Shout Down the Moon (13 page)

“I’m not getting drunk,” I say, but I see her point. I go back to the couch, rub my temples. “It’s not all that easy for me. I have a kid, they don’t.”

“That’s true.”

“And I’m new at this. Jonathan’s been playing for over ten years. Ten years ago I was in grade school.”

“That’s true too, honey.” She looks at me. “But what’s this about? Did Brewer say you weren’t good?”

I tear at the label of my beer. “You know what? I bet I could sing jazz. All I’d have to do is listen. Fred says I can sing anything.”

She laughs. “Listening might help.”

“I’m serious here.” I wad up the gummy label and stick it in the empty beer; then I exhale deeply. “At least, I think I am. I want to be serious.”

After a minute, I tell her I’m going over there.

“Where?”

“To their jam. I’m going there and tell them I want to sit in and do some jazz.”

“Oh honey, it’s not just the guys tonight, it’s this huge thing at Eliot’s sister’s farm. Harry said there might be forty or fifty musicians, some of the best jazz players in Kansas City. You know, since the clubs are all closed for Labor Day.” Irene pauses. “But Eliot’s sister is a singer. I guess you could check her out. She’s good; she used to front for Max Adams and his trio.”

I’ve never heard of Max Adams, but Eliot is the guitar player who crashed with the band for a couple of weeks last spring. We were staying in hotel rooms; I rarely saw him. All I remember is that he was always high and always wore sandals, even though it was only fifty degrees. And his clothes were ripped-up rags. Jonathan had to lend him a shirt one night after the club owner complained that Eliot was a bum, scaring off the customers.

“Eliot has a sister with a farm?”

Irene laughs. “You wouldn’t know it from meeting him, huh? It’s not a farm, farm. It’s on thirty acres, but she doesn’t have animals or crops, just a big vegetable garden.”

I sit up straighter. “Can you show me how to get there?”

“Yeah, I was going over anyway. I told Harry I’d be there around eight.” She looks at me. “But are you sure you want to do this?”

“I have to prove to Jonathan that he’s wrong.” I shrug. “I’m going to listen until I get the hang of it, then get up and sing. Really belt one out.”

My voice is confident, even though my stomach is doing flips and my heart is pounding so hard I can feel it against my shirt. But what choice do I have? I can’t just let Jonathan tell me I’m not good enough and walk away.

When I call Mama, I’m hoping she’ll say she and Willie need me, but she doesn’t. She says they’re doing fine. There’s no way out.

“I’m glad you’re coming,” Irene says, as we walk out of her apartment. She smiles. “I know you’ll pull it off.”

I can’t smile back; I’m way too nervous. But later, as I’m steering the Ford down a dirt road, trying to keep up with Irene’s Honda, I remind myself that this is my chance, I have to take it. I’ve wanted to be a singer my entire life. I am a singer and a good one too. Tonight, I’ll show everyone what I’m made of.

T
he farm is about ten miles south of Kansas City, outside a suburb called Raytown. The house is so much bigger and nicer than I expected. As we walk in the door, Irene whispers that Eliot’s family has money; his father is an investment banker who made a killing in the stock market.

“This place is like a mansion,” I tell her.

“Yep.” She laughs softly. “Calling this a farm is like calling a millionaire comfortable.”

Eliot’s sister Lydia doesn’t look rich, I think, as Irene introduces us. She has on baggy jeans and a Miles Davis T-shirt, no shoes. She’s in her mid-twenties, and she isn’t wearing makeup. Her brown hair is cut short and so close to her head it looks like a cap.

Lydia is telling us who’s here, but the music is loud; it’s hard to hear her. And the names I do catch don’t mean anything to me anyway. If Irene didn’t have her hand on my arm, I’d probably run back to the Ford. It’s stupid, but I’m obsessed with what I’m wearing. I still have on the lime green sundress I wore to Fred’s this morning; I didn’t have time to change, but also I thought it would be good to be dressed up. Wrong. Every time somebody walks by—always in jeans or tattered shorts—I feel like I’m wearing a neon sign that blinks Outsider.

“There’s a spread in the dining room,” Lydia shouts. “You hungry?”

Irene shakes her head. “How about you, Patty?”

“No.” I feel a little nauseated. It’s nerves, but also the smell: the place reeks of weed, tobacco, and patchouli oil. Irene always says that patchouli oil is the musician’s all-purpose product because it substitutes for deodorant, aftershave, cologne, even the necessity of a shower.

“I’m going to wander around,” I tell them. I’m hoping to find a dark spot close to the music, where I can listen and not be seen.

I wander through room after room, nodding at people I don’t know, as the music gets louder. Some of the rooms are almost empty, but others are full of solid, heavy furniture and have walls covered with bookshelves, paintings, thick colorful tapestries hanging from wooden poles. It seems funny that I thought Eliot was so poor he was homeless when he slept on the floor of Jonathan’s hotel room in Joplin. I should have known better, since I’d heard Eliot tell Jonathan he’d just gotten back from Paris. In all my time in shelters, I’ve never met one homeless person who talked about their time in Paris.

