“How I could I have missed that?” I whisper, walking to the keyboard. Moron.
Naked and standing on wobbly legs, I scribble down those lines, and then several more that start flowing into my mind. They hint of a killer melodic line and how to rework the chorus and the bass line.
“Come on, Jonathan,” I chide myself. “This is so obvious. Where’s your head been?”
I write “Sin with Me” across the top of the page.
The sound of the keys sliding into the door wrests me from the new song. I leap toward the bed, crawl in next to Amy, and pull the sheet over myself right as the door swings open. I pretend to sleep. Scott’s boots thud loudly across the floor along with another pair of shoes. Plastic bags crinkle, and something thunks down on the table.
Following that, there’s a hush, and then whispers, quiet treads of boot and shoe, my keyboard’s stool sliding a few inches, papers shuffling.
Then there are only the sounds of faraway traffic.
“So,” Scott says quietly. “Pleasure after business. With her, that’s a shock.”
“I like them together,” Nancy says. “She’s his recurring brief habit. Nice twist.”
I take this as the excuse to fake waking up, so I stir, roll over, and open my eyes. I wave. Nancy, smiling as always, waves back.
Scott waves his meaty hand at the new song. “Good stuff,” he says.
“We need to rework the bass line and chorus with everyone. Easy fixes,” I say, reaching for my jeans. I extract my boxers.
“Still. We need to nail it down by next Thursday,” he says. “Seven days.”
Under the sheets, I slip on my boxers. Slinking out of bed, I lay the sheets over Amy’s shoulders again.
“What was that about recurring … whatever?” I ask Nancy.
“Brief habit,” Nancy says. “A habit that’s interesting because it’s new, and brief because it’s discarded before it gets stale. And it’s replaced by a fresh new one. Now, you’ve worked out a nifty trick—same habit, briefly, again and again and again. It always feels new; never gets stale. Frederick would be proud.”
“Sorry to break up philosophy hour,” Scott says, “but you might want to get your habit dressed before everyone else gets here.”
• • • • •
Rehearsal goes very well in spite of Amy watching; tonight I have a new song to focus on. We work out the kinks quickly and have “Sin with Me” ready to go in a couple of hours. After three hours, Amy’s still content to listen and drink. Looks like she’s finally having fun. Before running through our set one last time, we break, and that’s when Randal shows up. He’s alone again. Scott asks him why Tanya hasn’t come around lately.
Randal says nothing; he only shakes his head as though he’s trying to get something out of it, and he then takes off without a word, leaving an odd feeling hanging around us.
Deciding break’s over with that, we run through our set, which sounds almost good enough, and Scott gives a few last notes.
It’s the usual crew of late—the band, Ron, Wendy, Chris, and Jennifer—plus Amy. Everyone’s milling around, talking, getting restless to go someplace when Ron holds up his camera, and asks Wendy, “When’s Charlene going to get over here to do the shoot? I’m all set up.”
She glares at him. Chris looks shocked; Jennifer, mortified.
“Shit. Kenny,” he says, “I mean Kenny.”
“That son of a bitch,” Jennifer spits out. “He should die for what he did. Threw her off the balcony. Goddamn him!”
Amy leans over to me. “What’s this about?”
“A model. You never met her,” Scott says. “It was on the news. ’Bout a week ago. Fell from—”
“No,” says Jennifer. “She did not fall. She got murdered. Her boyfriend pushed her off a twenty-three-story balcony. Pushed my friend off. Made her fall. Twenty-three stories. Goddamn him!”
“Okay. Pushed,” Scott says. “Anyway, she was here at our first party and was supposed to do a shoot here.”
“It’s pretty fucked up,” I say, and immediately I regret my shallow words.
“We are … were … best friends,” Jennifer says. “Almost roommates. We were supposed to be roommates! That fucker!” Her face wrinkles up as if she’s going to cry.
With a camera up to his eye, Ron seems unsure if he should take shots of this or not. He doesn’t.
