Vanni: A Prequel (Groupie Book 4) (11 page)

“Why would I? You had someone. We were just… I dunno. Funning around.”

“I’m pretty serious now,” I tell her, leaning so close I could kiss her again. And God knows I want to, even though she just shakes her head.

“Vanni,” she says. “Look at you. You could have any girl in this bar.”

I know that’s true. It’s not conceit. I’ve sung in front of these girls all weekend, which comes with a lot of extra attention even when I’m not behind a microphone. They shove folded napkins with their numbers on it in my pockets, some even copping a feel as they pull away.

Had I been a different sort of man, I could have had any number of them.

But none of that excite me more than Pam does. She is so different from Lori in every way, from her crazy red hair and her tattoos, to that luscious hour-glass figure that feels soft and full, like an angel in my arms. Her rose is in full bloom. And goddamn if I don’t want to caress each and every sensual petal. “What if I said I wanted you?”

She touches my face with her hand. “I’d say I’m flattered… but I’m also realistic. You are on the cusp of something amazing. I know it way down deep in my soul. There’s no room there for… for ordinary,” she says, struggling for words. Is that how she really sees herself? “I’m sorry Lori left. Really. But you won’t need her where you’re going. You won’t even need me.” She reaches up leave a sweet peck upon my lips. “You surpassed ordinary from the very first song you wrote. And that’s just the way it is.”

She holds me in her arms, a strong hug meant to reassure me. I let my hands slip easily over her back, relishing in how she feels under my fingers. Despite my passion for all women, and my experiences thus far, I’ve never really been with a voluptuous woman before, and I find that her womanly figure is inviting and luxurious to the touch. I just want to lose myself inside of her and never find my way back out again.

She pulls away from me suddenly, as if she senses how my cock jumps at the thought. From the flush creeping up her neck and into her face, I know I tempt her every bit as much as she’s tempting me. 

“I gotta go back to the bar,” she says. I do not stop her. Instead we exit the car and walk wordlessly back into inside. I then head to the stage where, if nowhere else, I’m the star. More girls pile around me, and I’m tempted to take one back to my now-empty home.

Instead I stop at a liquor store on the way home and buy a couple of bottles of whiskey. It’s going to be a long night, and I need the comfort of a couple old friends.

Later, while I’m sitting in bed and killing bottle #2, I prowl through the want ads in the back of the music magazine Pam had given me. I don’t know what I’m looking for until I find it. It’s a small ad, but my eyes zero in on it all the same… as if it had been waiting just for me. And maybe it was.

NEW BAND SEAKING LEAD SINGER. MUST KNOW 80s-90s ROCK. SOME SONGWRITING SKILL PERFERRED BUT NOT REQUIRED. INQUIRE WITH YAEL SATTERLEE.

I don’t even think twice as I reach for the phone.

Instead of going to McKinley, Donnelly and Roth Monday morning, I head over to SoHo’s Cast Iron District where Yael has a loft. The old building is huge and private, which explains why I practically hear Yael playing all the way to the street. But there’s no one around to complain.

He answers the door, wearing jeans and an old rock T-shirt, his jet black hair tied back away from his face. Though I sense he doesn’t do it often, he smiles immediately. He offers his hand. “Hey, man. Glad you could make it.”

“My pleasure,” I tell him as I follow him inside. “Great place.”

“Thanks. I think I’ve driven away every last neighbor but it’s been worth it. Come on, I want you to meet the guys.”

We turn the corner to a large living space. It’s a studio apartment, so Yael’s bedroom, such as it is, is secured behind an Oriental room divider in the corner. There’s a kitchen on the opposite wall, and a door for what presumably is a bathroom in the corner. At least a dozen guitars line the walls. He plucks one down as we pass. “Hey, guys. This is Vanni.”

A man in shorts, tank top and flip flops rises through a dense cloud of smoke as he stands up from the thread-bare sofa. “Hey, how’s it going?”

I nod and shake his hand as Yael makes the introductions. “This is Felix Soto. He’s our drummer.”

“It’s really nice to meet you,” I say. He looks every inch a California stoner, but I can tell by his biceps that he is not afraid of intense work.

The bathroom door opens and another, younger guy emerges. His hair is black as night, much like Yael’s, but his eyes are a pale blue, made even lighter by his thick dark lashes. He looks like he just stepped off the cover of a magazine. “And this is Bobby Rocco. He’s our bass player.”

I shake his hand. “Vanni. Nice to meet you.”

We all sit around the large coffee table, overflowing with cigarette butts, marijuana paraphernalia and sheet music, some printed, some done by hand. “So tell us what kind of experience you have,” Yael says.

“Right now, karaoke,” I say, which makes Bobby chortle openly.

