“Ha-ha. He goes to shows all the time for business. You told me he goes out at least one night a week.”
“Right.” She took a sip of beer. “For business. Not to see Dawson’s Geek.”
“Dawson’s Freak,” Petra corrected.
“I know, Petra,” Emma groaned.
“He said he wanted to hear a demo,” I pointed out. “If he wants to hear a demo, wouldn’t he want to see us live?”
“I told you, he was drunk when he said that.”
“He only had nine martinis, right? How drunk are you right now?”
“Ha! Let me explain something to you, Hen. My dad’s clients play at Giants Stadium. Not the Bimbo Lounge.”
“Nada Surf plays at Giants Stadium?” I asked. “Where? In the men’s room?”
“Okay, look,” Emma said. “You want to know the truth? Even if my dad did come and see you play, he wouldn’t remember it.”
“What do you mean? Why not?”
“He drinks too much, Hen! There’s no way he’d come to see you play unless he was loaded. Not to mention the fact that he hates rap rock. He wouldn’t get the irony. He’s going to see Journey because he genuinely enjoys their music.”
“Well, maybe he’d enjoy ours,” I said angrily.
She shrugged. “Whatever.”
Petra didn’t look so happy anymore. “What do you think we should put on the flyers?” she asked me.
“And that’s another thing,” Emma said. “If I were you guys, I wouldn’t waste money making flyers.”
“Waste money?” Petra repeated.
Emma nodded. “That’s right. Flyers don’t work.”
“I found a job because of a flyer,” I pointed out.
“And look how wonderful it is. Look, the best way to promote a gig is to tell all your friends. But no offense, Hen, you don’t have any friends besides the people in this room. You’re looking at your audience. And two of them are already in the band.”
“How many friends do you have, Emma?” I snapped.
She rolled her eyes. “I don’t want to be a famous rock star, Hen. Come on, do you really think that people are gonna want to shell out eight bucks or whatever it is to see your band play at some dump? On a Wednesday?”
I frowned. Lots of people had seen PETRA the one time we’d performed at school. Then again, attendance at the assembly we’d played had been mandatory. There hadn’t been a cover charge, either.
“I’m sorry,” Emma said. “Look, I don’t want to be a Negative Nelly, I swear. And I would have tried to get people at work to come, but I don’t think homeless people make enough money to go out on weeknights. I know volunteers don’t.”
Petra scowled. “Emma, why are you so catty around me? Can’t you say one nice thing for once? Like, ‘Hey, guys, way to go. I think it’s great you got a gig.’”
Emma laughed and looked at me again. “Because if I said that, I wouldn’t be fulfilling my god-given role as the only realist in this strange little posse.”
I knew she was expecting me to laugh, too. But I didn’t give her the satisfaction. I didn’t even smile, and I was proud of myself. It meant that I had grown up a little this summer. Emma might have morphed into a surly, intolerable booze-hound, but she could no longer cajole me into having fun at my own expense.
“You know, I was thinking about something,” Bartholomew Savage said. “We should just make our demo off the sound board at the show. Victor said they have a really good system there. My dad got me ACID Pro, and I…”
“Donovan Wood never made it to that first gig,” Jim Forbes said.
Thankfully, the comment drowned out Bartholomew Savage’s rambling monologue. Once he started talking about computers, he wouldn’t shut up. Blah, blah, blah. He never understood that the average layman has no interest in sequencing and layering…it was all technical mumbo jumbo. On the other hand, I had complete faith in his abilities. If he claimed he could produce a first-rate demo, then he would. He’d opted to take elective computer courses at Spencer, the way normal people at Franklin opted to take fun elective courses like Knitting, or the Literature and Films of Woody Allen.
“When their lawyer listened to the recording from the show, there was no turning back,” Jim Forbes went on. “Donovan Wood knew a sure bet when he heard one. Dawson’s Freak had captured a sound like no other, at the right time, in the right place—”
“Beer tasting is a good idea!” Bartholomew Savage exclaimed.
I glanced around the room.
“It makes sense, right?” Emma said. “I mean, just as many people drink beer as they do wine. Beer deserves the same snootiness.”
