Syncopation

by Jodi Payne

  Kyle nodded and stepped back from Colt slowly, eyes on the floor but focused inward as he worked through the sound of the music, the tempo, the patterns. He moved across the floor in small movements at first, marked turns, small jumps, and then suddenly he had it. He dove toward the floor and rolled, landing in a long, stretched-out pose that he held for a second not a foot away from Colt’s guitar. Then he reached back and lifted himself to his feet with one arm and took off across the room.

  The tempo changed, the slaps on the acoustic sounding tribal, the deep thumps adding a necessary bass, one that reverberated through the room. He felt the bass in his chest, let it drive his movement.

  He didn’t think at all after that; he just went with it, moving freely, though he knew some part of his mind was remembering the steps when they were really right. Improv was about staying in the moment, not thinking ahead more than a measure or two.

  Colt seemed to get it, seemed to get him, giving him a delicious mixture of tempo and pause, the dark eyes on him, learning him. He was too focused on his form to look back, but he knew. He could feel Colt’s eyes track him down the length of the room.

  Once he realized how in tune they were, he decided to have some fun, to see how Colt’s playing responded to him and his movement instead of the other way around. He pulled out some of his own choreography, a piece he’d been working on largely in silence for lack of the right accompaniment. He made a point of heading off in another direction, stepping off the beat on purpose and hoping Colt would catch on.

  The music grew softer for a moment, curious; then it attached itself to his heels like a shadow, finding him unerringly.

  The piece started out cautious emotionally, reticent, but took a few small risks that became more frequent as they were rewarded. It was a piece about stepping beyond one’s comfort zone, about the process of learning and the things that open up the world of what’s possible. Toward the finale of the piece, it exploded with joy, an energy that filled the room to the rafters and echoed off the walls.

  By the end the guitar was ringing, the strings bent to Colt’s will, the studio reverberating with pure happiness.

  Kyle let the last notes dissipate before he moved, and then he spun around and slid across the floor to Colt, still trying to catch his breath. “Woo!”

  Colt was sheened with sweat, breathing hard, and he got a grin, a wild kiss. “So fine.”

  He laughed breathlessly and stretched out on the floor on his back, in front of Colt. “Amazing. Just… fantastic. Stunning. Will you remember any of that? I’d love to get it recorded sometime. You know, I hadn’t finished choreographing that piece? The whole last third was just… on the fly. It just kind of happened.” He was talking fast, even for a New Yorker. It would be a miracle if Colt actually understood any of that. “God, that was awesome.”

  “You are. I could do that forever.” Colt leaned forward, touched his arm. “Magic, eh?”

  “Not me, baby. Us.” He covered Colt’s hand with his and rolled to face him. “It was magic. That’s the only word for it.” He sat up then and kissed Colt quickly over the top of the guitar. “You’re not going to do that forever, though, because it’s our rest day. I’m done dancing; you’re done playing. Quick showers, some coffee, and then we have a city to see. Right?”

  “Right.” Colt grinned at him. “I want to see things, hear the sounds, hmm?”

  “Feel the rhythms. Soak up the energy.” He stood up, still high on their positive vibe. “Have some fun.”

  He waited for Colt to stand, and then they made their way back to the bedroom for showers. After that, he made them a pot of strong, dark coffee and some avocado toast.

  “What do you want to do first? We could go to Central Park and explore. We could go to the top of the Empire State Building. We could head up to the Botanical Gardens or wander around the West Village….” He was up for anything. He almost never got to be a tourist in his own city.

  “Yes. Anything.” Colt moved in his kitchen easily, tasting food as he cooked, adding a sprinkle of lime here and cayenne there, surprising him with a little strange spinach salad for the top of the toast. Kyle was glad to see Colt eating instead of insisting on only coffee until dinner. The man needed his strength.

  “Mmm. This is delicious. And pretty. We’re going to have some fun cooking dinner in here tonight.” He took his plate and his coffee to the small round kitchen table and pointed to the other chair for Colt. “We’ll start up high, then, get a view of the city, and decide what’s next from there.” He liked the view from the Empire State. It was a zoo on Saturdays, but he’d been given a couple of passes as an opening night gift that should get them up top fairly quickly.