I follow the music until I finally get to the back of the house, where the jam is taking place. It’s an enormous room, as big as some of the clubs we’ve played, and it seems even bigger because all the furniture has been pushed against the walls to make room for the musical equipment. It’s so dark I can’t tell how many musicians there are. They’re standing all over the room, facing each other. Those who aren’t playing are sitting along the side, leaning against the furniture, smoking cigarettes or joints.

I know Jonathan isn’t playing right now. The piano player has a completely different style—more rhythmic, less melodic— than Jonathan. When my eyes adjust to the dark, I can see the drummer and it isn’t Dennis. After a minute, I make out Harry. He’s over on the right, playing his acoustic bass. The guitar player is taking a solo. It’s Eliot. He has long red hair; he’s hard to miss.

I’m relieved as I move over to the corner next to a leather couch. There’s so much going on here, no one is going to care about my dumb dress. I don’t know if I’ll have the guts to sing, but I am hoping Lydia will. I want to check it out, see if it’s really as difficult as Jonathan claims. In the meantime, I’m going to sit back and listen. Maybe I can figure out something I can use.

The first thing I figure out is that clapping is inappropriate at this jam. When Eliot’s solo ended, I was the only one who clapped, but not for long. I gave two big claps, then two halfhearted ones, so it would seem like I was only fading out, not suddenly dropping my arms because I’d made a stupid mistake. Clapping is for audiences, but everyone here is part of it: they don’t clap, they yell. “Cool.” “Damn.” “Play it.” “Yeah.” “Like that.” “All right.”

After about twenty minutes, Irene plops down next to me and shouts that she hasn’t seen any of the guys but Harry. Maybe they left, I suggest, but she says no. Lydia told her they were around here somewhere.

When Lydia comes in, the musicians are paused, discussing what they’re going to play next. Eliot sees her, tells her to quit playing hostess and get over here, get busy. She laughs. “I am busy. I’m making sure all these sleazy musicians you invited don’t steal anything.”

Everybody laughs. Before Lydia leaves, she says she will sing in a little while. “But not ‘Satin Doll.’ I sang that every night for three years. I vowed never to do it again.”

“How about ‘Going to Kansas City’?” somebody shouts and the whole room groans. I’m not surprised. Jonathan hates that tune; I’ve heard him tell the guys that the chord changes are completely uninspired, stupid. Of course it’s a popular request in clubs all over Kansas City, so maybe that’s why he hates it; maybe that’s why they all do. Popular always seems to mean bad.

The music here is good, I know, and I like it, but I don’t love it. Even when Jonathan takes over the piano, I still don’t love it. He isn’t playing his songs, he’s playing what Irene tells me are jazz standards. “That’s what you need to learn,” she says. “The words to one of the standards.”

Actually, I realize I already know the words to some of these songs. I’ve heard them on the radio in the van, when Jonathan tunes in a jazz station. The one they’re playing now is called “Body and Soul.” I’ve heard it several times, but only once with a singer. But I remember the words, or at least I’m pretty sure I do. There’s no way I could sing it though, not the way they’re playing it. Everybody is playing around the tune, over it, under it, and every way they can except straight through it. I can’t imagine how a singer could fit in.

When Lydia joins them on the next song, I find out. They play it much straighter. They have her do the verses and the bridge, and then they start taking solos. She doesn’t have to do a solo; she doesn’t have to do anything but sing the usual words while they back her up. And I do know these words; I can mouth them as she goes along. The song is “When Sunny Gets Blue,” and I just heard it yesterday on the way back from Topeka.

She’s not a power singer. Her voice is what Fred calls smoky, which means breathy with lots of vibrato. By the end of the song, I realize I don’t see what’s so great about her. I have a bigger range, better intonation. I’m a better singer; at least, I think I am.

At some point, Irene elbows me in the ribs. “Check out the way Lydia keeps leaning on Jonathan. They used to date when they were in college. The rumor is she still has a crush on him.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. And notice how she waited until he was playing before she got up. She definitely has a thing for him.”

They do seem to be having a good time together. By the third song, a lot of the other musicians have dropped out: it’s just Jonathan, Lydia, Harry, and the drummer I don’t know. After Jonathan’s solo, Lydia laughs and says, “You’re pretty good for a white boy,” and the others laugh too. After she finishes the bridge, somebody shouts, “Damn,” and Jonathan says, “She’s all right for a white girl.”

Irene turns to me, asks if I want to hear a joke. Before I can answer she asks if I know how many white jazz players it takes to screw in a lightbulb. I say, “No idea,” and she giggles. “There’s never enough. Even if you get a thousand of them together, nobody will do it. If they leave the light off, they can pretend they’re black.”

I smile, but I can’t manage a laugh. Lydia’s on the verse again and I can hear her going flat on the low note at the end of each bar. I’m better than she is, I’m sure of it now. Yet Jonathan obviously respects her, and he has never respected me, not for one single minute in the year I’ve worked with him.

