Alisaura
Blue Crack Supplier
Hello! Here is the next installment of lemon-related time-travel adventures. Diane has asked me to make the following statement on her behalf:
"This is when thevoices characters in my head kind of took over and didn't let me get any sleep. I also tried not to put the whole speech in and I think I got the point across."
Obviously this chapter is based around a real event, but besides that, we have taken extreme liberties with reality and the rest of it is utter rubbish.
Chapter 6
The next morning, they gathered again in the lemon's main control room. None of them had slept particularly well, except for Bono, who had snored for most of the night. He had nearly been sucked out of the toilet after he got up, however, so Edge felt that they'd all had their revenge.
Adam had also grumbled about the state of their clothes, which had not fared well between the dinosaur, the cavemen, and all the running and panicking. Edge conceded that he had a point, and disappeared into the cupboard, returning a minute later with a pile of clothes for them all. They were plain and nondescript, and they had to use the belts they were already wearing, but it was enough.
Edge was explaining his plan to get them jobs and earn some money.
"... We'll split into pairs, it will look a bit funny if four of us are wandering around together. We're lucky our clothes are okay," he added, casting a critical eye over their apparel.
Adam's eye was on Edge's beanie. "It's a bit warm to be wearing that, isn't it?"
Edge was ready for this. "I'll take this off if Bono takes his shades off. They're far too futuristic."
Bono spluttered. "It's sunny out there!"
"Sunglasses were not red in 1963," Edge asserted. "You can get a pair here if you need them."
The two of them stared at one another, until they both gave in to logic, and removed their accessories with a mutual sigh.
"Right," Edge said, moving on. "With all the people for the march due in town, shops might be seeking extra employees, so we should be able to find something fairly easily. And remember the Rules!" he said. "Don't say ANYTHING about anything that's going to happen after today. Don't even mention the march or Dr King if you can avoid it, and certainly don't even think about talking about his assassination, or JFK's, or anything like that. And don't say anything that sounds Communist, either. The Cold War's in full swing."
A singer, a bass player and a drummer blinked back at him. They hadn't really thought about the implications of where, and when they were. Adam did some thinking.
"The Cuban Missile Crisis was only last year," he said, awed.
"Try to keep that in mind," Edge replied.
"I think we should empty our pockets of futuristic evidence before we go anywhere," he continued after a pause. He got a wicker basket out of the closet and proceeded to dump all his change and guitar picks into it, along with his BlackBerry, the electronic keys to his car, and various other odds and ends that didn't belong in 1963. The other three followed suit.
Edge, Bono and Larry all stared at the variety of objects Adam turned out from his pockets.
"What?" Adam said defensively, when Bono mutely picked up a stethoscope that had emerged from under Adam's shirt. "You never know."
Finally they were ready, and after making sure the coast was clear, they emerged from the lemon. The only electronic device Edge kept about his person was the remote control to open it from the outside.
"Adam and I will try this way," Edge said, waving his hand to the north, "and you two can go that way," he pointed south. Larry nodded. "We've all got the local time now," Edge went on, indicating his watch. "We'll meet back here at 3pm, all right? And be careful!"
"Yes mum," Bono muttered, rolling his eyes as they parted company. He and Larry walked along, keeping an eye out for likely looking places of employment.
"Do you realise," Larry said slowly, "that our mothers are alive now? Over in Ireland?"
Bono hadn't realised this, and stopped in his tracks. Larry turned to look back at him.
"Do you think... we could...?" Bono couldn't quite get the question out.
Larry sighed. "No. There's no way. We'd have to get enough money to buy plane tickets, and Edge will need that to buy stuff to fix the DUMASS. It's more important than... than us wanting to see them one last time."
Bono stepped closer to Larry and rested a hand on his shoulder. "When he fixes the DUMASS properly, we can go and see them then. He probably won't let us talk to them, but we can see them."
"Yeah." Larry kicked at the pavement for a moment before pulling himself together. "Come on, we need to make some money so Edge can do some more impossible things."
---
Several streets away, Edge had fallen in love.
Adam was trying unsuccessfully to drag him away from the window of a music store. "Come on, you said yourself we don't have any money..."
