We Need YOUR Help!
“Thanks, Seattle, you’ve been a great audience.”
“Vancouver, Lenny, we’re in Vancouver.”
“Vancouver? Are you sure?”
Bodine held his Stratocaster up against the massive tower of amplifiers. Feedback shrieked out over the fifty thousand fans jammed into BC Place, drowning out his lead singer. He turned back to the audience and began to play the riff off their latest chart-topper. The roar of recognition hit him like a wave.
One more song, would Lenny make it without passing out on stage? Bodine sidled up beside him. He’d sing the chorus into the same mike, prop Lenny up, help him remember the words.
Lenny threw a drunken arm around his shoulder and gave him a sloppy smile. Bodine smiled back. Cameras were everywhere, what good would it do to show how disappointed he was with his best friend or how sick he was of this way of life. He was a rock star, living the dream, or at least that’s what the fans wanted to think.
He moved out on the runway for his guitar solo, fans on three sides screaming, grabbing, frothing. It was a blur of open mouths, waving hands and a very large picture of a fabulous Blue and Gold Macaw that could be Manny’s twin. The message in bold type above the picture read We Need YOUR Help.
A young woman was holding the sign above her head. She was not your average Seditious fan - instead of piercings, rainbow hair, garish make-up, and bodacious cleavage she had short brown hair, a scrubbed face and a turtleneck sweater. Her expression was not one of wanton depravity; it was serious. A seriously not having fun face.
A roar went up from the crowd and Bodine turned to see Lenny lurching toward him to finish the last verse. He stumbled and plunged off the runway disappearing amongst the crowd.
Not again.
Bodine cut his solo short, grabbed the closest microphone and finished the last verse. The stage went dark, stadium lights came up. As his handlers started to hustle him toward a back exit, he noticed a knot of people including security guards and first aid attendants accompanying his lead singer away in a wheelchair. Lenny gave him a thumb’s up. Looked like he’d survived to rock on.
And there she was again. She’d taken advantage of the lapse in security and moved right up to the stage. She was yelling something and pointing to the picture of the macaw.
“Jimmy, see what that bird girl wants,” Bodine said to a roadie.
“Who?”
“The girl with the picture of the macaw.”
“The picture of what?”
“The bird.”
“You mean like invite her back to the party at the hotel?”
Three tours ago Bodine stopped partying with groupies after concerts. He didn’t party now with anyone, didn’t even stay at the same hotel as the rest of the band. He showed up for rehearsals, recordings and concerts and that was it.
“No, just get her telephone number.”
As he headed for the dressing room, Bodine wondered how Manny was doing. He’d give Jessica, his bird sitter/companion a call and ask her to put him on speakerphone. Manny got excited when he heard his voice. He loved that bird and why not, other than his parents it was the longest, most enduring relationship he’d ever had with any living thing.
Pickles wasn’t happy. Her shrieks were nearing eardrum-piercing level and exacerbating Mattie’s post rock concert headache.
“Jonathon, give her some treats,” Mattie said.
“I already have. She’s jealous of all the attention you’re giving to the new African Greys.”
The two new parrots had just arrived in a bailiff’s van. A pet store had gone broke, and the birds were part of the inventory seized. Saunders Exotic Bird Sanctuary had been asked to care for them for a few weeks until they could be sold. Mattie eagerly agreed. She desperately needed the five hundred dollars plus thousands more–a month.
The Seditious concert last night in BC Place had been a waste of time and money. She’d read that Bodine, the lead guitarist of the bad-boy rock band had a macaw as a pet and since he was obviously wealthy, she hoped might be sympathetic and use some of the money he now spent on his hedonistic lifestyle to help her precious, beautiful birds. It was a desperate act but then these were desperate times. It was festival seating, meaning there were no seats just a crush of frenetic humans, every one of them trying to get as near as possible to their idols on stage. It took the entire concert, if that’s what you could call it, to finally get near enough that he might notice her sign. And he did, at least he looked right at her. Then the leader singer had fallen off the stage, the lights had gone on and the concert was over. Some guy came up to her and said Bodine wanted her telephone number, but for all she knew he was a creep hitting on her. What the hell, she’d thought, and gave him the sanctuary number.
And now, even as she thought about it, that telephone was ringing or was that Pickles imitating it?
