Chapter 19

I remained on guard around Kat for several days, wondering if there’d be any fallout from my rejection. I’d tried to soften the blow as best I could, but that was one of the major things that triggered her condition, and the last thing I wanted was to make her worse. That was the main reason I’d said no in the first place.

Oddly, by the next day, she was back to acting like herself, almost like the entire experience never happened. I knew she was good at compartmentalizing things she didn’t want to face, but seeing it up close like this was a little disturbing. My only fear was that she was hiding her real feelings and we wouldn’t find out until she had some kind of massive meltdown.

What she really needed was serious therapy, which was the one thing we couldn’t get her until she was no longer a minor or out of her dad’s custody. Although, even when she was no longer a minor, we’d have to find a way to pay for therapy, since if she did just up and walk out on him, which was her plan, she’d also lose any insurance that would pay for treatment.

There wasn’t much I could do at this point besides leaving it alone and hoping we could keep patching over the problem until she was able to get free and we figured out the problems of actually getting her help. I talked to Hanna about it later that night, after Kat had gone home, and we’d agreed to continue keeping an eye on her, but to just let it drop after that. Of course, neither of us had expected the full denial routine when we’d decided that.

By Saturday, we were all just pretending it never happened and had gotten on with our lives. Thankfully, I had stuff to keep me distracted. After Willie okayed hearing Seth, Marco and I play, to see if we fit and to give the pair a once over, I’d called them and they’d been okay with it. They had to be back at one of the theatres they played backup at later that night, so they’d have to take off shortly after, which meant that my schedule was: audition with them, train with chef, rehearse with Willie, and then play the gig that night. Overall, one of the busiest Saturdays I’d had in a while.

I’d at least convinced Kat that I needed to skip studying that morning, since there was no way I would be able to keep focused enough to remember anything she taught me. At least Chef understood why my focus was all over the place and cut me some slack for once. It actually surprised me a little when he didn’t give me extra conditioning to remind me to keep my head in my training; not that I was complaining.

By the time I showered and was back downstairs Seth and Marco were already there, standing out on the front porch with Willie and Hanna.

“You guys made it,” I said, shaking their hands.

“We said we’d be here, and here we are,” Seth said. “Hanna was just introducing us around, although I’ve actually met Willie before. I wasn’t around this year, but I played drums for him at the Wild Cat the time he came through before.”

“Ohh, I didn’t know that,” I said, although it shouldn’t have surprised me.

Willie usually traveled by himself, without the rest of his band, so he used whatever house band a venue had, which would have meant that Seth would have had a chance to play with him.

“Yep, I remember him. Kept a real fine beat.”

“So, how do we want to do this?” I asked Willie.

“I already had the boys set up the equipment on the stage. This isn’t going to be all formal or nothin’, I just wanted to hear how you three sound together. You played your music at the Wild Cat last weekend, right?”

“Yes, including the newest one which we’ve done in practice a couple of times but I haven’t actually played here yet.”

“Okay, then let’s do it this way. You three set up and do a few warm-ups and when you’re good I want to hear you play through Charlie’s three songs. Charlie said the bassist y’all had didn’t work out. Did y’all want to just do it with the three of y’all, or did you want Howard to step up and cover?”

Howard was the bass player for Willie’s band at the Blue Ridge. He was quiet and at first glance, didn’t seem like he’d have the strength to stand up on stage playing for hours, but once he got going on his bass he was an unstoppable force. I swear when he finally went, it would be with his instrument in his hand.

I looked at Seth and Marco trying to gauge what they were thinking before saying, “Yeah, let’s have Howard sit in if that’s okay. Country Roads, especially, really needs the baseline or it won’t sound right.”

“Sure. I told him you might need him to cover, although you know it’s not hard to get him to start playin’. Y’all work through the songs and let me know when you’re good, although remember we still got to practice before we go up tonight, so you don’t have forever.”

I didn’t know if that was Willie trying to put a little pressure on or just reminding me, since normally I just went with the flow and followed what they’d always done. I led Seth and Marco to the stage where I was surprised to see Marco’s keyboard. It made sense that he’d have carried it with him, since they played at different clubs on different nights, but I’d imagined he’d have done this audition just using the upright piano that Dwight, Willie’s piano player, always used. Of course, that didn’t really make sense. The sounds were different and they’d want to show what they could do, since both seemed excited about the prospects of this working out.

We went through each of the songs a few times, to get Howard up to speed. It wasn’t all that hard, since Howard had been playing professionally longer than three of us had been alive.

I’d also made some changes since we played the weekend before, mostly revolving around working a keyboard into the mix. I don’t know why I hadn’t considered it before, maybe because Dad never had one in his band, but it seemed obvious in hindsight. My music had much more of a combination of pop and country than Dad’s classic rock, where guitar was king. The slower Country Roads, in particular, was practically made to have a keyboard in it, although the off-the-cuff way we’d done it at the Wild Cat had used Marco to his fullest. At the Wild Cat, Marco’d mostly just been mirroring what I’d been playing, although sometimes shifting chords here or there. That really wasn’t what a keyboard was best at in a rock band.

With some help from Mr. French, I’d given the keyboard its own part, to the point of even taking over the melody from the guitar on the verses, although the guitar kicked back in during the chorus. I also extended the intro to Hush quite a bit with the keyboard doing a softer, sadder version of the rhythm everyone thinks of from the nursery rhyme the song was playing off of.

