Vanni: A Prequel (Groupie Book 4) (10 page)

By the time I make it back to Brooklyn, I’m ready to celebrate. I head straight to Fritz’s, which is abuzz courtesy of a new karaoke machine to turn up the volume of 80s night. The bar is so full I can barely squeeze between the bodies. I hold up a finger to Pam, who knows already what I order. She nods and gives me a wink. I turn around to face the happy folks crowded around the tiny stage erected on the limited dance floor. Some woman nearing her 40s is massacring “
Open Arms”
by Journey. I grimace through it, while everyone else claps and encourages her on. They’re all happily under the influence, which I presume makes it easier to enjoy the show.

Pam appears like an angel beside me, offering me a frosty mug of beer. I lean down so she can hear me. “When did you decide to go karaoke?”

She laughs. “This is the first weekend. It’s sort of a trial run.” We glance around the crowded bar, which is more business than this neighborhood haunt has seen in quite a while.

“Looks like it was a successful experiment,” I say.

She shrugs. Her lovely apple cheeks flush with a faint hint of pink I can still detect under the colorful lights. “It was my idea,” she says. “Confession, you kind of inspired it.”

“Oh, yeah?”

She nods. “Yeah.” Her bright eyes sparkle up at me. “You should totally go up there. Show them how it’s done.”

“You think?”

“I know,” she says. “You’ll have them eating out of the palm of your hand, Vanni.”

With a shrug, I figure what the hell? I get in line and set up my song. I dig back a little deeper in time and pick “
Time of the Season
” by the Zombies, because I’ve always thought it was a sexy song. A sexy song deserves a sexy delivery, and I’m more than ready to shed that rat race idiot who used to work at McKinley, Donnelly and Roth. I toss my hair with my fingers, and I untuck my dress shirt, which I unbutton halfway down my chest. I almost wish I could shed it completely, but that seems too much.

Maybe one day
…

As soon as I hit the stage, it’s as natural as breathing. I look out at the expectant faces in the crowd, like a lion surveys a pack of juicy wildebeests. The girls in particular are ripe for the picking. They brazenly scope me up and down, sending me suggestive smiles as they stare up at me.

Well, what do you know? The girls I love actually love me back. They’re not looking down their noses at me like Stu. They’re not rolling their eyes at me like Lori. They look at me like I’m interesting, fascinating, appealing, and all I had to do was step on this stage. How fucking wonderful is that?

The minute the song starts, I’m somebody else. Only this somebody isn’t some pathetic little automaton punching a time card. I wield power like a magician, and the microphone is my wand. I hear my voice through the speakers. It doesn’t even sound like me. It sounds better than me.

It’s
him
, the New Vanni who has finally given his last fuck.

The girls come apart as I sing the lyrics to them. They turn into instant groupies. It blows my mind. I open my mouth, and they rush to the stage. They can’t seem to get close enough. I relish in their attention, getting grittier with every verse. I pull one of the girls onstage with me to dance during the music solo. When I begin to sing to her, she practically melts at my feet.

This is so much better than some florescent-lit hellhole in the basement of a skyscraper.

Pam cheers the loudest as I finish and hop down off the stage. Everyone chants my name, which makes my blood pump in my veins.

“Didn’t I tell you?” she says as I reach her. “Palm of your hand. You’re a natural, Vanni. You’re going to be headlining sell-out venues one day. I know it.”

“I have a long way to go still,” I tell her. “I have hardly any experience and zero opportunity.”

“I don’t know about that,” she says as she heads back to the bar. There are a stack of free magazines for the NYC music scene. She opens it to the back where there are tons of classified ads. “There’s your opportunity, honey,” she says. She points to her stage. “There’s your experience. I mean, you’re going to be here anyway, right? Hone your skills where you can. Before you know it, you’ll have mastered something great.”

I can’t resist. I pull her into a hug and hold her tight. She feels warm and comfortable in my arms, like a plush teddy bear. It feels so good that I don’t want to let go, so I don’t for a long moment. I just relish every inch of her. She clears her throat and pulls back. I know she’s still keeping her distance because of Lori. Frankly, that only makes me like her more.

I don’t tell Lori about my karaoke success that night when she comes home from the club. I don’t tell her about quitting, either. While she’s at work all that weekend, I’m practicing my new skill as a singer in front of the mirror at the house, and then on that tiny stage at the bar. When several girls hit on me, asking to take me home, I figure I’m doing something right.

Or at least,
he
is.

I like this new guy a lot more than the other one. He’s got confidence and swagger. I almost believe him when he struts across that tiny stage and drives all the girls crazy. I make up for the lackluster rendition of “
Open Arms”
on Saturday night, where no fewer than five girls fall head over heels in love with me.

It’s empowering. That night, when Lori gets home from work, I practically pounce her from the front door. We make love in the living room, then again in the kitchen, and finally in the bedroom.

I borrow some of the new guy’s swagger to make her come until she nearly passes out. I figure everything is fine until Sunday afternoon, when she finally asks. “When are you going to get your hair cut, Vanni? The weekend is nearly over.”

I grin at her. “I didn’t hear any complaints last night when you grabbed it and told me to fuck you harder,” I growl as I pull her into my lap. She turns away from my kiss.

“Vanni. I’m not kidding around. You know you have to cut your hair.”

I sigh. “If I want to keep that job, then yes. I have to cut my hair.”

“What do you mean if?” she says at once.

“I mean if, Lori. Jesus.” I know I’m just putting off the inevitable, but I can’t yet utter the words. I have to push her out of my lap and turn away so she can’t see my face.

“Vanni.”

I take a breath and just go for it. “Fine. I quit my job.”

Her eyes are lethal. “When?”

I rip the bandage all the way off. The word lands like a hand grenade. “Friday.”

