A Perfect Blindness

by W. Lance Hunt

  I need some help here, ’cause I ain’t feeling it anymore. Like in the video, I imagine the director instructing me to act like I mean it. I’ll do my best. Like last time.

  I press my hips to hers, and exactly like the director wants, she presses her thigh to mine. It’s warm and firm.

  But I don’t want to do this.

  What am I supposed to say now? Sorry, but I’m not into you enough?

  But I’m not evil. Only empty.

  The front door opens.

  “Cut!” my make-believe director yells.

  “Hey, Jonathan,” Scott says, walking in. “I’m back.”

  Thank you for interrupting. I don’t know what to do with her.

  Marci shrinks from the edge, crouching behind me.

  “Yo, Jonathan!” he calls. “You home?”

  I crouch next to Marci. “Well. This sucks. Sorry.”

  “That’s Scott right? Scott Marshall—the guitarist. He’s so”—she peeks around me—“big.”

  I lean forward, looking through the aluminum spires of the balustrade.

  He’s putting down his travel bags. Once he stands back up, he brushes his hair across his forehead. “You still sleeping? What the hell did you do last night? It’s three thirty.”

  “Not sleeping. I was home last night.”

  “I have to call Wax Trax! today. We need to go over what you’ve got ready.” He takes a couple of steps. “Someone up there with you?”

  “Yeah. A fan. Big fan of yours.”

  She smacks my arm, grinning.

  “Reeeeally now?”

  “So she said.”

  “Did not,” she whispers, biting her lip.

  I listen to the clopping his boots make on the stairs.

  Perhaps she’ll like him. I’ll slip away.

  Scott’s head pops up at the head of the staircase, and he grows larger and larger. Finally whole, he nods to Marci.

  She stares at him.

  “Scott,” I say, “Marci. A big fan of yours.”

  “Hate to break this up, but we’ve got some work to do.”

  Marci’s face deflates.

  “Seems I’ve … lost track of time,” I say.

  “I could, you know, just … stay out of everyone’s way …” she says. “I love you guys. Your guitar playing is … Wow.”

  “Well,” I say helplessly, looking to Scott.

  He actually looks flattered—not something I’m used to seeing. Marci’s biting her lip, her legs nervously bouncing.

  “I don’t know. Depends on how our meeting’s going to go,” he says.

  “We do have rehearsal later.”

  “So the meeting’s not going to go well?”

  Saying nothing, I nod at Marci, raising my eyebrows. “Rehersal?”

  He gives Marci a long, hard look and nods.

  “So,” I say. “For now, we need to hash some things out. Alone. You can, you know, hang out at the Myopic. Right around the corner. Then come back for rehearsal. Meet everyone.”

  I’m sorry. I made a mistake inviting you.

  “Sure,” she says.

  “Give us an hour, hour and a half,” I say to her, nodding. “Head back. And Scott. Why don’t you do the honors? Show her where it is. I’ll …” I motion toward the pile of songs on the keyboard.

  “Sure,” he says.

  He leads her down the stairs from the balcony; they find her coat, and Scott snags his off the rack on the way out.

  Eventually I start trudging down the stairs to the keyboard.

  Feeling the disapproval of the angel, I stop and face her.

  “You were wrong. Look what you made me do.” I shake my head. “She’s an innocent here. Getting tossed away.”

  Turning from the angel, I continue to the keyboard. “When are you going to let me free? I never wanted to hurt anyone.” I pick up and start reading the first song. Sophomoric. I discard it and pick up the next and the next until Scott pulls open the heavy steel-wrapped front door.

  My head drops. Oh, here it comes.

  “Guy,” he says, intimidatingly, like a bouncer, “could you please tell me what’s going on.”

  “I’ve tried. Believe me. To have at least a single ready. But nothing. It’s like someone has stolen my—”

  “No, no, no, no,” he says, wagging a finger. “We need these songs you’ve been promising. Eight. At least. It’s in the contract.” He slams his foot on the floor. “We’re due in the studio next month, for fuck’s sake! If we don’t have at least a single ready by then …” His hand rises to hold his drooping head.

