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

I love it. Sounds exotic and interesting. “Nice to meet you. I’m an aspiring performer myself. I have to say that set was quite inspiring. Maybe I could buy you guys a round and pick your brains about the business.”

The man named Yael chuckles humorlessly. “If you can tie Marty down, more power to you.” He nods off towards the bar, where nearly a dozen girls surround the lead singer. He has his arm around one, while he chats up two or three more. He’s literally got his hands full.

“Girl in every port?” I ask.

“Something like that. It would sell tickets if he didn’t give them all away. He likes to fluff up the crowd with sexy girls at every show. I tell him they’ll buy them, but I think he prefers other types of payment.”

Watching the man named Marty work his groupies, I figure Yael is probably right.

“Just you then,” I say. “You have to tell me about Julliard. That’s like a dream come true for someone like me.”

Yael raises an eyebrow. “You play?”

I shrug. Aunt Susan has tried her best to get me to play an instrument, but I really have no patience for it. “Chopsticks, mostly,” I answer. We laugh.

He looks down at his packed guitars for a moment before he finally says, “Sure, why not? I could use a beer.”

I notice that there are no groupies surrounding the stage for Yael. He seems perfectly happy with that. His fulfillment comes from elsewhere, and that’s a beautiful, fascinating thing. “Let me help you,” I say as I reach for one of the cases. He doesn’t argue, so I carry the case and follow him outside through the exit behind the stage.

The December air turns our breath to frost the moment the heavy steel door closes behind us. Neither of us wears a jacket, so we trot over to his tiny, second-hand car parked close to the building in the private lot. As much as their act had filled the small club, his car is beat to shit. I can see why he’d be miffed that the lead singer gave away so many tickets for free.

As beloved as they seemed to be, they are still living hand to mouth just like I am, busting my ass at Cynzia’s. This realization doesn’t deter me in the slightest. I know that it’s not the fault of the music, but a boneheaded decision on behalf of one of the important members of the band. With the right lead singer, Yael could be selling out venues all over the world. No, shit. He is that good.

We make it back into the bar, where I buy him that promised beer. His hands still shake from the cold outside as he brings the frosty glass to his lips. “Tell me about your band,” I say.

He shrugs as he places the mug back onto the polished bar. “I guess you could say we’re getting there. We’ve done a few demos that have been passed around town. No offers yet.”

“Is that what you want?”

“Isn’t that what we all want?” he shoots back. “I just want to play. I’m never more alive than when it’s just me and that guitar. I can’t stay away from it.” I nod. I completely understand. “So I’d rather work for peanuts doing what I love than make someone else rich. It’s a hard life, but it’s worth it when you hit the right note, or compose the right song.”

“I work at a pizza joint right now,” I tell him, reaching for my own beer. “Singing is the only thing that keeps me sane. If I could do it full time, that’d be a dream come true.”

He glances over me with wise, knowing eyes. “So what’s stopping you?”

I sigh. I ask myself that same question dozens of times a day. “You name it, I’ve got an excuse for it, I guess. I live with my great aunt. She’s in her seventies. She helped take care of me and my mom until my mom passed away. I guess I feel like I owe her something. How can I take away what little income we have left? Just doesn’t seem practical.”

Yael chuckles. “There’s no room in rock music for practicality, my friend. If we were all rational, sane people, we’d get a nice, safe nine-to-five just like everyone else. We live off of the danger. We get an adrenaline rush from the uncertainty. Not a whole lot of people are built to sustain this life, and even fewer people actually make it. Knowing you can do nothing else has to be enough sometimes.”

I nod. I get it.

“One person,” he goes on to say. “That’s all you need. Convince one person you’re a rock star and that person will convince another and another. It’s like a ripple in a pond.” He gestures to Marty, who now sits in one of the booths near the bar, flanked on every side by an adoring fan. “Marty may not be the best singer in the world, but he’s convinced enough people that he’s a star. He believes it, right down to his bones. It fills in all the gaps of mediocrity.”

The comment takes me by surprise. I thought Marty was a decent singer. Or maybe he had convinced me he was with his swagger and stage presence, just like Yael says. It had amped me up and sold me on his rock-n-roll image from the moment he stepped out into the spotlight.

“What about you?” I ask. I can tell by his face that he’s not use that question. It’s almost as if he’s familiar in the anonymous, darkened shadows behind the more dynamic frontman.

He chuckles again. It’s a wry little laugh that immediately makes me smile. “He’s got swagger, I’ve got skill. Whether I play backup for him or backup for some other singer, it doesn’t matter. As long as I get to play.”

