Monday, September 16
I
leaned on the wall, cradling the receiver of a payphone in one hand, chewing on
the right side of my lip and shaking my right boot heel side to side. Two
rings, three…four…I glanced at my watch nervously. It was only six-thirty…we
were in the same time zone…
“Hello?”
She sounded breathless, but just the mere sound of her voice was enough to ease
all the tension in my shoulders. My boot heel stopped kicking the wall.
The
rather bored operator droned in my ear. “Would you accept a collect call from…”
“Yes,
yes, definitely.”
“Thank
you for using Western Bell .”
“So,
how’s it goin’ eh?” she asked, sounding like a cast member of SCTV.
“What
took you?” I asked. My house isn’t that big and I have a phone in almost every
room…And why are you breathing so heavy? And
when I did I become so insecure? Jesus.
I couldn’t tell if she was
suppressing laughter or huffing at me in annoyance. “I was doing the pool man.”
“I
don’t have a pool.”
“That’s
what I kept trying to tell him, but he insisted we should get one so he could
keep coming back.”
I
started to laugh. “I’ll get one just so I can drown his ass in it.”
“I
was doing laundry downstairs,” she explained.
“Let
Marietta do
that,” I suggested. “That’s what I hired her for.”
“I’m
sorry, I couldn’t help myself.”
Wait a
minute…“There’s a phone in the garage.”
“It doesn’t work.”
“It doesn’t?
“Nope.”
Something I’d have
to fix when I got home. Married life begins…
“Laundry.
You’re that bored?”
“My
mother’s coming.”
Oh…shit.
“I thought she was coming when your Dad was.”
“That
fell through. She wanted to come on her own.”
Brilliant.
My mother-in-law in my house when I wasn’t there. That was almost as bad as
having my regular mother in my house
when I wasn’t there. “Hide the pot and the porn,” I said, half-jokingly.
“We
have porn?”
I
guess she hadn’t figured out where everything in the closet was yet. “Never
mind.”
“Anyway,
she wanted to come spend some time with me alone before all this stuff starts,”
she said. “And I think she wants to check out my new living arrangements for
herself.”
“She
gonna try to talk you out of it?” I planted my back against the wall, glancing
down the hall to my left as stage techs wandered in and out of the corridor.
“Don’t
think so. She approves of you.”
“Hmm.”
“What’s
really bothering you?”
She
was getting way too good at this. Now she could read my thoughts over the
phone. Just like my mother. Do they take women aside at a young age and teach
them how to weasel into a man’s brain?
I
tried to fake it. “Why would anything be bothering me?”
“I
can hear it,” Season said. “You’ve got that ‘thing’ in your voice.”
“I
don’t have a ‘thing’ in my voice.”
She
didn’t speak for minute, and I could see her sitting in the living room, curled
in the papasan chair, that “I got your number” look on her face.
I
sighed heavily in defeat. “I’m just worried about you there by yourself. Out in
the boonies and everything.”
“No
worse than a bayou,” she said. “And Arizona doesn’t have alligators.”
“I
just…” That wasn’t what I was worried about, and I was certain she knew that.
What had happened over the weekend still made my nerves itch. “Just be careful
when you go out. Y’know, don’t let anyone give you any shit about…stuff.”
“What
stuff?”
I
grumbled inwardly, pinching the bridge of my nose. “In a lot of ways Phoenix is
a small town. People…talk about things they don’t know anything about.”
“A
lot like New Orleans,” she answered. I loved how she could make it sound like
one word, “N’awlins.” Her accent wasn’t as heavy as her bass player Rick’s, but
every so often I’d hear it in certain words and it did strange things to my
body. “I’m not worried about that.”
But I am. Someone will come up and say something and I won’t be there to defend
myself…or her “Just don’t…don’t…”
“Don’t
what? Jon, I’m a big girl. I can take care of myself.”
That
she could. But I was…letting the stupid comments of four of my friends, and
this psycho Indian girl that I knew, screw with my head. I propped a shoulder
against the payphone and watched as venue security escorted some girls in tight
clothes to the meet and greet in the green room. They giggled as they passed
me.
“Ooh,
there’s Jon!”
“God,
he’s hot!”
I
smiled, gave a finger wave, and as soon as they were gone, I rolled my eyes.
They needed to get over themselves. One of them had really great legs…I’m not looking…
“I
really miss you,” I said into the phone.
