Johnny Greer’s Blues - Part 7

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Johnny didn't sleep well that night, and what sleep he did have was haunted by terrible dreams. In one dream, Johnny was in the studio of Delta Sounds. The place was quiet, save for the blues Johnny played on his uncle’s old guitar. Johnny sat on the wooden stool and was lit by a single blazingly bright spotlight from above. Johnny couldn’t see beyond the pool of light, but he could sense what felt like an infinite darkness.

Johnny finished the song he was playing. The tune was familiar, but he couldn’t place it. He set his guitar down, and when it contacted the studio floor the sound echoed. Johnny brought his hand up to his eyes to peer out of the white wash of light, trying to spot the booth. “How was that?” he asked. He received no answer, other than the echo of his own voice. That wasn’t right. This room wasn’t supposed to echo, but it did, and his own voiced seemed to bounce off the walls and run all around him.

The spotlight shut down with a loud, percussive thump that Johnny felt in his belly. A dim light appeared around him as the darkness seemed to drain from the room, leaving behind the familiar studio. Johnny looked to the booth and saw someone at the controls. It wasn’t Bones Baer and his ever present cigar. It was Gold. His face seemed to be illuminated by a flickering red flame. He nodded at Johnny and grinned. Even from inside the studio, Johnny could see that his mouth was filled with rows of razor sharp teeth.

“That was good,” Gold’s voice said over the intercom. “But let’s make it better. Let’s make it a duet.”

The studio door opened, and Charlie Miller entered. The man was dressed as he had been the day Johnny delivered the letter to him, and he looked the same except for the small ragged hole in his right temple and the much larger one on the opposite side. Dark red blood soaked the checkered shirt he was wearing.

Miller moved slowly towards Johnny, his face contorted into an unsettling rictus. He didn’t walk so much as he seemed to slither towards Johnny, who looked down and grabbed the neck of the guitar almost like a character in a movie would clutch a crucifix, hoping it would protect him from whatever thing it was that lurked in that film’s shadows.

When Johnny looked up, Charlie was standing next to his left. Johnny could see into the large hole in the country musician’s skull. He didn’t see blood or gore. He didn’t see anything, just a black void with no bottom or end.

“Let’s sing, Johnny. What do you say?” Charlie asked.

“I don’t want to.”

“Don’t nobody care what you want. He wants us to sing.”

“You can’t make me,” Johnny said.

Charlie laughed. It was dry and ugly. “Why don’t you just tell him you don’t want to. That’ll end it.”

Johnny looked to the booth. Gold leaned forward looking at him as the light danced on his face. “He’s right, Johnny. Say the word and the session will be over,” Gold said over the intercom. “Or you can stay with me and make great and wondrous music. The choice is yours Johnny.”

Johnny stared at Gold and then looked back at the grinning dead man.

“You’re one of us, son. Let’s sing,” Charlie said, throwing an arm over Johnny’s shoulder. The arm felt cold and damp. Johnny flinched as a sulfurous odor blasted his nose.

“Alright, I’ll sing,” Johnny said.

“I can’t tell you how happy I am that you’ve made that choice,” Gold’s voice said over the speaker.

The white floodlight came back on, which is when Johnny woke up covered in sweat and shaking with chills.

The following night, Johnny went to work at the Silver Palace. Pete took one look at him and sent him home.

“You take your sickly ass out of my palace and take it back to your Rat Palace, King Johnny. I don’t need you scaring my customers into thinking they’re going to catch some kind of killer disease. Go on.”

Johnny went home and noodled on the old two-tone Gibson Es-335 Theresa had loaned him. Johnny liked how it sounded through the headphones he had jacked into the guitar. The songs he knew how to play sounded new through the electric, and Johnny knew he could squeeze out a good sound with the instrument.

Johnny practiced late into the night, practically falling asleep with the Gibson in his hands.

That night, he dreamed the studio dream again, exactly the same as before. This time he woke up in a sweat and panic at about 7:30 in the morning. Johnny sat up in bed for a while, trying to shake off the dream and the fog in his head. He took a shower and then made himself some coffee and a small breakfast.