“You deserve to play in front of sell-out crowds,” I tell him sincerely. I recognized his skill when he improvised a guitar solo on one of the cover tunes. “He’s not the only one convincing people he’s a rock star.”

Yael shakes his head. “Yeah, I don’t know about all that.”

I hold up my beer mug. “I’m only one person, but you convinced me.”

He mulls over what I said before he clinks his glass to mine. “Guess it’s your turn to go convince someone.”

I glance up towards the VIP section above the stage. “You are absolutely right.” I toss some bills on the bar to pay for our drinks before I head up the spiral stairs to find Lori.

I don’t have to go too far. Tony and Lori begin their descent right as I reach the middle of the staircase. I wait until they reach me. “Early night?”

Both nod. “I get enough of this place when I work,” she says, stifling a yawn. She’s indulged me yet again like the good girlfriend she is. I take her into my arms. “Let’s head back to the house, then.”

She pulls away ever so slightly. “Actually, I’m going to stay in town tonight.” I immediately pout, so she touches my arm to reassure me. “I have an early train to Boston tomorrow. It just makes sense.”

I nod. Her family is from Boston, and I forget that people with large families tend to have other obligations on the holidays. It’s just me and Aunt Susan now. “Sure, okay,” I say, but I still pout.

She giggles and stands on her tiptoes to kiss me on the lips. Even with the extra steps, she has to strain to reach me. I bend happily to meet her halfway. “Maybe I could stay with you tonight,” I murmur against her lips.

She giggles again. “I told you I have to get up early tomorrow. This weekend is going to be chaos. I need some sleep.”

I wrap my arms around her tiny waist. “You can sleep on the train.”

She indulges my passionate kiss for a moment before she finally pulls away. “I’ll see you on Monday,” she promises.

“You need some cab fare?” I offer, but Tony shakes his head.

“Her apartment is on the way to my place. I’ll just give her a ride. If that’s okay.”

I nod. Of course it’s okay. It reassures me to know she’s with someone I trust, someone who can protect her against the mean streets of New York City. Of course, as an Irish-American from Boston, with four older brothers the size of linebackers, I know that despite her diminutive size, Lori is quite capable of taking care of herself. But still, it’s Christmas Eve-Eve and the streets were especially crowded, even with the frigid weather.

“Thanks for everything, man,” I tell him as I envelop him into a bro-hug.

“My pleasure,” Tony says.

“Next time you’ll come to see me play,” I promise with a wide smile.

“I wouldn’t be anywhere else,” he assures me before he takes Lori by the arm and escorts her down the stairs. I glance back to the bar, to see if Yael is still there. Perhaps I’ll join him again. I have no place to be for the next few hours.

But the reclusive guitarist has disappeared, as has the horny front man, Marty. I stay only for one more drink, where I stare at the empty stage the way a homeless guy might stare at a hot meal on somebody else’s table. I want this. I
need
this. I have to make this happen.

When I make it home a little over an hour later, I find Aunt Susan asleep in her chair, a book opened across her lap. My heart fills with love for this woman. She’s the one who gave me the gift of music. There’s only one way to repay her. I have to make myself a huge success so that I can give her the life she deserves. No more waiting on all of us, no more struggling to make ends meet, no more worries that the roof might leak or the plumbing might fail.

I would treat her like a queen. And I knew I would always be her prince.

I kneel down beside her, propped up on my knees as I circle her generous waist with both arms. I’m holding her tight, my head on top of the book on her lap, when she stirs. “Giovanni,” she murmurs as she strokes my hair. “Did you just get home?” I nod but say nothing. “Did you have a good time?”

I lift my head to look at her. “The best.”

A tender smile appears on her face. “Good. You deserve it.”

“You deserve more,” I tell her. “And one day, I’m going to give it to you.”

“Oh, Vanni,” she says as she cups my face with that gnarled but gentle hand. “You already did.”

“I mean it,” I assert. “I wouldn’t even know to sing if it hadn’t been for you.”

She chuckles as she pulls me back into her lap to stroke my hair. I cuddle her closer. “You were born a singer, Giovanni. I just lit the way. If it hadn’t been me, the music would have found you eventually. That’s how destiny works.”

I squeeze her tightly. God, how I needed to believe that. “Do you really mean that? You’re not just saying it, right?”

She whacks me softly on the back of my head with an open palm. “You would really accuse me of lying?”

I shake my head, instantly chagrined.