Everyone was smiling. Apparently, Bartholomew Savage wasn’t talking about computers anymore. I didn’t know what he was talking about. This kind of thing had happened a few times before in the last few days. I’d zone out with Jim Forbes for a minute or two—and before I knew it, the tension would be gone and Emma and Petra and Bartholomew Savage would be sharing a new inside joke that I’d completely missed. I tried to smile along, but I felt as if I had tuned into a zany new reality show whose premise I didn’t understand. The fresh, fuzzy glow of the evening was beyond my reach. And I couldn’t ask them to repeat what they had said or I’d look like a moron. I wondered if this was what Gabriel had felt around Rich and Madeline and Tony.
“You’d have to use the same language as a wine tasting,” Petra said. “You’d have to describe the beer the way you’d describe a person. You know?”
“It’s an aggressive beer,” Emma suggested, “but coquettish at the same time.”
“Yes,” Bartholomew Savage agreed. “It skips the foreplay and goes straight for the intercourse.”
“Right, right,” Emma said. She sat up straight, eyeing her bagged bottle thoughtfully. “Drinking this beer is like making love to a butch lesbian in prison.”
The three of them laughed together. “Haw, haw, haw. Hee, hee, hee.”
I tried to smile. It didn’t really work. Nice. I was a loser and outsider in my own home. No big deal, though. I was still excited about the gig. Like Emma had said, I was “up.” Or I could pretend to be. Dawson’s Freak had begun its rocket ride to the top. We would blow everyone’s minds Wednesday night—and then Emma and Petra would forget all about beer tasting or prison sex or whatever it was their new girl club plus one was talking about. They’d only remember I was the glue that bound our strange little posse together.
The morning of the gig, Gabriel offered me these ridiculous words of advice: “When you’re onstage tonight, don’t look out at the audience until halfway through your second song. Then make eye contact with Emma.”
I was sitting on the edge of his futon, plucking out the “Oedipus Wrecks” riff for the nine hundredth time. He was nodding his head in rhythm, sipping a Bloody Mary.
“And why on earth would I do that?” I asked.
“Because that’s how long it generally takes for the wall of make-believe to go up. Once it’s up, you can see the truth.”
I glanced up at him. “Did you start drinking before I got here?”
He laughed and scratched his belly through his flimsy T-shirt. “Every gig you play has a wall of make-believe,” he stated. “It goes up when you’re pretty well into it. It’s that magical point when the people you’re performing for, your closest friends, actually buy into the role you’re all playing. You’re the professional musician, putting on a show. They’re the audience members, digging it. At that moment, you are a rock star.”
My fingers began to ache. I stopped playing. “Do you think maybe you could talk to me the way normal people talk for once?” I asked tiredly. “You know, instead of like some cult leader or infomercial scam artist?”
He upended the glass and drained it, then plunked it on top of the amp, where it teetered dangerously for a few seconds before wobbling to a standstill. “You sound a lot like Sarah sometimes,” he said with a sigh.
Ugh. Reminding him of my sister was definitely not te
rritory I wanted to explore. “Hey, speaking of Sarah, do you have any idea when she’ll be back?” I asked flatly.
He flashed me his usual, half-apologetic, half–Cheshire Cat grin. There were bits of tomato juice stuck in his teeth. “Soon, I hope. This wasn’t part of the plan. We were supposed to figure this part out together.”
“Oh, yeah? Go on. I’m listening.”
“Aren’t you more interested in learning how the wall of make-believe allows you to see the truth?” he asked. “It’ll be important for tonight.”
I blinked at him several times, my jaw clenched.
“I guess not,” he said. “Well, I’ll tell you, anyway. That’s the kind of bass teacher I am. See, there will be a moment tonight where Emma will feel safe enough to show you how she really feels. You onstage, her in the audience…Just watch her body language. That’s when you’ll know. If you wait until the middle of the second song, then look up, smile, and make eye contact—”
“I’m a lot more interested in talking about Sarah,” I interrupted.
