The Byron Journals (11 page)

It was dark by the time they pulled the bus to a stop at the end of a long line of parked cars. In the distance, the lone, two-storey house looked like a lantern nestled in the rainforest. They loaded the gear onto the trolley and made their way towards it. A whip bird's call echoed through the darkness and the sound of music and conversation mixed with the buzz of insects.

‘Stay off the coke tonight, Jade,' Tim said.

‘As if, babe! It's New Year's Eve.'

‘Hey, I'm the one who has to deal with you when you're coming down.'

‘Don't talk to me like that! You're going to make a fool of me if you talk like that in front of my friends.'

There must have been at least two hundred guests. The crowd easily filled the enormous central living space and spilled onto the wide decking that ran around the outside of the house and overlooked the steep valley. Mostly older couples in hippyish evening wear, but also some young people, models, Andrew assumed, dressed in brighter clothes, as well as clean-cut waiters in black pants and white shirts.

Already running late, they unloaded their instruments where the stage had been erected and began setting up. This would be the biggest private show they'd played to date and the money was good, too.

An elegant waif in a black satin dress approached Jade, shrieked with excitement and threw her arms around her. Andrew watched Jade and the girl talk excitedly, holding hands, before an older man with combed back grey hair and faded blue eyes stopped beside them. The waif introduced the man to Jade, and Andrew's heart sank. Wasn't she supposed to be modelling for him?

Tim looked up as the older man kissed Jade's hand. ‘This is exactly why I didn't want to come,' he said.

Arm in arm with the man, Jade walked over to the edge of the stage. She introduced him as Gilbert, the owner of the house. In a smarmy, caramel voice, Gilbert thanked them for playing and asked if they wanted any drugs.
Performance enhancers,
he called them, anything they wanted—on the house, of course. Heidi and Jade glanced at each other and nodded.

‘Andy?' Heidi said.

‘No thanks.'

‘I used to be high on life too.' Gilbert smiled. ‘But then I developed a tolerance.' He turned to Tim. ‘Can I get you anything?'

Tim ignored him and continued setting up. Unphased, Gilbert led Heidi and Jade through the crowd into a small side room. They emerged five minutes later, sniffling and touching their noses, and Gilbert wandered off to attend to other guests.

Jade stopped beside Andrew, while Heidi returned to setting up her drum kit. ‘I'm getting everyone drinks,' she said. ‘What do you feel like?'

‘Just a Coke, thanks. Coca Cola.'

She laughed. ‘You're such a good boy, aren't you, Andy?'

When she came back with their drinks, Andrew skolled his. He wouldn't get the chance to have a drink once the show started. It was when he'd put down the glass that he noticed the strange, bitter aftertaste.

Heidi played a fill on her kit, Tim fired off a rhythm and Andrew tested the keys. The music on the stereo, Baba Maal, was turned off and the murmur of conversation filled the room. Someone cheered in anticipation and Andrew felt a lick of nerves. This was the moment he always found the most intense. The moment when the three of them made a standing jump—a simultaneous leap into sound and movement. The moment when the chances of everything going wrong and falling apart seemed greatest. Tim played his call and their music burst from the nothingness—clean, balanced and good. It thrilled Andrew every time.

Twenty minutes in, Andrew started feeling a lightness in his chest that spread through his body. He felt both inside and outside of himself—a strangely pleasant vertigo. He remembered the bitter aftertaste and wondered what Jade had put in his drink. He would have felt nervous about it if he wasn't starting to feel so damned good. The music intensified as though it was a gentle ocean washing through the room around him. The keys felt like an extension of his mind, seamlessly translating thought and feeling into sound. When he looked up, people were dancing and grooving to the music—laughing and shouting with happiness. Separate but connected.

Tim called the music to a stop for Heidi to play a solo and Andrew felt his whole being ascending dizzily with each hit, a hang-glider rising on warm gusts of air. He turned to watch her drum, her eyes wide with concentration and her hairline dark with sweat. How extraordinarily beautiful she was. He dropped a couple of chords through her rhythm. She looked up, biting her lip, and nodded. He chopped out a progression, slicing up majors and suspended sevenths. He felt phenomenal— like there was lightning in his blood. Tim played the call, the three of them smashed into a new rhythm and the audience erupted.

