Lo Fi

Chapter 5

5.

Justin Wilson is missing. The news breaks days before he’s supposed to play at The Venue. He posted something cryptic on social media—going away away away, always better this way—and then went dark. Nobody has heard from him in days. I’m in bed when I read the news, just a few lines posted on the Nashville Scene’s website, my feet bare, my lips chapped. At first, it sounds like overblown clickbait about a local musician. He’s known for a lot of drinking, a lot of drugs, you could say, but with only a single post online and no other comments from family, nobody is doing much speculating, not yet. I don’t like the feel of it, though. Especially not when paired with his frank—often dark—songs and his occasional dismal online musings.

I search around to see if his guitar player, Esther Wainwright, has said anything. They’ve had an on-again, off-again romantic entanglement for a while, but she hasn’t commented. She’s apparently been in Australia for a solo gig. I wonder if she even knows yet. Only local news seems to have picked up the story, and barely that. When I go to text Julien about it, I realize I somehow don’t even have his phone number, just a work email. I send him a link to the story. Wilson’s gig at The Venue this week was supposed to be a short set, not with Esther but with another local band—a local supergroup of sorts, with Wilson as lead, calling themselves How High We Go.

I wonder if he’s dead, but then again I don’t really know anything. I’m not a friend of his, I’m not family. I just work the door. I stamp hands. I’m not even a critic or a journalist, not a true insider. I’m not in a band. To even say I write songs wouldn’t be fair, not in a town full of songwriters. If I’m anything at all here, I’m just a fan.

Julien responds to my email a couple of hours later, but all it says is: Whoa, no, didn’t see this. Thx for sending.

—Good, you’re here, Julien says.

It’s the night Wilson is supposed to perform. The clock blinks: five after five. I pull out my headphones.

—I’m on time, I say. I was—

Sounds from an acoustic sound check seep into the office. I figured the show tonight would be canceled—postponed—when Wilson’s disappearance was announced earlier this week, though I hadn’t heard one way or the other from Julien or Andy.

—Set times are shifting, Julien says, handing me a sheet of paper. How High We Go is no longer on it.

Low Lights—7:45

Disaster Tourist—9:00

—Seriously? I ask.

—What? Julien looks up from his phone.

I wave the paper at him.

—You think I need a piece of paper to remember two show times? I know the bar isn’t that high around here, but—

—Those aren’t for you. I need you to hang them up back in the greenroom. Oh, and restock the water bottles too, he says.

He’s inscrutable, glancing up at me and then back down at his phone, then over his shoulder to the main space.

—The openers are seriously still playing? I ask. Aren’t they supposed to be friends of his? Hasn’t anyone heard anything?

Julien passes me a roll of duct tape.

—Not my call, he says.

—Where’s Andy? He’s the one who booked this show, isn’t he? Can’t we at least postpone it? The guy is missing.

—Listen. I know. It’s weird. But How High We Go wasn’t the only band on the bill. And there are contracts involved. Promoters. Show guarantees. Plus, you’re right, they are friends of his. And I think they want to play.

A case of beer crashes onto the wood floors outside. I hear Colt curse loudly.

—That doesn’t mean they should, I tell Julien.

There are layers and layers of fame in Nashville, and you have to sift through them to understand anything. Izzy understands it inherently; Sloane is an expert at it. Recognizing the base of the pyramid and its fresh-faced wannabes: virtuoso guitarists, singer-songwriters staked out at every open mic, fiddle players and guitar players and banjo players standing on the street corners up and down Broadway. Then there are the people who aren’t famous but think they deserve to be—and the ones who aren’t famous but think they are, dressing up in wide-brimmed hats and Peter Nappi boots and dropping heavy credit cards on overpriced martinis at the Standard or Oak Bar. Then there are the local, regional, micro-famous, the people who sell out the Ryman three nights in a row every year, but don’t always have national name recognition.

That is Justin Wilson. Still local, but always on the cusp of breaking out nationally. His first album, Interlude, Key of J, was sad acoustic sleep rock, with just the right amount of falsetto and flourish, angst and alternate guitar tunings, and it made some waves. He hasn’t released anything since. Esther cowrote almost all his songs, but everybody always says it’s Justin’s voice—that voice—that carries the songs. They’re not wrong. His voice is one of those haunting, once-in-a-lifetime howls, sadness just pouring through it. But I always wonder—would he have anything to sing at all if it weren’t for her?