  “Sounds good. This is a different city than I’m used to, but all of them are, I think. Everyone has a different vibe.”

  “What are you used to? You mean compared to home?” He was so curious. He needed to know more about Colt, more about where he was from and what influenced him.

  “I been to Baton Rouge, Nashville, Memphis, Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Austin. They’re all different. I love New Orleans the best, then Austin. It’s a music city too. Down to its roots.”

  He nodded. “New York is heavily rooted in music too. You’ll see it everywhere. Jazz clubs and other nightclubs with amazing vocalists, street musicians, buskers in the subway.” There was no shortage of music in the city. “What makes New Orleans your favorite? Just because it’s home? The kind of music? The vibe?”

  “It’s home. I grew up in Houma, but my daddy played there. It’s a special place—there’s magic on the streets, voodoo queens and priests, bluesmen and witches.”

  Voodoo and witches. Like Johnson and the Devil, he would have considered them little more than spooky stories before he met Colt. He wasn’t sure where he stood anymore, if he was honest, but he understood that his lover believed in those things deeply, and he had no intention of insulting Colt. “I don’t know if I believe in all of those things, but if I ever go, I want you to be my tour guide.”

  “I’d be honored.” Colt winked over the top of his coffee cup. “And none of them things care a bit whether you believe, honey. You make yourself happy, and they will too.”

  “I’m pretty good at making myself happy.” He leaned closer to Colt, smiling back. “You’re pretty good at it too.”

  “I do try, cher. I do. This is some nice coffee. I like.”

  “That’s my little bit of magic. I make a great cup of coffee.” He’d finished his, in fact, and got up to take his things to the sink. “Are you ready?”

  “Lemme grab a shirt and my boots. I brought an extra. Shirt, not boots.”

  “Don’t rush, baby. I’m going to clean up here.”

  “Oh. Oh, I’ll help. That ain’t right, you washing up alone.” Colt jumped right up to help.

  “Dishwasher, baby.” He pointed. “I’m fine. You go on and get ready. We’ll get out of here faster. Don’t forget sunglasses and your phone for pictures.” The glare was something else from up high.

  “I’m on it.” Colt kissed him, deep and hard enough that he saw lights for a second, and then Colt was off like a shot.

  He licked his lips, the coffee tasting even better with a splash of Colt in it. Fuck, those kisses were never going to get old. His mind could have wandered after Colt all morning, he couldn’t help but go over that dance in his mind, Colt playing for him and reading his intention so well. And the way they worked together like they shared—

  Whoa.

  Okay, so that was crazy.

  He was just a little dance-drunk, right? Still caught in the music. In Colt’s music. In Colt himself, and he still couldn’t understand why. He needed to figure it out, figure out what they were doing. He’d invested before in people who had other places to be, and while Colt was interested in New York now, he knew the type. A gig would come up in Chicago or Austin, and Colt would be off, fascinated by a new place. Whatever that was that had happened this morning in his studio felt real
but fragile and rare. He needed to understand it.

  Colt came back to him, singing softly in a lilting patois, hands finding him unerringly.

  “Oh, look. A shirt.” He smiled and let Colt pull him in close, exploring the fabric with his fingers.

  “I know. I’m all dressed and pretty for you.” Those black-button eyes twinkled for him, wicked and playful. Joyous.

  “So pretty I could just eat you up.” He kissed Colt’s nose. “Let’s go play tourist.” He wriggled away, actually wriggled like he was four or something. God, those eyes made him giddy.

  “Works for me, cher. I’m good at playin’, me.” Colt shot him a wink and grabbed his hand. “Allez!”

  LORD HAVE mercy, they’d done looked and seen and heard, and the sun was shining, and he was having the best time a man could with clothes on.

  They went up into shining buildings and down into the earth. They walked a million miles, Kyle laughing and leading him from one fascination to another. This time to Central Park.

  “We’re here!” From Strawberry Fields, they’d taken a nice walk around the south end of the lake, and now they were looking at Alice, sitting on her toadstool, bronze and bigger than life. Kyle just about looked like he was fixin’ to bust with happy. “Oh, the Mad Hatter is wonderful. My favorite of them, I think.”

