Chapter 4
4.
A dream: backstage, my hands running through Colt’s hair, over Nick’s hips. A finger slipped inside me, ice cold, but it’s not enough. Hands tugging at my hair, so hard I’m sure chunks of it are falling out, but it doesn’t hurt. I can’t see myself, but my hair is darker, my lips are red, my curls are thicker, maybe. Andy walks in: we pull apart. Nick’s dick is in my hand, Andy is gone, we’re alone again. Not at The Venue, but in a room I don’t recognize. Lemony lights and a peeling poster of a lead singer—ZZ Top or Iggy Pop or someone else. Julien’s voice, asking me a question. Our clothes are off—Nick? Julien?—and our faces are blurry. Sloane’s voice carries from somewhere in the living room. I run a hand through my hair and it’s mine again, ragged blond tangles, just waves. I’m alone.
When I pull into The Venue a few weeks later, before sound check, cars have appeared in the parking lot, like doors are already open—like we’re already open. The parking lot is dotted with them: an old Honda Civic, a black Mercedes Sprinter van, Julien’s Explorer, the color of a sad winter day. I run my fingertips along the bumper and over a tiny, peeling sticker: Belle and Sebastian. Something he clearly tried to take off in recent years—Belle and Seb, it reads now—but he gave up, the plastic practically fused to the plastic.
—What are they doing here already? I ask Julien upstairs, pointing out the office window to the band. The Wild Loose, an indie band who’s playing tomorrow night, is unloading some instruments from the van.
—They wanted to meet Danny, Julien says. I think they’re in town a night early, recording or something. I told them they could come up before tonight’s sound check.
Danny still isn’t here, though. He works as a studio sound engineer by day—mostly alt-country with spiritually leaning content, like a Christian Dave Cobb—and when he’s here he usually spends his time consulting with the bands back at the sound booth or working in the larger office downstairs, big headphones on, eyes squinting at his computer. He has an A2 guy, Simon, with long dreadlocks and a sweet grin; he does all the monitor mixing and mic work for the bands, but he isn’t here either. The band is still lingering by the van. All eight of them, which is way too many people for a band.
—Do you think the lead singer is the one on the phone? With the concave ribs? Or the guy with the long curly hair?
The skyline behind the band, over on Broadway, is dotted with construction cranes—behind the convention center, at the traffic circle on Eighth. Julien’s next to me now, the sleeve of his shirt grazing my shoulder.
—Neither, he says, pointing to the guy who’s sprawled on the hood of the van now, doing little snow-angel movements with his arms and legs.
—You win, I say. Definitely a lead singer.
He nods.
—Cute bumper sticker, by the way. Always loved Belle and Seb.
—It really just will not come off, he says, a half smile spreading across his face.
—Did you ever see them live? I ask. I think they’re playing War Memorial next month.
—Oh yeah, I think Jess told me about that. One of her bands is opening.
—You might end up losing the whole bumper if you keep trying to get the sticker off, I say. Or you could just say fuck it. Introduce the world to Belle and Seb.
He laughs and then his face settles into that intense look again, eyes studying me, like I’ve said something much more serious than I have.
—Glad to meet another Seb fan, he says.
My laughter is instinctive, high-strung, waiting for something to break on his end. I’m about to tell him I’m messing with him, looking down briefly at his feet to spare myself his stare, but when I look up, he finally breaks—laughing, eyes squinty, head shaking, like it’s all just a way to fuck with me.
It’s the lead singers you have to watch out for. That magnetism, especially onstage, that you need to make a band work. Presence. Some combination of ego and delusions of grandeur, enough to propel the band but not so much that they implode. The kind of personality that takes up space in a room but then makes you feel like you’re the only other person in it. People offer to pay for their drinks at bars, ask them for advice when making small talk, ask them for directions, for restaurant recommendations. People ask who they are: if they’re a surfer, a drummer, a carpenter, a professional athlete. A model, an actor, a musician.
