Finding Abbey Road (15 page)

I see Val.

I see Kellen.

They're talking.

He's leaning over her like a vulture, speaking into her ear.

I freeze. What the hell? But no, I need to trust Val. She doesn't know yet about the one a.m. time switch, does she? Unless she's already been back to check in with Caleb and then slipped away again.

As I'm stuck there, jostling between shoulders, Kellen stands up straight, pats Val on the shoulder. He hands her something small. A card? And then he slides away from the bar and straight toward the doors.

Val heads back toward Caleb.

I shove my way through the crowd and intercept her, grabbing her arm.

“Hey,” I say.

“Oh, hey, you made it—”

“I saw you.”

Val glances toward the door, and luckily doesn't try to deny it. “He cornered me over there,” she says. “What a jerk.”

“It looked like you guys were having a pretty in-depth conversation.” I try not to sound mistrustful, but of course some of it is slipping in.

“Relax, Catherine,” says Val. “I didn't tell him anything
except that we were signed to Candy Shell Records, and this was our celebratory trip. Pretty sure he didn't buy that at all, but whatever.”

I want to believe her. I so, so do. But . . . “Does he know about Eli?”

“He told me that he's had a private-investigator service sifting through flight records and stuff for years, just in case. He said he never totally bought the suicide . . . And then Eli's name popped up last week for the NYC trip. I told him it could have been a different Eli, 'cause there's probably a bunch in the world, but he just smiled at that.”

“Good try,” I say.

“Yeah. I don't know how he figured out the flat thing. Maybe he asked my mom for any details that she remembered about being in London with him. Maybe he found the pictures like we did. Except she hates him almost as much as she hates Eli. And life. I don't know.”

“So . . . ,” I say. “He knows why we're here.”

“Yeah. And he says he's got no issue with us, but obviously he does with Pops. Then he said a bunch of stuff about legal jargon and lawsuits and also me being a minor and blah blah.” Val rolls her eyes. “Kellen's a serious dick.”

“Did you tell him anything else?”

Val scowls. “Why would I tell him anything else?”

“I don't know,” I say. “I'm just freaked out. This is all way too James Bond.”

“Look, he wants us to help him but I told him to screw
off. I didn't admit to knowing Eli was here but obviously he thinks we do, so, tomorrow afternoon, we just have to be really careful not to lead that slimy over-the-hill rocker to my slimy undead father. Are you believing any of this? Or do you think I was actually plotting to join up with Kellen, find Eli, and be the new bassist on the Allegiance to North reunion casino tour?”

I bite my lip. “I don't think that.”

“It's okay, I know you never totally trust me.” She stalks off, back toward Caleb.

Tomorrow afternoon
, she said. At least Val didn't even know the real meeting time when she talked to Kellen. But ugh, Summer, these thoughts! Not trusting Val, after all we've been through. I follow her back toward Caleb and I swallow it, yet, as the Poor Skeletons' set goes on, my eye is constantly darting to her.

I'm making fiction in my head. I know I am and I know it's stupid. But still . . . part of me thinks it's also stupid not to be at least a little worried. And another part of me thinks my brain is so wound up at this point I could make a conspiracy theory out of just about anything.

“What is it?” Caleb asks, leaning over. “Don't you like them?” He's been bopping up and down, totally into it, which I'm so happy to see.

“No, they're good,” I say, and I resist telling him what's worrying me, and instead just focus on checking out the band. I can't wait for these hours to pass. I want to go
now, to finally get our answers. We're so close! Just a little longer . . .

12:55 a.m., Thursday

The streets around Abbey Road are silent, a still life with only an occasional red bus chugging by. We cross the iconic white lines from the Beatles cover, sharing a smile with one another, but keeping quiet.

The building itself is unassuming, set back from the road, a sea of parking lot between its front door and the graffiti-scrawled outer wall. There are two gated entrances.

