FAREWELL GHOST

by Larry Caldwell

  “Just an empty suit, after all,” Clay said from the doorway. But there was no humor in his words. No emotion at all.

  After they checked Peter for signs of life (he was alive and conscious, but in a nearly comatose state of shock), after they had stabilized his shattered arm and assured themselves he could nap in a Vicodin stupor for a little before going to the hospital, after they’d inspected the damage to the Rickenbacker (a crack in the headstock, but otherwise unharmed), after Clay and Savy had grown accustomed to witnessing their idol and his lady-love in the flesh again (and what repulsive flesh it was), Boyle asked Clay if he would collect a few armfuls of kindling.

  Clay located the surviving tools behind the rubble in the back yard and chose the hand ax over the chainsaw. Savy joined him as he walked the grounds, hacking branches and whole limbs off of trees. They said little to each other, though Clay didn’t doubt their heads were full of chatter—whole conversations, questions asked and replies imagined.

  In reality, their silence spoke loud enough.

  Boyle and Deidre, on the other hand, seemed to know all the right things to say to each other. They’d had years to think it over, years of death to ponder a second chance at life. Standing in the dark among the Generator’s ruins, they spoke in a low, continuous murmur, and it occurred to Clay that “There’s No End to This Wanting” was as much about the longing of these two lost souls as about him and Savy. Clay went on cutting down branches long after there was enough, buying them as much time as he could.

  Finally, he led Savy back to the ruins. “Ready?” Savy asked them, as they offered up the piles of wood.

  “Hell yes,” Boyle replied. “These bodies are full of pain.”

  Clay arranged the fresh wood on top of the collapsed roof, the way he had been taught as a Cub Scout in another, more innocent life. He stacked the heavier branches in the middle, with the thickest standing straight up, and dressed this frame with twigs and brittle-dry leaves. “Wish I had a badass Zippo to send you off with,” he said. All he could find was a matchbook from Chili John’s.

  He tore a single matchstick loose, licked it across the striking strip, then set fire to the entire book and tossed it into the pyre. It hadn’t rained more than a drizzle in L.A. for longer than Clay had been living here; to say the wood combusted was an understatement.

  As four, they stood together, watching the flames gather.

  Boyle dropped a bony hand on Clay’s shoulder and Clay tried not to shrivel from that friendly, but horrid touch. “He won’t bother with you now, brother.”

  “I’ve heard that before.”

  “You’re too much a pain in the ass. There are other souls, far easier to corrupt.”

  At this point, Boyle seemed to remember that Savy was standing on the far side of Clay and he left it at that. Clay stared into Karney’s single eye—seeing Boyle, in a manner of speaking, for the first time. “Thank you, Rocco. For the times.”

  “You’ve built the skills, now go show ’em to the world. On your terms.”

  “I’m sorry I harassed you when we first met,” Deidre added, and Clay nodded and wondered how often poltergeists actually apologized for their abuse. First time for everything.

  “Wherever you guys go,” Savy said quietly, “I hope you go there together.”

  “Same for you two,” Deidre replied, unaware. “You’re both clearly head over heels.” She hugged them each, then looked to Boyle. The love of her life, and death.

  “Well, honey, it’s been a compelling existence,” Boyle told her.

  “Got that right.”

  Deidre leaned toward him and they kissed, the one-eyed skull and the bloody woman with the smashed face. Their teeth grinding together.

  “Any last requests?” Boyle asked.

  “‘Face the Music’,” Deidre replied. “You know it was always my favorite.”

  The fire had spread four feet across and was now chest high, sending crackling sparks into the starry sky. Boyle and Deidre joined hands and, without the slightest hesitation, stepped into the flames.

  And as the fire took hold of their legs, Boyle’s voice sang out, pitch perfect, for the last time: “Darkness falls upon us all. But you and I have seen the worst. If it’s time, to face the music, close your eyes, we’ll lift the curse…”

  Clay and Savy backed away as the flames grew hotter. The two damaged bodies were mere shadows among the firelight, entangled and going up. And even if Karney’s throat had melted to the bone, Clay still heard Boyle’s words: “…of our damaged souls…”

  Silence after that. Silence save the crackling of dead wood.