Sloane thinks the same thing. That maybe Esther deserves a little more credit, even if Wilson has the voice. He’s fucked without her, she said, even though she doesn’t actually know anything about their lives, how they write their songs, what their romantic relationship is like. But I’ve always thought of Esther as both muse and mistress, subject and songwriter. Maybe there isn’t any him without her.

Esther tried to break out, solo, once. She released a few albums—critically regarded, commercially unsuccessful. I haven’t really listened to any of them. It’s Justin’s career that gets all the attention. Whatever their dynamic is behind closed doors, though, it’s impossible to ignore what happens onstage between them. Absolutely crackling. Energy and tension, full of intimacy: harmonies that braid together like bodies, breaths in between notes that sound like—

Everybody wants that kind of chemistry. And since the album that took off was technically his, he became the breakout success. That word—breakout. Like someone freeing themselves. Like they were in some kind of trap. Which is funny, because if anything in the music industry seems like a trap, it’s the attention, the fame. The kind of thing you can really only break out of by disappearing.

Backstage: a sad cheese spread limp on the coffee table, a half-empty Miller Lite. Cold coffee in a white Styrofoam cup, teeth marks along the rim. Golden light garish as I tape the new set times to the wall next to the fridge, taking down the one with Wilson’s name on it. Sloane’s texts coming through in my pocket: Do you work tomorrow? Want to have taco night? I’m making margs. And getting beer. Yuengling right?

A slice into my finger, a straight line of red appearing along the outside of my pinkie, as if it’s been drawn there. As thin as the high E string on the guitar.

Not having perfect pitch. Not knowing how to adjust the action on my guitar. Not having the finger strength to play a full song using only barre chords. Not being able to sing in front of people, even though I love to sing. Getting so much wrong at The Venue: not knowing where to put the recycling, not knowing how to fix the humidifier. Knowing I shouldn’t sleep with the hot bartender but still wanting to sleep with the hot bartender. Giving my phone number out to singers that first month, so often that Andy starts to joke about it. Not taking myself seriously for so long that eventually I start to wonder if anyone else ever will.

Colt is sweaty and gaunt-eyed at the bar lineup, like he hasn’t slept in days. He’s cut his blond hair again. It’s practically buzzed, which I hate. His face still looks beautiful, though I flinch remembering the rest of our night the week prior, its blurry edges, like taking a picture with your finger over the frame. Eddie’s trying to show me the lyrics to a song he wrote, reaching across the space between us and shoving his phone toward me. As if this is the right time, as if I want to read his song lyrics in front of him while he reads over my shoulder, while I’m working. Julien is on the other side of me, shaking his head and laughing quietly, watching Eddie.

—We’re eighty-six Yuengling, Colt says. Should be restocked tomorrow. I think that’s the only thing we’re out of. And try to avoid telling people about the pizza. It makes the whole place reek, and I don’t know, this isn’t a goddamn Papa Johns, y’know?

Technically, according to some ancient Tennessee liquor law, every bar has to sell a food item. We sell pizzas: frozen, microwaved, to be consumed in moments of drunkenness or desperation or both.

My eyes shift to Julien for a beat, my eyebrows lifted and his head shaking.

—And please remind the bands that the drink tickets we give them up front are the only drink tickets they get. No more tabs. These guys are gonna drink us fucking dry.

Eddie salutes Colt but he doesn’t catch it. The smell of weed drifts over from somewhere backstage. Colt’s palms are pressed against the lip of the bar, like he’s about to start doing push-ups. Christ, we are a little Scooby Doo gang.

—Is that it? Julien asks Colt.

—You tell me, Colt says, a hint of irritation humming beneath the words.

—We should be out of here early tonight, Julien says.

—Al, you got a second? Colt asks.

I want to say it again—because the goddamn headliner is missing—but just then a delivery guy drops so many cases of Pbr on the floor that the floorboards actually tremble. Everybody pauses for a moment, and then without any direction otherwise, the meeting disbands.

Julien heads for the stairs, calling back to me:

—I need you downstairs. Don’t really have time for—

—For what? Colt asks.

The two of them stand there for a moment, their eyes fixed in a pissy little impasse.

—I’ll be right down, I say.

