“Seems like a good set up,” agreed Jake, taking a seat on the couch beside Grey. “So, what have I missed so far?”
“We were talking about what material you guys have ready for me to work with,” said Dr Marrs. “Sounds like there’s still a lot to be written.”
Jake nodded, “There is. With all that’s been going on, I’ve not as much ready as I’d hoped to have.”
“How many complete songs do you have?”
“Maybe four,” replied Jake openly. “Five at a push.”
“Guess it’s a start,” commented the producer bluntly.
“We do have a load of riffs, bridges, melodies and shit that Rich left us on his laptop,” revealed Jake, glancing at his bandmates for reassurance. “Not sure where he recorded them. Quality’s sharp. It would be good to use as much of that stuff as we can.”
“And you all feel that?”
“Yeah,” replied Grey. “He’s left us in the shit. Least he can do is help us out a bit from the other side.”
“Jake,” began the producer. “You got the files?”
Jake nodded, “I’ve a copy in my bag for you.”
“Ok, leave those with me and I’ll see what I can extract from it. You ready to pull double duty, Mr Power?”
“Do I have a choice?”
“No,” stated Dr Marrs plainly. “Right, let’s work out a rough plan here. Start marking up that board with what we have so far.”
Having completed their shopping with time to spare, Maddy suggested that they drive up to Starbucks at Safeway saying that she needed to pick up some groceries while they were up there. Checking the time, Lori agreed that a coffee sounded like a good idea.
When they reached the parking lot, Maddy pulled into the space beside Lori then both friends headed into the store. Coffees in hand, they sat at the first empty table they came to. Again, Lori checked the time.
“School doesn’t get out for nearly an hour,” laughed Maddy. “Chill out here, girl!”
“Oh, I can’t!” laughed Lori. “I keep thinking about her. Keep fretting.”
“Stop stressing,” scolded Maddy playfully. “I’ll put ten dollars on it that Miss M skips out of class saying she’s had the best morning ever!”
“Oh, I hope so.”
Stirring her latte, Maddy commented, “Feedback from Saturday night has been awesome. Has Jake said much about it?”
“We’ve not had a chance to talk about it. He was wiped out by the time we got back to the hotel,” replied Lori, staring into her Americano. “He still struggles to talk about Rich.”
“How much do you know about that music teacher that was hanging about?”
“Nicole?”
“Yeah. I was watching her,” said Maddy, an edge of mistrust to her voice. “Keep your eye on her. She’s worth watching.”
“Why?” asked Lori innocently.
“Just something I thought I saw,” replied the band’s tour manager. “A couple of things actually.”
“Like what?”
“She caught Jake’s towel as they headed back out for the encore. She was sniffing it. Inhaling the smell of it.”
“Jake’s sweaty towel?”
Maddy nodded, “And I think she’s helped herself to the shirt he had on. He took it off on the way backstage. Threw it onto a table in the green room. Next minute I looked round, it was gone. Only person near it was her. I think she stuffed it into her bag along with the towel.”
“Why would she steal Jake’s shirt? You sure it didn’t fall down the back of the table onto the floor?”
“I don’t like her, Lori,” stated Maddy sharply. “I think she’d steal more than your husband’s laundry if she got half a chance.”
“You think she’s after Jake?”
“Call it a hunch. I’ve seen her type before,” replied Maddy. “Keep an eye on her.”
Hauling a plastic crate from the stack at the side of the building round to the rear of JJL, Jake settled himself down in the late afternoon sun to work on some lyrics. Since lunchtime, he’d been working with Grey to build on a half-finished song that he had been playing with on and off for a few months. On the last leg of the tour, every few shows Jake would play the riff over at soundcheck. When they’d gone into the live room just before lunch to set up, he’d subconsciously played it again after he brought his guitar into tune.
“For Christ’s sake!” growled Grey. “Not that fucking riff again!”
Jake looked up, genuinely surprised by his friend’s reaction.
“Either write it into a song or quit playing the fucking thing!”
Over the next couple of hours, they’d expanded on it under Dr Marrs’ calm supervision. Having requested that Paul and Grey work on the bass and drum tracks for it, the producer had suggested that Jake find himself a quiet corner to come up with some lyrics.
Conscious that some of the song content they had already gathered was quite dark and heavy, Jake felt that this song needed to be more tongue in cheek to lighten the load. Grey’s frustration proved to be the creative catalyst he needed. As the idea developed, the words flowed from his pen onto the page. He was so engrossed in his work that he never heard the car pull up at the shady side of the building.
“Hi.”
Looking up, Jake found himself face to face with Nicole.
“Hi,” he replied, wondering why she was there.
“I’ve a meeting with Jim,” explained Nicole, almost as if she’d read his mind. “I’m trying to convince him to help me out with a music production course.”
“He’s inside with Grey and Paul.”
“And have you been banished?” she quizzed softly. “Been cast out into the wilderness?”
“Something like that,” replied Jake, noting the short skirt she was wearing and the white silky shirt. “You been at work?”
“Classes started back today. I had a year nine class and a year eleven group before lunch,”
