Nine Volt Heart (3 page)

JASON

H
ERE’S JASON TAYLOR TAKING
care of business, poking at the screen on my cell. There’s little use now in
keeping the number of that Indian restaurant on Vauxhall Road at the top of my
call list. Here in Seattle, someone on Karl’s support team—I think it was
Warren—answered my next call and patched me through instantly.

“Hi, Karl. I’m back in the good old USA. How’s the lawyer
business?”

“Jason?
Que pasa
? What’s all that
noise?”

“I’m at the airport. They lost my uncle’s guitar.”

“You missed the meeting today.”

“I couldn’t get an earlier flight.”

“You missed the meeting on purpose.” Karl wasn’t happy with
me.

“It’s what I pay you for, to talk to people I don’t want to
speak with.”

“Will you be here Monday? I can hear you fidgeting over the
phone.”

“We start rehearsal Monday. If it’s bad news, tell me now.”

“Dominique wants shared rights as co-author for songs you
wrote while you were together.”

“She never co-authored anything in her life.”

“Her chief claim is prior art for ‘Rhianna’s Song.’”

“Sheesh.” I clapped my cell phone closer to my ear, to keep
my head from exploding. “She made a comment while reading
USA
Today
, and I used it in a song. That isn’t co-authoring.”

“So I take it I’m supposed to say no?”

“Yes, say no. Does she claim anything I wrote after we
separated?”

“No. We excluded your new work from community property.”

“Then screw how long it takes to close this. She can have
all the money she wants, but not the rights to any of my music. Not when all I
got was eight months of singing with the devil in disguise. We didn’t even
sleep together after—”

“Don’t tell me more than I need to know, Jason.”

“I’m sorry. I try not to say or think bad things about her.
So tell me what we get for giving up rights to a song about my mother, whom she
never met.”

“She’ll let you have the Leschi condo and all your personal
effects.”

“That’s it? She crucifies me in public and I get to keep the
shirt I had on when she first stalked me?”

“What else do you want? All winter, you never helped once
when I tried to make counter-offers.”

“An apology. I want a public acknowledgment that all those
rumors aren’t true. And that B.S. in her interviews—what is it she says?”

“‘I know in my heart he just needs time to recover from
grief and the problems in his life.’”

“Great imitation, Karl. She makes it sound like I’ve been in
the Betty Ford Clinic instead of playing music in Europe. What does it mean?”

“She’s implying that you took your uncle’s death hard.”

“I did. Beau was more father to me than—”

“You don’t have to say it, Jason. I know.”

“Dominique hated Beau so much that she can’t say his name
out loud. Why does she keep lying? How many times has she said ‘I know he’ll
come back to me’ in interviews? She’s the one who ran off to sleep with half of
Nashville and most of L.A.”

“As a country, diva, she needs to protect her wholesome
image.”

“Then why is she dancing on TV in her underwear? I want an
apology.”

“All right, Jason. I’ll add that to the negotiations. You
need to be here for the meeting on Monday.”

“Sure. Did you get the email list of benefit shows I agreed
to?”

“All the paperwork is done and ready for you to sign. There
are other proposals here, including a benefit in mid-May against landmines.
Dominique already turned it down.”

“Then say yes for me. Say no to everyone else who just wants
money.”

“You need to pursue the foundation idea I suggested, Jason.”

“Yeah, yeah. Ian said Cynthia set up the details with a
cousin of hers. You and Cynthia can figure it out.”

“Get involved, Jason. You don’t have dependents or
significant property. Be prudent, or taxes will take everything Dominique
doesn’t get.”

“Like I care about the money.”

“I do, since I’m paid to be the adult. You care, too. To be
independent of the labels, you need to pay strict attention to business. It’s
called ‘indie,’ not ‘flakey.’”

“Email the details and I’ll read it later. Right now I need
food. The vegetarian meals on British Airways didn’t stick with me.”

“If you’d eat a burger once in a while you wouldn’t be so
hungry all the time. Jason, can I give you some legal advice?”

“It’s what I pay you for.”

“Don’t get involved with a woman again without written
agreements, since Washington is a community property state. When I see a chick
buying
Woman at the Well
, I want to ask for my fee up
front.”

“Be respectful of your income source.”

“You are such a nice guy. Why does Dominique hate you so
much?”

“It beats me, Karl. Dominique stood on my back to make
herself a star. And I didn’t stop her from leaving with the next sucker she
chose. I don’t know why she’s so teed off.”

“She’ll take everything if you don’t help. What are you
hiding from?”

“Being blind-sided by a soul-sucking vampire? I can’t trust
anyone.”

“Hence my caution about getting legal agreements up front.”

