Steel Guitar (4 page)

The blonde giggled and pointed at me. “Forget it, Freddie. No way she's a cop.”

“Freddie,” Dee said warningly. “Swear to God, you're just trouble waiting to happen. I can't decide if you're gonna go down for jailbait or dope.”

“Oh, preach it, Mama,” Freddie chanted sarcastically, brushing whatever powder he'd missed into a neat little line and offering the straw to the sandy-haired man on the couch. He didn't notice, but the shoulder-rubbing woman took a hit.

“Carlotta,” Dee said, “would you believe he sings harmony like God's own angel? Not to mention he can keep time like a clock.”

“Life isn't fair,” I said.

The dark-haired woman flashed me a sloppy grin of total agreement and clung even tighter to the much younger man at her side.

“What's with you, Bren,” Dee said, “encouraging this kind of shit?”

“Oh, Dee,” Brenda responded in a tired whine, “come off it. You haven't been out there kissing ass all night. I've been telling everybody what a great goddamn guitar player and what a great goddamn singer you are for four freaking hours. It wears thin, you know.”

“Bren, I don't set up the parties—”

“No. You just run off and leave us to pick up the pieces. Those guys expected to party with the very famous Dee Willis. Then she walks out, and they're stuck with her very un-famous bass player.”

“Who'd much rather be doing other things,” Freddie said with a twinkle in his voice.

“Shut the mouth, Fred. Nothing good comes out of it unless you're singing,” Brenda retorted.

Dee didn't seem to notice their animosity. She kept talking to the bass player. “So tell 'em you're gonna throw up, Bren. Leave. Nobody told you to be so goddamn super-responsible. Now, all of you, get out, or I'm gonna have Carlotta bust you. Show 'em your license, Carlotta.”

At the word “license,” Freddie stuffed his cigarette case into his girlfriend's canvas throw-all, a very streetwise thing to do, the golden rule being: Never get caught with the goods on you. He wasn't quite sure if Dee was pulling his leg or not, but he wasn't taking chances. The blonde didn't seem to realize she was holding enough to earn her a stay at MCI-Framingham.

Freddie sniffed and said, “Well, if your friend's not gonna arrest me, I been working on that bridge, that two-four A flat major shit, and you gotta hear it. You gotta tell Bren that—”

Brenda said, “Nobody's gotta tell me you're a showboat, Freddie.”

“Ooh, Bren,” Freddie said, a hard edge to his teasing voice, “hold tight to lover boy. You ain't gonna find a livelier specimen. Not at your age.”

A knock on the connecting door, three raps, then two, interrupted the bickering. Dee quickly crossed the carpet and stood behind the door as she edged it open.

A frowning gnomelike man walked in. I was surprised by the flood of sound that entered with him. This hotel, unlike every fleabag I've ever stayed in, had terrific soundproofing.

Dee leaned back against the door as she shut it and folded her arms deliberately across her chest. Her red shirt glittered with embroidered gold dragons. “Hal, for chrissakes, can't you keep people out of my goddamn room?”

He was in his mid-forties, maybe fifty. When he saw Dee, he started to smile, as if smiling were his natural state, but he killed the grin and spoke sternly. “You want to go out,” he said flatly, “you notify me. I'll get you a driver. Okay? You want to drive around all night, fine. You come to me. You want to jog or something, I get you somebody to jog with. You don't just disappear on me. Ever.”

Dee started to flare, the way she used to if you crossed her, and I braced myself for a shouting match. She surprised me by making a visible effort at self-control. She closed her eyes for a long ten-count, blew out her breath in a deep sigh. “I forgot, Hal,” she said, aiming for contrite but not quite hitting it. “I mean, I'm not used to being a goddamn industry. So what if I go out?”

She looked at the other members of the band for support but none was forthcoming. She was meal ticket number one for the moment and everybody seemed to want to keep a close eye on her.

Hal said, “I know the thing next door's not your kind of scene, but MGA went to a whole lot of trouble and expense to arrange it.”

“They can afford it,” Dee said. “Don't ask me to bleed for them.”

Mimi, the blonde groupie, said, “Well, Freddie was really worried about you, Dee, you know. He knocked and knocked, and you did say you had a splitting headache and were going straight to bed.”

