The Big Rewind (15 page)

T
wo days later I was washing Philip's dainties and Mac's number came up on my phone. I dried my hands and picked up just before it went to voice mail.

“There isn't much, but I found something,” Mac said by way of greeting. “It took me forever, finally managed to track down a copy of
Minnie Underground
, a University of Minnesota zine from 1993 that had an interview with the lead singer of a band called the Chauffeurs and a pretty shitty photocopy of the liner notes. Your mystery song is called ‘Secret Girlfriend' from the band's only release.”

Perfect title.

“It gets better,” he continued. “The lead singer, Cassie Brennen, lives here in New York. She still plays gigs here and there; she's got a show tonight at the Bitter End. I'd go, but I'm at the store until ten. You should go, see if she'll sign your tape. Bet she'd love to hear that her old song is still floating around.”

My heart did a weird fluttery thing and I couldn't discern if it was excitement or fear. “Mac, you're the best,” I said. “Thanks so much.”

“Anytime,” he replied. “Still got three crates of
The Stranger,
if you need any more favors.”

I
CALLED
S
ID
and left him a message as I headed uptown. The show didn't start for another hour, which gave me time to drop off Philip's package and get back down to the Bitter End for Cassie's show. I told Sid to meet me there if he could and shot him a text message, just in case he didn't feel like checking his voice mail.

I loved the brick walls of the Bitter End. I loved that the bartender still ID'd me, and I loved sitting there imagining that I was seeing the next James Taylor or Lady Gaga, that one day I would be able to tell my kids that I saw such-and-such back before they hit the airwaves. I got myself an Original Sin cider and took a seat near the back because it felt like church in there. What I was hearing, what I was witnessing, was sacred and profound, and I didn't want to interrupt anyone else's worship.

Cassie wore burgundy Doc Martens with black tights and a flannel skirt; her dark-blond hair was crimped and pushed off to the side with a handful of clips. She was a relic of the last time music mattered, where a songwriter wasn't some Swedish computer geek plotting songs like math problems. Her silver nameplate bracelet and the necklace that matched were the only things about her that looked new and shiny. Everything else about her had the worn edges of a hard-won life.

She played an acoustic guitar, seated on a stool, her voice no longer the delicate, unsure alto of “Secret Girlfriend,” now almost gravelly, but more confident, playful. She sang a whole set of originals, along with a cover of Billy Joel's “State of Grace” with such raw beauty that I began to rethink Billy Joel's entire catalog. With her talent, she could have even saved “Piano Man.”

I closed my eyes and imagined myself on that stage, hearing her voice in my throat. This is what music was supposed to sound like—raw, tender, pure power held in check for the sheer safety of the audience. The sound coming from between her lips wasn't manufactured Auto-Tuned bullshit or soulless climbing between all the notes just to show off that you could hit them.

This was the kind of music I wanted to write about. I wanted to put words to the way the music must have felt to her as she war
bled lyrics tinged with wisdom and melancholy. But nice as they were, none of them made me feel that desperate love I'd heard in “Secret Girlfriend.” I found myself praying that she would sing it so that I would know I had truly found what I had been seeking.

She sang two more originals after that and announced she'd be taking a break. The bar filled with conversation, drowning out my own whispers as I tried to talk myself into approaching her. I crept up to the edge of the stage, feeling as though I was trying to steal the Mona Lisa.

“Your set was really great,” I said.

She smiled as though she didn't quite believe me. “Thanks,” she said. “Glad you came out.” She set down her beer and shook my hand. “You a musician too?”

“Tried to break into music journalism, but I wish someone had told me print was dead,” I joked.

“There's always the vast wasteland of the Internet,” she said. “When I moved here, it seemed like all I did was temp and wait tables. Then one day, I just said, ‘Fuck this shit,' picked up my guitar, and got back to it. Not full-time yet; I still have a day job, but the night is all mine.”

“I've got the temping part right,” I joked. “Now I just need to get back to the writing.”

“You will,” she said. “Hell, I spend my afternoons engraving ‘Amber' and ‘Tiffany' into plate necklaces for rich dudes' mistresses.” She held up her necklace. “We do what we can to support our craft. Where are you temping?”

“MetroReaders,” I said.

“That's hysterical,” she said, cracking a grin. “I used to work there too. You'll make some good contacts, ton of good session guys.” She took a sip of her drink. “You know, I'm going to be recording my new album soon, could use a press kit—maybe I could throw some work your way. Help us both out.”

I couldn't believe what I'd just heard. Me, preview her newest album? My day couldn't have gotten better if Warren Zevon had risen from the dead. “I'd love to,” I breathed.

She grinned and handed me a pen and a flyer. “Here, just write your name and number down. Might still be a while, but it's not like I've got
Rolling Stone
on speed-dial.”

