Sunday You Need Love

 by Jay Macleod

We had volume wars one summer. It was me with my music and them with their fucking. We were only a few inches apart separated by some struts and drywall and insulation.

It was one of those houses downtown which has been converted into apartments by a landlord eager to make some quick coin off university. The original building was probably one hundred years old or more, wood-framed.

You ever hear The Oblivians? They’re a garage band from Memphis.  You want to name their best record I’d say “…Play Nine Songs with Mr. Quintron.”  There are gospel songs on it and everything.

I was working at the call centre.

Let me be more specific: it was year two of four and a half at the call centre. It was month eighteen of fifty-six.I was in between not getting laid for several years and getting married. I don’t know what their deal was. Maybe they were trying to have a child.

I’m assuming it was the landlady’s brother. She was a crone, he was a hick. That was my initial assessment. Let me be more specific: she had a hunched back and wore granny glasses and was probably in her early forties. He drove a huge goddamn pickup truck and wore a red-checked flannel jacket every time I saw him and lived in the apartment overhead. Probably he was in his mid-thirties. 

I was twenty-five. My favourite bands were Leatherface and the Cramps and The Oblivians. Come to think of it that is still pretty much the case.

It was war.

The Mr. Qunitron album is excellent.

I had this great turntable and some OK speakers.

One time they banged on the ceiling. It was a “shut the fuck up” kind of thing. It was twelve thirty. I guess I can understand. Then they started to fuck. I played “Mary Lou” and “What’s the Matter Now”. The next night they banged again except it was only eleven-thirty. I blasted “I Want to Live the Life” at them, and “Repeater” and “Fill Your Boots”.  I’d receive messages from the rental-crone asking me to keep the volume down.  At that point I wasn’t answering my phone much and would get a message from her days after the fact. Hers was one more bill I didn’t need to pay.

I never heard from them upstairs but I heard them. After I heard them I made sure they heard me.

We never discussed it face to face.

I’d like to say there was a big climax or something but there wasn’t. I played Trio and Turbonegro and Rollins Band for awhile. I don’t know if she got pregnant or if they broke up or what. The monster-ass truck never left the parking lot. A few weeks after our war I met the woman who’d marry me.

She can’t stand punk rock.

I’d like to think we didn’t disturb the neighbors when she came over but honestly I don’t care if we did.

Jay MacLeod is from Vernon BC. He drives a Chevy truck most everywhere. This week he celebrated his third year of marriage.