Three Chords, One Song

by Beatrice M. Hogg

  She ran her hand through her hair, which caused her to look at her reflection again. She couldn’t imagine being a baby. She couldn’t imagine looking at her father with unadulterated love and trust.

  “But as much as I loved you, Ricky and Dee, I couldn’t let go of my other love. When Dee was gone and I was alone with you guys, I used to play my acoustic guitar. I still have it. Soon it will belong to Soleil. I created songs, and it felt like they were my children, too. But I loved to play my songs for you. Whenever I played, you would stare at me and listen. I always hoped that you would want to play, too, but you never showed any interest. But I could tell that you liked it when I played.”

  Eve vaguely remembered hearing her father play guitar. It was magic. The pieces of wood seemed to come alive in his hands. Once she had looked into the sound hole, looking for the secret of the sound. But how could he choose music over the children he claimed he loved?

  “I couldn’t stay in Pittsburgh, Eve. I couldn’t work in a steel mill all my life. I was never good in school, so going to Pitt or even Point Park College was never an option. The only thing that kept me alive was my music. As much as I loved all of you, I couldn’t get the music out of my head; I couldn’t keep the guitar out of my hands. On Friday nights, I used to play some of the local clubs in Oakland and South Side. I never noticed the audience; it was all about the music. I didn’t get into rock and roll for the women; I got into it because music was as important to me as the air that I breathed. It’s not something that I can even explain with words. But I knew I had to go. There was no way I could get enough work as a musician to support a wife and two children in Pittsburgh.”

  So you just left us behind, she thought.

  “Dee never understood. Sure, when we were dating in high school, she liked the idea of dating a guy who played in bands. But once we got married, she expected me to turn into someone else—she wanted me to become her father, or my father. Going down to J&L and working until I died. After we got married, she turned against the music. The only time I played guitar at home was when she wasn’t there. I left my Strat at a friend’s house. Dee threatened to destroy it if she ever saw it again.” He coughed. “But enough about my shit.”

  Her mother never seemed interested in music. She was always telling her to turn off the radio. But Eve remembered the first time she heard Sheffield Steel on WDVE. Even through the effects, the power chords and the studio engineering, she knew immediately that it was her father singing and playing. It was a song that she had heard as a baby, in its infancy. “Working at the J&L” flew off the shelves in Pittsburgh. Everyone knew that Mik DeSalle was really Rick Shelton, that flashy guitarist who used to play in the local clubs. And even though she knew that to admit it to her mother would have been considered treason, she was proud of him.

  “Dee told me that if I left, I would never see you or Ricky again. But I knew that if I stayed, I would be killing myself, killing my spirit. I called you guys every Christmas, every birthday, until Dee changed the number. I sent presents all the time, but Dee sent them back. I tried to visit whenever I was near Pittsburgh, but she wouldn’t let me see you. But I tried. I sent money to Dee, I sent money to my mom, my sisters and Dee’s mom—but she wouldn’t accept any money.”

  As he talked, the Pittsburgh accent came back into his voice. Eve smiled at the familiar sound.

  “But you made it on your own. I’m proud of you. I wish you had never gotten involved with that asshole MacRae, but you knew what to do. I hope that you will remember me with love, find some of that little girl you once were. That little girl who used to sit on my knee and listen to me sing until she fell asleep. You are a fighter. But don’t fight those who love you. That includes not only me and Dee, but your sisters, and Mariah, too. You have grown up to be a beautiful and intelligent woman, Evelyn. Deidre and I were lucky to be your parents.” His voice caught, as if he had just felt a sharp pain. “Have a good life, Evie. I love you, always have, always will.”

  Eve waited to see if he said anything else, but there was only silence. Dead air. A voice she would never hear again. The phone rang, but she couldn’t will herself to move to pick it up. She knew who it was.