I obeyed, hands shaking. “You really capture exactly how it feels to fall in love,” I said. “All the frustration and fear and excitement that gets mixed up inside you.” It was all I could do not to smack my hand across my forehead right in front of her. Of all the dumb things to say . . .

“Wow,” she said, sweeping a black-nailed hand through her crimped hair. “Can you put that in an Amazon review?”

“Sure,” I said.

“So, this probably sounds completely arrogant, but can I ask what your favorite song is? I'll play it in my next set.”

“‘Secret Girlfriend,'” I said. “I haven't heard a song like that in forever.”

The smile dropped off her face like I'd slapped it off. “I don't play that song anymore,” she said. “It was just some dumb song I wrote when I was a kid. You don't go to hear Patricia Smith's high school poetry, so you didn't come here to hear me play some shit I wrote on the back of a math quiz for some asshole who broke my heart.”

I stammered an apology that didn't sound like words, and she went back to her sound equipment, pretending to fiddle with some knobs. I turned, fully aware that the six other people in the room were staring at me. I was just glad the room was dark enough that no one could see how red my cheeks were, the tears glittering in my eyes.

E
verything inside me felt like it was being kicked out onto the pavement. I was humiliated and hurt. All I wanted was to hear one beautiful song, and it had been thrown back in my face.

I called George when I got out of the subway. I was surprised when he picked up until I heard how thickly his greeting came down the line. “Jett Bennett,” he slurred. “Jett. Ben-nett. Any word?”

“None yet,” I said. “But you never answered my question—who wrote ‘Secret Girlfriend,' the last song you put on KitKat's mix tape?” I had to believe that this was just a coincidence, that he'd stumbled across that song in his research. I needed that much to hold on to, to believe that even though she hated that song, I could find something left in it to love amidst all the ugliness it was connected with.

I heard ice clatter into an empty glass and then the slosh of liquid—gin, I imagined. “Cassie Brennen,” he said. “She was kind of a proto-KitKat.” He chuckled and I heard him take a drink. “I was just this shy kid, listened to Jethro Tull, played
D&D,
wore black Wranglers. She used to wear these great vintage fur coats with these oxblood Doc Martens, and she was the first girl I knew who wore black nail polish.”

“You knew her?” That much I hadn't been expecting. Was he the asshole she was talking about?

“She was my girlfriend,” he said. “That song was about me.”

“Yeah, well, I saw her tonight and she didn't want to play it,” I said.

He choked. “You shouldn't have done that,” he spat when he got his breath back. “You should have asked me first.”

“How come?” I asked. I was getting that low feeling in my gut again, the same feeling I'd gotten the first time I'd heard that song. The details were starting to come into focus even if I wasn't sure what the whole picture was just yet. “You put that song on KitKat's tape.”

“Why can't you just leave this alone?” he snapped. “I cheated on my wife, my girlfriend got
murdered,
and the last thing I need is you digging up some ex-girlfriend I haven't thought about in twenty-five years. I don't need this stress in my life right now.”

“I am trying so goddamn hard to figure out who killed my friend,” I hissed. “So I need you to explain why mentioning one stupid song got me snapped at in the Bitter End!” I was near tears with frustration.

He sighed and softened his tone with another rattle of his glass. “We had a falling-out,” he said. “My senior year, she moved to New York to try and get a record deal. I was planning to join her, but she picked up a nasty heroin habit.” He paused to swallow. “Such a cliché, I know, but that was the nineties. She'd call me in the middle of the night, smacked out of her mind, while I frantically tried to figure out a way to get out there and save her. Then she dumped me. Dumped me for some drummer.” I heard the glass slam down hard. “I spent the next few weeks eating tranquilizers by the fistful and drinking myself to sleep. Maybe I forgot about her. Maybe I buried her. Either way, I met Linda, and we got married seven months later. And everything was
fucking fine
until I met KitKat. And then everything came to the surface.”

He was getting drunker, and I was getting uncomfortable. I
wanted to hang up, block his number, figure out the connection on my own, but he kept talking. “I found her tape in the garage a few months back and I just knew KitKat would dig it. And that song, the one she wrote for me before it all fell apart, I could finally give it to someone else I loved. I could finally,
finally
let Cassie's ghost go.”

“And then KitKat would have had to carry it around in her broken heart until she found someone else to unload it on,” I snarled. “You're a selfish, rotten bastard.”

He swallowed audibly. “That may be true,” he said. “But none of that matters now.”

I hung up on him and dialed Sid's number as I started up my apartment stairs. After it went to voice mail twice, he finally picked up. I heard dance music in the background, cars in the distance.

“Hey there, darlin'.”

