by Rick Boling
Doris and Ellie served as my nursemaids, although Ellie stopped short of accompanying me to the bathroom, which was where I spent most of the morning. Her contribution to my recovery was limited to the afternoon, during which I drifted in and out of consciousness, sipped chicken broth from the spoon she managed to occasionally squeeze through my clamped lips, and was forced to listen to her continuation of Jackson’s arguments in favor of my return to the stage. Even though my brain had all the functionality of a squashed grape, I soon came to realize that the musical finale to the previous night’s meeting had been part of a carefully-planned setup.
My anger over the conspiracy was no-doubt influenced by the pain and nausea; however, the seed had been planted. And in my dreamlike, post-inebriated muddle, I began to imagine a scenario in which I could, as Jackson had suggested, do something ‘pure’ with my music; something disassociated from ego or money or stardom. Even though I’d thought of my earlier songwriting as being rebellious when it came to compromising its integrity for the sake of commercialism, I knew much of what I’d written had been influenced by the “rules” that had been drummed into my head over the years by producers—producers not unlike the one I’d become in this life. As I thought about this apparent contradiction, snippets of the previous night’s conversation began to come back to me.
“I don’t see what’s wrong with trying to reach as many people as possible with your music,” Jackson had said in response to my insistence that commercial compromise was the harbinger of artificiality. “It’s no different from a journalist adhering to the rules of grammar and punctuation so that what they write can be understood and appreciated by the public. It doesn’t mean you can’t be innovative or that your music won’t have value. It only means you’re using those rules to make what you write more accessible. I think you overemphasize the downside of commercialization.”
“Ah,” I said, “so you admit there’s a downside.”
“Of course there is. When a song’s commercial viability is due only to repetition, or pathos, or hook lines, with no emotional appeal other than jerking a tear or suggesting something sexual or violent, then, sure, it’s like a plastic imitation of reality. Even though it may sell a million records, that doesn’t mean it has lyrical or compositional integrity. On the other hand, just because a song has those elements doesn’t mean it is valueless, especially if it has a message or comes from the heart or tells a story based on some real experience others can identify with.”
He’d gone on to admit that he thought he’d been guilty of commercial compromise himself at times, though he’d never consciously written with sales as a goal. “There’s always a seed of something real and personal in my lyrics,” he said. “And the music itself is never compromised. I’ll admit that I sometimes think about how a song is going to go over and make adjustments accordingly. But if it means being emotionally dishonest or sacrificing the true essence of the story I’m trying to tell, I’ll shut it down, maybe put it on the shelf for a while and see if something more authentic comes out of the idea later on.”
After that, the conversation had devolved into a blur of senseless, drunken rhetoric, until he brought up the subject of Chapman again. Because of the looming urgency and my growing fear of failure, the change of subject once again awakening the dread I’d been living with for months. And while we discussed various ideas, discarding most as impractical or too dangerous, I continued to drink myself into a catatonic stupor. My reward was this stupendous hangover, which had me promising myself I would never take another drink of liquor, a promise I’d made—and broken—hundreds of times in my first life.
Around four 4:00 that afternoon I noticed a slight lowering of the pain index, while the cesspool in my stomach seemed to have dissipated somewhat. As the brain fog began to lift, I heard the sound of guitar music; a soft, distant, fingerstyle arrangement being played on an acoustic. I had started to relax and enjoy the soothing sound, when I realized my imagination must be playing tricks on me, because I was listening to music that did not exist in this dimension. In fact, I was listening to a song from my last album, one I had never played—let alone recorded—in this life.
As the music increased in volume, I took a chance on opening my eyes, expecting a stab of light-induced pain that—thankfully—never came. Blocked by the thick canopy of our banyan tree, the afternoon sunlight was muted, though not enough to hide Ellie’s self-satisfied smile. Her expression reminded me of our cat, Jenny, on one of the many occasions when she had proudly presented me with a dead mouse.
“Where did you get that recording?” I croaked. “I thought they couldn’t bring anything material into this universe.”
“They can’t,” she said. “Not yet, at least. But they do project their non-material images and voices into our world. So I asked Aurie if she could play your albums for me, and I made the recordings on this end. You know, Dad, there are some really great songs on those albums, and I’m not talking only about the ones you’ve produced for Blue Note’s artists.”
“Look, Ellie,” I said, “I know what’s going on here, though I sure don’t understand what all the fuss is about. It’s not like the world is going to be a better place just because there’s one more singer-songwriter to listen to. I appreciate the thought, but I’ve got a lot more important stuff to worry about right now, so please stop hassling me about this.”
“I will if you promise me you’ll give it a shot once we’re through with the liquidation and you’ve taken care of the Chapman situation. And I’m not saying that because I think the world is going to be a better place. I don’t mean to get all mushy about it, but I love you, Dad, and I want you to be happy. When you’re not, I worry, and I’m getting tired of worrying about you all the damn time.”
Hearing her say those words nearly choked me up. We weren’t the kind of family that openly expressed our feelings to one another, and I knew this was my fault, probably because I took after Dad in that regard. I often regretted it and wanted to change, but over the years I’d come to realize that you really can’t teach an old dog new tricks. About all I could come up with was a nervous smile, before turning the subject back to the daunting reality we faced.