“Many singers have darkened these doors. They learn all the notes. They can sing perfectly on pitch. But you, my sweet, sweet boy. You have a gift. When you open your mouth to sing, people stop to listen. They know you have something to say, something to share. That’s reason enough to share it whenever you get the chance.”

“Tony and Lori say that I should have a Plan B.”

She plays with my hair for a long moment before she says, “Tony and Lori need a Plan B. Some people just do. There’s nothing you can do about that.” She tips my chin to look me in the eye. “But this isn’t their path to walk, Vanni. You have to do what’s right for you. You follow your heart,
tesorino
. It will never lead you astray.”

I smile at her. “And you’ll still love me if all I’ll ever be is some low-paid singer in a bar?”

She gathers my face in her hands. “I’ll love you till my dying day and beyond, Vanni. Never question that.” There are tears in her eyes, so I wouldn’t dare. “I just want you to be happy. If chasing rainbows makes you happy, chase away. You never know when you might actually catch one.”

I chuckle as I lift up to take her into a warm bear hug. “I’ve already got my pot of gold right here.”

She laughs. “You keep sweet-talking like that and you might just become a star yet.” I know she’s teasing from the glint in her eye. “Someone has got to make it,” she says, bringing the conversation back on point. “Might as well be you.”

I nod. “It might make things hard around here for a while. There’s no steady paycheck in chasing rainbows.”

She shrugs. “We made it before. We’ll make it again. I never want to be the reason you don’t try.”

How could she think such a thing? “You’re the reason I wake up in the morning,” I tell her. Aside from my mother, Aunt Susan is the truest love of my life. “And if I make it, you’ll be the reason why.”

She grabs my chin in her hand. “
When
,” she corrects. “If this is what you want, then it’s up to you to make it happen. I believe in you,” she adds, which fills my heart with joy. Those are about the four best words anyone can say to another. It proves she loves me best of all.

With her on my side, I can’t lose.

I rise to my feet and pull her up to hers. “We have a big day tomorrow,” I tell her. I wrap my arm around her, pulling her close to me as I assist her to her bedroom, accepting no argument this time. “You’re my first groupie,” I tell her with a grin. “I have to take care of you.”

I make sure she is safely tucked into bed before I leave her room. I take the stairs two at a time to my room, where I can shamelessly dream of conquering the world.

The sun burns bright into my bedroom by the time my eyes finally peel apart. After spending much of my night burning the midnight oil, I didn’t fall into bed until sometime before dawn. But it’s totally worth it. I have a list of at least five places to audition. Sure, I don’t expect much to happen until the holidays are over, but I like to have a plan.

There is also a slip of paper on my nightstand, where I have written, half-asleep, lyrics for my very first song. Aunt Susan’s voice lingers in my ear to “
Make it Happen
,” so of course I have to pay homage to my favorite muse with my tentative verse. I find that my words don’t come as easily as hers.

But there’s time to fix all that. After the bustle of our annual Christmas events die down, I can corner Aunt Susan at her old piano to help me pound out a melody for the song. Hopefully I can pick her brain for more nuggets of wisdom.

I smile as I think of how much it will please her to do so. She is my biggest cheerleader–my good luck charm.

I sit up and the cotton sheets slide down my half-naked body. I hadn’t even bothered with pajamas, despite the cold night. I know I have to dress quickly. Susan’s probably ready to dig out her old yard stick to beat some Christmas spirit back into me if I don’t appear downstairs for our traditional Christmas Eve breakfast. My mouth waters just thinking of the hearty holiday meal, which consists of eggs over easy, crispy bacon, sausage and a warm slice of her cranberry coffee cake.

Usually there’s enough for us to nibble on all day so that we can run around like crazy people trying to prepare everything for the big Christmas celebration. This often includes last minute preparations with the choir for the church performance every Christmas Eve, including my customary solo singing “
O Holy Night
” a capella.

When I grab a robe and head into the hall towards the upstairs bathroom, I expect to hear the chaos down below. Even with my mother’s noticeable absence, our neighborhood–and my aunt’s parish–are full of boisterous Italian women ready to pitch in to make enough food to feed an army. And they all prepare like they’re going straight into battle, fending off hunger one ravioli at a time.

It’s a tradition, you see. No matter how cold, snowy or inclement the weather, my Aunt always hosts a holiday meal for everyone in the neighborhood. It starts in the evening, generally around sundown, and goes all the way until we all walk down to the massive church five blocks from the house for midnight mass. Honestly, though, the party starts somewhere around noon.

With a smile, I glance down at my watch. To my surprise, it’s nearly noon. She really must have let me sleep in. I rush to the bathroom to shower and change.

