Different Circles

No one mentioned to Celia that they knew what the tune was about. They did not have to. They simply worked on it professionally, like the musicians they were. Today they progressed beyond the basic acoustic version of the piece and started the process of working it up into what it would eventually be. This was where the teamwork and musical relationship between Celia and Jake truly shined. Celia suggested that the verses of the song remain at the tempo she had composed it and that her twelve-string would remain the primary melodic instrument. Jake agreed that this would work but suggested that for the choruses they go up-tempo and switch to a moderately distorted electric guitar for the melody here, backed by a strong backbeat of drums and bass.

“That could work,” Celia said thoughtfully after pondering this. “Show me what you mean.”

He showed her. He plugged in his Les Paul and spent the better part of twenty minutes working out a suitable translation of the acoustic melody into a distortion riff. Finally, he hit upon something that seemed to work. Coop and Charlie then jumped in and they ran through it a few times until it sounded reasonably like music. Then Celia joined them, singing the lyrics at the new tempo but keeping her own guitar mute.

“I like it,” said Celia with a smile. Since it was her tune, she had the final say. “Let’s work it up a little and see if I keep liking it. If I do, we’ll try to get Liz and Eric in on it somehow.”

“What about me?” asked Laura, who was sitting in a chair, still sipping from her tea, her alto sax still hanging on the rack.

“I don’t know,” Celia said. “I can’t envision any sax on the choruses, but maybe as a secondary melody on the verses?”

“It would have to be a light melody,” Nerdly said sternly. “You don’t want to overpower the guitar.”

“That is a good point,” Jake said, nodding.

“What if I used the soprano sax?” Laura suggested. “Like I did on Blur?”

Celia thought about this for a moment. “That might just work,” she said. “Let’s run through the choruses until we get it down and then we’ll try you out on the verses, Teach.”

“And maybe we can have Eric do some fills on top as well,” Jake suggested.

“Maybe,” Celia said.

They spent the next three hours playing around with the song. They decided that there should be no percussion at all on the verses, just a light bass line to set the rhythm. Laura on the soprano sax did compliment the acoustic guitar melody quite well, as did some fills by Eric on the violin. Liz and her piano, however, did not mix well on the verses and they abandoned that experiment rather quickly. On the heavier choruses, on the other hand, Liz was able to lay down a secondary melody atop the distorted guitar that kept the tune from broaching into the land of hard rock by just the barest of margins. After they settled on the distortion riff, Jake unplugged his guitar and let Little Stevie start working. As always, he perfectly imitated the riff that Jake had composed, the only difference a slight variance of phrasing.

They knocked off for the day just before five o’clock. Everyone stowed their instruments in their accustomed places while the Nerdlys made sure all of the electrical equipment was shut down. Nerdly then gathered up all of the notes and musical scores they had generated that day and scanned them into the computer in the office, where one copy was saved to the hard drive and another copy was saved to a disc that Nerdly would take home with him and put in his safe. The studio was then locked up and secured with the alarm (there was over a hundred thousand dollars worth of musical instruments and audio equipment in there). Everyone said their goodbyes to one another and climbed in their vehicles for their respective commutes home.

Celia deliberately left first in her Mercedes. Jake and Laura deliberately left last in Jake’s truck. They thought they were being discreet and perhaps they were. They need not have bothered, however. By this point, everyone in the band—even Eric—had realized that there was something going on between the Kingsleys and Celia Valdez. No one had overheard any remarks made, any plans being laid down, or any other confirming information. None of them had even talked to each other about their suspicions (except the Nerdlys among themselves). But all had noted the way the three of them always sat together, how they looked at each other, how they whispered to each other at times.

They were fooling no one but themselves.

By this point, Jake and Celia had their own garage door opener and key to Celia’s Malibu house. Jake parked next to the Mercedes and closed the garage door using the opener before either he or Laura stepped out of the truck. Once the door was closed, they made their way into the foyer and down the stairs to the second level. The lights were all off in the lower level, the blinds all drawn. The hallway that led to the master bedroom was lit up. They turned right and headed that way.