Devon opened the door. “Hey. We’re going to be practicing for awhile, so I brought you your ear plugs.” He left them on the desk.
“Thanks. I’ll probably need them.”
He gave me the ghost smile and started to leave, then stopped. “I’m going to play for them what I wrote last night. If you want to, you know, come down. You can hear it.” He looked so sheepish. He was killing me.
“Of course. I’ll be right down. I’m just going to change.”
He nodded and shut the door behind him.
Ok, wardrobe. What should I put on today? I decided on a sundress, as it was fairly warm in the building. I stayed shoeless. It was kind of nice to go barefoot all day. I braided my hair really quick and brought my sketchbook. They were already playing as I came down the stairs. Marcus waved at them to stop and addressed the group.
“So I have a plan. Since we’ve got to have material ready to record by next week, I thought we’d start today by going through what we’ve come up with so far. It looks like we’ve got the three I came up with and D, we can try that one you played for us yesterday, but I’m not sure about the lyrics yet.” Marcus was handing out notes to the other guys.
“I actually wrote some. They’re rough still. And I’ve got a new piece I messed around with last night.”
Marcus looked at him for a moment and gave him a grateful smile. Devon just looked down and started tuning his guitar.
Marcus made eye contact with me and mouthed, “Thank You.”
I just shook my head at him.
“Ok, let’s start with Track One.”
Star counted them off and they launched into a gritty, down-tuned number with a slower beat. Marcus had some lyrics he would sing over what I guessed would be the chorus:
I am the leather, you are the lace
I hold you close and caress your face
You are the leather, I am the lace
I’m bound to you tightly, I crave your embrace
Not bad, not as slutty. I liked the beat. It was kind of sexy. When that one finished, they all gave notes and fell into communicating in their secret language of sounds. Today I focused on sketching Jade, as I hadn’t drawn him yet. When he played he was frantic. I could tell he was somewhat contained in this practice, but I could imagine his frenetic energy on the stage would really be something to see. His long hair flicked off his shoulders with every beat and he swung it around to free his face.
They started Track Two, which was the piece they played yesterday that had a lot of changes. They stopped abruptly and then Jade said, “Could we add the...” and then I lost him again. It was impressive how cohesive they were, how they could communicate through the music and make changes through eye contact. They tried one last change, then repeated an earlier part and then ended together on a beat. Marcus seemed pleased.
“Yeah! That sounds good, guys. Let’s do it again and then let’s hear what D has for us.”
They launched into it again and it was cleaner, more together. It sounded really cool and I found myself trying not to start rocking out.
They played it through three more times and then took a break. I walked behind the bar and got a bottle of water. I watched Marcus and Devon out of the corner of my eye. Devon was showing him something he’d written. Marcus was chewing on a fingernail and reading it, nodding.
“This is deep, D. Really good, man. Want to sing it?”
Devon shrugged and plugged in his acoustic. The other guys sat and listened intently. My heart pumped wildly when I heard the first notes of his singing. His voice was rich and husky. It was so explicit; like you could discern every emotion he was carrying in one line of a song. He didn’t seem super confident with the vocals, but did his best to get through the very emotional lyrics.
Heavy is the weight on my chest
Heavy are the burdens I carry
Heavy is my heart
Heavy is my soul
Heavy is the only thing that keeps me
Here, I’m flattened by this pain
It rips at my heart
It tears at my soul
Heavy is the only thing that keeps me
Living alone
Living without you
It’s crushing me inside
Why can’t I move?
Why can’t I move on
From this heaviness inside?
Heavy are the memories
Heavy is the love I felt for you
Heavy is my heart
Heavy is my soul
Heavy is the only thing that keeps you
Here, you left me behind
I’m buried in my guilt
I’m buried in my pain
Heavy is the weight that drowns me
Living alone
Living without you
It’s crushing me inside
Why can’t I move
Why can’t I move on
From this heaviness inside?
He played a few more chords and then stopped. The room was completely silent.
Marcus stood up first. “That was beautiful, D. Just beautiful.”
Devon gave a ghost of a smile and put down his guitar. His blue eyes looked wet, but the tears hadn’t spilled. “I’m going to go get some air.” He went out the back door and closed it behind him.
I looked around at the guys and they were staring at me. Jade and Star both had tears in their eyes, Mage was giving me a suspicious look.
“What?”
Mage walked over to me and took my hand, kissing the back of it tenderly. He spoke quietly, “You might not believe you have a gift, but no one else could have moved him to write that song. Merci, chère.”
I looked at the others and they were all nodding at me.
“Whatever you’re doing, please continue.” Marcus took a long drink of water and followed his friend outside.
I frowned. Why were they looking at me like this? I hadn’t done anything.
“I’ll be right back.” I ran up the stairs and went into the bathroom. I made sure both doors were locked and looked at myself hard in the mirror. Gods, that song was achingly beautiful. Was this what he wrote last night? Maybe the music, but this morning we talked about those things. Maybe somehow that had helped him put into words what he was feeling.
Devon was in such pain, I could barely breathe while listening. He was pouring his heart out, telling us all exactly where his head was. Maggie must have been his soul mate for him to be feeling this much.
