Somebody Everybody Listens To (7 page)

“A
singer
singer?” She fastened her eyes on me, and I nodded. “So have you had any success yet?”

“I just got here today.”

“You're not from Nashville, then.”

“No. I'm from Starling. It's a tiny town about two and a half hours from here.”

“You're kidding, right?”

“No, I'm really a singer.”

“I mean about the name of your town.
Star
-ling?” She laughed.

“Oh, no, I mean, yes, that's really the name of my hometown. I never even thought about that before . . . you know, about the
star
part.”

“Sounds like you made it up. But I believe you,” she added quickly. Her steady, smart gaze was making me feel all squirmy. “So, what drives you?”

“I drove myself,” I said.

“No no. I mean what
drives
you? I'm especially fascinated by what motivates people, you know.
Why
they pursue certain things. For some, it's financial gain, the external rewards. For others, it's more, you know, intrinsic.”

“It's—well, it's hard to say,” I replied, and laughed uncomfortably.

“God. Sorry. I get way too serious. Are you sure you don't want these?” she asked, and held up the books again. “What is it Cicero said? ‘A room without books is like a body without a soul.' Or something like that.”

“Books aren't really in my budget right now,” I confessed, and noticed her outfit—navy-and-white-striped slacks with the cutest little brown buttons at the waist and a built-in belt tied in a perfect bow. The cuffs were wide, and her bright red toenails peeked out from the edges of her sandals. Her fitted white T-shirt looked nothing like my baggy gray one. It hugged her shape nicely and set off those adorable pants.

All at once I was dying to get out the door. My faded cutoffs had ragged edges, and my flip-flops were two summers old, not to mention I'd been sweating my butt off in a hot car (according to Goggy, the a/c hadn't worked since '96). I probably smelled, too.

“I don't know what drives me either, and it's making me a little crazy these days,” she went on. “I'd like to be intrinsically motivated, follow my bliss and all, but I'm a product of this saturated American culture. In our society we often have to choose one or the other, it seems. Very few have the privilege of both intrinsic and extrinsic satisfaction, at least in their professional lives.”

I nodded and tried to follow what she was saying.

“So you're probably doing the whole Country Music Festival thing this week, right?” she asked, switching gears.

“Country Music Festival?”

“You know what it is, of course.”

“Yeah, definitely,” I said, trying not to let the panic show on my face.

I'd followed the event closely my whole entire life, but this year, of all years, I'd forgotten about the Country Music Festival, the one that draws
thousands
of fans to Music City every summer, the one people buy tickets for a whole
year
in advance, the one that fills
every
hotel and motel for miles around. Suddenly a parking ticket seemed like the least of my worries
.

“I'm Emerson Foster,” she said, and extended her smooth hand.

“Retta Jones,” I replied, and wondered if I'd just stabbed her with my daggerlike hangnails. “Do y'all sell street maps?”

“No, but the Kwik Sak probably carries them. It's about a half mile up the road.”

“Okay, thanks. It was nice to meet you,” I said, and inched toward the door.

“Hey, why don't you just take these?” she said, and held up the books.

“Really, I can't.”

“I don't mean purchase them. You can read them and return them when you're finished.”

“But this isn't a library,” I said, wondering if I'd somehow missed that important detail, too.

“No, not technically, but it's fine as long as you take care of them. Just a second,” she said, and headed toward the register. I watched while she bagged them up and stuffed in some bookmarkers. “No dog-earing the pages or cracking the spine. Be sure you return them when my boss isn't here.”

“But how will I know who—”

“She's hard to miss. Her glasses are yellow with black rhinestones, and she always wears a starched blouse and pops the collar. Oh, and don't return them on a Sunday. That's my day off.”

“I don't think this is such a good idea,” I said, and glanced up at the security camera. One brush with the law was enough.

“Seriously, it's fine,” Emerson insisted, and came around the counter. “Take them,” she said, and handed me the bag. “Believe it or not, you'll actually be helping
me
out.”

“This is really nice of you,” I said, and followed her to the door. She pushed it open and held it for me. The second my flip-flops crossed the threshold, the alarm blasted in our ears.

“Go ahead,” Emerson shouted above the noise. “There's probably a sensor tucked inside one of the pages. You can gingerly peel it off when you get to it.
Gingerly!
”

“Okay,” I replied, and racewalked toward Goggy's car. Any second I expected a SWAT team to wrestle me to the ground and handcuff my arms behind my back. I slid into the front seat and sat there for a minute, tried to decide what to do with the books. So far, I owed forty-five dollars for absolutely nothing and nothing for forty-five dollars worth of something. Technically, I was stealing. Or maybe not.
What motivates me?
I mulled over her question.

Nobody had ever asked me that before. People wanted to know the kinds of songs I could sing or when I was available to sing, but never, ever
why
I sing. Even though I didn't want to confess it to Emerson, I knew the answer: I sing because it's the only time people really listen to me.