—Don’t guess, Andy had told me the first weekend I worked, a sold-out show with a guest list longer than normal.
—Okay, I said. No guessing.
—Not with the list, not with the IDs.
—I can do that.
—We always ID. And when someone tells you they’re on the list, wait for them to say their name or ask it. Don’t guess it. Even if you’re certain you know who they are. Even if they say they’re Julien’s girlfriend or my kid or, I don’t know. Just don’t guess.
It seemed simple enough in theory, but in practice it was an act of restraint. Because I knew which girls were Mollys, Kates, which guys were Trevors or Jeremiahs or Jesses. Which people were fucking the lead singer, the guitarist, the drummer, the bass player. And which people wanted to be.
Sloane’s car pulls into the lot; she parks across two spots to the left of the entrance and leaves her windows down. My phone buzzes in my pocket. A text from Nick, with a link to a song from a Detroit folk band that I can’t get to open. When I look out the window again, Sloane is somehow already talking to the band, a cigarette in her hand, her head leaning back in a cascade of laughter.
—Iggy Pop played here? she asks, as she steps into the office upstairs a few minutes later, eyeing the posters on the back wall.
—Metallica too, I say.
—Aw. My little metalhead, Sloane says.
—Did you guys know that Che Guevara was rhythm-deaf?
This comes from Eddie, who’s sitting on the couch with a slice of pizza in his hand. He’s dressed in overly stylized Western garb, rust-colored corduroy flares and a brown button-down that’s too small, fabric stretched across his chest, pearl snaps wanting to pop. I’m sure he’s just in from an intro-level stats class at Belmont, but he looks like he’s on his way to Dolly Parton’s birthday party.
—Why is everybody here? Julien asks. We’re not even open yet.
Jessika is here too, like she works here, like she’s one of us—half of her hair tied back, curls fanning out from her head. She briefly rests her head on Julien’s shoulder as he leans over a clipboard. He’s actually trying to work when nobody else is, though something in his face softens a bit.
—I gotta talk to you about the Denim slot, Jess says to Julien. Let’s say four-week residency. Believe me, in a few years when these guys are full-blown superstars, you don’t want to be the guy who refused to book them.
She’s pushy but convincing, her confidence laced with flirtation—a seductive blend. But Julien somehow doesn’t bite.
—Talk to Andy, he says. You know it’s still his call for now.
—I’m probably rhythm-deaf, I say to Eddie.
—Impressive, Jess says to me.
She has a mild accent I can’t place, a Southern drawl that’s slightly smothered.
—I could see that, Eddie says, and even though I asked for it, I can feel the irritation heating up my chest.
—No you’re not, Julien says, looking at me with his eyes narrowed.
—There’re these videos of Che, Eddie goes on, dancing a mambo when everyone else is dancing a tango. But you want to see real dancing, come with me to Motown Monday later. Who’s in? My buddy’s bartending.
Julien and I share a quick glance—no.
Jess turns around and leaves the office; I hear the door to the bathroom open and close. Colt comes in, looking pale, but somehow still good.
—I thought you were off, Julien says to Colt. He looks frustrated—too many people in the space when he’d obviously planned on being alone.
—Delivery, Colt says. Our distributor had to come today instead of tomorrow. I didn’t realize the whole Scooby Doo gang was here.
He tries to make eyes at me, but I look over to Sloane.
—Let’s roll, she says to me.
—To where? Colt asks.
—Third Man, I say. We can walk. It’s basically across the street. Literally point-two miles.
Sloane has supposedly gotten us on the list for a record release there this afternoon.
—You can walk, Sloane says. I’m driving.
My phone. Another text from Nick, about the song he sent. Made me think of you. He always does this: just as the space between us seems permanent and I’m starting to put him behind me, starting to run off into the distance, miles and miles and miles away, he zips the space back up with an offhand text, an email, a late-night Gchat just asking how I am. And then the zipper’s stuck and I’m alone and I can’t get out of the fucking dress.