She
laughed. “It’s only been what…thirty-six hours?”
With
only 132 more to go before I got home Sunday. Suddenly I could picture her,
wearing the same denim mini-skirt I’d just seen on that brunette and nothing
else but her engagement ring and some glossy red lipstick…I was gonna have a
hard time being away from her, not that I was really interested in the vast
array of females that surrounded me whenever I went on the road, but…well…
Being
a road musician is a life many people don’t understand. I love to play. I love
to get on stage and be adored by thousands of people, male and female alike.
But then there’s those moments when you come offstage, and you’re wired and hot
and sweaty and the first thing you want to do is kick back a cold alcoholic
beverage or toke on a reefer then lay down with someone soft and beautiful who
claims she’s worshipped you since she first saw you and would do anything to
please you for just one night…
Been
there, done that. Many times. It was pretty frickin’ awesome for some guy who
was a short, scrawny, four-eyed nerd with Groucho Marx eyebrows and a Dudley
Do-Right chin. Well, maybe I’m exaggerating about the eyebrows and the chin,
but I was self-conscious about my looks for years because I never felt I looked
as good as my dad, who was tall and fair like Robert Redford and I…wasn’t. But
one day I picked up a bass guitar and let my hair grow some, and suddenly I had
them walking up and grabbing my ass, asking me to play Rush songs so they
could…
Dammit. There she was again. The real
reason I’d called.
“Just
steer clear of anyone who’s says they’ve been with me,” I said finally. “You
know they’re probably lying.”
“I
know that,” she said. “Did you forget that the guys in my band deal with this
same thing? Clint’s practically a virgin, but if we were to tally up how many
women have claimed to be with him in New Orleans alone, he would have never had
time to start the band.”
It
was true. And fan mail is the greatest evidence you have of proving someone’s
true sexual worth in a band. That and a tour schedule. If Steve had truly been
with all of the women who said they slept with him, he would have
had to have been in four cities at once and done at least fifty girls per day. How
he’d loved to be able to do that…but it was funny how our talent agency’s
secretary can keep up with that stuff. Supposedly I’d fathered at least five
children in Boston, Massachusetts alone. And I didn’t even sleep with anyone in
Boston , Massachusetts
“I’m
fine, Jon, really,” Season finally said. “Besides, my mama will be here to
protect me.”
“Okay,”
I relented. “And don’t let that pool guy in anymore.”
“Bummer.
You’re so mean.”
I
laughed aloud, wanting to go home so badly I could taste…her. “Well, I gotta
draw the line somewhere.”
“I
love you,” she said.
I
drew in deep breath, her words like oxygen. Don’t
ever stop saying it… “I love you, too.”
“See
you soon.”
“I’ll
call Wednesday,” I said. “I won’t have time tomorrow.”
“I’ll
be here.”
You better be… “Bye.” And no pool man.
“Au revoir, ma cher.”
“Oh,
shit, don’t do that.” Morticia Addams again. Maybe I could get her a really
tight black dress to wear, too…
“See
ya, moron.”
I want to go home.
“Mama,
you didn’t have to bring all this stuff.” She brought in yet another box from
the backseat of her mother’s Buick. “You shouldn’t have driven all this way by
yourself. You should’ve just let Daddy bring it all.”
“I
been drivin’ a lot longer than you have, chere.” Nadine Cooper smoothed a stray
hair back from her forehead, throwing a long, black braid over one slim
shoulder. “An’ yo daddy an’ me hitchhiked all da way from Shreveport to Needles once.”
“That
was in the sixties, Mama.” Season dropped the box in front of the window
looking out into the front yard, just behind the chairs in the living room.
“It’s more dangerous now.”
“Not
if you know where to stay away from,” her Creole mother answered. “I made it
just fine and I’ll make it back just fine.” She surveyed the house, with its
high cathedral ceiling, stone double fireplace, and hodgepodge furniture. She
glanced up the stairs to the open loft bedroom. “Just the one bedroom upstairs?
And it’s all open like dat?”
Season
cringed somewhat, thinking about what she’d been doing in that one bedroom for
the last few days. She missed that Jon wouldn’t call today…just to hear him say
one word would’ve been enough.
“It’s
a loft,” she said simply.
“Dat’s
gon’ be a problem when you start havin’ children.”
