‘What’s going on?’ piped up an LA blonde I recognised as one of Penelope’s assistants. ‘Is there a hotel?’
‘Jesus Christ, how many of you are there?’ I snapped.
‘It’s a party of ten, not counting the pilots,’ declared a sing-song voice.
‘Kilo, for fuck’s sake, what are you doing here?’ I gasped at the appearance of my personal bag man.
‘Don’t ask me! We’ve been chasing you across half of America,’ he pouted. ‘You should be in Seattle tonight, playing to twelve thousand screaming fans, and believe me, I’d rather be there. I have friends in Seattle.’
‘Sorry,’ I shrugged, duly chastened.
‘There is a fiesta in Pedro’s honour,’ explained Doña Cecilia. ‘As you are his friends, of course you are all invited.’
‘Who is this lady?’ sniffed Penelope. ‘Is she your new assistant?’
‘This is Doña Cecilia,’ I explained. ‘She’s the local schoolteacher.’
Penelope peered at her through her sunglasses. It was getting dark quickly, and I didn’t imagine she could see much. ‘You can take your sunglasses off now, Penelope,’ I said. ‘Nobody here knows who you are anyway.’
‘I know who you are!’ shouted Jesus, hopping up and down at my feet.
‘What an adorable child,’ said Penelope, smugly.
‘You got a cigarette, Señora Penelope?’ asked Jesus, winking saucily.
Grover pitched up hauling two stuffed Louis Vuitton cases. Penelope had never been known to travel light. ‘I need to freshen up,’ I heard her say as Doña Cecilia escorted her to my grandmother’s house. ‘Is there a shower?’
Someone had started a generator and twinkling coloured lights came on over the dining structure. More food was being spread out on the table and two men began playing fast, rousing tunes on acoustic guitars, with lots of short sung verses and lusty cries of ‘Oh!’ while another accompanied them on pan pipes. More fireworks exploded in the sky. People started to gravitate towards the food, including members of Beasley’s party. I don’t think I had ever seen my manager look so uncomfortable, struggling to exert control in a situation where everyone was ignoring him. ‘I must admit I’m surprised to find you in such good shape,’ he said, throwing a big arm around me and locking me tight. ‘Nevertheless, I want you to check into a clinic. The good Dr Gillette here has agreed to certify you mentally incompetent.’
The weaselly stranger in glasses stepped forward on cue to shake my hand. ‘It’s a thrill to meet you in person,’ said the doctor. ‘My daughter is a big fan.’
‘Doesn’t he have to examine me before he can declare me incompetent?’ I asked Beasley.
‘Well, technically—’ started the doctor.
‘You don’t seem to understand the gravity of the situation, Zero,’ boomed Beasley. ‘We are being sued by every venue in the US and unless we can persuade tour insurance to kick in for medical reasons, they’re going to bankrupt us, number one album or not.’
‘I am perfectly competent, Beasley,’ I said. ‘I may be saner right now than I’ve ever been.’
‘Look, there’s no shame in a nervous breakdown,’ insisted Beasley. ‘Some of the greatest stars of all time have had them. Look at Britney Spears. It did wonders for her career, completely repositioned her in the marketplace. Tell him, Flavia.’
My PR stepped in. ‘According to market research, this whole flight from fame stunt has polled incredibly well not just with teenagers and young twenties, who one might expect to go for the rebel star bit, but with older music consumers too, the forty-to-sixty age group, who are suddenly looking at you as a potentially more serious artist.’ Flavia didn’t look me in the eye once during that whole exchange. I hoped she was as ashamed of herself as she should be.
‘I’m perfectly sane,’ I insisted.
‘I was afraid you might think that,’ said Beasley. ‘Unfortunately, your actions suggest otherwise. As your manager and your friend, I am concerned you might be a danger to yourself, which is why I have reached out to your family, and asked your next of kin to take the required legal steps to have you hospitalised for your own safety.’
My dad smiled apologetically. ‘I was worried about you, son.’
‘Now would those be the laws of the USA, Ireland or Colombia?’ I asked Beasley. Cause I’m not sure your doctor’s got any jurisdiction here.’
‘Actually my practice is in Brazil,’ said Dr Gillette.
‘Which is just a short hop across the border by helicopter,’ said Beasley, in his lowest, most lethal tone. ‘And since nobody knows you’re here, then nobody can say for sure where we found you.’