Eddie finishes his slice of pizza and puts his feet up. He’s settled in, like he’s at a friend’s house and doesn’t plan on leaving for days. Julien’s trying to do something on his computer, but his face is all twisted up in frustration. Jess comes back and sits down next to him, nuzzling his shoulder like a kitten. He keeps his eyes on his computer. Everyone seems slightly annoyed to be here, and yet everyone has chosen to come up hours before they’re needed. Colt leaves the office. A few moments later, we hear the sound of a bottle being opened down in the main space.
—Ready? I ask Sloane. You guys have fun on your big afternoon off.
A train is stalled on the tracks between The Venue and Third Man Records. A mural of an American flag outside the Rescue Mission—we take pictures in front of it to put online later, mellowed by a sepia filter, oblivious to the backdrop of urban blight. A Kings of Leon song blasts from Sloane’s speakers, something about kissing the stars, making us feel completely unique even though the album’s sold millions of copies. Even though everybody everywhere is listening to it, playing it over and over until it loses all resonance. The song changing, the sound of a bottle cracking against the concrete.
As it turns out, Sloane has not, in fact, gotten us on the list. Though there is a list, there is only one list—as in, the release is a completely private event. You cannot buy tickets, and you can’t even really just wait around. It is, as Sloane frames it to me on the way there, invite only. She just failed to mention that we haven’t exactly been invited.
I assumed that Sloane’s radio cred meant we’d have actual access to the show, which is starting at the oddly early hour of five p.m. Eddie’s covering my shift at the door. The streets back here are full of dilapidated warehouses and strip clubs. You can get turned around even if you’re staring directly at the map on your phone. The Venue is really only a block or two away, but not the kind of block or two you should walk, even though I suggested we try. A highway overpass, antique shops that never appear open, boarded-up storefronts. But then, planted right in the middle of it all, Third Man Records: Jack White’s studio, store, venue, his own little music factory. All shiny and black and yellow and new. Sloane parallel parks on Seventh by the train tracks, so studiously that she doesn’t even look over her back shoulder after initially eyeing the spot.
—I saw him last week, she says. Mr. White, Prince of Nashville. Just getting himself a piece of pie.
I ask where and she mentions the restaurant down the block on Eighth.
—The Willy Wonka of the music world. Out in the wild, I say.
Sloane laughs, a loud, sharp cackle. In her rearview mirror, she ties her short hair back into a tight ponytail and changes the song on her phone.
—You’re going to be obsessed with this, she says, nodding to the dash.
—Turn it up, I say.
—Your Warped Tour buddy was there too, she says.
—Who?
—Door guy. Dark hair kind of in his eyes?
—Julien?
—Julien, yeah. Jujubean. He’s cute. A little emo, but cute.
—He is, I say, and then immediately ask: With Jack White?
That laugh, again: like a pint glass shattering at an after-party.
—Jesus, no. Alone.
—That makes more sense, I say.
—Reading Spider-Man, Sloane says. Actually, that girl was there too. The tall one? Pretty hot?
—Jessika, I say.
—Are they dating? Sloane asks.
—With a k, I say.
Sloane lays on her horn for a friend she recognizes crossing the street, and our conversation is drowned out by the piercing F.
At the door, Sloane does her sweet-talking thing. She looks effortlessly hot: a white ribbed tank top, cutoff shorts, an expensive watch, and no makeup (or, more likely: just enough to make her even more effortlessly beautiful, not so much to be noticeable). I take a picture of the line we’re in—a string of skinny hipsters waiting in a gravel alley along a chain-link fence—and text it to Nick. It looks like nothing, but the black-and-yellow backdrop of Third Man will let him know where we are. My service is spotty and I can’t tell if the text has gone through, but when I look up, Sloane is waving me toward an irritated redhead with vampiric skin and bloodshot eyes who holds out a wristband for me, asking in a monotone: ID?