Dee glanced sharply at the gnome. “You got a key to my room, Hal? I mean, I am a grown-up. There are times when I don't want people busting into my room.”

Mimi kept yapping. “Well, you didn't have the Do Not Disturb sign on your door. And we checked Ronny's room—”

“Ron and I are not an exclusive item,” Dee said evenly.

“Yeah, well, that's good,” Mimi said, with a big smile that didn't reach her eyes. “'Cause he was having a little party of his own.”

“Shut up,” Freddie said.

The gnome shrugged. “Just let me know if you feel the urge to travel after midnight, okay?”

“Carlotta,” Dee said after a brief pause, “this is my road manager, Hal Grady. Thinks he's my baby-sitter too. Just let me be, everybody. Okay?”

The dark woman lit a cigarette and nodded in my direction. “So who is she?”

“Bren, this is an old buddy of mine lives in Cambridge. Carlotta, meet Brenda.”

We shook hands and Brenda gave me a steady onceover. “You really a cop?” she said.

“No.”

“But something like a cop, right?”

“Right,” I admitted.

Freddie piped up, “Dee, we really need to fix that A flat major stuff. And this would be a great time. I can really feel it, you know.” He smacked the cocktail table like it was a conga drum. “Let me get my trap-set. Hal, you think the people next door would like to hear it?”

“Freddie,” Dee said sternly. “Out. And take your girlie with you, okay?”

Mimi, blouse over her arm, made a rush at Dee and gave her an unwanted, enthusiastic hug. She even grabbed my hands in her excitement, and I got a tiny taste of stardom by association.

“Weird Bren gonna get her boy-toy out too?” Freddie asked with a nasty grin.

Brenda patted her companion on his skinny arm, and gave Freddie a look that should have scorched him. The wispy boy on her arm just smiled.

“See you, Dee,” the bass player said coolly. “We need to talk, I think. Real soon.”

“About the A flat major break?”

“Nah. Freddie's just being stupid about the changes. The stuff works fine. You sure you're okay?”

“Okay,” Dee said.

Brenda and her boyfriend exited through the connecting door, heading to the MGA-sponsored bash. Dee gave the drummer the eye until he and his blonde huffed their way out.

The others filed out with no words, just nods. I wasn't sure if Dee even knew them, but Hal, the road manager, did. He asked the sandy-haired guy who'd been sitting on the couch to stay for a second.

“Hal, how'd you get in here?” Dee asked. “Or were those guys in before you?”

“Freddie came by when you didn't answer his knock. I worry too much. I mean, you know, I thought you might be sick or something. I got a spare key at the desk.”

“How?”

“Asked for it.”

“Tight security,” I commented.

Dee said, “Look, Hal. I don't want you thinking I'm passed out any time I don't answer my damn door. I'm not drinking like that anymore.”

The road manager studied his running shoes. “It would make a lot of guys happy if you'd come next door for maybe five minutes, ten at the most, shake a few hands.”

“Shit,” Dee said.

Hal took that for a yes. “Jody,” he said to the sandy-haired man. “Get Travis and Marshall and a couple of the other veeps and head them over to the front door. If I walk her through the room, she'll never get out.”

Dee gave the sandy-haired man a once-over as he left. Late twenties, early thirties. Thin. Good muscles.

“He work for you?” she asked Hal.

“He works for you,” Hal corrected.

“Yeah, well, like I said, I'm a goddamn industry. I oughta get to know my employees better, huh?”

She turned to me. “Come on, Carlotta. Come with me. You ought to see this thing.” Then she added under her breath, “And see if you can grab us something to eat. I'm starving to death.”

Five

Three steps inside the double doors, Dee half screamed in my ear, “Just like old times, huh?”

“Whoo-eee,” I hollered in amazed response, “wish I'd worn my formal.”

First off, there were the gilt-and-crystal chandeliers. Then there was the wallpaper, painted scenes of pre-Marie Antoinette France, with lots of fluffy sheep tended by buxom shepherdesses falling out of low-cut dresses. Mylar balloons, each inscribed with Dee's
Change Up
album logo, covered the ceiling, trailing gold ribbon tails. The band must have taken a break; the music was DJ-driven rock, three times as loud as a jackhammer. Guests had to shout to be heard.

