by Mark All
“Okay, done,” she said, the thrill that only major music events could generate running through her like electricity. “Let’s work out logistics, then I’ll pass you over to a numbers person in Accounting to talk money.”
Jessica glanced out the glass wall of her office, looking for Charlene’s blonde head over the top of her cubicle wall. Her friend wasn’t there. She remembered Charlene’s immoderate absorption in the music the day before and a twinge of worry creased her forehead. She assured herself that the girl would be okay. Right now Jessica had to get this deal done and get on the road. She didn’t even have the band signed yet.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Friday midday
It was time to kill the Oblivion project.
David had startled awake, tormented by horrendous nightmares, visions of a world gone mad. Millions of people hacked and bludgeoned each other to death, wading in blood, and screamed and wailed and howled, all set to the soundtrack of Oblivion. With the mastering completed, the ball in Jessica Chandler’s court, his job done and no purpose to engage his mind, the music’s hold on him loosened, and he finally saw the horror.
He clicked the folder containing the project files, holding the left button down, poised to drag it to the Trash. His hand refused to cooperate, as if his conscious and unconscious minds struggled in a tug of war, paralyzing him. The mouse went nowhere.
Letting up on the mouse button, he shook his hand, and performed the hand and arm stretches he used when practicing the guitar. All he had to do was click and drag the folder to the Trash in one swift motion, without thinking, and do it so fast that his unconscious could not interfere and thwart his intention.
The desktop phone’s yellow call light illuminated and blinked insistently, the ringer silenced so as not to ruin any recording done in the control room itself. David looked at the mouse again. Just do it. The light continued to blink. He looked at the mouse, at the light, at the mouse.
David attacked the mouse, clicked the folder and dragged it to the Trash.
“Hell, yes!”
A rush of relief swept over him, relaxing the tense muscles throughout his body. He felt as if he’d just avoided falling, or jumping, into the burning pits of Hell, and saved his immortal soul. Assuming he had one. He hadn’t believed in it before, but Vince’s resurrection indicated that consciousness did indeed survive death.
The phone’s call light continued to blink, and the LED showed SAGE REC. He picked it up.
“David? Jessica Chandler. I’ve got news!”
The Sage Records A&R rep sounded exuberant—while his own elation faded. Her calling just as he deleted the Oblivion files couldn't be a coincidence.
“Jessica,” he said dully.
“Clear your calendar. You’re playing the Athens Theater tomorrow night.”
Her words seemed to produce a physical effect on David. His gut suddenly felt weightless, as if he were on a roller coaster, cresting a rise and speeding downhill, his body dropping and leaving his stomach behind. The fear that had just seized him at the reintroduction of the Oblivion project into his life, only moments after he’d killed it, drained from him as abruptly as it had come. An odd euphoria flooded his body like an intravenous Valium drip.
“David?”
“Uh…”
“Can you do it? It’s insanely short notice, but they had a cancellation. We can’t do a lot of promotion in one day, but I don’t think it will matter. You’ve already got the world’s attention. The manager, Sharon Stevens, says you’ll pack the place, no problem.”
She paused, evidently expecting a reaction.
“David? Are you there?”
As if teleported to an alternate reality, he suddenly experienced playing onstage again, a visible energy force flowing from his fingers through his guitar rig and into a galvanized throng. A crowd of faceless automatons banged their heads in unison to the beat of “Fire It Up.”
“Yeah. That…that sounds great.” He loved playing at the Athens Theater. Just to play for a crowd again, for the first time in a year, with the band back together, thrilled him. He felt a rush as if he were stoned or tripping.
“Awesome,” Jessica said. “Our tech-savvy interns in Promotions will start tweeting and posting their little asses off, spreading the word. I can do some social networking myself, after I get to Athens. I’ll need to get some pictures of you, preferably without your shirt, for Pinterest and Instagram, for starters.”
David felt a warm sensation suffuse his body. “You’re coming to Athens?” Without his shirt?
“Hell, yeah, I am. I’m bringing a contract, and I’m staying for the concert tomorrow night.”
“Super.” His mind, foggy for a few moments, cleared and locked into business mode. “I finished mixing and mastering the album. You can give the raw mixdown tracks to a professional studio for mastering if you want, though. I’ll give you both versions of the files after everyone’s signed the contract. Uh, except John. I don’t think he’s going to.”
“It’s okay. I’ve got a release form.” She paused. “Can you play the show without him? Is there anyone… Oh my God, nobody could learn that complex material in a day.”
“It’s okay. We’ll just use a prerecorded bass track—we have to play along with the prerecorded keys and a click track on the computer anyway. If John won’t do it, I’ll just include the bass on the performance mix.”
“Thank God. Okay, tell me your address, and I’ll give you the details about the show. You can set up and do a sound check this evening—tonight’s act is a solo electronica nerd chick who won’t need much stage. Got a pen?”
