“A boot-maker? We have a sister married to a boot-maker?”
Manuel risks a grin.
“It was the first thing that came into my head. I was staring at the bastard’s shiny boots, and it sort of came out …”
“Well, I’m glad it did, Mannie.” Ardillo bends down and begins gathering the first pile together, shoving the rags into the pannier. “I was afraid he was going to see through us. I had a mental block for a moment. I couldn’t think of anything to tell him.”
Francisco begins to help him.
“I wish I had the chance to wipe that smile off his stupid face.”
“No, you don’t.” Ardillo pauses and looks at the boy. “By now we would be dead — or worse — if you’d tried. And the information in that basket would never get to Mendez. You’re a soldier now, Francisco — even if you don’t look like one in those rags. And a soldier follows orders. That’s how he stays alive, and how he protects his comrades. If you had breathed wrong, that sergeant would have cut your throat and watched you bleed. Sometimes the hardest thing in the world is to do nothing.”
The boy nods and continues picking up the mess of material. Part of him understands, but he is hot-headed, and watching the two from a few metres distant, Manuel cannot help but notice how different his two brothers are …
“I hear your song on the radio this morning.” Abuelito has reminisced enough.
Alex waits, but nothing more is forthcoming. Vaguely he wonders what the old man was doing, listening to the kind of station that would be playing “Falling into the Sun”, but he asks no questions.
The boy looks at his watch.
“I have to go, viejo. Will you be alright till dad gets back?”
The old man laughs.
“Seventy-eight years, I look out for myself. Suddenly, I good for nothing? Just go. And tell that pretty girl of yours, she promises an old man a game of damas.”
The boy smiles as he turns to leave.
16
LOADED QUESTIONS
CLAIRE’S STORY
I took Alex to meet Mr Friedman.
We had a couple of hours to kill before he had to be in Max’s office, and I hadn’t been to see the old man in weeks. Mr F was maybe eighty-five, but you wouldn’t know it from his attitude to life. His body was letting him down, but his mind was as sharp as ever, and he had a wicked sense of humour.
He also played a mean game of checkers.
That was where I learned to play well enough to impress Alex’s abuelito.
I started visiting the nursing home when I was in Eighth Grade. It started out as a community service project that one of my teachers thought up. When you go to the sort of school my parents put me through, they have this idea that wealth has its obligations and we need to develop the “right attitude” to those “less fortunate than ourselves”. You get the picture.
So once a fortnight they’d bundle us onto the school bus and ferry us across to the Carrington Street Home for our regular dose of “good deeds therapy”.
At first I went through the motions — like most of the kids. Except for Karissa Mountford, who looked forward to it like nothing else. But last thing I heard, Karissa was studying to become a nun or something; she always was a bit different.
I’d probably have forgotten the whole thing at the end of the year, the same as everyone else, except that one day in late August they sent me in to speak with Mr Friedman.
He was new to the place. He’d fallen down and broken his hip, and it wasn’t mending very well, so he couldn’t look after himself properly.
Exactly why we hit it off, I’m not sure. We were about as different as two human beings could possibly be. As well as the age factor, there was nothing in our backgrounds that was remotely similar.
Harry, Mr Friedman, had spent his whole working life on the waterfront. He was a union organiser from the thirties to the seventies, and he was convinced that the country was being run by people with “more dollars than sense”. Which, I guessed, included my parents.
Come to think of it, that might have been exactly the reason we did hit it off. Not just because he was everything that my parents weren’t, but because he was about as lonely as I was most of the time.
His wife had died in the late seventies, and they had never been able to have kids. Most of his “mates” were dead, and there was really no one who cared whether he was alive or not. The Union sent people over to visit once in a while, “for old times’ sake”, but this was a new era. He didn’t know them, and they didn’t know him. He didn’t even feel close any more to the organisation he had spent his whole life building.
Then there was me.
What was I? Thirteen years old? What did I know. About anything?
I knew about loneliness. Even at that stage it was over between my olds, and they were both too tied up in their own problems and blaming each other to worry about the adolescent angst of their only daughter.
But Harry …
He seemed to understand. How, I’ll never work out. Maybe all those years in the Union had given him some special insight into human nature. Whatever.
I remember thinking once that I’d never known either of my grandfathers. Harry Friedman filled that gap, too.
After I finished Eighth Grade I kept visiting. Not every week, but often enough. With friends it isn’t a matter of regularity, it’s about caring. And we did.
So it was natural that I’d bring Alex along to meet him. After all, I’d met Alex’s family, and Harry was about the only “family” I had available to show off.
I was glad I did. They got on really well. Alex has always been close to his grandfather, so he wasn’t at all uncomfortable with someone as old as Mr F.
He was carrying his acoustic with him, not wanting to leave it in the car, and it wasn’t long before Harry had him playing requests.
Even then he managed to surprise me.
“Do you know any Bach?” he said. Just like that. Not “something classical” or “something old”, but Bach.
