Coda (Songs of Submission #9) (12 page)

“Are you trying to tell me something?”

“Attitude is everything.” More lilting vowels to express something serious. “You missed a few days in your log.” She flicked her wrist at my little blue leather book. “You need to take it with you everywhere. Even if you’re going to a restaurant.”

I rolled my eyes and immediately felt like an adolescent or worse. I ran through the international news as if the tablet was on fire, trying to not feel over-mothered. I hired her to do this. I couldn’t get mad about it. “Okay,” was all I could get out.

“What is this?” She took a plastic container out of the crisper and held it at my eye level.

I looked at it then back at the tablet. “Monica’s Brazilian chimichuri. Her mother was over the other night. The two of them ate it like… I don’t know.” I waved my hand. “They slather it on everything like they’re trying to scald their faces. It’s blowtorch-hot.”

“Oh, that sounds good.”

“Does spicy food bother you? With the pregnancy?”

“Nope.”

“Take it then.” I scrolled through the financials. “We have two.”

“Really?” She peeled the top off and took a whiff. “Oh my God, this smells so good.” She put it under my nose, and I pushed her away. “Oh, I forgot. Well, I understand. Donny doesn’t like spicy food either.” She put the container in her bag of medicinal crap.

“Donny’s three,” I said.

Laurelin shrugged. “He’s a good boy.” She patted my shoulder. “Like you.”

I didn’t want to fuck my nurse at all. Not even a little. But I wanted to spank her. Hard.

I turned back to my tablet and tapped the local news, missed, and hit entertainment, which I couldn’t care less about. But I let it load, and probably because Monica’s name was associated with my account, or the wifi, or because it was the top entertainment story of the minute to people who weren’t married to her, her picture was front and center.

Her and some swarthy guy. His arm was around her. He was kissing her cheek at a restaurant, and she was smiling, looking at the ceiling. She looked happy and carefree. In her element. And on his face? That was a simple prelude to fucking her. I couldn’t take my eyes off the picture and that look in his eye. His fingertip was on her shoulder as if testing his right to touch her.

I knew my wife didn’t have cheating in her heart. But I also knew men, and that asshole had her body on his mind. He wanted to fuck her. My wife. Mine. I wanted to take his skin and peel it off him. Rip him apart.

“Mister Drazen?”

Laurelin’s voice sounded a million miles away.

“What?”

“Are you all right?”

I tore my face from the screen and looked at her. Her brow was knit, and she was packed to go.

“I’m fine.”

“I think I should take your BP again.”

“No, no. I’m fine. Let me walk you out.” I smiled, but I knew no joy reached my eyes. I hustled her to the front door.

“Mister Drazen,” she said when we got there, “really, you need to avoid stress.”

“Stress is part of life. Don’t worry. I’m good.”

She left. I went upstairs and paced. Looked at my watch. Did some math. I couldn’t keep Monica enclosed. I couldn’t keep men from wanting her. She only got more beautiful every day, and men were disgusting creatures who cared for nothing but the daily mounting pressure in their ball sacks.

I trusted her. With every cell in my body, I trusted her. But when I thought about how I’d almost lost her, how she hadn’t been happy and I’d just kept letting shit slide, I wondered what would have happened if I hadn’t gone to the studio that day and reasserted myself.

She could be away. She could travel. Her career was necessary to her happiness, and more than anything, I wanted her to be happy.

So why did that picture bother me? We’d reestablished ourselves. I trusted her. She needed to do her job and make her art. What was the problem?

The problem was that we had a disconnect, and that disconnect was me. She’d come back to me fully, but I hadn’t broached my side of the distance. I hadn’t gone to her with an open heart the way she’d come to me.

That was going to change.

MONICA

T
he balcony had room for two, maybe three if everyone liked each other. It overlooked a tiny cobblestone street in Chinatown and onto the tops of the beat-down signs in Cantonese. Manhattan had many of the same structures as Los Angeles. They were straight up from the ground at ninety degrees, had corners, straight walls, windows, and roofs. Some buildings were made well and some were sad. But the whole proportion of the place was different. It couldn’t be absorbed by car; it could only be experienced on foot or bike. Then the flower boxes, cornerstones, and cobbled streets took on their natural life.