Edge barely noticed, eyes glued to the guitar on display. "1963 Gibson Firebird III," he was murmuring, entranced. "Two humbucking pickups... neck-through construction..."
"Edge," Adam hissed. "People are looking..."
The guitarist didn't seem to hear him. "... Mahogany/walnut neck... Gibson Vibrola..."
A beefy, smiling man emerged from the shop and grinned at the two musicians. "I can see you know your guitars, sir," he said, and Edge's attention finally wavered from the guitar. "You know that's based on the Explorer design? Why not come in and give it a try...?"
Adam tried to pull Edge away while smiling at the shopkeeper. Edge ploughed into the store though, and Adam was forced to follow.
The shopkeeper took the guitar down and handed it to Edge, who sat down with it reverently and plugged it into an amp provided for customers.
"It's a shame the Explorer didn't sell well, I thought it was a lovely guitar," the shopkeeper was saying.
"Oh, it is, I love it," Edge said vaguely, tuning a string. "Been playing them for nearly thirty years..." He strummed a chord and sighed happily, completely oblivious to Adam's mouthed swear words.
The shopkeeper stared, then laughed. "They only came out five years ago!"
"Dave likes his little joke, don't you Dave," Adam said, punching Edge in the arm and giving a very fake laugh.
Edge's face looked as if it couldn't decide whether to go white or red, horrified or mortified. "Haha, yes, only joking... I'm sure people will be playing them in thirty years and wondering why they never sold," he said hurriedly. "They were ahead of their time..."
Adam shot Edge a filthy look. After all his admonishments to them to be careful, and not talk about the future... The bassist rolled his eyes heavenwards.
"Well, go on sir, let's see what you can do with the Firebird," the shopkeeper said.
Obligingly, Edge gave him a truncated performance of I Will Follow, then the Streets intro, then after seeing Adam staring at him incredulously, went into a fairly average rendition of Blue Suede Shoes. The shopkeeper seemed relieved to hear something familiar.
"You certainly know your way around that guitar, sir," he said. "You're in a band?"
Edge was determined not to make any more temporal faux pas. "Oh, once upon a time," he said.
"This guitar will serve you well, I'm sure," the shopkeeper smiled.
Edge finally realised, with a sinking heart, that he had no money. He stood up and sighed, handing the guitar back to the shopkeeper.
"I'm sorry to waste your time, but this is a little out of my price range at the moment," he said, his fingers lingering on the headstock as the shopkeeper took it.
"Well, I can give you a real good deal. I'll even throw in the strap and a handful of picks..."
"I don't suppose you have any positions vacant in your store at the moment?" Edge asked. "Because that's the only way I'll be able to buy it."
The shopkeeper looked at he and Adam shrewdly. "Just off the boat, eh? Welcome to the land of opportunity, sir. I can certainly do with a hand around here, and I can see you know guitars. A buddy of mine needs help at his liquor store, if your friend here needs a job too...?" He looked at Adam.
"I don't drink," Adam said.
"Perfect!" The shopkeeper beamed, delighted. "The last assistant he had was stealing bourbon every week. Can you start tomorrow?"
Adam and Edge looked at one another, stunned at how easy it had been. They nodded to the shopkeeper.
---
Bono and Larry didn't return to the lemon until after 3:30pm, by which point Edge was wondering what would happen if he tried calling Bono's mobile. Except then he remembered the Bono had left his phone in the lemon, as they all had. There wouldn't be any network to carry the signal, anyway...
After Edge had yelled at Bono for twelve minutes and forty-seven seconds, Bono said, "Are you done?"
"I think so," Edge said, panting.
"Then you can yell it all at Larry now, because he's the one who made us late."
All eyes swung to Larry, who had a dreamy sort of look on his face.
"He's become a motorcycle mechanic," Bono explained.
"1957 Harley-Davidson X series sportster..." Larry was murmuring, in much the same way Edge had been murmuring about the Firebird. Edge sighed, unable to be mad at Larry when he'd been the same way over a guitar.
"How about you? Please don't tell me you've become Martin Luther King's personal assistant," Edge said to Bono.