Inside, it takes several disorienting seconds for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. Low indigo light, faint wisps of fog curling up at people’s feet. We’re in a spherical room, the infinity walls curving up toward the ceiling. Everybody else apparently agreed in advance to dress in all black.
The nice cocktail spot on Division is catering the drinks, a kind of curated open bar. A few spaces ahead of me in line, a tall guy in a yellow shirt bounces on his toes, his keys clipped to the belt loop of his jeans, red sneakers. Julien? Did he say he was coming to the show? Then he turns and it’s someone much older, a face I’ve never seen, an expensive camera on his shoulder. Sloane and I move with the line.
My eyes have adjusted and I’m scoping the inky space for more familiar faces. The same people tend to show up at all the shows around town: underemployed recent Belmont grads who are recording their alt-country debuts down at Welcome to 1979, tour managers home for a week before hitting the road again, sound engineers on break from marathon recording sessions at Bomb Shelter, unrecognizable songwriters, now and then an actual famous musician—Ben Folds or Hayley Williams or even Robert Plant. I recognize a few Belmont guys over by the front of the stage, another guy who works the door down at Robert’s, a bartender from the Villager. Faces I’ve grown familiar with, names I can’t quite recall.
Jessika is there too, across the room, talking with a few guys whose backs are to me. She has a big camera slung over her shoulder now, a pass sticking out of her pocket. The kind of person who’s actually on the list, who wears lipstick and manages bands and pursues her own art in her free time. I can hear her laugh even above all the buzz—that bracing cackle from across the room. She’s standing with the drummer from Denim, a ragged waif of a guy who looks like a walking hangover. They’re talking with a handful of older men, the kind you can tell are music execs just by their age and their designer jeans.
Drinks appear. Sloane and I find a little bit of space just to the left of the makeshift bar, where I can watch a bartender with nice eyelashes make expensive drinks for people who don’t have enough cash on them to tip him.
My phone vibrates: Nick.
Jealous of your life, it says in response to the picture I texted him from the line outside.
Sloane glances at his name on my screen and shakes her head at me.
No you’re not, I almost type back, but instead I turn my phone off, slide it back into my pocket. Look up at Sloane like: See? I’m not thinking about him. I don’t think about him. I don’t even think about thinking about him.
But even with my phone off, I’m wondering: Do his bandmates ever lean over his shoulder, ask him who he’s talking to? Do they give him a look like Sloane just gave me? I’ve met them all at their shows before, but now I wonder: Did they think I was just some fan?
A hand on a shoulder, the sound of ice shaking into plastic. Overeager laughter. The flash of an iPhone. The twang of an unplugged guitar being tuned, the chatter of a girl flirting and failing. The brief sensation of being completely alone, silent, lost in the pulsing crowd. The smell of weed and then sage and then weed again.
The thing about Nashville: everybody here knows someone who knows someone. Either you’re in the music industry or you’re industry-proximal or you’re proximal to the people who are proximal to the industry. And this town is small. Every week I see Andy dropping his girls off at the elementary school on Tenth; Colt catching a cab downtown; Julien on his front porch on Music Row; our sound guy, Danny, walking through the littered streets of Midtown after an open mic. Jessika now, everywhere, it seems. Even Eddie, as I duck my head in avoidance, chatting up the baristas at the coffee shop across from the Belmont campus, hanging flyers for his jazz nights on the bulletin boards by the bathrooms. Your eyes are always open for someone you might recognize. It isn’t a city for hiding in plain sight, for slipping away into anonymity. It’s the kind of place you come to be known—whatever that means to you.
Sloane disappears off to the bathroom and a pair of hands squeezes my shoulders. I turn around to find Colt, short hair wet, smelling like whiskey. Color has returned to his cheeks. He’s standing too close, and he plucks an eyelash off my cheek.
—Make a wish, he says.
—No, I say.
He laughs, blows the black comma off his fingertip and into the air.
