People who haven't been on tour think it’s basically like living in The Hangover.
Booze. Drugs. Strippers.
Tigers.
Zach Galifianakis wandering through the background in his underwear.
It’s not true.
The scene around me tonight, though, is pretty cliché.
“Jax, baby, come on.” The blonde shifts onto my lap, wiggling to get there. Her mouth pouts with whatever gloss she slicked on while she was thinking about me, or Brick, or Kyle, or Mace. Most of them don’t care which.
Right now, I’m a hard pass.
It’s been a long time since I screwed around on tour, and almost as long since I’ve wanted to.
I shift out from underneath her and reach into my pocket for the device I’m suddenly more protective of. I bang out a text.
Need 2 take my mnd off thgs
I glance at Mace, who’s making out with a brunette. I’d never hear the end of it if he knew what I was doing.
At the bar across the room, I fix myself a bourbon because I like the way it makes my throat curl inward after a long night of spilling my guts into the mic.
Kyle and two redheads who look like twins are dueling on Guitar Hero in the next room.
Brick is plugged into a console in the corner playing Fortnite.
The only woman he even looks at is Nina, and I’d know if something happened there. Even if one of them wasn’t too proud to admit it, neither of them would break the rules.
I can imagine it’s a shitty place to be. When the person you want’s the one person you can’t have.
The drink’s gone, and still my phone’s silent. I send another message.
Where r u?
I slip out of the band’s room and into my suite at the end of the hall. My bags are there, still zipped up.
The first week of tour, some assistant’s assistant tried to unpack for me. It didn't end well.
On top is a stack of paper, different sizes, held together with a clip.
I could try to write—a phrase, a verse, a bridge—but I haven’t turned out a good song in years. I’m not just losing my edge—I’ve lost it.
I pull my phone from my pocket and drop it on the bed. I strip the shirt over my head, wincing as I do. The mirror reveals a bruise near my rib, and I don’t know how I got it.
I strip off my jeans, dropping them and my shirt in a pile in the corner of the room. My shorts go next.
The shower’s hot and welcoming as I soap off the sweat, the grime, the makeup.
I let my mind go blank. For all of Neen’s obsession with Buddhist monks or whatever, there’s something to be said for living in the moment. It gives you relief from your thoughts.
One thought drifts through my mind and refuses to let go.
Leonard fucking Cohen.
The girl knows music, I’ll give her that.
I’m tempted to ask Nina where Haley came from, but knowing the background of every tech on my tour is definitely below my paygrade.
I’m curious. That’s all.
Maybe because she’s the opposite of everyone else around here. The women who want to strip naked and do anything I ask.
I don’t judge them. It’s part of the aura, the sheen.
I have a halo around my head that’s as fake as the rest of this circus.
But I get it. They don’t really want me. They want the circus.
Haley on the other hand…
Being close to me physically seems to sicken her.
Though when I’d grabbed her hip—a reflex when she jumped at the sudden noise down the hall—she hadn’t screamed.
Or hit me.
Or run away.
I reach for the tap. Instead of turning it off, I turn it cold. The water has my abs clenching, my thighs hard.
What threw me was the way she’d looked at me when I told her I saw the Memphis show. Those eyes—I still can’t decide if they’re brown or green, and it’s starting to bug me—widened, and she’d sucked in an excited breath so big she was practically vibrating with it.
But if there’s one thing I don’t do on tour, it’s hang out with interns.
At 2 a.m.
Alone.
By the time I step out and pull on track pants and favorite hoodie, there’s a response to my message.
Lobby bar
I slip out the door and take the elevator. No one’s in the lounge save the bartender and two figures in chairs hunched over a table.
But Jerry’s not waiting for me because he’s already playing with someone.
Haley’s curled up in the opposite chair wearing purple pajama pants under a white hotel robe.
Plus slippers.
I can’t remember the last time I saw a woman in slippers.
“If you do that,” Jerry says, “then I’ll go like this.” He swipes a piece off the board, and she watches intently. He starts to reverse it, but she stops him.
“No. Take it off.”
I wonder if she knows she's learning from the master. Of chess and sound engineering.
A group of people older than me come into the bar, and I flip the hood of my sweatshirt up.
Jerry's as much a legend as I am, but she doesn’t pump him for information or suck up.
“I heard you got the boss’s phone back.”
She shrugs a shoulder without lifting her gaze from the board. “Yeah. I had to give something up to get it back, though.”
I’m bristling before Jerry asks what.