  Savy doubled over and turned her face from Clay.

  “Beautiful,” a voice called behind them.

  Clay froze. That voice. He knew it as well as Boyle’s now. As well as his own.

  Savy did not know it though. Her dealings had been with Priest entirely. She didn’t spin around nearly as fast as Clay.

  The Hailmaker was standing under the busted light, in the moon shadow of the largest orange tree. His figure tall in a trenchcoat and wide-brimmed black hat. Clay couldn’t see the face, but had little doubt it was different from Payton Alexander’s or the Queen Bitch’s or The Man’s. If there was anything under the brim at all.

  “Who…” Savy’s voice was uncertain. “Is that…?”

  Clay made a concerted effort to look where the eyes should have been, to stare back into that darkness and choke down his fear. “Get out of here.”

  “You’ve made your choice, Clay Harper. She, on the other hand”—the Hailmaker lifted an inhumanly long finger—“signed. She belongs to me.”

  “So you’re him,” Savy said, sounding brave—but also like someone had smashed her in the gut.

  The Hailmaker tipped his hat like a proper gentleman.

  And Clay told him, “You’re going to let her out of that contract.”

  “No,” Savy whispered.

  “You’re going to let her out—because then I’ll sign whatever you want.”

  “No, Clay!”

  The figure was quiet, as composed as ever, letting them have their little soap opera.

  “You sold out to save your family,” Clay said. “Now I’m going to save you.”

  “I could have said no to Priest. I had the will, but not the want. What I want is for my life to be different, Clay—even if I have to trade everything for it.” Savy shook her head. She seemed to be growing very pale. “I gave up too quickly. I failed you. I stole your songs.”

  “I don’t care about any of that. I’m not letting him take you away.”

  “He would only use me to ruin you. Then all I’d be is another succubus.”

  Clay reached out for her, pulled Savy to him. He was starting to feel desperate, like she was dangling over some infinite abyss, his strength to hold her running out. “You’re still here. You’re standing right here with me. Nothing’s over.”

  Savy swallowed. She was petrified; trying not to show it. “I’m sorry”—she turned to the figure in the shadows—“that I interfered. I love him and I couldn’t stay out of it.”

  “Yes. Love makes us weak, Savannah Marquez,” the Hailmaker told her, and now his voice skewed feminine: “But you’ll learn. I’ll show you how never to feel heartache again. Come. Band practice in the morning. A tour to follow. We must begin to heal the wounds this foolish boy has inflicted.”

  Savy took an obedient step in the figure’s direction.

  “I said, take me instead!”

  The unseen face tilted toward Clay. “I don’t want you anymore. Your curse is to live a long life in a ruined world that’s moving closer and closer to the end.”

  “Come into the light and talk.”

  The figure didn’t move.

  “No?” Clay spat. “Who the hell are you to demand anything genuine? You're a liar. You lied about my mother and you’re lying now. You’re no Master of Puppets—you’re a pervert with a sock! At fucking best!”

  Now the fig
ure did move. But only to beckon for Savy.

  “Come closer, you fucking coward. Fight fair!”

  Savannah turned slowly back toward Clay. “I’m sorry,” she was whispering. “I’m sorry.”

  “Sav, stop saying that, there’s always a—”

  Her fist came from nowhere to hammer his thigh. The nerves screamed up and down Clay’s leg. He grunted and she struck him again, harder, in the same place.

  Clay wobbled, took a knee in the grass. “You—dead-legged me?” he groaned, honestly surprised.

  “I’m so sorry.” She leaned down and kissed his forehead. Lips trembling. “But don’t chase me. I’ll only run faster.”

  Clay grabbed for her, but Savy moved out of reach. A choked sound escaped her as she sprinted for the dark of the orange grove, where the Hailmaker received her under one impossibly long arm.