Five years I’d known him, and I never knew he was interested in classical music. He knew I played piano, of course, but there was no piano in the Home, so I guess it hadn’t really come up.
Alex launched into a Gavotte, and a section of the Toccata. Then he threw in a bit of very un-Bach, bottle-neck blues to round off the recital.
Then it was time to leave.
In the car on the way into the city Alex was quiet. I didn’t push it. I knew he’d break the silence when he was ready.
In the end he did.
“You know,” he said, “I never really understood why my grandfather dwells so much on what happened all those years ago. I suppose I just figured it was an age thing. But it’s not that simple, is it?”
I shrugged, and looked back at the road. I was only a sounding-board; he didn’t expect me to answer.
“I guess it’s all about dreams, isn’t it? I mean, when you’re a kid, tomorrow’s about as far ahead as you can think, but when you’re our age, you have dreams. What you’re going to do with your life, who you’ll finally marry. All kinds of stuff …”
He paused for a moment, and I looked up to see him staring at me. Then he went on.
“You know that there’s not a hope that all of the dreams will come true, but you can try to make them happen, and you can find new ones that you never thought of. But then you reach a certain age, and something inside you tells you that it’s over. The dreaming, I mean. That anything you didn’t manage to make happen by now is never going to happen. And you stop looking to the future, and spend your time looking back — at the dreams and the achievements. And the failures. The future is lost, the present holds nothing … What is there left but memories?”
He was silent for a long time. Every now and then I looked across at him, but he was lost in his thoughts.
“And what are your dreams, Alex?”
It was the kind of loaded question you only ask if you’re very sure of the person
you’re asking it of — or if you’re a bloody masochist.
I don’t think I was all that sure.
He looked at me for a moment. We were stopped at the red, so I could hold his gaze — which I did until the lights changed and the cab-driver behind me pressed his horn.
“With everything that’s going on at the moment, I don’t have room for many dreams. I want the band to be a success. I want a life that lets me play my music and … not much else. And I want to convince you that I’m not just after your body.”
There was a light note in his voice. It was a subject we inevitably came around to.
I laughed. “But you are after my body.”
“I know. But I want to convince you that I’m not.”
I knew he loved me, but he never pushed me to go further than I wanted to go. I wonder sometimes if he ever knew just how close I was to taking that final step.
Maybe he did. Maybe the thing that was holding him back was the same thing that was holding me back.
It was a question of commitment. I’d watched my parents being gradually torn apart by forces outside their marriage. His job, her job, his money, hers … I wasn’t going to get caught up in a relationship like that. I could wait.
At that moment there was no way he was ready to make any sort of permanent commitment to anything but his music. I knew it, and he knew it.
So he kept on trying, and I kept saying no. And I think, in a perverse way, he was happy with the arrangement. It meant we could enjoy being with each other without the extra pressure that sex brings with it. God knows, there was enough pressure already, without me adding any more.
I don’t think any of them realised just what it meant to be the kind of stars they were being groomed to be. But they found out pretty damned quick.
17
BENEFIT
MAX’S STORY
It was Tasha I was still most worried about. I went backstage to wish them luck and she looked almost catatonic.
They were all nervous. It was natural. After all, this was their first live gig, and after all the hype, well, there was no turning back. It was put up or …
Symonds was happy with the early sales figures. With just a bit of help in the first couple of weeks, “Falling into the Sun” was doing fine under its own steam. Top ten in every state, top five in the ones that counted, and number four nationally — and it didn’t look like it had peaked yet. A debut single in the top five was all anyone could have hoped for.
But the acid test was always going to be the live performance.
If Asturias was going to be anything more than a one-hit-wonder, they had to cut it on-stage.
Typically, Symonds had chosen to be somewhere else on the big night. Not that I minded — the whole thing was nerve-wracking enough without the Ice-man breathing down everyone’s neck. And it wasn’t as if he wasn’t there in spirit. I counted at least ten of his ‘yes-people’ in the foyer before the show, and they were only the ones I saw.
But I wasn’t really interested in all that. Symonds was protecting his corporate position, and that was fine. It’s just that there wasn’t anything I could do to protect mine. The concept, the recruitment, the months of grooming — it had all come down to this.
One band, one stage. And one audience ready and willing to make a judgement.
It was only a short set. Four songs and — we hoped — one encore. We’d chosen a benefit concert in support of a street-kids’ drop-in centre, which pleased Marco, as well as the marketing people. A charity gig is always a good compromise. I figured it was a way of easing them into the live scene, without the pressure of headlining or doing a main support totally cold.
But still, as I watched them backstage I began to realise the kind of pressure the whole six-month process had put on them. Here they were, the chosen ones, carrying along with them all the baggage of our expectations. They’d done everything we’d asked of them so far, but in the practice room and even in the studio, a mistake, a missed note, a total stuff-up didn’t matter all that much. Take two, take three, and it was fixed.