“We are, in a way. Just let me finish.” He grabbed his glass and plodded into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. As always, my eyes guiltily darted toward the pile of manuscripts. It was a reflex I should really learn to quash. I’d make a terrible criminal. I was a terrible criminal. “The moment I’m describing…I had it with Sarah at the last gig Friends ever played,” he said. I could hear him refilling his drink, the quiet chug-chug-chug of a big bottle of vodka. “We never talked about it. But I still know.”
“Know what?” I demanded.
“That we were more than just friends, and we always would be.”
I tossed the bass onto the mattress. “So let me get this straight. If I look at Emma in the middle of the second song at the gig tonight, and make eye contact with her, I’ll know she really is the cheese to my macaroni.”
“Yes! You’re catching on.”
My shoulders sagged. I was too fed up to be annoyed anymore. “Fine. But let’s make a bet, all right? If I do everything you say, and there’s no magic moment between Emma and me, then tomorrow, you have to tell me why you and Sarah ran away and came back. Okay?”
He poked his head around the corner. His rheumy eyes twinkled. “I’m sorry, Hen. I’m not the gambling sort. I deal in absolutes.”
“Jesus, Gabriel.”
“All right, I’ll tell you this. If you want to understand why Sarah and I came back, read No Exit by Jean-Paul Sartre. Then you’ll know.”
No Exit, I thought to myself, suppressing a puzzled grin. Coincidentally enough, I had read it—for Intro to Philosophy last year. “Isn’t that about a bunch of dead people trapped in hell?” I asked him.
He smiled sadly. “Exactly, Hen. That’s exactly what it is. And I think that ends our bass lesson for today.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Underage Talent Night
Emma was right: The Bimbo Lounge was a dump.
When I first walked through the door, I honestly thought that I had made some kind of mistake—that the club had moved from its original location, or that they were renovating…or something. This couldn’t be the place, the famous underground spot where David Bowie had played an impromptu acoustic set. It was smaller than my living room. The floor was strewn with cigarette butts—odd, as smoking in bars is illegal in New York. The bar against the right-hand wall was only about ten feet long.
“Hello?” I called.
Nobody answered. I shivered—partly from nervousness, and partly because it was so cold. The air-conditioning was cranked. It felt like a walk-in freezer. I shifted my bass case from one hand to the other and peered toward the tiny stage in back. Bartholomew Savage had promised me that I wouldn’t need to bring my awesome bass rig. He and Petra were still outside, unloading our equipment from a cab. But all I could see were two monitors, two mic stands, and a tangled web of wires. There were no amplifiers. Where would I plug in? Would I have to rush back home to get my rig? Even if I did, I couldn’t see where I would put it. The stage didn’t look big enough for a drum kit, let alone anything else…
“Oi!” a voice barked.
I jumped. A punk rocker poked his head out of the small sound booth next to the door. He looked and sounded exactly like Sid Vicious from the Sex Pistols. The resemblance was shocking. He had the same ghoulish complexion and spiky hair; he even had the same chain-and-padlock necklace.
“Nobody’s allowed in till eight,” he growled.
“But I’m playing tonight,” I answered meekly. I waved my bass case, as if to prove it.
“You Spacetime Logic?”
I blinked.
“What band?” he snapped.
“Dawson’s Freak,” I said.
He laughed. “Right. Victor’s little brother’s band.” Something in his tone suggested that the Bimbo Lounge might as well have booked a sock puppet show to fill the eight o’clock slot. He disappeared down a hidden stairwell. It was strange; my life was inexplicably top-heavy with British assholes: this guy, Mrs. Abrahmson…
The door opened. Bartholomew shambled past me with his kick drum case and dumped it onstage. I felt better with him around. He was practically family at this place. His presence lent mine credibility. And in the red light, he really looked amazing. He’d spiked his hair. He was wearing leather pants. Bartholomew Savage was the only kid I knew who could wear leather pants and still be taken seriously by girls. I probably should have tried to dress up a little more. I was wearing a pair of old brown cords and a black T-shirt: the same outfit I had been wearing all day. I looked like a geek and smelled like an old English bulldog.
“Did you meet Sid?” Bartholomew Savage asked.
My eyes narrowed. “The sound guy?”
