I'll Sing for my Dinner

by BR Kingsolver

  “That was quite a performance,” he said. “Are you interested in singing professionally?”

  “I am a professional,” she said proudly. “I get paid.”

  “What I mean,” he said, “is I could book you into larger venues, ones with more exposure. I could put you in some big clubs in Denver and Boulder. I think you have the kind of talent to pitch to a record company.”

  Her demeanor changed entirely and the smile disappeared. She became very serious, and very distant.

  “Thank you, Mr. Thomas. I appreciate your interest. I don’t think I’m interested, however. I’m content just playing here at the Roadhouse.”

  She turned away and went to the restroom.

  He looked at me. “Did I say something wrong?”

  “No. I’m sorry, Dave,” I said. “I don’t know where that came from. I thought she’d be excited. You really think she has what it takes to make it?”

  “All the way, Jake. You were right. She’s a rare talent. The voice, the instrumental dexterity, and her stage presence are incredible. I think she can go as far as she wants to.”

  He shook his head. “I also think that she’s too much for me. What I would do is take a small advisory fee and set her up with a big agent on the West Coast, someone with top-level connections. But we could start building her brand here in the Denver area while I can find the right situation for her.”

  “I’ll talk to her, Dave. I never expected her to take that attitude. You saw her. She lights up on stage. She lives to perform.”

  That night, I said, “I’m sorry, Cicely. I thought you’d be excited by the chance to get some gigs. Dave thinks you have the talent to become a big star. He’s not just blowing smoke. I’ve known him a long time, and he’s a straight shooter. He knows the music business.”

  She put her arms around my neck and kissed me. “Thank you. It was very sweet, but I’m not interested. I’m happy here with you. All I want is to help you make the Roadhouse a success. Is that such a bad thing? To want to work with the man I love?”

