Nine Volt Heart

by Annie Pearson

  “Too much testosterone for your dainty sensibilities?”

  It is clear in retrospect how I get myself into these situations, but I can never see it at the time.

  After Jason had entertained himself by making me uncomfortable, he turned serious again and began what would be a theme for the day: asking questions that either exposed a raw nerve or drove straight to my heart.

  “And Billie Holiday? Big Mama Thornton? Or Mabel Mercer? Which of them makes you weep, Susi?”

  I couldn’t answer. As he said Billie Holiday’s name, a ball of emotion choked up in my throat so that the most graceful sound I could make was a false “Hmm.” How could he understand? I spent hours listening, trying to understand where that sound came from, how she could live with that organ of feeling in her body. I have tried imitating her, may the forces of the universe save me from anyone ever knowing. I will never achieve what Billie Holiday did, and thinking about it plunges me into a personal abyss where I cannot confront my failures.

  “I can’t see you and Patsy Cline together,” he said. “Or Wanda Jackson. Oh, wait, Wanda is later than when you traveled to our own century.”

  “I know Patsy Cline’s music. However, I simply don’t understand the Slave-to-Romance theme.”

  He didn’t bother to hide that he was laughing at me.

  “All right, Susi. We will move closer to the time you came from in the last century. The Carter Family? Do you like a good mountain hymn?”

  “I appreciate their achievement, but I prefer the women from the Appalachian hills. Hazel Dickens and Alice Gerrard, Wilma Lee Cooper. Patsy Montana for cowboy music.”

  “Because you like pure natural religion?” He was teasing.

  “Just the pure and natural part.”

  Because I can sing it—though I couldn’t tell him that. That had been the most exciting discovery in the past winter, changing the entire color of my life. It was more than the intellectual excitement of plunging into my father’s old research that brought me to invent this musical curriculum.

  When we parked at the school, Jason stood in the parking lot, his hands jammed in his jeans pockets, staring up at the ivy-covered building.

  “Why did I let you walk me down memory lane?” he said.

  “The trustees are especially interested in your helping us, since you went to school here.”

  He laughed, as if in disbelief. When we entered, he held the door for me, wrinkling his nose in distaste.

  “I hate the smell of this place. It hasn’t changed in a dozen years. Creeps me out. Tell me, Susi, is old Hector Henderson still teaching here?”

  “Yes.”

  “He is such a character-disorder guy. It’s a wonder he’s allowed among children—even his own biological offspring. Still, I suppose everyone has their level. His is just below sea level.”

  “Don’t be mean.”

  “Me? I’m the nicest guy you will ever meet.”

  14 ~ “Frying Pan”

  SUSI

  “JASON DOESN’T NEED AN introduction,” Gwyneth Lukas said when we sat down for the meeting, after I had introduced him to the three trustees and Randolph. “Your reputation precedes you. As well as your record here at the school.”

  “I’m not as bad as I’m made out to be,” Jason said.

  Gwyneth laughed (I try not to let that fluty tone bother me, but it is difficult), and so Rafe Joseph and Talbot Sheldon chuckled too in their gentlemanly, business-like way. Randolph, however, had determined that a competition existed with Jason; guarded hostility was the highest response he offered throughout the day. Why do men sniff each other and growl? For Randolph’s part, I knew it was because of me, which made the situation faintly humorous. If there were a competition, Randolph would not be in the running.

  I have to render a confession which, even if no one reads this but me, remains difficult to reveal. After the first few skirmishes with the trustees, I let Jason save me, and I was glad of it. I have never had a man rescue me from anything in my life. (My dad’s help when I was recovering cannot be considered a rescue.)

  It was Gwyneth in her mink vest and limited-edition Italian jeans that my knight-errant saved me from. The other two trustees had supported the idea of the music institute when Angelia and I first presented it. The same men had treated me with kid-gloves when they interviewed me for the teaching position, each saying that he knew my history and—oh god—felt sorry for me. Gwyneth just didn’t get the idea of the Lost Troubadours Institute, or even the basic idea of music education.