"Starting tomorrow, I shall be purveying fine books to the good people of Washington D.C.," Bono grinned. "I sold two today without even trying!"
"You didn't let anything slip, did you?" Edge asked.
"What, like, 'I've been playing Explorers for thirty years'?" Adam put in before Bono could answer. Edge stamped on Adam's foot, scowling at him to shut up.
Larry and Bono stared, then the lemon echoed with hoots of derisive laughter.
---
Three days later, Edge (or Dave, as his new employer and all the customers knew him) had just sold an acoustic guitar to a teenage boy, when a young, skinny, African American man with a modest afro strolled into the shop. He browsed through a few of the guitars lining the walls, then picked up a Telecaster. Edge hovered attentively.
"Can I help you, sir?"
The young man turned around, shooting Edge a glance that might have been surprised, or suspicious. Edge wondered if it was really so unusual for a black customer to be address as "sir" by a white person...
"How's this one sound?" the young man asked. He slung it over his shoulder, upside down, and gave it an experimental strum with his left hand. Edge got a niggling feeling that he looked familiar.
"I'm afraid we don't have a left-handed model of that one in stock," Edge said. "We might have a Strat, or maybe one of the Gibsons..."
"Nah, I play them like this, just re-strung the other way round." He pulled a pick out of his pocket, and plucked at the strings, moving his head in time with a tune he was only partly playing.
"Well, we could re-string that one for you, if you'd like to try it out," Edge said, and then suddenly realised who he was talking to.
"You're Jimi Hendrix," he blurted, staring. Then he winced, kicking himself internally. Hendrix was a long way from his eventual fame, in 1963.
Hendrix gave Edge another sharp look. "You seen us play?" he asked.
"Yeah," Edge said, thinking furiously. That was the only reason he could have recognised him at this point in time. "You were great," he added, hoping to forestall any questions about exactly where and when he'd seen him. "Amazing stage presence."
Jimi Hendrix smiled at him. "Guess you don't think I'm over-the-top," he grinned.
Ten minutes later, the Telecaster had been re-strung upside-down, and Edge was trying not to goggle as a young Jimi Hendrix strutted his stuff with it. He still had some way to go before he was electrifying the audience at Woodstock in six years' time, but it was still undeniably Jimi Hendrix.
Hendrix ended up buying the guitar, and Edge ended up inventing an extra piece of paper that he supposedly had to sign in order to make the purchase. He went back to the lemon that night with the paper tucked safely in his pocket and a facial expression that still threatened to slip into the realm of goggling.
The day after that, Bono reported seeing Bob Dylan in the bookshop where he was working. He had been deeply amused to see his friend so young, and resolved to somehow show the older Dylan the autograph he'd signed, when they got home. Just as long as he didn't tell Edge...
"Well, I can't wait for Elvis to show up at the bike shop," Larry muttered sarcastically, then realised that this was entirely possible.
"We knew Dylan was at the March on Washington," Edge reasoned. "I don't know if Elvis was here too, you never know."
Finally, the day of the March had arrived, and all four members of U2 begged off work to attend. They weren't alone - a lot of shops had closed for the day, their employees at the March, or else the owners not anticipating a good day of sales.
They made sure to arrive early, but even so, they were lost amid the staggering mass of disaffected humanity that had flooded the city. Just seeing the sheer number of people who were there was enough to bring a lump to Bono's throat, knowing that there were millions more being represented who had all suffered prejudice and injustice. Who all needed it to end.
There was a series of speakers and musical performances through the day, notably including Bob Dylan. Dr Martin Luther King, Jr. would be the final speaker, and Bono knew that he and his bandmates were not the only ones waiting to hear his words.
Bono just stood there and watched as this man, the man who stood for peace and non-violence, walked onto the stage and stood behind the podium. He looked just like any other man, but everyone who was there knew he was far from that.
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Did he know how much the world would change because of him or did he just trust that something good would come out of it?
Bono looked over at his friends and saw that they had the same expressions on their faces... awe. There was no other way to describe it. He looked around at all the other people and everyone was just entranced by the spirit of the man.