  Put that way, what could I say? She took me to bed, and all thoughts of anything but her went out of my head, as they always did.

  ~~~

  Chapter 8

  Cecily

  I lay awake, listening to Jake breathing. I couldn’t remember ever being so happy in my life. I had a man who loved me, who treated me like a princess. I was able to perform, and people liked what I did on stage. It was everything I ever wanted. No, I wasn’t rich and famous. I wasn’t traveling around the world, seeing my name in lights.

  But those were the dreams of my younger self. Before I screwed up my life and discovered what was really important. Maybe I should have given Jake a different name instead of telling him my real one. I hadn’t even thought about what it might mean to have my real name on that sign above the Roadhouse. But I also never expected to find love and kindness when I entered his bar. I didn’t even know those things existed. Before I met Jake, they were only words.

  All I could hope for is that Mr. Thomas went away and left me alone.

  Of course, there was another issue that I was refusing to confront. If I loved Jake, and I did, how long could I go before telling him everything? He deserved the truth. I knew that I would be angry if I found out he had a big, horrendous secret that might explode in the middle of us, wrecking our lives and our plans for the future. I was so afraid he would send me away, or turn me in, if he knew my deepest secrets. I couldn’t imagine how he would react if he knew how black my sins were. I knew he was going to heaven, and I was going to hell. My whole life with him was a lie.

  He was talking about taking me to Hawaii for Christmas. But he would ask questions when I told him I couldn’t get on an airplane. You needed identification to do that. I wondered how long it would be until he offered me a ring. I didn’t care if he never did, as long as I had him. But he was an honorable man, and he would probably try to do what he thought was the honorable thing. In his world, two people married when they were in love.

  As far as I was concerned, he could hide me under the bed and deny he even knew me, as long as he let me hold him and make love to him every night. I wasn’t important, but he was my world. Would he throw me out if I told him the truth?

  I asked Jake to drop me off downtown the next day, telling him I would take the bus to work. Going to the library, I entered a search for Cecille Buchanan. I found a lot of entries on the internet, but nothing in the past year and a half. The last flurry of activity was when I cancelled the tour. Probably the worst decision of my life.

  I entered Eddie’s name, and got a lot of hits. That also faded out, with nothing in the news during the past three months. In an earlier story, I found a reference to ‘a mystery girl’ that was connected to him, but not my name.

  Relieved, I bought some ice cream and took the bus to the Roadhouse.

  I managed to talk Jake and Jared into letting me clean out Mary’s closet and her other belongings. I also cleared their parents’ clothing and other personal items out of the attic. We donated it all to the church they attended when they were growing up.

  Gradually, I turned the house into a home for Jake and me, not just a place to sleep. Jared only stayed there a couple of nights a week.

  I had never done housework in my life. The vacuum cleaner was a complete mystery, but I found the instructions for it stuffed away in the ‘junk drawer’ and read them. Dusting, oiling the woodwork, cleaning the oven, all those sorts of thing I had seen people do. I learned to do them, and because I was doing it for Jake, I loved it.

  Cooking was another story. I knew how to make a simple breakfast and sandwiches, but I had never cooked a real meal. Since Jake bought groceries, and had a freezer full of meat, I assumed that he did. I found a couple of cookbooks in a drawer in the kitchen that were older than Jake, so I assumed they were his mother’s. By following the directions exactly, and looking up every term I didn’t understand, I managed to avoid any disasters.

  One morning, when Jake went into town on business and to pick up some groceries, I stayed at home, cleaning and doing laundry. His CD collection was a marvel. Next to the Grateful Dead was Gustav Holst’s The Planets symphony. And he had opera. I hadn’t even heard an opera in two years before he brought me home.

  Mozart’s Magic Flute was playing at a volume where I could hear it throughout the house and I was singing along with it. Standing in the kitchen, I was singing ‘Hell's vengeance boils in my heart’, the Queen of the Night’s aria from act three. It felt so good to stretch my voice and hit the notes of the soprano coloratura part, and I was lost in the music.

  I took a breath to ready myself for the next lines, and realized he was standing at the edge of the kitchen, watching me. The woman on the CD sang on alone.

  “Hi, I didn’t hear you come in,” I said.

  “My God, Cecily,” he said, “your voice is phenomenal.”

  “I listened to a lot of opera when I was growing up,” I said, turning to continue wiping the top of the stove with the dishcloth I was holding.

  “That’s bullshit,” he said, and I flinched. “I can understand you not wanting to tell me some parts of your life, but do you have to completely shut me out of all of it? No one can sing an aria like that unless they’ve been trained for it. Especially that one.”

  I bit my lip, turning to face him. “Jake, I don’t know what to tell you. I never want to lie to you, so I don’t tell you anything. It scares me, Jake. I’m so afraid that if you find out who I really am, how screwed up and damaged I am, that you won’t love me anymore. Sometimes I want to tell you. Tell you everything. But I’m a coward. And I know that isn’t fair to you, and it’s tearing me apart.”

  He walked over and took me in his arms. “Nothing could stop me from loving you,” he said.

  My face hidden against his shoulder, I said, “You don’t know how bad I am. I don’t love me, how could I expect you to if you knew the truth?”

  “How do I convince
you to trust me?” he murmured into my hair.

  “I trust you,” I said. “You’re the fool for trusting me.”

  I felt him stiffen. “Are you so bad that you need to be punished?” he asked.

  “Yes, please,” I whispered.

  He picked me up and carried me across the room, slamming my back against the wall. Rough, careless hands pulled my shirt open, and tore my jeans off. With no foreplay or preparation, he penetrated me and pounded me, punishing me with his body. Feeling him driving hard and deep inside me as I rode the edge between pleasure and pain, it was as though he was driving a spear into all the evil and humiliation buried in my soul. When he climaxed, an orgasm slammed through me like a battering ram, and I screamed his name.

  He withdrew, and held me in his arms, tears running down his cheeks. It was the first time he had been able to let go, to give me what I needed.

  “Thank you,” I whispered. “God, I love you, Jake.”

  “Is that really what you want me to do to you?” he asked.

  “Yes. You need to punish me sometimes. When I hurt you. I don’t mean to hurt you. I just can’t help myself. You can’t just let me hurt you and be silent. You need to punish me for it. You need to hurt me back and make things balance.”

  “God, Cecily, I don’t know if I can do that again. I feel like ...”

  “Shhh,” I said, putting my fingers to his mouth. “Love has many ways of expression. You don’t have to understand, Jake. Just know that you make me happy. And I’ll try, I promise I’ll try, to make you happy, too. I’ll try to be better, Jake. I’m trying to learn to be good enough for you.”

