7. Blue Rose Days (updated 7-11-14, 7-18-15)
3.
Blue Rose Days
Johnny got off the
plane at JFK. No one was there to meet him. He couldn’t afford a car service or
taxi. At least his dear mother was letting him stay back at his old apartment
for a while. He took a city bus to the Rockaway ‘A’ train and rode the long
local back into Brooklyn. The beer bottles rolled up and down the floor of the
dilapidated car each time the motorman put on the break. The homies who entered
stayed clear of the wart infested white cracker slumped in the corner seat. Johnny
sat trying to not stink. No one would dirty their switchblade on this pitiful
dude. Even the hookers avoided him. Johnny rode to the end of the line in
Jamaica Queens before he realized he had passed out. His duffle bag was gone
when the transit cop awoke him. Instead of sleeping at the apartments of women
he met, he slept in the subway for weeks until cops threw him out. His only
filthy clothes kept getting filthier and reeked of urine. It kept everyone at a
distance. It was better than sitting in a Tahitian prison but he had lost every
penny he had earned bootlegging cassettes there. The drinks weren’t free
anymore, either, and neither were the women. He was homeless bum for time
uncounted. His toilet was his pants. His sustenance was a bottle of tequila.
Shriveled dead he was, subway dead, but a Guardian Angel dared to rouse and
speak with him; he got a phone number out of his mumbling brain. He called
Johnny’s home.
Mom had been worried sick. The Angel called
911 and got an ambulance to take Johnny to Belleview. Mom met him there with
Dr. Grossman, her uncle by marriage. Dr. Grossman got him ambulatory to his
Park Avenue office and, at his cousin’s behest, without any of his tawny
patients seeing, gave Johnny a full physical exam. “Thank God,” Dr. Grossman
said, “he doesn’t have AIDS, but he has everything else.”
How much time had
passed since he arrived back in New York City Johnny didn’t know for sure. He
was back in his old bedroom in Mom’s apartment. When he was lucid enough, Johnny
Livewire called up everyone he knew: Mousey, Teddy, even Derek Loxlear, They
were all either drug addicts, married, or dead. He lived with Mom until she
couldn’t take his alcoholism and drug use any more. She was just about
to throw him out.
Through
a chance meeting between their moms, Johnny learned that Dr. Drake Loxlier, his
neighbor and guitarist from the ‘70’s, was in Connecticut. He called Johnny
that evening and invited him up. Sir Drake, as they called him, was trying to
get a set to play out with local musicians; a cover band in Hartford. Johnny
couldn’t be particular anymore; he just wanted to play. Nothing had changed;
Derek still thought he was the best guitarist in the world. His bass player, a
neighbor and fellow insurance salesman named Drew James, played along with his
arrogance and his guitar much better than Derek but couldn’t get a note in
edgewise. What the heck. That’s the way it goes.
Johnny Livewire was
back behind the deli counter at the supermarket he had worked at in the 70’s.
The wages were good plus he got time and a half four hours over forty and
double time for working on Sundays and holidays. The manager of the department
was still Jake Eisenberg, the old geezer. Back in the ‘70’s Johnny had been
classmates with his son in junior high school. Johnny re-met Alan Eisenberg one
day when he was getting weed from his dealer; The dealer asked if he knew Alan.
They became re-acquainted. They got high. Alan asked his dad to give Johnny his
job back. Johnny’s only request of Jake was that he had Thursday evenings off,
the night of band practice.
“A
half pound of mortadella and provolone, please.”
“Do you want the
combo special?”
“Yeah, that’s okay
just cut it thin, please.”
Life back at the
deli counter wasn’t that bad. It was a good thing Jake hadn’t retired yet; he
had two more years to make it to thirty-five and get his full pension. Union
jobs had gotten scarcer since Johnny Livewire left for Tahiti via San
Francisco. It seemed like a lifetime ago to Johnny though it had only been
seven years. Thanks to Jake’s son, Johnny had gotten his old job back. With
credit for the five years he had worked there before his sojourn to the
tropics.
