Nine Volt Heart (18 page)

JASON

“E
VERYONE IS LOOKING AT US,
Jason.”

“Are you bragging or complaining, Dominique? You’re the one
who suggested the highest traffic coffee bar in Seattle. Did you get my fax,
Ephraim? The song list?”

“Yes. That’s why I thought we should all get together.
Without any attorneys.”

“Are you sure you feel safe being with me, without the
protection of the law, Dominique?”

“Jason, that wasn’t my fault.”

“Karl doesn’t allow me to say the word ‘fault’ when he’s not
present.”

“Knock it off, both of you. This is just business. These are
really good songs, Jason.”

“Of course they are. For the others that I sent before, I
changed the key and reworked the vocal part. I have the notation and lyrics
here. We’ll have all the rehearsal demos for her to work with by the end of
next week. We’ll make your June deadline if you can persuade Dominique to spend
even five minutes practicing—”

“I practice.”

“What? ‘Practiced at the art of deception’? You’re a star,
Dominique.”

“You are such a self-righteous prick, Jason. Why don’t you
bend over and screw yourself?”

“Stop it, you two. The vocal range is fine, Jason. I’m
concerned that this might come off as too rockabilly for Dominique’s direction.
She is aiming for a higher sensibility.”

“Too bad she won’t be able to hit her target.” I sipped tea.
She sucked her chai latte.

“I have succeeded at everything I ever tried, you brat.
Which is more than you can say, since you haven’t—”

“Stop it, Dominique.” Ephraim was firm. “I don’t want to
hear more from either of you. Jason, you know what I’m saying about the music.”

“The underlying music will be densely textured, and I’m not
asking her to bend notes or add twang in the vocals. I am in all sincerity
trying to give you what you want—commercial music that appeals to a wide and
undereducated audience.”

“I knew you were a smart boy.” Ephraim sat back. He seemed
satisfied with my song list. Or maybe just with his triple espresso.

“I want out from under both of you. If this is acceptable,
then let me off the hook. Let Karl file the papers without any more bullshit.”

“There is still the tour to discuss, Jason.”

“I’m out of here. We discuss everything only when Karl is
present.”

Dominique gasped as if in pain. “Damn it, Ephraim. Make him
sit down. That bitch-boy writer who trashed me in the
Seattle
Buzz
is sitting over there watching us.”

“So let him watch. Dominique, you love every column inch you
get.” I waved at Quentin

“You are just saying that because he took your side, Jason.
He wants to go to bed with you himself, the fool.”

“I didn’t see the story. Quentin has to be radical and rude
to keep his job. He trashed my music long before I met you because there’s too
much melody. He thinks I should revive the post-grunge scene in Seattle. Don’t
take what he writes personally.”

Dominique rapped the table in frustration. “We’re supposed
to be recording together. He’ll start all kinds of stories if he sees us like
this.”

“Like what?”

“You being all pissy and superior, Jason.”

“I left my positive mental attitude in the studio, where it
has value.”

“Kiss me.”

“What?”

“Don’t run off without kissing me goodbye.”

“Geez, you duplicitous witch. I need anti-venom, quick.”

“Ephraim likes it fine.”

“He must have got all his shots at the vet. Here, Ephraim.
That’s the complete notation for all the music. A courier will bring tracks
over to your house. Which, please remember, is actually my house.”

JASON

P
ART OF THE TIME, it felt like
I was back in high school, trying to make up for skipping too many classes and
delaying term projects for too long, cramming a half a year’s work into a week
or two. However, once I finished the notation for the vocalist, it felt like a
weight had been lifted. No, it felt like I had pried Ephraim’s foot off my
face.

After the first few days back in the studio, I had sorted my
thinking into categories, since it felt jumbled the first day we came to plug
in. The work at night, when it was possible to play without thinking too much
about it, kept me calm enough that by Friday I knew where I was going.

With the music, I mean.

Agitating Ephraim wouldn’t get me out from under Dominique
or Albion Records. Since I was smart enough to figure that out by lunch on
Monday, it didn’t take much to plan what would satisfy him as the Albion key
man. Then he’d take care of Dominique in relation to the music. As angry as I
felt about what had happened between us, I knew to take Ephraim’s advice about
the business end of the music. He had no motivation except to make money. Once
I decided to roll over, the solution lay in how fast I could transcribe the
music.

Toby and Ian accepted my argument for what it was, and we’d
played together too long for it to take more than a series of afternoons to
work out the basic music, since the solution was to pick the obvious answer to
every musical question. Toby decided that if he had to do it, he was going to
do the best possible job, as long as I promised that the instruments would be
heard in the final mix. Ian just did what he always does, elegantly, which is
to read my thoughts before I think them.

We had all been having too much fun at night to complain
about workingman’s blues from noon to seven in the studio.