It only takes me ten minutes to rush through my morning routine. Steam fills the hall as I open the bathroom door. I dry my hair with a towel as I skip down the steps. My brow creases as I land on the bottom step. The drapes are still pulled and none of the lights are on, nor is there a fire burning in the small fireplace, all the things I have seen every single Christmas Eve for over ten years.

Even odder, there is no smell of food coming from the kitchen, like there usually is every waking moment of my aunt’s life. I glance towards her door, which is still shut. Before I can turn that direction, someone pounds on the front door.

Maybe she had to go to the market. I was gone all day the day before, so I hadn’t been able to do any last-minute errands for her. Every single Christmas for more than ten years, there have always been errands. And now that Mama was gone, only Susan or I could ensure it was all done.

I smile as I walk to the entryway to pull open the heavy wooden door with the cheerful stained glass panel across the top. I expect to see my elderly aunt with an armful of bags from the market down the street, all those leftover incidentals we always seem to forget until the last minute.

However my face instantly falls when I open the door. It’s not Aunt Susan on the stoop. It’s Mrs. D’onofrio from next door. “Merry Christmas, Giovanni!” she greets with a smile. She juggles four big pans, which I know are full of every comfort food known to Italy. She promptly plops them in my arms. “I would have been here earlier but I swear, the older I get the more scatterbrained I get. Usually Susan calls me to pick something up at the store, which reminds me to get my fanny in gear.” She laughs. “Guess she forgot too.”

I look again towards her closed bedroom door. My gut instantly sinks, but Mrs. D’onofrio practically drags me to the kitchen.

“I’ve prepared all the dishes. They just need to be heated. Since it’s so late now, I guess we should get started.”

She flips on the light in the kitchen, which is as spic and span as the night before. There are no breakfast goodies, leftover from my sleeping in. There is no warm, spicy fragrance of coffee cake rising in the air, long after she had pulled the decadent treat from the oven. And it’s all wrong. Very, very wrong.

Mrs. D’onofrio and I share a startled glance before I dump the pans on the kitchen table with a bang. She grabs my arm as I race from the room and down the hall.

“Vanni!” she calls, but I can’t stop. My heart settles somewhere near my stomach as I reach Aunt Susan’s door. “
She’s asleep
,” I tell myself over and over again. Of course she’s never slept in before, but she was up late last night… waiting for me.

Oh God
…

I don’t even bother knocking on the door. My hand shakes as I grab the knob and turns it, opening to a darkened room, with all the drapes shut tight.

Aunt Susan is still in bed. She faces the window, just like I left her the night before.

“Vanni,” Mrs. D’onofrio says softly from the doorway, but I don’t stop. My feet shuffle towards the bed as I focus on the silhouette of her body under the covers, searching in vain to see the reassuring rise and fall of her chest.

She remains completely still.

Tears pour from my face but I barely notice. “Aunt Susan?” I call, and my strained voice croaks in the quiet stillness of the room.

I round the bed where I can see her face. Her mouth has fallen open, but her lovely, dark eyes are shut. The closer I get, the more I see the purple tint crawling up her neck and towards her face. My knees buckle and I land on the floor next to the bed. A cry of anguish immediately erupts from my soul. From another room I hear Mrs. D’onofrio call 9-1-1.

I can’t even form a coherent thought as my shaking hand hovers over her beautiful, wizened, weathered face.

I was there in the room when my Mama passed at last. She had been in hospice for a week before she died, and every waking moment was spent staring at her, waiting for the moment she’d heave that last breath and depart her earthly dwelling for the great unknown. I didn’t want to miss one minute. I never wanted to have one regret.

Now that sonofabitch Grim Reaper had stolen my last known family away from me in the still of the night… Christmas Eve no less. I didn’t get to say goodbye. I didn’t get to tell her…
thank you
… for all the things she had done for me.

Tears course down my face as I touch her cold skin. It feels like paper underneath my hands. “
Prozia
,” I repeat, hoping that she’d hear me, hoping she’s still near enough to find her way back. She has to come back if I’m being a good boy, right? Isn’t that how this works? The universe can’t be this cruel… it just can’t. “
Ti amo
.
Per favore
,” I say. I want to beg her to stay, and I think I remember what to say but I’m probably mangling every single syllable. My Italian has always been rudimentary at best, something that would make her whack me upside the head sometimes to correct. But I can’t stop. If she can hear me, if she can hear me…

“Vanni,” Mrs. D’onofrio says as she places her hands on my shoulders. “Come on.”

“I’m not leaving!” I scream. I never should have left her the night before. If she had called out in her sleep, I could have helped her.

