Know Me (Truthful Lies Trilogy - Book One) (15 page)

“
Somehow, I think I’ll be thinking of you
all day tomorrow. Too distracted to actually catch a
beat.”

“
Then mix me a tape.”

“They don’t call them tapes anymore, you
know.”

“What do they call them?”

“Just mixes.”

“Then mix me a mix.”

He makes me laugh, regularly, and every laugh
is a quiet release of worry. “No problem.”

“
You got a Spotify account?”

“
Of course.”

We exchange usernames and I
start following him and then he
follows me. I follow him on Twitter, friend him on Facebook, and
add him to my circles on Google Plus. He doesn’t use MySpace so I
give him my username and tell him he’s welcome to subscribe to my
updates. “I’m hoping to get the ‘live’ feed, instead,” he says.
“You got a blog?”

I give him the address.

“
Damn, you’ve covered all bases, haven’t
you?”

“
And still, what it really took was just a
phone call from someone to get a break. Makes me feel like the
internet’s the Pacific Ocean and I’m just a raft in the middle of
it somewhere.”

“
I got most of my biz from word of mouth as
well. I did some internet advertising, and it helped a bit I guess.
But my biz is local, so, I think that makes it easier when people
search.”

“
What business are you in?”

He reaches into his pants pocket, pulls out a
card and flings it in front of me.

“
DWAT
?”

“
Read the heading underneath.”

“
Dude with a
Truck
.” Another laugh
from me.

“
That’s me. I take my truck, lift shit, put
it in the back of it, and move people to new apartments or
houses.”

“
No shit.”

“
No shit.”

I steal a glance at his body, smirk.
“Well, I might end up needing your services soon.”

“
Yeah, I kinda figured that when I heard
you talking on the phone.”

“
Yip. Realty developers are wolfing down
the neighborhood. My landlord’s caved in to the pressure, and,
well, in six months I’ll probably be out on my ass.”

He frowns. “Damnit. It’s fucking bullshit.
Anyway. Keeps me in business. People moving left and right.
Williamsburg is an exodus of talent, and an influx of yuppiness
ever since I started this gig.”

I put the card in my pocket.

Silence passes for a second, then
he resumes nibbling the
fingertip he’d since stopped kissing.

I melt, and gush.
This is so unlike me...
“Should we get outta here?” My
heart dances psychotically in my chest.

Deck throws cash on the table
(completely ignoring that it
was supposed to be on me tonight), and grabs me by the
wrist.

In a breath, we’re back
in my apartment and on my bed, going at
it. Ferociously. I can’t get his shirt off fast enough. I can’t
climax fast enough.

And
, after, I can’t rest on his warm body again fast
enough.

We fall asleep.

In the morning, before the sun is up, he
wakes me with a kiss, already fully dressed and freshly showered.
“I gotta go, Blaze. Moving furniture all day.”

It feels like a sword to my heart.
“Oh, right, sure.” I get up,
rub my eyes.

“
After that, I’m training with Skate; Trev
as well. It’s typical Alpha Male shit. Lots of sweat and grunting
and showing off. But...if you’d like...I could pick you
up...”

The sword eases itself out of me slowly.
“And watch you grunting it with all your buddies?”

“
Right, I know, stupid—”

“
Sounds awesome.”

“
Cool. Cool. Can I pick you up around
four?”

“
Sure, or I could meet you if there’s a
subway near it.”

“
I think there’s a station there, no idea.
I haven’t used the subway as a regular form of commute in years.
I’ll pick you up. I’d...uhm...like to see you a few minutes before
grunting it out with a bunch of sweaty men.”

I think of
grunting it out with
this
sweaty man...

“
Awesome. Around four then.”

We stare at each other for a second. Then
he bends down, holds my cheeks, smothers me with a debilitating
kiss. In my now-dazed state, he whispers, “Blaze Ryleigh, I feel
like I don’t know the first thing about you. And, at the same time,
like I know everything there is to know about you.”

And with that,
he goes. The door closes. And I’m alone. In a big
empty loft.

With
all my memories.

But they’re further away
now, I can feel it. They’re no
longer slapping me and smothering me. I feel like I can actually
breathe, not rocked by their penetrating pain.

Did
someone mention earlier about a certain game
changing?

Declan DMs me on Twitter.

Hey
Blaze, had a good time. Just FYI.
Looking fwd 2 2nite
.

H
e also messages me on FB saying the same thing—except for
right at the end where he adds:
Sent this here as well ’cause I dunno if
you’re an FB or Twitter fan mostly
.

I’m about to respond with
Actually, I rarely
use either
, when I
notice I have a friend request. I usually get one or two legit ones
a week from local indie bands that I reach out to during the
week.

But the request isn’t from an indie
band.

“
Hello baby, heard you played
fuckin unbeleivable [sic] set on Saturday. I want us too [sic]
forget past and talk. Be friends? Tolek”

Even the written word
betr
ays his accent. It’s
almost like I can hear him speaking above me, hands raised:
Is NOT over,
Błażej!

A shiver crawls slowly down my
spine
, like a
hairy-legged crab.

I decline the request and click that I
don’t know
him. An
innocent lie for a little peace of mind...

I have
most notifications turned off for my social apps because
they get too distracting, but there were a few on Twitter that I
noticed when I got Declan’s DM notification. I go back to the app
and incidentally notice: “
Thirty-seven
new followers?” For me, with the whopping ninety-two I had
yesterday (of which I think half are spambots), this is one
serious
improvement! I look through my
follower list and they mostly look legit, not bots.

I look at my reply stream.