In the office: Colt pushes me against the door, a firm hand tight around the back of my neck. No lead-up—just tongues across the slick surface of each other’s lips, the rest of the day fading to black as I fumble with his belt buckle. It’s all so unnecessary, loud, desperate. Like we can’t wait, can’t find anywhere else to go, can’t control ourselves at all. And then the doorknob twists and I push him away quickly, running a hand through my hair, across my mouth.

Julien appears in the doorway. I exhale slowly, trying to stand up straighter. He looks from me to Colt and then back to me, his eyes squinted. Colt clears his throat and I take another step away from them both, like if I can back away far enough, I’ll disappear completely.

—Doors, Julien says to me and then turns around.

Melodies that have been stuck in my head over the past five months instead of my own:

“Moth Eaters” (Justin Wilson)

“Play Crack the Sky” (Brand New)

“I Only Wear Blue” (Dr. Dog)

“Hush Now” (Justin Wilson)

“Fade into You” (Mazzy Star)

“Cathedrals” (Jump, Little Children)

“Wish You Were Here” (Ryan Adams)

“Paper Thin Walls” (Modest Mouse)

“Misery Business” (Paramore)

“Shanghai Cigarettes” (Caitlin Rose)

“Girls of Athens” (Pet Lions)

—Did you hang the new set times backstage? Julien asks later, down at the door.

—I managed.

He’s sitting on one of the black stools, tearing wristbands apart. Doors aren’t for half an hour, and the sun is setting in a lovely blurred blue out beyond Cummins Station. The wristbands split in quiet, rhythmic rips. Upstairs, a grungy bass line thumps away. Julien taps his foot to it.

—Do you play? I ask.

I want to talk about anything besides what he may or may not have just seen. He glances over, his foot stops keeping the beat.

—What?

—Do you play bass?

—No. I mean, not really. No—

Now his right foot is at an odd angle, like he’s fighting the urge to twirl it. A nervous tic.

—Why?

—You look like a bass player, I say, shrugging.

For a few moments it’s quiet in our little atrium. The bass line above us has stopped. Doors aren’t open yet.

—Am I doing something…Are you pissed at me? Ever since I got here today—

Julien glances up and then looks down again. He looks good when he’s frustrated, his irritation bubbling something up to the surface that I haven’t seen before.

—No, he says.

—Sorry, I say. About earlier.

—I don’t care what you do outside of work.

—I mean—

—At work, I care, but you’re—he’s—

He sighs.

—We’re all adults. I just, I really just need you at the door when I tell you I need you at the door.

—Okay. That’s it? I ask.

He nods, but he doesn’t look at me. My face is warm, sweat beading at my hairline. I pluck several strands out and relish the quick pricks of pain.

He looks at me for a long time, then lets his eyes drift over to the door. The sun shifts behind a shelf of clouds, casting the front room in shadow.

—You’re right, Julien says. It’s kind of weird that we’re still having the show.

Oh Jesus. I’m pretty sure she’s wasted. Do you think he’s dead? No fucking way. That’s some Elliott Smith shit. Different Justin. He’s not even famous. You smoke? Good, you shouldn’t. Lost in the flood. He’s producing now I think. No, insurance didn’t cover it. I can’t, I have the hiccups. Years ago, yeah, out by the lake. Nobody’s looking. You can do it right now. If you go down on Sunday, during the day, the place is empty. Fifty Shades of Hay! The bartender is fucking hot, yeah? It’s been more than forty-eight hours. Yeah, man, he’s probably dead.

During the set, I lose track of Julien. I drink more than I should without realizing it, a thrum of energy starting in my chest and then short-circuiting in my stomach. I don’t realize the nausea I’ve had until it’s gone. Colt’s feeding me gin and tonics and we’re eye-fucking shamelessly—a look that always feels like a risk-free flirtation, though nothing really is.

I pass by the office on my way to the bathroom, surprised to find the door cracked. It’s usually locked during shows, but now a sliver of light shoots through, like the single bow of a violin.

—Come on, what if it’s not four weeks? a girl’s voice says.

—It’s Saturday nights, Julien says. I can’t.

My palm was on the door, the cobalt paint flecked on my palm, but I pull it back, running it through my hair.

—Exactly, Jess says. It’s Saturday night. That’s the point.

Her voice, forceful and loud, is recognizable now.

—Maybe a Monday. Or Tuesday. I don’t think they’re there yet, Julien says. Not for a weekend slot.