“If you’re going to worry about something,” I said, squeezing the words past the lump in my throat, “you’d better make it Chapman. From what Jackson told me, your target date for the inaugural concert is Saturday, December sixth, which is two days before the original assassination. Obviously John is going to be the headliner at that one, and according to your mom, the publicity will be unprecedented. So Aurie and I are thinking Chapman might take advantage of the confusion and the crowds to carry out his plan.”
“Aren’t you having him followed, though?” she asked. “Won’t we know where he is and what he’s doing as the date approaches?”
“We are, and we may, but there’s no way to know for sure. Chapman is proving to be an awfully erratic fellow, and predicting where he’s going to be or what he’s going to be doing at any particular time is turning out to be more difficult than we expected. Over the past twelve months he’s been all over the place, from Geneva, Switzerland to London to Hawaii, where he married a Japanese-American girl last year. So far, his movements have been similar to what Aurie was able to find out through her research, and it’s been fairly easy for our investigators to keep tabs on him. The problem is, John’s schedule is going to change drastically with all the tour preparations and plans, so we have no idea what Chapman is going to do from here on out.”
“So, what’s the plan?” she said.
“I don’t know, honey. It has to remain pretty fluid because things are still evolving. What we do know from the two shrinks we hired to work with the investigators is that he’s apparently starting to fall apart mentally. He checked himself in and out of a psychiatric hospital there in Hawaii, then ended up working for the same hospital as a maintenance man and later in the print shop. He quit that job to work in maintenance at a big condo near Waik
iki Beach, but that didn’t last long. And now he seems to have disappeared, which means his previous pattern has already been broken. We know he was drinking heavily and that he suffers from severe paranoia, so maybe he caught on to the fact that he was being followed. Aurie keeps reminding me that even though he’s nuts, he’s no dummy, and right now our guys are scrambling to pick up his trail again. In fact, I was thinking you might be able to help, maybe use some of your predictive techniques to see if you can figure out where he might be or where he’s likely to go.”
“I’ve talked to Aurie about that,” she said, shaking her head, “but, unfortunately, there isn’t enough data to work with. Even though she was able to find dozens of news stories and short bios, they were all pretty murky when it came to exact details, and many of them contradicted each other about dates and locations and activities. If I had detailed, reliable data to work with, I might be able to integrate that information with the current changes in John’s schedule and come up with some sort of probability timeline. But I don’t have that kind of data, so all I could do is guess. And if I guess wrong, we could end up chasing our tails while he’s out there planning some kind of elaborate, unpredictable attack. My job right now is to concentrate on forecasting the sociopolitical impact that prolonging John’s life will have on the future of our world, and believe me that is no small task itself.”
“Great,” I said. “Not that I think what you’re doing isn’t worthy and important, but if I can’t manage to keep John alive, that all becomes moot. And that puts a shitload of pressure on me, Ellie. I’m no goddamned Jason Bourne, you know. Hell, I don’t even own a gun, and I wouldn’t know how to use one if I did.”
“Maybe you should consider buying one and getting some training,” she said. “And who the hell is Jason Bourne?”
“Long story. I guess you could think of him as the James Bond of the 21st century. But my point is I’m not really cut out for this kind of spy crap. And the whole damned thing is scaring the shit out of me.”
“Don’t get discouraged, Dad,” she said, squeezing my hand. “I have all the faith in the world in you, and so does everyone else. You’ll figure something out, I’m sure of it. Besides, we’ve got bodyguards now and all manner of security for the shows, so even if he shows up at one of the concerts he’ll be faced with a phalanx of professionals whose sole job will be to protect John and the rest of us.”
“Boy, I wish we could let John in on all this,” I said. “Things would be a lot easier if he knew what was going on and we had his cooperation.”
“I know,” she said, “and I’ve discussed the idea with Aurie. But she and Heyoka worry that if too many people are made aware of what we’re doing, of what the foundation is really all about, it could compromise our effectiveness. Much of what we want to do in the future will require absolute secrecy in order to succeed, and the more people who know about it, the more likely it will be for someone to let the cat out of the bag, either accidentally or on purpose. Right now, except for Sam, it’s all family here in this dimension. At least it will be shortly. And we’ve all agreed that it should stay that way.”
“Shortly, huh. When is the Big Day anyway?”
“We haven’t decided yet, but you shouldn’t get your hopes up for a ‘Big Day.’ We don’t have time for a fancy wedding, nor do either of us want one. I know it’s going to piss off the grandparents, but we’ll probably just stop off at a justice of the peace somewhere and do a quickie. Right now we’re trying to coordinate Jackson’s travel schedule with stops at some major cities we’re hoping to book as venues for the tour. And along the way we’re going to be recruiting more performers. Meanwhile, Mom will be handling logistics and publicity with a team of agents and promoters she’s putting together, and Jackson and I are going to be doing fundraising for the tour during our travels. So if you want to talk about full plates, all you have to do is look at ours.”
