Beyond the Footlights, page 24
Had it ever done that for him? Drawing in a deep breath, he followed them from the house and down the path that lead to Vance’s home recording studio.
Of course “home recording studio” made it sound like some ad hoc thing cobbled together in a back shed. This building was not that. This was a professional studio with all the bells and whistles.
Stepping inside made Kilmer remember the exact moment he and the music business had parted ways.
“Don’t freak out,” Vance warned him, turning around and placing a hand on his shoulder as Len opened the door. “There are no asshole Nashville producers here. Just us.”
Kilmer nodded. “Yeah. I’m not freaking out.” Much.
“Trust me.” Vance’s expression, the eye contact, the hand on his shoulder. Like he knew this was a thing for Kilmer. Which it wasn’t. Much.
Kilmer swallowed as best he could past his dry throat and nodded. “I’m fine. Really.” Because it wasn’t a thing. It didn’t matter. He could do this. He was a grown man. Much as he had been the last time he’d been in a sound studio, standing in front of the mic in a room barely big enough for him, his guitar, a stool, and the ego of the technician on the other side of the glass. That studio hadn’t been a good place when the technician’s boss or manager, or whoever the hell he had been, had come in and started cussing in his face and stabbing a finger into his chest.
“Kil.” Vance had moved his hand from Kilmer’s shoulder to the back of his neck. “Will you look at me?”
Kilmer blinked and focused. “Yeah. Sorry.”
“Come on. You need to see the space before you check out altogether, okay?”
“I—sure. Yeah. Okay.” He followed them in, lagging behind a bit as they walked through a spacious two-story vestibule. The space reached up to a timbered roof with skylights above. Mostly glass walls showed off vistas of the barnyard and horse paddocks. Comfortable-looking leather loungers slouched around an open room. There was a glass-fronted fridge in one corner filled with water, juice, soft drinks, and a few beers in the bottom. No doubt Vance had stocked anything anyone needed to make their recording experience as good as it could be. He would want everyone to feel welcome.
“This isn’t so bad,” Kilmer said, running a hand over the back of a long sofa.
“No reason people shouldn’t be comfortable in their downtime,” Vance said. “There are a couple of areas.” He pointed out a secluded alcove off to the left. “Len likes to go back there when he’s working. Even if no one else is around.”
“It’s a nice corner,” Len chimed in. “Quiet. Even if people can hear me, they can’t see me, and I can’t see them. I can forget they’re there.”
Kilmer nodded. “What’s behind there?” He pointed to a shoulder-high wall running parallel to the right side of the building.
“Kitchen-type area. Tables, microwave, fridge with actual food, and some dishes.”
“Toaster?” Kilmer asked absently.
There was a pause, and when he looked over at Vance, his friend was grinning ear to ear. “Of course. You know I look out for you.”
Heat infused Kilmer from neck to ears, and he glanced sidelong at Len, who was all but laughing. “Like I didn’t know you have a toaster waffle obsession.”
“Yeah, but.” This wasn’t his space. Vance had built it years ago, and Kilmer had never set foot inside. “I’ve never—”
“Think that stopped me hoping you would someday?” Vance asked quietly. “Come on to the back and look at the recording bits.”
Holding on to the warmth of the realization that Vance had included him in the place even knowing Kilmer might never go inside, he followed.
“Wait until you see the board,” Len said, gripping his hand and dragging him forward through a glass double door into a wide, bright hallway with doors on either side. “Those are practice rooms,” Len said, waving a hand at the left side of the hall.
Vance pushed a door open to reveal a room bright with natural light from a series of narrow glass-block columns on one wall. It wasn’t huge, but it wasn’t the closet-sized space he’d experienced either. “Check it out. This is the main recording room.” He pointed to a window at one end. “You can see the technician through there.” He reached into the room and flipped a switch. A bank of bright LEDs lit up along a ceiling bulkhead.
“Nice setup.”
“I can record my next album here. Don’t have to go into the city. No long hours or nights away. It’s got everything so the only time I have to spend away from home is when I’m on tour.”
