Tangled Web

by Jade C. Jamison

  As she was removing the key from the lock, she heard someone down the hall. “Katie. Katie!”

  She looked toward the familiar voice. It belonged to Heather, her roommate. Heather walked as quickly as her tiny feet would carry her. Katie was always surprised at how lithe Heather was, but she would never say anything to Heather about it, because she thought Heather might be sensitive about her weight. The young woman was by no means obese, but she was overweight by at least thirty pounds. And Katie always expected the girl to lag behind because of it; instead, Katie’s short legs often had problems keeping up with Heather.

  The young woman, almost ten years younger than Katie, was indeed breathless when she caught up to her. Heather’s large blue eyes sparkled and deep dimples appeared in her cheeks as a smile spread across her face. “What’s going on?” Katie asked.

  “Oh, my God! You’ll never believe it!”

  Katie slipped the key in her backpack and slung the pack over her shoulder, starting to walk back the way Heather had just come, Heather beside her. “Try me.”

  “KPQI is giving away concert tickets right now!”

  Katie smiled and continued walking. “Yeah, so? They’re always giving away concert tickets.”

  “But...” Heather paused and stopped walking.

  Katie got a few paces ahead before she realized she was walking alone and turned to face Heather. “But what, for heaven’s sake?”

  Heather inhaled deeply. “You said J. C. Gibson was one of your old friends.”

  Katie’s heart sunk at the mere mention of Johnny’s stage name. Yes, of course, he was an old friend, but they hadn’t spoken since she’d gone to Bad Boys and begged for his forgiveness... and she still wasn’t sure she had it, no matter his assurance. “Yeah...”

  “Well, his new band had an interview a little bit ago on KPQI. I tried calling your cell, but I figured you were with a student. Anyway, they’re still at the station, and they’ve been giving away tickets to their concert tonight all afternoon!”

  Katie smiled and began walking again. Heather took the hint and rejoined her side as they walked out the front doors of Crawford Hall. “I take it you’re wanting to go to the concert?” Heather nodded. “Aren’t the tickets sold out?”

  “Well, yeah,” Heather exclaimed as if Katie had just asked her a dumb question. “Shock Treatment in concert with Bitch Slap and Alien Invasion. Are you surprised?”

  Katie’s mouth screwed up at one corner. “Really? No.”

  “So don’t you wanna go?”

  Katie thought about it. “I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

  “Oh, my God. What’s wrong with you?”

  Katie shook her head. “I don’t think I’ve ever told you the whole story, have I?” Katie continued walking down the sidewalk, but Heather tugged her arm.

  “I’m parked over here.” She cocked her head toward the parking lot. Katie had planned on walking to their apartment as she usually did, but of course she’d take a ride with Heather. “So there’s a story, huh?”

  Katie sighed. “Yeah, and I’m afraid if I tell it to you, you’ll think a lot less of me.”

  “Oh, puh-leese,” Heather wheezed, her smile causing her rosy cheeks to crowd her eyes, making them look like she was squinting. “I somehow doubt it. You know I worship you. You’re my muse. And I guess if you’re flawed, that’s why you’re such an awesome writer.”

  “You are desperate for tickets, aren’t you?” Katie almost snorted. “So what’s the plan?”

  “Well, I wanted to go to Sonic for a limeade, and we’ll listen for the next chance. If I’m driving, you can call. I have the number on speed dial.” Katie laughed and slid in the passenger side of Heather’s Camaro convertible her father had purchased for her several years ago after tossing her backpack on the backseat. “And on the drive, you can tell me this ‘story’ of yours.”

  She didn’t even know how much she would wind up revealing to Heather, so she started by telling her about how she’d had a crush on Johnny since high school, but then she backtracked and explained that they’d been best friends for years before that. She told Heather about how that crush had been unrequited for years and how no guy could even begin to erase his memory. But then, after she turned thirty, she was finally able to move on, she told Heather, skipping the part about Johnny’s shaking heroin, and that’s when some weird kind of magic blossomed between them. But she was already engaged, she told Heather. That was the problem.