“Fundraising? I thought this thing was going to be financed by the foundation.”
“Sponsored by,” she said. “We’ll need a little funding at first—seed money—but if my plan works out, the expenses will be covered by donations and grants, plus the proceeds from sales of live albums, videos, and other merchandise. So all the profits will go straight to the causes we’ve chosen without being diluted by operating and administrative costs. I’ve got my own team of producers, road managers, and finance people working on developing the tour, and in addition to several stadiums here in the US, we’re hoping to stage concerts in major venues around the world, including the UK, Hong Kong, Taipei, Prague, and even Sydney.”
“Far out,” I said, and I meant it. I had no idea they were planning anything of that magnitude. “So what about artists? You’re going to need a lot more than the few you’ve recruited if you’re going to fill that many venues.”
“Well, once you got Stevie Wonder and Springsteen for us, the walls came tumbling down, so to speak. We already have commitments from over thirty of the top acts in the world, and believe it or not, we’re even talking to The Stones. The cool thing is that not only are all of the ones we’ve signed so far playing for free, many are making substantial donations as well. This thing is going to be a monster, Dad, and we’re going to save lots of lives. In fact, if things work out like we hope, we should be able to stave off the coming famine in Ethiopia and have enough left over to fund several other projects. Willie and Mellencamp are talking about doing something for farmers here in this country, so we’ll probably get involved with that. And from there the sky really is the limit.”
My daughter never ceased to amaze me. Her energy level was so far above mine, it was hard to believe she carried my genetic lineage. Of course, a lot of that came from Doris, whose workload was such that it would take ten people to replace her. That is, if you could find ten people with her brains and drive, which was doubtful.
The conversation had exhausted me, and Ellie must have realized this because she reached over and touched my drooping eyelids. “Get some sleep now, Dad,” she whispered, gently closing my eyes with her fingers. “Everything’s going to be okay. I promise.”
Her cheerful optimism was often infectious, but on that somber afternoon it failed to raise my spirits. At the time I chalked this up to the waning effects of the hangover, however, I would later look back and wonder if it wasn’t my intuition telling me that her prediction was destined to miss the mark by a wide margin.
As I dozed off, the final words of the last song I’d ever recorded drifted across the room. It was the song I’d written to my father long after his death in my first life; the one I’d recalled as I drove away from Heyoka’s villa, only to stop and return:
Be there no graves in the fields of your memory
No end where there is no beginning
For passing before you the lives of your people
Must drown in the sea of their sinning
Nobody’s winning
We’re all just beginning
Beginning again
Best Laid Plans
Have you thought any more about the music thing?” Aurélie asked me. She’d just finished a lengthy session with Sam and had called me down to the old studio to go over some newly discovered details on Chapman’s life.
“I wish you’d leave that alone,” I said. “I’m sick of everyone harassing me about getting back up on stage.”
“Sorry. I was just—”
“Chapman’s off the radar again,” I said, interrupting her. “He flew back to the states about a month ago, leaving his wife in Hawaii. My people lost him in LA—he ditched them in Chinatown of all places. He’s carrying a wad of cash he borrowed from his father-in-law, so he’s not using credit cards, which makes his movements even harder to trace.”
“That matches the timeline I have for him, except that his destination in the states was New York. Another thing I found out was that, for some reason, he’d become obsessed with the novel The Catcher in the Rye. He even considered legally changing his nam
e to Holden Caulfield.”
“Our PIs mentioned something about that. They said he was splicing together reasons for killing John from the lyrics of Beatles songs, the soundtrack of The Wizard of Oz, and quotations from the Caulfield book. This guy is really around the bend, but he’s apparently got everyone fooled. And we can’t touch him unless he does something illegal, which he hasn’t even come close to doing so far.”
“Is the tour kickoff still scheduled for next month?” she asked.
“Unfortunately, it is. I’ve tried to get Ellie to postpone the whole thing, but too much has gone into the planning. They have contractual obligations with dozens of acts, hundreds of support staff, and several major venues. About all we can do now is make sure John and Ellie and the rest of the artists slated for the first concert are blanketed with protection. We’ll have agents stationed all over the place, and everyone who enters will be scrutinized as they pass through the gates. Plus, we’ve warned John that there have been numerous recent death threats against him and Yoko, and despite their objections, we managed to convince them they should get out of New York and move in with us at least a week before the event. We’ve also hired doubles who will take their place in the New York apartment, then fly to Tampa the day before the concert.”
I had talked Ellie and Doris into holding the inaugural event at the Tampa Stadium, which had recently been remodeled and could now accommodate around 65,000 plus standing room when configured for a concert. I argued that the location wouldn’t matter because of the worldwide publicity and international TV coverage, and that because our people would be familiar with the layout, security would be far simpler than at some huge open venue like Central Park or Watkins Glen. In addition, Sam had been working with Motorola on accelerating the implementation of cellular technology, and after a lengthy battle with the FCC, they’d joined with AT&T to gain approval for a test program in the Tampa Bay area. So our team would be equipped with wireless, handheld phones for instant communication throughout the region.