“Say,
you look familiar,” said a little middle-aged balding man with tortoise shell
framing his tired eyes. “Didn’t you used to work here years ago?”
“Seven
years ago I did.”
“Where
have you been?”
“It’s
a long story. Say, aren’t you a mail carrier or something?” said Johnny as he
slapped a few more slices of mortadella onto the scale.
“That’s
right; a mail carrier! You’ve got a good memory.”
“At
least I’ve got that!” Johnny kept piling slices. “Say, it’s a little over;
okay?”
“Yeah;
that’s okay. Wasn’t you in a band? You’re a singer, right?”
“Yeah,
I was.”
“You
sing anymore?”
“What’s
the use?”
“What,
did you lose your voice or something?”
“Singing
don’t pay no bills. Say,” said Johnny as he fingered in the price per pound.
“Weren’t you in a band?”
“Yeah,
my name is Rocky. You’re Johnny Livewire; right?”
“That
was my stage name; no more stages for me. It’s Livinsky now.”
“Why?
That’s sad,” said Rocky as he took two white paper packages off the
refrigerated showcase counter. “Say, Johnny. I still fuck around with some guys
in the neighborhood once in a while, you know, blues rock. Are you interested?
Come down to practice with us, won’t you?” Rocky put the packages into his
shopping cart. “Maybe you could sing a song or two with us.”
“Which
songs?”
“I
don’t know; how about ‘Born Under a Bad Sign?’ Do you know that song?”
“Do
I know that song?” Johnny had sung it a million times.
“Great.
Do you have a pen? Let me give you my phone number.” Johnny handed Rocky a pen
and a cutting of butcher block paper. “Here’s my number. Give me a call before
Thursday to let me know if you’re coming. I’ll call the other guys and rent
some space to practice.”
“I
have no equipment at all!” said Johnny as he placed the sealed slab of cold cut
back into the refrigerated case.
“All
the equipment you’ll need is there.’ Rocky could see how the spirit had drained
out of Johnny. He didn’t remember him being so negative seven years ago. In
fact, Johnny was such a big shot back then that he had turned down an offer to
play in Rocky’s band. Times had changed. Rocky somehow had enough spirit left
for the two of them.
“Say,
Johnny, I have a few Horner harmonicas I can’t use. Are you interested?”
“I
play the blues harp.”
“Sure
you do. Say, they’re yours if you want them. They’re no good to me.”
Johnny
stopped what he was doing and stood squarely facing Rocky,” That’s nice of
you.” Johnny handed Rocky a slice of prosciutto which Rocky took with two
fingers and dropped into his mouth. He gave Johnny a wink.
“Give
me a call.”
Johnny was a mess from all the trouble he
had had in Tahiti. The alcoholism and syphilis had taken its toll and Johnny’s
eyesight wasn’t so keen anymore; he needed glasses. He was a wreck. His bronze
complexion was ruddy red with yellow eye sockets hallow and sunken. His body
was emaciated; down to his pre-draft weight of 170 lbs., way down from his bloated
girth in the sunny tropics. Ironically, he could fit into the size 36” pants
his mother had kept had kept absent-mindedly hanging in his old closet. His
muscles had turned to flab and moved from his rear end to his stomach. His long
dark brown hair, now cut short for convenience, was showing streaks of white
though he had only turned forty a year ago. The few shirts he had abandoned
before heading west hung in the closet besides his black leather pants, the
ones he’d gotten emulating Jim Morrison. They fit him again but were now a
laugh. Johnny dared not wear them in public.
In his Mom’s apartment, he was still
waking up for beer breakfast mouth washed so that Jake and the customers at the
supermarket wouldn’t notice. Johnny took the invitation to play with Rocky as a
blessing that he shouldn’t waste. When on that afternoon Rocky approached and
reached over the counter with three Horner harmonicas, Johnny almost bowed in
courtesy. He felt like it would be his last chance to make it as a rock singer.
“Listen Johnny, it’s not working out.