“Karl, I have to go before you chill my fearless heart.”

“OK. See you Monday? Talk to that cousin about the
foundation?”

“Sure, sure. Can’t hardly wait.”

SUSI

“S
TEVEN? IT’S SUSI. I won’t
make it to dinner tonight after all.”

“It’s me, sis. Not voicemail. I was about to call you. I
have to go out of town, so Damien and I can’t make the concert tomorrow.”

“Oh drat. I need you with me.”

“You don’t need your brother along on a double date.”

“It’s not a date. I’m just escorting Angelia’s cousin
around. It’s Randolph who’s the problem.”

“Still trying to get you to marry him? Yet you want Randolph
to think of you only as a music teacher? Good luck with that, Susi.”

“That’s all I am, and he’s just the vice principal at school
and the fundraiser for our foundation.”

“You never should have taken the job when you found out Randolph
worked there. I told you that he’d interpret it as an invitation to intimacy.”

“Yuck. I do not like hearing the word ‘intimacy’ much
anyway, but definitely not in the context of Randolph’s name.”

“He’s a handsome, educated person. A bit too heterosexual for
my tastes, but that shouldn’t affect your opinion.”

“Don’t make jokes. Before my accident, Randolph was
practically a stalker—and I was married then, for Pete’s sake. Now it’s like
I’m taking a bath in pity whenever I’m around him.”

“Where are you anyway? That sounds like an ambulance.”

“On Capitol Hill. I missed my connection with Angelia’s
cousin so now I have to chase him down. Perhaps I should ask Dad to go to the
concert.”

“No, leave Dad alone. You don’t need a chaperone. And by the
way, he doesn’t need you dropping by every night to check on him.”

“Is this the monthly ‘get a life’ lecture?”

“You have spent most nights alone or camped out with Dad
since he moved to assisted living.”

“I’m better off alone than lonely, like I was when I was
married to Logan. I won’t do that again.”

“Not all guys are asshats like Logan or Randolph. I’ll call
you when I’m back in town, Susi. If the sun shines this weekend, go work in
your garden.”

“I can’t. I’m in grant meetings or fundraising visits all
weekend.”

“Then please tell Randolph hello for me and that I think he
has a very cute ass.”

“You can amuse yourself thinking I might just do that.”

JASON

A
FTER WAITING TWO HOURS for my
lost baggage and then not finding Cynthia’s cousin, I submitted to the mandated
extortionist prices for a cab ride into town. The cab dropped me at Neumo’s,
where I wanted to check out a drummer playing a show that night. We lost our
last drummer, Hakeem, to hearth-and-home when his wife had a second child. If I
don’t find a replacement, we’ll be paying a session man. That just isn’t us.

I arrived late in the set, but heard enough to know that
this drummer wasn’t the guy we needed. The barmaid recognized me and gave me a Jagermeister
that I didn’t want, since I don’t drink. After ten hours across eight time
zones, I didn’t even want coffee. I accepted her gift though and hung around
for a few minutes more.

First, I had to reassure myself that the world hadn’t
changed, so I looked around for the archetypal inhabitants of any club scene.
The world’s oldest skinhead—replete in Doc Martens boots and red suspenders—had
his usual place pogoing up by the stage, although the band’s current number was
in three-quarter time. Frodo the bootlegging hobbit fidgeted by the sound
board, recording the show to post online later, having failed to talk the sound
technician into letting him patch into the board.

As the music ended, “That Guy” who appears in every club in
North America (we’ve played most of them) made his perpetually lame attempt to
hustle a group of women who just wanted to be left in peace. T.G. said, “What
are you ladies doing here alone? Let me buy you all a drink. Good-looking
ladies like yourselves shouldn’t be alone.” Et cetera.

Quentin Henderson leaned against the wall near the back—a
real person, not an archetype, even if Quentin sounds like an alias. He appears
everywhere I go. I’ve known him since jazz band in high school, where his father
taught sterilized jazz. However, I achieved with Quentin what I tried to do for
the others in jazz band, turning him on to a much wider range of music. If old
Hector Henderson hasn’t kicked the bucket, I bet he is still ticked at me for
luring Quentin over to the dark side.

Now Quentin has a job with a Seattle news weekly as music
critic and cultural scribe, with high hopes of going further, and he still
follows me, as if I could dispense a rock-and-roll elixir that will carry him
to fame. In our last interview, I tried to explain that fame isn’t a drink worth
taking. That particular interview had occurred earlier this same day, when
trapped together on the flight from London, I told him the story he wanted
about coming to Seattle to record and the new directions Stoneway is pursuing.
He won’t ask about personal stuff, because that’s not what he wants to sell in
his career. Months before, he managed to peddle an interview with me to
Rolling Stone
.