  ~~~

  Chapter 9

  Jake

  Dave Thomas called me and asked if we could meet. I left Cecily at home cleaning the bathroom and singing along with an aria from one of my CDs. Since that day I came home and found her singing opera, she had opened up to admit that she’d had extensive classical training, both voice and instrumental. But she hadn’t told me much more than that.

  We met at the bar before my staff showed up to open for the day. He handed me three CDs. The name of the artist leaped out at me, Cecille Buchanan. One was ‘Interpretations of Beethoven on the Celtic Harp’, the next was ‘Greatest Violin Solos’, and the third was ‘Operatic Arias’. The pictures in the liner notes confirmed that my Cecily and Cecille Buchanan were the same woman. I hadn’t known her full name before, never thought to ask.

  “Jake, I’m sorry if you think I’m sticking my nose in where it’s not welcome. Something about the way Cecily acted that night didn’t make sense. Just because I’m retired doesn’t mean that I’ve lost my instincts.”

  I met Dave when I was still in the Marines. It was right after I came back from Afghanistan the last time. A young Marine in my company was murdered, and the FBI agent assigned to the case was Dave Thomas. He found the two men who were to blame.

  We became friends, and when he retired the next year and moved to Colorado, we reconnected. In his youth, he was in a rock band that cut one album and had some momentary fame. When the band broke up, he went to college and then joined the FBI. In retirement, he wanted to get back into the music business and became a booking agent.

  “Jake,” he said, “the FBI and the Baltimore police are looking for your girl.”

  My head snapped up. A cold, numb feeling spread through my mind. “What did she do?”

  “As far as I can find out, they aren’t sure she did anything. The official line is that she’s being sought as a material witness in a murder investigation.” He shrugged. “That could be a smoke screen. I didn’t inquire too closely, because I didn’t want anyone to know I might have too much of an interest. Jake, I’m not an agent anymore, and I don’t plan on talking to anyone else about this. You’re my friend, and I figured I’d tell you what I know.”

  “Who was murdered?”

  “A fairly high-level cocaine dealer was killed in Baltimore. The cops think Cecily was living with him. They also think that she might know who killed him, maybe even witnessed it. She disappeared before his body was found, and some inside the Bureau think she’s dead as well. Their interest is in following the distribution chain and trying to nail the suppliers above him. His name was Edward Jimenez, known on the streets as Fast Eddie. He was selling quantities in the ten to twenty kilo range. Big bucks.”

  I looked at the CDs. “How did she get involved with someone like that?”

  “A quick google of Cecille Buchanan turns up a wealth of information. Child prodigy, Carnegie Hall debut at twelve. Featured solo gigs with the New York Symphony at sixteen. Graduated high school at sixteen and enrolled at the Peabody Institute. She graduated college at twenty and had a solo world tour scheduled. And then, it was abruptly cancelled and she dropped out of sight. Almost nothing since then.”

  “I would have been in the service then,” I said. “And when I got out, I wasn’t paying much attention to the classical music scene. I had other concerns.”

  He handed me several sheets of paper. Leafing through them, I saw they were performance reviews from the New York Times, San Francisco Chronicle, and London Observer. The one from the Times was four years old.

  Saturday evening, New York was treated to a performance at the Met by the foremost operatic voice to debut in this century. Cecille Buchanan defies the stereotypes. For those expecting a rotund diva, the diminutive teenager walking on stage was a surprise. But when she opened her mouth, she silenced the audience and firmly established herself as a force for decades to come. Her power is extraordinary, her range unprecedented. During the evening, she sang arias in the soprano, mezzo and contralto ranges without missing a note.

