by Jude Hardin
We checked in at the Beverly Hills Hotel. It was a fancy place, everything plush and expensive. My room had a king-size bed and a desk and a leather couch. There was a flat-screen television and a Jacuzzi and a large balcony with chairs and a table and a big umbrella.
“This is nice,” I said.
“I’ll be next door,” Brother John said. “The rooms open to a suite if you want to visit.”
“OK.”
I didn’t want to visit. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had any privacy, and I wanted to relish every minute of it.
“You ready to go get some lunch?” he said.
“I was thinking about just calling room service and hanging out here.”
“Suit yourself. I’ll see you later this afternoon, then.”
“I need my shot,” I said.
He left for a few minutes, and came back with the syringe and pushed the medicine into my PICC.
“We’ll leave about five thirty to go back to the studio,” he said.
“OK.”
I called room service and ordered a turkey bacon club and French fries and a bottle of Perrier. I watched Bonanza on TV while I ate. Amazing the trouble those guys could get in and out of in the span of an hour. After lunch I climbed into the bathtub and ran the jets for a while and then just soaked and relaxed. The bars of soap were larger than you get at most places. They were embossed with The Beverly Hills Hotel logo and smelled like cinnamon. The wrapper said they were made from goat’s milk and olive oil. It was damn good soap. It made my skin feel silky smooth.
I watched some more television after my bath and fell asleep on the couch. I woke up to an infomercial about a revolutionary new herbal supplement that would transform you from a fat and stupid lazy sloth into a rich, sexy supermodel practically overnight. All that for only three easy payments of $39.99. Lifelong happiness for a hundred and twenty bucks. It seemed like a bargain to me.
I picked my Rolex up off the coffee table. Five fifteen. Almost time to go. As I went to put the watch on my wrist, something caught my eye. There was an inscription engraved on the back plate. It was barely visible. I had to squint to make it out.
It said To Pete. All my love, Denise.
At five thirty someone knocked on my door. I answered. It was Brother John.
“Why aren’t you ready?” he said.
I was still wearing the BHH terry cloth bathrobe I’d found in the closet.
“Who’s Pete?” I said.
“Who?”
“And Denise. Who are they?”
The names sounded familiar, but I couldn’t for the life of me visualize the people they belonged to. It was frustrating, like having a word on the tip of your tongue and not being able to come up with it.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Brother John said.
I handed him the watch. “Look at the back plate. Look really close.”
He looked really close. “To Pete. All my love, Denise. Is that what you’re talking about?”
“Yeah. Who are they?”
“Well, I’m afraid I’m busted,” he said. “You see, the watch wasn’t new. I bought it at a pawnshop.”
“But those names sound really familiar to me. Like…déjà vu or something.”
“I don’t know what to tell you. Anyway, we need to get going.”
“I’ll be ready in five minutes,” I said.
“Meet me in the lobby.”
I opened a suitcase and chose a pair of black jeans and a white Tommy Bahama button-down. I put those on and a pair of loafers and walked to the lobby. I left the hard case behind and carried the Strat in a black vinyl gig bag.
I followed Brother John to a Mercedes convertible in the parking lot.
“Where’d this come from?” I said.
“You didn’t think we were going to ride around in that van the whole time, did you? This is a rental. Pretty nice, don’t you think?”
“Bitchin’,” I said.
We took Sunset to Vine and turned into a twenty-four-hour lot across the street from the Capitol tower. Brother John handed the attendant a voucher. The barrier arm rose and we drove through and found a spot. We walked across the street, went inside, and took the elevator to the eighth floor. When we stepped out there was an overhead sign that said QUIET—RECORDING AREA—OBSERVE RECORDING LIGHTS.
We were quiet.
We walked down a hallway with more gold records on the walls and more pictures of bands and solo artists. The RECORDING light over the doorway to studio B wasn’t on, so we walked on in. Bob Watson was sitting on a sofa talking to a guy with long, black, curly hair. The guy wore a black Led Zeppelin T-shirt and black leather gloves. He had tattoos on both arms and about a million bangles on his wrists and a medallion with a serpent on it around his neck. Apparently, he was finished talking with Bob Watson. He got up and punched some numbers into a cell phone and stalked toward the door. He seemed to be in a hurry. He passed by Brother John and me without acknowledging our presence.
“Hey, guys,” Bob said.
“Was that one of the guys in Testimony?” I said.
Bob laughed. “That’s a good one, Maddog. So how you feeling? You ready to lay some tracks?”
I didn’t get the joke.
“I’m ready,” I said. “But really, where’s the rest of the band?”
“You’ll get to meet them tomorrow. In the meantime, I got some solid drum tracks down this afternoon, so we can go ahead and lay some guitar on top of those.”
“OK.”
My Marshall stack was set up in the main room. There was a Steinway grand and a bunch of microphones on stands off to one side. Wood paneling, vaulted ceiling, recessed lights. You could have heard a pin drop in there.
“I’m going to be in the control room with Brother John and the engineer,” Bob said. “Go ahead and get set up and get tuned and everything, and then just put those cans on when you’re ready.”
He gestured toward a set of headphones on the stool by my amp.