“My jacket. I mean, I can get another one, but it was my mom’s. She gave it to me before she died.”
My hands ball into fists, but Jerry hmms over the chess board.
They play in silence for a few moves. Then he says, “If I worried you earlier, I didn’t mean to.”
“It’s okay. I thought I did something wrong.”
He makes a dismissive noise. “Being on tour is the best thing and the worst thing for a human being. It’s a lonely business. There’s a lot of time to spin in your head, which means we all have our…moods.”
She smiles. “I get it. My roommate Serena says I have my moods too. Usually two days a month. And during midterms.”
Two moves later, he has her in a checkmate.
“Thank you. For teaching me.” Haley rises, and her robe slips open before she refastens the tie. “I’m going to go work on a program, but can we do this again sometime?”
“Sure. Goodnight, Miss Telfer.”
“Night, Jerry.”
I watch her round the corner toward the elevator before I drop into the chair she vacated.
“‘Miss Telfer.’ You trying to score a spot on her dance card?” I prod as I reset the chess pieces on my side.
“I’m too old for her. So are you,” he jabs with a toothy smile.
I ignore him.
Jerry wins the white pieces, and he opens with a pawn.
I match him.
“You had an appointment before we left Philly.” He moves another pawn. “What’d the doctor say, Jerry?”
“I’m an old man.”
“That’s all?” I send my bishop along the diagonal, covering his king.
His hand trembles on the pawn as he takes mine with his. “It’s Alzheimer’s.”
A wave of nausea washes over me and I shove it down. “This is the second doctor. You could see a third.”
“No more doctors, Jax. Besides, I have help. Or didn’t you notice?”
I let out a half laugh I don’t feel. “I’m not worried you’re going to forget to plug me in one night, Jerry. I’m worried about you.”
“Maybe you should worry less about me and more about you. I hear you’ve got another album to make.”
I grimace. “Cross has been leaving messages daily. Sometimes I’m surprised he’s letting me finish the tour before dragging me back in the studio.”
But he can’t. We agreed to a year’s break before the last album I’ll ever make.
“You written anything?”
If I can’t talk to Jerry, I can’t talk to anyone. The man’s had my back since I was twenty. He might be the only one who has. “I’m not sure I have it in me. The first album was too personal. The next two…”
“There’s less of you and more of them,” he finishes.
I nod because he’s right. The production studio takes over. Starts focus grouping and auto-tuning, and before you know it you’re just one input in the marketing machine.
I take his pawn. “I’ve been at this a long time. I’m ready to go the hell home.”
The group at the bar is laughing and drinking and oblivious to us.
I focus only on his king. He takes my bishop, sparing me a narrowed glance.
“I almost missed calling Annie on her birthday today because I was too distracted by all of this shit.” Familiar bitterness rises in the back of my throat. “Ten more stops. Then I’m done, Jerry. I’m out.”
“How many albums you sold?”
My gaze works over the board between us. “Forty-six million.”
“How many shows?”
“How much have you made in the last ten years?”
“Okay, now you’re being rude.” I lift my attention to Jerry’s lined face.
“Memory serves—and I know sometimes it don’t…” His face lines as he grins. “…you’re the one who signed on for this shit.”
“I was eighteen. Living in a one-bedroom apartment, no food and no future. Wasn’t much of a choice.”
Jerry glances at my bourbon. “That Bulleit?”
“You know it.”
He takes it from me, sipping and making a sound of appreciation.
At least until he coughs.
“Should you be drinking that?” I ask wryly.
“I’m too old to drink bourbon. I’m too old to walk,” he replies, handing the glass back. “You ever heard of Robert Johnson?”
I shake my head.
“Bluesman from the thirties. His work was remade by Clapton. Keith Richards. Anyway. They say he was driving through Mississippi late at night when he came on a crossroads. The devil offered him the chance to turn around or take the blues in exchange for his soul. You know what he did?”
“I’m guessing he didn’t turn around.”
“Nope. And before he died at twenty-seven, he made some of the best damn music that’s ever existed, present company included.”
“What’s your point?”
He grunts, his gaze never leaving the board. “You signed on the line. You chose your path, son. I’m glad you did because I wouldn’t have the privilege of sitting in that box every night watching you do your work.
“Now you got another choice. You can spend your life regretting the deal you made, shutting everyone and everything out while you’re at it, or”—he moves his queen down the board, and I see the checkmate too late—“you can play the blues the devil gave you.”