  “Shit. It’s like a fairytale love story. You seriously had the best sex with him ever?”

  Katie nodded, remembering that night over a year ago. “By far.” Katie shook her head. “He knew when, where, and how.”

  “That’s so romantic.”

  Katie sat up, nudging the radio volume up a couple of notches now that the song had ended. “That’s so not. I was cheating on my fiancé, and I was dishonest with my best friend. And the next day, I was so sick. Yuck.”

  “But you guys finally discovered your love for each other.”

  Half of Katie’s mouth pulled down into a frown. “Oh, yeah? Ask Johnny about that.”

  Heather pulled onto the off ramp leading them away from the freeway. “He wasn’t forgiving, I take it?”

  Katie looked out the right side where a window would normally be, the breeze kissing her face. “Not at all. I mean, he said we were still friends, but the look on his face...”

  Heather merged into traffic on the busy street. “Yeah, but surely he’s let it go by now. You guys have a solid history.”

  “I don’t know.”

  Heather squealed and turned the radio up higher as she pulled the car into the left-hand lane. The deejay interrupted their conversation. “Up next... we have Shock Treatment in the studio with us this afternoon. If you didn’t catch their interview earlier, you might not know that after the break they will be quizzing listeners. So, KPQI citizens, if you want to earn some awesome tickets to see the sold out triple threat of Shock Treatment, Bitch Slap, and Alien Invasion, stay tuned and call in if you know the answer.”

  Heather’s shoulder-length red hair flowed behind her as she accelerated with the green light. Katie was relieved to see Sonic ahead. Heather’s driving sometimes made her a little queasy, and now was one of those times. Heather pulled up into one of the parking spots. She asked Katie, “Do you want a limeade too?”

  Katie thought about it and shook her head. “How about an iced tea?”

  Heather nodded and punched the red button. When a teenage girl’s voice came through the intercom, Heather decided at the last second to add a large order of onion rings to the list, and the two roommates sat in the car waiting for their drinks, listening to insipid radio ads about male enhancement, talking fast food, and getting out of debt.

  Katie looked at Heather’s profile as the girl turned the radio up again, another fast-food ad blaring through the speakers. Heather had been a good choice for a roommate, Katie thought. Her first semester, new to Denver, she had chosen to live on campus in a graduate apartment. It was cheaper than living off campus and lots more convenient. Yes, she’d had money from the sale of her house, but she didn’t want to spend it all during her first year of school. But soon after, she changed her mind about living off campus. She missed Sam (and suspected her mother didn’t like caring for him), and she didn’t like the rowdiness of on-campus living. So when her new friend Heather whom she’d met in her Fiction Seminar told her she was looking for a roommate, Katie asked when she could move in. Spring semester it was, and it was a mere two months away.

  Heather was a considerate roommate. Katie had no fear of getting a good amount of sleep or of having plenty of time to study. They were both neat and clean and Katie appreciated her friendship as well. Heather had just broken up with a long-term boyfriend when they met, and Katie had grown to know Heather through her writing. Heather may have hidden her thoughts and poignant feelings in person, but paper captured it all, thanks to Heather’s writing talents. Ka
tie helped Heather see the positive in life and learn to appreciate herself.

  The deejay came back on. “Beck here on your favorite radio station in the Rockies, KPQI. Okay, listeners, as promised, I have Shock Treatment here in the studio, and let me tell you, if you missed it earlier, we had a great interview, and the band played a song off their debut album right here on the air a while ago. It was the unplugged version, not what you’re likely to hear tonight. Anyway, I have here a list of questions--five to be exact. When I have a question, the first caller to answer it correctly will win a pair of front row tickets to the show tonight. Remember, listeners, tonight’s show is sold out, so if you don’t have tickets, this is the only way you can get in now. And it promises to be a helluva show.”