  “When she dropped off the map two years ago, she had a contract with the foremost agent in the classical field. As far as I can determine, that contract is still valid.” Dave said. “No wonder she gave me the cold shoulder. If she hit it big in popular music, we could have found ourselves on the wrong end of a multi-million dollar lawsuit.”

  “What you’re showing me means money. I know opera singers aren’t rock stars, but the top performers make millions,” I said.

  “Her parents control her wealth. Or at least they did until she turned twenty-one. As far as I can tell, she’s very rich, and she hasn’t touched it.”

  “Dave, what am I supposed to do with all this?” I felt lost.

  “I can’t tell you that. I do know that as long as the Bureau has a material witness warrant out for her, potentially you could be charged with either harboring a fugitive, or obstruction of justice. I think you need to figure out what she really knows, and then either contact the authorities, or find a way to smuggle her out of the country to a place without an extradition treaty.”

  He placed a hand on my arm. “Jake, even if she’s innocent of everything except having bad taste in men, if the drug lords think she’s a danger to them, I don’t blame her for hiding.”

  When I left in the morning, she was singing along with Salome in Italian. Returning, I found a Grateful Dead album blasting through the house. I turned it down to a background music level, and almost immediately heard her bounding down the stairs.

  With a leap, she flew into my arms, landing on my chest with her arms around my neck and her legs wrapping around my waist. I staggered, and the kiss she planted on my mouth almost made my legs give out.

  “I love you, Mr. McGarrity,” she said with a smile. “Guess what? I’m getting as fat as a pig. Will you still love me if I’m fat?”

  I had to laugh. “I doubt that anyone would use the word fat to describe you.”

  “I weighed myself. A hundred five pounds. I’ve never weighed that much in my life.” She pursed her mouth and looked down, then back at my face. “You would think that some of that would end up in my boobs. But I guess it’s all landing on my ass. Will you still love me when my ass is so big it won’t fit on a barstool?”

  Since I was holding the anatomical part under discussion, I squeezed it. “I thin
k you’ve got a long way to go before we have to worry about that. You’re beautiful, Cecily, and I’m very happy that you’re filling out. You were way too thin when we met.”

  “Yeah, not eating for a few weeks will do that for you,” she said. “But still, I don’t think it’s normal to gain twenty pounds so quickly. Does good sex make you gain weight?”

  I carried her to the couch and sat down, with her straddling my lap. “We need to talk, sweetheart.”

  She sobered. “Okay. You look so serious. What’s going on?”

  I reached into my coat pocket and pulled out the CDs. She stared at them as though I held a snake. Her hands pushed against my chest, and she tried to get up, but I held her firm against me.

  “Cecily, I found out a lot of things about you today. I know about Edward Jimenez.” She tried to get away again, her face twisting in pain. “No, wait. Listen to me. I love you. None of this changes that. Do you understand me? I’m not leaving you, and I’m not letting you leave me. If you’re in trouble, we’ll deal with it together.”

  She searched my face, and I guess she decided she liked what she saw there, because she kissed me. Slowly and tenderly.

  “You’re too nice for your own good,” she said. “How did you survive in a war zone?”

  “By being as tough as nails and faster than the guys who were trying to get me,” I answered. “Cecily, we’ll get through this, but it’s time for you to be honest with me.”

  Nodding, she said, “Let go. I can’t talk like this.” When I gripped her tighter, she said, “I’m not going to run away, but I can’t think when I’m this close to you.”

  I let her go, and she paced around the room, a look of intense concentration on her face. Stopping in front of the window, she asked, “How much do you know? What kind of trouble do you think I’m in?”

  “I was told the federal authorities are looking for you. And that maybe some drug dealers are looking for you, too.”

  “Shit. I’ve checked, and I couldn’t find that an arrest warrant had ever been issued. I hoped that maybe I’d gotten away with it.”