Then there was the central fountain, which, I swear to God, dispensed champagne. Not that we had to race over and lap it up. A waiter materialized with a silver tray, and Dee and I had glasses in our hands before I could sort out a single face in the crowd.

I turned to say something to Dee, but she was surrounded, engulfed. I shrugged. This mob seemed less threatening than the one in the park.

Waiters kept zooming by with little bits of this and that, and I seized on the strategy of grabbing two of everything, wrapping the doings in cocktail napkins, and thrusting them unobtrusively into my handbag. Dee, her back against a door, champagne in one hand, and a constant parade of well-wishers squeezing the other, never had a chance to snatch so much as a crabmeat-stuffed mushroom.

I'm not a cocktail-party whiz. I hate affairs where you're supposed to stand around in high heels and look like you're enjoying yourself. I could hear Mimi's stoned giggle off to my left, but she didn't seem like someone I wanted to get to know better. I looked for the bass player, but couldn't spot her in the crush.

I saw faces I recognized from TV: local newscasters, sports heroes, and gossip columnists. A few others looked familiar, but I couldn't place them; I thought they might be musicians, hard to identify without their instruments and microphones.

There were men who gave the impression that they'd stepped out of ads in
GQ
, with perfect women on their arms, ladies who looked like they rented by the hour. Then there were the deliberately funky statement-makers, like Mimi in her well-filled black lace bra, and a woman in a skintight catsuit with silver bangle bracelets at wrist and ankles. There were even a few rhinestone cowboys. All in all, a pretty good sideshow.

On the pocket-sized dance floor, couples—sometimes trios and singles—were doing everything from dignified fox-trots to moves that looked pornographic standing up.

I dumped my empty champagne glass on a passing tray and was rewarded with a full one and a hundred-watt smile from a waiter who looked like he was auditioning for a toothpaste commercial. The smile was wasted on me, but it made me realize the kind of music industry power that must be in the room.

I found myself humming that Joni Mitchell song about “Stoking the starmaker machin'ry behind the popular song.” I could have sung it full-volume and nobody would have heard a word.

It looked like Dee would be handshaking forever. I was checking around for a place to sit when I saw a long linen-covered table filled with goodies of every variety, tiny china plates, dainty silver forks. The plates seemed like a better way to stock up for Dee, so I shoved through the crowd and tried to see how many shrimps I could fit in a six-inch circle.

“Nice party, huh?”

Busily spearing shrimp with toothpicks, I didn't realize the tall man in the tuxedo was speaking to me.

“Okay,” I yelled. He seemed vaguely familiar. Big. Beefy. I never watch football or wrestling; if he was a celeb from either field, I wouldn't have seen him play, but I might have caught a news photo if he got injured or caught doing dope.

“There's no place to sit,” he observed. Something about the matter-of-fact way he continued the conversation made me wonder if he knew me. I gave him the once-over as subtly as possible. There was a time in my life when I dated a lot of guys, did a bit of indiscriminate one-night-standing, to tell the truth.

“Yeah,” I said, agreeing with his comment about the lack of chairs so he wouldn't think I was being deliberately rude. I'd already filled one plate to overflowing. I quickly drank the rest of the champagne, set the glass down, and started loading a second plate. The huddle surrounding Dee was moving back toward the door. I thought she might be attempting an escape.

“You with somebody?” the guy said.

“Huh?”

“You here with somebody? I don't want any guy thinking I'm trying to cut in, you know?”

“I'm a friend of the bride,” I said.

He smiled. “I know the groom. We were altar boys together. I'm Mickey, remember?”

Next to me, an angry man in torn jeans and a yellowed T-shirt screamed, “Honey, don't talk to me about royalties. Royalties, hah!”

“Well,” a plump black-clad woman responded, “at least you're getting your mechanicals.”

Huh? I thought. “Mechanicals” and a guy I couldn't remember. Great party so far.

A woman in tight black slacks, a fuchsia shirt, and batgirl makeup shrieked, “Oh, God, I love it!” in my right ear.

I turned to face her, rarely having heard anyone wax so enthusiastic over shrimp. She was leaning close to a skinny man with a seamed face, a bald pate, and a fringe of long hair. He looked like a member of some group I'd liked a long time ago. He seemed to be singing into her ear.