Of course she’s been to college, like he has. She’s probably read all those “fascinating” books he’s always telling the guys about. I’m sure she knows all kinds of things, just like his other girlfriend Susan, the one who played chess and wrote poetry.

Irene wants to know if I’m coming along. I was so lost in thought I didn’t realize that the music has stopped, the room is emptying out. “Where?”

“To the dining room. Lydia just announced that she made all this food; everyone has to eat something now or she’s going to end this party.”

“She’s weird,” I mumble, and Irene nods. When she stands up, I follow her to the door leading to the dining room.

The house is air-conditioned, but it’s warm in here. The dining room connects to a large screened-in porch and Lydia has the glass doors open so that people can fill their plates and go eat at one of the big wicker tables. The crowd around the dining-room buffet is intimidating, and the food looks strange: lots of unidentifiable dips and odd black-purple vegetables, a large bowl of brown gook that looks exactly like mud. Lydia’s talking loudly, explaining what each dish is. I hear someone ask where the meat is, and she laughs and calls him a cannibal.

I grab a beer from the ice bucket against the wall and tell Irene I’m going out on the porch. I need some fresh air.

No one is out here yet and it’s nice. There are probably a hundred candles sitting on tables and on brass stands along the walls, and in the breeze they’re flickering, dancing on the ceiling. I go to the darkest corner, settle in a rocking chair by a wind chime. The noise sounds as soothing as a lullaby.

I’m not sure what time it is, but I know it’s late; Willie is obviously in bed. I wish I’d been there to tuck him in. As soon as Irene gets finished eating, I’m going to make up some excuse to leave. This is a waste of time.

“What’s this? You all by yourself out here, green dress?”

I look up and see a man standing next to my chair. He’s maybe sixty, black, and his voice sounds hoarse like a smoker’s, like Mama’s. He’s not wearing jeans, which makes me like him immediately. He has on gray pants, a bright yellow button-down shirt, and a fancy black hat with a broad rim. When he asks if I mind if he sits at this table near me, I say that would be fine.

He asks my name, and tells me his: Charlie Jubar. When I ask him what he plays, he says, “Alto,” and laughs softly. “I guess it’s gotta be alto if your mama gives you the same name as the Bird.”

He’s eating deviled eggs and a pastry dish I don’t recognize. After he takes a few bites, he says, “And you, Miss Patty green dress? What’s your specialty?”

“Nothing, unfortunately.”

“Come on now. I know you’re shy, but don’t hold back on old Charlie.”

“Okay.” I smile. “I’m a singer.”

“Bet you are,” he says, nodding. “Bet you bring ’em to their knees too.”

“I wish.”

He shakes his head a little, tells me doubting yourself is normal when you’re young. “There ain’t no perfect music, but you just gotta keep going. I’ve been playing almost forty years and I sure learned that.”

He asks if I know what jazz was like in Kansas City in the mid-fifties, when he first started. I say no, and he says it was a hard time. All the great names were gone: Lester Young had left; Charlie Parker had just died. There were few clubs that wanted anything other than big bands. And smack was taking a huge toll. Half the musicians he knew were sick; his older brother, a drummer, died of an overdose.

I’m nodding, just to be polite, but he narrows his eyes. “You understand about this, don’t you?”

He seems like he knows, which is impossible. I never talk about this part of my life with anyone, not even Irene. I feel like saying no, but I can’t. His face is too open, sincere. When I mumble yes, he says, “I could tell. You got the look, green dress.”

I have no idea what that means, but I can’t bring myself to ask. And he’s talking again about how hard it was when he started just to keep a band together and keep playing night after night with audiences that talked over your solos and sometimes booed you off the stage.

“That still happens, I guess,” I say. I know it used to happen to Jonathan’s quartet; Irene has told me some of the awful stories. Once a club owner picked up one of Dennis’s drums and threw it out the back door after he told the guys to get packing and they didn’t move fast enough.

“Now you’re getting my point,” Mr. Jubar says. “It’s always been hard and it always will be. But you gotta keep the faith. You gotta do it, be it, live it. Keep paying dues till you got the chops to play your heart.”

He sits quietly for a moment; then he glances around the room. “Look at all these hungry folks.”

I was so engrossed in what he was saying I didn’t notice the porch fill up with people. Mr. Jubar is still turned around in his chair, facing me, but every seat at his table is taken.

“You still feeling shy,” Mr. Jubar says, “or you want me to introduce you to some of these folks? I think I know ’most everybody here.”

“It’s not necessary.”

“Sure it is.” He turns to the guy next to him. “Malek, I want you to meet a friend. Her name’s Patty and she’s one fine singer.”

I sit on the edge of the rocker, so I can see Malek, nod hi. He smiles and says his ax is bass, but it used to be cello. “Ain’t much work for jazz cello players, eh, Charlie?”

They laugh, and then Mr. Jubar leans closer, whispers, “Now, that wasn’t so hard, was it?”

“No,” I say, and smile. I can’t believe how nice he’s being. “But you haven’t heard me sing. How do you know I’m fine?”