I leaned forward on the counter and realized my knees were shaking. I can’t even fathom what it would be like to be loved by someone so deeply. Even more, how could you carry on after they left?
But there was something more. He talked about guilt. What the hell happened for him to be feeling guilty? I had to find out what happened to her. This was getting ridiculous. I’d never been much for solving mysteries. It was time I got some answers.
When I went downstairs only Star and Jade were there. “Hey guys, are you still practicing?”
They shook their heads. “Nah, they left to go pick up lunch. We might try to learn that song this afternoon. If Devon can play it again.” They looked at each other and then looked down.
This was an opening and I was going to take it. “Guys, I think I need to know what happened to Maggie. I was going to wait until you were all together, but that seems to not be the best way to go about this. Will you tell me what happened?”
They looked at each other and Jade shrugged. “I guess we can tell you. It’s not like it’s a secret.” Star nodded. “It was bad, Jaylene. Real bad. We were all kind of in a bad place when it happened, too, and that’s what made it so horrible.”
I sat down on the edge of the stage near them and waited for them to continue.
Star took a drink of water and heaved a big sigh. “When Burns Like Ice was about to drop in December, we were all insane. We’d been touring non-stop for two years, partying too hard, never in one place longer than a week. We were wrecked ph
ysically but pumped for the release. The label planned a big party for us at the Whisky in Hollywood. All of our friends, people who worked with us, industry people, radio people, shit like that. We played a few songs from the album and then shit got crazy. We were all drunk and high on whatever was there. Devon got in a huge fight with our producer, Richard. I’d never seen him so pissed. He even pushed him, and D never puts his hands on anyone. Anyway, Maggie got pissed at him, told him to quit acting like an ass, and that she was leaving. He told her to fuck off. Again, not something he ever did. Then she left with Thomas.”
I wasn’t surprised to hear about the excess, although that seemed a long way from where they were now. I waited for him to continue.
“A half hour or so later Thomas came back all bloody and his clothes were all fucked up. He said they wrecked on Sunset in his fucking Porsche and that Maggie was gone.”
My mouth went dry. It was more awful than I could have imagined.
“He hit a pole and she was ejected from the car. He left the accident to come and tell us what happened. One of the execs drove him back there and he was arrested. They pronounced her dead on the scene. We brought her home to Houma and had her service. Devon was a mess. We had 10 weeks of shows scheduled to promote the new album. He didn’t speak to us the whole time we were doing the shows and when we were done, he came home and that was it. He said he wasn’t going back to L.A.”
Jade wiped at his eyes, “So here we are. Marcus figured if he wouldn’t come to us, we’d come to him.”
Star got up from where he was sitting on the stage a few feet away from me. He cracked his knuckles and the bones in his neck. He hopped down from the stage and stood next to Jade.
“Did any of you ever talk to anyone about what happened that night?”
They shook their heads. “Marcus said we just needed to keep moving, that Maggie would have wanted it that way. So we did the shows. Star talked about it some. He spent some time in rehab when we were through.”
I looked over at him, figuring my guess had been correct about him and the block. “Did it help,” I asked him.
“Yeah, it did. I was drunk or high all the time, just to stay numb. While I was there, I talked about it a little with my counselor, but really I just focused on quitting the drugs and drinking. It sucked. I needed to get away for a bit.”
I reached out and touched his shoulder.
“I’m glad you got some help. Was drinking always an issue for you?”
“I guess. My dad was an alcoholic and I was always around him and my uncles. My parents fought all the time. I had plenty of reasons to drink before this. It was never this bad though. I was a functioning alcoholic for years, since I was about 15. I’ve been clean and sober for two months now and I feel pretty good. Just gotta stay busy.”
“I’m proud of you, Star. I know how difficult it is to find a healthy way to cope with your stuff.”
He smiled and blushed. He was so like a young man still. I loved the innocence about him. I was glad I was getting the opportunity to know him.
“Thanks for telling me, guys. I know this isn’t easy on any of you. You have your own grief to deal with it. I understand you were all close to her.”
“She was a natural mom type, a nurturer,” Jade said with a humorless laugh. “She was the Sharon to our Ozzy. She believed in us and pushed us to keep coming up with better stuff, to become better musicians.”
Star nodded in agreement. “She was just like the sun, man. You felt warm in her presence. She would laugh at us being stupid, liked to play pranks on us, dress us up. She tried to knock the small-town mindset outta all of us.”
Jade laughed. “She did! She showed us all around L.A., and wherever we traveled, she always took us around to museums, historical places, shit like that. And she knew the business. She may have been young, but she was smart like that. Marcus really tried to learn from her, he lives for that stuff. He’s really taken over the business side of the band since she’s been gone. Sherry might be our manager now, but he’s kept us moving forward, kept us together. He’s a pain in the ass, but if it wasn’t for him, we’d be in deep shit right now.”
“Who’s a pain in the ass,” cried out Marcus as they came in the back door.
Mage was right behind him carrying bags from Frenchman Deli. Devon brought up the rear, his aviator shades back on.