David exchanged information with her, making thorough notes and jotting down a quick To Do list, then they hung up. She’d be there in a couple of hours. He needed to get busy: remix the tracks, pack the equipment, and make calls. He had to get Mike and Alan on board for the show, and who knew, maybe even John, and cancel his lessons for the afternoon. He’d been taken over once more by an overwhelming need to get the music out there. The opportunity to play it live, to have the ultimate musical experience, better than sex, was impossible to resist, to not embrace with the fullness of his being.
He clicked on the Trash, found the Oblivion folder, and dragged it back to its rightful place in the file list.
* * * *
Charlene got off the couch and stretched listlessly, the wires to her ear buds pulling taut. She’d put on a sloppy flannel shirt with a front pocket to hold her phone so she could wander around without losing the sound. Not that she’d wandered much. Her butt was getting itchy and sore from sitting so long.
The song was the ultimate earwig. At this point she could loop it endlessly in her head without even listening to the actual recording any more, but why should she? At some point during the foggy night she’d had to get out her charger and had sat cross-legged on the floor, watching the little battery indicator light move slowly from left to right, then repeat, like the music she was playing.
She walked into the kitchen and surveyed the mess with dull eyes. Empty cracker boxes, a baggie that had held celery, a pimento cheese container with orange crust. The countertop was a record of her last sixteen hours. She hadn’t slept, had only dozed between snacking and the occasional trip to the bathroom, and had mostly drifted in a dream state.
Picking up a paring knife she’d used to hack up the celery, she stared blankly at her reflection in the blade, hardly recognizing herself. Her experiences during her dark reverie had been disturbing, yet compelling, and when she’d roused and peeked out into reality from time to time, she felt as if she’d awakened from a nightmare, but one that had deep significance for her, and longed to return to it, to continue the strange odyssey.
Mostly she felt confused, as if she were the embodiment of a curious duality that refused to merge. The song engendered in her a strange euphoria, an almost physical sensation. It was as if she were flying, gliding through mountain passes, then swooping lower, over cities, towns, and su
burbs. Between the buildings, in parks and yards, streets and roads, too far below to see distinctly or make out details, mobs of tiny figures like angry ants roiled and writhed in chaos and violence. She was unable to descend any farther, but watched in fascination from above.
Charlene sensed that she’d already played her role, that she would not be allowed to participate further in what she knew to be a vast change sweeping the planet. A longing and emptiness wrenched her insides and tears welled in her eyes.
What was the point, really, in going on now? Why wouldn’t the music stop, why wouldn’t it leave her alone? It had what it wanted from her. Make it stop.
She set the paring knife back on the counter and looked around the kitchen, feeling as if she were a demented octogenarian visiting her childhood home, and it had lost all meaning it once held for her. Sick at heart and dizzy on her feet, Charlene turned and went back to the couch, where she could rest her eyes and dip back into the well of sorrow; experience the dream world to the shallow depth she was permitted.
As the song played on, over and over, she stared at the Stop button. Her fingers refused to reach out and press it.
* * * *
In his office at First Bank of Athens, Bob Finster hummed as he ran his hunting knife lovingly back and forth against the sharpening stone. “Fire It Up” played at low volume on his desk speakers, with iTunes set to “Repeat > One.” He hadn’t heard from David Fairburn since the guitar player had raided Vince Buckley’s safe deposit box, so Bob wasn’t sure if this song was related to that less than legal fishing expedition. He had a feeling it was, though. He was grateful to have played a small part in bringing this awesome music forth from the grave. That’s what fans were for, right? To support the artists. Bob played a little guitar, but he sucked and he knew it, and that was okay. He had a great career and wife and two little girls, and that had been enough—except now he realized there was more to life.
He sighed with contentment, happy to have facilitated d Penumbra’s comeback. Running his thumb along the edge of the blade, he hardly winced at the fine slice in his skin. He put his thumb in his mouth and gently sucked the bead of blood.
He was getting the urge to hear live music. To go out and party like he had in his fraternity days. Maybe get in a brawl. To hurt people. Hurt them bad.
For just a taste of that violence, he pricked his index finger with the tip of the hunting knife. The pain was electric, but good, real, in a way his humdrum everyday existence could never be.
Smiling between swapping his finger for his thumb in his mouth, he decided he needed to get out this weekend, rock and roll a little. Like the good old days at UGA.
* * * *
“Come on, get your ass up,” Nancy Dillehay barked, dragging Alan to his feet.
He looked at her dazedly. “Don’t stop it. Don’t stop the music.”
She looked at him blankly for a moment, wondering what the hell he was thinking. “Of course I’m not going to stop the music, silly. I’m just going to make something to eat while we listen.”
Alan blinked. “I didn’t sleep too well last night.”
Nancy frowned as gauzy memories of dreams that didn’t want to be remembered bumped up against the surface of her consciousness. Recording the album seemed so very long ago. What had they done when they’d gotten home? Nancy shook her head. She remembered getting high on the couch, dozing for a while… She’d had a dream about John. That was odd. She’d seen his face clearly, and they’d been working together on her program, the virus to stop the dirty bastards who stole Penumbra’s art.