I burst into tears at the sound of his voice. “I need you to come over,” I said. “Please. I'll make us dinner, I'll buy the wine. Please, Sid, I just need to see you.” After Cassie, after George, I just needed someone who would be nice to me, not swear or snap at me for perceived infractions, someone who would hug me and pour me a drink and help me sort out this terrible feeling into something that made just a fragment of sense.

“I can't,” he said. “I'm kinda busy.”

Music. Cars. I could solve one mystery tonight. He was standing outside of Fairy Tales, choosing Cinderella over me.

“Sid, please,” I begged. “I really need you to come over here. I've had an awful evening. I really need a friend right now.”

“Jett, I'm sorry, but Cinderella's going on in, like, five minutes. I really can't be late. Can I call you tomorrow?”

“No,” I spat. “No, you can't call me tomorrow. And you know what, Sid? She can have you. Let her listen to you ramble on about the Vapors. Let her keep your records at her place. Let her make you dinner, but I have a feeling you'll be eating the leftovers of a hundred other guys.”

He was silent. I imagined he was impressed by my expertly crafted vulgarity. “You don't know her,” he said coldly. “And clearly, you don't know me either.”

“If this is who you are, I don't want to know you,” I sneered. “If I wanted some sleazebag, I could go to one of Natalie's house parties and find one—but I thought you were better than that. Guess I was wrong.”

The line went dead in my ear as I kicked open my door. Baldrick, as if sensing the storm, ran and hid under my bed. I fell onto the couch and pulled a throw pillow I'd made out of a vintage Boz Scaggs concert T-shirt over my face, sobbing so hard I was screaming. Everything was at a dead end—George, Cassie, my song, my case, and worst of all, Sid. My best friend, the only one who knew anything about what I was going through with KitKat's case, couldn't be bothered to come comfort me when I needed him more than ever.

I just let it all out, all my frustrations and anguish, until I was choking and trying to catch my breath. I felt a little better after my meltdown, but even if Catch had walked through my door with flowers and an apology, today would still have ranked up there as one of the worst days of my life.

E
xcept for brief periods of sleep and dumping food in Baldrick's bowl, I spent the next four days at work, trying to keep Sid off my mind. Every time the thought of him crept in or one of his songs came up on my playlist, I read harder, hit fast forward, did everything to try to keep him away. I crammed in six shifts and promised myself a treat when my paycheck came through. I even got Philip's laundry back in record time.

I was finishing up my Saturday afternoon shift at Hartford when Bronco came into the temp lounge with his courier bag slung over his shoulder and his bike helmet in his hands. He lit up a little when he saw me. “I didn't know you worked here.”

“Just one of the many places that keep me gainfully employed,” I said. “How are you doing?”

He ran his gloved hand across his scalp. “Pretty shitty,” he admitted. “Bryce and I broke up. Last night.” He tossed his helmet back and forth between his hands. “Kind of hoping work will take my mind off it. I sure as hell don't want to be home when he comes by to get the clothes he kept at my place.”

The closest Bronco and I had ever been was the afternoon we'd spent together in the prison visiting room, but he looked like he could use a friend. And with no word from Sid, I knew I too could use some friendly commiseration. “Do you have any
place else to deliver to?” I asked. “We could go get a cup of coffee, just hang out for a bit.”

He looked like he was about to say no, but then he changed his mind. “I'm free,” he said. “I could do coffee.”

“Let me just double-check to make sure they don't have anything left for me to do,” I said. “Why don't you go grab us a place so you don't have to walk your bike on the sidewalk, and text me so I know where you are?”

He nodded and put on his helmet. By the time I had checked in with Susan and gotten my time card filled out, I had a text that said he was standing in line at Bourbon Coffee and asking what I wanted.

And when I got there, he had a soy latte for himself and a hazelnut one for me, plus a seat at a dollhouse table in the back by the bathrooms. I started to get out my wallet, but he shook his head. “To thank you for coming to see me in jail,” he said, taking a swig. “I know it probably wasn't easy, but it meant a lot.”

“I know you didn't do it,” I said. My coffee was still too hot to sip. “Do you want to talk about Bryce?”

“I do and I don't,” he said, chuckling. “Isn't that the worst part of a breakup? You're just so pissed, and you want to tell everyone how badly you're hurting so they'll be extra nice to you, but you don't want anyone asking,
Oh, are you okay? How are you doing?
I've had enough of that bullshit in the past few weeks.”

“I get it,” I said. But more than anything, I wanted him to ask how I was doing, just so I could tell somebody what had happened with Sid in hopes that they might be able to solve it, coach me, figure it all out, and tell me how to say
I'm sorry
. “But how
are
you doing?”

