Emerald City

by Chris Nickson

  “I think I owe you more candy for that,” I said when she was done.

  “Well, you know me, I’ve never turned down a bribe in my life,” she giggled.

  I thanked her, hung up, and returned to work. By the time I finished, the afternoon was beginning to fade. Carla would be arriving, and I wanted to talk to her before Steve came home and the pair of them started trading music stories.

  I had the cassette recorder and microphone set up and two beers cold from the refrigerator waiting when she knocked on the door. I hung her coat on the rack and led her through. She’d been here a few times, for parties, even for dinner once, but she still looked around as if she’d never seen the apartment before.

  “I can’t believe how many records you’ve got.”

  “Comes with the job,” I said, and it was mostly true. There were shelves and shelves sagging under the weight of LPs, others holding cassettes, even a few of the new CDs that were appearing. Everything filed, everything useful, all of them a pleasure. They were there for work but even more because I loved them. A married friend had once joked that they were the children I’d never had. It had stung; maybe there was a grain of truth in it. I handed Carla a beer and we sat down.

  “You’re sure you want to do this?” I asked, hand over the record button.

  “Yeah, it’s cool.” She looked at me. “Really, Laura, it is.”

  “Okay.” I started the machine. “So you knew Craig at school?”

  She took a long sip of beer. “We were in the same class from elementary on. But I didn’t really get to know him until we were in high school.”

  “What made you two become friends?”

  She put the bottle down and moved it around on the table, creating a design of wet marks on the Formica.

  “Do you know Bainbridge Island at all?” she asked.

  “Not really,” I told her. “I’ve only been there a few times.”

  “Right.” She emphasized the word carefully. “It’s like there are two different types of people there, okay? You’ve got the rich ones who moved out there for the big country life. They commute to Seattle on the ferry every day and they have plenty of money.” She looked at me to make sure I understood. “Then there are people like my family and Craig’s. No money, they do all the shit jobs and just get by. So there’s this divide, and it was like that at Bainbridge High. The rich kids were all high achievers, lots of academics and sports. Go fucking Spartans.”

  “And you...?”

  “We were different,” she replied with pride. “There were a few of us listening to all the punk stuff while all the jocks and preppies were into Journey and Styx and all that other shit. You’d walk around Winslow at night and all you could hear was Don’t Stop Believing or some other crap coming from the cars. So we stayed together and listened to our Clash albums.”

  It was something I could understand all too well even without growing up there. The great musical divide. I’d always been one of those who cared what she listened to, always changing the radio station until I found a song that meant something.

  “What was Craig like then?”

  She thought for a while before answering.

  “He was sweet. I think he had this crush on me, but I was never into him that way. He played guitar – he taught me my first chords. But I didn’t know he sang and wrote songs, too. He kept that pretty well hidden, even from me. He could be kind of shy about things, you know. He had a summer job as a busboy in one of the restaurants, and saved up to buy himself a Telecaster and a beater car for getting around in.”

  “Did you come over to Seattle at all?”

  She laughed. “Only every chance we got. We’d get on the ferry on Saturday and then drive up to the U-District and hang out on the Ave thinking we were cool as shit. We’d watch all the students and the street kids and just smoke and talk, or look through the record shops. Not that we had more than five bucks between us. It all changed when we were in our senior year, though.”

  “What happened then?”

  “Craig got this wild hair about starting a band. He wanted me to be in it, singing and playing, along with him and these two other guys we knew. Just covers, punk and New Wave stuff. We rehearsed a lot in my folks’ garage, but we only ever played three gigs. I guess it gave him a bigger taste for music. As soon as we graduated he moved over here, got himself a job and started putting a real band together.”

  “What about you? What did you do?”

  She shrugged. “I stayed out on the island for a couple of years. It wasn’t like I’d planned to go to college or anything. I worked at the grocery store and started writing songs. Most of the people I’d known had gone. I’d come over on weekends and see Craig. About half the time I’d end up crashing at his place then take the ferry back on Sunday. He’d gotten really serious about music and he started playing me his stuff. At first I was just surprised that he could sing so well, then I began to realize what a good writer he was.” She drank, taking half the beer in one swallow. I brought her another. “I mean, he was seriously talented. He was getting better on guitar, too.”