I had no business being on the balcony off the studio, since Omar and Trudy were smoking and I wasn’t about to even try it.

“It gives me my edge,” Omar said. “Biggest secret in music is how many of us smoke.”

“The other type of smoke, not such a secret,” Trudy said.

She was a guitarist and could smoke her brains out for all I cared. From Omar, well, I admitted to being a little disappointed. I took so much care with my vocal chords. I could tell when there was a forest fire in Flintridge based on how my throat felt.

“Does he do this all the time?” I jerked my head toward the inside, where Hartley had abandoned his drums to throw up last night’s party.

Trudy smashed her cigarette underfoot and blew a cloud carelessly. It landed in my face, and I resisted the urge to wave my hand in front of me.

“Constantly,” she said. “But he never pukes. I think it’s a flu or something.”

“Oh.” I tried to not look more worried than any normal person would. Normal people got the flu and just suffered through it. But I had a husband on immunosuppressants, and a flu could kill him.

“Quentin’s looking for another drummer.” Omar shrugged. “Or Franco can do it.”

“Nope,” Trudy said. “He’s down with it too.”

“What is it? A percussionist’s strain?” I joked.

“All those guys hang out together. It’s like incest without the sex.”

I didn’t know what came over me, but the words shot out of my mouth before I’d even thought about the logistics. “I know one. He can be here tomorrow. He has something today. He’s really good.”

“Do I know him?”

“He’s from LA originally. So probably not. He’s super-hot in indie circles.”

“Not that husband of yours, is it?” Omar smiled a half moon of perfect white piano keys. It was the third time he’d mentioned Jonathan that day, as if he was trying to gauge my reactions.

“The only instrument Jonathan plays is me.”

“That can be good or bad.”

“He’s a maestro, trust me.”

I went inside. I’d wanted to learn from Omar, and he’d taught me a few things, but I was starting to feel as if it all came with a price. Maybe that price was simple flirtation and attention or maybe he expected more, but I was getting irritated with his off-color comments and sultry eyeballing.

Everyone was filing back into the studio. There were fifteen actual musicians. Some kept klatches of preeners and hangers-on. Others traveled alone. Add to that the engineers, press, security, and agents, and the room was as hot as a sweatbox and smelled only ten percent better.

I couldn’t believe there wasn’t a drummer among us, but it was worth a try. I found Quentin in the middle of eating a slab of crunchy fried fish, surrounded by people I didn’t know.

“Hey,” I said, trying to slink into the tiny room unobtrusively and failing.

“Faulkner! Everyone out!” He made shoo-shoo motions with his fingers, and everyone shooed. He closed the door behind them.

I hoped I wasn’t stepping out of the frying pan with Omar and into the fire with Quentin.

“Sorry,” he said, rooting around his leather messenger bag. “Not a big deal, but I didn’t know what this was, so I didn’t want to give it to you in front of everyone.” He handed me a long, blue velvet box. “This was at reception with your name on it.”

“Thank you,” I said, taking it.

He slung the bag over his shoulder. “I have to find a drummer.”

“No one in this building can do percussion? It’s a house full of musicians.”

“You have no idea how hard it is to find a good one.”

“I kind of do.”

“Evan Arden’s in the bathroom puking his guts out, and he’s on bass. If I can’t find someone within the hour, we’re all going home for the day.” He made motions to leave but was so slow about it. He glanced at the velvet box then back at me. “Sorry, not trying to be nosy.”

“Not trying?”

“Even straight guys like a little sparkle. Come on. Don’t hold out.”

I smiled. What could it be? Jonathan never disappointed me, but I was afraid it was a diamond-studded leather collar or a bracelet with the word SLAVE in emeralds. That might require a little more explaining than I was willing to do.

I held the box at my eye level and cracked it open so only I could see. Whatever it was, it didn’t sparkle. I didn’t know if that excited me or scared me. But it looked harmless enough. I opened it all the way.

“What is it?” he said, hand on the doorknob.

“It’s a Sharpie.” I turned it toward him. Indeed, right inside the bracelet box lay a black Sharpie. I could see from his expression that he was disappointed, as if he’d expected an actual bracelet in the bracelet box.