No one speaks until Wendy says, “Let’s get gone.”
She, Jennifer, and Chris leave.
“Wonder what happened,” Scott says once the door closes behind them. “I mean, people don’t get thrown off a twenty-whatever-story balcony for nothing.”
“Cops’re still trying to talk to the boyfriend,” Nancy says. “Read he’s some sort of international business dude.”
“So, you knew her, this model?” Amy asks.
“Not really,” Scott says. “Only met her a couple of times. Once here. At our first party.”
“I’d been hoping to catch her at a rehearsal,” Ron says. “Set up a session. But I never got a hold of her. Now that I’ve got things ready, I can’t get a hold of Kenny. Let’s hope he hasn’t gotten himself shot or something.” He laughs. “Curse of the North Avenue loft.”
“Oh, come on, man,” I say. “That’s ill.”
“Let’s go out,” Amy says. “Check out a club, bar—whatever. Get away from the curse.”
“I dunno,” Scott says.
“Club Dreamerz,” AnnMarie says. “It’s like a four-minute walk. Nothing else like it in town.”
Scott’s doubt crumbles quickly, and in a few minutes, we’re down the stairs and out the door.
While we walk along Milwaukee, Amy’s the only one talking—about how the neighborhood is using pop art and punk images to make itself over as cool, and how it’s starting to show up in some advertising in New York: images from and inspired by Keith Haring, Basquiat, Warhol, the Sex Pistols, and Lichtenstein.
“Love it,” she says. “Sells a lot of pants.”
We arrive at Club Dreamerz—one storefront among blocks of them, with a hand-painted sign above the door. Inside, carved-up and graffiti-covered booths sit empty along the one wall under twenty-foot-high stamped-tin ceilings. Across from the booths is an art nouveau bar filled with people wearing black leather jackets bearing band logos painted in white, and boots or thick-soled shoes, the men with plaid flannel shirts tied around their waists like skirts, the women in black dresses. Piercing and rings glint in the darkness as the music howls from the dance floor in back.
“Yes,” Amy says, grabbing my arm. “This is fucking awesome. They got this nailed. It’s, like, perfect.”
After ordering a round of Jägermeister shots, we toast and drain the thick, sweet liquor, and then head back through a short hallway, passing bathrooms with doors hanging off-kilter, to the dance floor, which is in a moody, boxlike room with walls covered in graffiti names, obscenities, and black-figure scrawls. Huge bass bins crouch in the corners; midrange and treble speakers cling to the walls above. In the far corner, I can see a patio through a doorway that looks though another doorway. In the middle of the empty dance floor, Amy starts tossing her arms out and flicking her legs, keeping her head lowered long enough for her dark hair to fall straight down, obscuring her face, before she tosses her head around and her hair bursts out into a fan.
I join her.
Thrashing at the angry music that has vocals like snarls, I try losing myself in the music, exploding into motion; but thinking about Amy takes up too much room in my head, crowding out the music. The rhythm fails to sink in, and I can’t make my body match the music.
After two songs, I give up and walk out onto the patio, alone.
Spitting sparks, an ‘L’ train clamors above the far end of the patio, drowning out the sound of the music. Look down at the patio, I notice it’s paved with headstones: “Will
iam Hunter 1952–1978”; “Maureen McCormick 1958–1978: Beloved daughter of …”; “Laura Smith 1956–1977: Too soon taken”; “Genevieve C. Tolbert 1950–1985: Daughter, sister …”; “Jeannine Martin 1957–1978: Lying in the Arms of God …” Are these mistakes? A patio paved in damaged memorials—did they get these at a closeout sale for the dead? Or maybe it’s littered with the owner’s memories carved in stone.
I wonder what’ll they put on Charlene’s headstone. “Life lived too pretty”?
I join AnnMarie, Nancy, and Scott at a picnic table. Several bottles of beer crowd the center. Snagging one, I drink. It feels cold and good.
“So,” AnnMarie says, “that’s Amy.”