Bono knew this speech by heart so he started concentrating on the man himself.
But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.
"How could a man who's seen so much violence and hatred have so much forgiveness and grace inside him?" Bono wondered to himself. It was a lesson he himself was trying to learn. It dawned on him that the way they grew up wasn't really all that different. Dr. King had the violence and hatred of the white people toward the Negros and he had the "troubles". Dr. King had the demonstrations in the streets and Bono had the bombings in 1970's Ireland. It was no wonder he was drawn to the man.
As we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied, as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating "For Whites Only". We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
Bono didn't realise that tears were falling down his face as he was listening. He looked over at the others and saw that they were doing the same. Even Larry, which made Bono smile a little.
He had grown up learning about Dr. King and what he stood for and now here he was standing there listening to his most famous speech. This was a pinch-me moment if there ever was one.
I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
All of a sudden Bono got the idea of maybe warning him. Telling him not to go to the Lorraine Motel. He looked over at Edge.
"Can't we...?" Bono started to say.
"No B. We can't," Edge said before he could finish his question. He could hear the regret in Edge's voice. "His death was just the beginning of his victory."
This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
Bono started thinking about when they wrote Pride. At the time it was just an ode to his hero. Now it was more of a statement of an ideology. Change made through non-violent means. He hoped he could only do half of as good of a job of it.
Bono didn't realise that he was humming MLK under his breath. Edge looked over when he heard but didn't say anything. The words had been going through his head as well.
"This," Edge thought, "this is why I built the Lemon."
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.
And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"
"Amen," the four men said.
The crowed roared their approval, the sound seeming to shake the air and the ground.
After the speech had finished, they didn't think it was a good idea to hang around too long, the danger of being caught in a photograph gradually filtering through their awe. They spoke very little as they slowly worked their way out of the huge crowd, composed of the whole cross-section of American citizenry. There were black people and white, Jews and Gentiles, just as Dr King had said. Protestants, Catholics, Asians and Hispanics, old and young, he had been talking to them all. Adam caught the eye of a middle-aged woman with greying hair, and just for a moment, he felt they shared something. An understanding, a consciousness of what had just taken place. Adam held onto the feeling as they walked back to the lemon.
****
"This is when the
Obviously this chapter is based around a real event, but besides that, we have taken extreme liberties with reality and the rest of it is utter rubbish.
Chapter 6
The next morning, they gathered again in the lemon's main control room. None of them had slept particularly well, except for Bono, who had snored for most of the night. He had nearly been sucked out of the toilet after he got up, however, so Edge felt that they'd all had their revenge.
Adam had also grumbled about the state of their clothes, which had not fared well between the dinosaur, the cavemen, and all the running and panicking. Edge conceded that he had a point, and disappeared into the cupboard, returning a minute later with a pile of clothes for them all. They were plain and nondescript, and they had to use the belts they were already wearing, but it was enough.
Edge was explaining his plan to get them jobs and earn some money.
"... We'll split into pairs, it will look a bit funny if four of us are wandering around together. We're lucky our clothes are okay," he added, casting a critical eye over their apparel.
Adam's eye was on Edge's beanie. "It's a bit warm to be wearing that, isn't it?"
Edge was ready for this. "I'll take this off if Bono takes his shades off. They're far too futuristic."
Bono spluttered. "It's sunny out there!"
"Sunglasses were not red in 1963," Edge asserted. "You can get a pair here if you need them."
The two of them stared at one another, until they both gave in to logic, and removed their accessories with a mutual sigh.
"Right," Edge said, moving on. "With all the people for the march due in town, shops might be seeking extra employees, so we should be able to find something fairly easily. And remember the Rules!" he said. "Don't say ANYTHING about anything that's going to happen after today. Don't even mention the march or Dr King if you can avoid it, and certainly don't even think about talking about his assassination, or JFK's, or anything like that. And don't say anything that sounds Communist, either. The Cold War's in full swing."
A singer, a bass player and a drummer blinked back at him. They hadn't really thought about the implications of where, and when they were. Adam did some thinking.
"The Cuban Missile Crisis was only last year," he said, awed.