She immediately flies off the bed. “What the hell were you thinking? How could you quit? Do you know how hard Tony had to fight for them to hire you?”

I stand to face her, by now just as angry as she is. “And just how much of my life do I have to give up in exchange for that generous gesture, Lori? A year? Five years? Fifty?”

“It was a chance to build a career,” she starts, but I’m over it.

“It was a shitty no-where job and you know it.”

“It didn’t have to be. You are the one not trying hard enough. You can go to school. You can cut your hair–”

“Oh, right. Just change everything about myself to make everyone else happy. Sometimes I feel like I died with Susan that day. I haven’t recognized myself since she’s been gone.”

“Look, I’m sorry your aunt died, Vanni. But you would have had to grow up either way. You’re twenty-six years old. You’re a man. If you want to be taken seriously–”

I scoff. “You keep saying that to me, but I’m starting to think the only person not taking me seriously is you.”

We stare at each other for a long, hard minute before she finally grabs her clothes that are slung over a chair next to the bed. “You’re such an asshole,” she grits between her teeth as she slips into her jeans. “I gave up everything for you. I gave up my apartment, my friends, my life. I moved in here and helped keep you together every day since your aunt died. And all I get from you is grief. You want to play around like a kid and I’m the big mean meanie who is trying to turn you into a man.”

“Fuck you,” I spit.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” she retorts. “Get me in bed, keep me distracted. Anything to keep from facing reality.”

“And what reality is that?” I ask. I can’t seem to stop myself.

Her eyes meet mine. “You don’t have what it takes to make it, Vanni. You’re 100-percent dreamer with zero discipline. You have a little talent, sure, but no skill, and certainly no patience to develop any. You want to be a star, but have you ever thought about what kind of hard work it takes to really do the job well?”

Immediately I want to bring up all the practice that I’ve been doing, playing until my fingers cramped, learning what songs I could, and writing new songs along the way. I’m pretty proud of how far I’ve come. I know it’s useless. She sees music as a hobby. “I’ve got an idea,” is all I say in answer to her question.

“Yeah, well if you think I’m going to work my ass to pay the bills while you go off and play, you’ve got another thing coming, Vanni. I want a partner, someone who knows where he’s going and knows what it takes to get there.”

“You’re just assuming I don’t because I want to pursue music.”

It’s her turn to scoff. “You don’t want to pursue music, Vanni. You want to be famous. You want to live the high-flying life of a celebrity. But when it comes to working at something, at anything, you suck.”

I follow her through the house as she heads for the front door. “So you’re just leaving?”

She whips around to face me. “I’d stay forever if you could just get your head on straight.” She waits for a moment, as if she expects me to grovel and beg for her to stay, to promise her that I’d do whatever she wanted to make her happy.

Only I tried that, and I was the miserable one.

“I’ve got to do this,” I tell her. “I know you don’t understand. But it’s just something I need to do for me. If I fail, I fail. But at least I’ll know that I tried.”

“Fine. You do what you need to do. Just don’t expect me to watch you blow through Susan’s inheritance on a pipe dream.”

She slams out the door.

I can’t wait to get to Fritz’s that night.  There I’m not derided like a child for believing in my dreams. I’m celebrated for being good at something I only dreamed I could be good at. There’s a glimmer of hope there that pumps into my veins like heroin.

There’s also Pam, who has never criticized me for who I am or what I want to do. When she looks at me, she really sees me. And that person really matters to her, with all his silly hopes and dreams. I realize that is what I’ve been missing most all this time.

Suddenly I want to see her more than anything.

As I drive up in the parking lot, however, I see Pam standing outside the main entrance, in the arms of another man. He’s a little older than me, with dark, short hair, wire-framed glasses and a slight paunch. He looks like some kind of nerd, but Pam doesn’t seem to care. She reaches up for a kiss and the lucky sonofabitch obliges.

I remain in my car until he leaves. The longer I have to wait, the more I fume. Every single time we managed to get close, she used Lori as her excuse to break out of any embrace. Has she been hiding this jerkoff the whole time?

I’m still mad when I enter the bar, where she tends to customers, wearing that same jovial smile. Our eyes meet. I know I’m not the only one who feels it sizzle down to my toes. I motion for my beer and she nods, before she quickly looks away.

I know now that’s guilt she wears.

She avoids me through much of the night. It’s as if she knows I know. Finally I grab her wrist as she deposits drink #4. “We need to talk.”

She relents with a small nod, motioning to Cheryl that she’s taking a break. She allows me to pull her around the bar and off towards the parking lot, where she lets me into her car. “What’s up?” she says, once we finally get settled.

“Lori left me,” I tell her. Her eyes widen as she stares up at me.

“I’m so sorry,” she starts, but I don’t let her finish. Instead I cup my hand around her neck and pull her towards me, crushing her full, sexy mouth under mine for a demanding kiss. It’s like I want to erase any trace of any other man’s lips there, because they don’t belong. She’s so stunned her lips part in a gasp, and I deepen the kiss immediately. From the way she swoons against me, I can’t imagine that dork would have anything on me. I moan into her mouth as she kisses me back, just for an instant. Then suddenly she pushes against my chest, pulling away.

“Vanni, I can’t.”

My eyes drill into hers “Why not?”

She sighs. “I’m… I’ve been seeing someone.”

It’s a guilty admission, as though she’d been caught cheating. Like she has to answer to me. And right now, she does. “Since when?”

She struggles for the words. “Since… since forever I guess. I mean, he’s an old family friend. He’s known my dad for ages. They invited him for Christmas dinner, and, I don’t know. I guess we just thought we’d see where things would go.”

I grasp her arm with my fingers. She’s being seeing this fuckwad since
Christmas
? Is she fucking kidding me? “I see. And you never thought to bring it up?”