  “I seen a play once about Alice being lost in the bayou, and the Queen was Marie Laveau.” The hatter had been Baron Samedi, and the hare had been a zombie, jittering about. Best had been M’sieu Lapin as a rougarou, the crazy beast chasing le feu follet into the darkness. He’d loved that, the way the people had been all in black, running with fairy lights to give the monster bunny something to chase.

  “Okay, who is Marie Laveau? You’ve got to be sick of me asking you to explain things all the time. I’m sorry.” Kyle rubbed his arm, looking honestly apologetic but interested.

  He knew Kyle was curious and liked to know things. “Oh, Lord, Lord. She is a voodoo queen from my neck of the woods. Damn powerful, so the story goes. Some say they saw her walking the day after she died. If you have a wish you need spelled, you can go draw an X on her grave, but you got to sneak in, these days, so it better be a powerful need.” Wandering St. Louis No. 1 was taking your life into your own hands, especially after dark.

  Kyle listened to every word, looking thoughtful, working something over behind those maybe brown, maybe green eyes. “I love your stories.” He took Colt’s arm, leading him over to a vendor under a yellow umbrella. “Let’s sit and have a drink, and then we’ll go shop for dinner.”

  “Sounds good.” One day he would take Kyle to Bourbon Street to the Jean Lafitte, to Marie’s House of Voodoo, to Jackson Square and have his palm read. So many things.

  Kyle bought them lemonade, and they sat by the Conservatory Water, watching the little model boats sail the pond. “If you kind of tune out the building back there, they look so real.”

  “They got lots of boats from my home too. Lots. You ever been on any?” He’d been on a bunch—airboats and shrimping boats and riverboats and bass boats.

  “Oh yeah. My dad has a couple. A thirty-foot sloop and a forty-eight-foot yacht. I’ve been on a cruise to the Caribbean and on a bunch of little boats for fishing. Also canoes, kayaks, stuff like that.”

  “How cool is that?” He couldn’t imagine what that meant really, but he knew it sounded important. Sloop sounded like a word in a doo-wop song, sort of like duck shit hitting the water. Sloop.

  “You like the water?”

  “You cain’t be a bayou baby and not like the water, I don’t think.”

  “Well, maybe we’ll get out on a boat sometime.” Kyle finished his lemonade quickly, noisily slurping up the last drops and grinning. “Pardon my Scotchman’s whistle, I guess I was thirsty.”

  “Scotchman’s whistle… I like that.” He blew across his straw, making a deep, low sound that made him chuckle.

  “Always making music.” Kyle leaned against him. “You want to shop? Do you know what you’re making me?”

  “What’s that, cher? Happy, I hope.”

  Kyle laughed. “For dinner, baby.”

  “Shrimp étouffée, hmm? With a good bread?”

  “Sounds perfect. And yes, you’re making me happy.” Kyle kissed his cheek and took his hand. “I’m having a great day. You?”

  “I am. This is a good place, so much to see. I bet you could spend a whole life and not get to it all.”

  “I basically have, yeah. And the weird thing is, when you live here, you hardly ever see any of it, you know? So busy working and whatever. It’s just hanging out right under your nose.”

  Kyle stood up. “Come on, we’ll hop the bus and head home.”

  “Is there a store to shop at?” He’d need the holy trinity and Gulf shrimps, if he could.

  “Yeah, closer to my place. You need a fish market?”

  “Ooh, yeah.” He loved to see all the fishes, see what was good. Sometimes he would go to the market after his long night playing, walk around with all the cooks in their checkered pants.

  Kyle smiled at him. “Okay. We’ll start there.”

  The bus was a long trip, but he got to see lots of this part of the city out the windows. The park was on the right all the way to midtown and on the left were cool old buildings, with details and carvings and most of them had doormen.

  The fish market was a big, open space. Busy and chilly, and noisy too. Whole fish on ice, filets in glass display cases, live lobsters and crabs.

  He wandered, happy as a pig in shit, looking at all the different seafood. The redfish was gorgeous, and they did have Gulf shrimps, head on. “I need two pounds of them, please, sir, and a redfish.”

  “Whaddya makin’, my man?” The older man behind the counter got to work.

