She looked up to him. “I’m so sorry.”
Before she could ask another question, The Lost Boys finished with one last scream. The crowd went wild, stomping and clapping and demanding more, but Andrew shook his head and held his hand out. “Thank you, good evening,” he managed to shout through the racket. “’Twas a pleasure.” Christian and Simon smiled and waved, and with that they trotted off the stage.
Neil looked on as Andrew took Emily in his arms and swirled her around, laughing as he kissed her. He was riding the high of performing, buzzing with infectious energy. People had started to swamp them, asking for their autographs. The guys signed a few bar napkins graciously; Simon grinned as two girls giggled like crazy and snapped his picture on their phone. Across the room, S.J. began to make her way toward them.
“Let’s all get out of here,” Andrew announced to their table.
“Excellent idea!” Without hesitating, Emily grabbed his hand and all of them, Neil included, headed for the door.
They dashed into two taxis, yelling back and forth on where to go next, and decided on a nearby club in an attempt to burn off their newfound energy. Once there, Neil opted out of dancing, and with a rare smile at Emily claimed the best partner was taken and excused himself to make a few calls at the bar.
“We won’t be long,” she promised him and felt a twinge watching him stand alone.
After slamming down endless shots, the guys hauled the girls off to the dance floor and into a throng of gyrating, feverish bodies, the music blaring in their ears. Emily couldn’t make out Christian or Zoey in the flashes of light that pierced the blackness as the beat pounded up through the floor. Simon was visible, along with what remained of his tuxedo. He shook a pack of cigarettes in Margot’s direction and cocked his head toward the exit.
“No! I want to dance,” she said in a challenge. He threw the pack over his shoulder and swung her madly into the crowd. Emily could almost hear her laughter over the blare.
That left Andrew. Smiling like Satan himself, he circled her slowly and then placed one hand on her hip and one on the side of her face. He seductively drew her to him, leaving nothing but his lust between them. His lips trailed along her cheekbone.
“You were made perfectly to be loved—and surely I have loved you, in the idea of you, my whole life long.”
He spoke the words of Browning as though he had written them. His arms wound around her waist, and he kissed her with abandon, then pressed against her, melting into the music. Her mind raced with unanswered questions, but she could only throw her head back as his mouth devoured her neck, her eyes falling shut.
The music and the tequila ignited stars of arousal behind her lids, a maddening, dizzying hunger rampant again between them. He could feel her surrender, and he forced himself hard against her, the song getting louder and raunchier by the second. He gazed down at her, his hands tight on her hips.
“How? How can I want you like this? I was raised better than this, you must know. With manners and etiquette. So proper, so poised at all times. If you cut me, I swear it’ll run blue. My father’s people were all the epitome of English culture, Emily. My mum, Christ, she’d die a thousand deaths if she knew what I’m thinking of doing to you right now. There’s sanity in this head, I swear.
“I wasn’t raised to want to keep you tied up in a bed. I wasn’t raised to want to keep you as my slave, my whore.” His mouth was hot against her skin as he gasped the words, making her moan. “I adore you beyond reckoning, but one look from those exquisite eyes and I’m no longer sane. And it terrifies me as much as I crave it. Crave you. Because the longer I’m with you, the longer I touch this skin and kiss this mouth, the more I can’t control it, and it kills me and…I love it.”
His mouth collided with hers. She kissed him back, channeling all the passion and fears she possessed, letting him know she felt the same torture, the same inexplicable longing, and she feared drowning in it too but was unwilling to do anything to stop it.
We are lost. So gloriously lost.
Later, after the men had mercifully burned off some of their energy and the women had begged for a reprieve, they ended up at a neighborhood favorite, Mad Dog in the Fog, an English pub not far from their home. There they offered the type of Guinness Simon demanded, the darts Christian was dying for, and the booths where Emily could put her aching feet up while keeping Andrew at arm’s length. The women were exhausted, but by the looks of things, the men had just started the evening. Neil had not yet bid them goodnight but sat tending his drink, watching them all.
