by Rick Boling
Title Page
Copyright
THEN AGAIN
Copyright © 2015 by Rick Boling. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, please write WordMerchant Publishing at the address below.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, incidents and locations are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Manufactured in the United States of America
First WordMerchant edition published 2015
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WordMerchant Publishing
Post Office Box 1764
New Port Richey, FL 34656
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ISBN
Cover and Interior Design by R. LeBeaux
Madisons Photo by Jimmy Powell
Author Photo by Steven Kelley
CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Quotes
NOW
Heyoka
The Villa D’Ailleboust
The Prodigy
The Fiasco
Probabilities
The Showdown
Aurélie
The Lab
Playing By Ear
Dodging Bullets
THEN
Coming Attractions
Sword Of Damocles
Till Death Do Us Part
Catch 42
My Special Angel
The Skip School Flu
Rest In Peace
Lost And Found
Legal At Last
R & R
Georgia On My Mind
Robin’s Song
A Change Of Plans
Swan Song
Transmigration
THEN AGAIN
Pain Free
The Les-Paul Solution
Sam The Man
Charlotte’s Web
Twilight Time
Changing Direction
Match Making
Back To The Future
Blue Note Records
Vatican Roulette
Karmageddon
Crazy
Another Prodigy
Sunday Morning Sentinel
“Familiar” Advice
The Empress’s New Clothes
The Facts Of Life
Pons Asinorum
Running On Empty
Homecoming
Conspiracy
Requiem
Reunion
Terra Infirma
The Confession
Penance
Intervention
The Foundation
The Morning After
Best Laid Plans
Collateral Damage
Suicide Is Painless
Capitulation
The Getaway
Georgia
Debut
Secondary Education
Old Home Week
My Place Or Yours
Inquiring Minds …
Millennium Park
The Message
The Second Time Around
A Star Is Born
Special Delivery
Epilogue
Song Lyrics
Acknowledgements
About The Author
Dedication
Quotes
NOW
Heyoka
I first met Heyoka Husereau D'Ailleboust in Lyon, France, at a small concert bar called LeMusique. I was backstage in the room labeled Cabine D’Essayage—which I assumed translated into "cramped closet you may use as a dressing room"—slamming down a couple of last-minute Jacks to make sure my liver remembered who was boss, when Mariah Carey came in and delivered a note written on a crinkled drink napkin. On second glance, I decided it wasn't really Mariah Carey, only a pudgy barmaid with big boobs who might have passed for a distant cousin of hers to someone high on half a quart of Tennessee whiskey.
Despite the crinkles, after I flattened out the napkin, the handwriting was clear and a little effeminate. At first I thought the note might have been an offer by one of my two remaining female fans to introduce me to some elaborate variation of coital acrobatics, but no such luck; the note turned out to be a simple, though peculiar, request. Unaccompanied by currency of any denomination, or even the offer of a drink, it read:
I was wondering if you might consider playing “Florida in my Bones.” It’s a song I remember from my college days, and hearing it has an uncanny way of transporting me back in time, reliving fond memories, if you know what I mean.
Thanks,
Heyoka (A lifelong fan)
There might have been ten people in the world who remembered Florida in my Bones, an obscure little tune that had been included as a last-minute filler on the B-side of my first album. And the odds against one of those ten people finding me at this dead-end gig nearly 5,000 miles from the Sunshine State were astronomical.
Like most of my more recent venues, LeMusique was what we over-the-hill touring musicians like to call an "intimate room," as if we preferred performing for a few dozen drunks instead of a stadium full of 50,000 screaming fans. Of course, I'd never starred in one of those stadium gigs myself. The closest I'd ever come was on a shared tour in 1975, shortly after Robin’s Song, my first national release, peaked at number nineteen on the Billboard charts. I served as the opening act for another non-superstar one-hit-wonder by the name of Danny O'Donnell, whose single, I've Got a Rose for You, briefly hit number five, then disappeared for all time into that vast dustbin of forgotten bubblegum ditties. Danny and I performed at a few fairly large venues on that tour, though we never drew more than ten thousand, and there wasn’t a lot of screaming.
Still, somewhere among the few cells that remained operative in my oxygen-deprived brain, this particular request lit a spark of long-suppressed ego, and I decided to search the music files on my laptop for the lyrics. Luckily—or maybe not—I found them, and by the time the MC knocked to let me know I was on in three minutes, I had put together a reasonable facsimile of the original chord arrangement. Hitting the high notes with my aging James-Earl-Jones of a voice, however, was going to be a different story.
It was seventeen paces from the lovely Cabine D’Essayage to my stool on the tiny, darkened stage, and I made it without tripping. Unfortunately, my night vision had long ago gone the way of the cassette tape, and when the curtain lifted I was caught trying frantically to return the stool to an upright position. This might have been embarrassing had I not managed to turn it into a humorous imitation of a Jim-Carrey pratfall.