After we played everything through a few times, we called Willie in and played each song for him. I was pleased with the way it was working out and the songs were starting to sound a lot more polished, like real music. The other big change I’d made, knowing they were joining me was in the vocals. While it might be bragging to say I was still the strongest vocalist out of the three, Seth was not far behind me. Marco was much too low to carry anything, but adding him in allowed us to do some great harmonies. In the end, I still took lead vocals on all three songs, although if this worked out and we kept writing new music, I could see Seth getting his own songs. His voice was a lot raspier than mine, which would work on something more abrasive like rock, and would give us more options.

I didn’t try to go too far yet, mostly some simple two-part harmonies or just the three of us sharing the chorus using the same pitch, which didn’t change the sound but did amplify it, adding something extra to sections that needed punch to it. The other thing that occurred to me was we had the chance of some good three-part harmonies if we worked at it, giving us more range.

Not everything was my changes. Even during these practices, both Seth and Marco made suggestions for slight tweaks to my new changes, which is what I really looked forward to. Music can be an amazing collaborative process, especially the longer a team works together and learns each other’s strengths and weaknesses and how to best play off that.

Watching Dad over the years, I’d always thought of it as a mostly solo kind of thing, since he always went alone or had to back up a headliner who he’d only play with the one time, so all he could do was follow their lead. I’d seen a little of that with Willie, but he and his band had been playing together for so long doing mostly the same thing every weekend, that there hadn’t been much need for brainstorming. They just played what they always played or did more free-flowing jamming, instead of crafting their own music. It wasn’t until last weekend, getting input from Seth and Marco on my music, that I started to see how important having a band that could work together would be.

We finished up and we all came to the front of the stage, sitting on the edge to talk to Willie.

“So, what’d you think?” I asked, maybe a little too eager.

“You’ve been making some changes since I heard them last,” Willie said.

“Yeah. Some of it was to work in Marco, since I hadn’t even considered a piano or keyboard line in the song, and partly to mix in the vocals. They had some great input on that though, so it wasn’t all me.”

“Don’t let him fool you,” Seth said. “He had most of that ready to go when we started. We only made a couple of suggestions. The rest of it is all Charlie.”

“Still, this is the best I’ve heard Charlie sound, and I think you two deserve a share of the credit. You three seem to work really well together, so consider this my seal of approval. You’re gonna need a bass player though. You can’t have Howard and I think if you try to pull that part out, it’ll weaken the sound you’re putting together.”

“Yeah, I know. About the needing a bassist part ... not about Howard,” I said. “Seth said he knew a guy, although I’m open to ideas.”

“My first thought was this guy, Paul Malone. I’ve only played with him a few times when we were both filling in, but he could really wail. I called him after we talked the other day and he said he was open to it, but he had a gig in Raleigh last night filling in last minute for someone and couldn’t make it back in time for today. If it’s okay, I thought if things went well here and we were going to make a go of this, I could have him come by practice or whatever, once we figure out how this is going to work. He could play with us and you could figure out if he fits or whatever.”

I looked at Willie, who just gave me a shrug and said, “It’s your band, kid. I’m happy to give you advice and such, but if you want to do this, you can’t be lookin’ to others for answers with this kinda stuff.”

“Yeah,” I said to no one in particular. “First, let’s work out how this is going to work, and then we’ll get to that.”

“Sure,” Seth said.

“Willie seems to approve and I have to say, I’ve really enjoyed playing with you guys, both at the Wild Cat and now, and I think we can make this work. How do you guys feel?”

“It feels good to me,” Marco said. “You’ve really got something with these songs and you’ve got better contacts than I have, and I’ve been doing this for five years already. I’ll be honest, I haven’t gotten a lot of shots yet and this has the most potential of anything I’ve got going on, so I’d want in, even if it wasn’t working. That being said, had we all been in high school together and just playing parties, I woulda still wanted to do this, ‘cause it feels right.”

“Same here,” Seth said.

“Good, ‘cause I feel the same, about the ‘it feeling right’ part, I mean. I want to lay out some of the challenges, so you know what you’re getting into. While I do have an audition with a talent scout, I want to make sure you know it’s a friend-of-a-friend kind of thing. He isn’t seeking me out because he’s heard I’m some kind of up and comer. I just don’t want you to think you’ve hooked up with a sure thing.”

“Man, nothing in this industry is a sure thing and from what I’ve seen, a friend of a friend is how most of this business gets done,” Seth said.

“Ain’t that the truth,” Willie agreed.

“Okay, I just wanted to make sure you guys understood that. The other thing may be a deal-breaker, so I’ll be honest. I’m gonna be tough to work with,” I said, counting off points on my fingers as I listed them. “One, I’m in high school, which really limits what I’m going to be able to do, which means it’ll limit what the band can do. Two, I don’t have regular transportation. I do have friends who’ll help me with rides and I’ll be turning sixteen soon, although I’m not going to be able to afford a car, so that doesn’t help much. And three, my schedule is crazy packed. Besides going to school during the day and homework, I have regular tutoring sessions, Baseball practice after school and games every week until summer, training here in the afternoons, and on weekends when I don’t have gigs elsewhere I play here on Friday, Saturdays and Sundays, which doesn’t leave a lot of time for practice.”