Yet here he was following me to a club because he knew I’d
be here. At least he had a woman with him, though it was someone who was
uncomfortable in this venue and who wasn’t listening to the music. All her body
language indicated that her date bored her. Quentin himself dressed
conservatively in a Nine Inch Nails t-shirt and black jeans, complementing his
long, scruffy hair. Mine is just as long, but I keep telling him that you have
to spend money and time if you want to look tidy with long hair. Yet Ian, who I
trust, says I’m too obsessive about personal grooming.

When Quentin glanced my way, I nodded and toasted him with
my unsipped Jagermeister. To tell the truth, I wished he would publish a good
word about the band, so I could fool myself into thinking it’s possible to live
and work in Seattle again.

“Jason!”

I turned when someone called my name, but so did the dude
next to me, who looked more salesman than head-banger, dressed in Dockers and a
golf shirt. He laughed when he saw me turn.

“The second most common name in America for an entire
decade. What were our mothers thinking?”

It was his friend, not mine, who had called our name, and
after they shook hands, that Jason and his friend departed into the night. Among
the heads that turned when the name “Jason” was called were several other
people I know. When you live in the same town all your life, you’ll see all
sorts of people you know everywhere. If you travel for business as much as I
do, that feels good. It anchors you in reality, when you have to spend so much
time in other towns while touring. I wanted real people to greet me in Seattle
again.

Warren, the admin from Karl’s office, seemed shy about
returning my wave. He writes the checks for my bills and tracks my business
when I’m out of town. P.J. Jones, a piano man from a trio that traveled with us
about five years ago, came over to say hi. He had been the coolest road companion,
always finding the bright side of rubber eggs and acid coffee after a too-short
night in a mosquito-infested motel amid the tumble weeds of Idaho. He had a
great repertoire of Mac Rebennack-style piano blues.

“Where are you playing these days?” I asked.

“Nowhere. Home. I have a couple of kids now.”

“Nice.”

“It is. But I had to remodel my approach to life. I’m
working for a monolithic software corporation.”

I’d heard this kind of story before, and know better than to
express my dismay at another musician lost to the pressures of domestic
economy.

“Two kids, P.J.? Girls? Boys? One of each?”

“Boys. The oldest is three, and he’s at the keyboard
already.”

“Lord, is it that long since I’ve seen you?”

“I’d invite you over, Jason, but I’m sure you’re booked.”

“No way. I’d dig that. Seriously. Let me give you my cell
number. I haven’t got a place to live yet, but call me.”

Call me
. He wouldn’t. He doesn’t
want his old road life mixed up with his new family life. As nice as he is, I
could see it on his face. Another voice was calling my name.

“Mr. Taylor? It’s good to see you.” It was the owner of a
Portland roadhouse where we played often, maybe seven years ago. “Your friend
told me you’d be here tonight.”

He pointed across the way to where Ian’s cousin Arlo stood.
I shook hands with the promoter but went deaf to what he said as I watched with
foreboding while Arlo weaved through the crowd toward me.

“You know, Mr. Taylor, I’d like to book Stoneway again,
though I don’t have space big enough for you now.”

“Give me your card. We haven’t finished booking for the
summer yet, and we want to play smaller places again.”

While I said goodbye to the guy, Arlo began to close in. I
saw Warren nearby and took four steps to stand by him.

“Hey, friend, save me from Arlo.”

Warren looked up, surprised.

“Gosh, Mr. Taylor. Sure.”

Warren is a straight-arrow guy who dresses in the same mode
as I do, as if he could afford to do his laundry and iron his clothes. Like me,
Warren knows how to comb his hair. In comparison, Arlo, while a bipedal
hominid, isn’t part of the
Homo sapiens sapiens
line
of evolution. It’s another branch altogether. He is Ian’s cousin, but I know
every single person Ian is related to, so I suspect Arlo was switched at birth.
Or dropped on his head. He doesn’t so much walk upright as scuttle. He keeps
his hair long because someone told him he looked like Tom Petty, so he works to
maintain an iconic presence of the musician he worships, but the pointy nose
and stringy hair also require a certain charisma. My animus started in junior
high. I should be over it by now, but he keeps stepping out of bounds.

“Ian said I might see you here tonight, bro.”

Arlo grasped my hand like a hippie, trying to get a thumb
dance out of me. His palms are always damp, and I covertly rubbed mine on my
jeans when he let go.

“Back in town and looking for poontang, huh?” Arlo’s voice
has a peculiar pitch on a twelve-tone scale that gets under your skin and then
rakes along the thinner bones inside your skull. “Didn’t you get enough tail in
Europe?”