Mornings, I cleared up the notation work quickly, because I
wanted to remix some older live recordings. We were giving Albion Records one
last goodbye kiss. Then we’d do what any ambitious band can do if it has
sufficient capital and only modest desires for fame: work without a major
label; distribute through the Internet. To do this, we needed viable material
right off the starting blocks. I’d been playing historical tapes every morning,
but it took me until Thursday to recognize how our sound had shifted as soon as
Dominique began to sing with us that fateful night in L.A. In the ten months of
sound-board tapes from when we had been together (if you can call it that), the
sound drifted off. I don’t mean it was experimental. I mean we didn’t know
where we were going.

Me. I didn’t know.

A radio talk-show therapist could have diagnosed the early
demise of my marriage. The dynamic I’d always had with Toby and Ian leaked
away, with no new foundation replacing it. The resulting music, when I
struggled to merge Dominique’s vocals with our old guitar sounds, was not
collaboration. It was more like a shotgun marriage.

So I took a digital knife and cut out Lady D from everything
up until I sent the
Woman at the Well
masters to
Ephraim so he could make the masters with his new mistress. These made decent
instrumentals, though it was unmoored sound seeking anchor. Then I tweaked the
recordings Ian and I made on our European anti-valedictory tour. The tectonic
shift was profound. You could hear it now when we played at night. Ian and Toby
are having fun again. We could bring others in to play with us in the mornings
to explore the same vein we mined each evening.

However, the studio time was costing me a personal fortune.
We needed to do our work efficiently and get out. We had to build our future on
work in three basic piles in the studio. One pile was the older, pre-Dominique
work, saleable as classic Stoneway. Another was last year’s confused effort,
which the Dragon Woman co-owned. She wanted Stoneway’s name as the price for my
freedom, and I needed to be free to continue with the third pile, our modest
recordings from Susi’s and Ian’s houses.

No one could help me find the straight line through the
mess. I can’t ask Karl for advice about music. Ian and Toby are waiting for me
to tell them what’s up. Fundamentally, that’s why Ephraim ticked me off so
much. I once thought I could trust him; I believed he could help untwist the
musical confusion that began when I let Dominique sing with us.

I can’t rely on others. I have to figure this out on my own.

JASON

“M
ARTHA, DID ANY OF THE pawn
shops call back about Beau’s guitar?”

“You know I’d tell you the minute they did.”

“How about any of the bass players you called? Are any
available?”

“No, sorry. Do you want me tomorrow, Jason? There’s food
coming at noon. I left breakfast for you in the refrigerator.”

“No, thanks. You’ve done a spectacular job.”

“If I don’t come tomorrow, are you going to take care of
that girl’s breakfast? Should I make sure she doesn’t need a doctor? I’m
worried about her. I still don’t think it’s a good idea to let her sleep here.”

“What girl?”

“The one your brother sent here. It’s hard for me to be
quiet about this, Jason. I think he took advantage of that girl just because
he’s your brother.”

“Martha, I don’t have a brother. What girl?”

“That one sitting under the tree on the corner. She spent
the day hanging around, waiting for him to come. She had a note from you that
said, ‘Do whatever is necessary.’ I didn’t want to disturb your work this
week.”

~

We couldn’t get much of a story out of her, except her name was
maybe Crystal. Or maybe that is what she used instead of food and she had
gotten the two confused. She had that wasted, red-rimmed look in her eyes that
meant her skeletal thinness didn’t come from suburban anorexia. Clearly under
age, she wasn’t telling us her name, rank, and serial number because she didn’t
want to get sent home. So we tried to learn the man’s identity, which I needed
to know for my own purposes.

“What does the guy look like who sent you here?”

“Like you, but shorter. He’s your brother, isn’t he? Though
you are a lot better looking in real life. I can’t believe I’m meeting you.”

“What’s his name?”

“Is this a joke? He’s your brother.”

“Crystal, I don’t have a brother. Someone played a trick on
you.”

“I can’t believe it. He seemed like a good guy. He was real
sweet and kind of shy. He knew everything about you.”

“He isn’t a good guy.”

“But he used a rubber. That’s how you tell if he’s a good
guy.”

Even Martha, who solves all problems on the material plane,
was at a loss for what to do with her, but we decided to try the YWCA for
shelter.

“Where did she get the note?” Martha asked. “I feel so
guilty now for not asking more questions.”

“It is not your fault, Martha. It’s the original note I
faxed to Karl from my hotel in London.”

“She surely didn’t follow you from London?”

“No, but my low-rent doppelganger did. Can you find that
card from Officer Page and call tomorrow? I guess we need security, though I
don’t know who I pay to stop a creep from using my name with street girls.
Here, take this money for dinner and the shelter, but don’t give her any of it.
Stop at that twenty-four-hour clinic on Denny to see if she has anything that
needs medical attention. Good god, I shouldn’t ask you to do this.”

“It’s not your fault either, Jason.”

“The worst problems seem like they’re never my fault. Yet
there’s such a pattern, it makes me wonder.”

Crystal kissed me before Martha took her away, exhaling a
sugar-laden, druggie breath and whirling her dirty blond hair across my face
when she turned away, which left me feeling like I needed medical attention
myself. I went back in the studio and brushed my teeth in the can, twice,
trying to resist the impulse to wash with sink cleanser before saying
good-night to the remaining crew at Temple Bell.