“What’s it for?”

“I have no idea.” I opened the little card that had been folded inside the lid. It was typed.

Keep this with you, goddess.

I closed it slowly.

“He’s more of a romantic than I thought,” Quentin said.

“You know him?”

“We have a long history of feeding children together.”

“Is that why you hired me?” I said before I could catch it. That was a completely unprofessional thing to ask, and it made me look like an insecure ingrate.

“I hired you because Dionne Harber couldn’t make it. I don’t regret it.” He winked at me and got away with it.

“Thanks. And I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to imply my spot was bought.”

“It wasn’t. Trust me.”

He left with a smile. I opened the velvet box again. Shook it. Looked under it. Turned the card over. Nothing special. I got my stuff ready to go.

Typically when I traveled, Jonathan and I spoke once a day, and our conversations were short and mostly about his medicines and appointments. But that was the old us. The miserable us. The couple treading water in a sea of doubt and unsaid truths. I didn’t know or understand the couple we’d become, and I didn’t think there was much precedent for it.

So I didn’t know what he intended with the permanent marker, and I didn’t know enough to be excited or anxious. I was only curious as we laid down some tracks, and I played my theremin for everyone in the studio while we waited for two other people to decide if they were too sick to continue.

“We’re doing a small thing at a club after,” Omar whispered in the hall outside the bathrooms. “You’re invited.”

“Thank you. I think I’m just going to bed.”

“Alone? I bet we have the day off tomorrow.” He put his hand on my wrist.

“You know I’m married, right, Omar?”

“Where is he?” He spread his arms, indicating the whole of the studio, New York, the world about us, where Jonathan wasn’t.

Was he drunk? Who would make such an implication? What person in their right mind would assume my husband’s presence was required for my fidelity?

The answer came to me in the tightness of Omar’s jaw and the tension in his fingers. He was on something. Some white substance whispered in his ear that he was a god and entitled to whatever he felt like having.

I sighed. I’d really admired him. He sang like an angel, but he’d just been in the studio thirty minutes ago. I recalled the moments of inappropriate laughter and long space-outs when I’d thought he was preparing, but he’d been stoned the whole time. I knew how many artists worked stoned. I’d always told myself it was their thing and not my business, but suddenly I felt as if it was most certainly my business.

“My husband’s home,” I said, “waiting for me to call.”

He looked at me as if he didn’t believe me.

“Look,” I continued, “I know what you’ve probably heard about me, and it may be all true. But this scene, the drugs, and the other shit? The partying until all hours? The fucking around? It’s not my thing. And if that means I’ll always be small time, well, it’s okay.”

He didn’t move, as if stuck in that moment. “You think I got where I am because I party?”

“No, I—”

“No?”

I didn’t think he’d coasted. Not at all. But he wasn’t interested in hearing it. I’d insulted his talent and his manhood, and he was walking away with at least one intact.

“Break it down,” he said firmly, his jaw still grinding. “You just said you’d be small time if you didn’t party. You know what, girl? I’ve done everything I could to support you. I lifted you up the minute you got here. And this is the attitude you throw me? You think your pussy is dipped in gold? Well, fuck you.”

He turned on his heel and went down the hall just as Rob Devon cut the turn and ran into the men’s room as if his belly were on fire. In seconds, the hallway was silent again.

I dragged myself out the door, and Dean waited for me in the Rolls. I’d walked into the studio wrapped in confidence and love, and I was walking out feeling as if my expensive ride was an ugly appendage, a street sign pointing at my gold-plated cunt. God, I must make such a scene with this stupid car.

“Mrs. Drazen,” Dean said by way of greeting.

“Hi, Dean.”

“Back to the hotel?” He opened the back door.

“Yes, thanks.”

I slid into the pristine comfort of the Rolls. It envelops you, that luxury. The money. The sense of well-being. That was the point, wasn’t it? When the car started, there was no jolt, no rumble, just movement.

I called Jonathan as the streetlights streaked across the night sky, then stopped seamlessly at a stop sign, then started again.

“Hello, Monica,” he said, and I wanted to cry.

“Hi.”

“I see you’re on your way back to the hotel?”