The next few songs were a kind of flight. Andrew was a trapeze artist twisting and somersaulting through the air, being caught in the grip of each new bar and flung forward into the next. He felt as though nothing could stop him, as though there was no way he could possibly fall. And it made him crazy. He jumped up and down, spun in circles, and left his keys to double up with Heidi on drums.

They stopped for a break and Tim walked out to the balcony. Jade rushed after him and Heidi and Andrew followed. Heidi and Andrew halted just outside the door when they saw Jade and Tim arguing at the far end of the deck.

‘What's going on?' he asked.

‘Just their usual bullshit…How do you feel?'

He drew her into a long, velvet embrace. ‘I'm absolutely… Fizzing!'

She laughed. ‘Oh! You're fizzing, are you?'

‘Yep. Like a giant can of lemonade!'

She pressed herself against him. ‘You don't mind that we slipped you E?'

‘Nah, I don't mind, I don't mind at all. We should have some more. This is amazing. This is the fucking best!'

She turned to him and smiled. ‘I thought you might like it.'

Jade sidled up next to them and lit a cigarette, glancing over her shoulder at Tim. ‘So much for spending New Year's Eve together.'

‘What happened?' Heidi said.

‘He said that we can all go and get fucked. That's what happened. Lovely, isn't he?'

Andrew turned and saw Tim stomping up the driveway towards the street.

Heidi frowned. ‘What's his problem?'

‘He was carrying on like he owned me or something. I just told him that I wasn't his possession…So now he's called a taxi to go home.' She glanced at Andrew and smiled. ‘How's our protégé doing?'

‘Loving it,' Heidi answered for him. ‘He wants some more.'

‘Well, we better give him some.'

Heidi placed a pill on her tongue and gently pushed it into his mouth as they kissed. Her mouth was soft and delicious and he swallowed the pill without water. Jade raised her eyebrows at Heidi. ‘And where's mine?'

Heidi put another pill on her tongue and kissed Jade while Andrew watched, feeling like he'd just been blasted with a defibrillator and was smashing into a higher plane of consciousness.

Behind them, a man cleared his throat. It was Gilbert. ‘It's awfully quiet inside…are you playing another set? Or is that it?'

Heidi turned to Andrew. ‘Andy?'

‘Definitely!' He replied. ‘But I'm dying to go to the toilet first.'

‘Me too,' Jade added.

‘All right, you two go and I'll get the show started.'

Andrew followed Jade up the long hallway to the bathroom and waited outside. He drew a deep breath and the air filled his body like helium. His muscles were bursting with energy—he felt strong enough to lift a car.

The toilet flushed and Jade emerged, staring. ‘Look at you!'

‘What?'

‘Your eyes—your—' She stroked the side of his face. ‘How do you feel?'

‘Amazing.'

She bit her bottom lip. ‘Tim says I'm ugly when I take drugs.'

‘Don't worry about Tim. You're beautiful.'

She moved closer and ran her hands down his arms. Her breasts grazed his chest. She drew him into an embrace and slid her hands over his back. ‘Do you really think so, Andy?'

Her lips brushed his ear, sending ripples of warmth through him. His hands passed across the bare skin of her back. He felt her goosebumps. Then without thinking, he let his hand move beneath her dress, over the lacy ridge of her g-string to the soft, round curve of her arse. He wanted to put his fingers inside her, hot and wet. But she pulled away and the separation was like being ripped in two.

She smiled and nodded back towards the party. ‘That's a long solo Heidi's playing.'

Andrew nodded. Heidi. Heidi. Heidi. He heard the rhythm of her drums and the shouts and cheers of the party. For a moment, he'd completely forgotten what he was doing. The world had shrunk to this single hallway space.

She kissed him on the cheek, smiling. ‘Maybe we could swing something with Heidi later…if you want.'

