2. Chapter 2
“I’m home!” I shouted, closing the front door behind me.
Until an embolism took her from us. Two years into their marriage and a few hours after giving birth.
And this family home, this brownstone with the loose radiator covers, the chipped wood panels in the hall, my crayon mural by the backdoor, everything here remained untouched by the forward march of time.
Mom’s presence hung in every nook and cranny in this drafty old house. Dad wouldn’t let her spirit go.
In the living room, I ran my hand along the brick mantle above the fireplace.
Mom’s violin sat there in a place of pride.
The wood and strings were as shiny and lacquered as the last time she’d played it over thirty-three years ago.
Growing up, I’d glance at the instrument and imagine her with me—creepy to an adult, but comforting to a child who didn’t have a mom and had no explanation why.
“Hey, Mom,” I mumbled. Greeting her was second nature.
“Poppy!” Dad called.
I raised my eyebrows at the violin as if she knew how annoying her husband was. When she didn’t answer, I headed into the kitchen
The hearty smell of simmering gumbo filled my nose.
The kitchen was a dinosaur of a relic compared to the rest of the vintage house.
The yellow cabinets and lime green countertops were an eyesore.
It shocked me when I started going to my friend’s houses and discovered that everyone’s kitchen didn’t look like the sick corpse of Big Bird’s cousin.
God bless the 70s.
Dad struck a tall, imposing figure if you ignored the flour stains decorating his shirt.
Time had grayed his temples, and being my parent had added worry lines to his forehead.
He stood at the old stove that desperately needed replacing.
We were broken reflections staring at each other.
I hated the fact that at my big age, I still needed so much of his help.
I wanted to be better. Of course, that would start with me being able to support myself.
Failure as a daughter.
“Hey, Dad.”
“Baby girl!” There was a syrupy warmth in the moniker. Dad’s voice filled in the space around me.
He kissed my forehead. However annoying he could be, Dad was my rock. Him and I. We were all we had.
“You’ve gotta hear this! New artist, their label sent down a demo EP and I’m shocked how much I like it.”
Dad pressed play on his phone and an explosion of drums, oboe, and saxophone filled the room.
Eyes closed, he tapped his fingers on the countertop, perfectly on beat.
Music was a lullaby to him. No matter the genre, a competent rhythm could soothe him.
Nowadays, his smooth voice recommended songs and talked Black pop culture weirdness as the host of a weekday radio show.
Dad was a classically trained saxophone player.
His once-prized possession now collected dust in the hall closet.
A shared love of music brought my parents together.
The saxophonist and the violinist. Two Black nerds who wanted to get more kids of color playing music.
They had dreams and goals as a unit. Dreams unfulfilled.
Every crumb dad told me about mom I snatched up and held close.
She was an enigma I only knew through others.
I stored everything I was told about her in a vault in my head.
I watched Dad do his weird nerd guy shoulder shimmy as the song ended. We were not a family of dancers. Rhythm didn’t come naturally to us.
“What do you think?” he asked.
I didn’t have the heart to tell him it was all a wall of noise to me.
“Sounds awesome. Unique.”
He nodded. “I knew you’d get it, baby girl.”
Although his passion for playing music died with mom, music still turned dad into a puppy hopped up on pixie sticks.
He breathed it—meaning it was also a part of me.
Not to the same depth, but still a strong thread that coursed through me all the same.
I couldn’t play an instrument, or carry a tune, but music provided me an entryway to countless worlds.
I loved closing my eyes and letting the notes take me away.
In the breathless atmosphere behind my closed eyelids, music helped me create: worlds, plots, characters, anything and everything I could bring to life with the help of the right soundtrack.
Dad wiggled his eyebrow expectantly. He was such a dork, and I was his daughter, therefore I was a dork, too.
“What’s the plan today?” I asked.
“Hopefully, dinner will be done soon. We’ll eat, then I was thinking we’d head down to see if Fetus has anything new. But right now, I could use your help getting the rice going.”
I hopped off my stool and headed to the pantry.
“Oooo! Dad! Could you put on some Summoner?”
“Tall Summoner’s Tales?”
“Yes! You know that’s my favorite!”
Dad scrolled through the music app on his phone. The album started, and the goofiest grin spread across my face.
Dad’s and I’s music tastes clashed. Listening to a jazz jam band play a twenty-minute song that was just a repeat of the same three chords was the seventh circle of hell to me, but it was delightful to him.
I loved the theatrics seeped in glam rock and new wave, but dad thought it was overcompensating for a lack of a solid musical foundation.
Our musical tastes were oil and water. But the one thing we could musically agree on was Summoner.
His blend of jazzy pop/rock was comforting, like a warm embrace on a rainy day.
His songs had been a part of the soundtrack of my life for what seemed like forever.
A pivotal moment in my life happened one summer afternoon when I was ten years old. I stumbled into the house while Dad was spinning records on Mom’s portable player. His head rested in his hands while a girl group sang for their baby in high-pitched harmony.
Dad’s moods often rode a wave. This was something I would eventually come to notice in myself. Even when things were fine and dad was happy, I more often than not walked on eggshells waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“Hey, baby girl.”
I waved and wandered over to the mess of albums he’d left strewn across the table.
“Be careful with those!”
I nodded as if he hadn’t drilled proper album care into me the moment I learned how to walk.
The wail of the cordless phone lost somewhere in the living room sent Dad on a wild goose chase and gave me freedom to look through the records.
60s girl groups to 80s rock and roll—his collection had little rhyme or reason attached to it.
A glaring bit of purple underneath everything peeked out and caught my eye.