@DJHeavenLeigh OMFG OMFG OMFG.
PLEASE TELL ME WHERE YOUR PLAYING NEXT!!! YOU ARE
INCREDIBLE!!!

@DJHeavenLeigh WOW! TKU so much for mixing
our demo tape into your mix! We’ve had calls all morning!

@DJHeavenLeigh Call me. Ur hot!

@DJHeavenLeigh Our agency would like to chat
about representing you. Please send contact details through.

“
Oh. My. Freaking. God.”

I answer a few. Funnily enough, although
there are indeed a few spammy tweets (“
Wanna know more about Heaven Leigh’s
latest singles? Visit: link.to/gHyy6Rt
”—this then lands on a porn site), I get no hate
tweets. Maybe it’s easier for people to hate on you when they’re
talking behind your back?

It’s the same with my email
acc
ount—notification
emails about comments on my blog (First one: “Heaven-Leigh, you
rock! R U single?”) I pull open my laptop, log into the blog and
turn off the email notifications (and approve the one saying I’m
hot.) I log onto FeedBurner and see I have a staggering forty new
subscribers. Staggering to me, because that’s about as many
subscribers as I got in the last four years since creating the damn
thing! If you take off Mamah and a few friends of friends, probably
I only really had twenty actual subscribers.

It’s a similar scene on MySpace, Google
Plus (I’m added to twenty-nine new circles.) My mood lightens the
more I read some of the positive feedback. I feel on top of the
world. I feel like luck is on my side. It seems
them haters
were only on that one forum.

Time flies by, and b
efore I know it, it’s twelve
P.M.

I haven’t done a damn thing for the day!
Not even eaten!
“Shit!”

I’m making myself some coffee when my
phone buzzes.
XAVIER.

“
Chiquita, moolah’s on the way. Randy want
to meet
wichyoo
tomorrow. He want to talk about clubs, the label, all those
things.” Xavier’s accent only comes out thick when he’s either
in
Business
Mode
or
Gangsta
Mode
. Which, sadly, is
really one and the same...

“
What time can you make it?” he
asks.

I’m such a terrible riser. Who
is
, when they work at
parties all night? “Eleven?”

He bellows into the background. I think
Randy answers. “No problem. Eleven. Look, he want to know as well
what he need to do to guarantee at least a few more gigs
wichyoo
. I mean,
you seem to be getting a lot of buzz right now. Know what I’m
sayin?”

“
Not really.”

“
Can you guarantee him you’ll sign with
him? As a favor. Seeing as he’s the one who broke you
out?”

Uhm, hello!?
Can anyone spell
déjà vu
? “Didn’t we just have this conversation
yesterday?”

“
Things are heating up, so we havin it
again.”

He’s like a dog to meat, and I’m the
meat.

I feel a sting of discomfort. And,
although I can’t speak for Randy, I know Xavier
too well to think he isn’t getting a cut
out of this. Maybe it isn’t Randy pushing the deal at all. Maybe
it’s Xavier. Because why isn’t Randy calling me personally?
“Xavier, how much of a commission are you getting on
this?”

He hesitates. “Well, a man has to
live.”

“
I see.”

He says nothing, doesn’t even
try
to defend himself.

“
Look, Xavier, fine. Tell him I can’t
guarantee taking ‘his’ offer until I know what it is. But that I
also won’t take anybody else’s until I’ve heard him out. I can
promise him that at least.”

“
I can live with that. Meet us at Randy’s
store at eleven. You know the spot?”

Randy owns a DJ gear store. Whatever money
he doesn’t make directly on his parties, I’m sure he makes it in
kit sales
to wannabe
DJs. “Sure. See you then.”

Sipping
my coffee, I check out MySpace and discover that
my track plays—my original music, made with
FL Studio
—are through the roof. And I know that my
idea of “through the roof” is tiny, but you gotta start somewhere.
On a hunch, I go on YouTube. Against Randy’s wishes, someone did
make a video of Saturday’s session. It’s not viral, but it’s got
lots of upvotes and has quite a few comments. The quality is
typical YouTube comment-quality (“Dope shit cuz I digzz some musicz
shitz!! PIECE!”) so I don’t bother looking at any more of
them.

It’s all very sudden. I mean, this has
always been my dream.
Hasn’t it?

Suddenly I’m seeing floating envelopes
around me and tax forms and men in suits and YouTube comments and
people putting me down, others pushing me up, people wanting things
from me, unpaid rent, no guarantees but plenty of hope, web pages,
Facebook accounts, lease agreements—

It’s too much.

I can’t
deal with it right now. So I put my phone on
flight mode, slap on my
Allen & Heath
headphones. And I bury myself in creating Declan’s
mix.

When I mix, I don’t think. The thinking is
done outside the mix. Inside the mix, there’s no time for it. So I
spend my days with headphones in my ears. Yesterday—the day I spent
with Declan—was the first day in four years where I wasn’t
listening to music most of the day. Usually, it’s Spotify or
Beatport or my local iTunes library on the road. Getting to know
the BPMs by heart so I’m not dependant on the digital display of
the
Serato
software
on my Mac, or on my decks.

That part is the work.

The mix is the fun. The mix is the
escape.

My Adam
.

The real
Adam. Or, if Savva were saying it,
The Real Doctor of
All Ultimate Molly Doctors Everywhere, baby.

Patryk—he once told me that an artist
should be completely cool with her tools, so she can simply create.
Actually, he used the pronoun “he.” The creation comes from
somewhere else, somewhere inexplicable, he said. “You have to feel
it. In
here
!” And then
he slapped my upper chest firmly.