We watched the headliner at Bush Hall, and then got Indian food around the corner. Val sulked for a while about not having a chance to chat with the Scottish boy at the after party, and all the while I watched her with the slightest worried eye, that same old mistrust. Then we walked back to the hostel, stayed down at the café for forty minutes, and then, finally, made our way here, taking a zigzagging route, even doubling back at one point. And now . . .

We wait.

But with eyes peeled in either direction. Will it be a taxi, a car, a ghostly figure approaching out of the dark?

“It's one o'clock,” Caleb finally announces.

There is a buzzing sound, and then with a rattle, the metal gate in front of the Abbey Road Studios parking lot begins to swing open.

“Do you think this is for us?” Val asks.

“I think we'd better find out.”

We slip through, crossing the lot to the steps. The door buzzes when we reach it. Inside, a security guard gazes at us.

“Hi,” I say nervously, “we're here to see—”

But he buzzes the inner door open. “Studio Two,” he says.

We follow signs and enter a low-lit control room with couches on one wall and a large mixing console against the other.

“I'm glad you made it,” says the woman standing at the board.

It's Susan.

We are too stunned to speak. She smiles and shrugs at the same time.

“I know,” she says. “There are obviously some things I haven't been quite honest about.”

“You . . . ,” I begin, but I'm not sure what to say, trying to understand what it means that she is standing here now.

“What are you doing here?” Caleb asks.

“Running a recording session,” says Susan. “I've been more than just your dad's landlady these last years. Wait, that sounds scandalous. It's not like that. What I mean is, I've also been part of his life. Okay, still not exactly what I mean . . .”

“Just tell us,” says Val.

“Right.” Susan breathes deep. “What I'm saying is, I help him . . . do this.” She nods to the wide rectangular window above the console.

We all step toward it, until we can see through. The window looks down into a long, high-ceilinged room. There's only one light on inside. In the pool of light is a drum set, a bass, two electric guitars, and an acoustic, all perched on stands. Cords connect them to amplifiers whose orange standby lights glow. Sound baffles make artificial walls around the perimeter.

Sitting on a stool in the center . . .

It's him.

Eli.

The beard from New York is gone. His hair is a shaggy mop of brown, not unlike Caleb's but streaked with gray. He's wearing torn jeans and a flannel shirt, unbuttoned over a T-shirt.

Susan is pulling a large, round metal case from her bag. It looks like it should hold movie film.

“I'm also your dad's sponsor,” she says. “We met in rehab. And this is our monthly meeting.” She places the reel of tape down on a large, vintage machine, spooling the shimmering ribbon through. “We come here once every month, or more if he needs it. The scheduling manager and I go way back.”

She hits a glowing yellow button and the tape spins into position. It makes a whir of sped-up sound, and then
a few moments of a track play through the giant speakers. There's a guitar, and drums, and Eli's voice, and I'm certain this is a song that none of us have ever heard before. New material.

Down in the studio, Eli flinches at the sound coming out of his headphones. Susan hits stop. She moves to the control board and puts a finger on the studio microphone. Before she keys it, she turns back to us. “Just . . . don't say anything yet, okay? We sort of have a way of doing things, and he needs it to go that way.”

The way she says it . . . Suddenly I understand something else, here in the dark.

Something that's going to hurt.

I take Caleb's hand and squeeze.

I don't even want to say it. Yet.

Susan speaks into a thin microphone. “How's everything?”

“Tuned and ready,” Eli says in a mumble. Like any words he has to speak that aren't singing are a chore.

“Do you want to hear the takes from our last session?”

Eli is silent for a moment, staring down into a spot on the floor.

Seconds pass, three . . . four . . .

“No.”

Susan sighs. “All right then, just a minute.”

She turns back to the tape player, hits a series of buttons, and the tape begins to spin at high speed, but silent.

“What are you doing?” Val asks, stunned.

“Shh,” Susan warns again. “I'm erasing the tape,” she adds matter-of-factly.

“But do you have other copies of those songs?” Caleb asks.