As he sipped his coffee, he made a decision. He was going to call Gold and end the deal.

Johnny paced his apartment nervously, ignoring the roach that made its way to the crumbs on his plate in the kitchen sink. He picked at the guitar for a bit, and then around 11:00 he walked down the street to the nearest phone booth and made a call to Gold’s office.

The woman with the smoked honey voice answered the phone. “Good morning, Mr. Gold’s office, how may I help you?”

Johnny struggled to respond to the woman. There was something about that voice that twisted him up and made him stupid. Johnny had gone through a few girlfriends back home, but this woman’s voice made him feel like a junior high school boy trying to talk to a pretty girl he liked.

“Umm, hi, it’s Johnny. Johnny Greer,” he said. “Can I speak to Mr. Gold?”

“Johnny, it’s so good to hear from you,” the woman said in a way that made Johnny believe her. “He’s been expecting your call. Just hold on, can you do that for me?”

Johnny thought he could do anything for her. He could kill or die for her. But, he didn’t tell her that. He just said, “Sure.”

A moment later, Gold was on the phone.

“Johnny, great to hear from you, champ. I’m hearing good things from Bones Baer about your session.”

“Thank you,” Johnny said.

“He tells me he wants a second, bigger one with more musicians and more time. Of course that means more money, but Bones tells me it’ll be worth it. Will it be worth it, Johnny?”

“Mr. Gold, I need to talk to you about Charlie Miller.”

There was a brief silence, and then Gold’s voice dropped into a deep, serious tone. “Sad story. Hell of a loss to the music scene. I’d go to the funeral, but the family wanted it to be private. Under the circumstances, I understand.”

“What was in that envelope, Mr. Gold?” Johnny asked.

“Johnny, it was private.”

“No sir, the way I see it whatever was in that envelope killed that man, and I deserve to know what it was.”

“Johnny, you do understand our deal, right? I get 20% plus your services as I see fit. I don’t owe you explanations.”

“No, I figure you don’t. But if you want me to keep working for you, I need some answers.”

“Johnny,” Gold said, an edge of menace creeping into his voice. “I think you need to reconsider your tone here and remember the dynamics of this situation. When I ask you to do something,I expect you to do it without asking questions. You are free to say no, of course, but if you do, that’s the end of our relationship.”

Silence hung on the line with them.

“But, hey, listen,” Gold said, the menace replaced with an upbeat air. “There’s nothing to hide. It was just a letter. I was simply confirming that he was free to seek other management. It was his choice.”

“Did he refuse to do something for you, Mr. Gold?”

“He chose to part company. And, I was as good to my word to him as I will be to you. I let him out of the contract and set him free. Now, what happened after that, well, I don’t know. The man was troubled, Johnny. That’s the truth.”

“I don’t know if…”

“Look, kid, I have just signed a check to Bones for the extra studio time. For the extra talent to back you. If what he is saying to me is true, this demo tape you are cutting will get you a record if not a multi-record deal. And I am prepared to promote the ever loving hell out of it. You want to hear yourself on the radio? It’s going to happen. Your momma and daddy and every friend and girlfriend you ever had? They are going to hear you on the radio. Just stick with me and give me a little - and a I do mean a little -time.”

“I just feel….”

“Guilty for Charlie,” Gold interrupted. “I get it and I understand. You would be a monster if you didn’t feel bad. I feel bad, too. But it’s not your fault or mine. All you did was deliver the mail. Neither one of us pulled that trigger.”

Johnny didn’t respond.

“Now, go to the next session and listen to Bones. I think you are in for a number of very good surprises. Of course, if you called to end our arrangement, I can call Bones and stop the wheels from turning on this train. No hard feelings. Is that what you want, Johnny?”

“No. No sir. I want to record.”

“I can’t tell you how happy I am that you’ve made that choice,” Gold said as the line went dead.

Part Eight will follow in the next installment.

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