  “Did he practice a lot?”

  “All the time, and I mean all the time,” Carla said emphatically. “We’d be sitting in his apartment and he’d be strumming chords or picking out licks. If he found something he liked he’d play it over and over until he remembered it. He had this little shithole one-bedroom on First Hill, more like a studio, really, but at least nobody cared if he had his amp turned up.”

  “Was he in bands back then?”

  She shook her head quickly. “Nothing that lasted. He was playing solo here and there. There was one Saturday he had a little spot at a place near Pioneer Square.” She paused, breathing in the memory. “He was opening for someone, I don’t even remember who. This was, like, three years ago. He did a couple of songs and then Tony just appeared out of nowhere, sat down and started to play along with him. I don’t think they’d rehearsed. Shit, I don’t even know if they knew each other before that. But suddenly everything turned beautiful. There was this instant chemistry, you know, a real trust between them. Suddenly it freed Craig up to really play. Before that I’d never understood just how good he’d become. It was stupid, it was just these two guys with acoustic guitars, but there was something special happening.” She looked at me. “You know, I even cried, and I gave Craig this big hug after. That’s how Snakeblood started. Tony brought in his brother and then Mike. Everything before had been working up to that.”

  “And it all built up from there?”

  “Oh yeah,” she nodded. “I’d moved over here by then and I was working, playing my own music, and living with this jerk I’d met, so I didn’t see Craig too often. But I know they took about six months to get everything right. We met up for a drink one night and he told me all about it, he was really excited, more than I’d ever seen him about anything before. He was writing a lot, they were practicing three times a week.” She began to smile. “He invited me down to their first gig. It was up at the Five-O. They just played a short set, supporting someone, but they blew me away. Really tight, and they sounded so passionate. It wasn’t like anything else happening here.”

  “I remember people saying they were good.” I’d heard about them not long after they’d begun playing, but then three months passed before someone seriously advised me to check them out. Even then I hadn’t bothered until a friend gave me the demo tape they’d made and the power in the music hit me. It was fully-formed, mature, not just a band still struggling to find itself. They had something special. They made me feel like a kid who’d found a secret and I wanted to share it. I’d written the first short piece on them and caught them live a few times here and there.

  Each time they were more commanding, the material better and better. Craig grew in confidence to become a charismatic figure on the stage; whenever he moved you couldn’t take your eyes off him. He wrote about being the outsider, the disaffected young man, but he avoided all the clichés, and
the band hammered like a fist behind him. They had everything going for them.

  “The word still got out pretty fast. By the time they’d played out four times they already had a few hardcore fans.” Carla laughed. “I know, I was one of them. The music was so strong. I guess I only broke away when I got serious with my own band. And it was Craig who made me believe I could do something. You know, seeing this guy I’d known for years looking like a star, someone totally different. I thought that could be me, too.” She smiled ruefully. “The only thing I don’t have is the talent.”

  “Did you see him after Snakeblood became more popular?”

  “Nah, not really.” She took a sip of beer and toyed with the bottle. “We’d run into each other from time to time and catch up, but that was about it. Besides, he and Sandy were together by then, so he wasn’t hanging out as much as he did before.”

  “Do you know her well?” I asked, hoping she might have some insights into Craig’s girlfriend.

  “Not really, we never talked.” She paused and cocked her head. “To tell you the truth, I think she was a little jealous of me.”

  “Jealous?” That surprised me.

  “Yeah.” She drew the word out as she thought of what to say. “Craig and I went back such a long way, and we had all these things in common that she could never be a part of. We could talk about people we’d grown up with that she didn’t know, or make dumb jokes about high school, stuff like that. I often felt like she just wanted him to herself, so he wouldn’t have any friends except her.”