  Clay watched them walk off together, Savy half-collapsed, as if drunk or overwhelmed, against the devilish form that was darker than the dark itself. And for a while, nothing existed to Clay but the pain; the deep ache in his leg that made its way to his chest, that ballooned there until he felt like he was going to fucking explode. He might have been slamming his fists into the ground because the pain was in his hands as well. And he was certainly screaming into the night, frightening the coyotes with his wordless howls.

  It was the fire that finally brought him out of it; that, and the idea that he had to get his father—who’d been there for him in the end—to a doctor. If he didn’t get moving, the fire was going to catch in the trees and carry, taking the house, and the neighborhood, with it.

  Clay fought to his feet and limped to the summer kitchen, where an extinguisher stood beside the grill. It took all the foam inside the canister, but Clay succeeded in dousing every last lick of flame. There was nothing left of the bodies that Boyle and Deidre had so recently inhabited, nothing but ashy bone and a new column of roiling smoke.

  And for a moment, Clay was tempted to step inside that column and breathe as deeply as he could, for as long as he could. Escape his torment with an endless slumber.

  Yet, despite his pain, despite his failure, Clay Harper did not want death. Not now. Probably not ever.

  What he wanted was a long life in this ruined world. A long life—with music.

  He stared up at the gray smoke as it spread across the night. Whispering: “And I never saw my love again…”

  EPILOGUE:

  CERTAIN SONGS

  Melody Press Magazine, November issue (cover story)

  A ROCK LEGEND IN THE MAKING

  by Lila Kendall

  At first glance he’s just another face in the New York crowd, someone you wouldn’t notice unless you were seeking him out. In less than an hour, though, Clay Harper will be on stage at Town Hall, in front of a sold-out crowd hanging on his every note and turn of phrase. Yet, at a pub less than two blocks from where his fans congregate, you wouldn’t know Harper has anywhere to go. “Right now I have this beer and Austin City Limits on TV and our conversation,” the singer/songwriter says, brushing his shoulder-length hair from his face. “The show’s going to be a blast, I’ll give the crowd everything I’ve got, but when it comes down to it, right now is all we have.”

  In the five years since the release of his debut album, Rise, Harper has accumulated a series of memorable moments, musical and otherwise. His ambient, emotionally wrought tracks have drawn praise from the hallowed likes of Springsteen and Dylan, he has toured with The Arcade Fire, Bright Eyes, The Blackheart Procession, and at last year’s South by Southwest Festival he managed to assemble a backing band that included no less than Dave Grohl, Kim Deal, and Tom Morello. What’s most impressive is that Harper has achieved this adoration about as single-handedly as any one man can. “When I set out, I started with a stool and an acoustic guitar,” Harper recalls. “I thought it would be fun to write ten songs and travel the country with them.” Living out of his Jeep, Harper ventured anywhere that would have him. “I played bars, galleries, libraries, laundromats, literal holes in the wall. One time I appeared in the bathroom at Carnegie Hall. That was fun. I jammed for twenty minutes before security kicked me out.”

  It wasn’t long before the music world took note. Harper became an internet and college radio sensation, the worst-kept secret on the indie music scene. “His songs reach out to you,” says John Maynard, a Melody critic who has attended Harper’s shows since his days with Farewell Ghost. “You can’t walk by a radio playing Clay Harper and not ask who he is.”

  Harper writes songs like poignant parables, about everyday people struggling with the world around them, people searching for redemption and peace of mind, clarity and love, people resisting the urge to surrender to acts of greed and violence and self-destruction. They are anthems that edify their listener in the way that great music always has. If the old industry adage is that “true talent only gets discovered every ten years,” Harper might have set everyone else back a decade.

  Record companies of all sizes have approached him at one time or another. But Harper declined all offers except one, at Throttle Up! Records, an upstart label created by a pair of musicians out of Lincoln, Nebraska. “I signed with those guys because they know more about music than anyone I’ve ever met. And they didn’t want to do anything with my career except release the songs I wrote.”

