And there she was, sitting
next to me in my black 80’s Chevy van as we cruised back home through
California state territory - we drove on Route 66 through Wonder Valley. That
she, was Emily. My Emily. She had long blonde hair, striking blue eyes which
you couldn’t see because of her sunglasses. She didn’t wear her leather jacket
as she would usually do - it was a particularly hot day, and I didn’t mind. She
wore a tight ‘n long white tank top instead, that perfectly followed the curves
of her body. Below were just the usual dark skinny jeans and trashed All-stars.
And she was more beautiful than ever - she was pissed at me, and it made her
hot, like smolderingly f*****g hot. I know, I have issues.
She
looked out of the passenger window, just to make sure she couldn’t accidentally
look my way. Her foot was on the dashboard, her elbow out the window, and her
hand troublesomely on her forehead.
“I
still can’t believe you fucked that up, Shawn,” she said to me without even looking
at me.
“C’mon
babe, your dad’s a dick. A f*****g priest would agree with me, still!” I
laughed it off.
“But
he’s still my dad. And this doesn’t make it exactly easy for the both of us. Do
you ever think before you say stuff like ‘I’m having sex with your daughter’
when you’re meeting my father for the first time?”, she still wouldn’t look at
me.
“Oh
yes, I do. Not much, I confess. But when I really want to, I do,” I said as I
looked at her from behind my dark shades, unremarked. “You should have been
there. Your loving dad was frying me like f*****g chicken. You could add up an
apple to the butt, if you want, because that’s how bad it was. You know, your
house is creepy. Damn crosses everywhere.”
“You’re
an idiot,” she only responded. Fine by me, to be honest. This wasn’t remotely
the first time she acted like this. It’s like second nature - a fine mist to
walk through to clear your head with occasional impulses of hate - nothing out
of context, in my opinion.
All
I saw before me was desert. The worst part was behind us, but the heat had
fried Emily pretty good. That last conversation, was actually the first on this
trip. She had slept throughout the first two hundred miles. I liked watching
her sleep. Especially when she would be pissed at me. It granted me the chance
to go through her hair without receiving the usual slap in the face, painful
pull at the ear, or most famously, the mean, clean, punch-the-balls-routine. I
did it a few times on this trip already as we speeded across the hot Arizona
desert on a straight road with nothing more to do than stare and touch.
“Now
what if we run out of money, huh? Then what? My father will see me come!” Emily
suddenly asked me.
“I
told you like a hundred times before; we won’t run out of money because I’ll be
rocking the States within thirty days.”
“Within
thirty days, huh?” She now turned her face to me and lifted her sunglasses - her eyes were mocking. “Like you said a hundred days ago?” She now threw me a
smile - a genuine one, but a smile of satisfaction, pure and only for the sake
of her, and not for me.
“Yes,
I said that, babe. But now, we’re going to Los Angeles! C’mon beautiful, the
City of Angels! Hollywood! First gig, next week,” I said. It was the truth. The
band was on the move. Further and further into the giant sinkhole of the extraordinary.
“Where
is it, then?” Emily shifted her whole body towards me and put the shades on top
of her head so she wouldn’t have to hold it anymore. She wasn’t at ease, as I
hoped she’d be. She held this tight pose, stiff, pressuring… She put the foot
that was on the dashboard on the floor again, knees facing my way. Her arms
crossed each other - closed, but her body language also told me she was
actually interested. About her expectations I was less sure…
“It’s…
in a bar,” I started. “You could call it a café maybe. A restaurant? A diner?”
“Where?”
She repeated stern.
“It’s
a nice place-“
“Where!”
She interrupted me.
“In
the Valley…”
“S**t,
Shawn. Really?!” She said and turned around again. All-stars hit the dashboard.
Without a touch of hands, the shades hit her nose, her eyes went out the
passenger-window again and it was silent. Just like that. She was a miracle,
that one. I remember me a small moment just like this - this… extraordinary.
This… sudden. This… great.
It
was about two years ago. My band, Shades of Strings, was just together for a
month of three. Our first gig was an utter disaster. We ended up playing two
songs before our drummer, Keith, fucked up the rhythm in the middle of a song - our one good song. Our only real song. Our only own song. Imagine, you’re
sitting in the audience. The band starts playing and the songs are covers - no
harm there, in my opinion. And it’s good, great maybe! And then, there’s this
song... You don’t know it yet, but it feels catchy - makes you want to move - really feel the rhythm, and then that exact element is gone and the harmony of
sounds collapses. We stopped playing.
Just
two weeks later, we were just about to do our second gig. Same place, same
crowd, we thought. What I didn’t know then, was that word had gone around town
about our little performance, and it had drawn attention. This, we heard when
we arrived.
As
we were setting up before the show, I met her. Full of confidence she moved
through the half empty bar. She had the same leather jacket as she still wore,
four inch heels and hair that would make the devil dribble -wild blonde with
little locks in front of her shrill blue eyes. She picked her seat, ordered a
round of beer for the group she was with and just sat there, watching us - me,
most out of the four of us, I’m quite sure.
There
were just mocking eyes upon me, I was instantly uncomfortable as I connected
the wires of our instruments, trying not to get them mixed up. I struggled not
to look. She wasn’t hiding her gaze from me, though, oh no. She was just biting
me with her eyes, and I was thunderstruck. Not like she wanted a piece of me, I
felt. Just to see what I was made of - to test me. And it lasted until I was
almost finished setting everything up. Even while sipping beer, she wouldn’t
break. This constant derisive behavior of her made me lose my way, and tripped
over the wires I’d just laid and fell on my a*s on stage.