I’ve had enough. I’m not young anymore. I can’t take your coming in at all
hours of the night, knocking things over, and waking up the whole building.
You’ve got to find your own place. You can afford it; you’ve been working at
Dan Supreme three months now.”
Johnny sat on the chair at the kitchen
table, bare-chested, in his boxer shorts, his bare legs sticking to the plastic
seat covers and listened to his mother complain. She was adamant, and afraid;
more than once Johnny had come home angry and cursing at invisible demons. She
had even called the police on him once when she thought she’d heard a burglar
at the window, but it was only Johnny trying to jimmy the lock because he had
lost his keys, “That’s just fine, if that’s the way you want it. I’ll leave but
give me time.”
“How much time?”
“I don’t know; until the end of the
month?”
“And then what?”
“I’ll be out of here by April.” Johnny
slowly got up, a tearing noise of his thighs, separation anxiety from the
chair, He knew his mom was right. He had got to get his shit together. He put
on his jeans, jacket and sneakers and headed up the corner to Sal’s Pizza to
use the phone and think. In his wallet he found the slip of paper with the few
names of friends who hadn’t told him not to bother them anymore. There were two
people left in Brooklyn that he knew; Dickey the drummer and Rocky the
guitarist.
“Hey, I’d really like to help you. I’ll
keep my eye out for a place.”
“Who’s that?” said Dickey’s wife, seeing
him on the phone.
“Shhh…what? No you can’t stay here for a
few days; there’s no space.”
“You’re damn right there isn’t,” said
Dickey’s porcelain doll.
“Quiet…no, not you Johnny.” Dickey gave
his wife a look. “I’ll ask around. How much are you willing to pay? Uh-huh.
Yeah; I’ll look. Okay, yeah, be cool, bye.”
Johnny fumbled in his pocket for another
quarter. He called Rocky and left a message that he would like to try out for
his band but that he needed a place to stay, too. After a beer and a slice, he
schlepped back down the street. He looked up as a car blaring “Welcome to the
Jungle” passed up the street. On the steps in the schoolyard Johnny sat to
collect his thoughts. The old schoolyard was quiet; he couldn’t handle the pain
anymore. He had started a joke which started the whole world laughing and now
clearly, he could see that the joke was on him. He broke down, but the streets
were empty; no one could hear his tears or feel his pain. Here was a failure.
Even his mom was telling him to leave. Johnny was thoroughly alone. “I should
have jumped off that bridge in Tahiti when I had a chance,” he said as he
sobbed uncontrollably. “It would have saved me a lot of trouble.” But then
Johnny coughed up a laugh. “It isn’t that bad,” he said aloud. “I have a
full-time job with benefits. I’m on the verge of joining a new rock ‘n’ roll
band.” Johnny stood, straightened his clothes, and walked the few paces to
Mom’s apartment. He showered and went to sleep. The next day was a work day.
“Hi Johnny, I got your message,” he heard
Rocky’s voice when he saw the red light flashing on the answering machine in
the morning. “I found of a place on 14th Avenue near 65th
Street that might be good; $400 a month, if you’re interested. It says to call
718-253-5143. Okay? Tell them you saw it in the Daily News. Oh, and I’ll see
you at Kings Rehearsal on East 16th near Kings Highway next door to
the OTB, 7pm, this Thursday. Bye.”
There were ten songs on the cassette
Rocky handed Johnny when he dropped off the harmonicas. Old blues rock
standards from Jimi Hendrix, Cream, and some new guy named Stevie Ray Vaughn.
He sat with earphones on and ran the cassette back and forth until he could
transcribe all of the words in the songs. A sip of tequila, a toot of
harmonica, that’s the way it went into the night on the roof upstairs from his
fifth floor walk-up studio until someone pounded on the ceiling for him to
stop.