I pulled it free and noticed it was one of Dad’s and I’s shared favorites, Daydream of Colorful Aquatic by Summoner.
I knew the track listing upside down and backwards, but I’d never really looked at the record sleeve.
Summoner stood against a brick building in an oversized jacket.
My brow knitted together as I flipped it over.
Thankfully, the gasp that left my mouth was covered by the sound of guitars and harmonized singing.
Summoner stared at me. His unblinking eyes bore into me.
Nervous energy radiated out of my chest as my fingertips grazed the edge of the cover.
In black and white, the stark severity of his eyes couldn’t be understated.
I was afraid. And all the reasons I felt afraid made no sense.
I was afraid he saw me. Not the Poppy everyone had to see—the good girl, the good student, the good daughter.
Just me.
My body felt warm. I tingled in places that I had never tingled before.
I was a touch terrified and confused. So fucking confused.
I tossed the album back onto the table. I didn’t want dad to see me touching it.
Shame covered me like an itchy rash, but my body still tingled.
Dad would know what was going on in my head and I’d get in trouble.
I swallowed and backed away from the table.
I dashed to my bedroom and locked the door behind me.
From that moment on, I had a new rock star obsession.
I listened to Summoner albums all day and fell asleep to him singing in my ears.
Sadly, Summoner suddenly stopped recording in 96.
He hadn’t been seen in public since then, either.
The heart-shredding anguish I felt as a teenager when I discovered I’d never have the chance to meet my favorite singer destroyed me.
Even now, I got pangs of sadness when I thought about it.
Summoner’s vanishing was worse than his death because it left room for countless questions, fan theories, alleged sightings, and speculation.
Why? Why would a musician on top of the world just vanish? His ex-wife and kids who were musicians, actresses, and account executives never talked about him and shut down all questions about him.
“—Baby girl, did you hear me?” Dad’s voice interrupted my thoughts.
“What were you saying?”
“Did I tell you about this new theory I heard about Summoner?”
I placed a pot of water on the stove to boil and held in a sigh. Dad treated Summoner like a UFO instead of a respected artist.
“What did you hear?”
“Well, this guy online said he knows some people in the Caribbean who are leasing some land to him and his followers.”
“Followers?” I raised my eyebrows skeptically.
“Yep, followers. He’s down there running a cult. His own private group of worshipers. An ego stroke if I’d ever heard of one.” He shook his head.
I rolled my eyes. Summoner was still alive; that much I knew.
I doubted he was running a cult in the Caribbean.
The Summoner whose songs soothed me through break ups didn’t have the ego the press claimed he did.
I obviously didn’t know him, but those asshats didn’t know him like I did.
I didn’t want to argue with Dad about how wrong he was, though. I just listened and nodded.
After dinner, Dad and I grabbed our coats and walked down the street.
“Are we looking for anything in particular today?” I asked.
“Not really. Fetus said he got some new stock, so I’m just getting a look before everyone else picks it over.”
I doubted anyone else was clambering to dig through Fetus’ dust bins.
Fetus’ record shop was a nondescript brick building with rusted iron grating over the yellowed windows.
Dad had been friends with Fetus forever, and it fit because they were both weird, but Fetus was weird inside and out.
Dad looked like Dad and Fetus looked like…
well, he looked like Fetus. His salt and pepper hair was a tangled mess of white guy dreads down his back.
His beard was just as long, and it shocked me that the forces of nature hadn’t dreaded it.
Occasionally, he wore an eyepatch over his right eye, and I didn’t know why.
It seemed like a weird fashion statement for anybody not named Fetus, but for Fetus, it somehow fit.
Dad held open the door, and I walked down the stairs to Fetus’ dark and dusty lair.
The smell of mothballs assaulted my nose.
Growing up, I hated coming here. I cowered in the corner for hours while Dad looked around and talked to the creepy guy.
Now, I waved at Fetus, who chilled behind the counter in a lawn chair.
“Hey there, Poppy ‘n Pete!” Fetus’ voice echoed like a budget narrator.
“What’s up, man?” Dad shuffled over to the counter for an hour of shooting the shit.
I couldn’t remember when Fetus went from scary to typical, but everything about him and his shop was normal(ish) to me.
I headed over to the space Fetus had designated for new arrivals.
A waist-high stack of milk crates waited for me to dig in.
I paged through the records in the first crate and didn’t see anything exciting.
Sometimes Fetus got gems; other times he bought stacks of Christian folk albums from the 50s.
Grunting, I moved the first crate to the floor.
“Careful, Poppy!” Fetus shouted.
I chaffed internally at the overprotectiveness of these older men.
With a huff, I started looking through the next stack of albums. After the millionth swing dancing album, I started to doubt I’d find anything.
But persistence won, and I kept digging.
I squealed as my fingers brushed across a gem in the middle of the stack.
Summoner Live 85 Daydream of Colorful Aquatic tour.
It was a well-done bootleg. The album sleeve was covered in glued-on pictures from the show.
I flipped the album over and froze. Next to the track listing was a picture of Summoner.
It was slightly grainy, but his excited passion for performing was still clear.
Summoner was frozen mid-song, his mouth open and his wonderful lyrics coming out strong.
Eyes.
His eyes.
Green eyes.
I’d seen those eyes before. Not in pictures, or on video, but in person. They were older and a bit more worn, but still strikingly intense. A bucket of cold water overhead doused the excitement at finding the album. I swallowed. My hands started to tremble, and the record dropped from my grasp.
My nervous tablemate from the coffee shop was him.
I had met my favorite singer.
I met Summoner.