“I
thought musicians were careful about their equipment,” the mocking voice I’d
imagined she would have sounded a few feet away from me as I sat up. I guess I
looked a little awkward.
“Oh,
believe me, I am, careful. I’m just…” I looked at her as she hung around this
amp at the front of the stage - had laid her head to rest on her arms on the
amp and holding it a little tipsy. And I was speechless as she wore this
strange smile. She was just playing with me, I knew. “-a little out of balance…”
I finally said dreamy.
“I
heard you guys were having some trouble last time,” she said, still holding her
head cunningly to my right.
“Um,
yeah. That would be our drummer. He was… a little lost, I guess,” I told her
honestly. I couldn’t come up with a flawless lie. “But this time we’ll kill
it,” I tried to get the band the appeal it should have. Emily got up from the
amp and held a beer in front of me and I accepted.
“Seeing
before believing,” she said and gave me, again, this mocking smile and she
walked back to the bar. And I was destined to kill it that night. There was no
way I was going to let that happen to me again. And we did kill it. I still
consider - or at least I tell people - that
gig to be our very first gig. We shredded, we pounded and simply killed. We
gave the full on rock show we’d hoped to give - the show of our dreams.
“Are
we there yet?” Emily woke me up from my memory.
“Oh,
you’re talking to me again?” I asked her with a smile.
“Don’t
push it, Shawn,” she said fierce. “So, are we?”
“Just
a few miles of desert left, babe. We’ll be there within the hour,” I told her.
She seemed somehow satisfied again - like she felt like we were nearing our
destination. Our new home, to hope for. There would be a slight transition,
though. It wouldn’t be from boy to rock star over night. We’d first stay at a
low-rent motel in the Valley, in the shade of the Hollywood Hills, but it would
be only temporary. I mean, the destination was planned, hopes were high - the
start was made, the train had left the station. Hollywood, here we come! There
was nothing left to fear.
“Shawn?”
Emily suddenly said with an asking tone. And with that tone, my dreamy mind was
put out of its haze.
“Yes,
babe?”
“You
think L.A. will change you?” she said in a way that was rare. It didn’t happen
often that she would be insecure - scared even, as I looked at her. She would
deal with her problems head on - fight her way out of it if she had to, and as she’d
done before. But these moments I would actually loath. There were only two ways
this could go down - in tears or satisfaction. And tears on a girl like her is
as covering a nun in blood - it doesn’t fit. It’s shocking. Merely upsetting. I
knew I had to be on my best guard whenever that tone would enter my eardrum.
“Yes,
it will change me,” I said to her flawlessly. And her eyes looked surprised, even shocked - not expecting the sound of ‘yes’ after her question. “It will make me better.
I feel like it’s where I belong. I want that life, and I want you to share it
with you.”
“I
mean, you aren’t going to turn into this giant dickhead, now are you?”
For
a moment I didn’t say anything.
“I’m
sure I won’t,” I told her at last. I hadn’t given it much thought, yet. It’s
said that Hollywood changes even the most divine - nuns would strip, fathers
would sip and children would trip. That it would be a whole other world, I
wouldn’t doubt. But all I ever thought of about L.A. was hanging out with the
band, my girl and rock the world. What would fame even do to me? Would it
change me? I was silent by the thought as I looked through a darkened screen over
miles of desert to come. I wasn’t the type for hookers, no. The thought had
never crossed my mind. Ok, maybe that’s a full-on lie. Still, though. I liked
booze, I wouldn’t lie about that. Some drugs on occasion I couldn’t resist - it
was just childish fun to be that out-of-reality. I had a heart for tendencies,
I know, but I’m a moral man as far as I could see. I know what’s right and what
is not, to my standards I have to add. So, I guess it wouldn’t change me that
much.
“That’s
it?” Emily asked.
“Yes.
I haven’t given it much thought, really.”
“It
seems like you’re holding stuff in.”
“No,
babe, I swear it’s the truth. I’m not a liar. I told you every detail about how
it went with your dad, even though it was really f*****g bad - disappointing to
you even,” she gave me this doubtful look. “Did I ever lie to you?” I asked
her. That was before I actually thought about if I’d actually ever lied to her.
Did I?
“Yes,
you did,” she said stern and to be honest I was a little surprised. I couldn’t
remember.
“I
did?”
“Yes,
you did,” she repeated and her eyes seemed only tired.
“Please, enlighten me babe,” I
said, because I wanted to know, truly.
“Well,
I remember you saying ‘I have this famous Fender guitar back home, that Jimi
used to play’, but which I never saw at your place.”
“Ok,
fair enough. I tried to impress you,” I rested my case. She got me there.
“Then
there is this time you said you wouldn’t smoke pot, ever,” she laid a beautiful
accent on ‘ever’ because a month after I said it I was smoking pot. I couldn’t
suppress a smile there.
“That’s
not lying, that’s just poor self-knowledge,” I said.
“I
disagree.”
“And
I, disagree with that.”
“You’re
an idiot,” she said again.
She would call me that once every hour. When I’m
having a good day more than I’m having a bad day. And that isn’t even strange
at all. On a good day I’m just an annoying shallow five-five tall cocky male
with a little too much testosterone. On bad days, I’m plain silent.
To be continued...
![[send message]](https://www.writerscafe.org/images/mail.png){kind=small}
![[befriend]](https://www.writerscafe.org/images/friend.png){kind=small}
Share This
Email
Facebook
Twitter
Read Request
My Library
Flag Writing