"Try to keep that in mind," Edge replied.
"I think we should empty our pockets of futuristic evidence before we go anywhere," he continued after a pause. He got a wicker basket out of the closet and proceeded to dump all his change and guitar picks into it, along with his BlackBerry, the electronic keys to his car, and various other odds and ends that didn't belong in 1963. The other three followed suit.
Edge, Bono and Larry all stared at the variety of objects Adam turned out from his pockets.
"What?" Adam said defensively, when Bono mutely picked up a stethoscope that had emerged from under Adam's shirt. "You never know."
Finally they were ready, and after making sure the coast was clear, they emerged from the lemon. The only electronic device Edge kept about his person was the remote control to open it from the outside.
"Adam and I will try this way," Edge said, waving his hand to the north, "and you two can go that way," he pointed south. Larry nodded. "We've all got the local time now," Edge went on, indicating his watch. "We'll meet back here at 3pm, all right? And be careful!"
"Yes mum," Bono muttered, rolling his eyes as they parted company. He and Larry walked along, keeping an eye out for likely looking places of employment.
"Do you realise," Larry said slowly, "that our mothers are alive now? Over in Ireland?"
Bono hadn't realised this, and stopped in his tracks. Larry turned to look back at him.
"Do you think... we could...?" Bono couldn't quite get the question out.
Larry sighed. "No. There's no way. We'd have to get enough money to buy plane tickets, and Edge will need that to buy stuff to fix the DUMASS. It's more important than... than us wanting to see them one last time."
Bono stepped closer to Larry and rested a hand on his shoulder. "When he fixes the DUMASS properly, we can go and see them then. He probably won't let us talk to them, but we can see them."
"Yeah." Larry kicked at the pavement for a moment before pulling himself together. "Come on, we need to make some money so Edge can do some more impossible things."
---
Several streets away, Edge had fallen in love.
Adam was trying unsuccessfully to drag him away from the window of a music store. "Come on, you said yourself we don't have any money..."
Edge barely noticed, eyes glued to the guitar on display. "1963 Gibson Firebird III," he was murmuring, entranced. "Two humbucking pickups... neck-through construction..."
"Edge," Adam hissed. "People are looking..."
The guitarist didn't seem to hear him. "... Mahogany/walnut neck... Gibson Vibrola..."
A beefy, smiling man emerged from the shop and grinned at the two musicians. "I can see you know your guitars, sir," he said, and Edge's attention finally wavered from the guitar. "You know that's based on the Explorer design? Why not come in and give it a try...?"
Adam tried to pull Edge away while smiling at the shopkeeper. Edge ploughed into the store though, and Adam was forced to follow.
The shopkeeper took the guitar down and handed it to Edge, who sat down with it reverently and plugged it into an amp provided for customers.
"It's a shame the Explorer didn't sell well, I thought it was a lovely guitar," the shopkeeper was saying.
"Oh, it is, I love it," Edge said vaguely, tuning a string. "Been playing them for nearly thirty years..." He strummed a chord and sighed happily, completely oblivious to Adam's mouthed swear words.
The shopkeeper stared, then laughed. "They only came out five years ago!"
"Dave likes his little joke, don't you Dave," Adam said, punching Edge in the arm and giving a very fake laugh.
Edge's face looked as if it couldn't decide whether to go white or red, horrified or mortified. "Haha, yes, only joking... I'm sure people will be playing them in thirty years and wondering why they never sold," he said hurriedly. "They were ahead of their time..."
Adam shot Edge a filthy look. After all his admonishments to them to be careful, and not talk about the future... The bassist rolled his eyes heavenwards.
"Well, go on sir, let's see what you can do with the Firebird," the shopkeeper said.
Obligingly, Edge gave him a truncated performance of I Will Follow, then the Streets intro, then after seeing Adam staring at him incredulously, went into a fairly average rendition of Blue Suede Shoes. The shopkeeper seemed relieved to hear something familiar.
"You certainly know your way around that guitar, sir," he said. "You're in a band?"
Edge was determined not to make any more temporal faux pas. "Oh, once upon a time," he said.
"This guitar will serve you well, I'm sure," the shopkeeper smiled.