“So no band experience?” Felix asks.

“Some,” I say with more confidence than I feel. Right now I feel like a kindergartener who just got caught picking his nose. “Years ago. Garage bands when I was a kid, mostly, but we never really went anywhere. Wanted to pursue music full-time but any job I got as a singer usually didn’t pay shit. A boy’s gotta eat,” I finish with a cheeky grin.

“But you write music,” Yael persists. I shrug.

“I doodle,” I say as I pull the folded piece of paper from my pocket and hand it to him. He opens it to skim over “
Make it Happen
.”

“You play piano?” he asks.

“A little,” I confess. I know that any other singer would bullshit his way into the band, but I want to start on the right foot. I motion to the piano sitting in the corner. “May I?”

Yael nods and I head over to the baby grand that barely fits where a dining room table is supposed to go. I turn on the microphone on the mic stand, which sends feedback throughout the room. I don’t even need the sheet music as I begin to play. “
Havin’ a dream, but going nowhere. Punch that clock, cut my hair. Waiting for permission to start my ignition. Just a regular Joe, still I know if I want something I have to make it happen. No excuses, no regrets. Make it happen. Raise my voice, learn the steps. Make it happen, grab that rope before I fall. I gotta make it happen, or it won’t happen at all
.”

As I sing, Yael fiddles around on his guitar to accompany me. Following his lead, both Bobby and Felix jump on their instruments. Music swells in the large, open space. What started as an idea, explored with simple notes and futile words to express it, has now become
music
.

I damn near cry it so fucking beautiful.

After I’m done with my song, Yael jumps into a cover of “
Livin’ on a Prayer
.” I take the microphone and walk over to the band where they sit in a circle overlooking the window, where I get into the character of the song without holding anything back. I don’t miss a beat when he segues into “
Man in the Box
,” slowing it down for “
Creep
,” and then finally “
Patience
.”

No one says anything as we plow from song to song. They’re completely in sync with each other, clearly these are familiar staples of their current set lists. And I step easily and quickly into place. I don’t need the sheet music for the songs that they play. Every single selection is right in my wheelhouse, songs I’ve been singing since I was a kid. The music from the last note finally dies out, echoing through the vaulted ceilings.

No one is laughing anymore. In fact, they all glance between each other, silently communicating about what they’ve seen and heard. 

Finally Yael breaks the silence. “Think you’d be up to testing onstage in front of an audience?”

“Whatever, whenever,” I say at once.

“We have a gig this Friday. Seedlings, where we met,” he adds, to remind me.

My eyes meet his. That’s where Lori works. If she sees me perform with a band, I know it’ll be the last nail in the coffin of our relationship.

But I can’t think of anything better to show her how fucking serious I really am.

Yael hands me the flier, which gives all the details on the gig. “
The Yael Satterlee Experiment
:
Featuring guest singer
,” it says. I cock an eyebrow.

“Auditions haven’t been going all that well,” he tells me with a cockeyed grin. “But we have some friends that aren’t really up for a full-time music gig. They fill in when we need them,” he said. “We’re still trying to find the right fit for us.”

My eyes meet his. I know I’m what they’re looking for; I could hear it when we performed. It was completely natural from the start. “I’ll be there.”

That week drags no matter what I do to pass the time. I go shopping for some new clothes, to wear in front of a band. This includes a tight pair of black jeans which fit like they were made for my body. Every chance I get, I sing every single song on that set list. I even attempt to learn them on piano, not because I think I need to but to further my own education as a songwriter. I love picking apart the notes and learning the chords. Nothing is more rewarding when, after frustrating minutes of floundering, I finally hit the right keys. I end up playing more by ear than by sheet music.

I work at Cynzia’s part-time during the week like I had been. Everyone there thinks I’m still working for the consulting firm. Little do they know I’m working even harder trying to crush the material given to me for the next step in my audition process.

The only thing I don’t do is call Lori. She’s not calling me either, so I know this is probably just a power play, to see which one caves first. I hate games like this. I thought she was above it.

The more I think of how she hadn’t really supported my dreams, even before Susan died, I can’t really deny that I have been unhappy with things between us for a long, long time. Worse, she never seemed to care. Almost from the moment Susan was buried, Lori has been single-minded in our pursuit to “make it better.” We renovated the house, we upgraded our jobs, and she tried her best to get me involved in higher education.

If that had been the life I wanted, it all would have been a dream.

I thought about that moment in the loft in SoHo, when the guys virtually wrote my backup music to my song, fleshing it out into a living thing I could hear outside my own head. From that moment I knew that I would never be content with her dream.

My only hope now was that she’d see how hard I had been working. Then maybe she’d know that I really do have what it takes to make this work, at least enough to give it a real shot.