As the nervous laughter died down, I took my seat and squinted at the invisible audience in a futile attempt to see beyond the glare of the spotlight and identify someone who looked like a Heyoka. The name was, to me at least, non-gender-specific, but even if I could have seen anything other than a swarm of Technicolor fireflies, I would have had little chance of singling out my one faithful fan. I could still sense an undercurrent of empathetic anxiety in the room, so I decided to start with one of my sure-fire, ice-breaking opening lines.
“Sorry to disappoint you, but I only know two songs,” I said. “And I always do one of them first.” I curled my arthritic claw of a left hand around the neck of my Martin D-28, then looked up and added, “This is the other one.” And over a ripple of chuckles I launched into the goof song I'd written decades before about always returning to the Sunshine State.
I've left this old state when I'm hurtin'
I've left it when I'm feelin' fine
Bu
t when I'm done funnin' and flirtin'
I keep wanderin' back to the palm trees and sunshine
As my eyes adjusted to the dim atmosphere, I started to make out a couple of faces in the crowd.
I've drunk moonshine in Pikeville
Felt Montana's wind chill
But no matter how far I roam
I always end up headin' home
That Florida sun's shinin' deep in my bones
God, I thought, did I really write this crap? And just then, while I played a little unplanned guitar interlude in order to give me time to catch a breath, I saw a row of brilliant white teeth floating behind a table close to the stage.
I've woken up mornin's
To wildflowers swarmin'
'Long the old Santa Fe Railroad line
I've stood looking over
Fields covered with clover
In the foothills of ol' Caroline
The teeth had to belong to this Heyoka character. No one else could be enjoying this stupid song enough to smile that broadly in public.
I've tried the Big Easy
I've let Vegas squeeze me
But no matter how far I roam
I always end up headin' home
That Florida sun's shinin' deep in my bones
And, much to my chagrin, it did not look like a female.
I've seen sunsets on mountains
Bellagio's fountains
Sat under a tall redwood tree
But when snow's a fallin'
I still hear the callin'
Of the surf and the sand and the sea
In fact, judging from the shadow that hovered behind those teeth, the owner was a rather husky male person.
I've seen fall in Ontario
The Yucatan in Mexico
But no matter how far I roam
I always end up headin' home
That Florida sun's shinin' deep in my bones
I had to look down in order to finish with the complicated Flamenco-style riff I surprised myself by remembering, and when I glanced back out at the crowd, those teeth were flashing like a lighthouse on meth behind two large, clapping hands.
As is often the case, one enthusiastic fan's applause was contagious, and that contagion repeated itself after each song in my 50-minute set, eliciting half-hearted ovations from an audience that otherwise couldn't have cared less. Applause, however, was applause, and regardless of its insincerity, I was transported back to those few years early in my career when I had a small but dedicated contingent of admirers. Which was why, once I was back in the Cabine D’Essayage and heard the inevitable knock, I resisted the urge to yell GO AWAY and opened the door.
My first clear view of Heyoka Husereau D'Ailleboust nearly knocked me sober. For one thing, he was huge, and—probably due to an autonomic fright response—my senses sharpened and my bleary vision cleared. The smile was still there, but it now protruded from the lower half of a deeply weathered face the color and texture of ruddy sandstone carved by centuries of water erosion. His mountainous nose swept out and down like an undulating inverted ski slope and, in contrast to the smile, there was a notable downcast to his triangular eyes, the pupils of which resembled pools of liquid onyx. Taken as a whole, his countenance projected a combination of intelligence and humor, infused with a touch of melancholy.
I tried to shake off my initial shock and formulate some kind of greeting when, without preamble, he said, "Buy you a drink?"
It was clear that the tiny dressing closet offered no possibility of accommodating two people, so I followed him into the bar. We made our way through the sparse crowd and headed for the attached dining room, where he motioned toward an empty booth overseen by a large oil painting of the late Jacques Morel. I’d met Morel—a celebrated singer-songwriter often referred to as the French James Taylor—back in the ‘80s, when he was single-handedly putting LeMusique on the map as one of France’s premier musical destinations. In the years since then, the club had become known more for its cuisine than its entertainment offerings, and today the restaurant’s three-star Michelin rating made it a favorite among English-speaking tourists. Which is why I happened to be among the few fading American stars hired to play for the concert bar’s dwindling audiences.
"Jack," Heyoka said the moment we sat down. I thought he was referring to the painting until he glanced up at a waitress who seemed to have appeared out of thin air. "Single Barrel. Two glasses. Ice. Bring the bottle and leave it." As abrupt as his words were, he said them with that warm smile, and it was obvious the petite young server understood his truncated descriptions, because she turned on her heel and left. I was about to ask how he knew my preferred form of liver assault, when he said, "Firewater. The bane of many a red man like me. And, of course, of one Rix Vaughn as well. Wonder if it's that small percentage of Powhatan in your blood. You think?"