Oh,
brother. Why is it mothers are so damn anxious to be grandmothers? “We’re not
having children,” Season said, wiping her hands on her shorts and starting
toward the kitchen. “Would you like some coffee, Mama?”
“Not
at all?” Nadine followed her daughter.
“I
didn’t say that.” Season reached into a cabinet to retrieve a can of chicory coffee.
“We just…we’d rather wait.”
Actually,
she and Jon hadn’t discussed children, period. They were still just kids
themselves…oh, no, here it comes…
“You
don’t think he’d make a good father?” Nadine settled her slender frame onto a
barstool, resting her elbows on the butcherblock countertop of the center
island. “He has ‘dose fits o’ temper you tol’ me ‘bout.”
“He’d
make an excellent father.” Season spooned coffee grounds into the coffee maker,
regretting that she’d ever told her mother about Jon being ill last summer. She
was beginning to understand his issues with his own mother. She really hadn’t
had issues with hers, until she up and decided to marry someone she’d basically
just met. “I don’t think we’re ready to be parents. We’ve got our careers to
think about.”
“Hmm.”
Nadine was still taking in the environment, rustic and earthy and in desperate
need of a woman’s touch, though she doubted her only daughter would provide
much of that. She’d raised her to be ladylike, yes, as any good Southern mother
would, but Season was not one to consider decorating a home a high priority.
The girl had eclectic tastes and was more worried about recording a new song
than she was about things looking pretty all the time. She was more practical,
like her father.
There
was silence for moment.
“Do you think
you’re ready to even get married?”
Season bowed her
head for a moment, fighting back the urge to lash out. Hadn’t Jon heard this
same thing just the other day? Wasn’t that why he asked her if she thought they
were getting married too soon? Everyone had cheered them on all summer, hoping
they’d be together, and now all they could do was make them doubt their
decision to make it permanent. She stabbed her finger into the “on” switch of
the coffeemaker and turned to face her mother.
“I love Jon and I
want to marry him,” she said. “Whether we’re ready or not, we’re doing this.”
Nadine raised her
chin, admiring her daughter’s strength, but worrying about it at the same time.
“I’m just askin’, Season.”
“I know what I’m
doing, Mama.”
“He doesn’t mind
that you have your career, too?” she asked, knowing full well how men could be
when their wives were more financially independent than they were. And she also
didn’t want to see such awesome talent go to waste because there was a husband
to worry about. One that had…issues. “You’ve worked so hard…”
The singer squared
her shoulders. “Our careers are what brought us together. He supports
everything I do, just like I do for him.”
Nadine laced her
long, thin fingers together and leaned forward some more. “You’re gon’ be away
from each other a long time, y’know.”
“Yes, I know
that…”
“And he was so
anxious to set the date,” she went on, raising her eyebrow. “Is dere som-ting
you need to tell me?”
Season was
confused for a moment, then she remembered that comment about children, and was
angry. “Mom, you put me on the pill when I was fourteen! I wasn’t even having
sex then! And didn’t for nearly five years! I’ve been taking hormones for so
long I probably can’t get pregnant!”
“I’m just makin’
sure.”
Season was almost
furious. Last summer, when they’d played New Orleans, when she’d brought him to
the store to meet her mother and Mama Claree, her mother’s questions had had a different
tone.
“So,” she’d asked,
as Mama Claree led him into the back room to read his fortune. “You haven’t
been to bed wid him yet.”
“What?” Was that
really any of her business? I’m
twenty-two years old for God’s sake…How would she even be able to tell
that? Oh, well, she should know the answer to that, her mother and grandmother
had been “reading” people for years. “Mama…”
“I can tell.” She
took her daughter’s face between her cool, smooth palms and looked into her
eyes. “You have longin’ in your eyes. And apprehension. If you’d made love, I’d
see fire there. Satisfaction.”
Season had sighed
in frustration, mainly sexual, because she desperately longed to feel his body,
his hands, his mouth…but was still afraid…of secret things in her past her
mother didn’t even know about, or at least she hoped she didn’t know. The intense
want she did feel had been growing stronger and stronger since the first touch
of his hand, and she feared the consequences if she gave in to him with as much
reckless abandon as she wanted to, letting him take her every way he could,
lose herself in what he could do. She saw it in his eyes, tasted it in his
kiss, how much he loved her, wanted her…she could drown in it and never want to
come up for air.