During breaks at Dan Supreme, , Johnny
went out back by the dumpsters to have a cigarette and practice singing and
playing some songs. ”Spoonful spoon full of coffee, spoonful spoon full of tea…”
That’s the way it went. Johnny couldn’t keep his mind off of it but he was
becoming nervous. He was drinking more. He was forgetting the words. “That’s
alright;” He wrote them onto a small slip of paper and folded it into his apron
breast pocket. His voice was cracking; he couldn’t hit the high notes anymore.
But he blew the sweetest blues swoons on the old harp when he called on them to
come out and play. He bought a bottle of Chloraseptic to spray his throat when
things got rough. Now he’d have to take Mr. Sybille’s advice and sing from the
diaphragm once and for all, the way he showed him back in high school. Johnny
knew he had to take some advice or fade away like a Tahitian sunset.
In a sound studio in the basement under
an Off Track Betting outlet and a Lebanese smoke shop. Johnny practiced with
Blue Rose, the name Johnny had given the band because they played the blues,
and no reason other than it sounded like a good name, and no one else had it.
Rocky, the guitarist, was a friend of Alan Eisenberg who was his mail carrier
colleague at the post office. “My friend’s band’s been looking for a singer.”
“We have some chick singing for us but
she’s been giving us a hard time; only wants to do her own songs. Maybe you two
could sing together,” said Rocky when Johnny Livewire went to their first
practice. Johnny met Biff, the deaf bass player, and Muff, the diaper
delivering drummer. It was the first of many Thursday’s developing a set list
and practicing the songs again and again, at $25 an hour, studio time. Johnny
so wanted to become the professional rock ‘n’ roll entertainer that had always
eluded him. He was the most serious. The other three musicians were playing as
a hobby; they had no illusion of ever becoming famous. Their goal was to make a
little extra money playing out in front of an audience. “Are you serious about
playing out?” Johnny asked in wonderment.
Johnny remembered back to his first stint
at the delicatessen counter in the supermarket. It was during high school
before he followed Sam to Morgantown, West Virginia, before he picked up and
moved to San Francisco, Johnny Livewire was searching for his venue, a stage on
which to flourish. He couldn’t find it. It was the years before The Holy Shit
had morphed into three other bands, the years before Johnny Livewire hung up
his microphone and put on the shoes of a minstrel poet in San Francisco. He had
had a horrible realization back then; either he was going to become a
professional rock ‘n’ roll singer or he was going to become a delicatessen
counter-man for the rest of his life. At least some of the female hors
d’oeuvres at the deli counter were tasty. He took a few home to eat and almost
married one.
Johnny tried to get in touch with every
woman he knew before he took off and went to Tahiti. He wrote letters to his
old girlfriends that he had when he was young and hot, “fans” he called them,
to see if they were still in love with him: One was a young woman he met when
The Holy Shit were playing at a rehab center in Miami Beach in 1974 during
their only out of New York City tour.
“Dear
Simi Parker:
I guess you remember me but perhaps not
the way I remember you. You were a fantasy I was going to fulfill. You almost
went along with me until you realized it couldn’t be true. Still I know you
liked the feeling I gave you lying on the grass in that baseball field near the
outfield palm trees. Though it couldn’t have been later than nine o’clock, it
was as quiet as three o’clock in the morning in Brooklyn. It could never be
that quiet at nine o’clock at night in Brooklyn.
Simi, I remember your hair; auburn and
flowing over your shoulders, parted in the middle of your forehead, held back
behind your ears. I remember your soft green eyes, unadorned with cosmetics, a
natural beauty make-up could not replicate. You weren’t taller than five-feet
four-inches though, at fifteen you must have grown since then, or possibly even
shrunk since you are now in your fifties and passed menopause .Excuse me if I
sound rude. I’m only making a joke.
Do you remember that song I wrote for you?
I called it “Free Fall.”It was about how much I would miss you. ‘Children
crying in spite of love and tenderness…’ that was about me. You kept telling me
to enjoy being there with you; that we were too young to think of a future. I
did put it out of my mind that evening with the bright moon shining over Miami
Breach silhouetting the palm trees. I only wanted to kiss you tenderly. I never
imagined that you would want to go down on me. I never asked for it nor did I
expect you to swallow me, but you did. I hope I’m not embarrassing you but I
can’t forget your unconditional love. I wish I had it now here in Brooklyn.