  “I don’t understand what British and Scottish folk music has to do with—what do you call it? ‘Music Theory and Popular Song’?”

  Before I could begin, Jason used Copland’s Appalachian Spring to explain. He held her flighty attention with a beautiful interpretation of how old hymns and songs are used in that symphony. She stared into his eyes while he spoke, but she apparently understood when he segued into a discussion of a collaboration by Yo-Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer, and Mark O’Connor.

  She said, “My husband got me that CD for Christmas last year, because James Taylor is a favorite of mine.”

  I didn’t know what orchestra Mr. James Taylor plays with, but the name rang a bell for Gwyneth, and she nodded her head as Jason explained the heroic role the institute would play for music education.

  We performed the same give-and-take for every other sortie. I presented the idea, Gwyneth attacked, and then Jason neutralized her. By the time we began eating our catered box lunches while completing a line-by-line review of the grant application, Gwyneth had attached herself to Jason like a limpet on a rock. He used every opportunity to show his erudition. If she wasn’t impressed, I was. In spite of what I knew about his background, and his chosen profession, he had an encyclopedic knowledge of arts and music, and an uncanny ability to express ideas in a way that even Gwyneth could understand.

  For my next sin, as is obvious from how I write about it here, I was as bad as Randolph, though I hope that I didn’t physically manifest the scorn I felt for Gwyneth’s flirting with Jason. I forgive people their foibles. I look the other way and don’t even comment to myself. Still, I wanted to break her little finger.

  At the next stop on the road to hell, I enjoyed it when Jason pointed out a typo and a math error in Randolph’s pro forma.

  “Let’s just fix this as we go,” Jason said, taking his laptop out of his pack. “Who has the original file?”

  Randolph went to fetch the file from his own computer, hunched in hatred. Since it was only a typo, my inflated sense of triumph weighed in on the side of sin.

  Then right at the doors of Hades, when it was possible to feel the flickering flames of damnation, I stepped brazenly over the threshold.

  I gave Jason my lunch.

  There was just one vegetarian box lunch, which Randolph had ordered for me. I gave it to Jason, so he had roasted peppers and hummus on Tuscan bread. I tossed out the ham from another box to create a Swiss-and-lettuce sandwich. Even though I was too keyed up over the grant to swallow even half a sandwich, the symbolism would be obvious to the most casual observer: If this were a relationship (which, of course, it isn’t), we had gotten off to the worst of starts, with me playing subservient wench delivering laundry, lunch, and self-sacrifice. All human feeling revolts at the thought.

  Whatever my sins and weaknesses, we won the day, if not wholly on the strength of the institute’s grand ideals, then on the basis of Jason’s easy erudition and great business management. The trustees conferred, and Gwyneth announced that they were granting us the boon we needed: use of school facilities for the summer as an in-kind contribution to the institute’s total costs. Having pronounced this as if it were her personal gift to the arts, Gwyneth rose, claiming an appointment, though we had worked through the entire business agenda two hours faster than we planned. “Will we see the two of you for luncheon tomorrow?”

  “Yes,” I said, though watching Jason, I could see him blanch.

  He said, �
�We will be there with bells on.”

  With Gwyneth departing, everyone else rose, even Randolph, who (I’m guessing) would have preferred to stay behind and stab Jason to death with his gold Cross pen.

  Randolph said, “So will I see you tonight, Susanna?”

  Staring at the computer screen, Jason didn’t look up, his nostrils flaring.

  I said, “It will just be me. Jason has other plans. Please tell your grandparents that I’m looking forward to joining you.”

  “I have changed my plans,” Jason said. “I will be joining you, too, if the invitation is still open.”

  The invitation had occurred before Jason flew in from London, and Randolph would have loved to snatch it back, but he avowed that he looked forward to the evening.