—Bullshit, she says. First of all, they absolutely are. That’s—I’m not even going to address that, because you know the kind of tours and late-night spots they’re booking right now. You just don’t like them.

—That’s not true.

—You can’t just book bands you personally like, she says.

—Why don’t you just go talk to Benji over at the End? I know for a fact they have residency slots open.

—The End? No. no. You know they’re bigger than that. These guys can bring in three, maybe four hundred on a night like this.

—Four weeks in a row? No way.

—They’re local, she says.

Julien sighs.

—Listen to it, Jess says now.

There’s a soft shuffling, a beat of silence in the conversation.

—I have, Julien says.

—No, not these. These are brand-new. They just recorded with Dave over in East. It’s fucking good stuff, Jules.

I stand up slightly straighter.

—Fine, but no guarantees, Julien says.

It’s quiet for a moment. I can hear the singer’s drunken onstage chatter as she tunes her guitar, the crowd on edge and quiet.

—Julien, I say, pushing the door open with my palm.

What I didn’t expect: the two of them wrapped in a hug, Julien’s arms slung low around Jess’s waist, Jess pressing her lips up into his neck. Julien catches my gaze over her shoulder.

—You really should come see this set, I say.

Jess doesn’t let go, but Julien presses away from her, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. Jess glances over at me. I wait for her to introduce herself, but she doesn’t, and then we’ve missed the moment.

—Good or bad? Julien asks about the set.

—I honestly don’t know yet, I say.

—I don’t think we’ve officially met, Jess says. She unhooks herself from the hug and walks over to me, sticking her hand out. I’m Jess, she says.

—Al.

—You guys haven’t met? Julien asks. I thought—

—With a k, I say.

She laughs. Hard to read her tone. But she’s looking at me like she did from down the bar the night Nick was in town. A smile of familiarity, recognition.

—So good to put a face to a name, she says, like she’s been waiting to meet me, like she’s heard about me. Like I don’t already know how to spell her fucking name.

—Okay, I’ll leave you two to “work,” she says, complete with air quotes.

—Nice to meet you, I say.

—Call me later? she asks Julien. I’ve got a showcase till eleven, but after that, okay?

Screeching feedback, slurred speech, the sound of feet on stairs, people trickling slowly out of the set. Resigned faces—the looks of people who want their money back but know they won’t get it. Julien follows me in silence as we head down to the main space, the disjointed banter carrying quietly from the stage.

—Did you clock out? he finally asks, nodding to my drink.

—Colt gave it to me, I say, shrugging.

—I’m sure.

—You gave me a beer during my shift, like, three weeks ago. Don’t be such a narc, Jules.

He laughs at this, an unexpected smile that springs across his face. Teeth: dainty and imperfect.

—I didn’t call me that, he says.

I just look at him and shrug, taking a sip of my drink.

—Did you clock out? he asks again.

—I will, I say, indignant.

—Let’s go see about this set, Alison.

The show is bizarre. The girl who opens, under her stage name, Low Lights, is fucked up, and she spends most of her set with her back to the audience. Her eyes can’t seem to hold themselves steady, and when she does turn around she looks like a picture that’s just slightly out of focus. She forgets the lyrics to her own songs, and at one point she sets her guitar down and walks offstage before coming back with a bottle of water and a disoriented, frightened look. When Disaster Tourist comes on, they try to do some kind of energy circle for Justin, but an amp goes haywire five seconds in, and a deafening shriek of feedback shatters the mood as Danny and Simon rush to do damage control.

Onstage, now, a busted amp; upstairs, a girl screaming obscenities on the balcony, drunk and sad. A blood-orange moon, my paper cut, still bleeding. Another text from Sloane: chicken tacos or beef? Simon messing up the monitors for the lead singers, Colt giving me miniature shots in secret by the back bar, his fingertips tracing my thigh anytime he walks past me. I’m clocked out though. Andy’s gone. Julien’s girlfriend is too. At the door, a cab driver hands us a cell phone of somebody he dropped off earlier. The smell of rain, but it’s just humidity. Boredom dripping into heavy, mindless drinking. Julien—Jules—distracted and distant.