  Despite having complete control over his music and touring schedule, the one detail Harper has not been able to manage are the sizes of the venues he plays. After his first tramp around the country, he had fallen in love with the small club scene, places that a hundred people could fill to the busting point. That changed, however, one night in Philadelphia. “I was playing my old hometown, at this coffeehouse in a mini-mall,” Harper tells me. “The place filled up and some angry fans busted into the hardware place next door and used drills to make eye- and earholes for themselves.” Reluctantly Harper began to return booker calls from the Electric Factories and Paramount Theatres of the world. “More and more people were showing up to the party. It’s flattering. Popularity is a good problem to have.”

  Indeed, as anyone who has ever Googled Harper’s name will know, popularity was a problem he could have had a lot more of. Another of modern music’s worst-kept secrets is that Harper was a founding member of the hard-hitting Farewell Ghost who, as fate would have it, are playing the first of two sold-out shows tonight at Madison Square Garden. Many have speculated that Harper wrote most of the tracks off Ghost’s debut, a question he has long sidestepped.

  When asked if he regrets anything about those early days, Harper throws on a smile. “I think we all have regrets about how things played out. There are times when I wonder what twenty-thousand screaming fans sound like, but you know, several hundred strangers who love you isn’t exactly obscurity. I wouldn’t change where I’m at for anything.”

  Although Ghost singer/guitarist Savy Marquez has admitted that she and Harper were once in a relationship, and that it was a contributing factor to the dream quartet’s end, Harper himself remains mum, leaving the rest of us to ponder what their offspring might have looked—and sounded—like.

  Still, you can’t help but feel a certain chill when the subject is raised. Did a Harper-fronted Farewell Ghost really practice in the room where their idol Rocco Boyle died? Was that rehearsal space really burned to the ground by a disgruntled and—as of yet—unidentified fan? With so much rock history at stake, it has been impossible for Harper or Marquez to avoid their shared history.

  Clearly neither enjoys the scrutiny, but if they agree on anything it’s that some things are best left in the past. Don’t expect to find Savy Marquez standing at the back of a Clay Harper show, and Harper won’t be appearing on stage with Ghost any time soon.

  Yet, no matter the subject, Harper remains the same stoically calm individual he has been throughout his career, a man at peace with whatever his past might be, heading toward what promises to be a radiant future.

  Thirty minutes before show time
, he drains his pint, waits for The Raconteurs to finish their set on Austin City, then signals to his band, who are piled in a corner booth. Harper draws them into a tight huddle and offers a quarterback’s words of encouragement for the upcoming show. Among these veteran players, there is a palpable excitement about performing with a legend in the making. But it’s that word, legend, that Harper balks at. “Legends, gods, it’s the stuff of fairy tales,” he assures me with his gregarious smile. “I’m just a flesh-and-bone man playing songs about the world I live in.” He pauses on his way out of the pub, unable to resist: “If others want to listen in, I’m all for it.”

  ***

  ROCK STAR PLUMMETS TO DEATH,

  CAUSE UNKNOWN

  Associated Press

  PARIS—The body of rock singer Savy Marquez was found in the middle of Rue Mouffetard early Friday morning, having reportedly fallen from the roof of her six-story apartment building.

  Marquez, 27, the lead singer of the popular rock band Farewell Ghost, was in Paris convalescing from a throat infection that forced the band to reschedule the latter half of its European tour. Her apartment, not far from the Mouffetard Market, was the sight of an impromptu gathering of stunned fans seeking answers this morning. “It’s a terribly sad day,” said Camille Binoche, 18, close to where Marquez’s body was found. “She was in the prime of her life, a hero to every girl with a guitar. Now she’s gone, long before her time.”

  The singer joins Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Rocco Boyle, and scores of others on a list of rock icons who have died before reaching thirty. “We believe Ms. Marquez fell from her rooftop between three and five a.m. this morning,” said Jean Girard, an investigator for the Paris Police. The cause of her fall is under investigation.