I considered mentioning that my folks had told me we were distantly related to Pocahontas, but I had no idea what tribe she belonged to. Besides, I had essentially been struck dumb by this strange encounter, and couldn't get my voice working.
He must have noticed my puzzled expression, because he chuckled. "Sorry. I guess you're a little confused. What say we start over?” He reached out a massive paw. “I'm Heyoka. Heyoka Husereau D'Ailleboust to be more precise. I'm pretty well known among a certain international cadre of physicists, though I'm sure you've never heard of me. In that sense we're a lot alike, except that I have heard of you. In fact, I'm probably one of your biggest fans."
"I, uh ..." I stammered, shaking his hand. "That's ... interesting." Thankfully, the waitress returned at that moment, placing a bottle of Jack between us, along with two large tumblers and an ice bucket. She proceeded to crack the bottle and drop ice cubes into our glasses with a set of tongs, but she stopped short of pouring. Instead, she stepped back and stood with her hands clasped in front of her, as if waiting for further instructions. By then I was in serious need of a drink, and had to resist the urge to grab the bottle.
"Is this okay?" Heyoka asked. "Or would you prefer a nipple?" His tone was one of intentional humor, not condescension, and I decided to reply in kind.
"What I'd really prefer is a funnel," I said. "But this will do." He gave a quick nod to the waitress—whose nametag, I noticed, read "Aurélie"—and she evaporated into the darkness while he poured us both a drink.
"To my favorite old folkie," he said, holding out his glass. I clinked it with mine and we both drank; him a sip, me a one-gulp drain.
"So," I said, reaching for the bottle, "how is it that you know so much about me? And what brings you to this aging bistro at the edge of European nowhere?"
"Long story." He took another small sip, then put the glass down and tapped on the rim with a gnarled finger. "I'd like to tell you all about it, but that will take some time. Speaking of time, since this is your last night, and you don't have any other engagements until the one at Le Barclay in Bordeaux three weeks from now, why don't you come stay at my place? I've got an extra room, and that would give us time to get to know each other."
I should have been shocked at his detailed knowledge of my schedule; however, by then I was past being surprised. Not only that, but I had a feeling I knew what this was all about. "Are you propositioning me?" I asked. "I’m not anti-gay, mind you, but I think you should know that I'm straight."
This time he laughed out loud, and when I didn't respond, he sucked in a breath and said, "Oh, man. I just realized how that must have sounded." He shook his head to clear away the last few giggles. "To be perfectly honest, I am propositioning you, but not in that way. I have no interest in sex, at least not with other men. I'm simply offering you a place to stay at no expense for the next few weeks. Room, board, conversation, and maybe a little music, if that's agreeable. I really am a fan, you know. Plus, I'd love to pick your brain about string theory."
I thought for a moment. Touring solo in Europe on a tight budget, with an agent who was close to cutting me loose, was a little ha
iry to say the least. So the prospect of three weeks without expenses was something I could hardly dismiss out of hand. Even if it meant spending that time in some hovel with a total stranger who was nutty enough to admit being a fan of someone as obscure as I'd become over the last couple of decades.
"String theory?" I said. "I've heard of it, but I'm no physicist, and I have no idea what it means.'"
"It means," he said, "are you still using GHS Phosphor Bronzes on your D28? What about the Hannabach Titanyls for your Ramirez? What’s the trick to playing that weird counterpoint Travis-pick you use on City Strings? Plus a few other questions I have. I play too, by the way. Though compared to you ... well, there is no comparison. As for physics, I want to talk a little about that as well, but I'm mostly interested in your music and your career."
Before I could think of a response, Aurélie materialized beside the table again. "Look," he said, "why don't you let me buy you dinner? That way you'll have time to consider my offer."
Thankful for the distraction, I nodded my agreement, whereupon he said to Aurélie, "Bring Mr. Vaughn a bloody filet, half-a-dozen seared scallops—from the sea, not the bay—a baked potato with butter, no sour cream, and some fresh asparagus. I'll have the usual. Oh, and bring us a bottomless basket of garlic bread." Aurélie glanced at me for approval, and when I tilted my head in acquiescence, she faded into the murky surroundings.
While we waited for the food, I again asked how he knew so much about me.
A trick of the light made his ebony eyes gleam as he looked across the table and said, "You will soon come to understand that I have an unusual talent for gleaning information directly from the ether." His voice lowered a notch, adding a sense of drama. "You see, I have this device called a computer, and it's connected to a sub-etheric information source called the Internet, wherein can be found a website called rvaughn.com, plus a Facebook fan page that contains a rather detailed profile of a singer-songwriter by the name of Rix Vaughn."