What about Tim? he thought. But before he could say it, Jade turned and headed back towards the party. Andrew closed the bathroom door behind him and stood there for a moment, not sure what he was doing. Now that he was there, he didn't even need to piss anyway. He washed his hands and the water felt amazing flowing over his skin. He felt ridiculously alive, jacked up on the possibilities. He looked into the mirror and couldn't recognise himself. His eyes were wide open, his face was sweaty and his jaw was clenched. A knock on the door snapped him back to his senses. He was in the bathroom and Heidi was drumming in the living room—waiting for him. He had to get back to her. He opened the door, flung himself down the hall and took his position behind the keys.

Heidi gave him a questioning look but he just mouthed the words:
Follow my lead.

He began playing the teaser of a funk chord progression, kind of James Brown style. The crowd cheered and shouted. Gradually, he edged it in, brought up the volume, teased it up, teased it up. It was like floating down a quick river of music towards a waterfall. As the final bar kicked in, he was jumping up and down, shouting— ‘Two! Three! Four!'

Heidi smashed out a new rhythm and he thumped out the chords full volume. People shouted and danced, laughed and cheered, and when he caught Jade's eye, he saw that she was watching him with a new intensity, as though only noticing him for the first time.

They finished playing half an hour later, packed up and lugged the gear back to the bus. They danced in the middle of the street. Andrew stretched out his arms and the breeze seemed to blow straight through him. He'd never realised how much air there was in the world. All he wanted to do was jump around and swish his hands through it. The girls laughed.

‘Let's go back to the party!' Jade said. ‘We can go home anytime!'

‘Anytime!' Heidi echoed.

They ran and skipped back down the long driveway. But this time, instead of turning right into the party, Jade turned the other way and led them into an alcove of the garden. She slid her hands around their backs and drew them together.

‘I love you guys!' she whispered. ‘So much!'

‘Oh Jade, we love you too,' Heidi said.

The world and everything in it was cut from the finest silks, everything was filled with warm whispers and soft skin.

‘I love both of you!' Andrew said. ‘More than that! And this is ridiculous! But I love everything, and everyone!'

They loved the world and the world loved them. It was fantastic; they were fantastic. And then they were kissing. Heidi's mouth was hot against Andrew's and he felt the brush of Jade's lips against his neck. His insides melted like thick drools of candle wax, running down and pooling in his groin, his belly, pooling there and filling him up. A hand slid up his thigh and squeezed his cock, another ran down his chest. He stroked Heidi's breasts, then Jade's. Nipples hardened against his palms and between his fingers. He didn't know it was possible to feel this good. It wasn't. Jade kissed Heidi and he watched them, mesmerised. He kissed Heidi's cheek and her neck, then Jade moved away from Heidi and started kissing him on the lips, the taste of red wine in her mouth.

Heidi stepped away from them and cleared her throat. ‘We should go back to the party.'

Jade and Andrew stopped kissing. They looked at Heidi. It seemed unfair of her to end this bliss.

‘Why?' he asked.

She glanced at his hand on Jade's breast. ‘I don't know…let's just go back inside. I feel like dancing.'

Jade dragged Heidi back towards them and kissed her neck. ‘C'mon, Heidi, it's just a bit of fun.'

‘It is fun, I know,' Heidi said. ‘But we should go back to the party.'

She turned and led the way. Jade took his hand and caught hold of Heidi's hand to slow her down.

They stopped on the verandah for the countdown to midnight, their arms around each other, and watched the fireworks lancing the night sky.

thirteen

Andrew couldn't remember the trip home. Only an ugly argument between Tim and Jade when they arrived. But then Tim left and everything was peaceful again. Heidi scrolled through her iPod and, a moment later, Four Tet's ambient electro-pop wafted through the room. Andrew was lying on the couch in the living room and the music had him sweeping down the gentlest of rivers, drifting and eddying in the currents.

The smell of cinnamon and clove filled his nostrils and he opened his eyes to see Heidi making chai in the kitchen. Sunlight streamed through the window and caught her hair. She was so damned beautiful, he thought. He was lucky. Beyond lucky. He closed his eyes again and lay there, melting in and out of the music.

Someone tickled his feet and he smiled, expecting the soft warmth of Heidi's lips. He opened his eyes and frowned. It was Jade. Her hair was wet and she was dressed in tiny shorts and one of Heidi's old cotton T-shirts without a bra. Her nipples were hard and her breasts jiggled when she moved.