Simi, I have had a hard life. I had been
living in Tahiti, if you could believe it, for over ten years. It wasn’t as
nice as it sounds. I can’t tell you how many times I looked up at that Tahitian
moon, even when I was with another woman and sad as hell, but I looked up and I
remembered you and I lying face up on that baseball field in Miami. I wondered
how my life would have been different if I had gotten off the train of life at
your station. But, anyway, you didn’t want me to stay then probably any more
than you want me to return now, if you still even remember who I am.
And so, Simi, I am dropping this note,
seeing on-line a name that is yours which may mean that you are still a single
woman. Answer me and I would love to re-meet you. Ignore and not find me and I
will cherish your memory just the same. Yours truly, Jonathan Livinsky (now
Johnny Livewire to the world of rock ‘n’ roll)”
He even got back in touch with Ferine. She
wanted to know what he was doing with his life. “ I took your advice and left
Larry,” Ferine said.
“What? You finally left him?”
“It wasn’t easy, Johnny. He begged me to
stay.”
“Why of course. Why should he buy the cow
when he can get the milk free?”
“Are you calling me a cow?” Well, it was
much easier after I met Dwayne.”
“Dwayne? Who’s Dwayne?”
“Dwayne is a lovely man I met who was up
in New York at a convention for a computer firm he works for.”
“He wants to marry me, Johnny. Can you
believe it?”
“I always said you shouldn’t be playing
second fiddle to a married man. When is the wedding?”
“We’re not having a party; he doesn’t have
time. He has to be back at work.”
“Where does he work?”
“Atlanta.”
“He’s from Georgia?”
“I’m quitting my job and moving down there
to be with him.”
“Wow,” Johnny gave Ferine a big hug but,
actually, he was disappointed. He was hoping himself to get back together with
her. Now he knew it was impossible. Well, at least they could still be friends.
Six months later, Ferine called Johnny
from Atlanta. “Johnny, come down and visit me for my birthday. I’ve been
telling Dwayne all about you and he’s dying to meet you.”
“She knew
he was my best friend. I guess that’s why I did it. It started out as a joke, a
joke to get some attention. She was giving all her attention to Dickey and I
couldn’t take it anymore. When she told me that his band, Funny Farm would be
playing in Manhattan at a club on the corner of Avenue of the Americas and W. 9th
Street, I guess she thought I would be happy for him as she was. Right? Could
you believe I would be happy for him? Dickey had stolen my girlfriend’s
attention. She was hanging out with his group of friends and his band mates.
She had given up on me; I wasn’t exciting to her. In addition to him, she
couldn’t see why I didn’t like punk music. She didn’t see the pretention I saw
in garage bands purposefully trying to sound amateurish. To me, it was like a
forty year old acting like a ten year old. Now I ask you, is that cute? Yes, I
told her my friend Sal was dead.” After their last LSD trip together, they both
knew what it was like to be dead.
“I knew
telling her that would get her attention. If it didn’t, well, I would then just
give up on her. I wouldn’t want to be friends with her if she didn’t even care
about my dear friend. Sal knew he wasn’t really dead. I told myself he wouldn’t
mind. I didn’t expect to get back together with her. So much had passed since
she dated her driver’s education teacher back in high school. She was long gone
from my life and had gone through another relationship with her new group of
Al’s friends before she settled on Dickey. She was deep into his crowd of glam
punk lovers, The Velvet Underground, The New York Dolls, David Bowie, and The
Ramones. They couldn’t keep The Ramones off the turntable. She didn’t agree
with me about how shitty they were with their one-minute forty-seven-second
ditties. She thought it was cool but I thought it was all a ruse. Anyone could
see that Iggy & the Stooges and the MC5 were much better musicians than
them. Even Patti Smith had more talent, though only as a poetess. Why were they
pretending to play and sing badly? It wasn’t right; it was like cheating.”