  “And the band.”

  “Well yeah,” she acknowledged with a shrug. “But I never saw her around them, so I don’t know what she was like.”

  “What about last year?” I said. “Did you see them when they were shooting up?”

  “Nope.” Her denial was emphatic. “I didn’t even know until you told me. I wouldn’t have wanted to see Craig that way, I’d have felt really sad, like I’d lost him, somehow.”

  She was about to say more, but the door opened and Steve walked in. He smiled to see Carla, they hugged and began talking twenty to the dozen. I switched off the tape recorder. Once they began discussing guitars and performing I wasn’t going to get any more. Still, she’d given me good information, much of the early background I’d need for the article. I thought of one more thing and interrupted their conversation. “Do you think Craig’s parents would talk to me?”

  “I don’t know,” Carla answered after a little while. “I remember them being a pretty close family, him, his brother and his folks. If I were you I’d leave it.”

  “What about his brother, then?”

  She cocked her head and thought. “Yeah, I guess Jimmy might,” she said after a moment. “He still lives out on the island, he’s a mechanic at that garage in Winslow. You could go over and see if he’s willing to talk.”

  “Okay, thanks.”

  She leaned toward me.

  “I’ll warn you, though, he never grew out of redneck.”

  I left them to it, happy voices quickly filling the living room again, took a fresh beer and sat out on the deck. It was still drizzling, but under the eaves I could sit in comfortable dryness looking out at Lake Union and watching the seaplanes taking off and landing.

  I was beginning to see the story taking shape, the man who lived for music, who had it in him, believing he possessed something special. But then there was the ending – and the message on the machine. That made me sure someone had killed him, even if all the evidence said overdose. There was something I hadn’t discovered yet and it was gnawing at me. I needed the answer to complete the puzzle.

  Eight

  The next morning brought more light rain, the return of the usual Seattle spring with cloudy skies and cool temperatures, the brief sunshine no more than a mocking memory. Once rush hour had passed I started the Pinto and drove into town and parked at Coleman dock on the waterfront, in line for the Bainbridge ferry, passing the time listening to KJET’s modern music. It was Thursday and only a few small cars and produce trucks were waiting to head out to the island.

  The green and white ferries were part of the fabric of Seattle, and the waters of Puget Sound just another Northwest highway, heading out to the other world of the Olympic Peninsula. You could drive through the mountains there, where there was still snow on the peaks, then down through the rainforest and come to endless miles of Pacific Ocean beach, so firm that the locals raced cars on the sand.

  Bainbridge was only a short trip, with barely a chance for coffee and some salt air on deck before diving back down into the gas fumes of the car hold as people waited to drive off again.

  The ferry reached its berth and I drove up the short hill into Winslow. It was a small, prettified town where a dollar didn’t buy much property any more, now that yuppies on the run from city life had purchased all the charm and history. There was only a single main drag, and what was on offer in the stores said everything about the place – restaurants offering wild greens and things I’d never heard of as their specials, boutiques with kitsch for the moneyed, and a general store that had moved up to selling groceries. Just beyond all that, set apart as if it didn’t quite meet the standards the rich new residents demanded, was the garage.

  It had a couple gas pumps, but repair was the main business; the parking area was dominated by BMWs, Alfas, and some vintage Volvos and Saabs that had been expensively restored. I parked the Pinto a discreet distance away on the street and walked over. I’d dressed for the trip in sweatshirt, jeans and boots, as neutral as possible.

  It didn’t stop one of the mechanics running his eye over me as he directed me to Craig’s brother. He was changing the oil on a Cadillac, standing under the hoist to fix a new filter in place.

  “You’re Jimmy?” I asked.

  “Hold on,” he replied, and a few seconds later he ducked out from under the vehicle. He was what Craig might have looked like in a few years, the same face and coloring, the thin shape of his mouth almost identical. The only difference was the short hair, almost a Marine buzz cut, and a livid scar that zig-zagged down his cheek. He looked at me, trying to figure out what score out of ten he’d give me.