Edge finally realised, with a sinking heart, that he had no money. He stood up and sighed, handing the guitar back to the shopkeeper.
"I'm sorry to waste your time, but this is a little out of my price range at the moment," he said, his fingers lingering on the headstock as the shopkeeper took it.
"Well, I can give you a real good deal. I'll even throw in the strap and a handful of picks..."
"I don't suppose you have any positions vacant in your store at the moment?" Edge asked. "Because that's the only way I'll be able to buy it."
The shopkeeper looked at he and Adam shrewdly. "Just off the boat, eh? Welcome to the land of opportunity, sir. I can certainly do with a hand around here, and I can see you know guitars. A buddy of mine needs help at his liquor store, if your friend here needs a job too...?" He looked at Adam.
"I don't drink," Adam said.
"Perfect!" The shopkeeper beamed, delighted. "The last assistant he had was stealing bourbon every week. Can you start tomorrow?"
Adam and Edge looked at one another, stunned at how easy it had been. They nodded to the shopkeeper.
---
Bono and Larry didn't return to the lemon until after 3:30pm, by which point Edge was wondering what would happen if he tried calling Bono's mobile. Except then he remembered the Bono had left his phone in the lemon, as they all had. There wouldn't be any network to carry the signal, anyway...
After Edge had yelled at Bono for twelve minutes and forty-seven seconds, Bono said, "Are you done?"
"I think so," Edge said, panting.
"Then you can yell it all at Larry now, because he's the one who made us late."
All eyes swung to Larry, who had a dreamy sort of look on his face.
"He's become a motorcycle mechanic," Bono explained.
"1957 Harley-Davidson X series sportster..." Larry was murmuring, in much the same way Edge had been murmuring about the Firebird. Edge sighed, unable to be mad at Larry when he'd been the same way over a guitar.
"How about you? Please don't tell me you've become Martin Luther King's personal assistant," Edge said to Bono.
"Starting tomorrow, I shall be purveying fine books to the good people of Washington D.C.," Bono grinned. "I sold two today without even trying!"
"You didn't let anything slip, did you?" Edge asked.
"What, like, 'I've been playing Explorers for thirty years'?" Adam put in before Bono could answer. Edge stamped on Adam's foot, scowling at him to shut up.
Larry and Bono stared, then the lemon echoed with hoots of derisive laughter.
---
Three days later, Edge (or Dave, as his new employer and all the customers knew him) had just sold an acoustic guitar to a teenage boy, when a young, skinny, African American man with a modest afro strolled into the shop. He browsed through a few of the guitars lining the walls, then picked up a Telecaster. Edge hovered attentively.
"Can I help you, sir?"
The young man turned around, shooting Edge a glance that might have been surprised, or suspicious. Edge wondered if it was really so unusual for a black customer to be address as "sir" by a white person...
"How's this one sound?" the young man asked. He slung it over his shoulder, upside down, and gave it an experimental strum with his left hand. Edge got a niggling feeling that he looked familiar.
"I'm afraid we don't have a left-handed model of that one in stock," Edge said. "We might have a Strat, or maybe one of the Gibsons..."
"Nah, I play them like this, just re-strung the other way round." He pulled a pick out of his pocket, and plucked at the strings, moving his head in time with a tune he was only partly playing.
"Well, we could re-string that one for you, if you'd like to try it out," Edge said, and then suddenly realised who he was talking to.
"You're Jimi Hendrix," he blurted, staring. Then he winced, kicking himself internally. Hendrix was a long way from his eventual fame, in 1963.
Hendrix gave Edge another sharp look. "You seen us play?" he asked.
"Yeah," Edge said, thinking furiously. That was the only reason he could have recognised him at this point in time. "You were great," he added, hoping to forestall any questions about exactly where and when he'd seen him. "Amazing stage presence."
Jimi Hendrix smiled at him. "Guess you don't think I'm over-the-top," he grinned.
Ten minutes later, the Telecaster had been re-strung upside-down, and Edge was trying not to goggle as a young Jimi Hendrix strutted his stuff with it. He still had some way to go before he was electrifying the audience at Woodstock in six years' time, but it was still undeniably Jimi Hendrix.