“You are, my brother,” Jade said. “What’d ya get for chow?”
They all hovered around the bags and it took Marcus slapping hands away to get them to snap out of their hunger-induced frenzy.
“Go wash your hands, you heathens! No one eats until you’ve washed your hands.” So Marcus was a lothario AND a mother hen? He was a man of many contradictions.
I went upstairs and washed up, leaving my unused sketchbook upstairs. I had a lot to process and really wanted some time alone. I was afraid I’d offend them if I didn’t have lunch with them. But when I came back down, they’d all grabbed lunches and were going over the new songs, discussing the parts. I quietly grabbed a small container with salad and a roll and tried to slip upstairs unnoticed.
“Jay? You ok?” It was Star at the bottom of the stairs.
“I’m fine, I’m just going to eat a quick bite and then work on some drawings. I’ll be down a little later.”
He nodded, looking unsure but letting me be.
I plopped down on my floor, turned some music on my iPod and put in my ear buds. I ate a few bites of my salad while the sounds of Tab Benoit helped me relax. Blues seemed appropriate for my mood at the time. So many thoughts were running through my head, it was kind of exhausting. I didn’t know how I was going to make it for two more weeks! Not only was their grief so heavy, their problems so massive, but their energy was exhausting. One minute they were playing around and acting like the teenage boys, I suspected they still were at heart, the next minute they were brooding, arguing, and on the verge of tears. They could get so angry at each other. It was like an emotional roller coaster that I had just exited and I couldn’t get my legs to work.
I picked at the salad but couldn’t make myself eat much. After I’d stared at my sketchbook and then back at the salad for about an hour, I got up and threw the box in the trash. I sat back on the bed, looking for inspiration to draw some more. The next thing I knew, I was being gently shaken and my face was smashed against the paper.
“Jaylene, wake up chère! You alright?”
I looked up and could barely make out anything in the dark room. I squinted and realized it was Daryl.
“Hey! What are you doing here? What time is it?”
He looked at his watch. “It’s 4:00, dahlin'. You been sleeping for hours now! Dem boys was afraid to come wake ya. You feelin’ alright?”
I tried to sit up and wiped the drool off my chin. Attractive. “I’m ok. I don’t know what happened. I was going to draw and I guess I just crashed. But you still didn’t answer my question. What are you doing here?”
He chuckled. “I’ll tell you after you go clean up. We got more company downstairs so hurry your pretty little self.”
He stood from his crouch and headed for the door. “And wear something nice, you.”
I threw a shoe at him that hit the door as he was closing it. “Smart ass!” I kind of felt hung over. I never did well when I napped in the afternoon. Especially when I got half a night’s sleep!
I stumbled into the bathroom and noticed the door on the other side was closed. I could hear muffled voices from downstairs and wondered who the hell could be here.
I took a moderately long shower. I needed to clear my head and it was a great shower after you got over the initial blast. When I turned the water off, I heard music being played downstairs. It wasn’t rock. It was some sort of bluesy Zydeco mix that sounded fun. I’d taken a liking to Zydeco since coming to New Orleans. There were some fun bands that played around the Quarter. I tried to catch a show occasionally when I wasn’t working.
I dried my hair, left it down and
went back to my room to search the wardrobe. Did I dare wear the halter? Yes, I did. It was black and I had some white capris with black skulls on them that I loved to save for special occasions. A pair of black sandals rounded out the outfit and a dash of eyeliner and gloss made me feel like a new person.
When I opened the door, I was assaulted by a savory scent...Someone had fried chicken down there! I slowly descended the staircase and recognized the band playing on the stage as Dwayne Dopsie and the Zydeco Hellraisers! They were one of my favorites! But what the hell were they doing here?
“Jay!”
I turned to see Mackenzie racing across the floor to me in a polka dot pencil skirt and cami with stilettos on.
“Whoa, Kenz, slow down before you hurt yourself!”
She pulled me into a rib-crushing hug before kissing me on the cheek. “You look fucking hot, baby girl,” she whispered in my ear.
I stared up at her. “What are you doing here?”
“Surprise! Daryl and Katie came and picked me up from the shop this afternoon and said we got to come visit! How exciting!”
She was bouncing on the balls of her feet and looking around in wonder. I knew she’d love this old building as much as I did. It had character. I felt like if I could stand still and quiet, I could almost hear the voices of those who’d been here before.
Daryl and Katie came over and both hugged me. I elbowed him for not giving me any warning about the event.
“For some guys who are trying to have a covert operation going on, they sure have a hard time staying hidden!” Katie rolled her eyes and Daryl laughed. “Since when do boys have any idea how to be subtle? These guys have been trying to be slick since they were teenagers and they still haven’t learned a thing!”
Katie had me cracking up. I’d forgotten she said she was friends with one of the guys' sister. Maybe I could get some more info from her about what they were all like growing up. For some reason, I really wanted to know what Devon was like as a teenager. Was he the cool cat he acts like now? Was he goofy like the other guys? It was apparent to me that this Devon I was getting to know was a small part of the overall Devon package. Hmmmm...And a package he was. Sigh. Too bad he was so unavailable.
Haunted Page 13