And her mother
could read that, too.
“You’re crazy in
love wid him,” Nadine had said, glancing toward the red curtain that separated
the fortune room from the rest of the store. “It’s easy to see why.”
“He’s so
beautiful, Mama. I’ve never met anyone like him.”
And now here she
was, only two months later, ready to make the biggest commitment a man and a woman
could make to one another, even after everything else they’d been through. And
if they could get through that, they
could get through anything.
At least she hoped
they could.
“I
love him so much, Mama,” she said as the coffeemaker shut down. “He means the world to me.”
Nadine
smiled. “I know that, chere. And don’t ever forget that you said that.”
Wednesday, September 18
Season
drove her mother into Phoenix
the next day, to have lunch at Pischke’s Paradise
in Scottsdale with
Carmen Nelson, Tarax’s publicist, and now her band’s also. The main topic of
discussion was how to handle publicity for the wedding, which Carmen warned was
going to be a challenge. The entertainment wires wanted exclusive coverage, but
Carmen insisted on carrying out the young couple’s wishes: highly limited
coverage of the ceremony itself, with just a little more exposure at the
reception. And the honeymoon? No one
even knew where they were going. “An undisclosed location” was the code word.
Nadine
was bothered by her daughter’s appetite, or lack thereof. “Why are you not
eatin’?”
“I’m
trying to stay slim for the pictures, Mama.” Although Perry was gone, she’d
grown accustomed to the months of abuse at his hands, his unnecessary comments
about her weight, which was only about one hundred and ten pounds: “Don’t eat
that, or your ass’ll be the size of the bus. We won’t even be able to get you
on it.” It was still hard for her to enjoy a large meal.
“Honey,
you’re almost too thin, still.” Carmen laid a slim, dark-skinned hand over
Season’s pale arm. “Perry’s gone. You can eat now.”
The
singer closed her eyes briefly. “I know. It just got to be such a habit.”
“Besides,
every woman’s beautiful on her wedding day.” Carmen leaned back in her seat,
and finished her glass of chardonnay. “And I know you will be. Have you chosen
your dress?”
“Mama
and I are going looking this afternoon.”
“Oh,
I wish I could come along. What’s Jon’s gonna wear? You think you’ll actually
be able to get him into a tux? He’d look damn good in one, the stinker.”
Season
shook her head. “I don’t know. A tux just isn’t his style…”
The
topic of wedding attire dragged on a bit, then Season happened to hear a husky
female voice from the booth behind her, carrying through the jungle of plants
just over the top of her head.
“…My
God, you can’t go anywhere in town without seeing them or hearing about them. Local rock star to wed at mountain hideaway.
It’s enough to make you sick…”
Another
woman joined in, a moderate-toned voice. “Especially after the two of them were
rolling around on stage screwing each other at that show in Los Angeles…”
“They
weren’t screwing each other,” chimed in yet another female, with a
high-pitched, slightly angelic voice. “They were just…”
“Slobbering
all over each other like they always do in public,” said the first woman, with
the voice like that of Lauren Bacall’s. “I heard about how they couldn’t keep
their hands off one another at Anton Greeley’s party last Friday.”
“I
think it’s kinda romantic,” said Woman Number Three. “They’re so in love. And
she’s so beautiful and he’s…” She sighed deeply. “He’s gorgeous. He’s actually
better looking than Steven Ivey.”
“Steven
Ivey looks like a girl,” said the second woman, with the flat, boring
Midwestern non-accent. “But Jon Warren’s all man.”
“And
they’re not in love, Vonda,” the Lauren Bacall sound-alike said. “That’s all a
publicity stunt. They’re probably not even getting married for real.”
“It’s just to sell more records,”
added Miss Midwest. “They’ll do anything to do that.”
“That’s why they
sing all those nasty songs about death and sex.” Lauren Bacall sounded like
she’d just lit up a cigarette. “I saw them play at the Canyon years ago, before
they hit it big. They were all pretty wasted afterward. Especially that guitar
player.”
“He’s a great
player, Lynette,” said Vonda. “He was listed as one of the top players in the
world by some music magazine.”
“He’s probably
going to prison,” Lynette, the smoker, answered. “After he killed that girl in
that accident last summer.”
“Didn’t I read
that it wasn’t his fault? That he wasn’t driving the car?” Midwest Girl asked.