I realize of course this hard work has more to do than just getting into a band. I have something to prove, to the guys in Yael’s band, to Lori… and to myself.

I decide to work out my act at Fritz’s. We don’t mention that kiss in her car, or her new man, when I ask Pam if I might use the small stage to hone my performance. I could have done it at home, of course, but I gravitate there because of anyone I know, she is the only one who doesn’t treat my dream to be a singer like it’s some kind of joke. And I need her voice in my ear to drown out all the naysayers who have planted their nuggets of negativity for months.

Like I suspected, when I tell her what kind of chance I have, she wants to help. Maybe she still feels guilty about that kiss, or that she never told me about her other guy. Either way, though technically the karaoke is only utilized on the weekends, she opens the bar early to me every single day so that I can work out a stage routine while they prep for the night ahead.

Pam makes a great groupie. Her face is so expressive when I target her from the stage that it becomes a challenge to see how far I can go. I can’t help but wonder what it might look like if I actually fucked her. I don’t know why the thought jumps in my brain, but I can’t get it out once it’s in there. And knowing that she’s off limits only makes it hotter for me. Since we both know nothing can happen, I indulge it during the performance, doing my best to make her blush as I openly seduce her from the stage, like mental foreplay.

By Friday morning, I’m worked up in more ways than one.

I catch a cab into town, where I meet up with the guys at Yael’s loft. Everyone is in great spirits, though I’m pretty sure that both Felix and Bobby are chemically enhanced. Yael is a straight-edge vegan, so I know his head is clear.

When Bobby offers me a drink, and Felix offers me a puff, I turn them down. I want my mind just as clear when I take that stage.

We get to Seedlings at ten before ten that night. We go onstage at midnight, but Yael wants to see how the crowd is reacting to the other bands in the lineup. It’s essentially a local music night. Seedlings is great about cultivating raw, untapped talent, giving them a place to play so they can turn into polished performers, hence the name. It’s where amateurs like me pay their dues.

Getting there so early doesn’t really help my nerves. I feel like a stallion locked up in the starting gate. I really want a drink to steady my nerves, but I know better. I head to the bar to order a bottle of water instead. “Hey, Micah,” I say to the familiar bartender.

“Vanni,” he says with a smile. “What brings you to the city?”

I’m with the band
. “I thought I’d check out the new music,” I say. “Is Lori here? I haven’t seen her.”

“She’s around here someplace. Check the parking lot. She’s been taking her breaks out there lately.”

I nod, take my bottle of water and head out to the private parking lot for the staff and talent out back. I spot her car easily. For some reason it makes me think of sitting in Pam’s car, particularly the night I stole a kiss that wasn’t mine to take. She was right to pull away. Things are so complicated, and I’m not really free. I do owe Lori something for all she has done for me since Susan died. So what if she hasn’t called me since she left? We mattered to each other for all this time, there has to be something left.

I start to take one step towards it and then decide I better not. Instead of telling her, yet again, what this dream means to me, I’d rather show her. I honestly can’t wait to see her surprised face when I take the stage. I’m glad she’s getting her break out of the way early. Now I know she won’t miss it.

But just as I turn back to the bar I realize that the obscured car on the other side of hers is rocking.

My brow creases as I snake my way through the cramped parking lot towards the red compact car Lori purchased to get her back and forth to Brooklyn. The closer I get, the more detail I can make out about the car parked right next to it. The black sports car is brand new, with dealer tags still on the back, and it has a large figure sitting in the driver’s seat, which I can barely make out through the foggy windows.

Everything sets off warning bells. Is this some big, rich muscle-head dude jacking off while watching my girl listen to music? Weirder things have happened in New York. Maybe she was nice to him in the club and he followed her out to the car. I’ll fucking kill him if he even thinks about touching her.

Of course, the closer I get, the more I can see that it’s not just one person sitting in the driver’s seat, it’s two. The couple is clearly fucking, with the smaller of the two, presumably the female, riding the person sitting in the driver’s seat.

That’s not the most shocking discovery I make. As I round Lori’s car, I spot the familiar parking permit hanging from the rearview mirror, one specifically made for McKinley, Donnelly and Roth. It sways back and forth with their zesty lovemaking, no doubt a quickie before she has to rush back inside to finish her shift.

I hear the woman’s screams, which sound so goddamned familiar it cracks my heart before I can make out the detail through the fogged glass. My good-girl Lori, who had always pushed me away whenever I tried to cop a feel or steal a kiss anywhere near her job, now calls out the name of another man. “Fuck me, Tony!”

I stumble backwards, backing right into another car. I can’t look away, even if I want to. My girl straddles my best friend, giving him the fucking of a lifetime right in the parking lot where she works like some common whore.