“Firefly can record here too,” Len said. “When… well. Whenever.” He bit his lip. “Hey. I got something for you.” He smiled and patted Kilmer’s arm. “Gimme one sec.” He disappeared into one of the practice rooms, and Kilmer could hear him rummaging around inside.
“You should play with him. Record some things, even if it’s just for fun,” Vance suggested, keeping his voice low.
“You know that isn’t me, Van. Recording studios and all that shit.”
“You never tried it.”
“Music was never my business. It’s a hobby. I do it because….” Why did he do it? He’d started to say because Vance had. They’d done everything together their whole lives, and now Vance wanted to draw Kilmer into the music he shared with Lenny.
“You used to do it for me,” Vance said, like he could read Kilmer’s mind. “Play, I mean. You started because of me.”
“Yeah, but it’s what you do with Len now.”
“Music doesn’t pick sides, Kil. You play because you play, or you don’t play. I can’t make you. But it might do you some good to stop putting limits on it. Stop thinking of it like a thing you only do to keep someone else happy, or a thing you stopped doing because it bothered someone. Play because the music means something to you. Do it for yourself and you might be surprised what you get out of it.
“But you can’t play in a vacuum and neither can Len. So share it a bit. Let him show you a bit of his magic. It might do him some good to be trusted with something so important. He’s carrying around a lot of guilt for not helping people he maybe thinks he should have.”
“You want me to be his project?”
“I want him to see he can be strong without me. He’s more likely to work at it if he thinks he’s doing it for someone else. At the end of the day, he’s a pleaser. He likes to serve, and I won’t be here. And you need some care. It’s a thing he can do that might be good for both of you, that’s all.”
“That’s shitty of you to use us against each other like that.”
Vance grinned. “More like usin’ you for each other but whatever. It’s not like I’m manipulatin’ you if you know I’m doin’ it and you make the choice, right? You know I’m not goin’ to stop loving either one of you if you don’t. So it is what it is.” He shrugged. “Call it peace of mind if I know I put all my cards on the table and did my best to make sure my two best guys are goin’ to be okay while I’m gone.”
“Am I ever goin’ to stop bein’ your guy, Van?” Kilmer asked, half hating that Vance still thought he needed that, and half hoping Vance would say some day he’d be free of it.
“I hope you’ll find someone you can belong to proper, but until then, if I’m what you need, then so be it.”
Kilmer nodded, and Len returned with a bass that was too pretty—and way too expensive—not to catch his attention.
“We can play out here,” Len said cheerfully. He had his own guitar in his other hand and pointed to a lounge area with some amps tucked in beside the couches. “Let’s see what you got, Tex. Besides knowing all Vance’s back titles and a few oldie goldies.” He grinned when Kilmer frowned at him. “Oh yeah,” he said. “I heard Tanner call you that.”
“You’re a brat.” Kilmer swung lightly at him.
Len laughed and danced back. “Tell me you didn’t just figure that out.” He practically skipped away.
Kilmer followed because the cheerfulness was infectious and Vance was prodding him from behind, and he wanted to make them both happy. They were very good to him, and playing a few of Vance’s old tunes that he remembered was the least he could do, wasn’t it?
26
LEN WAS a different person with a guitar strapped over his shoulder. He was still playful and fun, but he was serious too. Professional and focused. He wrapped the music around him like a cocoon, wove it through the air, and pulled more of it out of Vance and Kilmer—lifeblood and soul magic tripped off the tips of their fingers as they played and Len sang.
Len became what he played. He glowed with it, and he cajoled more out of Kilmer than Kilmer had known he had in him.
The cavernous space around them shrank down to an intimate pocket of quiet voices wrapped in melody and countermelody. They played some old standards, with Vance’s resonant bass countered by Len’s clarion tenor and underpinned by Kilmer’s steady bass rhythms. The more he played, the more he remembered. The more he remembered, the easier it got to improvise, and the more animated Len became. And as Len’s energy rose, so did Kilmer’s and Vance’s, and they would begin a new tune Kilmer had forgotten he knew.