“OK,” I said.
I tuned my guitar and plugged everything in. There was a cable connected from the Marshall head to a direct box in the wall, and there was a microphone positioned to pick up ambient sound from the speaker cabinets. I put the headphones on and sat on the stool.
“Can you hear me, Maddog?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Roger Henley. I’m the engineer on the record. Tonight I want to get some rhythm guitar tracks for all ten songs. These are just dummy tracks for the vocals, so they don’t have to be perfect.”
“Where do you want to start?”
“Let’s try ‘Need to Know’ first. You’re going to hear four clicks, and then the drums will come in. Ready?”
“Go for it,” I said.
I heard four clicks and then started playing chords along with the drums. It was easy. I knew all the songs by heart, and I didn’t make any mistakes. We went through all the songs that I’d learned the same way. It was a little after ten when we finished the last song.
Bob Watson and Brother John and Roger Henley walked from the control room into the main room while I was stowing my gear. Bob introduced me to Roger and we shook hands.
“Anybody want to go over to Dillon’s for a beer?” Bob said.
“I need to get going,” Roger said. “But nice to meet you, Maddog. You did a great job, man.”
“My pleasure,” I said.
Roger left the studio.
“I’m a little tired myself,” Brother John said. “I think Maddog and I should go on back and get a good night’s sleep. We have another full day tomorrow.”
“I wouldn’t mind going for a beer,” I said.
Bob said he would give me a ride back to the hotel. Brother John didn’t seem very happy about it, but he finally said that would be OK. We took the elevator to the first floor and exited the building and parted ways across the street. Brother John headed toward his Mercedes in the parking lot, and Bob Watson and I walked over to D
illon’s Irish Pub and Grill.
There wasn’t much of a crowd, but I reminded myself it was Tuesday and there naturally wouldn’t be. The place was fairly big as far as pubs go, with booths and sitting areas and a regulation-size pool table. Wood and leather everywhere. There were maybe twenty stools around the horseshoe-shaped bar, and on one of them sat Ericka, the receptionist who had winked at me earlier. She was alone. I followed Bob to the bar. He took the stool next to Ericka, and I took the one next to him.
“Hi, guys,” Ericka said.
“Hi, beautiful,” Bob said. “Have you met my friend, Alexander Maddox?”
“I don’t think we were ever introduced,” she said.
I stood and offered my hand. “My friends call me Maddog. Or just Dog.”
She giggled. “Maddog? Really? You don’t look like a Maddog. But I guess everyone has to have a crazy nickname these days. Like what’s-his-name who came in for a mastering session this afternoon.”
“Slash,” Bob said.
“Yeah, him. So why not just Alexander? It’s a very nice name.”
“You can call me Alexander if you want to,” I said.
The young lady behind the bar wore a plaid skirt and a white knit shirt with the pub’s logo over her left breast. She had olive skin and dark eyes and long, silky, black hair. She was very beautiful, maybe even more beautiful than Ericka. She came over and asked us what we wanted to drink.
“What do you have on draft?” Bob said.
She put her hands on her hips and stared at him. It was a joke. There were more brands on tap than I’d ever seen in one place. I counted thirty, and there were more on the other side of the bar.
Bob laughed. “Come on, Susan. I’ll give you a hundred bucks if you can name every one of them without looking.”
“Budweiser, Killian’s, Newcastle, Stella Artois, Peroni…”
She kept going until she had named every one. Bob took a wad of cash out of his pocket and peeled off a hundred-dollar bill.
“Impressive,” he said. “Here you go. You earned it.”
She took the bill and stuffed it into a pocket on the inside of her skirt. “So what’ll it be?”
“The usual,” Bob said. “You can chuck the rest of that shit in the river.”
Susan looked at me. I didn’t know what the usual was, but I told her to make it two. She brought the beers and Bob paid for them. She took the money and said thank you and turned her attention to a couple on the other side of the bar.
Bob asked Ericka what she was doing out by herself on a Tuesday.
“My roommate’s parents are in town this week,” she said. “They’re staying at the house, and I just figured I would make myself as scarce as possible. Her mom can be a pain in the ass.”
We sipped our beers. Ericka was drinking something clear on ice with a lime in it.
Bob’s cell phone trilled. He answered, and his expression turned sour when he listened to what the other party had to say. He disconnected and put the phone back in his pocket.
“I have to go,” he said. “Sorry, Dog. I’ll drop you at the hotel.”
I didn’t want to go. I wanted to talk with Ericka some more.
“I’ll give him a ride,” Ericka said.
“You sure?”
“I’m sure.”
Bob looked at me.
“I would like to finish my beer,” I said.
Bob said he would see me back in Studio B around ten in the morning and I said OK. He left the pub with a worried look on his face.
“So you have a place we can go?” Ericka said.
“A place we can go?”
She looked at the ice in her drink. “I’m not usually this forward.”
“I’m staying at the Beverly Hills Hotel,” I said.
“So you still want to finish that beer?”
“Maybe we could just grab a six-pack on the way.”