Live, there were no second chances. And, apart from Chrissie and in a different way Marco, they hadn’t had the opportunity of “coming up through the ranks” and learning the trade through trial and error.
Not even Alex, who was still the musical backbone of the project. There was no doubting his ability, or his looks, but he had always been the “back-up”. The anonymous player in the shadows of the studio.
Who knew how the bright lights might affect him? I sure as hell didn’t.
The spotlight is like a microscope. It can magnify what you do well, but it’s murder on what you don’t, and all the practice in the world is no substitute for experience.
Chrissie sat chewing gum in the comer and running her fingers gently up and down the strings of her bass as it leaned against the dressing-room wall.
Marco had finished his warm-ups, and he held his sticks loosely in one hand, while the other gripped the inevitable can. The guy was a soda-junkie.
Tim sat with his head down and his fingers linked between his knees. He looked like he was meditating — or praying. Neither of which seemed like a bad idea.
Alex stood in front of the mirror, adjusting his new outfit with nervous fingers.
In the end, the look that Penny had come up with was simple, and not at all radical, but it played to their strengths. From a distance of any more than two metres, it looked like leather. Black for the boys, white for the girls — and to hell with political correctness.
In fact, it wasn’t leather at all. It was some kind of synthetic that was easier to wear, and a whole lot cooler under the lights.
The boys and Chrissie wore tight fitting pants and calf-length boots, with a sort of sleeveless top, somewhere between a waistcoat and a jacket. Jewellery was optional and personal.
Tasha wore the same style top, but over it, Penny had added a loose-fitting, studded jacket, which she could discard at some stage if heat or the mood dictated. Instead of the pants, she wore a white mini and long boots, and with her long white-blonde hair hanging loose the effect was stunning.
The look wasn’t the problem.
I watched her. She was going over the show in her mind, note by note, line by line, and suddenly I got this terrible feeling that, in spite of everything, she was going to freeze. That out there under the lights, in front of all those people, the old Natassia was going to reappear, and the whole structure we had spent half a year planning and building was going to come crashing down around our ears.
I walked across and touched her gently on the shoulder and offered what I hoped was an encouraging smile. She returned one that was equally unconvincing.
With a movement of my head, I motioned Alex outside.
In the corridor, away from the air-conditioned dressing-room, it was warm—more than warm, it was damned hot. He stood there, waiting for me to speak. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to say. I guess I was just looking for some encouragement; for him to say, “Don’t worry, everything’s cool.” I wouldn’t have believed him, of course, but I think I still needed to hear it.
He smiled.
“Worried?” It was the question I should have been asking him.
I shook my head. “Nah. Piece of cake!”
“Good.” He grimaced a little. “Then you play lead, and I’ll stand in the audience and cheer. My stomach’s doing Boy Scout imitations.”
I must have let something of how I was feeling leak out onto my face, because he dropped the joke.
“Relax, Max,” he said. “We’re ready.”
I cast a glance towards the door of the dressing-room.
“All of you?”
He followed the line of my gaze. We both knew who I was talking about.
“She just might surprise you, you know. She’s a lot tougher than she looks.”
At that moment I was more than willing to be surprised. I looked at my watch.
“Five minutes to go. I’d best go
outside.”
He nodded, touched my shoulder, and smiled.
“Everything’s cool, man. We won’t let you down.”
Strangely, I found that I did believe him after all.
“I know you won’t,” I said. “You haven’t yet.”
As I turned to leave he called after me.
“Max!” I turned back to face him. “Thanks. For the chance.”
I just smiled, and opened the door into the auditorium.
18
STAGEFRIGHT
The first notes come out of the darkness, soaring into the air above the auditorium clear and precise, then a laser-thin pencil spot picks out the guitarist’s hand and slowly expands to light the guitar then the whole person. He is young and good-looking, dressed in black leather and standing alone at the side of the stage. The music is hypnotic — a driving, rolling tapestry of sound that seems to swell into something bigger than one pair of hands and six strings could possibly produce.
And then he is no longer alone.
A new rhythm begins weaving in and out, mellow and delicate beneath the first. And as another spotlight cuts the blackness at the far side of the stage, the girl is revealed, holding a bass guitar so huge that it seems to emphasise her tiny stature. Her hair is long and black, falling like a frame around her face and reaching almost to her waist.
She slaps a sudden staccato rhythm and the stage flares into light, as the keyboard and the drums cut in and the original melody transforms again. Now it is a wall of sound, with rhythm and counterpoint building to a crescendo that fills the hall, and then drops into a sudden brief silence which is almost physical.
It is into this silence that a new sound crashes: a twelve-bar riff, repeated twice and building in momentum, as smoke pours from the stage-floor and a strobe begins to flicker wildly.
A searing white spotlight illuminates a point to the right of centre-stage, and through the smoke a figure comes tumbling — a perfect somersault into a handstand split, then slowly, in direct contrast to the beat of the music, one leg at a time to a standing position in front of the mike-stand. Just in time to begin singing.
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