  I feel a stab of fear in my gut.

  “But this.” His mouth stays open for a moment as he raises his head and drops his hand. “No one stole anything. If you want to know why you’re where you are, go look in a mirror. The answer’s staring at you.” He waves his hand at papers sitting on the keyboard. “Let’s see what you have gotten done.” His boots thump with each step.

  “There’s nothing much to look at,” I say.

  “Because you’re too busy trying to nail teenagers.”

  “That’s not …”

  “Not what?” He pulls the black leather coat off his broad shoulders, drops it on the keyboard stool, and then picks up the stack of song lyrics and notes I’ve been foundering on. His eyes scan each page before putting it down into one of two piles. He shakes his head slowly before drumming two fingers on the smaller one. “You got some music to go along with these lyrics? Recorded, I hope? At least sketched out? These others … toss ’em.”

  “I can’t write anymore.” There. I’ve done it—spoken the words that I’ve been too terrified to think. Is that what you’ve been waiting for me to say, angel?

  “Well,” he says, shuffling the few pages of the smaller pile together. He then taps them into a neat rectangle, and carefully lays it down. “Not like you used to. Of course, nothing’s recorded either, right?”

  I avert my eyes.

  “So what are we gonna do now?” He waves his hand at the pile of misbegotten songs. “There’s little I, or the girls, can work off of. Nothing, really. No lyrics worth talking about. That I can see. Unless you’ve something in your head you’re not sharing. No music. Nothing recorded. Simply nothing.” He takes a deep breath.

  I click my Zippo open and shut.

  “Look, I don’t know what the problem is, but …” He pinches the bridge of his nose. “We are due in the studio, like I said, in a couple of weeks to cut the single for the album we’re recording a couple of weeks after that. Fuck this up … We’re done. Poof. Contract cancelled.” He flares his fingers in front of his face like a magician.

  “I know.”

  “Second Vision didn’t sell. It wasn’t good. This is it. The second chance.”

  “I know. I know,” I say.

  “Then act like it.” Scott thumps his finger on the pile of notes. “This stuff … is not good,” he says matter-of-factly. He takes a deep breath. “We all play with your lyrics and the melodies and rhythms you start us off with. No one writes like you, Jonathan. Not like you did.”

  “I’ve tried—”

  “Don’t say another word.”

  I stare at my shoes.

  “You drive this band creatively. Without you, there’s nothing to record. You can’t merely try. We can’t rehearse trying. I’m going to be meeting Kenny in a couple of hours to talk about his next single, ‘Fantasy in Black.’ Right now I’ve got to clear my head. Grab some coffee. So while I’m gone, look through this stuff. Find something we can salvage. We need a single. Without one, the whole CD won’t happen. I’ll call Wax Trax! later. Tell them … something.”

  Scott picks up his coat, stands still a moment, and then turns. “You know, ‘Fantasy in Black’ is solid—much more like our first disc than ‘
Should’ve Done It.’”

  “Yeah, and?”

  “Well,” he says, “I can talk to Kenny. See if he’d let us record it first.”

  I shake my head. “No. No, no, no. Uh uh. I’m not singing other people’s material. I’m not a failure.”

  “We need a single. In a couple of days. It’ll be our song.”

  “Not ours—his. I’ll get something for us. I will.” I nod vigorously. “I will.”

  “Do it, then,” Scott says. Pulling on his coat, he leaves me alone with the angel again.

  With a sweep of one arm, I send the piles of music sheets off the keyboard and into the air. With a sweep of the other, I send the ashtray into a column, shattering it.

  The ash falls like dirty snow.

  Chapter 48

  A Hesitant Breath

  —Jonathan—

  “It frustrates the hell out of me,” I say, turning my coffee cup around in its saucer. “I’ve got nothing for us.”

  Across the tiny table, Nancy languidly pulls a spoon around in her coffee. The neon sign hanging behind her glows “The Myopic” in the front window.