Somewhere after the second round, the bartender announced that it was trivia night. The somewhat blitzed bunch looked to Andrew, and he waved his Guinness in the air as if to say bring it on.
The topic was 1960s music. Periodically, the bartender would shout out some question to which the three of them would fire back a response. It quickly became embarrassing; death glares came their way from both a group of tourists and a rather drunk Irish soccer team. During an intense moment of Christian and Simon arguing over whether it was the heroin or the alcohol that killed Janis Joplin, Neil leveled Andrew with a cool stare. “If S.J. wanted you before, she’s going to really want you now, you know that. That little performance back there clinched the deal.”
Emily couldn’t tell if Neil had spoken in jest. Andrew merely sipped his Guinness and shrugged his shoulders. “Doesn’t matter. We’re doing the photo shoot, period.”
“What?” said Simon, breaking off from his argument in mid-sentence.
“I don’t trust her.”
“But what happens if I do?”
“The woman’s a shark.”
“And your point is? What better kind of person to have rep us? We don’t have to love her—we just need her to do her job.”
“Can’t we have both?”
“Yeah, and I’m going to grow a third tit. ’Tisn’t possible, Paulie.”
Neil put down his drink. “I wouldn’t say that.” The three men stared at him. “There are a lot of talented people out there, seasoned people, people who know the ropes, who would be lucky to take you gentlemen on. I know quite a few.”
Andrew shot Simon a long look, a look that had I told you he wouldn’t take us on written all over it. “So you changed your mind about managers, Simon? Since your previous plans seem to have fallen flat?”
“No, I’m being realistic. Isn’t that the word you’re always using? So the way I see it, one in the hand, as they say. We can’t wait around forever. This woman is at the top of her game, right? She’s also fronting some serious talent, so why not let her work her magic for us? Andrew, shit, we can’t go back out there and have you do it all by yourself again. We’re in this to make it, and I don’t want to make it without you, but I don’t want to wake up one day and be some gray-haired old geezer telling my kids about how I played backup for some other band. Some band they idolize. Fuck, the only thing more pathetic than old rocker has-beens is old rocker wannabes. This is our time, man. What are you afraid of?”
No one said a word. Andrew silently stared up at the bar.
“You three are the best I have seen in a long, long time,” Neil said levelly, breaking the tension. “Plus, you’re intelligent and grounded. You’re willing to work hard, and you’re loyal to each other. Simon is right. Your time to step up is now.”
“Neil…” Andrew began.
“Let me finish. You need to think about this, talk about it amongst yourselves. It’s a huge step, an important and hopefully life-long relationship, not something you can decide over a few beers. S.J. is very successful—that is true—there’s no denying that. But there are other things to consider.”
“You don’t want us to sign with her, do you? Why?” Andrew asked.
“My feelings about S.J. should not factor into your decision.”
“Like hell they don’t. What gives?”
Neil looked uncomfortable; he took a swig of his drink before he spoke. Emily had never heard Neil s
peak so candidly. This whole evening was full of surprises. “S.J. is famous for her mergers and acquisitions, insofar that she signs the talent then vivisects the band. Her modus operandi is to front the group, then go in for the kill and launch solo careers. I’ve seen her do it with her last several bands. It’s a pattern.”
“So you don’t trust her?” Christian leaned forward on the table.
“I don’t trust anyone in this business. Let’s just say I don’t care for her technique. I could be wrong in this case, but I never am.”
“Never?” Andrew asked, clearly intrigued by the content and tone of what Neil had just said.
“Only once.” Neil stared back at Andrew, his eyes a million miles away and yet totally focused on the young man that sat before him. “About a woman, actually, a very beautiful woman, but I get maudlin when I drink, so there.”
His eyes flashed to Emily, who knew he was thinking about his wife, and something inside of her wanted to reach out and take his hand.