  “Eve, are you home yet?” It was her mother. She looked at the stereo, and then at the phone. But she didn’t feel guilt. She didn’t feel torn. But she knew she would never share the disc with Deidre or her sisters. It was hers, hers alone. For the first time in her adult life, she realized that she had a mother and a father who loved her. “Call me,” Deidre said before hanging up the phone.

  Eve looked at the stereo one more time. “Bye, Daddy,” she whispered. She took the CD out of the player and placed it back in its paper sleeve, throwing the envelope into a wastebasket. On the shelf was a photo of her and Ricky, taken at his high school graduation. She slid down the back of the frame. The CD and its sleeve fit perfectly. She slid the frame back up and set the photo back on the shelf, disturbing dust that had gathered while she had been gone.

  She looked at Ricky’s face, blinking away tears. She was done crying. She turned her back to the photo, sighed and picked up the phone.

  “Hi Mom! I just got home….”

  Lucy

  Lucy decided to drive back to San Francisco. Why fly? She didn’t have anything to go back to or any reason to hurry back. Maybe she would do some soul searching, traveling to places known for encouraging peace and well-being. But she knew that whatever she did, wherever she went, only she could change her life. It was time to grow up and come to terms with it.

  Early in the morning, Mariah dropped her off at the car rental office. She rented a Mercedes convertible and got on Highway One after saying her goodbyes to her mother. As the familiar sites left her rearview mirror, she realized how much she missed LA. Maybe she would get a little place in LA, where she could visit her mother and Mika.

  She loaded the CD player with all of her favorite musicians, but left the Sheffield Steel Greatest Hits CD on the seat next to her. She looked at the photo on the cover, with the band’s youthful, brash guitarist pouting front and center.

  She had also forgotten how much she loved to drive, especially this magical highway by the sea. The hours flew by quickly. With a quick pit stop for snacks and nature’s call, she was in San Francisco before she knew it. She stopped at her post office box to pick up her mail. She had stopped getting mail at her residence years ago, after a rash of thefts in the neighborhood.

  She took a tote bag into the building with her, knowing that her usual mail of magazines, books and letters would have filled the large mailbox she rented for her business.

  As she dropped the box’s contents into the tote, she saw the envelope. She fished it out of the bag and glanced at the writing. It was addressed to “Ms. Lucille Williams DeSalle.” She recognized the handwriting as Mik’s—his final resolution to his annoyance with her using Mariah’s last name. She shook her head and smiled.

  But after she got in the car, she discovered that her hands were shaking. She didn’t want to go home. She put the car into gear and tried to steady her hands. There was only one place for her to go. She took a right on Portola and prayed that the parking gods would be on her side.

  She could feel the strong breeze on her face when she got to the top of Twin Peaks. The city stretched out below her as the sun lowered in the sky. From up here, it looked like a beautiful puzzle of concrete, framed by water and distant hills. She picked up the Sheffield Steel CD and ran her hands over the cover. She looked at the photo again. Once, all of those guys had been her family. On the road they teased her, gave her candy and soda when Mariah wasn’t looking, took her for piggyback rides and told her stories. It wasn’t until she started kindergarten that she discovered that not everyone traveled on a big bus with their parents and their friends, staying in a different city each night. As a little girl, Lucy always had a bag packed and waiting by the door, next to her parents’ luggage. She could rattle off tour dates before she even knew her ABCs.
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br />   She had never felt like the only kid on the bus. They were all kids, living a lifestyle where remaining childlike was rewarded and required. After all, didn’t her mother and father and pretend aunts and uncles spend their evenings “playing” for fans all over the world? The only rules were to get to the venue on time, play well and never disappoint the fans. But in the end, not only did they disappoint the fans, they disappointed each other. “Good times weren’t made to last, that’s what made them so good,” Mik had said to her once. She had nodded her head, even though she didn’t know at the time what he had meant.

  She leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes. A light breeze ruffled her hair.

  “Lucy, this is your Dad. I know you don’t like that word, and I don’t deserve that word, but I wanted to use it one last time.” His voice was low.