She realized with a start that she’d finished the program—at least in her dream—despite “Fire It Up” blasting from the stereo system. John had sat on the couch with her and the drowsing Alan, pointing out bugs in the virus, hinting at solutions. Nancy was a web designer and an amateur coder, but John was a pro. At the bass player’s urging, she’d fought off the almost overpowering desire to capitulate to the music, to drown herself in it, and worked through each logic issue, rewriting the code. But the struggle had given her a whopper of a headache. She hunched her shoulders and rolled her head.
Oddly, finishing her program now made it seem unimportant, irrelevant, the only good vibe she had being the satisfaction of solving a coding problem. The damn record company was giving the song away for free. She’d have to completely rewrite the search routines in her program to include exceptions for Sage’s free download—except she didn’t think she’d need to do that. She reluctantly accepted the usefulness of making teaser media available for free. The people who liked it would go on to buy the album, then maybe the previous album, and there would be a zillion people who’d bite that freebie fishing hook.
Besides, the music had won her over. She had a premonition that this album was going to take off, and way sooner than later. Big events were imminent. She shivered.
“I didn’t sleep much either, and I have a headache,” Nancy said. “And I’m starving. Want some eggs and bacon?”
“Hell yeah.” Alan checked his watch. “A bit late for breakfast, but we did just wake up.”
As she turned to head for the kitchen, her gaze fell on the flash drive stuck in her laptop’s USB port. On instinct, she bent, right-clicked the mouse to eject it, and snatched it up and put it in her pocket. As she did, a sharp stab of pain flared in the back of her head and she winced.
“You okay?” Alan asked. “Want me to cook?”
“Nah, I’m fine,” she lied. Her mind felt like a blasted battlefield. “Come on, rock star.” She took Alan's arm and led him to the kitchen. “Some food will help you recover from that marathon recording session. I’ve got a feeling we have a full weekend coming up.”
She had put the bacon into a frying pan when Alan said, “Babe?” in a shaky voice.
“What, Sweetheart?”
He was silent for a moment and she turned to see him staring at her with a puzzled expression, holding up his watch for her to see.
“It’s Friday,” he said.
“And?” She began separating the bacon strips with a fork.
“It’s Friday,” he repeated tonelessly.
“And?”
“We went over to David’s Wednesday night. We’ve been sitting here for over a day.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Friday afternoon
Jessica exited GA 316 and merged her Lexus into traffic on the Athens Perimeter, butterflies frolicking in her stomach. She was more psyched about signing Penumbra than she’d been over any band in her career. She also felt a giddy anticipation at meeting David Fairburn. Her glance kept returning to his photo on the open CD jewel case on the passenger seat.
She still had to focus on the job at hand, despite how cute the guy was and how long it had been since her last serious relationship. Other record companies would have taken note of Penumbra’s viral sensation, and if they hadn’t contacted David already, they would soon. She needed to nail down the contract before the concert tomorrow night. A concert she had arranged, she would remind him.
She took the 221 exit and followed the two-lane blacktop past Watkinsville and then increasingly smaller roads through the countryside, into a forested area. In five minutes she reached David’s subdivision, a maze of modest but attractive middle-class houses on medium-sized, semi-wooded lots.
After three turns she came to David’s house. It appeared to be about fifteen years old, its wood siding worn in a few places and in need of patching and a paint job, the roof adequate but reaching the end of its lifetime. In the front yard, a couple of Dogwoods stood in an island of ground cover at the center of a sea of grass long overdue for mowing. The driveway led to a side garage but had been extended past it, down a gentle slope around to the back of the house. Curious, Jessica followed it to a parking area before a set of sliding glass doors to the lower level, a daylight basement. She guessed from experience that it would be his rehearsal space and recording studio. The concrete turnaround was of course the band’s
load-in and load-out area. She parked the Lexus beside a black Toyota Tacoma pickup, got out with her briefcase, and stretched.
The back of the lot was a flat expanse of crabgrass interspersed with bare patches of red dirt, enclosed by trees on all sides. A faded wooden toolshed sat at the left rear corner of the scraggly lawn, and a collection of tattered lawn chairs sprawled around a gas grill that had seen better days. As she climbed the driveway, then the brick steps to the front porch, she got a feeling that the place was an empty, haunted shell, too lonely even for ghosts of the owner’s past life.
David met her at the front door, his warm smile dispelling her impression of desolation. “Jessica!”
She knew there was no such thing as love at first sight, just a strong physical attraction when people instantly assess a prospective mate and decide they want them, probably based on some unconscious evolutionary imperative. Whatever it was, it hit her hard. When David took her hand, a tingling sensation of lightness spread through her loins. He gave her hand a gentle squeeze and let go after holding it a second too long. That and his smoldering eyes told her he felt the same.
He stood aside. “Come on in.”
Jessica brushed his shoulder going through the door and was annoyed with herself when she noticed her breathing had deepened. She wanted to ascribe the brief, giddy thrill she’d felt to her excitement over the project, and even wondered for a moment if her feelings might somehow be due to the magic of the music, but she knew that was not the case—when he’d touched her, her job and the album had been the furthest things from her mind. This would not do. She couldn’t afford distractions; she had to get her emotions under control and get the contract signed. Save her career. And prove myself to my parents, she reluctantly admitted.