  “Étouffée.” If the shrimps were nice, next time he’d make barbecue ones. Or gumbo. “The fish, he just wants to come home and be eat up.”

  “Nice. Fresh clam juice on the end there if you need it.” The guy weighed the fish and handed it over.

  Kyle leaned around him. “I don’t think I’ve ever had redfish.”

  “No? We’ll have it with…. You got rice?” He needed celery, peppers, onions, some parsley and tomatoes….

  “Sure, I have rice.”

  “Shrimp.” The man handed over the wrapped-up package. “Enjoy your dinner.”

  He nodded and grinned, doing a little impromptu soft shoe. “Merci. Gonna. How about veggies? What all do you have, cher?”

  Kyle took his arm as they headed to the register. “Um. Usual prep stuff? Onions, peppers, garlic, celery, spinach, mushrooms… I grow some herbs—parsley, oregano, basil, mint. What do you need?”

  “’Sides that? A little bit of spices and some butter and flour to roux it up.” Oh, he was fixin’ to make Kyle’s house smell like home.

  “You want me to get that?” Kyle pulled out a leather wallet. “You’re a rent-paying New York musician now.”

  “We split it, hmm? Down the middle.” The room had to be cheaper than the hotel, so he had to be better off today than yesterday.

  “Sure, baby. Down the middle.” Kyle handed him cash. “I think I’ll have the spices you need. If I’m missing anything, I can run up the street.”

  “Works.” He found a lemon and grabbed it, then paid for the food. “Feels like forever since I got to cook, cher.”

  “I’m excited. I can’t remember the last time anyone besides me cooked in my kitchen. You’ll let me help? I’m an excellent sous-chef.” Kyle led him out, a happy little skip in his step.

  “’Course. It’s way more fun together.” Cooking was a joint effort.

  “That’s what I think.”

  It was a very quick trip back on the subway. One of these days, he’d figure out why and when you took the bus, or the subway, or an Uber, or your feet in this city. Right now it was all just getting around.

  Kyle let him in, then followed him to the kitchen. “I think I need a snack and a glass
of wine. You?”

  “Surely do.” That sounded perfect, in fact. A bite and chopping and drinking.

  “Hummus okay?” Kyle started pulling things out and spreading them on the kitchen table—a garlicky hummus and pretzel sticks, a couple of cheeses, crackers, a bunch of grapes. And then a glass of dark red wine appeared in front of his eyes.

  “Oh. Oh, I have this at Angeli’s. So good.” He loved to try new things, taste them. He stole a grape and popped it into his mouth. Uhn.

  “Angeli is a person or a place?” Kyle took a bite of the cheese and followed it with a big sip of wine.

  “Restaurant. Made it through the storm.” So many hadn’t.

  “Wow. You were there for that, huh? The pictures we saw up here….” Kyle shook his head, and warm fingers touched his arm. “So devastating.”

  “Yeah.” He had been in Houma with his mamma, but his daddy hadn’t made it out the other side of it. They’d lost some—less than others, but some.

  Kyle watched him, Colt felt the stare, and then leaned in and kissed him. “Whoever they were, they knew you loved them.” Kyle patted his shoulder, moved to the refrigerator, and pulled out some peppers.

  He nodded. If Daddy hadn’t then, he did now. He ate some cheese, then started cleaning shrimps, keeping heads and shells for broth.

  “How do you want these veggies cut? Little pieces? Bigger chunks?” Kyle pulled out a cutting board and a good chopping knife, then played with the phone on the counter and music filled the kitchen.

  “Mmm. Chop ’em up nice and fine. I’ll get the stock going.”

  “You got it.” Kyle set to dicing up the veggies, dancing a little and singing bits of the music. It didn’t take long to fill a bowl with onion, celery, and peppers, all diced up nice.

  They cooked together, making stock and stirring the roux. They sipped the wine and sang and stole long, lazy kisses.

  “It smells so good.” Kyle leaned closer to the pot and breathed in. “Mmm. And looks beautiful too.”

  “It does. We’ll cook the fish and the rice, and we’ll be eating.” He was tickled as all get-out. “Thank you, huh? This is… this is a good thing, a soul-deep thing.”