  He sighed. “I don’t know where to start. Out of all of my children, I have spent the longest time with you, but you are the one I have let down the most. I wish I could say that I know you the best, but I don’t. You have always reminded me of my little sister, always trying to find the good in people, trying to find the justifications for their actions. You always wanted to be the peacemaker.” He snorted. “And look what it got you.”

  She opened her eyes and looked at the people walking around enjoying the view. So far, this CD wasn’t what she was expecting.

  “Lucy, I fucked up big time with you. Mariah always tried to be strong for you, and I just let her. But you needed two parents. I loved you, but I didn’t want to be the parent. I wanted to be a father, I loved being a father to all of you, but I didn’t want to grow up and be a parent, a responsible adult that could be counted on.”

  An apology? Is that what she wanted from him?

  “But you seemed to be fine without me. You graduated from high school and got accepted to a good school. I was so proud that a daughter of mine got into an elite school like Stanford and graduated. I used to tell everyone about my Stanford daughter, like I had something to do with it. You got into Stanford because you were smart, not because of any DNA you got from me. Mariah used to tell me about your grades, how you made the honor roll in high school and the honor society in college, but I was too busy working or partying to think much about it. And then Ricky showed up.”

  Lucy looked around to see if anyone was listening, but no one was paying any attention to her. The panoramic view of the San Francisco Bay area had captivated everyone in her vicinity.

  Mik coughed, and his voice got slightly louder. “Ricky was my namesake, the boy I always wanted. I remembered the good times I shared with my dad, like playing catch and going to Steeler games. But I never shared anything like that with Ricky. We shared blow and hookers. Ricky was never interested in the music. He was interested in being the son of a rock star and all that went with it. And he was interested in you.”

  Lucy caught her breath. She thought of one of Soleil’s favorite sayings. What the fuck?

  “He was obsessed with you. He used to keep photos of you in his bedroom. I never knew why, as he didn’t have pictures of Dee or Eve.” He sighed again. “But I never thought much about it, I was either getting high or coming down from something. I gave him money to try to keep him busy, but he just spent it on partying and drugs. I don’t know what I expected him to do with it, go to Stanford?” He laughed bitterly. “I guess he did, in a way. I didn’t know he was visiting you until Mariah told me. So I stopped giving him money. I thought maybe he would get a regular job, meet a girl and get married or something. I mean, he saw the good influence that Sally had been on me.”

  She didn’t want to hear about Sally. Not now or ever.

  “But he wanted fast money. He had met Faith a few times and thought he could make money with her. But he fell under Faith’s spell, just like I had done. Like father, like son after all. There were a lot of things I wanted to share with Ricky, but my ex-wife and my addictions weren’t what I had in mind. I tried to get him to go back to Pittsburgh to get clean and get a better life, but he refused. But the last time I saw him, he said that he would go back, after he did one last job for Faith and visited you in San Francisco.”

  She looked out at the city. She wanted to put her hands over her ears or stop the CD, but she couldn’t. She had to hear what her father had to say.

  “Like an idiot, I believed him. But I should have called you. I should have warned you to not let him in. I didn’t know what he was going to do, but I should have guessed. But I never thought that he would involve you in his double-cross by hiding the money and drugs in your apartment.”

  Lucy’s heart was racing. He knew. He knew almost all of it.

  “When you called me that night, I knew that all of my past mistakes were coming back to haunt me. My son was dead and my daughter was hurt, all because I couldn’t behave like a responsible parent and try to stop all of that shit from happening.” His tone got lower and weaker and he moaned. “But I did what I always did, I just threw money at the problem. I paid off Faith’s goons and told Mariah what had happened. It broke your mother’s heart. And I think that, at that moment, Mariah gave up on me. And worst of all, I didn’t even have the balls to call you back.”

  Lucy shook her head at the dashboard. No, Mariah never gave up on him, not even after that. But he had given up on himself.