“Another lie, I’m
sure, Kate,” Lynette said. “Just so he can get off. Anyway, when I saw them at
Canyon, they were pretty good. And that Steve, of course, was all over every
girl in the place…”
“He is attractive,” swooned Vonda.
“And I tried to
speak to Jon, but he acted like some pompous ass.” Lynette was blowing smoke in
the air. “Like he was too good to even talk to me.”
“Were you trying
to come on to him?” Vonda asked innocently.
Lynette snorted.
“Maybe. But he said he was taken.”
“Really?” Kate
asked. “He had a girlfriend?”
“I guess. Some
dark-headed girl. Looked a lot like that hick Cajun thing he’s supposedly
engaged to now.”
“Oh, you’re just
jealous!” Vonda giggled. “He was right to turn you down anyway, back in those
days.”
“No man ever
turned me down in those days,” Lynette countered hotly. “He pissed me off.”
“Means he’s
faithful,” Vonda said. “That Season Trovisar’s a lucky girl.”
“Humph. Whatever.
There’s no way their relationship is real. It’s all a big scam.”
“A man who plays
in a band like that could never really be in love,” Kate went on. “And I’ll bet
that’s not even her voice on her album. They just put some woman out there who
looks good. I’ll bet her tits aren’t even real.”
“And she’s
probably been passed around a few times, too,” Lynette put in. “I’ll bet she’s
done every guy in Tarax as well the guys in her own band.”
“Isn’t one of the
guys in her band her cousin?” Vonda asked.
Lynette laughed.
“Well, they are from Louisiana . Bunch of
inbreeds.”
Season listened to
the entire conversation quietly, ignoring Carmen and her mother.
“That’s just
talk,” Carmen said. “They’re just jealous bitches gossiping.”
“Don’t let dat get
to you, chere,” Nadine added. “They don’ know what dey’re talkin’ ‘bout.”
On the other side
of the philodendrons Lynette laughed again. “Even if they do get married,
there’s no way in hell they could stay faithful to one another. They’ll be
screwing other people the minute they go on the road. I doubt they’ll even live
together…”
Season stood up.
“Since he lives in
town, are you gonna go looking for him again?” Kate asked Lynette.
“Maybe. I’ll show
that bastard what he passed up…”
There was suddenly
dead silence at the ladies’ table.
“I’m sorry to
interrupt,” Season said coldly. “But I couldn’t help overhearing.”
Vonda, a willowy,
pale blonde whose face matched her angelic voice, dropped her jaw to her chest.
“Aren’t you…?”
Season raised an
eyebrow. “I am.”
“You’re so
little.” Kate was an average looking woman with short brown hair cut like Molly
Ringwald’s. She looked at her lunch partners with embarrassment. “I’m sorry, we
didn’t realize…”
Lynette was eyeing
the singer with the same indignation she’d exuded while making her comments.
“Well, look who it is. How are wedding plans coming along?”
“Just fine, thank
you,” Season answered, the tips of her fingers tingling with rage. She stared
the second blonde woman with the really big hairdo, Lynette, straight in the
eye. “I just wanted to let you know, that my wedding is not a publicity stunt, it is
my voice on my album, and my tits are real.
You wanna feel ‘em?” She stood as tall as her heeled sandals would allow,
thrusting out her chest, only the slightest bit of cleavage peeking over the
bodice of her blue and green floral-printed dress.
Lynette shook her
head. “That’s not necessary.”
“And if you ever
go anywhere near Jon Warren again, I’ll own your ass. You got me?”
The blonde woman
lifted her chin in defiance. “As if I would.”
Season tried to still
the hard thud of her pulse in her ears. “Have a good day, ladies.” She tossed
her hair over her shoulder and headed for the door. “Let’s go, Mother.”
Then she turned
again to the women. “And by the way, I’m Creole. Not Cajun.”
The phone rang at twelve a.m. that night.
“Are you in bed?”
Ooh, his voice. Like the deep rumble of bass guitar strings, played high on the
fretboard…not too deep, not too high…
“Yes.”
“What are you
doing?”
“Actually, I’m
reading.”
“Penthouse Letters?”
“You wish.”
“I do wish. That
it was a letter about me and you.”
“Maybe I’ll write
one.”
He laughed, and
changed the pitch of his voice to sound like a little boy. “Would you please?”