“So it is.”
“I can see her giving you a fat lip.”
“Forgot you knew that.” I light a cigarette.
“I can’t believe she’s in my house again,” Scott says. “Thought those days were over.”
“Our house,” I say, remembering Amy telling me, “He so wants to fuck you.”
Scott pops his lips. “Our house. Yes. Still. Thought those days were over.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re here,” he says, pointing down. “And she is there.” He points off into the distance.
“Jealous?” I ask.
“Why the fuck would I be jealous?” He drains his bottle. “She’s a problem. Always has been.”
“What problem?”
“You haven’t been able to get your brain out from between her legs the whole time she’s been here.”
I rap my bottle on the table, running my tongue along the inside of my teeth.
“Hell, in Columbus, you couldn’t keep your dick out of her long enough to bother rehearsing.”
“You know—”
“Look what happened. Opening for Warren Zevon. Lost between her legs. And then here. Two days ago. We have our first show coming up. Zero time to waste. You practically stared at her crotch the whole rehearsal. It was pointless. Had to call it a night early.”
“Oh, like tonight? ‘Sin with Me?’ Two hours. New song. Done.”
“She got your dick wet.”
“Don’t,” I say, shaking my head. “No. Don’t talk about her like that.”
“Oh, really now,” he says. “Don’t talk about her—”
“Boys,” Nancy says, “you’re both handsome.”
Scott gives her a feral look.
I toss down my cigarette and crush it out across the name “Eileen S. Bobbitts” carved into a headstone.
Then I feel an arm sliding down my chest, and then lips pressing against my neck. I look up at Amy’s face.
Scott leaves.
Amy pushes me over enough to sit down and drapes her arms around my shoulders. “You’re going to get so boring here without me around.”
“What’s going to make me so dull? Me being here? Or that you’re not?” I ask.
“Either. Both.”
“And neither is going to change, right?”
She gives me a sour look and moves to the other side with Nancy, who raises her eyebrows at AnnMarie, her grin much less playful than usual.
“So,” AnnMarie says. “What do you do?”
“He hasn’t said? Guess he wants to forget everything,” Amy says. “I’m the head of a design group for Kolby, Green, and Michelson.”
“The New York ad agency,” AnnMarie says. “Impressive.”
“I like it.”
“Don’t they have an office in Chicago?”
“Yep,” Amy says. “I’ve thought about moving here. But it’d be a horizontal change into a bigger group—a demotion, really. Right now I’m the head of my area. I report directly to the creative director in New York. Here, I’d have to report to the Chicago director. But it’s tempting. Bigger market—all that stuff. Same reasons Jonathan abandoned Columbus. And me.”
“I didn’t abandon anyone,” I explain plainly. “Nor did I abandon Columbus. I came here to get what is only available here.”
Amy swirls the last of the beer in her bottle, takes a swig, and puts it down.
“Um,” she says. “I still live in Columbus. You don’t. You picked up and moved. With that wannabe boyfriend of yours.”
“Please, girl,” I say. “Let’s drop that delusion of yours already. That’s you being jealous.”
Amy laughs hilariously. “Oh, it’s the blind leading the blind.”
“You know,” I say, “this really isn’t fun anymore.”
“How can it be? You’re here. I’m still there. That’s not right.”
“You chose to stay.”
“You chose to leave.” Her eyes glow like burning sapphires. “This is only Chicago, Jon. I’ll be in New York soon—a year or two, I think. If this current project goes well, sooner.”
I shrug.
“Really?”
“Yeah. What does that mean to me?”
“What does New York matter to a musician? Are you actually asking me that question?”
“You’re going. Not me.”
“You could. With me.”
I shake my head and feel AnnMarie and Nancy watching, rapt. “No. I can’t.”
“Sure you can,” she said. “Buy a ticket home to Columbus. Live with me. You’ve got almost nothing here—”
“Nothing?”
“A mattress. Clothes. You can ship the keyboard. Hell, I can buy you a new one.”