  “And when I saw you last year, I knew that you had finally given up on me, too. I asked Mariah to marry me and gave her a ring, but I knew it was too late. Too many lies, too many lives destroyed. And all I can do now is say that I’m sorry.”

  She was still shaking her head and looking at the dashboard when she noticed that some people were now staring her. She stopped and stared down at the Sheffield Steel CD case.

  “I love you, Lucille. I hope you continue to see the good in the world. I hope that someday you will be able to remember the good in me. I’ll never be the father you wanted or the daddy you remembered from our touring days, but never forget that I love you. So many times over the past year, I just wanted to pick up the phone and call you or get in the car and just drive up there, but I never did. And now I never will. But try to forgive me. Don’t let the past destroy your future. Don’t close your heart to love.” He started to cough again. “You will always be my ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,’ forever.”

  Lucy could feel the pain in the pit of her stomach. That was the last thing he had said to her when they were together. But Ricky had tried to twist those words of endearment. Lucy pulled the keys out of the ignition, grabbed her purse, and ran to the nearby bathroom. She went into the first stall and threw up her lunch. After standing in the stall for a few minutes, she opened the door to an empty room. She washed her mouth out with water and splashed some on her face.

  She walked to the railing and stood there, looking out at the city along with the tourists. She didn’t look back to see if anyone was near the car. She didn’t care. She didn’t know what to think. But she was done throwing up. She was done giving up. No one was going to hurt her again. It was time to move forward.

  She got back into the convertible. She took the CD out of the stereo and replaced it with Sheffield Steel’s Greatest Hits. She hummed along as she drove down the hill.

  Chapter Twenty

  Soleil

  Soleil looked at the narrow vertical hole with two horizontal holes underneath it. The triangular outlet reinforced the feeling of strangeness that she felt. On the table in front of the outlet was an electric teapot. After twenty-three years, she had made it to England.

  It was hard to believe that she was actually in London. She glanced around the suite that the record company had reserved for her. The two rooms were almost as large as her apartment in LA. Tomorrow she would put the finishing touches on her first album. She was especially proud of the song that she and Mariah did, based on the song Mik had left her.

  She set down her new designer backpack and the bag of presents she got at the gift shop at Heathrow. Mika was going to love the souvenirs.
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  On the table in the sitting room were two large bouquets of flowers. One was from the record company, welcoming her to London. She didn’t have to read the card to know who the other ones were from, but she read it anyway.

  “Shit.” She let the card drop to the floor. She bent down to pick it up and read it again.

  Welcome to London. Heard the demo. Fantastic! Congratulations. It will be a great success. Sorry to hear about your mother. After I returned home, I talked to my wife and told her everything. She would like to meet you and we both would like to show you around our hometown. I’ll give you a call sometime during your stay. Cheers.

  That bastard! What was he trying to do to her? What did he want from her? She knew he had a hand in her record deal. Derek, the producer of her demo tape, was a friend of his. Did he think if he helped her to create her album it would make up for her sterility?

  She took the metal figurine of Big Ben out of the bag. Mika wanted models of all of the buildings and castles she visited. Her seven-year-old sister wanted to be an architect when she grew up. What would Faith think about that?

  She left the flowers in the room and went into the bedroom. She set Big Ben on the dresser. Her two bags were stacked on a luggage rack. She had gotten new Tumi bags for the trip. None of that flashy Louis Vuitton shit for her. That was Eve’s thing. She wondered how her sister was doing in her new house.

  Lucy didn’t move to a new place. She was happy in her apartment in the Marina. But she did buy a new sports car. Soleil tried to convince her to buy something more macho, but Lucy insisted on getting a Porsche. She also decided to spend money on a good therapist. Soleil promised she would go to a session with her when she got back to the States.

  Soleil glanced at her watch. She had promised everyone she would call as soon as she arrived. It was 10 a.m. in London, but it was the middle of the night in LA and Pittsburgh. She would call them all later. Now she needed some sleep. First class or not, she hated sleeping on airplanes.