She curled her
arms around his pillow, able to smell his scent though he was miles away. Citrus,
amber, musk, sandalwood…she loved smelling it on her hands after they’d been
tangling together in the sheets all night. “I miss you.”
“Four more days.”
He paused for a moment. “Is anything wrong?”
She didn’t answer
at first, mainly because the lunch conversation she’d heard still stung and she
didn’t want him to get upset if she told him about it.
“I overheard some
women gossiping today…”
He swore under his
breath. “I told you not to let that get to you. You know how people are…”
“I know, I know.
And it wasn’t about you and some old girlfriend…” Well, not really… “But they were talking about how this whole thing
is a publicity stunt and we don’t really love each other…”
“We knew that
would happen,” he said. “People are going to think all kinds of things that
aren’t true.”
“I just don’t want
it to change things,” she said. “I don’t want us to start believing it.”
There was a
strange silence on the other end of the line for a moment. “Why would we ever believe that stuff?”
Oh, crap. That didn’t come out right, Jon.
I’m sorry. “I…I’m just…nervous, I guess. I’m not used to hearing those
kinds of things about myself.”
“What did they
say?”
She could hear it,
the steeliness that cropped up in his tone, the tiger fur bristling. She gave a
brief rundown, ending with her interruption.
There was laughter
in his response. “Did you hit her with a chair?”
“No, but I wanted
to.”
“Then we’ll be
okay. Just blow that shit off. They’re just a bunch of dumb whores anyway.”
She picked up a
framed photograph on the nightstand, a picture of the two of them taken
backstage at the Forum the afternoon before he proposed to her. He was seated
in a chair, she straddled on his lap, his hands resting on her waist, hers on
his shoulders, their noses touching. That
was no publicity stunt. That was him reassuring her that he’d take care of
everything in her life from that moment forward, and so far, he’d made good on
that promise. She listened to him breathe through the phone, wishing
desperately that he was beside her in this bed, their bed, now, covering her body with his and joining with her,
his lips sucking at her skin, his hands caressing every curve...
“You’ll be okay?”
His question
jerked her out of her fantasy. “Yes. I’ll be fine.”
“You pick out your
dress?”
“I did. But you
can’t see it until the wedding.”
“I know.”
“Everyone seems to
be worried about what you’re gonna
wear...”
“Oh, I’ll be
presentable. You know my mother will see to that.”
“I’m sure she
will.”
Soon the phone
call was over, after more chit chat about the wedding and some pseudo-phone-sex
banter, but after the heartfelt “I love you’s” at the end, she buried her face
into his pillow again and tried to sleep, more restless than before.
Thursday, September 19
One more meet and
greet…Winnipeg , Manitoba …we’d been trying to catch the PMRC
hearings on CNN when we could. It was hilarious to watch Dee Snider waltz into
a Senate hearing room, dressed in denim and a Twisted Sister t-shirt, his curly
blonde and black-streaked hair making his huge frame even more formidable.
Frank Zappa, looking pretty dapper in his dress suit, John Denver decked out
like the Rocky Mountain High toker. It was bizarre to say the least. And it
made all of us want to slap Tipper Gore straight into heavy metal hell. She was
just in need of a really good banging. Steve wanted a phone number he could
call, ready to make the ultimate proposition.
“I’ll mess up that
blonde helmet hairdo but good,” he said.
It was even
funnier to hear a tiny, elderly woman spouting the lyrics to “Shock Me.
“Way to go,
granny!” Randy saluted the television with his beer bottle. “Just what you need
to brighten your day!”
“My grandmother would sound sexier
reading those lyrics,” I said.
“It’s only because
of her accent, Jonny-bear,” Terry thumped my head with a drumstick, making his
usual sacrilege of my grandmother’s nickname for me. “Nothing like a
French-Canadian grandma to rock your world.”
I just shook my
head. “Warning labels are only gonna make it worse,” I said. “And they’re still
bringing up bands no one’s even heard of. Nobody would’ve known about some of
this stuff if these Washington wives hadn’t started snooping around.”
I wondered if
Season was watching, and longed to make yet another collect call. I dreaded my
next phone bill. Maybe I shouldn’t buy her that second car…
The meet and greet
was the usual stuff. Row after row of young, beautiful women questioning my
latest personal venture, and the more attention I got the more Steve acted like
an ass. Tonight was no exception.