He nodded, then tiptoed over and leaned close to me. “His accent is fake,” he whispered. “He’s really from Great Neck. His name is Isaac Mendel. But he’s got mad skills. He worked on an Elefant record.”
Wonderful. Yet another lunatic in our midst. A lunatic responsible for engineering our demo, no less. But at least he had “mad skills.” I put down my bass and followed Bartholomew Savage back onto the street. The evening sun seemed much hotter. Petra scrambled to gather her guitar and amplifier and effects pedals, but she could hardly manage. I stacked the last of the drum cases. All of us began to sweat.
“Hey…uh, can I ask you guys something?” I said. “Is there a bass rig in there somewhere?”
Bartholomew Savage shook his head. “The bass always goes direct at Bimbo.”
Now I was scared. I’d never gone direct before: straight through a sound board, without any intermediary amplification. It didn’t seem right, somehow. A big electric bass needed a big bass amp.
“You sure that’ll work?” I asked, trailing him back inside.
“Yeah, yeah,” he mumbled. I couldn’t tell if he was trying to shut me up, or if he really knew what he was talking about. Despite the fact that Bartholomew Savage was two years younger than me, I always felt like a little boy around him. At fourteen, he’d already nailed the mature swagger of someone always on top of his game—a swagger I was certain would elude me until we were all rock stars (which we would be, soon enough).
Sid started setting up the mic stands. Petra and Bartholomew Savage joined him onstage. They had their own equipment to prepare. But I didn’t. All I had was my bass. I dropped off the drum cases and stood in the middle of the room, eyeing Petra. She’d dressed up for the gig, too. The ensemble was sort of painful: an oversized flannel shirt over a black cocktail dress, complete with a black wool cap, just like Emma had foretold. Was it a costume? Was it ironic? I couldn’t even tell anymore.
“’Ow many mics ya need, Bart?” Sid asked.
“Just one,” I said.
“I was talking to Bart,” Sid said.
Nobody spoke after that. As far as I could tell, the other three were pretending to be extra busy so that I would feel useless—connecting cables, tightening screws, mounting drum microphones. I
cast a longing gaze toward the exit.
“You wankers expecting a good crowd?” Sid asked. He carried one of the mic stands offstage.
Bartholomew Savage looked at me. Evidently, Sid wasn’t directing questions at him anymore. “Pretty good,” I piped up. I was lying.
“We set up a Facebook page,” Petra said. “We have two hundred eighty friends.”
Sid seemed unimpressed. “You gotta draw at least fifty real people if you wanna get booked here again. Did you make flyers?”
Petra and I exchanged a quick glance. I knew what she was thinking: If only Emma hadn’t opened her mouth… After her little Monday night rant, we’d felt too self-conscious to do anything other than update the news feed and pray for people to show.
“Army of the Night didn’t make flyers either,” Sid said. “Ever hear of them?”
Petra and I shook our heads.
“Of course you didn’t, wankers. ’Cause they didn’t make flyers. But, hey, it ain’t my fault if you don’t get another gig.” Sid headed toward the sound booth. “There’s a direct box on the floor,” he muttered to me. “Plug in there.”
“Hey, what’s the drinking policy?” I asked quickly. “Do bands drink for free?”
He sneered. “One soda, one Bud, or one Bud Light on tap. You pay for the rest. But that’s a moot point, mate. You’re underage and the bartender ain’t here. Now get onstage. You want a sound check or not?”
I swallowed. No beverages, no bass rig…the night was already falling apart, and it hadn’t even started. It was a very good thing that Emma’s dad didn’t know about this show. We could treat it as another rehearsal, preparing for the real deal: the big gig when we changed Donovan Wood’s life. The Bimbo Lounge was too small for us, anyway.
I took out my bass and slung it over my shoulder, then jumped onstage and plugged it into the tiny little black box on the floor. The instrument’s neck swung like a wrecking-ball crane, slamming into the hi-hat stand. Bartholomew Savage glared at me. “Oops,” I murmured. I grinned sheepishly and stood up straight. I had about six inches in either direction. If I moved too far to the left, I would bump into one of the crash cymbals. Too far to the right, I would fall off the stage.
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