‘Nobody knows I’m here?’ I exploded. ‘This whole fucking village knows I’m here. And you know what? They think I’m baby fucking Jesus. You try taking me out of here in your chopper and see what happens. I’m not the only one who can disappear up in the mountains, fat man.’
‘You fucking ungrateful little shit,’ snarled Beasley and something flashed beneath his skin, red and dangerous. For a second I thought he might launch himself at me in a murderous fury but he just as quickly regained composure. Maybe it had just been a reflection from the fireworks but I stepped back all the same, out of the reach of his thick fingers.
‘Look, Beasley, I don’t know what you’re up to but you can speak to my lawyer.’
‘I want to talk to you about that. Who is this Homer Pax?’ said Beasley. ‘He’s making a bloody nuisance of himself.’
‘Well, you better get used to it, cause he represents me from now on. Enjoy the party. I want to talk to my da.’
‘Wait!’ demanded Beasley as I turned my back on him. ‘We can work something out. We just need a story we can agree on, and all stick to it!’
‘Will you ever tell him to fuck off, Da?’ I suggested.
‘Fuck off, Mr Beasley,’ said my father.
‘Hey, Da,’ I said, taking him by the arm. ‘There’s someone I want you to meet.’ And I led him to where my grandmother was standing with Doña Cecilia, watching the festivities unfold. ‘Abuelita,’ I said, feeling the language on my tongue. ‘Quiero que conozcas a mi padre, Patrick.’
A tremble ran through my grandmother and she reached out, as if in shock, and pulled my father to her before he had time to resist. ‘Mi hijo,’ she gasped. My son. And my father let her hold him, standing under the stars, his body shaking in her wiry arms.
It was around then the feast really got going. I think Grover might have been responsible, grabbing hold of the roundest, fleshiest woman and whipping her off in a dancing whirl. Kids raced to join them, the musicians kicked it up a gear, and I learned something about Colombian peasants that they don’t tell you in the guidebooks: they know how to party hard. The aguardiente, home-brewed cerveza and bootleg chicha was flowing, a fire crackled and roared, the smells of roasting meat filled the air, insects buzzed around lamps hanging beneath the eaves, everything swaying to the whirl of bodies as the music grew louder, wilder, more supple and sensuous.
‘The musicians are your cousins,’ said Doña Cecilia.
‘I have cousins?’ I asked, surprised and delighted.
‘Everyone here is related,’ laughed Doña Cecilia. ‘I am probably your cousin!’
‘In that case,’ I said, ‘Will you do me the honour, cousin?’ And we took a spin around the dance floor, which was not a floor at all but a bit of open dirtland.
‘The lady is very, very beautiful,’ said Doña Cecilia, as we danced. ‘Is she your lady?’
‘I guess so,’ I admitted.
‘But you are so young to be with a lady like her,’ said Doña Cecilia. ‘She is old enough to be your mother, no?’
‘Don’t let her hear you say that,’ I warned.
Penelope emerged from my grandmother’s house, looking extraordinarily gorgeous in an outfit that might have been designed for just this occasion, an elegant mix of Hollywood gypsy and million-dollar mountain queen in loose, flowing fabrics. Children surged around her, to
uching her glittering dress, and she glided through them, gauze and chiffon billowing, skimming fingers and heads as if bestowing blessings. I couldn’t help but notice her assistant stayed close, discreetly spraying Penelope’s hands with germ-resistant sanitiser. ‘Oh, these children are impossibly cute, poor things,’ cooed Penelope as she billowed into my presence. ‘It’s so wonderful to see them smiling after all they’ve been through. Perhaps we should adopt one or two?’
‘The orphans are in MedellÍn,’ I pointed out. ‘These kids live here, with their families.’
‘Oh well,’ she shrugged. ‘I’d make a lousy mother anyway. Who does a girl have to fuck to get a drink around here?’
I thought it might be a good idea to stay sober but when Grover waltzed past dancing with a goat, I sensed resistance was futile. A swarthy hombre with a handlebar moustache poured us tumblers of clear liquid. ‘Para esposas y amantes, que nunca se encuentren!’ he roared, clinking our glasses.
‘What did he say?’ asked Penelope.
‘Something about “wives and lovers, may they never meet”,’ I translated.