“Jonathon, can you get the telephone?” she asked her assistant. The Greys were in bad shape. Being the smartest parrot in the world meant they suffered from anxiety, not unlike humans and their situation was extremely stressful. She needed to get them cleaned, caged and somewhere quiet–that would mean away from her angry macaw.
“A Mr. Bodine is on the line for you.”
“What does he want?”
“He wants to know what you want?” Jonathon handed her the portable telephone.
“Madison Saunders.”
“That sounds like a mighty upset macaw in the background.”
“You got that right. How can I help you?”
“I was going to ask you the same question.”
The penny dropped. “You’re that Bodine?”
“If you mean lead guitar and lyricist of Seditious, that’s me.”
He’d called, he’d actually called. But now was not a good time. She needed to be calm, clear, and convincing and at the moment she was anything but. Then again this could be her only chance. She looked at the two birds that had just come into her care. Their eyes were wide, necks extended, and both were shivering.
“I’ll call you back.”
“What?”
Bodine looked at the telephone. She’d hung up. The crazy Bird Girl had hung up on him, Bodine, lead guitarist of one of the world’s top rock bands and composer of three number one, multi-million selling hits.
He looked around the spacious, beautifully appointed, empty hotel suite. He had a day to kill since Lenny was being held over at the hospital for observation after his header off the stage last night.
They’d be back on the road tomorrow. There were still sixteen more concerts left in their fourth North American tour. He seriously doubted Lenny would complete it without killing himself or checking into rehab. If not him then Thumper or Bam Bam. Flint still had it under control but only because he had venereal disease and the street drugs counteracted his prescription medicine. There but for fortune...
Bodine picked up his acoustic guitar and plucked some chords. He was working on something completely different, mellower, more poetic. He imagined performing it solo, unplugged to a small intimate audience. It had to be good, very good. Something Sharon Isbin, his instructor at Juilliard–before he quit and joined Seditious, would be proud of. Something for his parents to make up for all the anxiety he’d caused them.
But his thoughts kept going back to the telephone call. That macaw in the background was pissed. Manny got like that especially when Bodine brought women back to the apartment. That bird could really kill the mood.
What the hell. He picked up the hotel house phone. “Can you get me the address of Saunders Exotic Bird Sanctuary, please?”
“How far is this place?” Bodine was restless. He hadn’t spent this long in the back seat of a car without having sex in years.
“Delta is a rural suburb of Vancouver. It will take another thirty minutes depending on the tunnel,” the driver of the Lincoln Town Car said.
“The tunnel?”
“Under the Fraser River. It’s a bad bottleneck at almost any time of day.”
This was a mistake. He could have gone to the Art Gallery just two blocks from his hotel. There was a show of some of Cezanne’s work. Bodine liked art, especially Impressionists and Cezanne was the father of the movement. He could have gone to the Aquarium and seen the dolphin show or walked across the chasm of the Capilano Canyon on a suspension bridge.
When on tour, Bodine did an internet search of the attractions the cities they’d be performing in offered. When they arrived he went to his own hotel, dressed in street clothes, pulled his wavy black hair into a ponytail, tucked it inside a coat, put on a Yankees baseball cap and a pair of photo-chromatic glasses that transitioned from clear to dark depending on the intensity of the light and headed out by himself to take in the sights.
He had yet to be recognized in any major city while on tour. If you didn’t act, dress or frequent places rock stars did nobody thought you were one. The heavy dark-rimmed, nerdy glasses also helped, as no fashion-conscious person would ever wear them.
Since he’d been clean and sober, he didn’t need to recuperate before the show or need to get high at the party after. That gave him time to fill and learning about, and seeing new things was what he did with it. The day would come when he’d no longer be a rock star, and he wanted to have other worthwhile interests ready to fill the void. After Lenny’s plunge off the stage at last night’s concert, that day might be sooner rather than later.
“We’re in luck,” the driver said. “Traffic’s moving well, no stalls or accidents–so far. Twenty minutes more, max.”
They took an exit onto a four-lane secondary highway just after the tunnel, then turned onto a two-lane street and then onto a narrow dirt road bordered by deep ditches. At the end of the muddy lane was an old two-story house. Behind the house was a small, metal prefabricated warehouse-type building. Long rectangular windows ran the length of the side wall visible from the lane.
“This is it?” Bodine wasn’t sure what he expected.
“According to the GPS, this is the address you gave me.”
END OF FIRST INSTALLMENT