Hours wafted by and he didn’t notice. The light tracked across the carpeted floor, crawled up the far wall, turned from golden afternoon to peachy-bronze evening to deep blue night. The LEDs came on automatically as the room dimmed around them.
Kilmer might have played forever, but next to him Len’s stomach growled and, as if on cue, his own answered. He’d played the entire day away. The three of them had created an intimacy that no amphitheater or bar gig could ever mimic.
Across from Len and Kilmer, on the other couch, Vance radiated peace and stillness. The only indication that he had been filled almost to breaking with tension for the past few weeks was the absence of it now.
They should have done this a long, long time ago. How had he forgotten this? How had he let it go?
“Van?” Kilmer reached over and touched Vance’s knee.
“It’s going to work,” Vance said and grinned from one of them to the other. “I knew I was right.” He set his guitar aside on a nearby stand and stood.
“What’s going to work?” Len asked, following suit and setting his guitar on a stand. He’d unplugged it and begun to roll up the patch cord.
“You and Kil. You’re going to be okay.”
Len smiled at him. “Course we are.”
“Come on.” Vance chucked Kilmer lightly on his shoulder when he didn’t immediately follow their example and put his instrument down. He was loath to let go of the thing now that he recalled how the music eased his soul. He’d always calmed himself playing solo, but this was a different animal altogether. The assurance he could hold his own with the likes of Vance Ashcroft and Lenny Stevens energized and centered him. It didn’t matter their genres were about as far apart as it was possible to get.
“Move, Kil. I’m starved, and I’m pretty sure Maggie has left us a scathing note along with instructions for heating up whatever she made for supper.” He held out his hand, and just before Kilmer followed his impulse to grab it, Lenny’s fingers laced through Vance’s.
Kilmer’s gut spiraled and gurgled. An intimate bubble? Yes. His bubble? No. Not really. He gulped down a lump of unease and set the borrowed bass on another stand before he got to his feet.
“Maybe I’ll—” He waved at the door to the outside. “Go into town. I think it’s mushroom burger night at the pub.”
“You don’t have to.” Len patted his arm.
“This was good.” Kilmer didn’t have to lie about that. He’d enjoyed the day. Lost himself in it even, and it had been good. But this was Len and Vance’s last night together. Vance would leave for the airport at noon tomorrow, be gone for months, and he was so not going to cramp their style tonight. “Dog and I can see how the reno holds up under a bit of use.”
He patted the dog’s head. Maggie had brought him out hours before and said he had been a pining, moping pest who wanted his person. She’d dropped the leash at Kilmer’s side and strode out of the studio building in a huff. She’d left them a carafe of coffee and box of sandwiches and cookies as well, though, so her ire was only skin-deep.
“Kil, you really don’t have to go,” Vance assured him.
“Yeah, Van. I do.” Kilmer clipped the leash to the dog’s collar and got to his feet. “Tonight’s about you and Len. You guys have done so much for me, and Len’s been generous enough in sharing you. He’s been a rock for both of us, and really, it’s time you gave some back without having to worry about me. I’m gonna go eat a burger and live in my house. I’ll be back before you leave. Promise.”
Len, who had been wrapping up cords and setting them on top of their respective amps, shot him a grateful smile from behind Vance’s back.
They didn’t argue anymore, and Kilmer realized he wasn’t even struggling to breathe properly. With the decision made, the warmth of the music still rolling through his mind and heart, he felt good about giving them their space. It wasn’t about what he might be missing, suddenly, but about what he had, what he knew he would never have to live without, even if he didn’t live with it.
He had their love and friendship, and it was enough. He had the music. He’d lost it for a while and hadn’t realized how much he’d missed it, but in the past week, he’d rediscovered how deeply ingrained it was and how grateful he was to his friends for helping him find it again.
27
VANCE’S LEAVE-TAKING was uneventful. Kilmer said good-bye to him at his front door, then headed out to the barn while a driver took Vance and Len to the airport. He was back by suppertime, so Kilmer stayed at the ranch so Len didn’t have to spend his first meal alone.