“Sure, I went
to see the shows at CBGB’s; even saw Blondie and Funny Farm. Maybe I was wrong
about them. I pretended that I had a change of heart; let bygones be bygones. I
could still like Ferine despite her friends and new musical interest I put on
my standard plain black T-shirt, jeans, and construction boots and took the
subway to the West 4th Street Station. I walked up a few block
across from the Women’s House of Detention and entered the club on the corner
When I walked in, Fun No Fun were in the middle of their set; I had no
intention of listening to their shit. I paid admission at the door, got carded
with my hand stamped for drinks, and went in.”
“There, I
saw Ferine, standing at the end of the bar near the rail that divided it from
the seats. She was standing with a mixed drink in her hand. I felt like
slapping her for wanting to be there and liking Dickey’s bad playing. I would
have been a better singer if they’d given me more of a chance, which they
didn’t. Because she liked Nicky now and not me she changed her musical taste to
his and abandoned mine.”
“’Did you
hear what happened?’ I said to her frighteningly, loudly to be heard over the
crowd but with a worried look on my face.
“’What!?’
she asked frantically. ‘What! What happened!?! I can’t hear you!’” she said
over the music
“’He’s
dead,’ I said, ‘Sal is dead! He killed himself!”
“’He
killed himself!?!’ When!?! Where!?!’
“I had
gotten her attention. I was surprised at how much attention I could get.”
“’Tell me,
tell me what happened.’ It was wonderful. She wasn’t listening to the music at
all; she was listening to me, all me. I had come so far with this joke that it
wasn’t a joke anymore; it was becoming a lie. I couldn’t turn back. I knew I
had ruined her night. I was glad. She deserved to have her night ruined. She
had abandoned me and my music for that asshole punk drummer. Let her suffer.”
“But look; she still cared for my friend and
she cared for me. Maybe I shouldn’t have lied to her after all. Maybe I
shouldn’t have ruined her night.”
“’I’m not
telling you the truth,’ I said.”
“’You’re
not what?!?’”
“’I said
Sal isn’t really dead.’”
“’Johnny,
then what did you say such a terrible thing like that for? That’s such a
terrible thing to tell someone!’”
“’I was
just joking.’”
“’That is
not a joke! That is not funny!’”
“She
turned away from me and looked back at the stage. The crowd was applauding
Dickey’s band that was just finishing their set. Dickey came off his drum
stool. He had a few words with the band and then a few fans gathering around
him. Then, he spotted me and Ferine and made it through the crowd standing near
the stage platform towards us. He was smiling but panting and waving; out of
breath. When he approached he took me in his arms and asked if I’d seen him and
how he was. He was glad that I’d changed my mind and came to see the band. Then
he looked at Ferine. She wasn’t smiling and the look on his face changed.”
“’What
happened, honey? Why aren’t you smiling?’” He looked over at me perplexed to
get a clue. I had none to give. I didn’t know what to say.”
“’He told
me Salvatore, his friend was dead!’”
“’Who? Sal
Arielle is dead?!? How did that happen? What happened, Johnny?’”
“’It
didn’t happen,’ Ferine said. Nicky’s faced changed again to anger.”
“’What?’”
“’It
didn’t happen; I lied to Ferine.’ I told him. I lied to Ferine.”
“’That’s
not cool, Johnny; that’s not cool at all!’” Dickey was livid, heaving with all
his adrenalin. Look what you did to Ferine! Why did you do that, Johnny?’” Just
then a band member came out to tell Dickey to get ready for the next set. He
looked at me, shook his head sadly, gave Ferine a kiss and went back in. Ferine
waited with me for a moment but couldn’t look at my face. I grabbed her hand
and pulled her outside the club but all she could keep asking me was why I did
it; why did I say it. All I could say was I didn’t know why.” She turned around
almost running back inside, leaving me outside on the stoop.”