  Once everyone had left, Jason said, “Susi, you can’t put your fate in that woman’s hands. Where the hell are we going tonight with your friend Randolph?”

  “You don’t have to come. He invited us to a concert with his grandparents. They are wealthy as Croesus and need one last social exchange to convince them to support the institute. That is the rest of my work for the weekend, to reel in the last of the donors for the grant’s matching money.”

  “You aren’t going alone. I committed to this, and I’m coming along.”

  “That’s kind of you.”

  “It isn’t kindness. You sold me on the idea, and I’m going to do what you ask, to make sure the business is handled correctly. Look here, on the page that lists the faculty. You can’t use this guy, Susi.”

  “They say he is well known on the West Coast. He did a seminar for the students one day on the influence of Mississippi blues on British pop. They loved it.”

  “He’s a drunk. You don’t want to risk wasting your time with him. And kids don’t need to be around that.”

  “How do you know?”

  “You asked me to give you my professional expertise, and that’s part of it. I won’t tell stories on the guy, but you don’t want him.”

  “Who can I get to replace him this late? He’s one of the most famous names I had to show on the grant request.”

  “Me, since I’m not going anywhere this summer. How much time will it take?”

  “Four hours a day, but—”

  “Schedule me in the morning, so I can balance it against other work.”

  “You are insane. You’re going to neglect your work to teach music?” After hearing his erudition at the meeting, I couldn’t argue that he wasn’t as good as a trained professional.

  “I’m not leaving my other work. I just want to stretch, to do more.”

  “However, I think I should use the name I have for the grant and make changes later.”

  He popped the disk out of his computer and handed it to me.

  “Let’s get out of here, Susi, before I have a flashback and you are forced to place me in a mental institution. I was allergic to this place years ago, and meeting these people didn’t help at all. This place gives me hives.”

  “Let me put these papers away in the office.”

  “Fine. I have to make phone calls.”

  The cell phone is his only noticeable vice.

  I suppose he can’t help the testosterone part.

  15 ~ “Devil in Disguise”

  JASON

  “IAN, I’LL BE LATE TONIGHT. I’m going out to hear music.”

  “She called here, man.”

  “Who?”

  “Your witch of an ex-wife. She’s going to be in the studio with us, isn’t she? You promised—”

  “No, she’s not. What did she want?”

  “She wanted you, jerk-face,” Ian said, “I didn’t get into a discourse with her. She wants to come by and see you tonight.”

  “I won’t be there.”

  “Neither will I. Jason, life is too short to spend time breathing air with Dominique. I’m headed out to catch a band at the Showbox.”

  “Then I guess I’ll see you in the morning.”

  When I tapped the End button, the phone rang almost immediately, so I figured it was Ian calling back. Which makes two bad guesses that day about Ian calling me.

  “Hello, Jason. Ephraim said you were in town. We need to talk, honey.”

  “No, we don’t, Dominique. Talk to Karl.”

  “I saw your song list for the new album. Those are songs you rejected for the last album.”

  “I rejected them because they were too mainstream, but that’s what you want, Dominique.”

  “You want to ruin this album just to spite me.”

  “The irony in that statement sends me reeling. We’ll be in the studio on Monday and playing music. As you know, no one in my band is capable of doing less than his best work.”

  “These songs aren’t appropriate for me.” Her voice hurt my ears.

  “Perhaps you’ll have to practice. The sole freedom I retained in that recording contract you talked me into is that I choose the music. Perhaps if you bothered to spend time rehearsing, you could sing those songs.”

  “You’re being mean, Jason.”

  “Me? How can you accuse me, Dominique? I do not deserve even half of what you did. You damaged friendships that I cherish. You lied to the police, and you never helped stop those lies about me on the Internet.”

  “You hurt me awfully.”

  “Telling you the truth isn’t the same as wife-beating. Why won’t you answer a straight question in interviews? Do you know what this has done to me?”

  “You got your own meanness back.”