  Heather screamed again, just as the carhop with long, straight blonde hair approached the car. Heather gave the girl a fistful of dollars and handed Katie her large drink. The deejay continued talking. When Heather was resituated, she flipped up the cover of her cell phone.

  The deejay’s voice came through the speakers again. “All right, callers. First question: Name at least one of the bands that J. C. Gibson played guitar in before Shock Treatment.”

  Yes, Katie knew the answer to that (it was a no brainer for any of his fans), and Heather dialed in only to get a busy signal. She continued to redial so many times she lost count. Just in case they were able to get through, Katie reached over and turned the radio down so it was hard to hear, but at last a caller answered that J. C. had most recently played guitar for Scathing Vengeance, and the lucky guy was promised tickets to the show that night. Heather looked sad but was not giving up. The deejay congratulated the winner and said, “Okay, I think we’ll ask one more question before going to commercial break. And here it is. What is J. C. Gibson’s birth name?”

  Heather looked over at Katie, one eye squinted, waiting for Katie’s response. Katie smiled and nodded. Heather had already redialed. Katie again turned the radio down so the sound was low, just in time for the deejay to say through the phone, “Caller, you’re on the air. What is J. C. Gibson’s birth name?”

  Heather’s eyes became blue saucers in her head, and her jaw tightened. She froze like a frightened rabbit. Katie grabbed the phone from her and pressed it to her ear. “Um, can you repeat that, please?” The deejay obliged. Katie then said, “His real name is Johnny Church.”

  There was a slight pause, and Katie smiled over at Heather, winking. The tickets were as good as theirs. The deejay said, “Well, J. C.?”

  Katie felt the hair on the back of her neck stand at attention when she heard Johnny’s voice. “Well,” he said, “that’s not exactly the answer I was looking for.” God, she missed him.

  “Ooooh,” the deejay chimed in, “I’m sorry, caller. We’ll--”

  Heather’s eyes narrowed when she saw the look on Katie’s face, and she moved her ear next to the phone, so that the top of her head touched Katie’s. They both heard Johnny interrupt the deejay. “But I’ll take it.”

  “Oh, looks like J. C. is a generous man. What’s the answer you were looking for?”

  “John Michael Church, the name on my birth certificate. But since I’m known in some circles as Johnny, I’ll give it to her. So, if you don’t mind, Beck, I’d like to ask this caller a follow-up question.”

  “Be my guest, J. C.”

  “Caller, I’ll throw in a couple of backstage passes if you’ll answer this question honestly.” Katie gulped. Why would he say honestly? What curve ball did he plan to throw? His voice grew quiet as he asked, “Have you missed me?”

  Heather pulled her head back to look at Katie in the eye, then pressed the back of her hand against her forehead and dropped her head back onto the headrest. Katie smiled at Heather’s pretense that she’d fainted but then got lost in Johnny’s words again. How had he known, when she hadn’t even admitted it to herself? And there was no way she’d ever let Johnny accuse her of lying again. “Yes.”

  The pause that followed, which seemed to Katie enough time for the pyramids to be built, ended when Johnny said, “Good answer.”

  The deejay took over again. “Caller, stay on the line. I gotta get some details from you off the air. We’re going to commercial now but stay tuned, listeners. We still have three pairs of tickets to tonight’s show to give away.” Katie heard the phone go silent as, she assumed, she was being transferred to another line. Heather began eating the onion rings. She tilted the bag toward Katie and Katie shook her head, her ear mashed against the phone to block out all the noise outside.

  After several moments, a woman came on the line and asked Katie for identifying information. She then told Katie she’d need to come to the studio to pick up her tickets. She began to give her the address, and Katie dug a pen and notebook out of her backpack. The woman also gave Katie basic directions to the studio, then told her congratulations and hung up. Katie snapped the blue cell phone shut and handed it to Heather.

  “Oh, my God, Katie. I think this is one of the best days of my life.” Katie was looking away, shell shocked, staring at the dashboard. “Katie? Aren’t you excited?”

