said. “Just jamming out on the weekends. Played a few gigs, really small stuff, did a battle of the bands, that kind of thing. I’m definitely looking for some serious players this time around.”
“We haven’t rehearsed yet, we’re still writing,” Fern told him. “We have maybe five or six songs, and Rachel’s working on lyrics for them. We wanted to get a full band together before we started going through them, even though Edgar and I have been playing together.”