  “OK, whatever it is you think I did to you, I got my own back. Doubled. Now tell the truth. I didn’t hit you or otherwise abuse you. And I didn’t steal songs from you.”

  “Honey, you know I wrote ‘Rhianna’s Song’ with you. ‘How can a mother bear to witness the death of her dreams’—that was my line.”

  “You read it in the paper, which is not like writing a song together.”

  “We will just have to agree to disagree about that, Jason. Listen, I’m doing a benefit tomorrow for a homeless shelter. Ephraim says you should sit in with me. Ephraim says we would get good press if we perform together in public. It didn’t do you any harm to come to the Grammys.”

  “Actually, it gave me a nearly fatal pain in the ass. Don’t call me, Dominique. Talk to Karl.”

  16 ~ “Something About What Happens When We Talk”

  SUSI

  THE NEXT SIN I must record in this journal, as a prelude to describing my wicked spring-vacation beach fling: when we stopped at my house so that I could change before we took a walk, I gave Jason my brother’s sweatshirt, which was again just a kindness, since he had nothing but that repellent Yankees ball cap and the thin leather jacket he wore on the flight from London to Seattle.

  Except, in addition to that act of consideration, I also made sure that Jason understood it was my brother’s sweatshirt, so he wouldn’t think a man left clothes at my house.

  We went north of the Ship Canal to walk at Golden Gardens on Puget Sound, where golden oaks sprawl up the steep hillside. There’s a sandy beach for shell hunting, a volleyball court where narcissists can show off their tattoos and muscles, a long strand for walking out along the Sound, and a circular drive for cars to cruise in summer.

  As we began walking toward the beach, Jason remained silent for many yards, as he had on the drive over. Then he seemed to rouse himself and moved over to walk close by me just at the moment when we had the divine luck to be in the culvert under the railroad tracks as a train passed overhead, making my bones vibrate from the rumble of steel wheels on the track. It made me smile with joy, first remembering all the times I had come here with my brother and father, and then I smiled just because Jason was grinning. He held my hand against his chest while he matched the tone of the train with his voice, so I couldn’t distinguish the train from the vibrating tone under my hand.

  As the train grumbled away, we jumped through the broken glass and puddles to ramble down to the beach. As we hit the s
oft sand, he stumbled into me, putting his arm lightly around my shoulders to steady himself.

  He glanced sideways at me as we walked.

  “‘Who are you really and what were you before, and what did you do and what did you think?’ Casablanca is from your era, isn’t it, Susi? Or did you travel here from before the Second World War?”

  “‘We said no questions.’”

  “No fair, Susi. We’ve already known each other for seventeen hours. By now I should get a free pass to ask questions, and you should entrust me with honest answers.”

  “I was married to the second trombone in the village band.”

  “And his name was Nanki Poo? The son of our Mikado?”

  “No, Logan Childs. The son of a druggist.”

  “You will get uptight if I make jokes about his name, won’t you?”

  “Hmm. I don’t usually laugh when I think about him.”

  “He’s a fool and a sinner, and there is nothing you should blame yourself for, Susi.”

  “How can you say that? Did she tell you—”

  “I’m just making logical deductions. He is not with you now, and that proves he’s a fool for letting you get away. Clearly he’s a sinner, for he appears to have hurt you.”

  He touched my face, the problem side, and I had to draw away.

  “Your turn,” I said. “Same questions and honest answers required.”

  “You know the story too well.”

  “Tell it from your point of view.”

  “My friend Toby says I married the Wicked Witch of the West. But I just married a woman who wanted me to be someone else. She went where she wanted to go, leaving me to find where I should go next. I stayed married to the wrong person too long, because I thought that you’re supposed to stay married, no matter what.”

  “Most people don’t think that anymore.”

  “It’s one of the rules carved on the millstone I tied around my neck, daring myself to be a better man than my father. How about you, Susi? How long did that fool hang on before he lost you?”