And Boyle had responded immediately, as if only waiting for his cue. “This is crazy,” Clay told him. “I mean, if the roles were reversed and I was talking to you… from the beyond, wouldn’t you think you were crazy?”
Certifiable, Boyle admitted, and again Clay was struck by how accurate the voice was. It was Rocco Boyle, spot on. Or Clay was certifiable.
How long… you.. en playing?
Clay shared a brief autobiography, doing his best to curb his Rocket Throne fanaticism. And when Clay insisted he wouldn’t be putting on any grand display of musical prowess, Boyle just told him to get on with it. Start playing and let… rest sort… out.
So Clay’s fingers found the green pick, the third string of the first fret and the fourth and fifth of the second, and he tried to recreate the song he’d written the night he discovered the guitar. And failed miserably.
Take a breath, Boyle said, and his voice was growing stronger, clearer, the dial finding the frequency of his voice easier. Play slower.
A few more stabs and Clay made it through the opening and into the first verse. He’d negotiated all the way through the second chorus before realizing he’d forgotten the bridge entirely. Finally, he managed a choppy version of all the parts strung together.
Boyle had extraordinary patience for anyone, living or dead; he waited until the last note rang itself out, before telling Clay, constructively, to shorten the intro and give the chorus an extra hook. It’s a start, keep grindin’.
“I must be boring the crap out of you,” Clay sighed.
The ghost laughed a familiar laugh. You kidding me? This is… most f… in years.
And Clay had laughed too. The idea that he could not only hear Boyle’s ghost, but that Boyle might have an interest in hearing him was astounding. A dream within a dream. If Clay had veered off the deep end of sanity, was there a better delusion to be having?
He ran through the song again, diving into the solo and diving into the solo until his fingers burned. You know your minor pentatonic scale, Boyle told him.
And Clay mmm-hmmm’d and thought he’d die of embarrassment if the ghost asked him to define what a minor pentatonic scale was. After an hour—or was it three?—Boyle suggested he give the strings a break. Now the words. Give us something to sing along to.
By then, Clay had played the verses enough to hear them easily in his head. He wrote, scribbling and crossing out as he went, while Boyle tutored him, leaning over his notepad (so Clay imagined) to tell him that a line was too crowded, or how a word could be stretched over a measure. This is how I empty pain, Clay wrote. In a world indifferent and insane. All I am is flesh and feeling, a light so fast and fleeting. Just a shooting, bursting spark. Shouting at these voices in the dark.
Get a load of you, Boyle laughed. Try… stead of ending on a third chorus, reprise the intro… ’peat that first line.“This is how I empty pain!” In a l… show, it’ll play big.
“You’ve done this before,” Clay quipped, and he was calmer now, his fear and excitement downgraded to a mild tingle of wonder. In the right circumstances, it seemed you could get used to anything.
There’ve been a lot of visitors since my death, Boyle told him. You’re the only one who’s heard me.
“It can’t be great. Being alone all these years. It must…” Clay stopped short of saying it.
Boyle paused so long that Clay feared he’d departed. It feels good to be creative again. I can’t express how good. So let’s… you in this band, turn the Generator into a music space again. How’s that sound?
Now Clay’s boots were stirring up dust on The Knickerbocker’s 11th Floor and he wasn’t nearly as nervous as he might have been otherwise. He turned the corner at the end of the hall and spotted the black door that Spider had mentioned, half a city block down. The door led him into a narrow metal stairwell, and the stairs led steeply upward to another black door, which brought him outside onto a red-glowing rooftop—and face to face with the very person he’d come to see. “Well, well,” she said.
Her hair was down tonight and she had traded her work polo for an undersized Minor Threat shirt. She offered Clay a bro-hug, which he willingly accepted, her warmth moving into him, then away again. “Ever jam on the roof of a famous hotel?”
“Only twice,” Clay tried, and Savy lifted her brow, impressed. They moved between the stair house and the hotel’s giant air-conditioning units to the open tar-striped space where the source of the roof’s garish red glow—the old and overwhelmingly large knickerbocker letters—stood upon steel girders, beaming into the troposphere. Three Marshall amps and Spider’s drumset were already arranged in the middle of the roof, the cymbals and drum skins glowing hot pink against the lights. It was so red up there that when Fiasco Joe spotted Clay it looked like he had a double case of conjunctivitis.
“No, no, no,” he shouted. “Him? We’re wasting roof time on Richie Rich?”
“Play nice,” Savy warned.
“Oh, I’ll play nice—you know that. But him? He can’t tell a G from an F-sharp. Your boy’s illiterate.”
Clay said nothing in his defense, trying to affect an air of armored detachment. But Fiasco’s barbs still found their way through. To her credit, Savy didn’t bat an eye—though Clay could tell the idea bothered her. “Fee, drop dead, huh?”
“No, we get to use the roof three, four times a year? I’m not throwing it away on a lot of feedback and fucking up.
