Michael Scott Cain Artie Bleeker Knocking back his fourth boilermaker, Artie Bleeker, who tunes pianos in a town that hates music, stares at the bottles behind the bar and says, "It can't be told, there ain't words to say, how much I loved that girl. To me, she was a D-flat chord on a fresh-tuned instrument. Esoteric systems say D-flat's the prime tone of the universe, you know?, the one that holds it all together? Remember Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers ending that tune with the whole band hitting D-flat? All at the same time? That's the way it was, just watching her walk to her car." Harry Neel, the meter-reader, takes in Artie with a tired glance and staggers to the rest room. Like the rest of us, he's heard this tale before and knows that wherever Artie Bleeker walks, you can bet there's no love on that street. | "America #2"~ Photograph by Thomas Kearnes |