Penelope knocked hers back in one. That woman could drink, as I had witnessed many times before. In fact, she could drink, snort, pop pills, shoot up and still look like a cheerleader on a health kick in the morning. ‘Do keep up,’ she insisted, so I tipped my glass back and felt the liquid explode in my chest.
Our glasses were immediately refilled. It was going to be one of those nights. We toasted health and we toasted love and we toasted friendship and drinking and getting to heaven half an hour before the devil found out we were dead. Every man in the village wanted to drink a toast to la bella dama and El Rojo and I feared we were going to have to get through them one at a time until (asking me to translate) Penelope raised her glass to ‘all the men, women, children, goats, mules and chickens of beautiful La Esperanza’ and dragged me out to dance.
Acoustic guitar licks fired rhythmic triggers in my brain as she obliterated everything in my field of vision, all of my senses filling up with her. There really was something different about her, something I couldn’t put my finger on. I let myself be sucked into the centre of those enormous dark eyes, long lashes beating like the translucent wings of black butterflies, luscious red lips like pillows you could rest your weary soul on, the warmth of her breath, the rising and falling of her breasts. As we spun giddily around, her silken black hair flew free, brushing against my skin, just like my mother’s hair …
I broke away, shocked at the image. But she reached gracefully out, lightly touched the tip of my fingers, and smoothly drew me back into her orbit. I was her dancing satellite. She was the Earth, and I was the Moon. So what was that great white orb in the sky that made me want to howl with hurt and loss and outrage at the tricks life plays? How could she do that to me? How could she leave me when I needed her most?
I broke away again. Penelope regarded me quizzically while I grabbed a guitar from one of my brethren musicians and attacked it with rhythmic fury, strumming like I could capture the night in my fingers, making chord shapes that conjured up the stars, and my cousins played along, laughing, trying to keep up with my shifts and changes, and the people stamped and clapped. I jumped up on to a table, melodies and harmonies flying like sparks from my fingertips. And I opened my mouth and I wailed. I sang without words because there were no words for the things I was feeling. I sang for my poor lost mother, and I sang for her poor lost son, and I sang for all the poor lost orphans in the world. When I was done, a cheer went up, ‘El Rojo!’, and I raised my guitar above my head, like I was bidding farewell to Madison Square Gardens. Thank you and goodnight!
I looked out into the faces of the people, my real people, and I was filled with love, a feeling so benign and enriching I wondered if it would ever be possible to capture it in music? Perhaps fearing I might be tempted to play an encore, one of my cousins gently removed the instrument from my grip. I lurched off, found a dark corner behind an adobe wall, got down on my hands and knees and threw up.
‘You made me look bad in New York,’ said a voice. I looked up to see Tiny Tony, glowering quietly in the shadows.
‘You can’t blame me for that, Tony,’ I said, wiping my mouth. ‘You should have a word with your parents.’
‘You little gobshite,’ snarled Tony, knuckles clenched. He looked like he was going to hit me, like he had been storing up a blow since I ran out on him.
‘Hold on,’ I gasped, and puked up another gut full of alcohol. It seemed to put him off his stride because he turned in disgust and walked away.
‘You know what, Tony?’ I called after him. ‘You’re fired!’
‘I don’t work for you,’ he spat back. ‘I work for Beasley.’
‘Well, that’s great then,’ I said. ‘cause he’s fired too.’ But I said it quietly, in case he changed his mind and came back and hit me.
I sat for a while, sweating alcohol. Then Kilo appeared, squatting next to me, unfolding a travel case vanity mirror and tipping out white powder. ‘This’ll get you back on your feet,’ he whispered.
‘Fuck off, no,’ I protested feebly. ‘I can’t touch that.’
‘Suit yourself,’ said Kilo. And he whipped out a rolled-up note and proceeded to hoover up half the stash. ‘I’ll say one thing about this ridiculous country, you haven’t tasted cocaine till you’ve tasted one hundred per cent pure Colombian!’ He shivered with satisfaction. ‘It’s like champagne to your fingertips.’
I looked at the remaining line of white crystals. I thought about all the misery they caused, the wars, the murders, the madness. I thought of how the poor farmers on this mountainside had been trapped by the world’s voracious appetite for their coca leaf, labouring for a pittance to feed their families so the decadent children of the West could get high. I thought of my mother, forced to leave her home, risking life and liberty to fly into New York as a drug mule. It was bad, bad stuff. And then I thought what the fuck, grabbed the straw and inhaled.