DESPERATE TO FIND A MOTEL, I kept driving—Nashville seemed to stretch on endlessly—and there was one “No Vacancy” sign after another.
Idiot!
I said to myself for forgetting about the festival. It wasn't like me to forget about
any
big country music event. Normally, I can't wait for the CMA and the ACM's big award shows every year. For weeks, I analyze the nominees, make lists of who's likely to win and why. And even though I can't afford to buy every new CD that comes out, I keep track of all the upcoming release dates on my calendar. When there's a new single, I follow it closely, try my best to figure out why some songs and artists are so successful while others simply limp along or disappear altogether. This time, however, I'd blown it, and now I'd probably have to sleep in Goggy's car as a result.

Next to some statues of horses, I took a left and ended up in magnate mansion land—one giant, fancy house after another and a parade of joggers. The neighborhood was confusing with its tasteful signs that were too small to read and its quirky traffic patterns. And all the yards were so lush and green and perfectly manicured that they looked exactly the same. I kept getting turned around and going down the same street over and over. It was close to dusk, and even though I hated to admit it, I was a little scared.

I pulled off to the side of the road and studied the new map again. It was wrinkled now and covered with palm sweat. Best I could tell, I was in Belle Meade, just southwest of downtown. Clearly, I wasn't going to find a Howard Johnson's or a Motel 6 around here.

Just as I was about to take off again, my cell phone rang. “Hello,” I said, trying to sound calm and casual, like things in Nashville were going great.

“Are you a big star yet?” Brenda teased. She sounded a million miles away.

“Not yet,” I replied, and shut off the engine (no wasting gas). I unbuckled my seat belt and leaned against the headrest. My neck and shoulders were stiff with tension, and I thought of Bobby McGee's big hands suddenly, how good they'd feel on my tired, stressed-out shoulders right about now. Tercell was always bragging about Bobby's expert massages. Brenda said something, but I wasn't paying attention. “What?”

“I said, ‘Did you find a motel?' It was all over the news tonight about the Country Music Festival, and I wondered if you'd have a hard time finding a place to stay.”

“Well, not—” I glanced in the rearview mirror, and a cop car was pulling up behind me. My stomach dropped to my knees; guiltily, I pushed the bag of books off the seat and onto the floorboard. He let out one of those obnoxious siren bleeps.

“You'll have to move your car!” he said through the loudspeaker.

“Who's
that
?” asked Brenda.

He was burly and frowning and pressing my way. “Call you back,” I said, and snapped the phone shut.

“Is there some sort of problem, miss?” he asked, looming in the driver's-side window.

“No, sir. I'm just a little lost,” I replied, and held up the map.

“Well, I suggest you find your way out of Belle Meade. This is a private, residential area. No trespassing. No soliciting. No loitering. No driving in the left lane between the hours of six A.M. and nine A.M. or between four P.M. and six P.M. Joggers,” he explained. “Didn't you read the signs?”

I thought about mentioning the fact that I had 20/20 vision, yet I
still
couldn't read the signs, but decided against it. Maybe they were just a formality anyway; people who truly belonged here didn't need to read them. “I wasn't trying to bother anybody. I'm sorry,” I said, and started Goggy's car.

As I pulled away, the officer yelled, “Buckle up! It's the law!” The cell phone rang again—Brenda, I knew. I steered with my knee, buckled the belt with one hand, and reached for the phone with the other. Lightly, I tapped the brake.

Except it wasn't the brake.

 

After a humiliating sobriety test—which I passed with flying colors, of course—I waited in the dark for the tow truck. According to the gruff-sounding man who'd answered the phone, it would cost $115 to haul Goggy's car to his nearby auto shop and an unspecified amount to fix whatever it was I had busted—on the car, that is. I was fine, and luckily, the stupid stone wall I'd hit was just fine, although why anybody would put a stone wall right next to the road was beyond me. Besides that, it was so low you couldn't even see it until your car was right on top of it. The cell phone rang, and since the policeman was gone, I answered it.

“Hey, Brenda,” I said.

“Why'd you hang up, Retta? And who was that?”

“Oh, nobody. Don't worry. I'm fine,” I said. Later I would tell her the whole story, but right now I was too tired. The line was silent for a minute. “Brenda?”

“Yeah?” she asked.

I hesitated and tried to steady my voice. “I miss you,” I said, feeling so lonesome I could cry, “and just so you know, it's not any easier to be the one leaving.”

Brenda talked for a few minutes, mostly about the gross stuff she was seeing at the hospital, and I just listened. When Wayne beeped in on call waiting, I volunteered to be the one to hang up, promised I'd fill her in on all my exciting first-day details tomorrow. At the rate I was going, I'd be able to tell her in person.

By the time the tow-truck driver showed up, I was asleep at the wheel with the windows rolled up (not
all
the way since I didn't want to suffocate, mind you) and the doors locked. The inside of Goggy's car was like a sauna.

“You busted the oil pan,” the man said, and tapped on the glass, startling me. “I ain't even looked yet, but I can tell by the way this car's a-settin' that's what you done. It's no wonder you hit that damn wall, though. They ought to have reflectors on it, especially so close to the road like this.” I rolled the window down, and the night air rushed in—it felt good on my sticky skin. I took a deep breath and reluctantly got out of the car.

Tow-Truck Man looked more like a biker dude, thick arms, tattoos, shaved head. “How old's this vehicle?” he asked.