—How’d you get in? he asks.
—I have my ways, I say. I thought you were waiting on a delivery.
It’s always a little out of context, seeing him outside The Venue, no bar mop over his shoulder or case of beer in his hands.
—Not anymore, he says.
—Do you have any Xanax? I ask. All these texts from Nick have made me jittery.
—Find me later, he says. Or come by tomorrow. We can play.
—I’ll come by, I say. But I don’t want to play.
—Even better, he says.
He leans in close to me and kisses my jawline. He punches his number into my phone and slides it into the back pocket of my shorts. His hand briefly cups my ass. I want to roll my eyes, shove him off, but I can’t defuse my own desire. He looks too good. And then, it’s extinguished. His hand out of my pocket, reaching into his own, pulling out a toothpick that he slides between his teeth.
—I’ll be back, he says, and turns around, a shape disappearing into the crowd.
Now I’m wet and I hate it. Fuck Colt and his pretty fucking face.
Songs to listen to when you’re trying unsuccessfully to forget someone:
“Mr. Brightside” (the Killers, obviously)
“Into Dust” (Mazzy Star)
“Tennessee Rose” (the Deep Vibration)
“Transatlanticism” (Death Cab for Cutie)
“Lost Cause” (Beck)
“The District Sleeps Alone Tonight” (the Postal Service)
“New Hampshire” (Matt Pond PA)
“Saints and Sailors” (Dashboard Confessional)
“Mix Tape” (Brand New)
“This God Damn House” (the Low Anthem)
“Land Locked Blues” (Bright Eyes)
“Chasing a Ghost” (The Head and the Heart)
I slink into a spot where I still have a decent view of the stage. Sloane’s taking forever, probably talking to strangers in line for the bathroom. Her dad manages some massive, storied seventies band; she’s known about town without even trying. At first I thought it was just because she works at the station, but she’d only been doing that for a few months when I met her, and already she knew everyone. Once I called her Almost Famous and she took a sip of a tequila soda and looked me straight in the eye and said: Fame adjacent.
The overhead lights go down. For a moment the whole room is swallowed in midnight black, until the stage lights go up in a foggy opal, the crowd a field of dim silhouettes. Then: a hand grabbing at my forearm. Sloane, pulling me into a pocket of privacy near the back. The lights are low and my body is light and Alison Mosshart is crawling across the stage in clothes that look like they’ve been smoked and shredded, the rest of the band settling in around her like she’s the sacrifice, the altar, all psych rock guitars and frantic rhythms, their instruments like weapons, like it’s a danger to the room for them even to be holding them up there.
Trippy, loud, and when the drinks mellow me out, it’s like we’re in another place, another city, another decade completely, like we’re all just floating through space listening to the music pulse and Alison Mosshart scream like she’s being murdered. I watch, mesmerized, her wild, drunken comfort—the way she owns the stage, the way she has made it her own, made it her home.
—You could do this, Sloane says. You just need a bigger stage next time.
—God no, I say. And anyways. She’s drunk.
—No way, Sloane says. She’s just in it.
Onstage, Mosshart looks wasted but somehow still precise. I let the envy melt over me, let the reality solidify around me: I will never step on a stage like that again. I finish my drink and order another.
Damp lips against my nipples, Nick’s melody ringing in my ears. The white skin of Colt’s waistline as I run a fingertip along his pubic bone. An index finger between my legs, lukewarm beer, the back of Colt’s teeth. Tousled hair, shirt unbuttoned. We push our tongues across each other’s and share a joint. He runs a finger up my forearm, his fingertips hot. There are several attempts at light conversation, but quickly I realize that’s not at all what we’re here for. Colt is not a conversationalist. Colt is unreasonable abs and a sultry voice, almost as good as Nick’s. He is free drinks and distraction and light scruff and a strong jaw and when he pushes himself into me, all I can think of is how beautiful his face is but how ugly his dick is.