Quite by accident,
I was the last member of the band to file in to the conference room, only
because Barry had stopped me to discuss some more ideas about the “Shock Me”
video shoot, that would not feature me or Season, but Steve and a model from Toronto . That had
alleviated Steve’s angst some, but when I finally strolled in, the crowd
screamed louder for me than they had the others, so much so that Terry actually
turned and said, “Jeez, man, I thought Superman had just flown in.”
It was a little
embarrassing, even for me. Steve had been first in, inciting the first round of
applause, then Randy, Bryon, and Terry. But when I came out, the whole place
went nuts.
“I didn’t plan it
that way, Terry,” I whispered as we took our seats behind a long table covered
with stack of glossy photos and boxes of Sharpies. “Neither did Barry.”
“Still, everybody
is really loving you!”
That may be, but
it made Steve even more…flamboyant than usual. He began to speak louder, become
more grandiose in his gestures. It was like he was trying too hard to be a rock
star.
Meanwhile, I
endured the third degree.
“When’s the
wedding?”
“Next month.”
“You two look
great together.”
“Thanks.”
“Thanks.”
“Where’s the
honeymoon?”
“Not telling.”
“Can we come,
too?”
“Don’t think so.”
It went on and on
and on. Then a really attractive older woman, at least older than the teenage
lot pouring through the room, managed to slip behind the table and actually
whispered in my ear.
“I have something
for you.”
For a minute I
thought maybe she worked for the hotel, and that I had a message from the front
desk, but that was not the case. She just managed to weasel her way in, to
“give” me something.
She slipped her
room key into my left jeans pocket, and slowly walked away.
I could feel my
face burn.
Terry leaned over.
“Who was that?”
“I don’t know.” I
took the key out of my pocket and handed it to him. “You take it.”
His eyebrows shot
up. “What the hell!?” He casually placed it in his own pocket. “You sure, man?
You could have a little bit of fun before you…”
“Shut up and shut up now,” I grumbled under my breath, as I scribbled my name across an older copy of our first album one of our guy fans had brought. “I don’t want to do that and you know it. Now would you guys please get off my damn back?”
“Shut up and shut up now,” I grumbled under my breath, as I scribbled my name across an older copy of our first album one of our guy fans had brought. “I don’t want to do that and you know it. Now would you guys please get off my damn back?”
He just curled his
lips into a goofy, juvenile grin. “I don’t think you trust yourself.”
I threw him a
scowl. “You don’t know shit.”
He made some kind
of “tsk, tsk” sound. “It’s a damn shame you’re going down so young…”
“Terry…”
“We’ll see if you can hack it,” he giggled. “But I know you, man. You may think you’re the noble, faithful hero, but you’ve got weaknesses, man. Not as bad as some, but you’ve got ‘em.”
“Terry…”
“We’ll see if you can hack it,” he giggled. “But I know you, man. You may think you’re the noble, faithful hero, but you’ve got weaknesses, man. Not as bad as some, but you’ve got ‘em.”
I was so glad I
was on medication. Or I probably would’ve killed him.
We arrived at Thunder Bay , Ontario at four a.m. , making it two a.m. in Phoenix .
“Yes, I’ll
accept.”
“Thank you for
using…” The operator’s voice faded.
“I’m sorry. I know
it’s late, but I couldn’t call sooner and you know Barry’s not letting us use
his mobile because we’re out of the country.”
“I know that,” she
yawned.
“I didn’t mean to
wake you up, but I just had to…”
“Had to what?” I
heard the sound of the bed creaking as she rolled over, the sound of sheets
rustling. Dammit, dammit, dammit…why
couldn’t I be home sooner?
“Hear your voice.”
“What’s the
matter?”
“Nothing.” Everything. I’ve got women giving me their room keys, I’m hot for you every second…
it’s not like it was on the road last summer before I met you and I wasn’t
having sex, because I didn’t want to
have sex with anybody until I met you…and Terry’s a stupid ass, making me think
of things I haven’t done in ages…
“I just miss you.”
“I miss you, too.”
She was humoring me, still asleep and not really paying attention. I didn’t
blame her really.
“Is your mother
still there?”
“She’s going home
tomorrow.”
“So we’ll be alone
when I get back?”
“Uh, huh.”
“Thank God.”
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