“I didn’t
know. I was so sorry for what I had done. She turned away and went back in the
club leaving me there. She was angry at me. I knew it would be the last time we
would speak for a long time. I said ‘sorry’ and ‘sorry’ again as she went back
in. I punched my hand into a cardboard sign on the wall and kept walking.
“’Hey
asshole.’”
“I kept on
walking, and then running to the subway station entrance pushing through the
crowd of couples and friends strolling along Avenue of the Americas. What was
the matter with me? What was wrong with me? I felt like killing myself. I had
done a terrible thing and I felt like killing myself. I felt so ashamed. I
stamped down the stairs to the station, slammed the token into the slot, and
violently pushed through the turnstile crying loudly. People looked at me
avoided me. I didn’t want to live anymore.”
“Downstairs
on the bottom platform, I stood stamping my feet and screaming to myself asking
what I had done. I heard the roar and then saw the headlights of the oncoming
‘A’ train. On the spur of the moment, I jumped down onto the tracks of the
approaching train. I heard the motorman pull the whistle and the screech of the
squealing brakes but I faced the train full body, eyes closed. It had stopped
four feet in front of where I stood! I hopped off the track and onto the
platform as fast as I could with the motorman, out of his cab screaming, ‘Son
of a bitch!! Hey you! Hey! Stop that man!’”
“I ran
down the stairs thinking I would find an exit but just then, on the lower
level, an ‘F’ train was closing its doors. I help one open and jumped inside
quickly. The doors closed behind me. The train closed up and pulled out of the
station. I remember thinking it was going to South Ferry and considered jumping
off the ledge into the waters off Battery Park. I thought about it but I was a
coward. I was a coward. I couldn’t do it. With all my energy drained, my
clothes drenched in sweat, I slumped into the car’s end seat and closed my sore
red eyes taking the train wherever it would go. It went back to Brooklyn. I got
off the Ft. Hamilton Station but this station was more than two miles away from
the Square and I walked, I walked slow, miserable, passed Greenwood Cemetery,
thinking of all the lucky stiffs inside.”
“When I
finally got home, around 4am, I went to the draw with my medication and
withdrew an opened quart bottle of Southern Comfort and drank. I spilled out my
guts out on the bathroom floor that night. I wanted to die but I would go on
living.”
“That’s some story Johnny, some story.” Dickey
hugged Johnny tightly though his arms hung limp. “I love you man, anyway.”
Johnny was visiting
the home of Dickey after he had come back from visiting Ferine in Atlanta.
Ferine gave Johnny Dickey’s phone number and told him to call him; Dickey was
still playing in a band and might need a singer. The topic of conversation was
Ferine.
“I thought we would
go on like that forever I did,” said Johnny as he sat in Dickey’s living room.
“We were inseparable for three years in high
school. Every way we could possibly enjoy ourselves, she enjoyed it, too. Yeah.
We must have gone up to a roof or under a stairwell a hundred times. All I had
to do was ask. Never her though. She was ashamed to remove her pants in public.
Once I got her to agree to do it in Prospect Park on a lawn near some trees but
she got a panic attack right when I was almost done and she pulled them up; she
though she heard a voice. It wasn’t. I told her the blue balls I’d suffer after
being unfulfilled was painful; she had to go through with it. She did.”
“She
got a thrill from arousing, didn’t she? We did everything four or five times a day
on good days. Once she ran away from home and came to my apartment building at
three o’clock in the morning; she knocked on the window and I pulled her up and
in. She got into trouble for that though. I couldn’t go over to her house for a
while. Her mom thought she had run away to a girlfriend’s house though; not
mine. I was back in her basement with her in no time.”
“I
always wondered why she needed her driver’s ed. teacher, too. I thought I was
enough for her; she was enough for me! He would drop her off at her house while
I’d be there waiting for her to come home. Her mom used to invite him in for
espresso and pastries; it was an Italian thing. She never liked me because I
wasn’t Italian. One day, when I asked her what was going on, she came clean. I asked
if there was anything going on between them and she said there was; they used
his friend’s apartment near the high school. Between Carmine and me, she was
having more sex in a week than most girls had in a year!”