“Actually, I’m looking for a drummer.” I gestured to the
stage.

“Have you seen fucking Ian since you got back?” Arlo hit a
note that exists in an imaginary place between D-sharp and E-flat. “He shaved
his fucking head so no one would recognize him. Cynthia is so pissed. Said
she’d shave his fucking balls for him.”

“Thanks for sharing that, Arlo.”

“So tell me about Europe, amigo.”

Before I could answer, Warren reached over and shook Arlo’s
hand.

“Hi, I’m Warren. We’ve met before—last year at Karl Schwann’s
barbeque? You know, a girl was just asking Jason about you, Arlo.” He stammered
slightly, being very shy, and I realized that the favor I asked caused him pain
to perform.

“No shit? Where?”

“She went into the girls’ can. I think her name was Rachel.
Or maybe it was Rebecca.”

Arlo scuttled back toward the johns, to wait for an
imaginary Rachel or Rebecca.

“Thanks, Warren. You are a true friend. He has been a pain
for years. Always hanging around, saying he’s with the band.”

“I know. He told me last summer that he got a girl to do him
at the Winthrop Rhythm and Blues Festival when she found out he was Ian’s
cousin and traveled with Jason Taylor and Stoneway.”

My worst nightmare—other people using our band’s name to
take advantage of women.

“Thanks again, Warren. I should split before he comes back.
See you around, my friend.”

“Is there anything else I can do for you, Mr. Taylor? Give
you a ride?”

“No, thanks. I prefer walking after the airplane.”

That’s how Karl’s entire staff is, all nice, helpful people.
I was hitching up my pack to hoof it over to Ian’s house when I spied this
woman scanning the crowd. I can’t say why I looked twice. She was just this
slender soul in an over-starched Brooks Brothers shirt and pressed jeans, a short
shock of blond hair in a boy’s cut, not even glancing my way.

A dude came by, wanting my autograph on a beer coaster and
hoping to commiserate over ball-breaking witches that screw up your life. I
used the line I always do when strangers presume to talk about my personal
business, “Love stinks—but heartbreak makes great rock-and-roll,” while
watching this cute woman over the guy’s shoulder. I gave him back the coaster
along with the unwanted Jagermeister and started to follow the cute woman, only
to be blocked by Quentin and Dating Woman.

“Hi, Jason. Righteous band, huh?”

“Hello, Quentin. Imagine seeing you here.”

He too wanted to do the hippie handshake thing as he said,
“Jason Taylor, this is Laura Stanley. She’s a big fan of yours.”

Laura looked like maybe she was a big fan of herself.
Quentin needed a boost by association.

“Hi, Laura. Pleased to meet you.”

“The pleasure is mine.” She wasn’t convincing. “But it
wouldn’t be honest to say I’m a fan. Your last album had a couple of cuts that
seemed almost interesting.” She named the two tracks that had received the
worst butchery at the hands of our producer. “I prefer hip hop. Modern country
doesn’t speak to me.”

It doesn’t speak to me either. We don’t play modern country.
However, I smiled, since I’m now used to people taking every chance to insult
my music. Including women who move toward me in a suggestive way as they
denigrate my work. Heck, I had married the queen of sexually aggressive music
criticism.

I said, “Our head-banger’s hoe-down isn’t for everyone.
That’s what Quentin says.” He didn’t. I made that up. “He is always urging me
to seek much broader influences. His past recommendations were Phosphorescence
and Mwahaha. What do you recommend for my edification?”

“The Lumineers. The Cave Singers.” She suggested other good
West Coast bands, and I nodded, commenting on the musicianship of their members.
Then she named a couple of label-manufactured synth-pop bands and went on to
offer me advice.

“No one wants to hear that twangy stuff since rockabilly
died in the Eighties,” she said. “Except dinosaurs living in trailers in Duvall.”

“I appreciate your insights. Though you can still find
trailer trash like us inside the Seattle city limits.”

Quentin stepped up, needing to claim whatever victory he
could with Dating Woman.

“I’ll be seeing you, Jason. It would be righteous to do an
on-the-job interview while you are recording. Call me?”

“Sure, Quentin. Let’s count on it.”

~

I looked over Dating Woman’s shoulder at the cute woman, who
saw me and broke into this indescribable smile that seemed to promise it would
never rain again in Seattle. As I moved away from Quentin, she came over,
extending her hand to shake like you do in business meetings.

“Are you Jason?” she asked as her hand grasped mine, her
voice as clear as a mission bell over the noise of the tavern. “I’m Susi.”

“Guilty,” I said, since I might as well get on with my life
and admit to being me. Her voice compelled truth.