“What I want to say to you gentlemen is that most of all, you need to do what feels right. Trust me, I know. This business has been in my blood since I heard my first live band. When I hear you play, I remember what I felt like back in London in the basement of that club, when I was younger than you are now. I’d forgotten that. You really don’t understand how great you are. It would be an honor for anyone to represent you. Just give yourselves a little more time before you make any commitments. You need to know who to trust.”
The band looked thoughtful and sat back in their chairs; the air around them seemed electric, alive with beginnings and fraught with peril.
“Whatever we do, we do it together, understood?” Andrew said. They all nodded. Without another word, the three of them held up their glasses and smashed them together.
“Okay, enough of this,” Christian cried. “Now let’s celebrate—Jesus, we’re going to be on the cover of Rolling Stone for fuck’s sake!”
“Waiter!” cried Andrew, laughing. “Another round!”
They all cheered and raised their glasses. “To The Lost Boys!”
By the time they staggered up their street, they were all pleasantly buzzed and singing at the top of their lungs. A few neighbors’ lights went on, and several dogs started to howl.
Christian howled in return. His arm hung over Zoey’s shoulder. She had a long-stemmed rose in her teeth, one of their winnings from the trivia contest.
Simon and Margot orbited each other. Simon eyed her over his glasses, shepherding her to stay on the sidewalk and not stray into the hedges and bushes that lined the road. Behind them, Neil held a bottle of wine, and although equally tipsy, he was definitely the adult supervision of the group. In the back of the pack, Andrew would stop Emily every few feet to kiss her and break into either laughter or song, using a Guinness bottle as a microphone.
They passed a tree, and before she could stop him, Andrew swung himself up into the branches.
“Andrew!” she hissed. “Get down! You’ll break your neck!”
“’T’ain’t my neck you should be worried about, darlin’.”
“Your hands then!”
“’T’ain’t me hands neither.”
“Why are you speakin’ Irish?”
“I was going for Scottish. Bugger.”
“Get out of that tree this instant, we’re losing them!” She pointed to the wayward party wobbling on ahead.
“Only if you promise me sometin’.”
“Anything, but please get out of the tree.”
A second later he began to climb dangerously higher and higher into the branches. Without warning, he sailed down the trunk with a whoop. She screamed.
His hand caught hold of a limb, and his face slung down inches from hers. She screamed again. “My ears, woman. Please. Now listen, I shall only get out of this shrub—”
“It’s a tree.”
“Whatever. I shall only get out of this tree-shrub if you promise me something. Else I’ll sit in here like I’m in bloody Greenpeace.”
“You’re insane, you know that? Yes, anything, what?”
“Marry me.”
Her heart skipped a beat, and she stared at his sloppy smile and tried not to laugh. “Didn’t we just—anyway, you cannot propose to me hanging from a tree.”
“Then I shall get down on one knee. See. There. Emily Thomas, would you do me the honor—aaaaahhh!”
In a flailing rush of leaves and flying arms, he fell off the branch and crashed into a bush below. White flowers exploded everywhere. She launched over to his prone body and tried to pull him out, but before she could find him in the darkened mass of greenery, two arms shot out and grabbed hold of her.
He rolled her out of the bush, over and over onto a lawn. Once she had caught her breath and stopped laughing, he stared down at her, and when he spoke, his voice was strangely hoarse and surprisingly sober. So sober, in fact, she wondered how drunk he really was.
“I love you, Emily.” His breath was uneven and tasted of barley, and his eyes glowed like the stars in the sky above him. “Marry me. Now, not later.”
She blinked back at him in shock. He probably wouldn’t remember a word of this tomorrow morning, she knew that, and for some inexplicable reason it made her want to cry. Swallowing down her hurt, she shimmied out from underneath him. Too overcome to say another word, she stumbled to her feet and, after a second, latched onto his hand and yanked as hard as she could. He staggered upright, crashing into her, his arms flailing around her waist.
“Easy there, cowboy. Let’s get you home.”