Whenever I watch the audio guys scrambling during a show like tonight, I can’t help but think about how easy my job is. Sometimes it’s just me and Julien, with Mazzy Star or Vampire Weekend or the Format playing overhead, as I flip through last week’s Nashville Scene, mocking the best-of lists, asking Julien if Panera is really the best bakery we have. Other nights it’s us and the whole city, the whole scene, an infinite line of people and names and faces. Melodies you want to hear over and over again, memories you’re trying to crystallize but the drinks make it impossible.

You are a gatekeeper and a hostess, a face people might recognize or resent or never think about again. A film on repeat—night after night, ID, stamp, skin, next, ID, stamp, skin, next. Face after face. We don’t even check bags. People could be carrying anything. Booze or weapons or glass bottles or coke or ketamine or whatever other drugs people do at shows. But mostly they carry nothing. Andy always says we can use our discretion: if someone looks way too wasted, or gives us shit, we can always turn them away. Julien does. But I still see myself as a conduit from the crowd to the artist, a benevolent figure at the gates of heaven. I don’t turn anyone away.

—I thought we were eighty-six? I ask Julien upstairs.

He smiles, shrugs. He doesn’t usually drink till the very end of his shift, by which point I’m on my second or third. But now he’s halfway through a Yuengling, sitting on the couch, and I should be drunk but I feel dead sober.

—Band loaded out? I ask.

—Almost, he says. Simon’s trying to get them done out back. You been at the bar?

Muffled house music, a drunken woman’s voice carrying from the bar. A text from Colt asking me if I want a ride.

—I clocked out, I say. What a weird night.

—It’s fine. That’s not what I was trying to say.

My arm reaches out toward him, asking for a beer. The room is low-lit, the lip of the skyline a faint outline in the dark window. Over the house music, an unfamiliar song. A trash bag crashing into a bin. Julien passes me his beer and I take a sip.

—Oh, hey. Who was your friend? he asks. It’s been a little while now, but I was meaning to ask you.

He stretches his arm up over his head, like he’s working out a kink in his neck. The hem of his boxers is briefly visible, a line of silver against his pale hip bone.

—What friend? I ask.

—The guy. The night of the flood. The night I gave you a beer like a bad narc. He looked familiar.

I laugh.

—That was forever ago, I say. He’s in that band Flirtation Device. They played here last year. Before I started?

This seemed like plenty of context, though I already wonder if I’ve said too much, tried to draw in too many details of Nick’s life.

—I don’t know them, Julien says. I just figured I’d seen him at another show.

—He’s a—

—He’s a what?

I narrow my eyes at him slightly, take a sip of the beer.

—Are we friends? I ask.

The sound of Colt’s voice floats into the room as he closes out the lingering bar guests.

—Well, I’m letting you drink my beer, he says, as I pass the bottle back to him. So yes, I would say that we’re friends.

It’s all so formal, though—his tone, every syllable stiff and stilted.

—Jesus. You say it like this is some kind of deposition.

He laughs, erupting in a cough, a hand to his chest.

—It sounds like one, he says.

—You’re so cagey.

—You think anyone who doesn’t talk all the time is cagey.

—I’m not cagey.

—Well, you talk all the time.

That seems like a joke, but when I search his face for a smile, he lifts the beer to his mouth. There’s a catch in my chest that I can’t quite control, an accidental inhalation of smoke.

How exactly can I explain it—that Nick and I were one of those somethings that never actually was anything? Social media would have distilled us down into a simple it’s complicated, but that would have hardly done it justice. And Julien doesn’t need to know any of this. He’s never even heard of Nick’s band.

—Nothing, I say. He’s nothing. Can I have my own beer?

Julien opens a mini fridge to the right of the couch, tucked behind the swung-open door. It’s buried in show posters and press kits and guitar picks and tuners. He passes me a Yuengling.

—Okay, he says. Heard.

—Oh, come on. Don’t you have someone like that? Someone from before you met Jess?

This time, I catch it: a small, thin smile—just for a second, like a frame in a cartoon that you only see for a flash. His eyes on me in that very focused way, enough that I have to look down. Someone tosses trash bags onto more trash bags outside the door, Simon says good night to Colt from the stairwell, Danny asks him if he needs a ride. My palms are warm. The bottle in my hand begins to sweat, a dribble of condensation down my forearm.

—Of course I do, Julien says.

Something in my chest clenches slightly; I want to ask who it is if not Jessika and does she live here and what happened and how much do you think of her, but instead I just say:

—So you know.

—I know, he says.

My beer isn’t cold enough, but I’ll drink every drop.