  “Not even two days alone helped. Scott got back a couple of hours ago, and all I had was a pile of vague notes and stiff, contrived lyrics to show for it. I tried to push out at least a single. And—nothing. Nada.” I sigh. “I couldn’t find anything to latch on to. As if I’m adrift. Have lost whatever it is I need to compose.”

  “I don’t think alone can work for you. You need to get laid.”

  I raise my eyebrow at her. The angel already tried that.

  “No,” she says. “Not what you’re thinking.”

  “Not what I’m thinking? Sounds pretty obvious.”

  “You’re thinking of the sex. But what you need is what leads to the sex and what happens once it’s ended. The life cycle of an infatuation.”

  “You’re prescribing obsession?” I snap my fingers. “Now, why didn’t I think of that.”

  “Only for a night.”

  “A one-night obsession. Clear as mud, that.”

  “What do you think Amy was?”

  “Nancy, hate to break it to you, but we were lovers for years.”

  “A single one-night stand at a time,” she says. “Night after night.”

  I scoff. “Why not start sleeping with my keyboard. Make lots of software babies.”

  “You?” She shakes her head. “No. You need the instability of flesh: falling in and falling out of love, the ecstasy and the sorrow. In a word—women.”

  “Jennifer said that.”

  “You should have listened to her. She was right,” Nancy says, looking slyly up. “What if she came back? Knocked on your door?”

  I shake my head. “I don’t … no. That. No.”

  “Why wouldn’t you want that?”

  “I was wrong. Everything was wrong. No.”

  “Three words: ‘Suffer in Silence.’”

  I can only stare at her smile. “I couldn’t do that to her again. To anyone. Not for anything. To write? No.” I shake my head.

  “Something to hold on to, right?”

  “I need it to be something else. Anything.” Except “Fantasy in Black.”

  • • • • •

  When I get home from the Myopic about an hour later, with nothing resolved, the numeral 4 glows on the answering machine. I push the oval button and listen to the tape rewinding as I drop my keys on the table.

  The machine beeps. “Hi guys,” AnnMarie’s voice says. “We’ll be at Gingerman later. A birthday party for Michele. If you remember her.”

  “Sure,” I reply to AnnMarie’s voice. From a different life. Back when I cared about why she was always around Tanya’s parties. When there were her parties.

  The machine beeps again. “Jonathan,” Scott’s voice says, “where are you? It’s five thirty-five.”

  “Figuring shit out,” I tell Scott’s voice.

  The machine beeps a third time. “Hey guys.” It’s Ron’s voice. “What’s up for next week? I need to schedule a couple of shoots. You gonna be rehearsing? Yes? No? Call.”

  “Don’t know, Ron. Call when Scott’s here.”

  Slipping off my coat, I walk toward the keyboard.

  The machine beeps for the fourth time.

  “Oh. Shut the hell up,” I tell the machine.

  “I called Jeff.” Scott again. “He’s pissed we don’t know when we need to book the studio for the session. If there’s going to be a session. We’ve got till next week to let him know.” He sighs. “I need to tell him something.”

  I collect the scattered leaves of paper from the floor and flip through them. After the last page flits off my thumb, I drop the pile back on the keyboard. I then get up, wander to the window, and stare down into the dusk. The streetlights cast orange-white circles on the sidewalks. I drum the sill with my fingers.

  “Okay, Jonathan. Time to wake up.”

  The stream of cars flows by below. A wind gust rattles the panes of glass.

  I’m all alone here. No one gets it. Not Scott. Not Nancy. Not even the angel. I counted on you guys.

  “Not gonna sing someone else’s words,” I say defiantly to the night.

  The phone rings.

  “Oh, fuck off!” I shout at it. “I don’t know!”

  It rings again.

  “No, Scott. I haven’t gotten anything done. I don’t know, Ron. I just … don’t.”

  It rings again. I grab the phone.

  “What?” I snarl.

  A faint, hesitant breath comes from the other end. Then: “Hi.”

  “Jennifer?”