We grabbed a six-pack on the way. We started kissing and tearing each other’s clothes off as soon as we got in the room. We fell on the bed together and went at it for a long time and when we were finished, we lay there in a tight embrace while the ceiling fan hummed overhead.
“You want a beer?” I said.
“Yes. That sounds wonderful.”
I got up and took two cans out of the mini refrigerator, opened them, and brought them to bed. We propped some pillows against the headboard and sat there sipping the cold beers. We didn’t say anything for a few minutes. I felt what I had done was very wrong, but I didn’t know why.
“So tell me all about Alexander Maddox,” Ericka said.
“What do you mean?”
“You know, where you grew up, where you went to school, what kinds of bands you’ve been in, how many times you’ve been married, all that good stuff. Let’s start with that tattoo on your arm. Where did you get that?”
“I don’t know.”
She looked at the ports on my PICC line, but didn’t say anything. She leaned against my shoulder. “It’s OK. You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.”
It wasn’t that I didn’t want to tell her those things. I genuinely didn’t know. It was as if my past had been completely erased. It was gone, like pages torn from a book.
I got up and put my underwear on, opened the drapes, and looked out at the big rectangular swimming pool. It was after midnight and there was a guy out there swimming laps.
“What are you thinking?” Ericka said.
“Don’t you know men hate it when you ask them that?”
“Why do they hate it? Is it because what they’re thinking is a big profound secret, or because they’re afraid to admit there’s nothing more than football and pussy rattling around up there?”
“Probably the latter,” I said.
“So what are you thinking?”
“Let’s put it this way: I don’t know anything about football.”
“You want to make love some more?”
“I do, but…”
“But?”
“It’s hard to explain. I feel guilty for some reason.”
“You got a wife or a girlfriend or something?”
“Maybe. I don’t know.”
She got up and started putting her clothes on. “Musicians are so fucking weird,” she said.
She grabbed her keys and walked out.
I didn’t try to stop her.
I tossed and turned and finally gave up on trying to sleep. At six, I got dressed and went to the dining area for breakfast. I ate some eggs and toast and drank a few cups of coffee and read the newspaper and then went back to the room and watched television. A little before ten, Brother John drove me to the studio in his Mercedes. He dropped me at the curb, said he had some errands to run.
“I’ll bring you guys some lunch after a while,” he said.
“I need my shot.”
He gave me the shot and I went inside and stopped at the desk to sign in. A skinny guy wearing a yellow shirt sat there typing something into the computer. His nametag said Brandon.
“Where’s Ericka?” I said.
“Called in sick. You got some ID?”
“I’m meeting Bob Watson on the eighth floor. Studio B.”
“You got some ID?”
“No. My name is Alexander Maddox. My friends call me Maddog. Or just Dog.”
“I can’t let you go upstairs without a picture ID. I’ll have to call and get you an escort.”
“OK.”
I walked around the lobby and looked at some of the gold records while I waited. I was reading the stats on Grand Funk Railroad’s We’re an American Band when a framed photograph caught my eye. It was a band called Colt .45, and on the left side of the picture stood a very young man, twenty-four or twenty-five, with hair to his shoulders and a full beard. He wore bell-bottom jeans and a denim jacket with the sleeves cut off. He was holding a red hollow-body electric guitar, and there was a white bandana tied around his head.
I read the caption and a lifetime of me
mories started swirling through my head like a tornado.
It all came back to me in an instant. I remembered the way my mother smelled the final time she left for work, minutes before crashing into an oak tree and dying on the way to the hospital. I remembered the day my stepfather taught me how to use a bait-caster reel, and the day he stabbed me in the gut with a steak knife. I remembered my first guitar. First record deal. First trip to Jamaica, where I met my wife, Susan. I remembered going through the pregnancy with her and rubbing lotion on her feet and belly every night and being in the delivery room when our baby Harmony was born and cutting the cord. I remembered being the sole survivor of the plane crash that killed Susan and Harmony and everyone in my band. I remembered giving up on music and going through a very dark period and hitting rock bottom and finally deciding to study and get a private investigator’s license. I remembered living in an Airstream camper on lot 23 at Joe’s Fish Camp and the life-changing case three years ago when a young lady named Leitha Ryan hired me to find her fifteen-year-old sister Brittney who had run away from home.
One thing led to another and I ended up infiltrating a group of white supremacists called Chain of Light, led by a self-proclaimed prophet named Lucius Strychar. Strychar had been keeping a journal called The Holy Record for a lot of years about his experiences as a minister and his personal conversations with Jesus Christ, and I desperately wanted to get my hands on that book. But some strange things started happening. They tried to drug me and I escaped into the woods in a van. I had a hostage named Brother John and he had the angel tattoo on his arm and a burning cross tattoo on his chest and he was one of the most hateful racist motherfuckers I’d ever met and I tortured him into giving me information about…
Brother John. Was the guy I had tortured and pistol-whipped and left unconscious in the woods at the Chain of Light Ranch the same guy who had brainwashed me and brought me to California?
I got short of breath and my heart pounded in my temples and for a minute I felt like I might pass out.
I went to the restroom and splashed some cold water on my face. It wasn’t him. The guy I was dealing with now didn’t look anything like the Brother John at Chain of Light.