Not that he really was alone. Maggie made sure of that, cooking enough for all three hands, herself, Janet, and baby Katie. It was a busy, happy meal, and Len smiled all the way through. If he was sad or upset, it certainly didn’t show that evening.
Afterward they hacked around on guitars while Janet sang in a sweet, timid voice, and Patrick watched her in awe and bounced her daughter on his knee. It was all very domestic and comforting. Vance needn’t have worried about Len one bit. They had built a little family here, and even in Vance’s absence—or perhaps because of it—Len was well looked after.
It wasn’t long, though, before it was the baby’s bedtime. Patrick walked Janet, Maggie, and Katie back to their cottage a mile down the road. Len went up to bed, and Kilmer tucked himself into the room off the kitchen.
Familiar as it was, he’d shied away from this space. But this was Vance’s house. The ambiance was different from his own house. The feel of the place was warmer, filled with comforting smells and the sounds he had grown accustomed to over years of keeping Vance’s ranch working while Vance was on the road. He knew this room and this house as well as he knew his own. Hoping familiarity would be a comfort, he was ill prepared for the restless night. He had thought that since he had slept so well with Tanner, he was over the worst of the dreams that kept waking him. Most of the time, he didn’t remember the dreams themselves. Only the sadness they left behind. He had thought wrong.
Len found him the next morning sitting at the kitchen table and waiting for the eggs Maggie was scrambling for them. He had a cup of coffee in front of him, as he listlessly watched Katie burble at the dog from the bouncy seat Maggie had strapped her into. The dog stayed close enough to entice Katie into reaching for him but far enough away she couldn’t grab a chubby fistful of his hair. She kept trying, though, and giggling up a storm every time she missed and set her swing to bouncing and bobbing.
When Len thumped down the stairs, Kilmer barely looked up for fear his poor night’s rest would be all over his face.
“Sleep well?” Len asked.
Kilmer nodded and sipped his drink. “You?” He glanced up at Len’s heavy flop into the chair across from him. Len’s pale skin showed the dark bags under his eyes and his hair hadn’t been combed and braided as he usually wore it.
“Well enough,” Len replied. “It’s always hard at first, isn’t it?” He looked to Kilmer like he hoped his hypothesis was the right one. “I mean, sleeping alone? I know he’ll be back and all. I’m just used to—” He closed his mouth and looked away for a split second. “Sorry. It’s not the same thing.”
“It’s hard at first,” Kilmer agreed. It wasn’t the same thing, true, but he understood what Len was asking. “But you have exercises? Something you and Van talked about?”
Len nodded. “I meditate. And my therapist knows he’s gone for a while, so I can call her if I need to.”
“You can call me too, yeah?”
“You’ll be here,” Len said.
Kilmer smiled. “Of course. I told Van I would look after you. You told him you’d look after me. So that’s what we have to do.”
Len grinned. The expression caught somewhere between scared and confident, but he nodded. “Yeah. It’ll be fine. We’ll shovel shit and play music, and it’ll be fine.”
And so they kept telling each other day by day. It did get better for Len. He talked to Vance at least once a day. He knew when he was coming home, and they had plans for that event. It wasn’t so terrible for Kilmer either, though he had less time for spending with Tanner than he would have hoped. He checked the progress on his house weekly, but spent the weekends—at least the first three—mostly with Len or the horses or both.
He played his bass and fiddled with old and new melodies with Len in the lounge area of the sound studio most nights. More than a few times, they both fell asleep on the cozy couches. Kilmer told himself he was doing it for Len. This was to keep him company in a way Len felt safe and Kilmer didn’t feel was taking advantage. He knew he was full of shit. He didn’t want to sleep alone at home. He didn’t want to fall headlong into whatever it was Tanner was offering. He didn’t want to lie awake in Vance’s house, listening to the groans and creaks and sighs of a home that was no longer his. To say he was doing it for Len was bullshit. But who was going to call him on it? Len certainly didn’t.