  Part of her was hopeful, but more of her was nervous. It was obvious that Johnny had recognized her voice. But his “follow-up question.” Was he just toying with her or had he really wanted to know? What kind of question was it anyway? Katie couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt so vulnerable. So she told Heather the truth. “I don’t know.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Katie had come home for Christmas Break to spend time with her mom and Sam. In mid-January, as she and Sam had been driving the one-hundred-plus miles back to her new apartment she was sharing with Heather, she’d heard the deejay announce that J. C. Gibson had a new band--Shock Treatment--and that the station would be playing the first single off their new CD. Since she and Johnny had never been good at keeping in touch, she hadn’t known. When she found out, though, she was disappointed that she hadn’t even gotten a CD with scratch tracks in the mail, like Johnny had done in the past. Listening to the radio, she was amazed that not only had he put a new band together but they’d already recorded a CD, one that the deejay promised would be released in February. Maybe, Katie thought, that was because Johnny was doing all the composing and his new band members simply had to learn everything.

  Hearing the deejay’s announcement, her disappointment quickly turned to sadness, because she still didn’t know the state of her friendship with Johnny. The two of them might not have been good at keeping in touch, but Johnny usually called her during the holidays, and there had been nothing. He must have still been angry. Or hurt. Or carrying a grudge.

  Still, she was one of his biggest fans and she wanted to hear his new band, so she turned the song up. It started with a screaming guitar, followed by fast-tempo drums and bass, and shortly into the song, the singer started screaming. Oh, he was good. Johnny had made a great choice. The singer had a melodic, smooth vocal quality but could scream like the best of them. There was a quality to his voice that reminded Katie of Riley in a good way, but this guy seemed to have more range. And Shock Treatment, just like Johnny had wanted, did sound a lot different--and more mature--than any of his other bands. There was no mistaking who was playing guitar, but there was a grown-up edge to it.

  So, as soon as the CD hit the shelves, Katie purchased it. It was when she popped it in her CD player at her new apartment that she and Heather discovered their shared love of heavy music, and it was also then that Katie told Heather that Johnny was an old friend. Heather had playfully pushed Katie’s shoulder and said, “Huh-unh. You’re yankin’ my chain!” Katie showed Heather Johnny’s first “homemade” CD and Heather listened to it, raw and unpolished, and then told Katie, “I have to hate you now. I’m jealous.”

  But after a week of intense listening to the songs every free moment, studying and analyzing them, followed by a full month of the music playing in the background constantly (something Katie did with all her new CDs), she began feeling
more uneasy about her friendship with Johnny. Their friendship was over now, surely. Looking back now, she could understand why. She figured she’d hurt him pretty badly. Of course, he didn’t know that she had, in the secret part of her heart, yearned for him for more than a decade. She listened for words in the songs that might allude to her, give her a notion about how he felt about her, but there was nothing. This album was mostly political, full of a lot of angry protest songs, but there was also a song that was Katie could tell was written for his mother and another about Winchester (or another town like it, but Katie was certain it was actually about Winchester). There was also a song about addiction, not a surprise to Katie. But there was nothing about love or sex or even friendship. Nothing about betrayal. Nothing about heartache or emotional pain. Maybe he was saving that stuff for the next CD. Or maybe it was too personal for him to write about. But one thing Katie knew for certain was that these songs were some of the most honest songs she’d ever heard from Johnny or even in metal in general.

  So she wasn’t sure about seeing Johnny right now. She was nervous, and the guilt she felt crippled her so that she doubted she’d be able to string six words together to make a sentence to him, even if it was an apology. But Heather made her promise. She told Katie she’d never be able to get anyone else to go to the concert on a moment’s notice. Katie laughed and told her that wasn’t true, that they knew plenty of people who’d gladly skip studying to go to a free rock concert.

  “Dang it, Katie. Do I need to slap you in the face? We got the backstage passes because he expects you to be there! If I were to show up with someone else (no matter how cute said someone else was), I’d be kicked out on my fat butt. You have to come.”