  “Never thought you’d hear from me again, did ya?” Jennifer asks.

  Chapter 49

  Playing for Drinks

  —Scott—

  Greeting me when I arrive home from the meeting at Bulldog Road with Kenny are a shattered ashtray, scattered cigarette butts and ashes, and the click and pop of a Zippo. Following that sound to the balcony, I find Jonathan standing against the aluminum balustrade, wearing that impish smile of his.

  “Oh, what have you gone and done now?” I hiss through clenched jaws.

  As if he heard me, he jumbles down the stairs, his bus-driver shoes clomping loudly, and starts to say something. Instead he shakes his head, mouthing, “No.” Continuing to the keyboard, he flicks the machine on, and climbs over the back of the stool. He plugs in his headphones, hangs them around his neck, and taps a pen on his lips.

  “Okay,” he says to himself.

  Closing his eyes, he sits very still for a moment. Then he suddenly leans down, flips over a sheet of paper, and starts scribbling.

  “Don’t bother with the show, man,” I whisper. “We’ve got ‘Fantasy in Black’ now. Kenny’s stoked to sing it for us.”

  I walk by him, up the stairs, across the balcony and into my room. I throw my bag on the bed.

  Now I need to talk to Nancy and AnnMarie. Considering Jonathan’s got nothing, they have no real option but to get onboard. With Kenny as guest vocalist. It is his song. They need to hear this as soon as possible and make the actual choice. No freak-outs. No drama. Simply business. Then we go to Wax Trax! and sell them on this. Course we’ll need to rehearse the song. Here. That’ll be tricky. But this will buy us the time we need for the rest of the songs.

  With or without Jonathan.

  Coming down the stairs, I still hear the mute clicking of the keyboard’s keys. He hunches over, working them with his right hand, pressing the headphones to his ear with his left. He stops, looks at his lyric sheet, and then starts again.

  Sitting there like that, you’re a bad rock ’n’ roll cliché: skinny, with long, unwashed hair. How could I have ever … I shake my head. You’re nothing like Sammy. Kenny? Well. Sammy’d approve of you. I’m sure.
/>   I enter the bathroom, walk to the mirror, and look. If you ever wonder why you are where you are in your life, look in a mirror: the reason is staring at you.

  “Exactly,” I tell my reflection. “It’s up to you to get this done. Don’t worry. I will. ‘Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.’” Exactly like you said, Sammy.

  As I splash my face with cool water, the clarity of resolve calms me. No more indecision.

  Dropping my head back, I take a deep breath.

  “‘Fantasy in Black’ will kick ass,” I tell my reflection. It has to. Everything depends on it.

  In the mirror, I can almost see Sammy standing behind me. “I’ll never break my promise. Even if you can’t keep yours.”

  I look away, holding my fist to my lips.

  I won’t let anything take that away. “I promise you …”

  It starts feeling too much, and I leave the bathroom.

  Heat shushes from a duct hidden in ceiling. I stand, letting it pour over me, warm and soothing.

  Jonathan’s still sitting at the keyboard, drawing his finger and thumb together repeatedly on his forehead. He taps on a few keys and shakes his head. He picks up the lyric sheet. He studies it for a moment. Then he starts clicking on the keys again.

  I can’t watch his delusion play out, so I go to the phone and call Nancy. She’s not there, so I leave a bland message about wanting to grab a cocktail. The same happens on my call to AnnMarie.

  Then I pick up my Stratocaster from its stand and slip on the strap. I stand ready, legs apart, knees bent. The weight feels good on my shoulder. Not needing to plug it in, I pull off one of the picks taped to the body and run a couple of quick scales up and down the neck.

  I start picking out the notes from “Fantasy in Black.” With his headphones on, Jonathan can’t hear. Even if he could, he’s too busy pretending he can write to pay any attention.

  It’s up to me to get our mojo back. Like when we played Metro on the first night of the Micherigan Tour.

  I remember the roar of whistles, claps, shouts, stomps, and cries for “Joie” blasting into the wing where I and Nancy leaned against one another.