He began to sing as they hobbled along, and she blew the hair out of her eyes. Her mind raced in circles, wondering if his drunken proposal was how he truly felt, if those words were locked in his heart and he couldn’t find the courage to voice them earlier. And were they the words she truly wanted to hear but was too afraid to ask?
She hazarded another question, knowing that if he was indeed drunk, she wasn’t playing fair. “Andrew, why did you go on that train with Memphis?”
He glanced at her from the corner of his eyes and grinned. “I liked the chickens.”
“What the fuck?” Simon cried ahead of them.
A dilapidated Volkswagen minibus sat parked on the street in front of their house; its windows were fogged over and the sides dented. The bumper was held in place by a slew of stickers that read: My other car is a broom, Every day’s a holiday when you’re pagan! and Get a taste of religion. Lick a witch.
Andrew and Christian started inventing their own sayings, causing the next-door neighbor’s dog to yowl, finally settling on Something Wiccan this way comes.
“That’s cleber,” Emily told them, beginning to feel the result of the countless drinks she’d ingested tonight, but still wanting an answer to her question.
“Berry, berry cleber. That’s why you love me,” Andrew replied.
“Berry, berry much.”
“Andrew,” Emily ventured, finding courage from God knows where, knowing she might never have another chance. “About what you said back there on the lawn, a little clarification would be nice—”
“Huh?” said Andrew, staring at their house. Candlelight was shining from the lower bay window. All at once, Emily got a sinking feeling in her spinning head that had nothing to do with alcohol.
The five of them tumbled up the stairs, and after much fumbling, Neil finally took hold of the keys and opened the door. He handed them back to Andrew who, with a growing sense of sobriety, quickly unlocked his front door and swung it open.
It was dark and difficult to see at first. The air was heavy with pot, but candles lit the room well enough to make out a series of shapes. Emily frantically pushed Zoey aside and approached a large table draped in a dark velvet cloth and covered with lighted tapers, chairs surrounding it. Three were occupied.
“Dwayne?” she stuttered, immediately recognizing the tattooed palm reader-security guard. “What are you doing here? Oh God.” She spun about, panicked. “W
here’s Nora? Tell me you didn’t smoke Nora.”
Dwayne looked to either side, where Dinesh from the Columbarium and a man she didn’t recognize sat, and began to open his mouth. Suddenly, a beautiful woman stepped out from the shadows.
“Andrew,” she cried in greeting, arms outstretched.
“Mum?” Andrew stammered in disbelief.
“Mum?” Emily gasped. “Oh hell.” She tried to straighten her clothes and hair.
“C.C.?” Neil whispered. A look of amazement blanketed his face.
At the sound of his voice, Andrew’s mother stopped dead in her tracks. “Lainey.”
“C.C.?” Andrew did a double take between his mother and Neil.
“Lainey…” she said tentatively.
“Righteous!” Dwayne cried.
“What the hell are you people doing in my living room?” demanded Simon.
Thank God someone had a knack for the essentials.
18
* * *
“YO, MUSE-LADY, YOU live here too?” Dwayne crowed, stepping away from the candlelit table to greet Emily.
The rest of the crowd remained silent. The previous rapid fire greetings had rendered everyone slack jawed and speechless. Emily was most concerned about Andrew, not sure what he would say or how he would act given his current state of drunkenness, but the steady stare he leveled at his mother told her he might be far more sober than she suspected.
“Righteous seeing you again!” Dwayne beamed. “Imagine me standing in your living room when only a few days ago you were running up and down my al-ter-na-tive working establishment.” His mangy mop of hair bounced like a bobble-headed dashboard dog while he turned about, taking in the demolished state of the walls and ceiling before swinging his hazy focus back to her. “You’re looking better than the last time I saw you, I’ve got to say—had me kind of concerned there…still a little gnarly with the sticks in the hair and all, but who am I to judge, right?”
Her hands flew to her head, feeling the undeniable presence of twigs and blades of grass. Oh God, what must she look like?
Grave Refrain: A Love/Ghost Story Page 29