And with a sprinkling of fairy dust from Kilo’s magic wand, I was back to my best, or worst, Zero the Hero, El Rojo, knocking back shots and dancing an Irish jig for the kids. I seemed to have lost my leather jacket somewhere and I was naked from the waist up, but never mind, either the night was warm or I was on fire. I lurched and fell at Flavia’s feet. ‘Are you enjoying yourself, Flavia?’ I enquired politely, as she helped me up.
‘I never mix pleasure with business,’ she responded coolly.
‘That’s what I always liked about you, Flavia,’ I said, grinning stupidly at her.
‘You’re behaving like a selfish prick,’ she said. ‘You should talk to Beasley. You’ve achieved things in a few short years that most musicians never manage in a lifetime. It’s a mistake to break up a winning team.’
‘I don’t know if I want to win any more,’ I mumbled, shuffling guiltily. ‘I don’t even know if I want to play the game.’
‘Oh what rot!’ Flavia tutted. ‘You’ve always been a player. The first time we met, I could tell right away you were ready to do whatever it took. You and Beasley were made for each other.’ And with that, she walked off.
‘I’m nothing like Beasley,’ I protested. But nobody was listening to me, which I was going to have to get used to. ‘I’m nothing like Beasley,’ I told Jesus, who was hanging around, puffing on a big cigar. ‘Where the fuck did you get that?’ I said, taking it from his mouth.
‘The fat man,’ Jesus protested, coughing up smoke.
Beasley was slumped at a table with the old men, slugging back their bootleg brew. It appeared to be some kind of drinking game, which he was losing badly. All his pumped-up energy had dissipated. He was like a deflating Michelin man, you could almost hear the air hissing as his rubbery frame shrank. His assistant, Eugenie, looked utterly miserable, sitting bolt upright next to him while a hairy old coca farmer patted her thigh proprietorially. She cast me a silent appeal for help. Had I ever fucked her? I couldn’t remember. I was pretty sure neither o
f us had seen Beasley this drunk before. I suppose she was afraid to leave him in this state, either out of loyalty or fear of being fired. ‘Deja a la chica, uh, muy solo, por favor,’ I said to Eugenie’s amorous old suitor. Leave the pretty girl alone, please. He shrugged apologetically and removed his hand.
Beasley tipped his bald head towards me, eyeballs rolling, sweat bristling on his scalp. ‘How long did it take us to build this?’ he slurred. ‘And you’re going to throw it away, over what? To live on a mountainside like a peasant? It’s a waste of God-given talent.’
‘And here’s me always thinking you worshipped the devil,’ I said.
‘You can’t have one without the other,’ said Beasley.
‘You want me to hit him, Mr Beasley?’ offered Tiny Tony. But Beasley waved him away.
‘What is his fucking problem?’ I asked.
‘You hurt his feelings,’ explained Beasley, sadly. ‘Mine too.’
Oh, what the fuck was going on? I wasn’t used to feeling sorry for Beasley. It must have been a hallucinogenic property of the drink. I could feel the poison bubbling in my bloodstream, warping and distorting reality. Two insects buzzed around a hurricane lamp, engaged in a weird ritual dance. I climbed up on a table, to get a better look, sticking my face into the light. Their colours shone bright and hard, like polished gems of cobalt and emerald. Wings beat frantically, feelers and antennae wrapped around each other, and they were secreting some kind of goo. I couldn’t tell if they were fighting or fucking.
I tried to remember why I was here. In the distance, I watched Grover dancing with Penelope, putting on the moves like a gigolo at Studio 54. ‘Go home to your wife, Grover!’ I shouted. He turned and waved. Penelope danced towards me and the whole party seemed to be dancing with her, like they were her chorus line, dragged wherever she went. I knew all about that magnetic pull. It looked like some badly choreographed horror video, with Penelope in the role of Amazon Queen and all the village men as her zombie love slaves. I blinked and she was Circe, and they were her animal lovers. I blinked again, and she was a Hollywood goddess and they were her entourage from hell. But where was her leading man? Surely not Grover, stroking his pencil moustache?
#Zero Page 30