Hendrix ended up buying the guitar, and Edge ended up inventing an extra piece of paper that he supposedly had to sign in order to make the purchase. He went back to the lemon that night with the paper tucked safely in his pocket and a facial expression that still threatened to slip into the realm of goggling.
The day after that, Bono reported seeing Bob Dylan in the bookshop where he was working. He had been deeply amused to see his friend so young, and resolved to somehow show the older Dylan the autograph he'd signed, when they got home. Just as long as he didn't tell Edge...
"Well, I can't wait for Elvis to show up at the bike shop," Larry muttered sarcastically, then realised that this was entirely possible.
"We knew Dylan was at the March on Washington," Edge reasoned. "I don't know if Elvis was here too, you never know."
Finally, the day of the March had arrived, and all four members of U2 begged off work to attend. They weren't alone - a lot of shops had closed for the day, their employees at the March, or else the owners not anticipating a good day of sales.
They made sure to arrive early, but even so, they were lost amid the staggering mass of disaffected humanity that had flooded the city. Just seeing the sheer number of people who were there was enough to bring a lump to Bono's throat, knowing that there were millions more being represented who had all suffered prejudice and injustice. Who all needed it to end.
There was a series of speakers and musical performances through the day, notably including Bob Dylan. Dr Martin Luther King, Jr. would be the final speaker, and Bono knew that he and his bandmates were not the only ones waiting to hear his words.
Bono just stood there and watched as this man, the man who stood for peace and non-violence, walked onto the stage and stood behind the podium. He looked just like any other man, but everyone who was there knew he was far from that.
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Did he know how much the world would change because of him or did he just trust that something good would come out of it?
Bono looked over at his friends and saw that they had the same expressions on their faces... awe. There was no other way to describe it. He looked around at all the other people and everyone was just entranced by the spirit of the man.
Bono knew this speech by heart so he started concentrating on the man himself.
But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.
"How could a man who's seen so much violence and hatred have so much forgiveness and grace inside him?" Bono wondered to himself. It was a lesson he himself was trying to learn. It dawned on him that the way they grew up wasn't really all that different. Dr. King had the violence and hatred of the white people toward the Negros and he had the "troubles". Dr. King had the demonstrations in the streets and Bono had the bombings in 1970's Ireland. It was no wonder he was drawn to the man.
As we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied, as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating "For Whites Only". We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
Bono didn't realise that tears were falling down his face as he was listening. He looked over at the others and saw that they were doing the same. Even Larry, which made Bono smile a little.
He had grown up learning about Dr. King and what he stood for and now here he was standing there listening to his most famous speech. This was a pinch-me moment if there ever was one.
I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
All of a sudden Bono got the idea of maybe warning him. Telling him not to go to the Lorraine Motel. He looked over at Edge.
"Can't we...?" Bono started to say.
"No B. We can't," Edge said before he could finish his question. He could hear the regret in Edge's voice. "His death was just the beginning of his victory."
This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
Bono started thinking about when they wrote Pride. At the time it was just an ode to his hero. Now it was more of a statement of an ideology. Change made through non-violent means. He hoped he could only do half of as good of a job of it.
Bono didn't realise that he was humming MLK under his breath. Edge looked over when he heard but didn't say anything. The words had been going through his head as well.
"This," Edge thought, "this is why I built the Lemon."
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!
Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.
And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"
"Amen," the four men said.
The crowed roared their approval, the sound seeming to shake the air and the ground.
After the speech had finished, they didn't think it was a good idea to hang around too long, the danger of being caught in a photograph gradually filtering through their awe. They spoke very little as they slowly worked their way out of the huge crowd, composed of the whole cross-section of American citizenry. There were black people and white, Jews and Gentiles, just as Dr King had said. Protestants, Catholics, Asians and Hispanics, old and young, he had been talking to them all. Adam caught the eye of a middle-aged woman with greying hair, and just for a moment, he felt they shared something. An understanding, a consciousness of what had just taken place. Adam held onto the feeling as they walked back to the lemon.
****
*L*
