Chapter 28
Hannah
Do you hear that, Ken?” I turn up the recording so he can hear the percussion. “You’re coming in a hair too late.”
“Mm.” Kenny closes his eyes and rubs his fingers over the beginnings of his beard. “So it’s supposed to go—” He taps the console in time with the words. “‘Slow down, you’re moving too fast.’ Like the drum line is this ominous sound—”
“Like an anxious heartbeat,” I say. “The drum line’s creating suspense. You know that feeling when you’re waiting for the other shoe to drop?”
He nods. “And then—” His fingers burst into speed. “The chorus comes in all hot like ‘I swear I never meant to hurt you bad’—”
“Exactly. The percussion becomes the shoe dropping. It opens the confession portion, where the narrator talks about how they always knew they were going to inflict damage on the people they love.”
“Got it.” Kenny swivels in his chair. “We’re writing a tragedy.”
Behind him, Ginny watches with unmasked affection. “I hope this goofball knows I loved him.”
I pick up my highball. The square ice cube clinks satisfyingly against the glass. “I’m sure he does. Now quiet down, we’ve got work to do.”
Theo pulled some strings and managed to get us time in Blackbird, one of Nashville’s most famous recording studios, to officially start putting our next album together.
It’s gorgeous in here: blond wood paneling, dim lights, red velvet curtains.
There are framed copies of all the legendary albums that have been produced in this very room on the walls.
I haven’t stopped imagining ours among them.
Nashville itself is a cool city—or at least it looks like one from behind my car windows on the way in and out of the studio every day.
In the week since Bonnaroo, we’ve managed to get album-ready versions of “Six Feet Under,” “Family Fruit,” “Little Beasts,” “Lady Dirtbag,” and “Another Story About Wolves,” a song Ripper helped me write.
The title is riffed from a Margaret Atwood quote, so it’s good to know Rip didn’t sleep through all his lit classes, just the one with me.
Now we’re recording the song Theo and I started on the plane, which I’ve tentatively titled “Shrines.”
The studio floor is littered with lyrics scribbled on napkins, old packages, and empty take-out bags.
Rip, Kenny, and I have basically lived here this week, which is probably why Theo is complaining it’s developed a smell.
But the truth about the creative process is that it’s far less glamorous than people like to imagine.
I’m so far down the rabbit hole Ginny says I wouldn’t notice if a tornado whipped through Nashville as long as the studio lights stayed on.
I used to live for these periods of flow.
Kenny hops up and stretches the tendons in each finger. “Let’s try again. This time I promise I’ll nail the timing.”
“You got it.” I wait for him to move into the live room. Since Ripper and Theo clocked out hours ago, insisting they needed sleep, and there’s no one else here this late on a Sunday, we can do whatever we want.
“Tell him,” Ginny insists.
“Tell him what?”
She looks through the glass at Kenny, poised with his sticks. “That I loved him.”
She and I look at each other. Ginny’s stare doesn’t waver. Finally, I sigh and grab the mic. “Hey, Ken. Ginny wants you to know she loved you.” I glance at her, and she makes a go on gesture. “You’re the calm in the storm and the backbone of the band,” I add. Ginny gives me a thumbs-up.
Kenny cocks his head. “Uh, Banana? I think recording for this long is starting to make you loopy.”
I flip him off, then press play on “Shrines,” and he wastes no time launching in.
Forty-five minutes later, Kenny’s dripping with sweat and I’m jittery and manic from listening to the damn song over and over and over, but we’ve got the drums portion down cold.
I’ve finished yet another highball in the meantime, which means tonight just might set the record for the most whiskey I’ve consumed in a single recording session.
“We are in business,” I croon through the mic, shaking the ice in my glass like a maraca.
Kenny wipes the sweat off his forehead. “Feels weird to be recording a song that isn’t about Ginny.”
“What do you mean?”
“‘Shrines.’” He nods at his drums. “It’s about falling in love with someone while you’re damaged.”
I drop my glass down heavily on the console. “No, it’s not.”
“Of course it is.” He lifts his voice. “Building little shrines to you out of every stolen moment. I’ve no heart to give but my body doesn’t know it.”
Is it?
“It actually made me think . . . ” Kenny pauses and pulls his long hair up into a sweaty bun. “There’s something I wanted to tell you.”
“Oh, yeah?” My voice comes out too high.
“I’ve been seeing someone.” His eyes are earnest through the glass. “For six months now.”
It’s so unexpected that all I manage to say is, “Six months?”
“Her name’s Birdie.” He smiles. “We met at a Getty exhibit. Sol LeWitt. She’s a yoga instructor and a Pisces and plays the harmonica and has a great laugh. Like, this big, silly laugh. I’m serious about her.”
I regret the whiskey now, because I can’t keep my feelings in check. “Were you keeping her a secret? Does Ripper know?”
He shifts on his stool, the sound of the legs scraping the wood jarring over the hypersensitive sound system. “I was just playing it cool. I worried maybe you’d see it as a betrayal.”
I try to laugh. “What, you think I don’t want you to be happy?”
The look he gives me is answer enough.
“Well, you’re wrong. I’m happy for you.”
But as soon as the words are out of my mouth, I know they’re a lie.
Kenny’s right. I’ve imagined the moment Kenny or Ripper came and told me they’d found someone they were serious about, and it wasn’t supposed to happen like this.
Ginny was supposed to be beside me, hugging and congratulating them because she was always better at the emotional stuff.
Now she’s gone, but the moment is still happening.
It’s like I’m caught in an alternate reality I need to escape from.
What does it mean to be happy now—that Ginny wasn’t necessary? That it’s possible, even easy, to live without her?
The way Kenny’s looking at me says I’m the problem.
“You okay?” he asks, and the sudden bark of his voice through the mic makes me jerk back, knocking my glass off the console. It shatters on the floor, a mess of shards, peaty-smelling whiskey, and melting ice.
“Shit.” I hear Kenny scramble to his feet.
But I just stare at the mess.
I think Theo might be right, those things he shouted at me in Vegas. I think there might be something really wrong with me.