“Oh, no, no, no.” I’m shaking my head vigorously. “Not … no. Mercurial Visions doesn’t fold up and fit into a portmanteau.”
“There are plenty of drummers and backup singers.”
“You came here to trip me up, didn’t you?” I ask. “You want me to fuck this all up.”
Her head shakes as her eyes grow narrow. “I did not come here for you. I came on business.”
“You called.”
“I want you.”
“See.”
“See what!” She slams her fist down. “What? That I want you? That you want me? That it’s stupid we’re apart!” She’s shouting now.
Everyone’s watching now.
“That’s not my fault,” I say.
“You left!”
“You couldn’t figure a way out of this. You couldn’t solve the problem—a problem I’d never have had—”
“You motherfucker.”
“Why are you here?”
“Making a mistake.”
“Then leave,” I say, standing.
She turns to stand but then stops. “Oh, no. No. I see it now.” She bows her head. “God, why did I think you’d stay …”
Unable to take a breath, I wait for her say something.
“You’re in love with that skinny little thing,” Amy says, raising her head. “Actually in love with her.”
“What are you talking about? Who?”
“How could you, ever, ever love anyone else.” Amy swipes two bottles off the table at me.
Jerking my hands up, I block one bottle from my face; it shatters on a headstone. The other hits my chest and drains into my lap. I leap up, rivulets of beer snaking down my legs.
“How could you?” she yells, jabbing two fingers into my chest so hard she pushes backward.
“I don’t love anyone. No one else. No one. Not even you anymore.” I turn away and march across the headstones to the doorway, where Scott steps silently out of my way.
“Fucking asshole!” Amy screams after me.
A beer bottle shatters on the doorway beside my head. I feel the splatter of cold beer hitting my face and slivers of glass deflecting off my jacket.
I walk straight through the bar as a bouncer rushes past me toward the patio.
Chapter 24
Just Walk Away
—Jonathan—
&
nbsp; Each step on my way home from Dreamerz becomes an exclamation point of anger at her, at myself, and at life and the shitty choices it keeps giving me.
An ‘L’ train screeches overhead as cars snarl along the street beside me. I need to keep moving to avoid any chance she might catch up to me; but I can’t run. That would burn up my anger and rot my resolve to cast out all my memories of her, to grind to death every feeling I might have ever had for her, and to strangle the very idea of love in my heart. Kill it. Dead.
“Kill it. Dead,” I tell the night. “Kill it all. Dead. All dead.”
Once in the loft, I search for anything of Amy’s. I’ll leave her no excuse to even call me. Kill it all.
After finding only a last lipstick, I make another sweep of the space. I need to keep angry, focused on what makes me angry, ’cause I know this final ending will hurt worse than when I left Columbus. There are no fantasies left. No hopes. What we’d been is beyond dead.
As I pass near the door, I hear a hesitant knock.
I consider walking past without answering it, but I stop instead. I open the door, stone-faced.
Amy stands in the fractured light of the hallway, biting her lip, her hair mussed, knees scraped, eyes red, and cheeks streaked with mascara. “They threw me out.”
I nod.
“I’m sorry. I was wrong. It’s all a mess and—”
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “It’s past that.”
“Please. I’m drunk. I can’t drive six hours right now. I don’t know where else to go. I’ll leave first thing in the morning. Please let me get some sleep. Two hours. Anything.” Her chin starts shuddering, and tears fill her eyes. One spills down her cheek. “Please.”
Closing my eyes, I sigh. “Couch.”
“Thank you.”
I walk to the couch and pat it without looking back. “When I get up—”
“I’ll be gone. I know. Yes.”
In the bathroom, I reek of beer; my soaked shirt and pants cling to my skin. Peeling everything off, I act out what I’ll say if she comes to me during the night, trying to make things right with her thighs.
“That’s it. No more. I should’ve known better. I should’ve never taken your call—never said yes when you asked to come.”
A Perfect Blindness Page 15