“It
went against everything I had believed about her. My world was turned upside
down. I slapped her; for the first and last time, I slapped her, in the face,
hard. I was so upset. She was so sad; she just wanted to be honest with me. I
didn’t know then that she was a nymphomaniac. Sure, we had joked about how she
might be one of those, but it was true. She had to have sex; a lot of sex, all
the time.”
“A
few years ago, when I moved back to Brooklyn, Ferine had broken up with Larry,
the married guy she was having an affair with for fifteen years. She had met
Dwayne and took my advice and told Larry it was over. She and Dwayne got
married and moved down to a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia where Dwayne was a
computer repair guy. He was okay with her lifestyle; open marriage you call it,
or maybe she never told him. She invited me to go down and visit. I had no
desire for Ferine anymore then so I went.”
“When
I got down there, she picked me up at the airport and drove to a coffee shop in
DeKalb County; “De-Cab” she called it. Hah! That’s when she hit me with the
bombshell; Larry was in town, too, and the both of us would be sleeping over
together. Her husband was nice enough, I guess, or he was in on it; she never
quite came out and said it. I jokingly asked if Carmine was coming down, too.
She didn’t like that. There we were, lolling around with whiskey. Ferine was
fine; so was Dwayne. So was Larry. Only I felt uncomfortable. What she had told
Dwayne about me and Larry I never learned. Dickey, maybe you know how I felt.”
“She
left me, too, to go out with my best friend, Ollie. Musical chairs; that’s what
it sounded like to me.” Just then Phoenix came back into the living room with
Ambrosia.
“A
woman who could never be satisfied,” said Johnny
“You mean like me?”
joked Ambrosia winked at Johnny who took the coffee from her hand and placed it
on the table near the cookies they’d brought. Ambrosia had a wonderful
collection of porcelain baby dolls in a cabinet and say Johnny
staring at it."
"Would you like to hold
one of my babies?" Johnny couldn't say no. Ambrosia opened the cabinet and
took a doll out. "Isn't she sweet?" she said and placed the doll in
Johnny's arms. Uncomfortably, he stroked it.
”We’re talking about
Ferine,” said Dickey. Now she’s a respectable southern dame; at least it seems
that way. They’re trying to have a child.”
“I
hope she’s finally happy,” concluded Johnny
“Yeah,
Say, we’re so glad you finally made it over. It’s been a long time coming,”
Dickey loudly said.
“The
pleasure is ours,” said Johnny trying to sound like Clark Gabel. “Ferine said
we would get along well,” Johnny replied
“She
was right about that. Music is the common thread,” Ambrosia chimed in.
“Yeah,
so come to our next practice, won’t you?” urged Dickey.
“I
think I will, thanks, for inviting me.” Johnny was thrilled.
“Yeah,
it’ll be great! Sing a few songs with us.”
It
was fifteen years since they last met on the steps of the club on Avenue of the
Americas and 9th Street. So much had changed since then but both men
were still trying to make it in bands; both spending all their time in their
practice. Dickey was still into punk rock and Johnny was still a blues shouter
but there might be a way to blend. They were approaching forty years old
swiftly and the last ditch effort was as hand. It seemed that everyone who never
made was starting rock ‘n’ roll cover bands; starting a band for the burgeoning
baby-boomer nostalgia circuit. Everyone was plugging away at it; Johnny
Livewire was no exception.
Meanwhile,
down in Soho, Johnny was invited by Dickey to try out for his new punk band,
Shit No Shit. After all those years, Johnny realized his music may be
blues-tinged but it was a garage band, so why not?
Blue Rose was going nowhere fast, Johnny felt.
It just didn’t feel right. He was starting to panic; he’d been caught-up with
another loser. He would take the chance and secretly audition for Dickey’s Band
as Blue Rose began wilting in Brooklyn.
(Write about the
audition for Shit no Shit)
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