  “Carla suggested I look you up,” I told him, fixing him straight in the eye.

  He was confused for a moment, then moved his gaze up from my chest. His face cleared and he smiled. “You mean Carla Pierce?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “Jeez, I haven’t thought of her in years,” he said. “How’s she doing?”

  “She’s good. I’m Laura Benton.” I extended my hand; he held his up to show the grease and oil.

  “Jimmy Adler. But I guess you know that.”

  “Yeah. Carla’s a friend of mine.” I hesitated. “I’m a journalist, I’d better tell you that now.” I saw his face darken with suspicion. “I’m a music journalist,” I added. “I’m doing a piece on Craig.”

  “I didn’t know chicks wrote about that.”

  “Yeah. This one does, anyway.” I bit my tongue on anything more and smiled.

  “And you want to talk to me?”

  “Yes.”

  He moved a step closer to me, nothing pleasant in his grin. “But I’m not sure I want to talk to you,” he said, the threat clear beneath his words.

  I didn’t move back; I wasn’t going to let him feel he could make me cower. “I can understand that,” I said seriously. “He was your brother, he’s just died. Would it help if I told you I wrote about him before, when his band was starting out, and I liked what he did?”

  “Maybe a little.” I saw his eyes start to soften.

  I had a way in and I was determined to use it. “All I’m trying to do is make sense of things,” I continued. “I don’t want to sensationalize anything. I can’t figure out why he did it.”

  “Yeah, well, that makes a whole bunch of us.” He spat and wiped his hands on a rag he took from a pocket of his greasy red coveralls. A badge saying ‘Martin’s Garage’ was sewn on the bre
ast pocket. He glanced around at the other mechanics watching us. “I’ll tell you what. You go back to the bakery in town. I’ve got a break coming. I’ll meet you down there.” He stared at me. “I’ll talk to you, but I’m not promising you anything, okay?”

  “That’s fair,” I agreed and began to turn away. It was more than I’d really expected.

  “And hey,” he said, “get me a large black drip coffee and a couple of crullers.”

  When he arrived fifteen minutes later the coffee had cooled and the crullers were sitting on a white plate at the table.

  “Sorry about that,” he said. “The boss needed to talk.” He’d cleaned up, but there was still dirt ingrained under his nails and in the whorls and ridges of his large hands. “Comes with the job,” he said when he noticed me looking. “Nothing I can do about it. My wife bitches at me all the time for being so dirty.”

  “Well, it’s honest dirt.” I paused. “I’m really sorry about your brother.”

  “Thanks.” He looked embarrassed. “Hey, tell me your name again. I don’t remember.”

  “Laura Benton.”

  “Okay.” Jimmy Adler gave a small nod and pushed his tongue over his teeth. “So you want to talk about Craig. The thing is, I don’t know why I should talk to a stranger about him. Especially a chick.” He took a sip of the coffee and bit into the first pastry.

  “It’s like I told you, I want to figure out why he died.”

  “He died because he was a stupid fuck,” Jimmy said coldly.

  “No,” I told him earnestly. “I don’t know how much you know...”

  “I know enough to tell you he fucked up.” His eyes were opaque and he was forcing the control into his voice. “I know he was on heroin last year. I came close to beating the shit out of him about it.”

  “Why?” Whatever I’d expected, this wasn’t it.

  He poured sugar into the cup and stirred it slowly as he gathered himself.

  “Because he knew my best buddy from high school ended up a junkie and died.” He took a long drink, and I could see he was debating how much to tell me, whether he felt he could open himself up to a woman. “This guy Dave, we’d been really tight all the way up to graduation. Past that, I guess. He got himself a job at the navy base at Bangor, up on Hood Canal, you know?” I nodded. “Six months later and the guy’s shooting up. Overdosed. They didn’t find him for a week. That was ten years ago but it still gets me. And then my asshole little brother comes over and starts telling me he’s doing smack. Him and that bitch he was with.”