Susan shakes her head. “No. Each time we get together, we tape, and then we listen back to the recordings, at least once, but usually two or three times. Then we record overdubs, sometimes for hours, until we get these pretty complete-feeling versions. And then Eli's one request is that I bring this same tape back to the next session, and if he says he wants to hear the tracks again, we'll listen. If he says no . . . we erase and start over.”

“How many times has he said yes?” I ask.

Susan bites her lip. “Never.”

“You've never saved a single recording?” says Val. “Why not?”

Susan just shrugs her brow. “It's one of the rules. When you're a former addict, you have to have rules. Rituals. In this process, I respect his wishes. And I'm glad I get to hear him, even if I'm the only one.”

“But what if the songs are great?” I ask.

“Oh, they are,” says Susan, “but that's just it: Eli loves to make music, to feel it, to breathe life into it. But from his point of view, everything that went wrong with Allegiance, and with his own life, happened when the music went from being just a creative expression, just
art
, to a
product. Something you sold, something you got
credit
for, something that determined whether you were going to be able to eat the next week, or later, buy as big a mansion as your friends. He thinks it ruins everything. Destroys friendships, lives, but most of all, turns art into dollars. I think he has a point. . . .”

“He does,” I agree, thinking of Jon and Caleb fighting over who got noticed more on stage, or the sticky conversations about the Candy Shell advance. Even about finding Eli's songs. Were we looking for art, for a connection, or for the ticket to playing cool shows and getting fans? There's no line between those two things, except the one you make in your head.

“If it were only up to him, we would erase it immediately after we were finished, but I've convinced him to at least take the time between when we see each other to think about it. Never works, though. Songs are what killed him, in a sense. They're also what keep him alive. . . . As long as they're never finished.”

The tape machine whirs down and clicks to a stop.

“No. A lot of times we do the same songs from session to session. Eli will track and re-track them, sometimes for years, and then at some point, he stops doing that song, swaps in another. The tape reel is only thirty minutes long.”

“How many songs have come and gone in these sessions, over the years?” I ask.

“Twenty?” says Susan. “Fifty? Sometimes there are
snippets. There have been some beautiful ones.” There's a note of heartbreak in Susan's voice.

“So then why even record at all?” I ask.

“Because that makes it real. It creates that real performance pressure that only hitting that red record button can make. If the tape's running . . . you play different.”

Caleb sighs and gazes darkly down at his father. “Should we go down there?”

“Let's let him play first,” says Susan.

“But he should know we're here,” says Val.

“I think we should stick to our usual routine. . . .”

I can't hold my silence any longer. I don't want to say the words but I have to:

“He doesn't know we're coming, does he?”

Susan's lips purse.

“Wait, what?” says Caleb.

“You wrote the note on that record,” I say. “Not him.”

Susan turns to the window, folding her arms. “I tried to copy his writing as best I could, but . . . yes. I've been watching you online, all this time, and . . . Eli doesn't do the internet. Nothing good comes of that for him. Years ago, he told me about those tapes he hid before he ‘died.' I could see that you were finding them, and when you got here, I wanted to help you see that through, but by the time you arrived, and I'd already met that Scotland Yard detective, I was paranoid about us being discovered. So yes, I made the note, to get you here safely.”

What she's saying makes so much sense, but it's also filling a cold weight in my chest.

“He doesn't know we're here. . . ,” Caleb says.

“No,” says Susan.

“Are you serious?” Val snaps.

Susan blinks back tears. “Listen: it's not his fault. He wants to hide again, after New York . . . I couldn't let him.”

“Well, fuck that,” says Val, her face a storm. “It's time to surprise him.” She starts toward the door.

“I don't think you should—” Susan says.

But Caleb is following right behind Val. “This is our choice. Not his.”

Susan starts to say more but doesn't. She watches them walk through the door.

There's a click from the studio speakers. “Suze?” Eli says over the mic. “Are we ready yet?”