“Come on. Let me get you some tea.”

“I don’t want any fucking tea!” I bellow at the generous woman who is just trying to be kind. And of course I know that. But I’m so angry. I’m so hollow. Instantly and completely. I just want to rage. My mouth opens and I release one long, angry wail as I clutch the blanket on her bed.

Mrs. D’onofrio sinks to her knees beside me and cradles me as I sob into the blanket. Her hand gently caresses my hair, which is still damp from my shower.

It had been only minutes, but my whole world had changed.

I do not leave the room until the paramedics come, and even then I can only make it to the doorway. Mrs. D’onofrio tries to turn me away, so I can’t watch. The minute they roll her over onto her back, I see that her entire left side is dark purple. I collapse against the door.

“Come on, hon,” Mrs. D’onofrio says. “There’s nothing more you can do here.”

Finally I relent and allow her to guide me out into the living room, which has begun to fill with people. Any other Christmas Eve, those people would have been boisterous and jovial. But it has ceased to be a holiday celebration.

Our time of mourning Susan Luisa Faustino has officially begun.

I sit in her chair in the living room, positioned right next to the humble Christmas tree. The smell of pine races up my nose as mourner after mourner passes by, offering me words of comfort I can’t even hear. It all devolves into some indiscernible hum.

I barely understand when the paramedics tell me that it was a massive coronary, and that she likely went quickly. I think that’s supposed to make me feel better, but it doesn’t. This isn’t the way it’s supposed to go. This isn’t the plan. This can’t be real. Maybe I’m having a weird nightmare. I pray each and every second that Aunt Susan will be nudging me awake, for the holiday we were supposed to have. The kind of holiday we always had.

Instead the nightmare drags painfully on. She stays in that room until the coroner comes, which is mercifully within an hour. I stand on the stoop with other people I haven’t the presence of mind to identify. We all huddle together, fending off the cold and the sorrow as the EMT’s roll the gurney from the house. I hear weeping behind me as someone realizes she’s covered head to toe, as if it is some revelation that she is really gone.

Father Genovese arrives to console me. We sit together in the living room. Someone has prepared hot buttered rum, which I cradle within my hands. I don’t speak much. I may shake my head or nod, but I hear nothing. Words jumble together like perfect nonsense.

Nothing makes sense to me now. Just yesterday…
just hours ago
… I had a plan. I had a dream. I had a
family
. Now I am alone. More alone than I have ever been.

As alone as I feel, it doesn’t take long for people to fill the tiny brownstone to overflowing. Everyone from the neighborhood stops to pay their respects. There’s more food than anyone wants to eat. There are stories, many stories, of Susan and her giant heart. I hear laughter mingle with the sobs as everyone reminisces on the amazing woman who had somehow just left the planet.

Already the world seems smaller without her.

I let the world spin on without me. I watch everyone bustle around the small house as if they are all in fast forward. The hands on the grandfather clock keep spinning, even though my heart stopped beating hours ago. I sit in that chair, staring into the Christmas tree that someone had finally turned on. “She loved Christmas,” I hear someone say.

Their use of past tense punctures my heart.

They are right. She loved Christmas. She loved the hope of it. “Every day of your life should feel like Christmas morning,” she would say.

Tears keep pooling in my eyes. I have no shame as I let them fall. Nothing matters anymore.

It is after six o’clock in the evening before I find the presence of mind to call Lori. But I figure she deserves to have a nice holiday with her family. I can’t just call her and drop this kind of bombshell. Susan would never forgive me.

In the blink of an eye it is nine o’clock, when everyone begins their migration to the church. They need the comfort of those four walls now more than ever. Mrs. D’onofrio sits on the sofa next to me. “You should go. It will make you feel better. Perhaps you could sing in her honor,” she offers but I shake my head.

I’m not sure I can ever sing again. And I know I’ll never sing
that
song again. I can’t, not without her to hear me. 

“Then I can stay,” she says. Again I shake my head.

As nice as everyone has been, I need to be alone. I’m exhausted from their constant attention, as well-meaning as it is. I need to rip off every scab by myself, in private.

Mrs. D’onofrio is not convinced. She purses her lips as she stares at me. I notice how her eyes are bloodshot and her nose is red. This has been a hard day for her too. I struggle to smile as I touch her hand. “Thank you for everything,” I tell her. I will never forget that she was there for me on my most difficult day.

She leans forward and cups my face with her hand. It reminds me so much of Aunt Susan that it rips fresh tears from my eyes. “I’m always here. Right next door if you need me. For anything.”