“Holding up as best I can,” he said. “My best friend's dead and the cops think I killed her. I just got out of the clink, and everybody hates me, then my boyfriend leaves? If this was happening on TV, we'd be waiting for a commercial so we could go get another beer.” He fiddled with the knitted sleeve he'd fitted over his cup; I recognized it as one like KitKat had made me when I
first moved to the neighborhood. “I told my lawyer where I was,” he admitted. “I did that for Bryce. It took everything I had, and it still wasn't enough. He just doesn't get it, you know? He was all Pride Parades and
Drag Race
and the fabulous gay lifestyle; me, I just wanted a boyfriend.

“I'm not ashamed of being gay,” he said, continuing. “Bryce always said KitKat was my cover story, but she really wasn't. I really loved her. The two of us could do everything together—everything but sex, obviously. But I think Bryce resented even that, and it just got to be too much for him. He kept yelling about how I needed to
show my true self
and
fuck all the haters
and that kind of bullshit. I think he was just mad because I hadn't officially proposed, like I was supposed to whip out a ring the minute New York legalized gay marriage.” He smirked a little, sad and sardonic.

“My parents are being really supportive right now, and I don't want to burden them with one more surprise. Fuck, when I told them about dating KitKat, my dad patted me on the shoulder and smiled and said, ‘I was starting to think you were a faggot.' Bryce just didn't understand that I needed to do things at my own pace. That pace was too slow for him.” He folded his arms on the table and looked past me out into space. “Guess they're going to find out sooner or later,” he said, “now that I've got an alibi.”

“Shouldn't that be enough to get you off?” I asked, thinking back to all the alibis offered on Sid's cop shows.
Sid.
I swallowed a too-big gulp of my too-hot coffee, the burn in my throat distracting me momentarily from the knife in my heart.

“My lawyer can argue it in court, but it's not as easy as it looks on TV,” he said. “He's got confidence, but I sure as hell don't. They've got my fingerprints, Jett, on the handle of that rolling pin. That's why I was at her apartment that morning. Bryce just couldn't wait to try out this vegan chicken pot pie recipe he got and the handle had come off my rolling pin. KitKat's marble one was good for pie crust, so she let me borrow it, and I was taking it back to her. Whoever killed her submerged one handle in the
dishwater but not the other, and my fingerprints came up in the system from back when I was substitute teaching.”

“But they didn't get the killer's prints?”

“I'm sure they were on there, and my lawyer will argue that,” he said. “But I'm the one a witness can place at the scene on the day of the crime, with weed in my system from one stupid brownie two weeks previous. And I'm black, Jett. You know that's what this is really about. Drugs and color, that's all. That's enough evidence for a jury to believe that I'm the kind of man who would bash in his girlfriend's head. The prosecution will argue that I was high and she threatened to reveal that I was gay, so I shut her up. Hell, I'd probably watch that
SVU
episode if it wasn't my goddamn life.”

I reached over and put my hand on his wrist. He put his hand over mine and squeezed a little, the skull on his left hand dancing just a little. “Thanks for letting me talk,” he said. “You're a good friend. Seems like everyone else has dropped off the planet now that I'm not a cause anymore—those who don't see me as a straight-up pariah, that is. I've started having my groceries delivered so I don't have to risk running into Jylle or Brandi again. Fuck them. Shit, Lovelle tried to apologize by saying I was welcome back so long as I didn't cause a scene—like I'm supposed to just keep my head down and thank people for calling me a murderer. I still don't know why they all turned against me except that there isn't anybody else to blame. I have no clue who could have done this.”

“No kidding,” I said.

“So who was this George guy you were asking me about?” he said. “Were you able to find him?”

“You were right,” I said. “He was her boyfriend. Her
married
boyfriend.”

“No wonder she kept him quiet,” he said. “Guess we had keeping secrets in common too. But I thought they broke up.”

“What makes you say that?” George had told me he was going to use the tape to dump her, but if Bronco knew because KitKat
had, perhaps, cried on his shoulder while the two of them pigged out on vegan ice cream, my dead ends were starting to look more like cliffs.

He tapped his left wrist. “Her bracelet,” he said. “Chunky silver chain with a nameplate, etched with some song quote. I never saw her without it until . . .” He started to choke up, hand gripping his cup so hard I was surprised the top didn't pop right off.

“Until when?”

He gulped hard. “Until the medical examiner handed me her personal belongings at the morgue,” he said. “The bracelet wasn't in with any of it. I thought I had seen her wearing it that morning, but when I asked the medical examiner if I could see the report, just to make sure some orderly didn't swipe it, it wasn't even listed. Guess I was mistaken about seeing it.” He wiped his eyes with the back of his free hand. “I had no idea she'd had me as her emergency contact until they called me in. For whatever we had, for whatever lies we told everyone else, she really did love me. And I really loved her.”

“I know you did,” I said. “And I know you didn't do this.”

He snorted. “Try telling that to everyone else.”